Plasticity of Cells and Ex Vivo Production of Red Blood Cells

The supply of transfusable red blood cells (RBCs) is not sufficient in many countries. If transfusable RBCs could be produced abundantly from certain resources, it would be very useful. Our group has developed a method to produce enucleated RBCs efficiently from hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells present in umbilical cord blood. More recently, it was reported that enucleated RBCs could be abundantly produced from human embryonic stem (ES) cells. The common obstacle for application of these methods is that they require very high cost to produce sufficient number of RBCs that are applicable in the clinic. If erythroid cell lines (immortalized cell lines) able to produce transfusable RBCs ex vivo were established, they would be valuable resources. Our group developed a robust method to obtain immortalized erythroid cell lines able to produce mature RBCs. To the best of our knowledge, this was the first paper to show the feasibility of establishing immortalized erythroid progenitor cell lines able to produce enucleated RBCs ex vivo. This result strongly suggests that immortalized human erythroid progenitor cell lines able to produce mature RBCs ex vivo can also be established

N4-methylation changes the conformation of (3S,6S)-3-alkyl-6-benzylpiperazine-2,5-diones from folded to extended

N4-Methylation of (3S,6S)-3-alkyl-6-benzylpiperazine-2,5-diones (S,S)-1a–c was found to change their folded conformation to an extended conformation. Conformational aspects of N1- and/or N4-methylated (S,S)-1a–c were revealed by single crystal X-ray crystallography and 1H NMR spectroscopy

Influence of soil parameters on the behaviour of catenary risers in ultra-deep waters

Orientador: Celso Kazuyuki MorookaDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Engenharia Mecânica e Instituto de GeociênciasResumo: Risers de produção são elementos tubulares que conectam a cabeça de um poço no fundo do mar a uma plataforma de petróleo, escoando a produção de óleo e gás. Para o estudo de uma sistemática para análise de operação e projeto de risers, faz-se muito importante o entendimento da modelagem matemática para previsão de seu comportamento estático e dinâmico e avaliação de sua vida útil. O objetivo dessa previsão é buscar uma melhor configuração para sua operação e projeto em função, principalmente, da profundidade de operação e das condições ambientais. Procedimentos numéricos têm sido desenvolvidos para determinar comportamento de um riser. Forças hidrodinâmicas, devido aos carregamentos ambientais, tais como esforços de ondas e correntezas marítimas, influenciam o comportamento de risers, e ainda, quando são conectados a plataformas flutuantes de produção, estas, estando também sujeitas à ação de ondas e correntezas, apresentam movimentos que se transferem aos risers. Essas excitações de diferentes origens geram esforços e tensões na estrutura dos risers. Outro fenômeno importante é oriundo dos esforços oscilatórios devido ao escoamento interno. O presente trabalho tem como objetivo investigar a influência dos parâmetros do solo na resposta dinâmica de risers em catenária sob a ação do meio ambiente e movimentos de plataformas flutuantesAbstract: Production risers are tubular elements that connect the head of an undersea well to the floating petroleum production facility. They transport oil, water and gas. For the study of a systematic approach to the analysis of the operation and the design of risers, the agreement of the mathematical models that predict the static and dynamic behavior and the evaluation of its service life are important. The objective of these models is to search for the best configuration for the operation and design of the riser. A critical concern is the complexity of operation and the environmental conditions. Numerical procedures have been implemented to determine the behavior of the riser. Hydrodynamic forces such as induced by waves and ocean currents influence the behavior of risers. Moreover, the risers are connected the floating platforms which also exerts further forces on the riser. These platforms also are affected by the waves and current, which produce motion that is then transferred to the risers generating stresses and tensions in the riser's structure. Another very important phenomenon is the oscillatory stresses due to variations in the two-phase internal flow. The objective of this work is evaluated the influence of the soil parameters on the dynamic behavior of catenary risers in ultra-deep waters applicationMestradoExplotaçãoMestre em Ciências e Engenharia de Petróle