Effects of ultrasound and ultrasound assisted alkaline pretreatments on the enzymolysis and structural characteristics of rice protein

The objectives of this study were to investigate the effects of multi-frequency energy-gathered ultrasound (MFEGU) and MFEGU assisted alkaline pretreatments on the enzymolysis and the mechanism of two pretreatments accelerating the rice protein (RP) proteolysis process. The results showed that MFEGU and MFEGU assisted alkaline pretreatments improved significantly (P < 0.05) the degree of hydrolysis (DH) and the protein elution amount of RP. Furthermore under the same DH conditions, ultrasound and ultrasound assisted alkaline pretreatments were more save the enzymolysis time than the unpretreatment. The changes in UV–vis spectra, fluorescence emission spectra indicated unfolding and destruction of RP by MFEGU and MFEGU assisted alkaline pretreatments. The circular dichroism analysis showed that both pretreatments decreased α-helix but increased β-sheet and random coil of RP. Amino acid composition revealed that MFEGU and MFEGU assisted alkaline pretreatments could increase the protein elution amount and the ratio of hydrophobic amino acids. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) indicated that both pretreatments destroyed the microstructures and reduced the particle size of RP. Therefore, MFEGU and MFEGU assisted alkaline pretreatments are beneficial to improving the degree of hydrolysis due to its sonochemistry effect on the molecular conformation as well as on the microstructure of protein.     

A novel dehydration technique for carrot slices implementing ultrasound and vacuum drying methods

A novel drying technique using a combination of ultrasound and vacuum dehydration was developed to shorten the drying time and improve the quality of carrot slices. Carrot slices were dried with ultrasonic vacuum (USV) drying and vacuum drying at 65 °C and 75 °C. The drying rate was significantly influenced by the drying techniques and temperatures. Compared with vacuum drying, USV drying resulted in a 41–53% decrease in the drying time. The drying time for the USV and vacuum drying techniques at 75 °C was determined to be 140 and 340 min for carrot slices, respectively. The rehydration potential, nutritional value (retention of β-carotene and ascorbic acid), color, and textural properties of USV-dried carrot slices are predominately better compared to vacuum-dried carrot slices. Moreover, lower energy consumption was used in the USV technique. The drying data (time versus moisture ratio) were successfully fitted to Wang and Singh model.     

Dispersive Solitary Wave Solutions of Strain Wave Dynamical Model and Its Stability

In the materials of micro-structured, the propagation of wave modeling should take into account the scale of various microstructures. The different kinds solitary wave solutions of strain wave dynamical model are derived via utilizing exp\((-\phi(\xi))\)-expansion and extended simple equation methods. This dynamical equation plays a key role in engineering and mathematical physics. Solutions obtained in this work include periodic solitary waves, Kink and anti-Kink solitary waves, bell-shaped solutions, solitons, and rational solutions. These exact solutions help researchers for knowing the physical phenomena of this wave equation. The stability of this dynamical model is examined via standard linear stability analysis, which authenticate that the model is stable and their solutions are exact. Graphs are depicted for knowing the movements of some solutions. The results show that the current methods, by the assist of symbolic calculation, give an effectual and direct mathematical tools for resolving the nonlinear problems in applied sciences.     

Clustering gene expression data analysis using an improved EM algorithm based on multivariate elliptical contoured mixture models

Clustering gene expression data is an important research topic in bioinformatics because knowing which genes act similarly can lead to the discovery of important biological information. Many clustering algorithms have been used in the field of gene clustering. The multivariate Gaussian mixture distribution function was frequently used as the component of the finite mixture model for clustering, however the clustering cannot be restricted to the normal distribution in the real dataset. In order to make the cluster algorithm strong adaptability, this paper proposes a new scheme for clustering gene expression data based on the multivariate elliptical contoured mixture models (MECMMs). To solve the problem of over-reliance on the initialization, we propose an improved expectation maximization (EM) algorithm by adding and deleting initial value for the classical EM algorithm, and the number of clusters can be treated as a known parameter and inferred with the QAIC criterion. The improved EM algorithm based on the MECMMs is tested and compared with some other clustering algorithms, the performance of our clustering algorithm has been extensively compared over several simulated and real gene expression datasets. Our results indicated that improved EM clustering algorithm is superior to the classical EM algorithm and the support vector machines (SVMs) algorithm, and can be widely used for gene clustering.     

First-order kernel density estimation of abdomen medical image intensity and spatial information and application to segmentation

Kernel density estimators (KDE) used for many medical image applications only consider the intensity information of each pixel or its neighbors without the ability of expressing the structure and shape of tissues and organs, and they suffer from boundary bias problem. In this paper, we propose a new first-order kernel density estimation (FOKDE) method for 1D intensity information and 2D spatial information of medical image in two steps. First, the FOKDE of intensity information is estimated and applied to medical image segmentation with the multi-thresholding algorithm. Second, we estimate the FOKDE of spatial information on the initial segmentation, which can express the structure and shape of organs and tissues. In order to evaluate the FOKDE and KDE of the 2D spatial information, we apply them to medical image segmentation with the hill-climbing strategy. Density estimation experiments and segmentation application results on the simulated dataset and real abdomen CT images show us that the FOKDE has smaller boundary bias than the KDE, and that it can estimate the structure and shape of tissues and organs with spatial information effectively.     

过渡流下近壁插入圆柱对壁面强化传热的影响

本文利用基于复合网格系统的计算方法,对Re=50～1200的近壁插入圆柱流场进行数值模拟,研究过渡流状态下在壁面附近插入圆柱对下游壁面传热强化的影响。并基于低速循环水槽流动实验台,采用粒子成像测试法(PIV)对Re=100～500的近壁插入圆柱流场进行可视化实验研究,验证了数值模拟方法的可靠性。研究结果表明:近壁插入圆柱流场在Re=100时进入过渡流状态;Re直接影响圆柱尾流中周期性涡脱和壁面涡岛的发生位置及其洗刷效应的大小,随着Re的增大,洗刷效应明显增强,因而,过渡流范围内Re越大,圆柱下游壁面传热强化越大。     

Degradation of Rhodamine B in aqueous solution by laser cavitation

A novel method of laser cavitation (LC) was proposed for degrading organic dye wastewater. Rhodamine B (RhB) aqueous solution was employed as the simulated organic dye wastewater, and a LC system was designed to conduct the experiments of degrading RhB. The effects of laser energy, initial concentration and cavitation time on the degradation were investigated. Moreover, the degradation kinetics, degradation mechanism and energy efficiency were analyzed. The experimental results indicate that RhB aqueous solution can be degraded effectively by LC and the degradation follows the pseudo-first-order kinetics. The extent of degradation increases by 27.6% with the rise of laser energy (50–100 mJ) while it decreases by 7.8% with increasing the initial concentration from (20–40 mg/L), but RhB can not be degraded when exceeding 100 mg/L. The degradation extent of RhB at 100 mJ and 20 mg/L for 3 h is 81.11%, and the RhB solution is almost completely degraded at 150 mJ (98.4%). The degradation velocity of RhB rises firstly and then decreases as the cavitation time increases. The degradation of RhB by LC can be attributed to the N-de-ethylation and chromophore cleavage caused by oxidation of hydroxyl (OH) radical and thermal decomposition. LC has a higher energy efficiency compared with other methods and is more energy efficient at lower laser energy.     

Modification of rapeseed protein by ultrasound-assisted pH shift treatment: Ultrasonic mode and frequency screening,changes in protein solubility and structural characteristics

We investigated the effect of ultrasound-assisted pH shift treatment on the micro-particle, molecular, and spatial structure of rapeseed protein isolates (RPI). Various ultrasonic frequency modes (fixed, and sweep) was used. Protein characterization by the indexes: particle size, zeta potential, sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), free sulfhydryl (SH), surface hydrophobicity (Ho), Fourier transform infrared Spectrum (FTIR) and fluorescence intensity was studied to elucidate the changes in solubility and structural attributes of RPI. The results showed that ultrasonic frequency and working modes substantially altered the structure, and modified the solubility of RPI. Ultra + pH mode at fixed frequency of 20 kHz had the best effect on the solubility of RPI. Under the condition of ultra + pH mode, 20 kHz at pH 12.5, solubility, compared to control, increased from 8.90% to 66.84%; and the change in molecular structure of RPI was characterized by smaller particles (from 330.90 to 115.77 nm), high zeta potential (from −17.95 to −14.43 mV, p < 0.05), and increased free sulfhydryl (from 11.63 to 24.50 µmol/g) compared to control. Likewise, surface hydrophobicity increased (from 2053.9 to 2649.4, p < 0.05), whilst ɑ-helix and random coil decreased (p < 0.05), compared to control. The fluorescence spectroscopy and FTIR spectroscopy showed that the secondary and tertiary structure of the RPI were altered. These observations revealed that changes in RPI structure was the direct factor affecting solubility. In conclusion, ultrasound assisted pH shift treatment was proven to be an effective method for the modification of protein, with promising application in food industry.     

Application of ultrasonic technology in postharvested fruits and vegetables storage: A review

It has been an important research topic and a serious applicable issue to extend storage time of fruits and vegetables using advanced scientific and effective technology. Among various approaches, ultrasound has been regarded as one of the most pollution-free and effective technical means to significantly improve the preservation of fruits and vegetables. This paper summarizes the application of ultrasonic technology in fruits and vegetables storage in recent years, including removal of pesticide residues and cleaning, sterilization, enzyme inactivation, effect on physico-chemical indexes. Additionally, we also discussed limitations and negative effects of ultrasonic treatment on fruits and vegetables such as damages to tissues and cells. Furthermore, a proper application of ultrasonic technology has been proven to effectively extend the storage period of postharvest fruits and vegetables and maintain the quality. Moreover, the combination of ultrasound and other conventional preservation technologies can further improve the preservation in a coordinate manner and even have a broader application prospect.     

Tensile properties and microstructure of 2024 aluminum alloy subjected to the high magnetic field and external stress

In order to explore the dependence of plasticity of metallic material on a high magnetic held,the effects of the different magnetic induction intensities(H = 0 T,0.5 T,1 T,3 T,and 5 T) and pulses number(N = 0,10,20,30,40,and 50) on tensile strength(σ_b) and elongation(δ) of 2024 aluminum alloy are investigated in the synchronous presences of a high magnetic held and external stress.The results show that the magnetic held exerts apparent and positive effects on the tensile properties of the alloy.Especially under the optimized condition of H~*=1 T and N~*=30,the σ_b and 8 are 410 MPa and 17% that are enhanced by 9.3% and 30.8% respectively in comparison to those of the untreated sample.The synchronous increases of tensile properties are attributed to the magneto-plasticity effect on a quantum scale.That is,the magnetic held will accelerate the state conversion of radical pair generated between the dislocation and obstacles from singlet to the triplet state.The bonding energy between them is meanwhile lowered and the moving flexibility of dislocations will be enhanced.At H~* = 1 T and N~* = 30,the dislocation density is enhanced by 1.28 times.The relevant minimum grain size is 266.1 nm,which is reduced by 35.2%.The grain rehning is attributed to the dislocation accumulation and subsequent dynamic recrystallization.The(211) and(220) peak intensities are weakened.It is deduced that together with the recrystallization,the hne grains will transfer towards the slip plane and contribute to the slipping deformation.