Large Femtosecond Two-Photon Absorption Cross-Sections of Fullerosome Vesicle Nanostructures Derived from Highly Photoresponsive Amphiphilic C(60)-Light-Harvesting Fluorene Dyad

We demonstrated ultrafast femtosecond nonlinear optical (NLO) absorption characteristics of bilayered fullerosome vesicle nanostructures derived from molecular self-assembly of amphiphilic oligo(ethylene glycolated) C(60)-(light-harvesting diphenylaminofluorene antenna). Fullerene conjugates were designed to enhance photoresponse in a femtosecond time scale by applying an isomerizable periconjugation linker between the C(60) cage and diphenylaminofluorene antenna subunit in an intramolecular contact distance of only < 3.0 ?. Morphology of C(60)(>DPAF-EG(12)C(1))-based fullerosome nanovesicles in H(2)O was characterized to consist of a bilayered shell with a sphere diameter of 20-70 nm and a chromophore shell-width of 9.0-10 nm, fitting well with a head-to-head packing configuration of the molecular length. At the estimated effective nanovesicle concentration as low as 5.5 × 10(-8) MV (molecular molar concentration of 5.0 × 10(-4) M) in H(2)O, two-photon absorption (2PA) phenomena were found to be the dominating photophysical events showing a large molar concentration-insensitive 2PA cross-section value equivalent to 8500 GM in a form of nanovesicles, on average. The observed NLO characteristics led to a sharp trend of efficient light-transmittance intensity reduction at the input laser intensity above 100 GW/cm(2).     

Design of Microstrip Antennas with Composite Laminates Considering Their Structural Rigidity

Two types of conformal load-bearing antenna structures (CLAS) were designed with microwave composite laminates and Nomex honeycomb cores to secure both the structural rigidity and a good electrical performance. One was a 4 × 8 array for the synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) system and the other was a 5 × 2 array for the wireless local-area network (LAN) system. The design was based on a wide bandwidth, high polarization purity, low losses, and high structural rigidity. The design, fabrication, and structural/electrical performances of the antenna structures were studied. Their flexural behavior was examined by three-point bending, impact, and buckling tests. The electrical measurements were in a good agreement with simulation results. The complex antenna structures obtained have good flexural characteristics. The design of this antenna structure is extended to give a useful guide for sandwich panel manufacturers as well as antenna designers.     

Parallel optimal control with multiple shooting, constraints aggregation and adjoint methods

In this paper, constraint aggregation is combined with the adjoint and multiple shooting strategies for optimal control of differential algebraic equations (DAE) systems. The approach retains the inherent parallelism of the conventional multiple shooting method, while also being much more efficient for large scale problems. Constraint aggregation is employed to reduce the number of nonlinear continuity constraints in each multiple shooting interval, and its derivatives are computed by the adjoint DAE solver DASPKADJOINT together with ADIFOR and TAMC, the automatic differentiation software for forward and reverse mode, respectively. Numerical experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach.     

On the Torsion of Elliptic Curves Over Quartic Number Fields

We determine which groups Z/MZZ/NZ occur infinitely often astorsion groups E(K)_tors when K varies over all quartic numberfields and E varies over all elliptic curves over K.     

Lysophosphatidylcholine suppresses apoptosis and induces neurite outgrowth in PC12 cells through activation of phospholipase D2

Lysophosphatidylcholine (LPC) is a bioactive lipid generated by phospholipase A2-mediated hydrolysis of phosphatidylcholine. In the present study, we demonstrate that LPC stimulates phospholipase D2 (PLD2) activity in rat pheochromocytoma PC12 cells. Serum deprivation induced cell death of PC12 cells, as demonstrated by decreased viability, DNA fragmentation, and increased sub-G1 fraction of cell cycle. LPC treatment protected PC12 cells partially from the cell death and induced neurite outgrowth of the cells. Overexpression of PLD2 drastically enhanced the LPC-induced inhibition of apoptosis and neuritogenesis. Pretreatment of the cells with 1-butanol, a PLD inhibitor, completely abrogated the LPC-induced inhibition of apoptosis and neurite outgrowth in PC12 cells overexpressing PLD2. These results indicate that LPC possesses the neurotrophic effects, such as anti-apoptosis and neurite outgrowth, through activation of PLD2.     

Solubility of water in a benzene-cyclohexane mixture

The solubility of a water molecule in a binary mixture of nonpolar cyclohexane and quadrupolar benzene is studied with the ab initio method. A novel self-consistent reaction field theory that properly accounts for benzene quadrupole moments in the continuum solvent framework is used to describe the solvation effects of the solvent mixture. The free energy of transfer from pure cyclohexane to the mixture solvent is obtained with the neglect of nonelectrostatic contributions. A reasonable agreement with experiments indicates that the theoretical method presented here provides a promising approach to electronic structure calculations in quadrupolar solvents and their mixtures with nonpolar solvents.     

Characterization of the variation of the material properties in a freestanding inhomogeneous thin film

This Letter presents a new technique for measuring the variation of the material properties along the thickness in a freestanding inhomogeneous thin film. The analytical results reveal a simple relation between the material properties and the set of cut-off frequencies of Lamb waves. The influence of the graded properties on the variation of cut-off frequencies in three different kinds of models, including artificial FGM model, sub-surface damage model, and nano-porous thin film model, is discussed. These results provide theoretical guidance for characterizing the material property variations of MEMS/NEMS.     

Molecular dynamics simulations of polyelectrolyte-polyampholyte complexes. Effect of solvent quality and salt concentration

Complexation between polyelectrolyte and polyampholyte chains in poor solvent conditions for the polyelectrolyte backbone has been studied by molecular dynamics simulations. In a poor solvent a polyelectrolyte forms a necklace-like structure consisting of polymeric globules (beads) connected by strings of monomers. The simulation results can be explained by assuming the existence of two different mechanisms leading to the necklace formation. In the case of weak electrostatic interactions, the necklace formation is driven by optimization of short-range monomer-monomer attraction and electrostatic repulsion between charged monomers on the polymer backbone. In the case of strong electrostatic interactions, the necklace structure appears as a result of counterion condensation. While the short-range attractions between monomers are still important, the correlation-induced attraction between condensed counterions and charged monomers and electrostatic repulsion between uncompensated charges provide significant contribution to optimization of the necklace structure. Upon forming a complex with both random and diblock polyampholytes, a polyelectrolyte chain changes its necklace conformation by forming one huge bead. The collapse of the polyelectrolyte chain occurs due to the neutralization of the polyelectrolyte charge by polyampholytes. In the case of the random polyampholyte, the more positively charged sections of the chain mix with negatively charged polyelectrolyte forming the globular bead while more negatively charged chain sections form loops surrounding the collapsed core of the aggregate. In the case of diblock polyampholyte, the positively charged block, a part of the negatively charged block, and a polyelectrolyte chain form a core of the aggregate with a substantial section of the negatively charged block sticking out from the collapsed core of the aggregate. In both cases the core of the aggregate has a layered structure that is characterized by the variations in the excess of concentration of monomers belonging to polyampholyte and polyelectrolyte chains throughout the core radius. These structures appear as a result of optimization of the net electrostatic energy of the complex and short-range attractive interactions between monomers of the polyelectrolyte chain.     

Bond character of thiophene on Ge(100): Effects of coverage and temperature

We have studied the adsorption and decomposition of thiophene (C4H4S) on Ge(100) using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM), high-resolution core-level photoemission spectroscopy (HRPES), and density functional theory (DFT) calculation. Analysis of S 2p core-level spectra reveals three adsorption geometries, which we assign to a Ge-S dative bonding state, a [4 + 2] cycloaddition bonding state, and a decomposed bonding state (desulfurization reaction product). Furthermore, we found that the number ratio of the three adsorption geometries depended on the molecular coverage and the annealing temperature. At low coverages, the kinetically favorable dative bonding state is initially formed at room temperature. As the molecular coverage increases, thermodynamically stable [4 + 2] cycloaddition reaction products are additionally produced. In addition, we found that as the surface temperature increased, the [4 + 2] cycloaddition reaction product either possibly desorbed as molecular thiophene or decomposed to form a metallocycle-like species (C4H4Ge2) and a sulfide (Ge2S). We systematically elucidate the changes in the bonding states of adsorbed thiophene on Ge(100) according to the thiophene coverage and annealing temperature.     

Enhanced electrical percolation due to interconnection of three-dimensional pentacene islands in thin films on low surface energy polyimide gate dielectrics

The role of lateral interconnections between three-dimensional pentacene islands on low surface energy polyimide gate dielectrics was investigated by the measurement of the surface coverage dependence of the charge mobility and the use of conducting-probe atomic force microscopy (CP-AFM). From the correlation between the electrical characteristics and the morphological evolution of the three-dimensionally grown pentacene films-based field-effect transistors, we found that during film growth, the formation of interconnections between the three-dimensional pentacene islands that are isolated at the early stage contributes significantly to the enhancement process of charge mobility. The CP-AFM current mapping images of the pentacene films also indicate that the lateral interconnections play an important role in the formation of good electrical percolation pathways between the three-dimensional pentacene islands.