Investigation of the stresses in continuous thin films and patterned lines by x-ray diffraction

Strains and stresses in aluminum thin films and patterned lines were measured using x-ray diffraction. Measurements were performed on pure aluminum and on ion-implanted aluminum, as annealed and six months after an annealing treatment. The results suggest that stresses in passivated lines, starting from an unequitriaxial state of stress, show the tendency to relax in the direction of an equitriaxial state of stress, depending on the ratio of grain size and linewidth or film thickness. The relaxation is particularly rapid in ion-implanted aluminum lines, in contradiction to the expected strengthening effect. Possible implications for electromigration resistance are discussed

Drift-diffusion of highly mobile dopants in CdTe

The diffusion of Ag in CdTe exhibits anomalous concentration profiles, which essentially reflect the profile of the deviation from stoichiometry. At a diffusion temperature of about 800 K, the Ag dopant atoms are present as charged interstitials. The deviation from stoichiometry at diffusion temperature substantially changes upon an external source of Cd atoms. Such an external source can be represented either by the vapor pressure from metallic Cd or by a Cd layer arising at the interface to an evaporated layer of Cu or Au. Also, the Co diffusion in CdZnTe is shown to be strongly affected by the presence of an external vapor pressure of Cd, but in a substantially different way compared to the Ag diffusion in CdTe

Porin from the halophilic species Ectothiorhodospira vacuolata: cloning, structure of the gene and comparison with other porins

The gene coding for the anion-specific porin of the halophilic eubacterium Ectothiorhodospira (Ect.) vacuolata was cloned and sequenced, the first such gene so analyzed from a purple sulfur bacterium. It encodes a precursor protein consisting of 374 amino acid (aa)-residues including a signal peptide of 22-aa residues. Comparison with aa sequences of porins from several other members of the Proteobacteria revealed little homology. Only two regions showed local homology with the previously sequenced porins of Neisseria species, Comamonas acidovorans, Bordetella pertussis, Alcaligenes eutrophus, and Burkholderia cepacia. Genomic Southern blot hybridization studies were carried out with a probe derived from the 5′ end of the gene coding for the porin of Ect. vacuolata. Two related species, Ect. haloalkaliphila and Ect. shaposhnikovii, exhibited a clear signal, while the extremely halophilic bacterium Halorhodospira (Hlr.) halophila (formerly Ect. halophila) did not show any cross-hybridization even at low stringency. This result is in good accordance with a recently proposed reassignment within the family Ectothiorhodospiraceae, which included the separation of the extremely halophilic species into the new genus Halorhodospira

What Can Surrogate Tissues Tell Us about the Oxidative Stress Status of the Prostate? A Hypothesis-Generating In-Vivo Study

BACKGROUND: Prostatic oxidative stress (OS) is androgen-regulated and a key event in the development of prostate cancer (PC). Thus, reducing prostatic OS is an attractive target for PC prevention strategies. We sought to determine if the individual's prostatic OS status can be determined by examining the OS in surrogate androgen regulated tissues from the same host. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Adult male rats were divided equally into three groups: (A-) underwent bilateral orchiectomy, (A+) received continuous testosterone supplementation or (C) were eugonadal. Serum testosterone, 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine (8-OHdG) and anti-oxidative capacity (AOC) were determined after 72 hrs and the prostate, salivary glands and the hair follicles' Dermal Papillary Cells (DPC) from each animal were harvested, embedded into tissue microarray and examined for the expression of 8-OHdG by immuno-staining. Multi-variate regression was used to analyze inter-individual differences in OS staining within each androgen group and if there was a correlation between serum testosterone, 8-OHdG or AOC and Prostatic OS in tissues of same host. At the group level, 8-OHdG staining intensity directly correlated with serum testosterone levels in all three target tissues (p>0.01, Mann-Whitney Test). Although different levels of prostatic OS were noted between rats with similar serum testosterone levels and similar systemic OS measurements (p<0.01), there were no intra-individual differences between the OS status of the prostate and DPC (p<0.05). CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: The level of prostatic OS is correlated with the OS of hair follicles and salivary glands, but not systemic OS. Moreover, systemic AOC negatively correlates with both prostatic and hair follicle OS. This suggests that hair follicle and salivary gland OS can serve as surrogate markers for the efficiency of OS reduction. This has tremendous potential for the rational evaluation of patient response to prevention strategies

Does compulsory voting increase support for leftist policy?

Citizens unequally participate in referendums, and this may systematically bias policy in favor of those who vote. Some view compulsory voting as an important tool to alleviate this problem, whereas others worry about its detrimental effects on the legitimacy and quality of democratic decision making. So far, however, we lack systematic knowledge about the causal effect of compulsory voting on public policy. We argue that sanctioned compulsory voting mobilizes citizens at the bottom of the income distribution and that this translates into an increase in support for leftist policies. We empirically explore the effects of a sanctioned compulsory voting law on direct-democratic decision making in Switzerland. We find that compulsory voting significantly increases electoral support for leftist policy positions in referendums by up to 20 percentage points. We discuss the implications of these results for our understanding of the policy consequences of electoral institutions