Valosin-containing protein regulates the proteasome-mediated degradation of DNA-PKcs in glioma cells.

DNA-dependent protein kinase (DNA-PK) has an important role in the repair of DNA damage and regulates the radiation sensitivity of glioblastoma cells. The VCP (valosine-containing protein), a chaperone protein that regulates ubiquitin-dependent protein degradation, is phosphorylated by DNA-PK and recruited to DNA double-strand break sites to regulate DNA damage repair. However, it is not clear whether VCP is involved in DNA-PKcs (DNA-PK catalytic subunit) degradation or whether it regulates the radiosensitivity of glioblastoma. Our data demonstrated that DNA-PKcs was ubiquitinated and bound to VCP. VCP knockdown resulted in the accumulation of the DNA-PKcs protein in glioblastoma cells, and the proteasome inhibitor MG132 synergised this increase. As expected, this increase promoted the efficiency of DNA repair in several glioblastoma cell lines; in turn, this enhanced activity decreased the radiation sensitivity and prolonged the survival fraction of glioblastoma cells in vitro. Moreover, the VCP knockdown in glioblastoma cells reduced the survival time of the xenografted mice with radiation treatment relative to the control xenografted glioblastoma mice. In addition, the VCP protein was also downregulated in ~25% of GBM tissues from patients (WHO, grade IV astrocytoma), and the VCP protein level was correlated with patient survival (R(2)=0.5222, P<0.05). These findings demonstrated that VCP regulates DNA-PKcs degradation and increases the sensitivity of GBM cells to radiation

Tunneling Qubit Operation on a Protected Josephson Junction Array

We discuss a protected quantum computation process based on a hexagon Josephson junction array. Qubits are encoded in the punctured array, which is topologically protected. The degeneracy is related to the number of holes. The topological degeneracy is lightly shifted by tuning the flux through specific hexagons. We also show how to perform single qubit operation and basic quantum gate operations in this system.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures. The published version in Phys. Rev., A81(2010)01232

Exposure to hazardous volatile organic compounds, PM 10 and CO while walking along streets in urban Guangzhou, China

Toxic air pollutants in street canyons are important issues concerning public health especially in some large Asian cities like Guangzhou. In 1998 <18% of Guangzhou citizens used public transportation modes, with a majority commuting on foot (42%) or by bicycle (22%). Of the pedestrians, 57% were either senior citizens or students. In the present study, we measured toxic air pollutants while walking along urban streets in Guangzhou to evaluate pedestrian exposure. Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) were collected with sorbent tubes, and PM 10 and CO were measured simultaneously with portable analyzers. Our results showed that pedestrian exposure to PM 10 (with an average of 303 μg m -3 for all samples) and some toxic VOCs (for example, benzene) was relatively high. Monocyclic aromatic hydrocarbons were found to be the most abundant VOCs, and 71% of the samples had benzene levels higher than 30 μg m -3. Benzene, PM 10 and CO in walk-only streets were significantly lower (p<0.05) than in traffic streets, and the differences in exposure levels between new urban streets and old urban streets were highly significant (p<0.01). Pedestrian exposure to toxic VOCs and PM 10 was higher than those reported in other public transportation modes (bus and subway). The good correlations between BTEX, PM 10 and CO in the streets indicated that automotive emission might be their major source. Our study also showed that the risk to pedestrians due to air pollution was misinterpreted by the reported air quality index based on measurement of SO 2, NO x and PM 10 in the government monitoring stations. An urban roadside monitoring station might be needed by air quality monitoring networks in large Asian cities like Guangzhou, in order to survey exposure to air toxics in urban roadside microenvironments. © 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Manipulation of heat current by the interface between graphene and white graphene

We investigate the heat current flowing across the interface between graphene and hexagonal boron nitride (so-called white graphene) using both molecular dynamics simulation and nonequilibrium Green's function approaches. These two distinct methods discover the same phenomena that the heat current is reduced linearly with increasing interface length, and the zigzag interface causes stronger reduction of heat current than the armchair interface. These phenomena are interpreted by both the lattice dynamics analysis and the transmission function explanation, which both reveal that the localized phonon modes at interfaces are responsible for the heat management. The room temperature interface thermal resistance is about $7\times10^{-10}$m$^{2}$K/W in zigzag interface and $3.5\times10^{-10}$m$^{2}$K/W in armchair interface, which directly results in stronger heat reduction in zigzag interface. Our theoretical results provide a specific route for experimentalists to control the heat transport in the graphene and hexagonal boron nitride compound through shaping the interface between these two materials.Comment: accepted by EP

Dimensional crossover of thermal conductance in graphene nanoribbons: A first-principles approach

First-principles density-functional calculations are performed to investigate the thermal transport properties in graphene nanoribbons (GNRs). The dimensional crossover of thermal conductance from one to two dimensions (2D) is clearly demonstrated with increasing ribbon width. The thermal conductance of GNRs in a few nanometer width already exhibits an approximate low-temperature dependence of $T^{1.5}$, like that of 2D graphene sheet which is attributed to the quadratic nature of dispersion relation for the out-of-plane acoustic phonon modes. Using a zone-folding method, we heuristically derive the dimensional crossover of thermal conductance with the increase of ribbon width. Combining our calculations with the experimental phonon mean-free path, some typical values of thermal conductivity at room temperature are estimated for GNRs and for 2D graphene sheet, respectively. Our findings clarify the issue of low-temperature dependence of thermal transport in GNRs and suggest a calibration range of thermal conductivity for experimental measurements in graphene-based materials.Comment: 18 pages, 4 figure

Optical generation of hybrid entangled state via entangling single-photon-added coherent state

We propose a feasible scheme to realize the optical entanglement of single-photon-added coherent state (SPACS) and show that, besides the Sanders entangled coherent state, the entangled SPACS also leads to new forms of hybrid entanglement of quantum Fock state and classical coherent state. We probe the essential difference of two types of hybrid entangled state (HES). This HES provides a novel link between the discrete- and the continuous-variable entanglement in a natural way.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure

Thermal conduction of carbon nanotubes using molecular dynamics

The heat flux autocorrelation functions of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) with different radius and lengths is calculated using equilibrium molecular dynamics. The thermal conductance of CNTs is also calculated using the Green-Kubo relation from the linear response theory. By pointing out the ambiguity in the cross section definition of single wall CNTs, we use the thermal conductance instead of conductivity in calculations and discussions. We find that the thermal conductance of CNTs diverges with the CNT length. After the analysis of vibrational density of states, it can be concluded that more low frequency vibration modes exist in longer CNTs, and they effectively contribute to the divergence of thermal conductance.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, submitted to Physical Review

Visualization of facet-dependent pseudo-photocatalytic behavior of TiO2 nanorods for water splitting using In situ liquid cell TEM

We report an investigation of the pseudo-photocatalytic behavior of rutile TiO2 nanorods for water splitting observed with liquid cell transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The electron beam serves as a “light” source to initiate the catalytic reaction and a “water-in-salt” aqueous solution is employed as the electrolyte. The observation reveals that bubbles are generated preferentially residing near the {110} facet of a rutile TiO2 nanorod under a low electron dose rate (9.3–18.6 e-/Å2·s). These bubbles are ascribed to hydrogen gas generated from the pseudo-photocatalytic water splitting. As the electron beam current density increases to 93 e-/Å2 ·s, bubbles are also found at the {001} and {111} facets as well as in the bulk liquid solution, demonstrating the dominant effects of water electrolysis by electron beam under higher dose rates. The facet-dependent pseudo-photocatalytic behavior of rutile TiO2 nanorods is further validated using density functional theory (DFT)calculation. Our work establishes a facile liquid cell TEM setup for the study of pseudo-photocatalytic water splitting and it may also be applied to investigation of other photo-activated phenomena occurring at the solid-liquid interfaces