Combining Data Longevity with High Storage Capacity—Layer‐by‐Layer DNA Encapsulated in Magnetic Nanoparticles

In this paper the practical density of long‐term DNA storage is increased. Specifically, the DNA weight loading of silica sphere DNA storage is increased to 3.4 wt%, a ten‐fold increase compared to the previous state‐of‐the‐art. By applying a Layer‐by‐Layer (LbL) design with alternating layers of DNA and a polycationic molecule, namely polyethyleneimine (PEI), another dimension to DNA surface binding onto magnetic nanoparticles is added. A protective silica layer is grown on top of the multilayered nanoparticles to shield the DNA from external sources of damage. Accelerated aging experiments of the nanoparticles and the subsequent quantification of DNA stability via qPCR show a significantly lower degradation rate compared to unprotected DNA. The novel material is compared to previous DNA storage technologies, outperforming those in DNA storage density as well as stability. Finally, the storage of an 83 kB digital file in DNA through a successful readout of a 4991 oligonucleotide pool is demonstrated from particle encapsulation, through accelerated aging, to sequencing.     

Fette, Wachse, Ceresin

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Synthesis,Spectroscopic Characterization and DFT/TD-DFT Calculations of new Fluorescent Derivatives of Imidazo[4′,5′:3,4]Benzo[<Emphasis Type="Italic">c</Emphasis>]Isoxazole

An increasingly wide variety of fluorescent compounds is used in biotechnology, genomics, immunoassays, array technologies, imaging, and drug discovery. Therefore, synthesis of fluorophores with novel structural features can be interesting and useful in various fields. In this paper, four new fluorescent heterocyclic compounds with high quantum yields are introduced. These new fluorophores are synthesized in moderate to high yields via regioselective nitration of 3-alkyl-8-(4-chlorophenyl)-3 H-imidazo[4′,5′:3,4]benzo[c]isoxazoles. The latter compounds are obtained from the reaction of 1-alkyl-5-nitro-1 H-benzoimidazoles with (4-chlorophenyl)acetonitrile in basic MeOH solution. Physical spectral (UV-vis, IR, ¹HNMR, ¹³C NMR, NOESY and fluorescence) and analytical data have established the structures of synthesized compounds. The fluorescence properties of new fluorescent heterocyclic compounds are studied. The fluorescence of all compounds is very intense and fluorescence quantum yields are high (> 0.52). Density functional theory (DFT) calculations are performed to provide the optimized geometries, relevant frontier orbitals and the prediction of ¹H NMR chemical shifts for confirming the exact structure of fluorescent compounds. Calculated electronic absorption spectra were also obtained by time-dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT) method.

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CALCULATION OF THE YOUNG’S MODULUS OF AN ADSORBED POLYMER LAYER

 Polymer layers adsorbed to a surface or in a confined environment often change their mechanical properties. There is even the possibility of solidification of the confined layer. To judge the stiffness of such a layer, we used the Hertz model to calculate the Young’s modulus of the polymer layer in the confinement of AFM experiments with silicon nitride tip with a radius of curvature of R » 50 nm and a glass sphere attached to the cantilever R = 5 mm. Since there is no visible indentation of the layer in the AFM experiments, the layer is either penetrated very easily, or the indentation is too small to be seen in a force curve. The latter would be the case for a polymer layer with a Young’s modulus above 4 ´ 10⁸ Pa in case of an experiment with a silicon nitride tip and 4 ´ 10⁵ Pa in case of a glass sphere.     

Poissonian Behavior of Ising Spin Systems in an External Field

We apply the Stein–Chen method for Poisson approximation to spin-half Ising-type models in positive external field which satisfy the FKG inequality. In particular, we show that, provided the density of minus spins is low and can be expanded as a convergent power series in the activity (fugacity) variable, the distribution of minus spins is approximately Poisson. The error of the approximation is inversely proportional to the number of lattice sites (we obtain upper and lower bounds on the total variation distance between the exact distribution and its Poisson approximation). We illustrate these results by application to specific models, including the mean-field and nearest neighbor ferromagnetic Ising models.     

Compound Poisson approximations of subgraph counts in random graphs

We use Stein's method to bound compound Poisson approximations of the distribution of the number of subgraphs in random graphs which are isomorphic to some fixed graph. Our application of Stein's method is appropriate when the fixed graph is a member of a certain subclass of the class of balanced graphs. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 18: 39–60, 2001     

Circuit techniques for large CSEA SRAMs

The CMOS-storage emitter-access (CSEA) memory cell offers faster access than the MOS cells used in conventional BiCMOS SRAMs but using it in large memory arrays poses several problems. Novel BiCMOS circuit approaches to address the problems of decoding power, electronic noise, level translation, and write disturbance are described. Results on a 64-kb CSEA SRAM using these techniques are reported. The device, fabricated in an 0.8-μm BiCMOS technology, achieves read access and write pulse time of less than 4 ns while dissipating 1.7 W at a case temperature of 70°C     

Stereoselective Synthesis of Enantiomerically Pure Natural Products—Estrone as Example

Natural products have been synthesized for billions of years in animals, plants, and microorganisms. As a rule they occur enantiomerically pure. Their chiral character corroborates their use in metabolism or as biologically active agents. Natural products may be insufficient in quality or quantity. They have recently begun to become accessible, either unchanged or modified, by biological synthesis; here, too, they are obtained enantiomerically pure. In the last twenty years chemical synthesis has become a major concern of organic chemists. Their target compounds are primarily enantiomerically pure natural products or biologically active variants thereof.