Criticality features in ULF magnetic fields prior to the 2011 Tohoku earthquake

The criticality of ULF (Ultra-low-frequency) magnetic variations is investigated for the 2011 March 11 Tohoku earthquake (EQ) by natural time analysis. For this attempt, some ULF parameters were considered: (1) F_h (horizontal magnetic field), (2) F_z (vertical magnetic field), and (3) D_h (inverse of horizontal magnetic field). The first two parameters refer to the ULF radiation, while the last parameter refers to another ULF effect of ionospheric signature. Nighttime (L.T. = 3 am ± 2 hours) data at Kakioka (KAK) were used, and the power of each quantity at a particular frequency band of 0.03–0.05 Hz was averaged for nighttime hours. The analysis results indicate that F_h fulfilled all criticality conditions on March 3–5, 2011, and that the additional parameter, D_h reached also a criticality on March 6 or 7. In conclusion, criticality has reached in the pre-EQ fracture region a few days to one week before the main shock of the Tohoku EQ.     

Combined Effect of Temperature and Ternary Mobile Phase Composition on the Retention in Ternary Isocratic and Gradient Elution RP-LC under Isothermal Conditions. Application to the Retention Prediction of Four Macrolide Antibiotics

Retention models considering simultaneously ternary mobile phase organic contents and column temperature (T) were developed by a direct combination of equations expressing separately the dependence of the retention upon each of these factors. Thus, a combination of a linear dependence of the logarithm of the solute retention factor, ln k (T), against 1/T, i.e. ln k (T) = a + b/T, and of either a linear or a quadratic dependence of ln k upon the compositions of a binary mobile phase, gave two different expressions for the logarithm of the solute retention factor in terms of both temperature and organic contents in the ternary mobile phase. The effectiveness of the above models was tested in the prediction of isothermal retention of a mixture of four macrolide antibiotics under ternary isocratic and gradient elution conditions using mobile phases modified by methanol and acetonitrile. The limiting case of using ternary eluents with constant ratio of the concentrations of the two organic modifiers was also tested.     

Targeting carbon nanotubes against cancer

The use of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) as polyvalent tools for cancer treatment is progressing at a very fast pace. The most promising approach is the targeted delivery of drugs, designed to selectively direct the therapeutic treatment towards the tumours. CNTs may offer several advantages to overcome one of the main limitations of most existing anticancer therapies, namely the lack of selectivity. Herein, an account of the existing literature on CNT-based nanomedicine for cancer treatment is given. The most significant results obtained so far in the field of drug delivery are presented for many anticancer chemotherapeutics (doxorubicin, methotrexate, taxanes, platinum analogues, camptothecine and gemcitabine), but also for immunotherapeutics and nucleic acids. Moreover, the alternative anticancer therapies based on thermal ablation and radiotherapy are discussed. The attention throughout the review is focused on the different targeting strategies proposed so far, mainly based on antibodies, but also on other specifically recognised molecules or on the application of an external magnetic field.     

Rheological characterization of polyethylene terephthalate resins using a multimode Phan-Tien-Tanner constitutive relation

Linear viscoelastic, shear, and extensional rheological characterization of linear and branched Poly(Ethylene Terephthalate) resins (PET) was carried out by means of both a parallel-plate and capillary rheometers. Before loading into the rheometers, the polymer pellets were thoroughly dried at well-characterized conditions long enough to obtain consistent and reproducible results. Continuing polymer degradation and poly-condensation reactions in the relatively open environment of the parallel-plate rheometer were accounted for by correcting the data using material-time super-position. The rheological data obtained were used to fit by nonlinear optimization, the linear relaxation spectrum and nonlinear parameters of a multi-mode Phan-Thien and Tanner (PTT) constitutive relation. It was found that this model can represent rheological data for PET resins very well and as a result may be used in relevant processing flow simulations, i.e. film casting.     

On the Volume Ratio of Two Convex Bodies

Let K and L be two convex bodies in Rⁿ. The volume ratio vr(K,L) of K and L is defined by vr(K, L = inf(|K|/|T(L)|)^1/n, wherethe infimum is over all affine transformations T of Rⁿ for whichT(L) K. It is shown in this paper that vr(K, L) , where c > 0 is an absolute constant. This isoptimal up to the logarithmic term. 2000 Mathematics SubjectClassification 52A40, 46B07 (primary); 52A21, 52A20 (secondary).     

High resolution multigrid cross-correlation digital PIV measurements of a turbulent starting jet using half frame image shift film recording

This paper describes a novel approach of acquiring two single-exposed, non-overlapping images using half frame image shift (HFIS) recording on photographic film. This technique permits the recording of two single-exposed, non-overlapping images of seed particles in a flow plane on high spatial resolution film with any arbitrary time delay between exposures. A new multigrid CCDPIV (MCCDPIV) analysis method is used to analyse the single-exposed, non-overlapping sequential images resulting in PIV measurements with a larger velocity dynamic range, lower random error and better spatial resolution than standard CCDPIV analysis. HFIS recording followed by MCCDPIV analysis was employed to measure the spatio-temporal evolution of the in-plane velocity vector and the out-of-plane vorticity fields of a turbulent starting jet at Reynolds numbers based on the orifice diameter and piston velocity of 10,780 and 13,860.     

Magnetohydrodynamics and Plasma Cosmology

We study the linear magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) equations, both in the Newtonian and the general-relativistic limit, as regards a viscous magnetized fluid of finite conductivity and discuss instability criteria. In addition, we explore the excitation of cosmological perturbations in anisotropic spacetimes, in the presence of an ambient magnetic field. Acoustic, electromagnetic (e/m) and fast-magnetosonic modes, propagating normal to the magnetic field, can be excited, resulting in several implications of cosmological significance.     

John's Theorem for an Arbitrary Pair of Convex Bodies

We provide a generalization of John's representation of the identity for the maximal volume position of L inside K, where K and L are arbitrary smooth convex bodies in ⁿ . From this representation we obtain Banach–Mazur distance and volume ratio estimates.     

Lower Bound for the Maximal Number of Facets of a 0/1 Polytope

Let $f_{n-1}(P)$ denote the number of facets of a polytope $P$ in ${\Bbb R}^n$. We show that there exist 0/1 polytopes $P$ with $$f_{n-1}(P)\geq\left (\frac{cn}{\log^2 n}\right )^{n/2},$$ where $c>0$ is an absolute constant. This improves earlier work of Barany and Por on a question of Fukuda and Ziegler.