In vivo Kinetic Biodistribution of Nano‐Sized Outer Membrane Vesicles Derived from Bacteria

Evaluation of kinetic distribution and behaviors of nanoparticles in vivo provides crucial clues into their roles in living organisms. Extracellular vesicles are evolutionary conserved nanoparticles, known to play important biological functions in intercellular, inter‐species, and inter‐kingdom communication. In this study, the first kinetic analysis of the biodistribution of outer membrane vesicles (OMVs)—bacterial extracellular vesicles—with immune‐modulatory functions is performed. OMVs, injected intraperitoneally, spread to the whole mouse body and accumulate in the liver, lung, spleen, and kidney within 3 h of administration. As an early systemic inflammation response, increased levels of TNF‐α and IL‐6 are observed in serum and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid. In addition, the number of leukocytes and platelets in the blood is decreased. OMVs and cytokine concentrations, as well as body temperature are gradually decreased 6 h after OMV injection, in concomitance with the formation of eye exudates, and of an increase in ICAM‐1 levels in the lung. Following OMV elimination, most of the inflammatory signs are reverted, 12 h post‐injection. However, leukocytes in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid are increased as a late reaction. Taken together, these results suggest that OMVs are effective mediators of long distance communication in vivo.     

李楼铁矿溜井料位监测系统的设计与应用

李楼铁矿主溜井未加装料位监测装置时,生产调度部门主要依靠经验和统计计算指挥控制溜井料位,其效率低并存在安全隐患。结合井下通信现状,采用Optech激光物位计设计了一套成本低廉、简单实用、稳定可靠的料位监测系统。该系统经煤矿现场应用,取得了良好的监测效果,提供了准确的信号,为生产科学调度提供了依据。     

Properties and applications of β‐glycosidase from Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron that specifically hydrolyses isoflavone glycosides

To modify the glycan part of glycosides, the gene encoding β‐glycosidase was cloned from Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron VPI‐5482. The cloned gene, bt_1780, was expressed in Escherichia coli MC1061 and the expressed enzyme was purified using Ni‐NTA affinity chromatography. The purified enzyme, BTBG, showed optimal activity at 50 °C and pH 5.5. Interestingly, this enzyme did not have any hydrolysing activity on ordinary β‐linkage–containing substrates such as xylobiose, lactose and cello‐oligosaccharide, but specifically hydrolysed isoflavone glycosides such as daidzin, genistin and glycitin. Compared to a commercial beta glucosidase, BTBG selectively hydrolysed isoflavone glycosides in soybean extract mixture solution. These results suggest that BTBG may be a specialized enzyme for the hydrolysis of glycosides and that the substrate specificity of BTBG is applicable for the bioconversion of isoflavone glycosides in the food industry.     

Corrosion morphology of AZ91D exposed in an atmospheric environment

The focused ion beam technique was employed to investigate the atmospheric corrosion morphology of AZ91D. It was found that the α matrix of the alloy was preferentially corroded in the areas adjacent to intermetallic phases. The most interesting finding was that the corrosion products in corrosion cavities were pelletlike, which has never been reported before.     

Range Assignment for Biconnectivity and k-Edge Connectivity in Wireless Ad Hoc Networks

Depending on whether bidirectional links or unidirectional links are used for communications, the network topology under a given range assignment is either an undirected graph referred to as the bidirectional topology, or a directed graph referred to as the unidirectional topology. The Min-Power Bidirectional (resp., Unidirectional) k-Node Connectivity problem seeks a range assignment of minimum total power subject to the constraint that the produced bidirectional (resp. unidirectional) topology is k-vertex connected. Similarly, the Min-Power Bidirectional (resp., Unidirectional) k-Edge Connectivity problem seeks a range assignment of minimum total power subject to the constraint the produced bidirectional (resp., unidirectional) topology is k-edge connected. The Min-Power Bidirectional Biconnectivity problem and the Min-Power Bidirectional Edge-Biconnectivity problem have been studied by Lloyd et al. [23]. They show that range assignment based the approximation algorithm of Khuller and Raghavachari [18], which we refer to as Algorithm KR, has an approximation ratio of at most 2(2 – 2/n)(2 + 1/n) for Min-Power Bidirectional Biconnectivity, and range assignment based on the approximation algorithm of Khuller and Vishkin [19], which we refer to as Algorithm KV, has an approximation ratio of at most 8(1 – 1/n) for Min-Power Bidirectional Edge-Biconnectivity. In this paper, we first establish the NP-hardness of Min-Power Bidirectional (Edge-) Biconnectivity. Then we show that Algorithm KR has an approximation ratio of at most 4 for both Min-Power Bidirectional Biconnectivity and Min-Power Unidirectional Biconnectivity, and Algorithm KV has an approximation ratio of at most 2k for both Min-Power Bidirectional k-Edge Connectivity and Min-Power Unidirectional k-Edge Connectivity. We also propose a new simple constant-approximation algorithm for both Min-Power Bidirectional Biconnectivity and Min-Power Unidirectional Biconnectivity. This new algorithm applies only to Euclidean instances, but is best suited for distributed implementation. A preliminary version of this work appeared in the proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on AD-HOC Network and Wireless (Adhoc-Now 2003). Research performed in part while visiting the Max-Plank-Institut fur Informatik. Gruia Calinescu is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the Illinois Institute of Technology since 2000. He held postdoc or visiting researcher positions at DIMACS, University of Waterloo, and Max-Plank Institut fur Informatik. Gruia has a Diploma from University of Bucharest and a Ph.D. from Georgia Insitute of Technology. His research interests are in the area of algorithms. Peng-Jun Wan has joined the Computer Science Department at Illinois Institute of Technology in 1997 and has been an Associate Professor since 2004. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from University of Minnesota in 1997, M.S. in Operations Research and Control Theory from Chinese Academy of Science in 1993, and B.S. in Applied Mathematics from Tsinghua University in 1990. His research interests include optical networks and wireless networks.