Cellular Disulfide Bond Formation in Bioactive Peptides and Proteins

Bioactive peptides play important roles in metabolic regulation and modulation and many are used as therapeutics. These peptides often possess disulfide bonds, which are important for their structure, function and stability. A systematic network of enzymes—a disulfide bond generating enzyme, a disulfide bond donor enzyme and a redox cofactor—that function inside the cell dictates the formation and maintenance of disulfide bonds. The main pathways that catalyze disulfide bond formation in peptides and proteins in prokaryotes and eukaryotes are remarkably similar and share several mechanistic features. This review summarizes the formation of disulfide bonds in peptides and proteins by cellular and recombinant machinery.     

Comparative study of the optimal operation of methane reforming process in cylindrical and spherical reactors using multi-objective optimization

We present a multi-objective optimization (MOO) based study of the optimal operation of methane reformer for spherical reactor and compare the results with the ones for the cylindrical reactor. We considered three objective functions for this comparative study, namely maximization of hydrogen production, minimization of carbon dioxide emission, and minimization of power loss due to pressure drop in the reactor. We solve four MOO problems, which include three 2-objective problems with each pair of the aforementioned three objectives. In addition, we also solve a three objective problem considering all the three objectives. The optimization variables considered for the MOO study correspond to the feed conditions. Specifically, the three variables include the inlet temperature and the molar feed ratios of oxygen to methane & steam to methane.     

On the dependence of interfacial resistance on contact materials between cathode and interconnect in solid oxide fuel cells

The dependence of interfacial contact resistance (ICR) on contact materials between cathode and interconnect is systematically studied under both isothermal oxidation and thermal cycling conditions. Three kinds of cathode current-collecting layer (CCCL) are used, (La,Sr) (Co,Fe)O₃ (LSCF), LSCF+10%Ag, and Ag, and tested in a SUS430/CCCL/SUS430 sandwich structure to simulate the actual operation of the solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs). Experimental results show that the ICR of LSCF+10%Ag exhibits the smallest value, in comparison with the specimens with LSCF and Ag paste, as well as the sample without a CCCL. For LSCF+10%Ag contact, the ICR increases from 0.0069 mΩ cm² to 3.74 mΩ cm² under an isothermal condition for 150 h, then increases from 3.74 mΩ cm² to 10.79 mΩ cm² after 15 thermal cycles. This work provides information for the understanding of possible mechanisms of performance degradation of SOFCs.     

Parametric Optimization of Complementary Split-Ring Resonator Dimensions for Planar Antenna Size Miniaturization

Wireless Personal Communications -     

Direct electrochemical detection of purine- and pyrimidine-based nucleotides with sinusoidal voltammetry

Sinusoidal voltammetry was employed to detect both purine- and pyrimidine-based nucleic acids. Adenine and cytosine, representing these two classes of nucleic acids, could be measured with submicromolar detection limits at a copper electrode under these conditions, where the sensitivity for adenine was much higher than that for cytosine. Detection limits for purine-containing nucleotides [e.g., adenosine 5'-monophosphate (AMP), adenosine 5'-diphosphate (ADP), and adenosine 5'-triphosphate (ATP)] were on the order of 70-200 nM using this method. These detection limits are achieved for native nucleotides and are over 2 orders of magnitude lower than those found with UV absorbance detection. Submicromolar detection limits were also obtained for pyrimidine-based nucleotides, which could also be detected with high sensitivity due to the presence of a sugar backbone that is electroactive at the copper surface. This detector is not fouled by the nucleotides and may be used for the sensitive detection of analytes eluting continuously in a flowing stream, i.e., from a chromatography column or an electrophoresis capillary.     

Formal modeling and verification of software‐defined networks: A survey

Unlike traditional networking devices, control and management plane are decoupled from data plane in software‐defined networks (SDN). The logically centralized control and management plane facilitate dynamic orchestration of network resources, services, and policies by writing software programs. This provides much needed flexibility and programmability where networking rules and policies can be modified dynamically depending upon the application context. As the operation of network services entirely depends on a program, a small fault may induce several issues which can adversely affect the expected behavior of the network. Formal modeling and verification help in catching inconsistencies and existence of errors prior to the deployment of the programs that control the behavior of a network. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive survey of tools and techniques available in the literature for formal modeling and verification of SDN. These tools and techniques are classified based on their types, the components of SDN where they can be applied, and the design and development phase when they are utilized. In particular, their respective benefits and limitations are discussed in terms of ease of use, interfaces, and the ability to capture and verify intended network properties.     

Design of wideband comb shape substrate integrated waveguide multimode resonator bandpass filter with high selectivity and improved upper stopband performance

In this article, a wideband bandpass filter (BPF) is designed using the comb slotted substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) cavities. The comb‐shaped slots engraved on the SIW cavity are used to constitute a novel multiple‐mode resonator (MMR) that accomplishes a wide passband of operation. Further, a Jerusalem cross defected ground structure (DGS) is introduced to miniaturize it and enhance filter performance in the pass band and stop band. The filter is fabricated on RT/Duroid 5880 having dielectric constant 2.2 and tested to prove the validity of design. The filter achieves 3 dB fractional bandwidth of 48%, return loss above 14 dB and insertion loss of 1.1 dB in the passband. Also, the proposed filter has steep selectivity and wide upper stopband with 25 dB attenuation from 16.7 to 24 GHz.     

Multi-channel local ternary pattern for content-based image retrieval

Pattern Analysis and Applications - A feature based on a single modality such as color or texture is not sufficient to investigate the appearance variation across multiple images. In this paper, a...     

Structural,dielectric, impedance and ferroelectric properties of lead-free Bi(Fe0.85Dy0.15)O3 ceramic

Nowadays, several research groups are extensively trying to develop by synthesizing and characterizing single/co-doped single-phase bismuth ferrite (BFO) in order to get a highly efficient eco-friendly multifunctional devices. In this process, this report is an attempt to provide the detailed studies of structural, dielectric, impedance and ferroelectric properties of Bi(Fe_0.85Dy_0.15)O₃ ceramic fabricated via the solid-state reaction method. Analysis of X-ray diffraction (XRD) data confirms a single phase of orthorhombic symmetry. The average crystallite (particle) size is found to be in the order of?~?41 nm. The field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) spectrum shows a homogeneous grain distribution of the sample. The elemental composition examined by means of energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDXS) shows the existence of constituent elements of the sample. The electrical measurements and analysis, carried out using a computer-controlled phase sensitive multimeter (PSM) in a frequency range of 1 kHz–1 MHz at different sets of temperature (25–325 °C), provide many interesting features to explain further conduction mechanism. The dielectric analysis exhibits high value of dielectric constant (?_r) and small value of dielectric loss (tanδ). Due to the effect of electronic and space charge polarization, the ?_r value falls with an increasing frequency. The frequency–temperature dependence of impedance and electrical modulus analysis reveals the presence of semiconductor nature and non-Debye type of relaxation process in the sample. The analysis of ac-conductivity (σ_ac) with respect to frequency and temperature obeys the universal Jonscher’s power law. The electric polarization study shows an enhancement in ferroelectric property of the material. Hence, based on the significant enhancement in electrical and ferroelectric properties of the Bi(Fe_0.85Dy_0.15)O₃ material, the material may be considered for some applications.

     

RP-LPP : a random permutation based locality preserving projection for cancelable biometric recognition

Biometrics are being increasingly used across the world, but it also raises privacy and security concerns of the enrolled identities. The main reason is due to the fact that biometrics are not cancelable and if compromised may give access to the intruder. Cancelable biometric template is a solution to this problem which can be reissued if compromised. In this paper, we suggest a simple and powerful method called Random Permutation Locality Preserving Projection (RP-LPP) for Cancelable Biometric Recognition. Here, we exploit the mathematical relationship between the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the original biometric image and its randomly permuted version is exploited for carrying out cancelable biometric recognition. The proposed technique work in a cryptic manner by accepting the cancelable biometric template and a key (called PIN) issued to a user. The effectiveness of the proposed techniques is demonstrated on three freely available face (ORL), iris (UBIRIS) and ear (IITD) datasets against state-of-the-art methods. The advantages of proposed technique are (i) the classification accuracy remains unaffected due to cancelable biometric templates generated using random permutation, (ii) security and quality of generated templates and (iii) robustness across different biometrics. In addition, no image registration is required for performing recognition.