Production of Prednisolone by Pseudomonas oleovorans Cells Incorporated Into PVP/PEO Radiation Crosslinked Hydrogels

In order to rise the yield of prednisolone from hydrocortisone, the Pseudomonas oleovorans cells were entrapped into radiation crosslinked poly (vinyl pyrrolidone)/poly(ethylene oxide) (PVP/PEO) hydrogel of different gel contents. The factors affecting the gel content and swelling behavior of the polymeric gel, such as polymer composition, polymer blend concentration, and irradiation doses, were investigated. The formation of gels having a good strength with the ability to retain a desirable amount of water in their three-dimensional network can be achieved by using PVP/PEO copolymer of composition (90 : 10) and concentration of 15% prepared at 20 kGy irradiation dose. At these conditions the prepared hydrogel is considered the most favorable one that gave the highest hydrocortisone bioconversion and prednisolone yield, 81% and 62.8%, respectively. The improvement of prednisolone yield was also achieved by increasing substrate concentration. Maximum hydrocortisone bioconversion (86.44) was obtained at 18 hours by using substrate concentration of 30 mg. Reusability of immobilized Pseudomonas oleovorans entrapped into PVP/PEO copolymer hydrogel was studied. The results indicated that the transformation capacity of hydrocortisone to prednisolone highly increased by the repeated use of copolymer for 4 times. This was accompanied by an increase in prednisolone yield to 89% and the bioconversion of hydrocortisone was 98.8%

St. Louis limestone, stratigraphy and petrography, near its type locality

The St. Louis Limestone of the Upper Meramecian Series, Mississippian System, is typically lithographic, light-to light-olive gray in color, dense, and fractures conchoidally. It is brecciated, especially in the lower part, and contains some chert nodules. Oolites are present close to the top of the formation. The Salem-St. Louis contact is placed at the base of the lowest breccia zone and the top of Salem is characterized by crystalline quartz and abundance of chert nodules. The appearance of typical Ste. Genevieve oolites with sand-size quartz grains indicates the St. Louis-Ste. Genevieve contact. The St. Louis Limestone is characterized by dominance of fine-grained texture (micritic) with fossil fragments and minor spar. Foraminifers and bryozoans are the main fossil constituents followed by algae, crinoid fragments and corals. Of the corals, Lithostrotionella and Lithostrotion are significant but of less obvious correlative value. Brachiopods and gastropods are present but to a lesser extent. The formation has about 3 to 5 percent insoluble residues (except close to the boundaries), consisting mostly of quartz. The degree of dolomitization is widely variable from one section to another. The St. Louis Limestone is high in CaD content except in the dolomitized zones. The explanation of the origin of brecciation in the St. Louis Limestone presents some difficulty. The St. Louis Limestone is tentatively subdivided into three units. The deposition of limestone was continuous from Salem through St. Louis time under quiet and shallow water environments. In the study area, the St. Louis Limestone is used for cement manufacture and road construction --Abstract, page ii

Petrography, diagenesis and environment of deposition of the Gasconade Formation, Lower Ordovician, southern Missouri

The Gasconade Formation (Lower Ordovician) has been studied in the surface and subsurface in the Ozarks of Missouri and northeastern Oklahoma. The formation is mostly dolomite with a sandstone member at the base (Gunter) and frequent occurrences of chert bodies of different shapes particularly in the middle part. The dolomite crystals in the lower and upper parts are subhedral to euhedral of equicrystalline to two-size fabric and range in size from 300-600 microns, and subhedral to anhedral of variable fabric and smaller size in the middle part. A sequence of cloudy and clear areas, named zoning, characterizes the euhedral crystals. Three different types of zoning are recognized; type A, cloudy interior-clear rims; type B, clear interior-cloudy rims and type C, a combination of both or repetition of either, the latter being the most common. Pellets, oolites, intraclasts, fossils, and algal (cryptozoan) structures characterize the formation especially the middle part. The Gunter sandstone is bimodal to polymodal. Post-dolomitization solution affected the dolomite and sandstone of the formation causing stylolites, rim and center corrosion, secondary mineral growth and pyrite replacement in dolomite and quartz. Both the dolomite and chert in the Gasconade Formation have been formed by replacement. Dolomite replacement occurred in three phases, early, middle (main) and late. Over 90 percent of the original carbonate has been dolomitized during the main phase of dolomitization. Chert replacement occurred in two phases, early and late. The early phase of chertification either interrupted or occurred soon after the main phase of dolomitization. The Gasconade Formation was deposited in the intertidal zone of a shallow sea. During the deposition of the middle part of the formation, the sea was shallower than during the deposition of either the lower or the upper parts. The diagenesis of the formation follows the following sequence: early phase of dolomitization; middle (main) phase of dolomitization; early phase of chertification; late phase of chertification and late phase of dolomitization --Abstract, pages ii-iii

BcB_c mesons in a Bethe-Salpeter model

We apply our Bethe-Salpeter model for mesons to the $B_c$ family with parameters fixed in our previous investigation. We evaluate the mass of the pseudo-scalar $B_c$ meson as 6.356 GeV/$c^2$ and 6.380 GeV/$c^2$ and the lifetime as 0.47 ps and 0.46 ps respectively in two reductions of the Bethe-Salpeter Equation, in good agreement with the recently reported mass of 6.40 $\pm$ 0.39 (stat.) $\pm$ 0.13 (syst.) GeV/$c^2$ and lifetime of $0.46^{+0.18}_{-0.16}$ (stat.) $\pm$ 0.03 (syst.) ps by the CDF Collaboration. We evaluate the decay constant of the $B_c$ meson and compare different contributions to its decay width.Comment: 9 page