Silicon-based Integrated Microarray Biochips for Biosensing and Biodetection Applications

The silicon-based integrated microarray biochip (IMB) is an inter-disciplinary research direction of microelectronics and biological science. It has caught the attention of both industry and academia, in applications such as deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and immunological detection, medical inspection and point-of-care (PoC) diagnosis, as well as food safety and environmental surveillance. Future biodetection strategies demand biochips with high sensitivity, miniaturization, integration, parallel, multi-target and even intelligence capabilities. In this chapter, a comprehensive investigation of current research on state-of-the-art silicon-based integrated microarray biochips is presented. These include the electrochemical biochip, magnetic tunnelling junction (MTJ) based biochip, giant magnetoresistance (GMR) biochip and integrated oscillator-based biochip. The principles, methodologies and challenges of the aforementioned biochips will also be discussed and compared from all aspects, e.g., sensitivity, fabrication complexity and cost, compatibility with silicon-based complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology, multi-target detection capabilities, signal processing and system integrations, etc. In this way, we discuss future silicon-based fully integrated biochips, which could be used for portable medical detection and low cost PoC diagnosis applications

Cardiomyocyte-Restricted Deletion of PPARβ/δ in PPARα-Null Mice Causes Impaired Mitochondrial Biogenesis and Defense, but No Further Depression of Myocardial Fatty Acid Oxidation

It is well documented that PPARα and PPARβ/δ share overlapping functions in regulating myocardial lipid metabolism. However, previous studies demonstrated that cardiomyocyte-restricted PPARβ/δ deficiency in mice leads to severe cardiac pathological development, whereas global PPARα knockout shows a benign cardiac phenotype. It is unknown whether a PPARα-null background would alter the pathological development in mice with cardiomyocyte-restricted PPARβ/δ deficiency. In the present study, a mouse model with long-term PPARβ/δ deficiency in PPARα-null background showed a comparably reduced cardiac expression of lipid metabolism to those of single PPAR-deficient mouse models. The PPARα-null background did not rescue or aggravate the cardiac pathological development linked to cardiomyocyte-restricted PPARβ/δ deficiency. Moreover, PPARα-null did not alter the phenotypic development in adult mice with the short-term deletion of PPARβ/δ in their hearts, which showed mitochondrial abnormalities, depressed cardiac performance, and cardiac hypertrophy with attenuated expression of key factors in mitochondrial biogenesis and defense. The present study demonstrates that cardiomyocyte-restricted deletion of PPARβ/δ in PPARα-null mice causes impaired mitochondrial biogenesis and defense, but no further depression of fatty acid oxidation. Therefore, PPARβ/δ is essential for maintaining mitochondrial biogenesis and defense in cardiomyocytes independent of PPARα

Three Dimensional Acoustical Imaging Based on Isosurface Technique for Bulk Material

The paper introduces the methods with time-resolved technique and isosurface display technique to get two- and three-dimensional (3D) acoustical imaging for scanning acoustic microscopy. Time-resolved technique presents the way to realize two-dimensional (2D) acoustical imaging - A- (O-), B- and C-scan, and a discrete combinatorial 3D image; and isosurface display technique realizes a 3D image with continuous distribution in full direction. The paper proposals a transitional model of square column, which consists of the data of echo signal pattern extracted from volume database, to construct the imaging cube and depict an isosurface using isovalue of internal boundaries in the cube, for the evaluation of internal defects in bulk specimen - Boron Nitride. 3D acoustical imaging has the advantage to show the position, size, appearance, distribution, and tendency of internal structures (voids, inclusions and defects) with complex shapes in non-transparent bulk material. The results show that 3D acoustical visualization presents more affluent, overall and intuitive pattern than 2D imaging for micro-sized structure investigation

Nonlinear-Optical and Fluorescent Properties of Ag Aqueous Colloid Prepared by Silver Nitrate Reduction

The nonlinear-optical properties of metal Ag colloidal solutions, which were prepared by the reduction of silver nitrate, were investigated using Z-scan method. Under picosecond 532 nm excitation, the Ag colloidal solution exhibited negative nonlinear refractive index (n2=−5.17×10−4 cm2/W) and reverse saturable absorption coefficient (β=4.32 cm/GW). The data fitting result of optical limiting (OL) response of metal Ag colloidal solution indicated that the nonlinear absorption was attributed to two-photon absorption effect at 532 nm. Moreover, the fluorescence emission spectra of Ag colloidal solution were recorded under excitations at both 280 nm and 350 nm. Two fluorescence peaks, 336 nm and 543 nm for 280 nm excitation, while 544 nm and 694 nm for 350 nm excitation, were observed

Experimental study of slit cylinder vortex shedding in circulating water channel

Conference Name:2012 International Conference on Measurement, Information and Control, MIC 2012. Conference Address: Harbin, China. Time:May 18, 2012 - May 20, 2012.This paper mainly researched the influence of slit-vent modification on the flow field variation of a circular cylinder's wake flow and the modulating effect on vortex shedding frequency. Experiment contents contained qualitative flow visualization and quantitative measurements. A huge amount of PIV data was acquired and evaluated to obtain the instantaneous flow structure as well as the time-averaged feature of wake flow past both slit circular cylinder and baseline circular cylinder. Meanwhile, complete periodical evolution of vortex generation and shedding in the near wake flow was analyzed, and the vortex shedding frequency alteration under different water channel speeds was also studied. The results of flow visualization revealed that, the vortex shedding frequency of slit cylinder was faster than baseline cylinder. It demonstrated that the slit structure of cylinder enhanced the intension of wake flow variation. 漏 2012 IEEE

Strength Reduction Method for Stability Analysis of Local Discontinuous Rock Mass with Iterative Method of Partitioned Finite Element and Interface Boundary Element

SRM (strength reduction method) with iterative method of PFE (partitioned fnite element) and IBE (interface boundary element) is proposed to solve the safety factor of local discontinuous rock mass. Slope system is divided into several continuous bodies and local discontinuous interface boundaries. Each block is treated as a partition of the system and contacted by discontinuous joints. The displacements of blocks are chosen as basic variables and the rigid displacements in the centroid of blocks are chosen as motion variables. The contact forces on interface boundaries and the rigid displacements to the centroid of each body are chosen as mixed variables and solved iteratively using the interface boundary equations. Flexibility matrix is formed through PFE according to the contact states of nodal pairs and spring flexibility is used to reflect the influence of weak structural plane so that nonlinear iteration is only limited to the possible contact region. With cohesion and friction coefficient reduced gradually, the states of all nodal pairs at the open or slip state for the first time are regarded as failure criterion, which can decrease the effect of subjectivity in determining safety factor. Examples are used to verify the validity of the proposed method