100 research outputs found
Nanofabrication and Electrochemical Characterization of Self-Assembled Monolayers Sandwiched between Metal Nanoparticles and Electrode Surfaces
Nanoscience and nanotechnology have reached the syllabi of many upper-division undergraduate and master-level courses all over the world. There is therefore a growing need for practical exercises that illustrate the fabrication, characterization, properties, and applications of nanomaterials. Here we describe an advanced-level laboratory experiment in which students had the opportunity to fabricate surfaces modified by ordered monolayers and nanostructured materials. The surface modification was quantified by means of a quartz crystal microbalance, while the electrochemical properties of the nanoarchitectures were assessed using cyclic voltammetry experiments. Electron transfer across self-assembled monolayers mediated by gold nanoparticles was presented as a topic for discussion, and consideration of potential practical applications of the observed phenomena (catalytic and electrocatalytic processes, as well as development of optical, (opto)electronic, and photovoltaic devices with enhanced properties) was proposed as a further reading exercise
Chemokine-guided angiogenesis directs coronary vasculature formation in zebrafish.
Supramolecular & Biomaterials Chemistr
High-contrast imaging constraints on gas giant planet formation - The Herbig Ae/Be star opportunity
Planet formation studies are often focused on solar-type stars, implicitly
considering our Sun as reference point. This approach overlooks, however, that
Herbig Ae/Be stars are in some sense much better targets to study planet
formation processes empirically, with their disks generally being larger,
brighter and simply easier to observe across a large wavelength range. In
addition, massive gas giant planets have been found on wide orbits around early
type stars, triggering the question if these objects did indeed form there and,
if so, by what process. In the following I briefly review what we currently
know about the occurrence rate of planets around intermediate mass stars,
before discussing recent results from Herbig Ae/Be stars in the context of
planet formation. The main emphasis is put on spatially resolved polarized
light images of potentially planet forming disks and how these images - in
combination with other data - can be used to empirically constrain (parts of)
the planet formation process. Of particular interest are two objects, HD100546
and HD169142, where, in addition to intriguing morphological structures in the
disks, direct observational evidence for (very) young planets has been
reported. I conclude with an outlook, what further progress we can expect in
the very near future with the next generation of high-contrast imagers at 8-m
class telescopes and their synergies with ALMA.Comment: Accepted by Astrophysics and Space Science as invited short review in
special issue about Herbig Ae/Be stars; 12 pages incl. 5 figures, 2 tables
and reference
Green function techniques in the treatment of quantum transport at the molecular scale
The theoretical investigation of charge (and spin) transport at nanometer
length scales requires the use of advanced and powerful techniques able to deal
with the dynamical properties of the relevant physical systems, to explicitly
include out-of-equilibrium situations typical for electrical/heat transport as
well as to take into account interaction effects in a systematic way.
Equilibrium Green function techniques and their extension to non-equilibrium
situations via the Keldysh formalism build one of the pillars of current
state-of-the-art approaches to quantum transport which have been implemented in
both model Hamiltonian formulations and first-principle methodologies. We offer
a tutorial overview of the applications of Green functions to deal with some
fundamental aspects of charge transport at the nanoscale, mainly focusing on
applications to model Hamiltonian formulations.Comment: Tutorial review, LaTeX, 129 pages, 41 figures, 300 references,
submitted to Springer series "Lecture Notes in Physics
Measurements of long-range near-side angular correlations in TeV proton-lead collisions in the forward region
Two-particle angular correlations are studied in proton-lead collisions at a
nucleon-nucleon centre-of-mass energy of TeV, collected
with the LHCb detector at the LHC. The analysis is based on data recorded in
two beam configurations, in which either the direction of the proton or that of
the lead ion is analysed. The correlations are measured in the laboratory
system as a function of relative pseudorapidity, , and relative
azimuthal angle, , for events in different classes of event
activity and for different bins of particle transverse momentum. In
high-activity events a long-range correlation on the near side, , is observed in the pseudorapidity range . This
measurement of long-range correlations on the near side in proton-lead
collisions extends previous observations into the forward region up to
. The correlation increases with growing event activity and is found
to be more pronounced in the direction of the lead beam. However, the
correlation in the direction of the lead and proton beams are found to be
compatible when comparing events with similar absolute activity in the
direction analysed.Comment: All figures and tables, along with any supplementary material and
additional information, are available at
https://lhcbproject.web.cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/LHCbProjectPublic/LHCb-PAPER-2015-040.htm
Study of the production of and hadrons in collisions and first measurement of the branching fraction
The product of the () differential production
cross-section and the branching fraction of the decay () is
measured as a function of the beauty hadron transverse momentum, ,
and rapidity, . The kinematic region of the measurements is and . The measurements use a data sample
corresponding to an integrated luminosity of collected by the
LHCb detector in collisions at centre-of-mass energies in 2011 and in 2012. Based on previous LHCb
results of the fragmentation fraction ratio, , the
branching fraction of the decay is
measured to be \begin{equation*} \mathcal{B}(\Lambda_b^0\rightarrow J/\psi
pK^-)= (3.17\pm0.04\pm0.07\pm0.34^{+0.45}_{-0.28})\times10^{-4},
\end{equation*} where the first uncertainty is statistical, the second is
systematic, the third is due to the uncertainty on the branching fraction of
the decay , and the
fourth is due to the knowledge of . The sum of the
asymmetries in the production and decay between and
is also measured as a function of and .
The previously published branching fraction of , relative to that of , is updated.
The branching fractions of are determined.Comment: 29 pages, 19figures. All figures and tables, along with any
supplementary material and additional information, are available at
https://lhcbproject.web.cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/LHCbProjectPublic/LHCb-PAPER-2015-032.htm
Evidence for the strangeness-changing weak decay
Using a collision data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity
of 3.0~fb, collected by the LHCb detector, we present the first search
for the strangeness-changing weak decay . No
hadron decay of this type has been seen before. A signal for this decay,
corresponding to a significance of 3.2 standard deviations, is reported. The
relative rate is measured to be
, where and
are the and fragmentation
fractions, and is the branching
fraction. Assuming is bounded between 0.1 and
0.3, the branching fraction would lie
in the range from to .Comment: 7 pages, 2 figures, All figures and tables, along with any
supplementary material and additional information, are available at
https://lhcbproject.web.cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/LHCbProjectPublic/LHCb-PAPER-2015-047.htm
flavour tagging using charm decays at the LHCb experiment
An algorithm is described for tagging the flavour content at production of
neutral mesons in the LHCb experiment. The algorithm exploits the
correlation of the flavour of a meson with the charge of a reconstructed
secondary charm hadron from the decay of the other hadron produced in the
proton-proton collision. Charm hadron candidates are identified in a number of
fully or partially reconstructed Cabibbo-favoured decay modes. The algorithm is
calibrated on the self-tagged decay modes and using of data collected by the LHCb
experiment at centre-of-mass energies of and
. Its tagging power on these samples of
decays is .Comment: All figures and tables, along with any supplementary material and
additional information, are available at
http://lhcbproject.web.cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/LHCbProjectPublic/LHCb-PAPER-2015-027.htm
Development of envelope protein antigens to serologically differentiate zika virus infection from dengue virus infection
Zika virus (ZIKV) is an emerging flavivirus that can cause birth defects and neurologic complications. Molecular tests are effective for diagnosing acute ZIKV infection, although the majority of infections produce no symptoms at all or present after the narrow window in which molecular diagnostics are dependable. Serology is a reliable method for detecting infections after the viremic period; however, most serological assays have limited specificity due to cross-reactive antibodies elicited by flavivirus infections. Since ZIKV and dengue virus (DENV) widely cocirculate, distinguishing ZIKV infection from DENV infection is particularly important for diagnosing individual cases or for surveillance to coordinate public health responses. Flaviviruses also elicit type-specific antibodies directed to non-cross-reactive epitopes of the infecting virus; such epitopes are attractive targets for the design of antigens for development of serological tests with greater specificity. Guided by comparative epitope modeling of the ZIKV envelope protein, we designed two recombinant antigens displaying unique antigenic regions on domain I (Z-EDI) and domain III (Z-EDIII) of the ZIKV envelope protein. Both the Z-EDI and Z-EDIII antigens consistently detected ZIKV-specific IgG in ZIKV-immune sera but not cross-reactive IgG in DENV-immune sera in late convalescence (12 weeks postinfection). In contrast, during early convalescence (2 to 12 weeks postinfection), secondary DENV-immune sera and some primary DENV-immune sera cross-reacted with the Z-EDI and Z-EDIII antigens. Analysis of sequential samples from DENV-immune individuals demonstrated that Z-EDIII cross-reactivity peaked in early convalescence and declined steeply over time. The Z-EDIII antigen has much potential as a diagnostic antigen for population-level surveillance and for detecting past infections in patients
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