Optimization of Sunflower Oil Transesterification Process Using Sodium Methoxide

In this study, the methanolysis process of sunflower oil was investigated to get high methyl esters (biodiesel) content using sodium methoxide. To reach to the best process conditions, central composite design (CCD) through response surface methodology (RSM) was employed. The optimal conditions predicted were the reaction time of 60 min, an excess stoichiometric amount of alcohol to oil ratio of 25%w/w and the catalyst content of 0.5%w/w, which lead to the highest methyl ester content (100%w/w). The methyl ester content of the mixture from gas chromatography analysis (GC) was compared to that of optimum point. Results, confirmed that there was no significant difference between the fatty acid methyl ester content of sunflower oil produced under the optimized condition and the experimental value (P ≥ 0.05). Furthermore, some fuel specifications of the resultant biodiesel were tested according to American standards for testing of materials (ASTM) methods. The outcome showed that the methyl ester mixture produced from the optimized condition met nearly most of the important biodiesel specifications recommended in ASTM D 6751 requirements. Thus, the sunflower oil methyl esters resulted from this study could be a suitable alternative for petrol diesels

Use of proteasome inhibitors in anticancer therapy

The importance of the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway to cellular function has brought it to the forefront in the search for new anticancer therapies. The ubiquitin-proteasome pathway has proven promising in targeting various human cancers. The approval of the proteasome inhibitor bortezomib for clinical treatment of relapsed/refractory multiple myeloma and mantle cell lymphoma has validated the ubiquitin-proteasome as a rational target. Bortezomib has shown positive results in clinical use but some toxicity and side effects, as well as resistance, have been observed, indicating that further development of novel, less toxic drugs is necessary. Because less toxic drugs are necessary and drug development can be expensive and time-consuming, using existing drugs that can target the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway in new applications, such as cancer therapy, may be effective in expediting the regulatory process and bringing new drugs to the clinic. Toward this goal, previously approved drugs, such as disulfiram, as well as natural compounds found in common foods, such as green tea polyphenol (-)-EGCG and the flavonoid apigenin, have been investigated for their possible proteasome inhibitory and cell death inducing abilities. These compounds proved quite promising in preclinical studies and have now moved into clinical trials, with preliminary results that are encouraging. In addition to targeting the catalytic activity of the proteasome pathway, upstream regulators, such as the 19S regulatory cap, as well as E1, E2, and E3, are now being investigated as potential drug targets. This review outlines the development of novel proteasome inhibitors from preclinical to clinical studies, highlighting their abilities to inhibit the tumor proteasome and induce apoptosis in several human cancers

Measurement-Based Noiseless Linear Amplification for Quantum Communication

Entanglement distillation is an indispensable ingredient in extended quantum communication networks. Distillation protocols are necessarily non-deterministic and require advanced experimental techniques such as noiseless amplification. Recently it was shown that the benefits of noiseless amplification could be extracted by performing a post-selective filtering of the measurement record to improve the performance of quantum key distribution. We apply this protocol to entanglement degraded by transmission loss of up to the equivalent of 100km of optical fibre. We measure an effective entangled resource stronger than that achievable by even a maximally entangled resource passively transmitted through the same channel. We also provide a proof-of-principle demonstration of secret key extraction from an otherwise insecure regime. The measurement-based noiseless linear amplifier offers two advantages over its physical counterpart: ease of implementation and near optimal probability of success. It should provide an effective and versatile tool for a broad class of entanglement-based quantum communication protocols.Comment: 7+3 pages, 5+1 figures, close to published versio

When does activism benefit well-being? Evidence from a longitudinal study of Clinton voters in the 2016 U.S. presidential election

Contrary to the expectations of many, Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The initial shock to her supporters turned into despair for most, but not everyone was affected equally. We draw from the literature on political activism, identity, and self-other overlap in predicting that not all Clinton voters would be equivalently crushed by her loss. Specifically, we hypothesize that pre-election measures of political activism, and level of self-other identification between participants and Clinton-that is, how much a person was "with her"-will interact to predict the level of distress of Clinton voters two months later. Longitudinal data support our hypothesis. Notably, among Clinton voters, greater activism negatively predicted depressive symptoms, and positively predicted sleep quality, but only when participants were highly identified with Clinton. We discuss the implications of the results for theory and research on social action and well-being

Violation of Bells inequality using continuous variable measurements

A Bell inequality is a fundamental test to rule out local hidden variable model descriptions of correlations between two physically separated systems. There have been a number of experiments in which a Bell inequality has been violated using discrete-variable systems. We demonstrate a violation of Bells inequality using continuous variable quadrature measurements. By creating a four-mode entangled state with homodyne detection, we recorded a clear violation with a Bell value of $B = 2.31 \pm 0.02$. This opens new possibilities for using continuous variable states for device independent quantum protocols.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, lette

TRiP: Tracking Rhythms in Plants, an Automated Leaf Movement Analysis Program for Circadian Period Estimation

Background: A well characterized output of the circadian clock in plants is the daily rhythmic movement of leaves. This process has been used extensively in Arabidopsis to estimate circadian period in natural accessions as well as mutants with known defects in circadian clock function. Current methods for estimating circadian period by leaf movement involve manual steps throughout the analysis and are often limited to analyzing one leaf or cotyledon at a time. Methods: In this study, we describe the development of TRiP (Tracking Rhythms in Plants), a new method for estimating circadian period using a motion estimation algorithm that can be applied to whole plant images. To validate this new method, we apply TRiP to a Recombinant Inbred Line (RIL) population in Arabidopsis using our high-throughput imaging platform. We begin imaging at the cotyledon stage and image through the emergence of true leaves. TRiP successfully tracks the movement of cotyledons and leaves without the need to select individual leaves to be analyzed

Experimental demonstration of Gaussian protocols for one-sided device-independent quantum key distribution

Nonlocal correlations, a longstanding foundational topic in quantum information, have recently found application as a resource for cryptographic tasks where not all devices are trusted, for example in settings with a highly secure central hub, such as a bank or government department, and less secure satellite stations which are inherently more vulnerable to hardware "hacking" attacks. The asymmetric phenomena of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering plays a key role in one-sided device-independent quantum key distribution (1sDI-QKD) protocols. In the context of continuous-variable (CV) QKD schemes utilizing Gaussian states and measurements, we identify all protocols that can be 1sDI and their maximum loss tolerance. Surprisingly, this includes a protocol that uses only coherent states. We also establish a direct link between the relevant EPR steering inequality and the secret key rate, further strengthening the relationship between these asymmetric notions of nonlocality and device independence. We experimentally implement both entanglement-based and coherent-state protocols, and measure the correlations necessary for 1sDI key distribution up to an applied loss equivalent to 7.5 km and 3.5 km of optical fiber transmission respectively. We also engage in detailed modelling to understand the limits of our current experiment and the potential for further improvements. The new protocols we uncover apply the cheap and efficient hardware of CVQKD systems in a significantly more secure setting.Comment: Addition of experimental results and (several) new author

Gold(III)-Dithiocarbamato Peptidomimetics in the Forefront of the Targeted Anticancer Therapy: Preclinical Studies against Human Breast Neoplasia

Since the serendipitous discovery of cisplatin, platinum-based drugs have become well-established antitumor agents, despite the fact that their clinical use is limited by many severe side-effects. In order to both improve the chemotherapeutic index and broaden the therapeutic spectrum of current drugs, our most recent anti-neoplastic agents, Au(III) complexes, were designed as carrier-mediated delivery systems exploiting peptide transporters, which are up-regulated in some cancers. Among all, we focused on two compounds and tested them on human MDA-MB-231 (resistant to cisplatin) breast cancer cell cultures and xenografts, discovering the proteasome as a major target both in vitro and in vivo. 53% inhibition of breast tumor growth in mice was observed after 27 days of treatment at 1.0 mg kgSUP−1 dSUP−1, compared to control. Remarkably, if only the most responsive mice are taken into account, 85% growth inhibition, with some animals showing tumor shrinkage, was observed after 13 days. These results led us to file an international patent, recognizing this class of gold(III) peptidomimetics as suitable candidates for entering phase I clinical trials

Expression profiling of the RPE in zebrafish smarca4 mutant revealed altered signals that potentially affect RPE and retinal differentiation

Purpose The purpose of this study was to develop a framework for analyzing retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) expression profiles from zebrafish eye mutants. Methods: The fish model we used was SWI/SNF-related, matrix associated, actin dependent regulator of chromatin, subfamily a, member 4 (smarca4), a retinal dystrophic mutant with a previously described retinal phenotype and expression profiles. Histological and Affymetrix GeneChip analyses were conducted to characterize the RPE defects and underlying differential expression, respectively. Results: Histological analysis revealed that smarca4 RPE was formed, but its differentiation was abnormal. In particular, ultrastructural analysis of smarca4 RPE by transmission electron microscopy demonstrated several defects in melanogenesis. The nature of these defects also suggests that the cytoskeletal dynamics, which are tightly linked with melanogenesis, were impaired in smarca4 RPE. To compare the expression profile of normal wild-type (WT) and smarca4 RPE, the gene expression profiles of microdissected retinas and RPE-attached retinas were measured with Affymetrix GeneChip analysis. The RPE expression values were then estimated from these samples by subtracting the retinal expression values from the expression values of the RPE-attached retinas. A factorial analysis was conducted using the expression values of the RPE, retinal, and whole-embryo samples. Specific rules (contrasts) were built using the coefficients of the resulting fitted models to select for three groups of genes: 1) smarca4-regulated RPE genes, 2) smarca4-regulated retinal genes, and 3) smarca4-regulated RPE genes that are not differentially expressed in the retina. Interestingly, the third group consists of 39 genes that are highly related to cytoskeletal dynamics, melanogenesis, and paracrine and intracellular signal transduction. Conclusions: Our analytical framework provides an experimental approach to identify differentially-regulated genes in the retina and the RPE of zebrafish mutants in which both of these tissues are affected by the underlying mutation. Specifically, we have used the method to identify a group of 39 genes that can potentially explain the melanogenesis defect in the smarca4 RPE. In addition, several genes in this group are secreted signaling molecules. Thus, this observation further implicates that the smarca4 RPE might play a role in the retinal dystrophic phenotype in smarca4