Porous Gold with a Nested‐Network Architecture and Ultrafine Structure

A preparation strategy is developed for monolithic samples of nanoporous gold with a hierarchical structure comprising two nested networks of solid “ligaments” on distinctly different structural length scales. The electrochemical dealloying protocol achieves a large retention of less noble element in a first corrosion step, thereby allowing an extra corrosion step which forms a separate structural hierarchy level. The beneficial impact of adding Pt to the Ag–Au master alloys that are more conventionally used in dealloying approaches to nanoporous gold is demonstrated. At ≈6 nm, the lower hierarchy level ligament size emerges extremely small. Furthermore, Pt favors the retention of Ag during the first dealloying step even when the master alloy has a high Au content. The high Au content reduces the corrosion‐induced shrinkage, mitigating crack formation during preparation and favoring the formation of high‐quality macroscopic (mm‐sized) samples. The corrosion effectively carves out the nanoscale hierarchical ligament structure from the parent crystals tens of micrometers in size. This is revealed by X‐ray as well as electron backscatter diffraction, which shows that the porous crystallites inherit the highly ordered, macroscopic crystal lattice structure of the master alloy.     

Co and Fe Catalysed Fischer–Tropsch Synthesis in Biofuel Production

Synthesis of liquid biofuels from synthesis gas is considered. A series of Co, Co/Ru and Fe catalysts supported by three Al₂O₃ based supports were prepared and tested for the Fischer–Tropsch (FT) reaction. The effects of supports and precursor salts on the activity of the catalysts were studied in the hydrogenation of CO using H₂/CO in a ratio of 2:1. The most active catalysts were tested with gas mixture having a composition close to synthesis gas derived by gasification of biomass. The combination of precursor salt and support is significant in order to get an active catalyst. Cobalt-based catalysts with traces of ruthenium on a small particle support proved to be the most active in the production of hydrocarbons with FT reaction.     

H2AX,MDM2 AND P53 PHOSPHORYLATION ARE DIFFERENTLY AFFECTED BY BAY- AND FJORD-REGION DIOL EPOXIDES DERIVED FROM CARCINOGENIC POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC HYDROCARBONS

The human lung cancer cell line A549 was exposed to diol epoxides (DEs) and the effect on DNA damage signaling proteins was studied. The DEs used were derived from the bay-region PAHs chrysene; CDE and dibenz[a,h]anthracene; DBADE, or the fjord-region PAHs benzo[c]chrysene; B[c]CDE, benzo[g]chrysene; B[g]CDE and benzo[c]phenanthrene; B[c]PhDE. All DEs induced a rapid response on Mdm2, p53 and histone H2AX phosphorylation, where Mdm2 was the most sensitive marker of DNA damage. Fjord-region DEs induced a stronger and more persistent effect on the proteins studied than the bay-region DEs. This variance is likely to reflect differences in adduct recognition and handling by nucleotide excision repair. The stimulating effect of DEs on histone H2AX phosphorylation demonstrated that, in addition to DNA strand breaks and UV-induced photoproducts, stable and bulky DNA-adducts also possess this capacity.     

Day‐length effects on protein localisation affect water absorption in barley (Hordeum vulgare) grains

BACKGROUND: Hordeins are major storage proteins of barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) grains and are considered to influence malting and brewing by forming a matrix surrounding the starch granules which affects the release of fermentable sugars. However, the extent to which environmental factors affect hordein location, and the impact of this on malting performance, have not so far been studied. Therefore the relationship of hordein location to water uptake and malting quality were studied by growing barley cv. Barke under different daylengths (14 h and 18 h of light) in controlled environment conditions. RESULTS: Differences in the locations of hordein storage proteins were observed, with C hordein being located more deeply within the endosperm of both developing grains at 35 days after anthesis and in mature grains under long‐day conditions. This deeper location of C hordein was correlated positively with water uptake during the steeping phase of malting. CONCLUSION: An effect of environment (daylength) on the localisation of C hordein was demonstrated. This difference in hordein localisation was also associated with differences in malting quality with water uptake in the steeping phase being associated positively with the deeper location of C hordein. These results indicate that environmental effects on protein location may affect malting performance of barley grains. Copyright © 2012 Society of Chemical Industry     

External sources of individual differences? A cross-linguistic analysis of the phonetics of mothers' speech to 1-yr-old children.

Wide individual differences in early word production characterize children learning the same language, but the role of specific adult input in this interchild variability is unknown. Sampling the speech of American, French, and Swedish mothers (5 in each language group) to their 1-yr-old children, this study analyzed the distribution of consonantal categories, word length, and final consonants in running speech, content words, initial consonant of content words, and target words (adult models of words attempted by the children) as well as the children's own early words (from age 9 mo to about 18 mo). Variability is greater in child words than adult speech, and individual mother–child dyads show no evidence of specific maternal influence on the phonetics of the child's speech. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Index for volume 18

The focus of the article is on small single‐family houses (omakoti) and their status and significance in interwar Finnish urban planning and the social situation at the time. The idea of omakoti, its international points of contact and practical implementation are viewed through the work of the architect Otto‐Iivari Meurman (1890–1994) as a planner of small Finnish towns. Meurman graduated on the eve of the First World War in 1914. After assisting in the office of Eliel Saarinen, Meurman worked as the town planning architect of Viipuri from 1918 to 1937. Later he became the first professor of town planning in the Nordic countries and maybe the most influential planner in twentieth‐century Finland. The newly independent Finland experienced a traumatic Civil War in 1918. The article shows how after the war single‐family houses and home‐ownership were regarded as bearers of social stability and as signs of loyal citizens in the Finnish housing discussion. For Meurman, residential areas were central to the development of society. A nuclear family with children living in a single‐family house surrounded by a garden was the normative unit of society for Meurman. His work as a planner gives an opportunity to outline how omakoti became a symbol of the good life and stable society in interwar Finland. Finnish architects sought housing models from Sweden, Germany and the UK. The importance for Meurman of Garden City ideas lay in their flexibility to be used as a way of promoting single‐family housing.     

Prediction of Chronic Inflammation for Inhaled Particles: the Impact of Material Cycling and Quarantining in the Lung Epithelium

On a daily basis, people are exposed to a multitude of health-hazardous airborne particulate matter with notable deposition in the fragile alveolar region of the lungs. Hence, there is a great need for identification and prediction of material-associated diseases, currently hindered due to the lack of in-depth understanding of causal relationships, in particular between acute exposures and chronic symptoms. By applying advanced microscopies and omics to in vitro and in vivo systems, together with in silico molecular modeling, it is determined herein that the long-lasting response to a single exposure can originate from the interplay between the newly discovered nanomaterial quarantining and nanomaterial cycling between different lung cell types. This new insight finally allows prediction of the spectrum of lung inflammation associated with materials of interest using only in vitro measurements and in silico modeling, potentially relating outcomes to material properties for a large number of materials, and thus boosting safe-by-design-based material development. Because of its profound implications for animal-free predictive toxicology, this work paves the way to a more efficient and hazard-free introduction of numerous new advanced materials into our lives.     

Heart rate variability related to effort at work

Changes in autonomic nervous system function have been related to work stress induced increases in cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Our purpose was to examine whether various heart rate variability (HRV) measures and new HRV-based relaxation measures are related to self-reported chronic work stress and daily emotions. The relaxation measures are based on neural network modelling of individual baseline heart rate and HRV information. Nineteen healthy hospital workers were studied during two work days during the same work period. Daytime, work time and night time heart rate, as well as physical activity were recorded. An effort–reward imbalance (ERI) questionnaire was used to assess chronic work stress. The emotions of stress, irritation and satisfaction were assessed six times during both days. Seventeen subjects had an ERI ratio over 1, indicating imbalance between effort and reward, that is, chronic work stress. Of the daily emotions, satisfaction was the predominant emotion. The daytime relaxation percentage was higher on Day 2 than on Day 1 (4 ± 6% vs. 2 ± 3%, p < 0.05) and the night time relaxation (43 ± 30%) was significantly higher than daytime or work time relaxation on the both Days. Chronic work stress correlated with the vagal activity index of HRV. However, effort at work had many HRV correlates: the higher the work effort the lower daytime HRV and relaxation time. Emotions at work were also correlated with work time (stress and satisfaction) and night time (irritation) HRV. These results indicate that daily emotions at work and chronic work stress, especially effort, is associated with cardiac autonomic function. Neural network modelling of individual heart rate and HRV information may provide additional information in stress research in field conditions.     

Optimal Algorithms for the Coverability, the Subword, the Containment, and the Equivalence Problems for Commutative Semigroups

In this paper, we present decision procedures for the coverability, the subword, the containment, and the equivalence problems for commutative semigroups. These procedures require at most space 2^c·n, where n is the size of the problem instance, and c is some problem independent constant. Furthermore, we show that the exponential space hardness of the above problems follows from the work of Mayr and Meyer. Thus, the presented algorithms are space optimal. Our results close the gap between the 2^{c′·n·log n} space upper bound, shown by Rackoff for the coverability problem and shown by Huynh for the containment and the equivalence problems, and the exponential space lower bound resulting from the corresponding bound for the uniform word problem established by Mayr and Meyer.