Strategies to Target Tumor Immunosuppression

The tumor microenvironment is currently in the spotlight of cancer immunology research as a key factor impacting tumor development and progression. While antigen-specific immune responses play a crucial role in tumor rejection, the tumor hampers these immune responses by creating an immunosuppressive microenvironment. Recently, major progress has been achieved in the field of cancer immunotherapy, and several groundbreaking clinical trials demonstrated the potency of such therapeutic interventions in patients. Yet, the responses greatly vary among individuals. This calls for the rational design of more efficacious cancer immunotherapeutic interventions that take into consideration the “immune signature” of the tumor. Multimodality treatment regimens that aim to enhance intratumoral homing and activation of antigen-specific immune effector cells, while simultaneously targeting tumor immunosuppression, are pivotal for potent antitumor immunity

Free Vibration of Simply Supported Rectangular Composite Plates with Patch Mass

Abstract: The effect of a distributed patch mass on the natural frequency of vibration of a laminated rectangular plate with simply supported boundaries is investigated. The third order displacement field of a composite laminated rectangular plate is defined using the two-variable refined plate theory. Equations of motion of the plate are obtained with the help of the calculus of variation. Parametric study of non-dimensional natural frequencies of vibration is carried out and the effects of geometrical parameters such as the aspect ratio of the plate, size and location of the patch mass on these frequencies are studied. The results are then compared with those reported using the third order shear deformation theory. The findings are found to be in a very good agreement

Effects of multi-scattering on the performance of a single-beam acoustic manipulation device.

The effects of multiple scattering on acoustic manipulation of spherical particles using helicoidal Bessel-beams are discussed. A closed-form analytical solution is developed to calculate the acoustic radiation force resulting from a Bessel-beam on an acoustically reflective sphere, in the presence of an adjacent spherical particle, immersed in an unbounded fluid medium. The solution is based on the standard Fourier decomposition method and the effect of multi-scattering is taken into account using the addition theorem for spherical coordinates. Of particular interest here is the investigation of the effects of multiple scattering on the emergence of negative axial forces. To investigate the effects, the radiation force applied on the target particle resulting from a helicoidal Bessel-beam of different azimuthal indexes (m = 1 to 4), at different conical angles, is computed. Results are presented for soft and rigid spheres of various sizes, separated by a finite distance. Results have shown that the emergence of negative force regions is very sensitive to the level of cross-scattering between the particles. It has also been shown that in multiple scattering media, the negative axial force may occur at much smaller conical angles than previously reported for single particles, and that acoustic manipulation of soft spheres in such media may also become possible

Nonlinear vibration behaviors of dielectric elastomer membranes under multi-frequency excitations

Dielectric elastomers (DEs) are electromechanical systems that play an essential role in designing soft robotic actuators. Due to their flexibility and lightweight, DEs mainly operate in nonlinear regimes and experience nonlinear vibrations in various applications. One of the newly developed stimuli in these actuators is the pumping deformation action due to vibratory response of DEs caused by the sound generation. In this study the nonlinear vibration behavior of a DE membrane under a multi-frequency voltage and a multi-frequency lateral tensile mechanical load is fundamentally investigated. The governing equations of motion are derived using Euler—Lagrange’s equation and solved using the Runge-Kutta method. Numerical calculations are presented in the form of time-history diagrams, phase-plane diagrams, Poincaré sections, and in the frequency domain using fast Fourier transforms. Results reveal that both electrical and mechanical multi-frequency excitations can cause chaos, quasiperiodicity, and torus-doubling phenomena in the system. The multi-frequency excitation can control the effects of the damping in the system. Results also show that multi-frequency excitations may improve the performance of dielectric elastomers, where a higher response amplitude is required. Moreover, the multi-frequency voltage may diminish the required high voltage in dielectric elastomers by adding an extra AC voltage. Torus-doubling bifurcation is also identified, which originated from the application of multi-mode frequency. Results also show that applying two low amplitude AC voltages can achieve a large amplitude vibration response compared to a single frequency high amplitude voltage. The results presented in this paper can thus provide an essential guidance in designing dielectric elastomer membranes under large vibratory deformation with low voltage requirement

New CRLH-Based Planar Slotted Antennas with Helical Inductors for Wireless Communication Systems, RF-Circuits and Microwave Devices at UHF–SHF Bands

Two novel planar slotted-antennas (PSAs) are presented that exhibit good radiation characteristics at the UHF–SHF bands. The proposed antennas are constructed using metamaterial unit-cells constituted from capacitive slots etched in the radiating patch and grounded spiral shaped inductive stubs. The proposed PSA design is fabricated on a commercially available dielectric substrate, i.e. Rogers RO4003 with permittivity of 3.38 and thickness of 1.6 mm. The first PSA comprising five symmetrical unit-cells of slot–inductor–slot configuration operates over a wide bandwidth extending from 1 to 4.2 GHz with a peak gain of 1.5 dBi and efficiency of 35 % at 2 GHz. The second PSA consists of ten asymmetrical unit-cells of slot–inductor configuration on the same size of substrate as the first PSA, enhances the antenna gain by 2 dB and efficiency by 25 % and operates over 0.75–4.5 GHz. The asymmetrical unit-cell effectively increases the aperture size of the antenna without comprising its size. The electrical size of the antenna is 0.083λ0 × 0.033λ0 × 0.005λ0, where free-space wavelength (λ0) is 1 GHz