Electrical sorting of Caenorhabditis elegans

The nematode (worm) C. elegans is one of the widely studied animal model organisms in biology. It develops through 4 larval stages (L1-L4) in 2 to 3 days before becoming a young adult. Biological assays involving C. elegans frequently require a large number of animals that are appropriately staged and exhibit a similar behaviour. We have developed a new method to synchronize animals that relies on the electrotactic response (electric field-induced motion) of C. elegans to sort them in parallel based on their age, size and phenotype. By using local electric field traps in a microfluidic device, we can efficiently sort worms from a mixed culture in a semi-continuous flow manner (with a minimum throughput of 78 worms per minute per load-run) and obtain synchronized populations of animals. In addition to sorting larvae, our device can also distinguish between young and old adults efficiently. Unlike fluorescent based sorting systems that use active imaging based feedback, this method is passive and automatic and uses the innate behaviour of the worm. Considering that the entire procedure takes only a few minutes to run and is cost-effective, it promises to simplify and accelerate experiments requiring homogeneous cultures of worms as well as to facilitate isolation of mutants that have abnormal electrotaxis. More importantly, our method of isolating and separating worms using locomotion as a defining characteristic promises development of advanced microfluidics-based systems to study the neuronal basis of movement-related defects in worms and facilitate high-throughput chemical screening and drug discovery.     

Efficiency enhancement of a two-beam free-electron laser using a nonlinearly tapered wiggler

A nonlinear and non-averaged model of a two-beam free-electron laser (FEL) wiggler that is tapered nonlinearly in the absence of slippage is presented. The two beams are assumed to have different energies, and the fundamental resonance of the higher energy beam is at the third harmonic of the lower energy beam. By using Maxwell's equations and the full Lorentz force equation of motion for the electron beams, coupled differential equations are derived and solved numerically by the fourth-order Runge-Kutta method. The amplitude of the wiggler field is assumed to decrease nonlinearly when the saturation of the third harmonic occurs. By simulation, the optimum starting point of the tapering and the slopes for reducing the wiggler amplitude are found. This technique can be applied to substantially improve the efficiency of the two-beam FEL in the XUV and X-ray regions. The effect of tapering on the dynamical stability of the fast electron beam is also studied.     

Efficiency enhancement of a two-beam free-electron laser using a nonlinearly tapered wiggler

A nonlinear and non-averaged model of a two-beam free-electron laser(FEL) wiggler that is tapered nonlinearly in the absence of slippage is presented.The two beams are assumed to have different energies,and the fundamental resonance of the higher energy beam is at the third harmonic of the lower energy beam.By using Maxwell’s equations and the full Lorentz force equation of motion for the electron beams,coupled differential equations are derived and solved numerically by the fourth-order Runge-Kutta method.The amplitude of the wiggler field is assumed to decrease nonlinearly when the saturation of the third harmonic occurs.By simulation,the optimum starting point of the tapering and the slopes for reducing the wiggler amplitude are found.This technique can be applied to substantially improve the efficiency of the two-beam FEL in the XUV and X-ray regions.The effect of tapering on the dynamical stability of the fast electron beam is also studied.     

Analysis of coupling in the semi-cylindrical surface plasmonic couplers

In this paper, we have investigated the performance of a nano-optical directional coupler based on gap plasmon waveguides. The coupler consists of two waveguides having a localized coupled plasmon propagating between two semi-cylindrical surfaces. It is clear that the wave number and correspondingly light confinement in the waveguides are the most effective parameters in coupling strength and coupling length. Some expected and unexpected dependencies of the coupling length on the structure parameters are shown. Simulation results of the coupler obtained by the compact-2D finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method comply with those derived by an analytic method with the aid of the finite-element frequency-domain (FEFD) software package of COMSOL. The considered structures, because of their small coupling length and dimensions are appropriate for use in optical integrated circuits.     

Deterministic “Snakes and Ladders” Heuristic for the Hamiltonian cycle problem

We present a polynomial complexity, deterministic, heuristic for solving the Hamiltonian cycle problem (HCP) in an undirected graph of order $n$ . Although finding a Hamiltonian cycle is not theoretically guaranteed, we have observed that the heuristic is successful even in cases where such cycles are extremely rare, and it also performs very well on all HCP instances of large graphs listed on the TSPLIB web page. The heuristic owes its name to a visualisation of its iterations. All vertices of the graph are placed on a given circle in some order. The graph’s edges are classified as either snakes or ladders, with snakes forming arcs of the circle and ladders forming its chords. The heuristic strives to place exactly $n$ snakes on the circle, thereby forming a Hamiltonian cycle. The Snakes and Ladders Heuristic uses transformations inspired by $k$ -opt algorithms such as the, now classical, Lin–Kernighan heuristic to reorder the vertices on the circle in order to transform some ladders into snakes and vice versa. The use of a suitable stopping criterion ensures the heuristic terminates in polynomial time if no improvement is made in $n^3$ major iterations.     

The role of folic acid in inducing of apoptosis by zinc(II) complex in ovary and cervix cancer cells

Molecular Diversity - Herein, the synthesis, structure, binding affinity, cytotoxicity, and apoptotic properties of the new Zn(II) complex composed of folic acid and bipyridine ligands are...     

Application of rotating circular obstacles in improving ferrofluid heat transfer in an enclosure saturated with porous medium subjected to a magnetic field

Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry - In this paper, the evaluation of the heat transfer rate and fluid flow in an enclosure with rotating circular obstacles has been studied. The enclosure...     

Simple synthesis of the novel Cu-MOF catalysts for the selective alcohol oxidation and the oxidative cross-coupling of amines and alcohols

A novel porous metal–organic framework {Cu₂(bbda)_0.5(Hbbda)_1.5(OAc)_1.5.8H₂O} (UoB-5) was synthesized under ultrasound irradiation by employing a new Schiff base ligand H₂bbda (4,4′(1,4-phenylene bis (azanylylidene)) bis (methanylylidene))dibenzoic acid) and was fully characterized. The microporous nature of UoB-5 was confirmed by gas-sorption measurements. This framework acted as a highly effective heterogeneous catalyst for the alcohol oxidation reaction with tert-butyl hydroperoxide (t-BuOOH) as an oxidant. The presence of coordinatively unsaturated metal sites in UoB-5 could be the reason for high performance in this reaction. Furthermore, using the long linker with the free -NC group and uncoordinated -N atom on the wall of the pores created UoB-5 an excellent candidate for the catalytic activities without activation of the framework. It was confirmed with the heterogeneous catalytic experiments on the one-pot tandem synthesis of imines from benzyl alcohols and anilines. Eventually, the new Cu-MOF (UoB-5) could be an alternative catalyst as a more economically favorable and environmentally friendly in the catalysis field.