Heartwood and sapwood in eucalyptus trees: non-conventional approach to wood quality

ABSTRACT This study evaluated the quality of heartwood and sapwood from mature trees of three species of Eucalyptus, by means of the qualification of their proportion, determination of basic and apparent density using non-destructive attenuation of gamma radiation technique and calculation of the density uniformity index. Six trees of each species (Eucalyptus grandis - 18 years old, Eucalyptus tereticornis - 35 years old and Corymbia citriodora - 28 years old) were used in the experimental program. The heartwood and sapwood were delimited by macroscopic analysis and the calculation of areas and percentage of heartwood and sapwood were performed using digital image. The uniformity index was calculated following methodology which numerically quantifies the dispersion of punctual density values of the wood around the mean density along the radius. The percentage of the heartwood was higher than the sapwood in all species studied. The density results showed no statistical difference between heartwood and sapwood. Differently from the density results, in all species studied there was statistical differences between uniformity indexes for heartwood and sapwood regions, making justifiable the inclusion of the density uniformity index as a quality parameter for Eucalyptus wood

Renal perfusion evaluation by alternating current biosusceptometry of magnetic nanoparticles

a b s t r a c t Alternating current susceptometry, a simple and affordable technique, was employed to study the sensitivity of this approach to assess rat kidney perfusion by the injection of 200 μL of magnetic nanoparticles with a concentration of 23 mg/mL in the femoral vein and the measurement of the signal above the kidney. The instrument was able to detect the signal and the transit time of the first and second pass were measured in five animals with average values of 13.67 4.3 s and 20.6 7 7.1 s