Recent Advances in Molecular Electronics Based on Carbon Nanotubes

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have exceptional physical properties that make them one of the most promising building blocks for future nanotechnologies. They may in particular play an important role in the development of innovative electronic devices in the fields of flexible electronics, ultra-high sensitivity sensors, high frequency electronics, opto-electronics, energy sources and nano-electromechanical systems (NEMS). Proofs of concept of several high performance devices already exist, usually at the single device level, but there remain many serious scientific issues to be solved before the viability of such routes can be evaluated. In particular, the main concern regards the controlled synthesis and positioning of nanotubes. In our opinion, truly innovative use of these nano-objects will come from: i) the combination of some of their complementary physical properties, such as combining their electrical and mechanical properties, ii) the combination of their properties with additional benefits coming from other molecules grafted on the nanotubes, and iii) the use of chemically- or bio-directed self-assembly processes to allow the efficient combination of several devices into functional arrays or circuits. In this article, we outline the main issues concerning the development of carbon nanotubes based electronics applications and review our recent results in the field

Completed cohomology of Shimura curves and a p-adic Jacquet-Langlands correspondence

We study indefinite quaternion algebras over totally real fields F, and give an example of a cohomological construction of p-adic Jacquet-Langlands functoriality using completed cohomology. We also study the (tame) levels of p-adic automorphic forms on these quaternion algebras and give an analogue of Mazur's `level lowering' principle.Comment: Updated version. Contains some minor corrections compared to the published versio

Effect of hypoxia/reoxygenation on the cytokine-induced production of nitric oxide and superoxide anion in cultured osteoarthritic synoviocytes

SummaryObjectiveHypoxia/reoxygenation (H/R) is an important feature in the osteoarthritis (OA) physiopathology. Nitric oxide (NO) is a significant proinflammatory mediator in the inflamed synovium. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of H/R on inducible NO synthase (iNOS) activity and expression in OA synoviocytes. In addition we studied the relationship between nitrosative stress and NADPH oxidase (NOX) in such conditions.MethodsHuman cultured synoviocytes from OA patients were treated for 24 h with interleukin 1-β (IL-1β), tumour necrosis factor α (TNF-α) or neither; for the last 6 h, they were submitted to either normoxia or three periods of 1-h of hypoxia followed by 1-h of reoxygenation. NO metabolism (iNOS expression, nitrite and peroxynitrite measurements) was investigated. Furthermore, superoxide anion O2− production, NOX subunit expression and nitrosylation were also assessed.ResultsiNOS expression and nitrite (but not peroxynitrite) production were significantly increased under H/R conditions when compared with to normoxia (P < 0.05). H/R conditions decreased O2− production from ∼0.20 to ∼0.12 nmol min−1 mg proteins−1 (P < 0.05), while NOXs' subunit expression and p47-phox phosphorylation were increased. NOXs and p47-phox were dramatically nitrosylated under H/R conditions (P < 0.05 vs normoxia). Using NOS inhibitors under H/R conditions, p47-phox nitrosylation was prevented and O2− production was restored at normoxic levels (0.21 nmol min−1 mg of proteins−1).ConclusionsOur results provide evidence for an up-regulation of iNOS activity in OA synoviocytes under H/R conditions, associated to a down-regulation of NOX activity through nitrosylation. These findings highlight the importance of radical production to OA pathogenesis, and appraise the metabolic modifications of synovial cells under hypoxia

Strain mapping at the nanoscale using precession electron diffraction in transmission electron microscope with off axis camera

International audiencePrecession electron diffraction is an efficient technique to measure strain in nanostructures by precessing the electron beam, while maintaining a few nanometre probe size. Here, we show that an advanced diffraction pattern treatment allows reproducible and precise strain measurements to be obtained using a default 512 x 512 DigiSTAR off-axis camera both in advanced or non-corrected transmission electron microscopes. This treatment consists in both projective geometry correction of diffraction pattern distortions and strain Delaunay triangulation based analysis. Precision in the strain measurement is improved and reached 2.7 x 10(-4) with a probe size approaching 4.2 nm in diameter. This method is applied to the study of the strain state in InGaAs quantum-well (QW) devices elaborated on Si substrate. Results show that the GaAs/Si mismatch does not induce in-plane strain fluctuations in the InGaAs QW region. (C) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC

Long-range attraction between particles in dusty plasma and partial surface tension of dusty phase boundary

Effective potential of a charged dusty particle moving in homogeneous plasma has a negative part that provides attraction between similarly charged dusty particles. A depth of this potential well is great enough to ensure both stability of crystal structure of dusty plasma and sizable value of surface tension of a boundary surface of dusty region. The latter depends on the orientation of the surface relative to the counter-ion flow, namely, it is maximal and positive for the surface normal to the flow and minimal and negative for the surface along the flow. For the most cases of dusty plasma in a gas discharge, a value of the first of them is more than sufficient to ensure stability of lenticular dusty phase void oriented across the counter-ion flow.Comment: LATEX, REVTEX4, 7 pages, 6 figure

Transient and modulation dynamics of an erbium fiber laser

No abstract availabl

SPECTRAL AND TEMPORAL BEHAVIOR OF AN ERBIUM DOPED FIBER LASER

The dynamics of an erbium doped fiber laser are analysed under continuous and modulated pumping. It is found that the bondaries between different modes depend only on the pump parameter and the lifetime of the photon in the cavity. Spectral and temporal behaviors are analysed