Copper-zirconia, zirconia-based metallic glass

Bulk glass-forming alloys have emerged over the past fifteen years with attractive properties and technological promise. One of the attractions in amorphous alloys is their unique set of mechanical properties. It is discovered that at room temperature, these amorphous alloys exhibits relatively high strengths compared to their polycrystals counterparts. Such superior attributes has led to promising applications in a wide area of industries.Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical Engineering

VISATRAM: A real-time vision system for automatic traffic monitoring

This paper presents a novel approach to automatic traffic monitoring using 2D spatiotemporal images. A TV camera is mounted above a highway to monitor the traffic through two slice windows, and a panoramic view image and an epipolar plane image are formed for each lane. Our real-time vision system for automatic traffic monitoring, VISATRAM, is an inexpensive system with a PC486 and a frame grabber. The system can not only count vehicles and estimate their speeds, but also classify them using 3D measurements. The system has been tested with real road images under various light conditions, including shadows in daytime and lights at night. Keywords: Intelligent vehicle/highway system, traffic monitoring, spatio-temporal image, epipolar plane image, panoramic view image * The author is currently on a leave in the Computer Science Department, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, MA 01003. Email: [email protected], or [email protected]. This work was supported by China Advance..

growthandphysiologicalfeaturesofcyanobacteriumanabaenaspstrainpcc7120inaglucosemixotrophicculture

Mixotrophic growth is one potential mode for mass culture of microalgae and cyanobacteria particularly suitable for the production of high value bioactive compounds and fine chemicals. The typical heterocystous cyanobacterium Anabaena sp. PCC 7120 was grown in the presence of exogenous glucose in light. Glucose improved the cell growth evidently, the maximal specific growth rate under mixotrophic condition (0.38 d(-1)) being 1.6-fold of that of photoautotrophic growth. Mixotrophy caused a variation in cellular pigment composition, increasing the content of chlorophyll a and decreasing the contents of carotenoid and phycobiliprotein relative to chlorophyll a. Fluorescence emission from photosystem II (PSII) relative to photosystem I was enhanced in mixotrophic cells, implying an increased energy distribution in PSII. Glucokinase (EC 2.7.1.2) activity was further induced in the presence of glucose. The mixotrophic culture was scaled up in a 15 L airlift photobioreactor equipped with an inner and an outer light source. A modified Monod model incorporating the specific growth rate and the average light intensity in the reactor was developed to describe cell growth appropriately. The understanding of mixotrophic growth and relevant physiological features of Anabaena sp. PCC 7120 would be meaningful for cultivation and exploitation of this important cyanobacterial strain

Growth and Physiological Features of Cyanobacterium Anabaena sp Strain PCC 7120 in a Glucose-Mixotrophic Culture

Mixotrophic growth is one potential mode for mass culture of microalgae and cyanobacteria particularly suitable for the production of high value bioactive compounds and fine chemicals. The typical heterocystous cyanobacterium Anabaena sp. PCC 7120 was grown in the presence of exogenous glucose in light. Glucose improved the cell growth evidently, the maximal specific growth rate under mixotrophic condition (0.38 d(-1)) being 1.6-fold of that of photoautotrophic growth. Mixotrophy caused a variation in cellular pigment composition, increasing the content of chlorophyll a and decreasing the contents of carotenoid and phycobiliprotein relative to chlorophyll a. Fluorescence emission from photosystem II (PSII) relative to photosystem I was enhanced in mixotrophic cells, implying an increased energy distribution in PSII. Glucokinase (EC 2.7.1.2) activity was further induced in the presence of glucose. The mixotrophic culture was scaled up in a 15 L airlift photobioreactor equipped with an inner and an outer light source. A modified Monod model incorporating the specific growth rate and the average light intensity in the reactor was developed to describe cell growth appropriately. The understanding of mixotrophic growth and relevant physiological features of Anabaena sp. PCC 7120 would be meaningful for cultivation and exploitation of this important cyanobacterial strain

Microarray Expression Profile of Circular RNAs in Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells from Rheumatoid Arthritis Patients

Background/Aims: Circular RNAs (circRNAs) compose a large class of RNAs that can be used as biomarkers in clinical blood samples. This study aimed to determine the expression of circRNAs in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients to identify novel biomarkers for RA screening. Methods: We started with a microarray screening of circRNA changes in PBMCs from 5 RA patients and 5 healthy controls. We then confirmed the selected circRNA changes in PBMCs from 30 RA patients and 25 age- and sex-matched controls using the real-time quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR). Spearman correlation test was performed to assess the correlation of circRNAs and clinical variables. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was calculated to evaluate the diagnostic value. Results: We identified and verified five circRNAs (092516, 003524, 103047, 104871, 101873) that were significantly elevated in PBMCs from RA patients. Among these RA patients, we detected no significant correlation between the five circRNAs and the disease severity, including disease activity score (DAS28), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), C-reactive protein (CRP), and health assessment questionnaire (HAQ). Yet, ROC curve analysis suggested that circRNA_104871 has significant value of RA diagnosis (AUC=0.833, P<0.001), followed by circRNA_003524 (AUC = 0.683, P = 0.020), circRNA_101873 (AUC = 0.676, P = 0.026), and circRNA_103047 (AUC = 0.671, P = 0.030). Conclusions: This study suggests that increased expression of circRNAs circRNA_104871, circRNA_003524, circRNA_101873 and circRNA_103047 in PBMC from RA patients may serve as potential biomarkers for RA patient diagnosis