Interglycolipid Membrane Interactions: pH-Dependent Aggregation of Nonionic Synthetic Glycolipid Vesicles

Large unilamellar vesicles composed of a nonionic synthetic glycolipid, 1,3-di-O-phytanyl-2-O-(beta-D-maltotriosyl)glycerol exhibited a pH-dependent aggregation-disaggregation process; vesicle aggregation occurred in a lower pH region and vesicle disaggregation occurred in a higher pH region. This process was almost reversible and the aggregation threshold pH increased as NaCl concentration increased. Electrophoretic mobility measurements revealed that the glycolipid vesicles are negatively charged in the range pH 1.6-13. The change in zeta-potentials as functions of pH and NaCl concentration could be well described by the Gouy-Chapman expression of the surface charges with an assumption that the interfacial charges arise from the "adsorption" of OH(-) at the vesicle-water interface and the dissociation of hydroxyl groups of the sugar headgroup in a higher pH regime (>pH 10). The pH-dependent aggregation process was reasonably well described by the classical DLVO theory. Thus, the double-layer repulsive forces appear to be a major factor in stabilizing the glycolipid vesicle suspension. Copyright 2000 Academic Press.     

Chromatographic deuterium isotope effects of derivatized N-glycans and N-glycopeptides in a zwitterionic type of hydrophilic interaction chromatography

HPLC/MS is now an essential method for the analysis of glycans and glycopeptides. A technique using ICATs is also becoming popular for their comparative/quantitative analysis based on MS signal intensities. However, the RP HPLC most often used causes "doublet" peaks of deuterium-labeled and nonlabeled peptides, which are well known for causing the chromatographic deuterium isotope effect. Such doublet peaks are undesirable for precise comparison of MS signal intensities. This report shows that, in the zwitterionic type of hydrophilic interaction chromatography, the chromatographic deuterium isotope effect is negligibly small for N-glycans derivatized with deuterium-labeled 2-aminopyridine and N-glycopeptides derivatized with deuterium-labeled succinic anhydride.     

Determination of genomic N3‐methylthymidine in human cancer cells treated with nitrosamines using capillary electrophoresis with laser‐induced fluorescence

Methylating substances alter DNA by forming N3‐methylthymidine (N3mT), a mutagenic base modification. To develop a sensitive analytical method for the detection of N3mT in DNA based on capillary electrophoresis with laser‐induced fluorescence detection (CE‐LIF), we synthesized the N3mT‐3’‐phosphate as a chemical standard. The limit of detection was 1.9 amol of N3mT, which corresponds to one molecule of N3mT per 1000 normal nucleotides or 0.1%. With this method, we demonstrated that the carcinogenic nitrosamine N’‐nitrosonornicotine (NNN) induced N3mT in the human lung cancer cell line A549. Treatment with NNN also caused an elevated degree of 5‐hydroxymethylcytidine (5hmdC) in DNA, while the methylation degree (i.e. 5‐methylcytidine; 5mdC) stayed constant. According to our data, NNN could, via yet unknown mechanisms, play a role in the formation of N3mT as well as 5hmdC. In this study we have developed a new sensitive analytical method using CE‐LIF for the simultaneous detection of the three DNA modifications, 5mdC, 5hmdC and N3mT.     

On the robustness of batching estimators

We propose and investigate an alternative definition of robustness for estimators of the variance of the sample mean arising in steady-state simulation experiments. The alternative definition implies that—of all known batching estimators—overlapping-batch-means estimators have both optimal mean squared error and optimal robustness.     

Classification of Equilibrium Solutions of the Cometary Flow Equation and Explicit Solutions of the Euler Equations for Monatomic Ideal Gases

The set of smooth equilibrium solutions of a kinetic model for cometary flows is split into equivalence classes according to similarity transformations. For each equivalence class in the two- and three-dimensional cases a normal form is computed. Each such equilibrium solution gives rise to an explicit solution of the compressible Euler equations for monatomic gases. The set of these solutions is discussed with special emphasis on solutions containing vacuum regions.     

The influence of corporate taxes on pricing and capital structure in property-liability insurance

A change in the corporate tax level can have a significant impact on rate making and capital structure for insurance companies. The purpose of this paper is to study this effect on competitive equity-premium combinations for different asset and liability models while retaining a fixed safety level. This is a crucial consideration as a change in the tax rate leads, in general, to a different risk of insolvency. Hence, fixing the safety level serves to isolate the effect of taxes without shifting the insurer’s risk situation whenever taxes are varied. The model framework includes stochastic assets as well as stochastic claims costs. We further compare the results for liability models with and without a jump component. Insurance rate making is conducted using option pricing theory.     

Monte carlo estimation of the sampling distribution of nonlinear model parameter estimators

The sampling distribution of parameter estimators can be summarized by moments, fractiles or quantiles. For nonlinear models, these quantities are often approximated by power series, approximated by transformed systems, or estimated by Monte Carlo sampling. A control variate approach based on a linear approximation of the nonlinear model is introduced here to reduce the Monte Carlo sampling necessary to achieve a given accuracy. The particular linear approximation chosen has several advantages: its moments and other properties are known, it is easy to implement, and there is a correspondence to asymptotic results that permits assessment of control variate effectiveness prior to sampling via measures of nonlinearity. Empirical results for several nonlinear problems are presented.This research was supported in part by the Office of Naval Research under Contract N00014-79-C-0832.     

On a mathematical model for hot carrier injection in semiconductors

We study a collisionless transport model for electrons in a semiconductor, and we perform an asymptotic analysis for low temperatures or large applied biases. We derive analytic relations for the built-in potential and for the current which flows through the structure.