High-power, continuous-wave, mid-infrared optical parametric oscillator based on MgO:sPPLT

We report a stable, high-power, cw, mid-IR optical parametric oscillator using MgO-doped stoichiometric periodically poled LiTaO? (MgO:sPPLT) pumped by a Yb fiber laser at 1064 nm. The singly resonant oscillator (SRO), based on a 30 mm long crystal, is tunable over 430 nm from 3032 to 3462 nm and can generate as much as 5.5 W of mid-IR output power, with >4 W of over 60% of the tuning range and under reduced thermal effects, enabling room temperature operation. Idler power scaling measurements at ~3.3 μm are compared with an MgO-doped periodically poled LiNbO? cw SRO, confirming that MgO:sPPLT is an attractive material for multiwatt mid-IR generation. The idler output at 3299 nm exhibits a peak-to-peak power stability better than 12.8% over 5 h and frequency stability of ~1 GHz, while operating close to room temperature, and has a linewidth of ~0.2 nm, limited by the resolution of the wavemeter. The corresponding signal linewidth at 1570 nm is ~21 MHz.     

Energetics of small hydrogen-vacancy clusters in bcc iron

Hydrogen may be trapped in voids in iron, leading to undesirable material properties. In this paper, the energetics of small hydrogen-vacancy clusters in body centered cubic iron are investigated. Results from two interatomic potentials are compared. We use molecular dynamics and Monte Carlo methods to find the minimum energy configurations of voids of up to ten vacancies containing up to 50 hydrogen atoms with ratios of hydrogen to vacancy of 10 or less. The formation energies and binding energies of defects to these clusters are calculated. Our results indicate that the hydrogen stabilizes bubbles by causing vacancies to be more tightly bound to clusters, while neighboring irons are less tightly bound. Hydrogen itself becomes less well bound to clusters as the inventory increases. The more physically relevant potential indicates a maximum supported ratio of hydrogen atoms to vacancies of about 4.     

Few‐cycle,broadband, mid‐infrared optical parametric oscillator pumped by a 20‐fs Ti:sapphire laser

A few‐cycle, broadband, singly‐resonant optical parametric oscillator (OPO) for the mid‐infrared based on MgO‐doped periodically‐poled LiNbO₃ (MgO:PPLN), synchronously pumped by a 20‐fs Ti:sapphire laser is reported. By using crystal interaction lengths as short as 250 µm, and careful dispersion management of input pump pulses and the OPO resonator, near‐transform‐limited, few‐cycle idler pulses tunable across the mid‐infrared have been generated, with as few as 3.7 optical cycles at 2682 nm. The OPO can be continuously tuned over 2179‐3732 nm (4589‐2680 cm^‐1) by cavity delay tuning, providing up to 33 mW of output power at 3723 nm. The idler spectra exhibit stable broadband profiles with bandwidths spanning over 422 nm (FWHM) recorded at 3732 nm. The effect of crystal length on spectral bandwidth and pulse duration is investigated at a fixed wavelength, confirming near‐transform‐limited idler pulses for all grating interaction lengths. By locking the repetition frequency of the pump laser to a radio‐frequency reference, and without active stabilization of the OPO cavity length, an idler power stability better than 1.6% rms over >2.75 hours is obtained when operating at maximum output power, in excellent spatial beam quality with TEM₀₀ mode profile. Photograph shows a multigrating MgO:PPLN crystal used as a nonlinear gain medium in the few‐cycle femtosecond mid‐IR OPO. The visible light is the result of non‐phase‐matched sum‐frequency mixing between the interacting beams.     

Short Hairpin RNA-Induced Myostatin Gene Silencing in Caprine Myoblast Cells In Vitro

Myostatin (MSTN) belongs to the transforming growth factor (TGF)-β superfamily and is a potent negative regulator of skeletal muscle development and growth. Dysfunction of MSTN gene either by natural mutation or induced through genetic manipulation (knockout or knockdown) has been reported to increase the remarkable muscle mass in mammalian species. RNA interference (RNAi) is the most promising method for inhibition of gene expression that can be utilized for MSTN gene knockdown by developing short hairpin RNA (shRNA) construct against it. We utilized three antisense RNA expressing vectors with six constructs to knockdown MSTN gene in in vitro caprine myoblast cell culture system. We observed that all six shRNA constructs were successful in MSTN silencing with efficiency ranging from 7 to 46 % by quantitative real-time PCR and up to 19 % by western blotting. The significant upregulation of interferon response gene OAS1 (5- to 11-fold) in cells transfected with shRNA constructs were indicative of induction of interferon response. This RNAi-based method of increasing muscle mass could provide an alternative strategy to gene knockout methods for improving the production traits and economic properties of livestock.     

Synthesis and Biological Activity of New Resveratrol Derivative and Molecular Docking: Dynamics Studies on NFkB

Resveratrol (RVS) is a naturally occurring antioxidant, able to display an array of biological activities. In the present investigation, a new derivative of RVS, RVS(a), was synthesized, and its biological activity was determined on U937 cells. It was observed that RVS(a) showed pronounced activity on U937 cells than RVS. RVS(a) is able to induce apoptosis in tumor cell lines through subsequent DNA fragmentation. From the EMSA results, it was evident that RVS(a) was able to suppress the activity of NFkB by interfering its DNA binding ability. Furthermore, the molecular interaction analysis (docking and dynamics) stated that RVS(a) has strong association with the IkB-alpha site of NFkB compared with RVS; this binding nature of RVS(a) might be prevent the NFkB binding ability with DNA. The present findings represent the potential activity of propynyl RVS on U937 cells and signifying it as a one of putative chemotherapeutic drugs against cancer.     

Curse of La Corona: unravelling the scientific and psychological conundrums of the 21st century pandemic

Molecular Diversity - Microbes possess a tremendous potential to interact with their surroundings and have continued to shape the future of all life forms existing on earth. Of all the groups of...     

Anisotropy of constrained magnetostrictive materials

The magnetic anisotropy of a ferromagnetic material that is free to deform is defined as the effective anisotropy, which is the sum of intrinsic anisotropy and magnetostriction-induced anisotropy. Prior works [1] and [2] (Baltzer, 1957; Kittel, 1949) indicate that if the material is undeformed then the measured anisotropy is same as its intrinsic anisotropy. When magnetostrictive materials are used as actuators or sensors they are often mechanically loaded, resulting in a restriction on the deformation. To capture their behavior in such scenarios, a modelling approach is required. Therefore, in this work, the thermodynamic accuracy of the common expressions for magnetostriction-induced and stress-induced anisotropies is first investigated. A 3D magnetoelastic model is then developed using Armstrong's implementation of an energy model. This 3D magnetoelastic model is capable of predicting the stresses induced when the magnetostriction of these materials is constrained. Using this model, it is shown that when the bulk magnetostriction of the material is clamped, the measured anisotropy will not in general be the same as the intrinsic anisotropy. It is also shown that when the magnetostriction is clamped at the microscopic level, i.e. if the material is locally constrained at the exchange length scales, then the measured anisotropy is the intrinsic anisotropy.     

Differentiable solutions of an equation with product of iterates

Aequationes mathematicae - The author, together with M. Veerapazham, S. Wang and W. Zhang, considered the existence and uniqueness of continuous solutions to an iterative equation involving the...