In Situ Monitoring of Intracellular Glucose and Glutamine in CHO Cell Culture

The development of processes to produce biopharmaceuticals industrially is still largely empirical and relies on optimizing both medium formulation and cell line in a product-specific manner. Current small-scale (well plate-based) process development methods cannot provide sufficient sample volume for analysis, to obtain information on nutrient utilization which can be problematic when processes are scaled to industrial fermenters. We envision a platform where essential metabolites can be monitored non-invasively and in real time in an ultra-low volume assay in order to provide additional information on cellular metabolism in high throughput screens. Towards this end, we have developed a model system of Chinese Hamster Ovary cells stably expressing protein-based biosensors for glucose and glutamine. Herein, we demonstrate that these can accurately reflect changing intracellular metabolite concentrations in vivo during batch and fed-batch culture of CHO cells. The ability to monitor intracellular depletion of essential nutrients in high throughput will allow rapid development of improved bioprocesses

Measurement of J/ψ -pair production in pp collisions at √s = 13 TeV and study of gluon transverse-momentum dependent PDFs

The production cross-section of J/ψ pairs in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of √s = 13 TeV is measured using a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.2 fb−1 collected by the LHCb experiment. The measurement is performed with both J/ψ mesons in the transverse momentum range 0 < pT< 14 GeV/c and rapidity range 2.0 < y < 4.5. The cross-section of this process is measured to be 16.36 ± 0.28 (stat) ± 0.88 (syst) nb. The contributions from single-parton scattering and double-parton scattering are separated based on the dependence of the cross-section on the absolute rapidity difference ∆y between the two J/ψ mesons. The effective cross-section of double-parton scattering is measured to be σeff = 13.1 ± 1.8 (stat) ± 2.3 (syst) mb. The distribution of the azimuthal angle ϕCS of one of the J/ψ mesons in the Collins-Soper frame and the pT-spectrum of the J/ψ pairs are also measured for the study of the gluon transverse-momentum dependent distributions inside protons. The extracted values of ⟨cos 2ϕCS⟩ and ⟨cos 4ϕCS⟩ are consistent with zero, but the presence of azimuthal asymmetry at a few percent level is allowed

Study of Bc+ → χc π+ decays

A study of B-c(+) -> chi(c) pi(+) decays is reported using proton-proton collision data, collected with the LHCb detector at centre-of-mass energies of 7, 8, and 13TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 9 fb(-1). The decay B-c(+) -> chi(c2)pi(+) is observed for the first time, with a significance exceeding seven standard deviations. The relative branching fraction with respect to the B-c(+) -> J/psi pi(+) decay is measured to beBBc+ ->chi c2 pi+/BBc+ -> (J/psi pi+) = 0.37 +/- 0.06 +/- 0.02 +/- 0.01,where the first uncertainty is statistical, the second is systematic, and the third is due to the knowledge of the chi(c2) -> J/psi gamma branching fraction. No significant B-c(+) -> chi(+)(c1 pi) signal is observed and an upper limit for the relative branching fraction for the B-c(+) -> chi(c1)pi(+) and B-c(+) -> chi(c2)pi(+) decays ofBBc+ ->chi c1 pi+/BBc+ -> chi(c2)pi(+) < 0.49is set at the 90% confidence level

Measurement of the CKM angle γ in the B0→DK *0 channel using self-conjugate D→ KS0h+ h- decays

A model-independent study of CP violation in B-0 -> DK (*0) decays is presented using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 9 fb(-1) collected by the LHCb experiment at centre-of-mass energies of v s = 7, 8 and 13TeV. The CKM angle. is determined by examining the distributions of signal decays in phase-space bins of the self-conjugate D. K(S)(0)h(+) h(-) decays, where h = p, K. Observables related to CP violation are measured and the angle. is determined to be. = (49+22 -19).. Measurements of the amplitude ratio and strong-phase difference between the favoured and suppressed B-0 decays are also presented