Pressure-induced structural transformations and the anomalous behavior of the viscosity in network chalcogenide and oxide melts

It is known that a number of compressed melts undergo structural phase transitions. Data on the structural changes at high pressures in chalcogenides (AsS, As₂S₃) and oxide (B₂O₃) melts with a network structure have been reviewed. Viscosity is one of the fundamental physical properties of a liquid. For various melts, it varies in a very wide range. Structural transformations in melts induce the corresponding changes in all physical properties, in particular viscosity. The measurements of the viscosity of a number of melts at high pressures and temperatures by the radiographic method have been reported. Changes in the viscosity by several orders of magnitude have been detected when the pressure is varied by several gigapascals. The diffusion mechanism in network-structure melts at various pressures has been analyzed. The prediction of the behavior of the viscosity of various melts at superhigh pressures is of high importance for the physics of glass transition, geophysics, and materials science.     

Prospects for the search for a standard model Higgs boson in ATLAS using vector boson fusion

The European Physical Journal C - The potential for the discovery of a Standard Model Higgs boson in the mass range m H < 2 m Z in the vector boson fusion mode has been studied for the ATLAS...     

Nonviscous metallic liquid Se

Viscosity is one of the fundamental physical properties of liquids; for different melts it varies in an extremely wide range. Selenium is among the first elementary substances to have manifested, at compression, a phase transformation in the liquid state accompanied by melt metallization. Direct measurements by means of a real-time radiography show that the viscosity of liquid Se under pressure drops by 500 times to a very low level of 8 mPa s. This is the first case of viscosity measurements being performed both for a relatively viscous semiconducting state and a low-viscous metallic state of the same liquid substance. The viscosity of the Se melt strongly decreases with pressure along the melting curve in a semiconducting state and experiences a further significant drop at melt metallization. A similar phenomenon is expected to be observed in many chalcohenide, halogenide, and oxide melts.     

MS/MS fragmentation-guided search of TMG-chitooligomycins and their structure-activity relationship in specific β-N-acetylglucosaminidase inhibition

The reducing tetrasaccharide TMG-chitotriomycin (1) is an inhibitor of β-N-acetylglucosaminidase (GlcNAcase), produced by the actinomycete Streptomyces anulatus NBRC13369. The inhibitor shows a unique inhibitory spectrum, that is, selectivity toward enzymes from chitin-containing organisms such as insects and fungi. Nevertheless, its structure-selectivity relationship remains to be clarified. In this study, we conducted a structure-guided search of analogues of 1 in order to obtain diverse N,N,N-trimethylglucosaminium (TMG)-containing chitooligosaccharides. In this approach, the specific fragmentation profile of 1 on ESI-MS/MS analysis was used for the selective detection of desired compounds. As a result, two new analogues, named TMG-chitomonomycin (3) and TMG-chitobiomycin (2), were obtained from a culture filtrate of 1-producing Streptomyces. Their enzyme-inhibiting activity revealed that the potency and selectivity depended on the degree of polymerization of the reducing end GlcNAc units. Furthermore, a computational modeling study inspired the inhibitory mechanism of TMG-related compounds as a mimic of the substrate in the Michaelis complex of the GH20 enzyme. This study is an example of the successful application of a MS/MS experiment for structure-guided isolation of natural products.     

Spatiotemporally controlled contraction of micropatterned skeletal muscle cells on a hydrogel sheet

We have developed gel sheet-supported C(2)C(12) myotube micropatterns and combined them with a microelectrode array chip to afford a skeletal muscle cell-based bioassay system. Myotube line patterns cultured on a glass substrate were transferred with 100% efficiency to the surface of fibrin gel sheets. The contractile behavior of each myotube line pattern on the gel was individually controlled by localized electrical stimulation using microelectrode arrays that had been previously modified with electropolymerized poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT). We successfully demonstrated fluorescent imaging of the contraction-induced translocation of the glucose transporter, GLUT4, from intracellular vesicles to the plasma membrane of the myotubes. This device is applicable for the bioassay of contraction-induced metabolic alterations in a skeletal muscle cell.     

Core-exciton induced resonant photoemission in the covalent semiconductor black phosphorus

Valence band photoemission spectra of black phosphorus have shown anomalous behavior at the excitation of 2p core-excitons. The intensity of the 2.7 ev peak shows a clear Fano type interference due to a direct recombination of core-excitons leaving one hole in valence bands. Besides, strong enhancement of the 10.8 eV peak is interpreted as due to a core-exciton induced resonance with two-hole final states. The role of core-excitons as intermediate states for photoemission processes is newly revealed in the experiments.     

Ultraviolet photoemission and 4d core reflectance spectra of SmSe(100)

Ultraviolet photoemission (UPS) and inner core reflectance spectra have been measured on SmSe(100) surface with synchrotron radiation. Besides the multiplet structures observed in UPS spectra for the Sm 4f, 5p and 5s excitations, the reflectance spectrum has revealed a multiplet structure associated with the Sm 4d→4f excitation. Each band of the UPS spectra has shown remarkably different hν dependence and the resonant behavior of the cross section. Sm 4f- and Se 4p-derived valence band features are unambiguously identified by the angle resolved UPS.     

Core-exciton spectra of AlxGa1−xAs studied with synchrotron radiation

Core-exciton spectra of Al_xGa_1?xAs have been measured in the photon-energy region from 19 to 27 eV by use of synchrotron radiation. The core-excitons associated with the Ga 3d core-hole and the conduction electron around the lowest L₆ and X₆ symmetry points are found to be coupled with each other through intervalley electron-hole interactions. Quantitative analyses have elucidated that intervalley Coulomb term is playing a dominant role for this coupling. Another higher energy doublet structure is interpreted as due to the transition from the Ga 3d core-levels to the rather flat region in the second lowest conduction band around the L₆ and L_{4, 5} symmetry points.