361 research outputs found
Quantifying the pathway and predicting spontaneous emulsification during material exchange in a two phase liquid system
Kinetic restriction of a thermodynamically favourable equilibrium is a common theme in materials processing. The interfacial instability in systems where rate of material exchange is far greater than the mass transfer through respective bulk phases is of specific interest when tracking the transient interfacial area, a parameter integral to short processing times for productivity streamlining in all manufacturing where interfacial reaction occurs. This is even more pertinent in high-temperature systems for energy and cost savings. Here the quantified physical pathway of interfacial area change due to material exchange in liquid metal-molten oxide systems is presented. In addition the predicted growth regime and emulsification behaviour in relation to interfacial tension as modelled using phase-field methodology is shown. The observed in-situ emulsification behaviour links quantitatively the geometry of perturbations as a validation method for the development of simulating the phenomena. Thus a method is presented to both predict and engineer the formation of micro emulsions to a desired specification
Aesthetics of immanence in the digital world
This project is an Exp-workshop for the DRS conference to further explore the aesthetics and the role of both creator and user of “Virtual Craft” in the digital world. Expworkshop was work for the conference was designated as half-experience and half-workshop, to make the audience perceive, imagine, and trigger acts of consciousness through experiential guidance. The objective is to stimulate experimentations, a new network, and a new thinking about practice in Art and Design. Today, the rise of the smartphone and social media filters have promoted temporary virtual-reality body adornments and the creation of virtual artefacts. We plan to initiate debates and panel discussions to explore the function and meaning of “craft” in the digital world
Metabolic Regulation of Trisporic Acid on <em>Blakeslea trispora</em> Revealed by a GC-MS-Based Metabolomic Approach
<div><p>The zygomycete <em>Blakeslea trispora</em> is used commercially as natural source of â-carotene. Trisporic acid (TA) is secreted from the mycelium of <em>B. trispora</em> during mating between heterothallic strains and is considered as a mediator of the regulation of mating processes and an enhancer of carotene biosynthesis. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and multivariate analysis were employed to investigate TA-associated intracellular biochemical changes in <em>B. trispora</em>. By principal component analysis, the differential metabolites discriminating the control groups from the TA-treated groups were found, which were also confirmed by the subsequent hierarchical cluster analysis. The results indicate that TA is a global regulator and its main effects at the metabolic level are reflected on the content changes in several fatty acids, carbohydrates, and amino acids. The carbon metabolism and fatty acids synthesis are sensitive to TA addition. Glycerol, glutamine, and ã-aminobutyrate might play important roles in the regulation of TA. Complemented by two-dimensional electrophoresis, the results indicate that the actions of TA at the metabolic level involve multiple metabolic processes, such as glycolysis and the bypass of the classical tricarboxylic acid cycle. These results reveal that the metabolomics strategy is a powerful tool to gain insight into the mechanism of a microorganism’s cellular response to signal inducers at the metabolic level.</p> </div
Expression patterns of several proteins at the protein and transcriptional levels.
<p>(A) The detailed expression patterns of several spots in the control and TA-treated groups at 12 h after TA addition; (B) Time courses of the transcription of proteins in (A) between the control and TA-treated groups at 3, 6, and 12 h after TA addition;. *(<i>P</i><0.05) and **(<i>P</i><0.01). SSP 0015, adenine phosphoribosyltransferase; SSP 1012, cytochrome c oxidase, subunit Vb; SSP 3413, diphosphomevalonate decarboxylase; SSP 3714, aconitase/homoaconitase; SSP 5008, proteasome beta type 7; SSP 8402, adenylosuccinate synthetase.</p
Comparison of the differential metabolites in <i>B. trispora</i> using HCA between the control and TA-treated groups.
<p>(A) Differential metabolites present at 6 h after TA addition; (B) Differential metabolites, including two unidentified metabolites, present at 12 h after TA addition. The Arabic numerals 1,2,3,4 are referring to the biological repeats in the same group.</p
Relative contents of differential metabolites for the control and TA-treated groups at 3, 6, and 12 h after TA addition.
<p>*(<i>P</i><0.05) and **(<i>P</i><0.01). The relative contents of each metabolite were expressed as the ratio of its peak areas to that of the internal standard adonitol on the same chromatograph.</p
Scheme summarizing the responses to TA at the metabolic level in <i>B. trispora</i>.
<p>The pink arrows indicate the speculative changes in metabolic flux after TA addition.</p
A Highly Reversible Room-Temperature Sodium Metal Anode
Owing
to its low cost and high natural abundance, sodium metal is among
the most promising anode materials for energy storage technologies
beyond lithium ion batteries. However, room-temperature sodium metal
anodes suffer from poor reversibility during long-term plating and
stripping, mainly due to formation of nonuniform solid electrolyte
interphase as well as dendritic growth of sodium metal. Herein we
report for the first time that a simple liquid electrolyte, sodium
hexafluorophosphate in glymes (mono-, di-, and tetraglyme), can enable
highly reversible and nondendritic plating–stripping of sodium
metal anodes at room temperature. High average Coulombic efficiencies
of 99.9% were achieved over 300 plating–stripping cycles at
0.5 mA cm<sup>–2</sup>. The long-term reversibility was found
to arise from the formation of a uniform, inorganic solid electrolyte
interphase made of sodium oxide and sodium fluoride, which is highly
impermeable to electrolyte solvent and conducive to nondendritic growth.
As a proof of concept, we also demonstrate a room-temperature sodium–sulfur
battery using this class of electrolytes, paving the way for the development
of next-generation, sodium-based energy storage technologies
The overview for origins and expansion of miRNAs derived from duplicated events in the four test plant species.
<p>ath: <i>A. thaliana</i>; ptc: <i>P. trichocarpa</i>; osa: <i>O. sativa</i>; sbi: <i>S. bicolor</i>.</p
Characterization and variation between RrmiRNAs and NRrmiRNAs.
<p>(A) The distribution of miRNA hairpin precursor sequence lengths in RrmiRNAs and NRrmiRNAs. (B) The G-C content in miRNA hairpin precursor sequences in RrmiRNAs and NRrmiRNAs (C) The MFEs for miRNA hairpin precursors in RrmiRNAs and NRrmiRNAs.</p
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