Innovative Eco-Friendly Hydrogel Film for Berberine Delivery in Skin Applications

Hydrogel formulations (masks or patches, without tissue support) represent the new frontier for customizable skin beauty and health. The employment of these materials is becoming popular in wound dressing, to speed up the healing process while protecting the affected area, as well as to provide a moisturizing reservoir, control the inflammatory process and the onset of bacterial development. Most of these hydrogels are acrylic-based at present, not biodegradable and potentially toxic, due to acrylic monomers residues. In this work, we selected a new class of cellulose-derived and biodegradable hydrogel films to incorporate and convey an active compound for dermatological issues. Films were obtained from a combination of different polysaccharides and clays, and berberine hydrochloride, a polyphenolic molecule showing anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory, antibacterial and antioxidant properties, was chosen and then embedded in the hydrogel films. These innovative hydrogel-based systems were characterized in terms of water uptake profile, in vitro cytocompatibility and skin permeation kinetics by Franz diffusion cell. Berberine permeation fitted well to Korsmeyer–Peppas kinetic model and achieved a release higher than 100 µg/cm² within 24 h. The latter study, exploiting a reliable skin model membrane, together with the biological assessment, gained insights into the most promising formulation for future investigations.     

Some Problems of Information Neurodynamics

The goal of neural science is to understand the brain, how we perceive, move, think, and remember. All of these things are dynamical processes which are taking place in a complex, non-stationary and noisy environment. This means that these dynamical processes at all levels from small neural networks to behavior should be stable against perturbations but flexible and adaptive. The goal of neurodynamics is to formulate the main dynamical principles which can be a basis of such behavior and to predict the possible activities of neurons and neural ensembles using the tools of nonlinear dynamics. In this paper we discuss our last results related to the mostly challenging part of neurodynamics: information processing by dynamical neural ensembles.     

Synthesis of nanocrystalline material by sputtering and laser ablation at low temperatures

Physical vapor deposition techniques such as sputtering and laser ablation – which are very commonly used in thin film technology – appear to hold much promise for the synthesis of nanocrystalline thin films as well as loosely aggregated nanoparticles. We present a systematic study of the process parameters that facilitate the growth of nanocrystalline metals and oxides. The systems studied include TiO₂, ZnO, γ-Al₂O₃, Cu₂O, Ag and Cu. The mean particle size and crystallographic orientation are influenced mainly by the sputtering power, the substrate temperature and the nature, pressure and flow rate of the sputtering gas. In general, nanocrystalline thin films were formed at or close to 300 K, while loosely adhering nanoparticles were deposited at lower temperatures. Received: 31 October 2000 / Accepted: 9 January 2001 / Published online: 26 April 2001     

Organic Light Emitting Diodes with Lithium Contained Alq3 as Electron Injection Layer

ＩｎｔｒｏｄｕｃｔｉｏｎＩｎｏｒｇａｎｉｃｌｉｇｈｔｅｍｉｔｔｉｎｇｄｉｏｄｅ(ＯＬＥＤ) ,ｓｏｍｅｍｅｔａｌｓｗｉｔｈｌｏｗｗｏｒｋｆｕｎｃｔｉｏｎ ,ｓｕｃｈａｓａｌｌｏｙｏｆｍａｇ ｎｅｓｉｕｍａｎｄｓｉｌｖｅｒ(Ｍｇ∶Ａｇ) [1] ａｎｄａｌｕｍｉｎｉｕｍ[2 ] ,ａｒｅｕｓｅｄａｓｔｈｅｅｌｅｃｔｒｏｎｉｎｊｅｃｔｉｏｎｃａｔｈｏｄｅｓ .ＩｎＭｇ∶Ａｇａｌ ｌｏｙｓｉｌｖｅｒｉｓｕｓｅｄｔｏｐｒｏｔｅｃｔｍａｇｎｅｓｉｕｍｆｒｏｍｔｈｅｒｅａｃ ｔｉｏｎｏｆｍａｇｎｅｓｉｕｍｗｉｔｈｏｘｙｇｅｎａｎｄ…     

Mono- and heterometallic carbonyl precursor based RuMo/Al2O3 catalysts: hydrodesulfurization activity and temperature programmed studies

The effects of preparation process and starting material on hydrodesulfurization (HDS) activity of alumina supported ruthenium, molybdenum and ruthenium–molybdenum hydrotreating catalysts were investigated. Conventional impregnation method and gradual gas phase adsorption were compared as a preparation route. The HDS tests showed that controlled gas phase deposition is advantageous in the preparation of the monometallic catalyst systems. The most promising HDS activity was achieved with the RuMo/Al₂O₃ catalyst prepared from binuclear organometallic complex. This suggests that the direct ruthenium–molybdenum bond in the structure of the catalyst precursor favors the formation of highly active surface phase. The oxidation and reduction behavior of the catalysts was studied by oxygen pulse chemisorption (PCO) and temperature programmed reduction (TPR). A clear relationship was observed between the method of preparation and the reactivity of the surface species.     

Development of Smart Polymer Microparticles through Suspension Polymerization for Treatment of Schistosomiasis

Schistosomiasis is a parasitic disease that affects millions of people, especially low‐income people, and is considered a major public health problem in underdeveloped countries. The drug used most often for the treatment of the disease is praziquantel (PZQ), which has a strong and characteristic bitter taste that makes treatment of children inconvenient. For this reason, the present work investigates the development of smart pH‐sensitive polymer microparticles produced through suspension polymerizations to be used as vehicles for the controlled release of praziquantel in the body. The microparticles are produced through copolymerization of methyl methacrylate and the cationic comonomers diethylaminoethyl methacrylate or dimethylaminoethyl methacrylate. The obtained results indicate that microparticles with sizes in the range of 10–1100 µm can be formed successfully, allowing high PZQ encapsulation efficiencies (>80%). Zeta potential analyses and drug release assays confirm the pH‐sensitive responses of the cationic copolymers, leading to effective release of PZQ (around 80% in pH 1.2) in acidic media that simulate the organic fluids present in the stomach.     

Stability of quadruped robots’ trajectories subjected to discrete perturbations

In this paper, we study the stability of a mathematical model for trajectory generation of a qua-druped robot. We consider that each movement is composed of two types of primitives: rhythmic and discrete. The discrete primitive is inserted as a perturbation of the purely rhythmic movement. The two primitives are modeled by nonlinear dynamical systems. We adapt the theory developed by Golubitsky et?al. in (Physica D 115: 56?C72, 1998; Buono and Golubitsky in J. Math. Biol. 42:291?C326, 2001) for quadrupeds gaits. We conclude that if the discrete part is inserted in all limbs, with equal values, and as an offset of the rhythmic part, the obtained gait is stable and has the same spatial and spatiotemporal symmetry groups as the purely rhythmic gait, differing only on the value of the offset.     

Fractional central pattern generators for bipedal locomotion

Locomotion has been a major research issue in the last few years. Many models for the locomotion rhythms of quadrupeds, hexapods, bipeds and other animals have been proposed. This study has also been extended to the control of rhythmic movements of adaptive legged robots. In this paper, we consider a fractional version of a central pattern generator (CPG) model for locomotion in bipeds. A fractional derivative D ^α f(x), with α non-integer, is a generalization of the concept of an integer derivative, where α=1. The integer CPG model has been proposed by Golubitsky, Stewart, Buono and Collins, and studied later by Pinto and Golubitsky. It is a network of four coupled identical oscillators which has dihedral symmetry. We study parameter regions where periodic solutions, identified with legs’ rhythms in bipeds, occur, for 0<α≤1. We find that the amplitude and the period of the periodic solutions, identified with biped rhythms, increase as α varies from near 0 to values close to unity.     

Modeling Methyl Methacrylate (MMA) Polymerization for Bone Cement Production

Bone cements based on poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) have been widely used in orthopedic surgeries for fixation of prostheses and filling of bone defects. Bone cements are produced through in situ and in vivo free radical bulk polymerizations, which are highly exothermic and are subject to strong gel and glass effects. As a consequence, high temperatures may be reached during application. Furthermore, residual monomer usually remains unreacted inside the body and may cause aseptic loosening and tissue damages. 1 In a companion work in this volume, it was shown that usual free-radical polymerization models might effectively describe the bone cement preparation 2 and therefore be used for quantitative analysis of the bone cement synthesis. In this work, a theoretical investigation based on a multicell reactor model is performed to study the bone cement production and allow for future optimization of the preparation procedure. It is shown that the degree of solubility of the pre-polymer powder in the liquid monomer is the most important variable during the bone cement preparation and that this variable should be manipulated for design and control of the operation in real applications.