2,660 research outputs found
mRNA-Sequencing Analysis Reveals Transcriptional Changes in Root of Maize Seedlings Treated with Two Increasing Concentrations of a New Biostimulant
Biostimulants are a wide range of natural or synthetic products containing substances and/or microorganisms that can stimulate plant processes to improve nutrient uptake, nutrient efficiency, tolerance to abiotic stress, and crop quality ( http://www.biostimulants.eu/ , accessed September 27, 2017). The use of biostimulants is proposed as an advanced solution to face the demand for sustainable agriculture by ensuring optimal crop performances and better resilience to environment changes. The proposed approach is to predict and characterize the function of natural compounds as biostimulants. In this research, plant growth assessments and transcriptomic approaches are combined to investigate and understand the specific mode(s) of action of APR, a new product provided by the ILSA group (Arzignano, Vicenza). Maize seedlings (B73) were kept in a climatic chamber and grown in a solid medium to test the effects of two different combinations of the protein hydrolysate APR (A1 and A1/2). Data on root growth evidenced a significant enhancement of the dry weight of both roots and root/shoot ratio in response to APR. Transcriptomic profiles of lateral roots of maize seedlings treated with two increasing concentrations of APR were studied by mRNA-sequencing analysis (RNA-seq). Pairwise comparisons of the RNA-seq data identified a total of 1006 differentially expressed genes between treated and control plants. The two APR concentrations were demonstrated to affect the expression of genes involved in both common and specific pathways. On the basis of the putative function of the isolated differentially expressed genes, APR has been proposed to enhance plant response to adverse environmental conditions
Joule-assisted silicidation for short-channel silicon nanowire devices
We report on a technique enabling electrical control of the contact
silicidation process in silicon nanowire devices. Undoped silicon nanowires
were contacted by pairs of nickel electrodes and each contact was selectively
silicided by means of the Joule effect. By a realtime monitoring of the
nanowire electrical resistance during the contact silicidation process we were
able to fabricate nickel-silicide/silicon/nickel- silicide devices with
controlled silicon channel length down to 8 nm.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure
Coherent Single Charge Transport in Molecular-Scale Silicon Nanowire Transistors
We report low-temperature electrical transport studies of molecule-scale
silicon nanowires. Individual nanowires exhibit well-defined Coulomb blockade
oscillations characteristic of charge addition to a single nanostructure with
length scales up to at least 400 nm. Further studies demonstrate coherent
charge transport through discrete single particle quantum levels extending the
whole device, and show that the ground state spin configuration follows the
Lieb-Mattis theorem. In addition, depletion of the nanowires suggests that
phase coherent single-dot characteristics are accessible in a regime where
correlations are strong.Comment: 4 pages and 4 figure
Andreev-Tunneling, Coulomb Blockade, and Resonant Transport of Non-Local Spin-Entangled Electrons
We propose and analyze a spin-entangler for electrons based on an s-wave
superconductor coupled to two quantum dots each of which is tunnel-coupled to
normal Fermi leads. We show that in the presence of a voltage bias and in the
Coulomb blockade regime two correlated electrons provided by the Andreev
process can coherently tunnel from the superconductor via different dots into
different leads. The spin-singlet coming from the Cooper pair remains preserved
in this process, and the setup provides a source of mobile and nonlocal
spin-entangled electrons. The transport current is calculated and shown to be
dominated by a two-particle Breit-Wigner resonance which allows the injection
of two spin-entangled electrons into different leads at exactly the same
orbital energy, which is a crucial requirement for the detection of spin
entanglement via noise measurements. The coherent tunneling of both electrons
into the same lead is suppressed by the on-site Coulomb repulsion and/or the
superconducting gap, while the tunneling into different leads is suppressed
through the initial separation of the tunneling electrons. In the regime of
interest the particle-hole excitations of the leads are shown to be negligible.
The Aharonov-Bohm oscillations in the current are shown to contain single- and
two-electron periods with amplitudes that both vanish with increasing Coulomb
repulsion albeit differently fast.Comment: 11 double-column pages, 2 figures, REVTeX, minor revision
Topological insulator quantum dot with tunable barriers
Thin (6-7 quintuple layer) topological insulator Bi2Se3 quantum dot devices
are demonstrated using ultrathin (2~4 quintuple layer) Bi2Se3 regions to
realize semiconducting barriers which may be tuned from Ohmic to tunneling
conduction via gate voltage. Transport spectroscopy shows Coulomb blockade with
large charging energy >5 meV, with additional features implying excited states
Electron Cotunneling in a Semiconductor Quantum Dot
We report transport measurements on a semiconductor quantum dot with a small
number of confined electrons. In the Coulomb blockade regime, conduction is
dominated by cotunneling processes. These can be either elastic or inelastic,
depending on whether they leave the dot in its ground state or drive it into an
excited state, respectively. We are able to discriminate between these two
contributions and show that inelastic events can occur only if the applied bias
exceeds the lowest excitation energy. Implications to energy-level spectroscopy
are discussed.Comment: To be published in Phys. Rev. Let
Multifunctional Devices and Logic Gates With Undoped Silicon Nanowires
We report on the electronic transport properties of multiple-gate devices
fabricated from undoped silicon nanowires. Understanding and control of the
relevant transport mechanisms was achieved by means of local electrostatic
gating and temperature dependent measurements. The roles of the source/drain
contacts and of the silicon channel could be independently evaluated and tuned.
Wrap gates surrounding the silicide-silicon contact interfaces were proved to
be effective in inducing a full suppression of the contact Schottky barriers,
thereby enabling carrier injection down to liquid-helium temperature. By
independently tuning the effective Schottky barrier heights, a variety of
reconfigurable device functionalities could be obtained. In particular, the
same nanowire device could be configured to work as a Schottky barrier
transistor, a Schottky diode or a p-n diode with tunable polarities. This
versatility was eventually exploited to realize a NAND logic gate with gain
well above one.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure
Kondo effect in an integer-spin quantum dot
The Kondo effect is a key many-body phenomenon in condensed matter physics.
It concerns the interaction between a localised spin and free electrons.
Discovered in metals containing small amounts of magnetic impurities, it is now
a fundamental mechanism in a wide class of correlated electron systems. Control
over single, localised spins has become relevant also in fabricated structures
due to the rapid developments in nano-electronics. Experiments have already
demonstrated artificial realisations of isolated magnetic impurities at
metallic surfaces, nanometer-scale magnets, controlled transitions between
two-electron singlet and triplet states, and a tunable Kondo effect in
semiconductor quantum dots. Here, we report an unexpected Kondo effect realised
in a few-electron quantum dot containing singlet and triplet spin states whose
energy difference can be tuned with a magnetic field. This effect occurs for an
even number of electrons at the degeneracy between singlet and triplet states.
The characteristic energy scale is found to be much larger than for the
ordinary spin-1/2 case.Comment: 12 page
Combined In Silico, In Vivo, and In Vitro Studies Shed Insights into the Acute Inflammatory Response in Middle-Aged Mice
We combined in silico, in vivo, and in vitro studies to gain insights into age-dependent changes in acute inflammation in response to bacterial endotoxin (LPS). Time-course cytokine, chemokine, and NO2-/NO3- data from "middle-aged" (6-8 months old) C57BL/6 mice were used to re-parameterize a mechanistic mathematical model of acute inflammation originally calibrated for "young" (2-3 months old) mice. These studies suggested that macrophages from middle-aged mice are more susceptible to cell death, as well as producing higher levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines, vs. macrophages from young mice. In support of the in silico-derived hypotheses, resident peritoneal cells from endotoxemic middle-aged mice exhibited reduced viability and produced elevated levels of TNF-α, IL-6, IL-10, and KC/CXCL1 as compared to cells from young mice. Our studies demonstrate the utility of a combined in silico, in vivo, and in vitro approach to the study of acute inflammation in shock states, and suggest hypotheses with regard to the changes in the cytokine milieu that accompany aging. © 2013 Namas et al
Noisy Kondo impurities
The anti-ferromagnetic coupling of a magnetic impurity carrying a spin with
the conduction electrons spins of a host metal is the basic mechanism
responsible for the increase of the resistance of an alloy such as
CuFe at low temperature, as originally suggested by
Kondo . This coupling has emerged as a very generic property of localized
electronic states coupled to a continuum . The possibility to design artificial
controllable magnetic impurities in nanoscopic conductors has opened a path to
study this many body phenomenon in unusual situations as compared to the
initial one and, in particular, in out of equilibrium situations. So far,
measurements have focused on the average current. Here, we report on
\textit{current fluctuations} (noise) measurements in artificial Kondo
impurities made in carbon nanotube devices. We find a striking enhancement of
the current noise within the Kondo resonance, in contradiction with simple
non-interacting theories. Our findings provide a test bench for one of the most
important many-body theories of condensed matter in out of equilibrium
situations and shed light on the noise properties of highly conductive
molecular devices.Comment: minor differences with published versio
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