Assessing the impact of pulsed-irradiation procedures on the thermally transferred OSL signal in quartz

Thermally transferred optically stimulated luminescence (TT-OSL) dating protocols have been suggested as a means of extending the age range of luminescence dating. Several studies demonstrate that TT-OSL signals increase with large radiation doses (>2000 Gy) and yet, few studies report older TT-OSL ages (>400 Gy) in agreement with independent absolute age control. In one such study, agreement with independent chronology was only achieved for the old samples by implementing a pulsed-irradiation procedure. Pulsed-irradiation is suggested to compensate for dose rate dependent competition effects by dividing the laboratory irradiation into discrete irradiation steps interspersed with heat treatments. However, every inter-step heat treatment has the potential to anneal part of the TT-OSL dating signal. This study compares constant- and pulsed-irradiation TT-OSL protocols and investigates the degree of partial thermal annealing. The results suggest that almost all of the difference in outcome between constant- and pulsed-irradiation protocols can be explained by partial annealing of the TT-OSL signal rather than by competition effects. Partial annealing distorts the laboratory dose response curve but has no impact on the natural signal, resulting in unreliable equivalent dose estimates. This means that pulsed-irradiation procedures may not be viable for TT-OSL dating measurements. Future studies implementing pulsed-irradiation procedures should carefully consider the extent to which inter-step thermal treatments partially anneal the signal.     

Kinetics of Iterative Carbohydrate Transfer to Polysaccharide Catalyzed by Chondroitin Polymerase on a Highly Sensitive Flow‐Type 27 MHz Quartz‐Crystal Microbalance

Using a highly sensitive flow‐type 27 MHz quartz crystal microbalance, we could detect a small mass change during stepwise and alternating one‐sugar transfer of glucuronic acid (GlcA) and N‐acetylgalactosamine (GalNAc) to an acceptor, catalyzed by chondroitin polymerase from Escherichia coli strain K4 (K4CP), and analyze the elongation mechanism of K4CP. K4CP was found to bind strongly to a chondroitin acceptor (K_d=0.97 μM ). Although the binding affinity and the catalytic rate constant for each monomer were considerably different, the apparent catalytic efficiency (k_cat/K_m) was similar (6.3×10⁴ M ^?1 s^?1 for GlcA transfer and 3.4×10⁴ M ^?1 s^?1 for the GalNAc transfer). This is reasonable for the smooth alternating elongation of GlcA and GalNAc on the acceptor. This is the first study to report the determination of kinetic parameters for enzymatic, alternated, sugar elongation.     

A New Sensor Method for Studying the Effect of Gentamicin and Cefotaxime Combination Against Escherichia coli

Abstract

A new sensor method based on a multi-channel series piezoelectric quartz crystal (MSPQC) was proposed for studying the effect of gentamicin and cefotaxime combination against Escherichia coli ATCC 25922. The frequency curves under different combination regimens were obtained and compared with each other. When antibiotic had an inhibitory effect to the growth of bacteria, frequency detection time (FDT) would be prolonged. The FDT was used to assess the effect of an antibiotic combination. By using the proposed method, simultaneous administration, different order, and time interval of nonsimultaneous administration were investigated in detail. The MSPQC method can provide the process information in real time. It is simple, rapid, and easy to perform.     

Professor Eduardo F. A. Neves (1933–2006)

Abstract

The present note deals with the optimization of the combustion of organic materials to CO₂ in Pyrex and quartz tubes. The influence of temperature and oxidant on the combustion yield was investigated. Different physical forms of CuO and a CuO/MnO₂-mixture were used as oxidants. Possible isotopic effects during combustion were tested by gas isotope ratio mass spectrometry (GIRMS) of the CO₂. Excellent results were obtained for combustion in Pyrex at 530 °C using CuO rods mixed with 20% MnO₂ as oxidant. The stable isotope results for CO₂ prepared with this method were accurate and showed a very good precision of 0.030 %. Applications for which quantitative combustion is a necessity, we suggest the use of CuO powder (< 100 μm) as oxidant and a combustion temperature of 850 °C.     

Polarographic Determination of Palladium(II) in Rocks After Extraction with [5-(4-Dimethylaminebenzylidene)rhodanine] and Methyl Isobutyl Ketone

Abstract

A sensitive and selective method for the determination of palladium(II) in mineral veins of quartz, a pegmatite rock from Campo Largo County, Parana State, Brazil, was investigated. After liquid-liquid extraction of Pd^2- from aqueous solution, pH 2.4, with [5-(4-dimethylaminebenzylidene)rhodanine] and methyl isobutyl ketone, the back-extraction was performed with 3.0 mol.L^?1 sulfuric acid. At pH 2.4, only trace amounts of gold(III) and silver(I) were co-extracted with palladium(II). However, neither Au³⁺ nor Ag⁺ interfere with palladium(II) determination by differential pulse polarography using tris(hydroxymethyl)aminomethane and potassium nitrate, pH 11.0, as supporting electrolyte. The observed detection limit was 1.0 μg(Pd²⁺).L^?1.     

Etching of polyethylene terephthalate thin films by neutral oxygen atoms in the late flowing afterglow of oxygen plasma

Films of polyethylene terephthalate were deposited on quartz crystals and exposed to oxygen atoms to study their etching characteristics and quantify the etching rate. Oxygen (O) atoms were created by passing molecular oxygen through plasma created in a microwave discharge. The discharge power was fixed at 250 W, while the pressure of oxygen was 50 Pa. Before exposure to oxygen atoms, a thin polymer film of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) was deposited uniformly over a crystal with a diameter of 12 mm. The crystal was mounted on a quartz crystal microbalance to accurately determine the thickness of the polymer film. The polymer film was exposed to O atoms in the flowing afterglow. The density of O atoms was measured with a cobalt catalytic probe mounted next to the sample and was determined to be 1.2 × 10²¹ m^–3. Samples were treated with O atoms for different periods of up to 120 min. The thickness of the film decreased linearly with treatment time. After 90 min of treatment, a 65‐nm‐thick polymer film was completely removed. Therefore, the etching rate was 0.5 nm/min, so the interaction probability between an O atom and an atom in the sample was extremely low, just 1.4 × 10^–6. Samples treated for different periods were investigated by atomic force microscopy and X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy to examine the etching characteristics of O atoms in the flowing afterglow. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Piezoelectric Quartz Crystal Biosensor as a Direct Affinity Sensor

Abstract

A microprocessor controlled piezoelectric detector as sensor was employed to monitor in real time protein adsorption and immunoreactions using piezoelectric quartz crystals (AT-cut) with a basic resonant frequency of 10 MHz. The adsorbed protein was an immunoglobulin (h-lg G); in the immunosensing a covalent immobilized molecule (the pesticide 2,4-D) formed the receptor for the immobilized ligand sample (Mab anti-2,4-D) in a competitive assay.     

PARALLEL FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS OF HIGH FREQUENCY VIBRATIONS OF QUARTZ CRYSTAL RESONATORS ON LINUX CLUSTER

Quartz crystal resonators are typical piezoelectric acoustic wave devices for frequency control applications with mechanical vibration frequency at the radio-frequency （RF） range. Precise analyses of the vibration and deformation are generally required in the resonator design and improvement process. The considerations include the presence of electrodes, mountings, bias fields such as temperature, initial stresses, and acceleration. Naturally, the finite element method is the only effective tool for such a coupled problem with multi-physics nature. The main challenge is the extremely large size of resulted linear equations. For this reason, we have been employing the Mindlin plate equations to reduce the computational difficulty. In addition, we have to utilize the parallel computing techniques on Linux clusters, which are widely available for academic and industrial applications nowadays, to improve the computing efficiency. The general principle of our research is to use open source software components and public domain technology to reduce cost for developers and users on a Linux cluster. We start with a mesh generator specifically for quartz crystal resonators of rectangular and circular types, and the Mindlin plate equations are implemented for the finite element analysis. Computing techniques like parallel processing, sparse matrix handling, and the latest eigenvalue extraction package are integrated into the program. It is clear from our computation that the combination of these algorithms and methods on a cluster can meet the memory requirement and reduce computing time significantly.     

ELECTRICALLY FORCED THICKNESS-SHEAR VIBRATIONS OF QUARTZ PLATE WITH NONLINEAR COUPLING TO EXTENSION

We study electrically forced nonlinear thickness-shear vibrations of a quartz plate resonator with relatively large amplitude. It is shown that thickness-shear is nonlinearly coupled to extension due to the well-known Poynting effect in nonlinear elasticity. This coupling is relatively strong when the resonant frequency of the extensional mode is about twice the resonant frequency of the thickness-shear mode. This happens when the plate length/thickness ratio assumes certain values. With this nonlinear coupling, the thickness-shear motion is no longer sinusoidal. Coupling to extension also affects energy trapping which is related to device mounting. When damping is 0.01, nonlinear coupling causes a frequency shift of the order of 10^-6 which is not insignificant,and an amplitude change of the order of 10^-8. The effects are expected to be stronger under real damping of 10^-5 or larger. To avoid nonlinear coupling to extension, certain values of the aspect ratio of the plate should be avoided.     

宏观尺寸弯曲石英管对中低能电子束的导向作用

研究了宏观尺寸的弯曲圆柱形石英管对 1 100, 1 300和1 500 eV 3种能量电子束的导向作用, 并对实验结果与相同材质和尺寸的直管的情形进行了分析对比。 实验中利用一个位置灵敏法拉第筒对从石英管出射的电子束进行探测, 获得从管道中出射的电子束流强度在位置灵敏法拉第筒各道上的分布, 其结果显示宏观尺寸石英管对电子束存在导向作用。 与慢速高电荷态离子和绝缘毛细管相互作用的物理过程类似, 这种导向效应是由电荷在管壁内表面自组织充电引起的。 实验还发现, 入射电子束流的强度越强, 其导向作用越明显, 这与微观尺寸毛细管对慢速高电荷态离子的导向作用不同。 石英管导向能力与管的尺寸、 形状及材料之间的关系还有待进一步的系统研究。 It was inevstigated in the experiment that the guiding effect of electron beam with energy of 1 100, 1 300 and 1 500 eV through a bended cylindrical quartz tube with macro sized. A position sensitive Faraday cup was developed and used to detect the electron beam transmitted through the quartz tube, and the distribution of transmitted beam current on each channel of the Faraday cup was acquired. Results indicate the existence of guiding effect which is due to the self organized charge up in the inner wall of the quartz tube similar to that of the highly charged ions. We also found that the guiding ability of the tube is related to the incident beam intensity. The relationship between the guiding ability and the material as well as the size of the tube is to be studied in the near future.