129 research outputs found
Comparative study of osteogenic activity of multilayers made of synthetic and biogenic polyelectrolytes
Polyelectrolyte multilayer (PEM) coatings on biomaterials are applied to tailor adhesion, growth, and function of cells on biomedical implants. Here, biogenic and synthetic polyelectrolytes (PEL) are used for layer-by-layer assembly to study the osteogenic activity of PEM with human osteosarcoma MG-63 cells in a comparative manner. Formation of PEM is achieved with biogenic PEL fibrinogen (FBG) and poly-l-lysine (PLL) as well as biotinylated chondroitin sulfate (BCS) and avidin (AVI), while poly(allylamine hydrochloride) (PAH) and polystyrene sulfonate (PSS) represent a fully synthetic PEM used as a reference system here. Surface plasmon resonance measurements show highest layer mass for FBG/PLL and similar for PSS/PAH and BCS/AVI systems, while water contact angle and zeta potential measurements indicate larger differences for PSS/PAH and FBG/PLL but not for BCS/AVI multilayers. All PEM systems support cell adhesion and growth and promote osteogenic differentiation as well. However, FBG/PLL layers are superior regarding MG-63 cell adhesion during short-term culture, while the BCS/AVI system increases alkaline phosphatase activity in long-term culture. Particularly, a multilayer system based on affinity interaction like BCS/AVI may be useful for controlled presentation of biotinylated growth factors to promote growth and differentiation of cells for biomedical applications
Transport and thermoelectric properties of the LaAlO/SrTiO interface
The transport and thermoelectric properties of the interface between
SrTiO and a 26-monolayer thick LaAlO-layer grown at high
oxygen-pressure have been investigated at temperatures from 4.2 K to 100 K and
in magnetic fields up to 18 T. For 4.2 K, two different electron-like
charge carriers originating from two electron channels which contribute to
transport are observed. We probe the contributions of a degenerate and a
non-degenerate band to the thermoelectric power and develop a consistent model
to describe the temperature dependence of the thermoelectric tensor. Anomalies
in the data point to an additional magnetic field dependent scattering.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figure
Real-time Measurement of Stress and Damage Evolution During Initial Lithiation of Crystalline Silicon
Crystalline to amorphous phase transformation during initial lithiation in
(100) silicon-wafers is studied in an electrochemical cell with lithium metal
as the counter and reference electrode. It is demonstrated that severe stress
jumps across the phase boundary lead to fracture and damage, which is an
essential consideration in designing silicon based anodes for lithium ion
batteries. During initial lithiation, a moving phase boundary advances into the
wafer starting from the surface facing the lithium electrode, transforming
crystalline silicon into amorphous LixSi. The resulting biaxial compressive
stress in the amorphous layer is measured in situ and it was observed to be ca.
0.5 GPa. HRTEM images reveal that the crystalline-amorphous phase boundary is
very sharp, with a thickness of ~ 1 nm. Upon delithiation, the stress rapidly
reverses, becomes tensile and the amorphous layer begins to deform plastically
at around 0.5 GPa. With continued delithiation, the yield stress increases in
magnitude, culminating in sudden fracture of the amorphous layer into
micro-fragments and the cracks extend into the underlying crystalline silicon.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figure
Stress Evolution in Composite Silicon Electrodes during Lithiation/Delithiation
We report real-time average stress measurements on composite silicon
electrodes made with two different binders [Carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC), and
polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF)] during electrochemical lithiation and
delithiation. During galvanostatic lithiation at very slow rates, the stress in
a CMC-based electrode becomes compressive and increases to 70 MPa, where it
reaches a plateau and increases slowly thereafter with capacity. The PVDF-based
electrode exhibits similar behavior, although with lower peak compressive
stress of about 12 MPa. These initial experiments indicate that the stress
evolution in a Si composite electrode depends strongly on the mechanical
properties of the binder. Stress data obtained from a series of
lithiation/delithiation cycles suggests plasticity induced irreversible shape
changes in contacting Si particles, and as a result, the stress response of the
system during any given lithiation/delithiation cycle depends on the cycling
history of the electrode. While these results constitute the first in-situ
stress measurements on composite Si electrodes during electrochemical cycling,
the diagnostic technique described herein can be used to assess the mechanical
response of a composite electrode made with other active material/binder
combinations.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure
Probing the surface states in Bi2Se3 using the Shubnikov-de Haas effect
Shubnikov-de Haas (SdH) oscillations are observed in Bi2Se3 flakes with high
carrier concentration and low bulk mobility. These oscillations probe the
protected surface states and enable us to extract their carrier concentration,
effective mass and Dingle temperature. The Fermi momentum obtained is in
agreement with angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) measurements
performed on crystals from the same batch. We study the behavior of the Berry
phase as a function of magnetic field. The standard theoretical considerations
fail to explain the observed behavior.Comment: 6 pages, 8 figures. Accepted to Physical Review
Stress Inducible Overexpression of AtHDG11 Leads to Improved Drought and Salt Stress Tolerance in Peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.)
Peanut is an important oilseed and food legume cultivated as a rain-fed crop in semi-arid tropics. Drought and high salinity are the major abiotic stresses limiting the peanut productivity in this region. Development of drought and salt tolerant peanut varieties with improved yield potential using biotechnological approach is highly desirable to improve the peanut productivity in marginal geographies. As abiotic stress tolerance and yield represent complex traits, engineering of regulatory genes to produce abiotic stress-resilient transgenic crops appears to be a viable approach. In the present study, we developed transgenic peanut plants expressing an Arabidopsis homeodomain-leucine zipper transcription factor (AtHDG11) under stress inducible rd29A promoter. A stress-inducible expression of AtHDG11 in three independent homozygous transgenic peanut lines resulted in improved drought and salt tolerance through up-regulation of known stress responsive genes (LEA, HSP70, Cu/Zn SOD, APX, P5CS, NCED1, RRS5, ERF1, NAC4, MIPS, Aquaporin, TIP, ELIP) in the stress gene network, antioxidative enzymes, free proline along with improved water use efficiency traits such as longer root system, reduced stomatal density, higher chlorophyll content, increased specific leaf area, improved photosynthetic rates, and increased intrinsic instantaneous WUE. Transgenic peanut plants displayed high yield compared to non-transgenic plants under both drought and salt stress conditions. Holistically, our study demonstrates the potentiality of stress-induced expression of AtHDG11 to improve the drought, salt tolerance in peanut
RNA Sequencing of Human Peripheral Nerve in Response to Injury: Distinctive Analysis of the Nerve Repair Pathways
The development of regenerative therapies for central nervous system diseases can likely benefit from an understanding of the peripheral nervous system repair process, particularly in identifying potential gene pathways involved in human nerve repair. This study employed RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) technology to analyze the whole transcriptome profile of the human peripheral nerve in response to an injury. The distal sural nerve was exposed, completely transected, and a 1 to 2 cm section of nerve fascicles was collected for RNA-seq from six participants with Parkinson\u27s disease, ranging in age between 53 and 70 yr. Two weeks after the initial injury, another section of the nerve fascicles of the distal and pre-degenerated stump of the nerve was dissected and processed for RNA-seq studies. An initial analysis between the pre-lesion status and the postinjury gene expression revealed 3,641 genes that were significantly differentially expressed. In addition, the results support a clear transdifferentiation process that occurred by the end of the 2-wk postinjury. Gene ontology (GO) and hierarchical clustering were used to identify the major signaling pathways affected by the injury. In contrast to previous nonclinical studies, important changes were observed in molecular pathways related to antiapoptotic signaling, neurotrophic factor processes, cell motility, and immune cell chemotactic signaling. The results of our current study provide new insights regarding the essential interactions of different molecular pathways that drive neuronal repair and axonal regeneration in humans
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