Nanoshells with Targeted Simultaneous Enhancement of Magnetic and Optical Imaging and Photothermal Therapeutic Response

Integrating multiple functionalities into individual nanoscale complexes is of tremendous importance in biomedicine, expanding the capabilities of nanoscale structures to perform multiple parallel tasks. Here, the ability to enhance two different imaging technologies simultaneously—fluorescence optical imaging and magnetic resonance imaging—with antibody targeting and photothermal therapeutic actuation is combined all within the same nanoshell‐based complex. The nanocomplexes are constructed by coating a gold nanoshell with a silica epilayer doped with Fe₃O₄ and the fluorophore ICG, which results in a high T₂ relaxivity (390 mM ^?1 s^?1) and 45× fluorescence enhancement of ICG. Bioconjugate nanocomplexes target HER2+ cells and induce photothermal cell death upon near‐IR illumination.     

Organic Phenolic Configurationally Locked Polyene Single Crystals for Electro‐optic and Terahertz Wave Applications

We investigate a configurationally locked polyene (CLP) crystal 2‐(3‐(4‐hydroxystyryl)‐5,5‐dimethylcyclohex‐2‐enylidene)malononitrile (OH1) containing a phenolic electron donor, which also acts as a hydrogen bond donor. The OH1 crystals with orthorhombic space group Pna2₁ (point group mm2) exhibit large second‐order nonlinear optical figures of merit, high thermal stability and very favorable crystal growth characteristics. Higher solubility in methanol and a larger temperature difference between the melting temperature and the decomposition temperature of OH1 compared to analogous CLP crystals, are of advantage for solution and melt crystal growth, respectively. Acentric bulk OH1 crystals of large sizes with side lengths of up to 1 cm with excellent optical quality have been successfully grown from methanol solution. The microscopic and macroscopic nonlinearities of the OH1 crystals are investigated theoretically and experimentally. The OH1 crystals exhibit a large macroscopic nonlinearity with four times larger powder second harmonic generation efficiency than that of analogous CLP crystals containing dimethylamino electron donor. A very high potential of OH1 crystals for broadband THz wave emitters in the full frequency range of 0.1–3 THz by optical rectification of 160 fs pulses has been demonstrated.     

Modulation of rheological properties by heat-induced aggregation of whey protein solution

Heat-induced protein aggregation at low protein concentrations generally leads to higher viscosities. We here report that aggregated protein can yield weaker gels than those from native protein at the same concentration. Aggregated protein was produced by heating a solution of whey protein isolate (WPI) at 3% and 9% w/w. The higher protein concentration resulted in a larger aggregate size and a higher intrinsic viscosity. The protein fraction in native WPI had the smallest size and the lowest intrinsic viscosity. The same trend was observed for the shear viscosity after concentrating the suspensions containing aggregates to around 15% w/w. Suspensions containing aggregates that were produced from a higher concentration possessed a higher viscosity. After reheating the concentrated suspensions, the suspension from the 9% w/w aggregate system produced the weakest gel, followed by the one from 3% w/w, while the native WPI yielded the strongest gel. Reactivity of the aggregates was also an important factor that influenced the resulting gel properties. We conclude that aggregation of whey protein solution is a feasible route to manipulate the gel strength of concentrated protein systems, without having to alter the concentration of the protein.     

Safety and Environmental Activities for ITER

This paper will summarize highlights of the safety approach and discuss the ITER EDA safety activities. The ITER safety approach is driven by three major objectives: (1) Enhancement or improvement of fusion's intrinsic safety characteristics to the maximum extent feasible, which includes a minimization of the dependence on dedicated safety systems; (2) Selection of conservative design parameters and development of a robust design to accommodate uncertainties in plasma physics as well as the lack of operational experience and data; and (3) Integration of engineered mitigation systems to enhance the safety assurance against potentially hazardous inventories in the device by deploying well-established nuclear safety approaches and methodologies tailored as appropriate for ITER.     

Experimental assessment of grinding bead velocity distributions and stressing conditions in stirred media mills

Fine grinding in stirred media mills is an important process in mineral, chemical and pharmaceutical industry. The stressing mechanism in these mills is grinding through compression and shearing by grinding beads. A few studies have examined grinding bead transport in stirred media mills. Radiometric methods detect the local filling degree, but little is known about the experimental motion of the grinding beads in the mill. This study aims to investigate the position, velocity and radial circulation of individual grinding beads at different operation parameters (viscosity and tip speed) by a fast and inexpensive measurement technique. Additional information about stresses in the mill were derived, such as a relation between axial grinding media distribution and grinding bead velocity. As a result, the two investigated operation parameter (viscosity and tip speed) effect the grinding bead velocity and grinding bead transport in the mill. The mentioned results can be used to validate DEM simulation results.     

Case diagnosis as positive identification in prostatic neoplasia

OBJECTIVE: To apply a distance measure and Bayesian belief network-based methodology to the positive identification of case diagnosis in prostatic neoplasia. STUDY DESIGN: Eight morphologic and cellular features were analyzed in 20 cases of normal prostate, 20 of low grade prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PIN), 20 of high grade PIN, 20 of prostatic adenocarcinoma with a cribriform pattern and 20 of prostatic adenocarcinoma with an acinar pattern. The diagnostic distance was evaluated to measure the "extent" to which the feature outcomes of the individual cases differed from the expected profile of outcomes in typical cases of normal prostate, low and high grade PIN, and cribriform and large acinar adenocarcinoma. Belief values were evaluated with a Bayesian belief network (BBN). RESULTS: A bivariate representation of the cumulative absolute diagnostic distances of all the cases from the prototypes of normal prostate and cribriform adenocarcinoma was made. Three separate groups of cases were observed, corresponding to normal prostate, low grade PIN and cribriform adenocarcinoma. An additional group was formed by the cases of high grade PIN and acinar adenocarcinoma--i.e., there was complete overlap between the diagnostic distance values of cases belonging to these two categories. However, these cases showed differences in clue outcomes. To explore the contribution of such observations to case identification, a bivariate representation of the diagnostic distances from high grade PIN and acinar adenocarcinoma was made. The cases then formed five separate groups corresponding to the five diagnostic categories. When the individual cases were considered, their shortest distance was from the prototype of the category into which they were originally diagnosed. The BBN gave these diagnostic categories the highest belief values. CONCLUSION: The combined evaluation of diagnostic distance and belief represents an identification procedure. The numeric value of certainty characterizes individual cases according to the level of progression from PIN toward cancer.     

The dynamics of spatial labor mobility in the Netherlands

"This paper discusses several factors that may explain [the] dynamic properties of internal labor migration. [The authors] focus especially on the influence of labor market and housing conditions on the mobility of people. A two-stage, generation-allocation model is proposed to investigate the role of different factors in the explanation of aggregate interregional migration flows. This model is applied to recent data on interprovincial labor migration in the Netherlands. The results indicate that housing supply seems to be an important determinant of temporal developments of spatial mobility, and that also the conditions on national and regional labor markets are associated with specific properties of recent migration patterns."     

德国的风景园林

风景园林学科在德国已有悠久的发展历史。早期“古典主义”的大部分作品保留完好,如文艺复兴时期巴洛克、洛可可式公园,其中有些甚至是联合国教科文组织世界遗产。80多年前,在德国大学中已经创建了风景园林专业这门学科。今天共有16所大学,技术学院或应用科学大学,都设有风景园林、风景园林设计和风景园林规划专业。自1954年开始,德国风景园林师协会(BDLA)作为国际风景园林师联合会(IFLA)的成员国,一直享有很高的声誉。1977年德国风景园林师协会设立“德国风景园林奖”。该奖项每两年由选出的独立评委会从德国近五年内杰出的项目评出两个大奖和八个荣誉奖。得奖的作品都具有很高的社会和生态价值,同时在美学上是令人信服和创新的。本文介绍了获得2003年和2005年德国风景园林奖的各个作品。它们是德国风景园林设计和规划领域目前最好的实例,从而很好地反映了德国风景园林行业现在的工作领域。