Concanavalin A Binding on PHEMA Beads and Their Interactions with Myeloma Cells

The aim of this study is to prepare concanavalin A (Con A) bound poly(2-hydroxy ethyl methacrylate) (PHEMA) beads for cell affinity chromatography. In the first step, PHEMA beads were produced by suspension polymerization, and activated by cyanogen bromide (CNBr) in an alkaline medium (pH 11.5), and then, the bio-ligand “Con A” was attached by covalent binding onto the CNBr activated beads. PHEMA beads were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), surface area and pore size measurements. The PHEMA beads have a spherical shape and porous structure. The specific surface area of the PHEMA beads was found to be 39.7 m²/g with a size range of 150–200 μm in diameter and the swelling ratio was 55%. The amount of bound Con A was controlled by changing pH and the initial concentrations of CNBr and Con A. The non-specific adsorption of Con A on the plain PHEMA beads was 0.1 mg/g. The maximum Con A binding was 4.8 mg/g at pH 7.25. Both plain and Con A bound PHEMA beads were interacted first with the myeloma cell suspension in phosphate buffer. Myeloma cell attachment was very low for the plain PHEMA beads, while the number of myeloma cells attached increased almost 20 fold when the Con A bound beads were used. In order to look at whether or not the interaction of the Con A bound PHEMA beads and myeloma cells are affected from the biological molecules and other cells in the medium. We selected sheep blood itself as the medium, and mixed with the myeloma cell suspension and changed the environment. Cell adhesion decreased but not very significantly by changing the medium from simple buffer to sheep blood.     

Supramolecular strategies to construct biocompatible and photoswitchable fluorescent assemblies

We designed and synthesized an amphiphilic copolymer with pendant hydrophobic decyl and hydrophilic poly(ethylene glycol) chains along a common poly(methacrylate) backbone. This macromolecular construct captures hydrophobic boron dipyrromethene fluorophores and hydrophobic spiropyran photochromes and transfers mixtures of both components in aqueous environments. Within the resulting hydrophilic supramolecular assemblies, the spiropyran components retain their photochemical properties and switch reversibly to the corresponding merocyanine isomers upon ultraviolet illumination. Their photoinduced transformations activate intermolecular electron and energy transfer pathways, which culminate in the quenching of the boron dipyrromethene fluorescence. As a result, the emission intensity of these supramolecular constructs can be modulated in aqueous environments under optical control. Furthermore, the macromolecular envelope around the fluorescent and photochromic components can cross the membrane of Chinese hamster ovarian cells and transport its cargo unaffected into the cytosol. Indeed, the fluorescence of these supramolecular constructs can be modulated also intracellularly by operating the photochromic component with optical inputs. In addition, cytotoxicity tests demonstrate that these supramolecular assemblies and the illumination conditions required for their operation have essentially no influence on cell viability. Thus, supramolecular events can be invoked to construct fluorescent and photoswitchable systems from separate components, while imposing aqueous solubility and biocompatibility on the resulting assemblies. In principle, this simple protocol can evolve into a general strategy to deliver and operate intracellularly functional molecular components under optical control.     

Univalence criterion for meromorphic functions and Loewner chains

The object of the present paper is to obtain a more general condition for univalence of meromorphic functions in the U^∗. The significant relationships and relevance with other results are also given. A number of known univalent conditions would follow upon specializing the parameters involved in our main results.     

Coefficient bounds for a subclass of starlike functions of complex order

In the present work, we determine coefficient bounds for functions in certain subclass of starlike functions of complex order b, which are introduced here by means of a multiplier differential operator. Several corollaries and consequences of the main results are also considered.     

Fixed point theorems for operators on partial metric spaces

Fixed point theorems for operators of a certain type on partial metric spaces are given. Orbitally continuous operators on partial metric spaces and orbitally complete partial metric spaces are defined, and fixed point theorems for these operators are given.     

Contrasting Cases of Calculus Students' Understanding of Derivative Graphs

This study adds momentum to the ongoing discussion clarifying the merits of visualization and analysis in mathematical thinking. Our goal was to gain understanding of three calculus students' mental processes and images used to create meaning for derivative graphs. We contrast the thinking processes of these three students as they attempted to sketch antiderivative graphs when presented with derivative graphs. These students constructed different and idiosyncratic images and representations leading to different understandings of derivative graphs. Our results suggest that the two students whose cognitive preferences were strongly visual or analytic and who did not synthesize visual and analytic thinking experienced different difficulties associated with their preferred modes for mathematical representation and thinking. Even the student who did synthesize these modes to some extent, to good effect, experienced difficulty when he did not do so. We discuss pedagogical implications for these results in a final section.     

The polynomial dual of an operator ideal

We prove that the adjoint of a continuous homogeneous polynomial $P$ between Banach spaces belongs to a given operator ideal $\mathcal I$ if and only if $P$ admits a factorization $P = u \circ Q$ where the adjoint of the linear operator $u$ belongs to $\mathcal I$ . Several consequences of this factorization are obtained, for example we characterize the polynomials whose adjoints are absolutely $p$ -summing.     

Fabrication of magnetic gold nanorod particles for immunomagnetic separation and SERS application

The preparation and application of rod-shaped core–shell structured Fe₃O₄–Au nanoparticles for immunomagnetic separation and sensing were described for the first time with this study. To synthesize magnetic gold nanorod particles, the seed-mediated synthetic method was carried out and the resulting nanoparticles were characterized with transmission electron microscopy (TEM), ultraviolet visible spectroscopy (UV–Vis), energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX), and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Magnetic properties of the nanoparticles were also examined. Characterization of the magnetic gold nanorod particles has proven that the resulting nanoparticles were composed of Fe₃O₄ core and the gold shell. The rod-shaped gold-coated iron nanoparticles have an average diameter of 16 ± 2 nm and an average length of about 50 ± 5 nm (corresponding aspect ratio of 3). The saturation magnetization value for the magnetic gold nanorod particles was found to be 37 emu/g at 300 K. Rapid and room temperature reaction synthesis of magnetic gold nanorod particles and subsequent surface modification with E. coli antibodies provide immunomagnetic separation and SERS application. The analytical performance of the SERS-based homogenous sandwich immunoassay system with respect to linear range, detection limit, and response time is also presented.     

Persistence and coexistence of infinite attractors in a fractal Josephson junction resonator with unharmonic current phase relation considering feedback flux effect

Josephson junction resonators are the devices which exhibit complex behaviours as a consequence of their inductive properties. Even though the insulating medium between Josephson junctions (JJs) is normally considered homogeneous, the fact that lithography is used to form the layer, it has fractal substrates. Such JJs are identified as fractal Josephson junctions (FJJs). In this paper, a new chaotic oscillator based on memristor and FJJ has been investigated. Superconductor properties can dramatically change its operating points especially voltage and heat that are related to Josephson tunnelling. Some changes in the operating points can cause the Josephson tunnelling junctions to oscillate in different oscillation modes in very high frequencies. This can be achieved by considering the potential across the junction with its flux feedback. In order to model the magnetic flux effect, we use a memristor whose memductance function is considered as an exponential function. By varying the type of the bias current, we could observe the property of infinitely coexisting attractors in the memristor-fractal Josephson junction oscillator, which is considered as a rare phenomenon in physical circuits. The proposed Josephson-Memristor circuit model is developed, and its equilibrium points, bifurcation and Lyapunov exponents are computed. As an engineering application, modelling the trajectories of the moving object has been realized. First, the SURF algorithm, which is not affected by the scale and rotations of the object, is used in the images to identify an object that tracks the states of the proposed Josephson-Memristor circuit. In this way, the coordinates of the orbits on which the object moves were determined on the image. In order to reproduce the orbits of the specified object, the coordinate information of the object has been trained to the artificial neural network model and the orbits of the object have been reproduced.

     

The Paul wavelet algorithm: an alternative approach to calculate the refractive index dispersion of a dielectric film from transmittance spectrum

A new application of the Paul wavelet algorithm was presented to determine the refractive index dispersion of a dielectric film from transmittance spectrum in the visible and near infrared region. The developed algorithm was tested by simulated data and experimentally applied to a sample of mica. The obtained refractive index dispersion determined by the Paul wavelet algorithm was compared with the refractive index values determined by the envelope and fringe counting methods, and also with the established result. It was shown that the degree of the Paul wavelet has a major effect on the outcome of a refractive index determination. The noise immunity of the presented method was shown by the simulation study.