628 research outputs found
Engineering NK Cells for CAR TherapyâRecent Advances in Gene Transfer Methodology
The development of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy has introduced a new and effective strategy to guide and promote the immune response against tumors in the clinic. More recently, in an attempt to enhance its utility, this method has been expanded to novel cell types. One of the more successful variants has proven to be the expression of CARs in Natural Killer (NK) cells (CAR-NK). Gene engineering NK cells to express an exogenous CAR receptor allows the innate anti-tumor ability of NK cells to be harnessed and directed against a target tumor antigen. In addition, the biology of NK cells allows the development of an allogeneic cell therapeutic product useable with most or all patient haplotypes. NK cells cause little or no graft versus host disease (GvHD) and are therefore suitable for development of an "off the shelf" therapeutic product. Initial trials have also shown that CAR-NK cells rarely cause cytokine release syndrome. However, despite their potential NK cells have proven to be difficult to engineer, with high sensitivity to apoptosis and low levels of gene expression. The creation of optimized methods to introduce genes into NK cells will promote the widespread application of CAR-NK in research laboratories and the clinics
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Materialsâ Methods: NMR in Battery Research
Improving electrochemical energy storage is one of the major issues of our time. The search for new battery materials together with the drive to improve performance and lower cost of existing and new batteries is not without its challenges. Success in these matters is undoubtedly based on first understanding the underlying chemistries of the materials and the relations between the components involved. A combined application of experimental and theoretical techniques has proven to be a powerful strategy to gain insights into many of the questions that arise from the âhow do batteries work and why do they failâ challenge. In this Review, we highlight the application of solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy in battery research: a technique that can be extremely powerful in characterizing local structures in battery materials, even in highly disordered systems. An introduction on electrochemical energy storage illustrates the research aims and prospective approaches to reach these. We particularly address âNMR in battery researchâ by giving a brief introduction to electrochemical techniques and applications as well as background information on both in and ex situ solid-state NMR spectroscopy. We will try to answer the question âIs NMR suitable and how can it help me to solve my problem?â by shortly reviewing some of our recent research on electrodes, microstructure formation, electrolytes and interfaces, in which the application of NMR was helpful. Finally, we share hands-on experience directly from the lab bench to answer the fundamental question âWhere and how should I start?â to help guide a researcherâs way through the manifold possible approaches.This project has received funding from the European Unionâs Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie SkĹodowska-Curie grant agreement No 655444 (O.P.). K.J.G. thanks the Winston Churchill Foundation of the United States and the Herchel Smith Scholarship for financial support
On the Cauchy problem for the magnetic Zakharov system
In this paper, we study the Cauchy problem of the magnetic type Zakharov
system which describes the pondermotive force and magnetic field generation
effects resulting from the non-linear interaction between plasma-wave and
particles. By using the energy method to derive a priori bounds and an
approximation argument for the construction of solutions, we obtain local
existence and uniqueness results for the magnetic Zakharov system in the case
of
Enhanced efficiency of solid-state NMR investigations of energy materials using an external automatic tuning/matching (eATM) robot.
We have developed and explored an external automatic tuning/matching (eATM) robot that can be attached to commercial and/or home-built magic angle spinning (MAS) or static nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) probeheads. Complete synchronization and automation with Bruker and Tecmag spectrometers is ensured via transistor-transistor-logic (TTL) signals. The eATM robot enables an automated "on-the-fly" re-calibration of the radio frequency (rf) carrier frequency, which is beneficial whenever tuning/matching of the resonance circuit is required, e.g. variable temperature (VT) NMR, spin-echo mapping (variable offset cumulative spectroscopy, VOCS) and/or in situ NMR experiments of batteries. This allows a significant increase in efficiency for NMR experiments outside regular working hours (e.g. overnight) and, furthermore, enables measurements of quadrupolar nuclei which would not be possible in reasonable timeframes due to excessively large spectral widths. Additionally, different tuning/matching capacitor (and/or coil) settings for desired frequencies (e.g. Li and P at 117 and 122MHz, respectively, at 7.05 T) can be saved and made directly accessible before automatic tuning/matching, thus enabling automated measurements of multiple nuclei for one sample with no manual adjustment required by the user. We have applied this new eATM approach in static and MAS spin-echo mapping NMR experiments in different magnetic fields on four energy storage materials, namely: (1) paramagnetic Li and P MAS NMR (without manual recalibration) of the Li-ion battery cathode material LiFePO; (2) paramagnetic O VT-NMR of the solid oxide fuel cell cathode material LaNiO; (3) broadband Nb static NMR of the Li-ion battery material BNbO; and (4) broadband static I NMR of a potential Li-air battery product LiIO. In each case, insight into local atomic structure and dynamics arises primarily from the highly broadened (1-25MHz) NMR lineshapes that the eATM robot is uniquely suited to collect. These new developments in automation of NMR experiments are likely to advance the application of in and ex situ NMR investigations to an ever-increasing range of energy storage materials and systems.This project has received funding from the European Unionâs Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie SkĹodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 655444 (O.P.). D.M.H. acknowledges funding from the Cambridge Commonwealth Trusts. J.L. gratefully acknowledges Trinity College, Cambridge (UK) for funding. K.J.G. gratefully acknowledges funding from the Winston Churchill Foundation of the United States and the Herchel Smith Scholarship. M.B. is the CEO of NMR Service GmbH (Erfurt, Germany), which manufactures the eATM device; M.B. acknowledges funding of the Central Innovation Programme for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs; Zentrales Innovationsprogramm Mittelstand, ZIM) of the German Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy (Bundesministerium fĂźr Wirtschaft und Energie, BMWi) under the Grant No. KF 2845501UWF. DFT calculations were performed on (1) the Darwin Supercomputer of the University of Cambridge High Performance Computing Service (http://www.hpc.cam.ac.uk), provided by Dell Inc. using Strategic Research Infrastructure Funding from the Higher Education Funding Council for England and funding from the Science and Technology Facilities Council and (2) the Center for Functional Nanomaterials cluster, Brookhaven National Laboratory, which is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, under Contract No. DE-AC02-98CH10886
On the 2d Zakharov system with L^2 Schr\"odinger data
We prove local in time well-posedness for the Zakharov system in two space
dimensions with large initial data in L^2 x H^{-1/2} x H^{-3/2}. This is the
space of optimal regularity in the sense that the data-to-solution map fails to
be smooth at the origin for any rougher pair of spaces in the L^2-based Sobolev
scale. Moreover, it is a natural space for the Cauchy problem in view of the
subsonic limit equation, namely the focusing cubic nonlinear Schroedinger
equation. The existence time we obtain depends only upon the corresponding
norms of the initial data - a result which is false for the cubic nonlinear
Schroedinger equation in dimension two - and it is optimal because
Glangetas-Merle's solutions blow up at that time.Comment: 30 pages, 2 figures. Minor revision. Title has been change
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[Ge<sub>2</sub>]<sup>4â</sup>Dumbbells with Very Short GeâGe Distances in the Zintl Phase Li<sub>3</sub>NaGe<sub>2</sub>: A Solid-State Equivalent to Molecular O<sub>2</sub>
The novel ternary Zintl phase Li3NaGe2 comprises alkali-metal cations and [Ge2]4â dumbbells. The diatomic [Ge2]4â unit is characterized by the shortest GeâGe distance (2.390(1)â
Ă
) ever observed in a Zintl phase and thus represents the first Ge=Ge double bond under such conditions, as also suggested by the (8âN) rule. Raman measurements support these findings. The multiple-bond character is confirmed by electronic-structure calculations, and an upfield 6Li NMR shift of â10.0âppm, which was assigned to the Li cations surrounded by the Ďâ
systems of three Ge dumbbells, further underlines this interpretation. For the unperturbed, ligand-free dumbbell in Li3NaGe2, the Ď-âbonding py and pz orbitals are degenerate as in molecular oxygen, which has singly occupied orbitals. The partially filled Ď-type bands of the neat solid Li3NaGe2 cross the Fermi level, resulting in metallic properties. Li3NaGe2 was synthesized from the elements as well as from binary reactants and subsequently characterized crystallographically.O.P. acknowledges
support from a Marie SkĹodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship.
L.M.S. is further grateful to the Fonds der Chemischen Industrie
and the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes for her fellowships.
A.J.K. gratefully acknowledges funding from the Alfred Kordelin
Foundation and computational resources from CSC â the Finnish
IT Center for Science.This is the accepted manuscript. The final version is available at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/wol1/doi/10.1002/ange.201508044/abstract
Global dynamics above the ground state for the nonlinear Klein-Gordon equation without a radial assumption
We extend our previous result on the focusing cubic Klein-Gordon equation in
three dimensions to the non-radial case, giving a complete classification of
global dynamics of all solutions with energy at most slightly above that of the
ground state.Comment: 40 page
Sodium Intercalation Mechanism of 3.8 v Class Alluaudite Sodium Iron Sulfate
Alluaudite sodium iron sulfate NaFe(SO) is one of the most promising candidates for a Na-ion battery cathode material with earth-abundant elements; it exhibits the highest potential among any Fe/Fe redox reactions (3.8 V vs Na/Na ), good cycle performance, and high rate capability. However, the reaction mechanism during electrochemical charging/discharging processes is still not understood. Here, we surveyed the intercalation mechanism via synchrotron X-ray diffraction (XRD), Na nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), density functional theory (DFT) calculations, X-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES), and MoĚssbauer spectroscopy. Throughout charging/discharging processes, the structure undergoes a reversible, single-phase (solid solution) reaction based on a Fe/Fe redox reaction with a small volume change of ca. 3.5% after an initial structural rearrangement upon the first charging process, where a small amount of Fe irreversibly migrates from the original site to a Na site. Sodium extraction occurs in a sequential manner at various Na sites in the structure at their specific voltage regions.The present work was financially supported from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan (MEXT) under the âElement Strategy Initiative for Catalysts & Batteriesâ (ESICB) project. The synchrotron XRD experiments were performed under KEK-PF User Program (No. 2013G670). Crystal structures and the Fourier difference maps were drawn by VESTA.65 G.O. acknowledges financial support from JSPS Research Fellowships under âMaterials Education Program for the Future Leaders in Research, Industry, and Technologyâ (MERIT) project. This project has received funding from the European Unionâs Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 655444 (O.P.). R.P. gratefully acknowledges financial support through the Marie Curie Actions People Program of the EUâs Seventh Frame work Program (FP7/2007-2013), under the grant agreement n.317127, the âpNMR projectâ. K.J.G. gratefully acknowledges funding from The Winston Churchill Foundation of the United States and the Herchel Smith Scholarship. This work made use of the facilities of the Center for Functional Nanomaterials, Brookhaven National Laboratory, which is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, under Contract No. DE-AC02-98CH10886.This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from American Chemical Society via http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemmater.6b0109
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