Effect of laser beam incidence angle on the thermoelastic generation in semi-transparent materials

When a laser beam is absorbed in a semi-transparent material, a volume acoustic source is created owing to penetration of the laser beam inside the material and to thermoelastic transduction. Many experimental and theoretical studies have been conducted to better understand this ultrasound generation process with normal laser light incidence on the material surface. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the effects of the asymmetry caused by oblique incidence of a laser line source on the generation of acoustic waves in semi-transparent isotropic materials. Experiments on a glass plate demonstrate that such an obliquely incident laser light strongly affects bulk acoustic waves generation. Compressional and shear waves are enhanced and the loss of symmetry of the acoustic source causes asymmetrical behavior of the acoustic waves. Surprisingly, compressional-wave amplitude decreases whereas shear-wave amplitude increases in the region where the electromagnetic energy is refracted. This feature is explained by semi-analytical calculations.     

In vitro immunosuppressive activity of tacrolimus dihydrodiol precursors obtained by chemical oxidation and identification of a new metabolite of SDZ-RAD by electrospray and electrospray-linked scan mass spectrometry

Different tacrolimus epoxides and dihydrodiol epoxides arising from the chemical oxidation of the parent drug are described. Open-chain tautomeric forms involving the lactone function were identified for the tacrolimus epoxides. Moreover, the identification by electrospray and electrospray linked scan mass spectrometry of an SDZ-RAD C16-C27 O-demethyl 17, 18-19, 20-21, 22 tris-epoxide new metabolite isolated from pig liver microsomes is reported. The in vitro immunosuppressive activity, using mixed lymphocyte reactions of the two macrolide reported oxidation compounds are discussed.     

Optical reflectometric detection of a three-dimensional acoustic field

In laser ultrasonics, when focusing strongly the pump beam, a three-dimensional (3D) diffracted acoustic field can be generated. Considering weakly absorbing materials, the 3D interaction of this elastic perturbation with the optical detection beam must be taken into account. A semi-analytical model is proposed to describe such phenomena in reflectometric measurements. Once the acoustooptic interaction has been partially linearized, the resulting inhomogeneous differential system is solved using the matricant method. Good agreement is found comparing the calculated results with the experimental data in an aluminum film.     

Algebraic Modeling of the Turbulent Heat Fluxes Using the Elliptic Blending Approach—Application to Forced and Mixed Convection Regimes

The present paper focuses on the application of the elliptic blending approach to the modeling of turbulent heat fluxes, in order to account for the influence of solid boundaries. The analytical justification of the extension to the temperature–pressure gradient correlation term of this approach, originally applied to the velocity–pressure gradient, is given. The assumption of weak equilibrium enables the derivation of two new algebraic flux models valid down to the wall. It is shown, with both a priori tests and computations in forced and mixed convection regimes, that the predictions of the streamwise heat-flux and the temperature variance are significantly improved by the use of elliptic blending. A particular attention is devoted to the issue of the modeling of the correlation length scale involved in the elliptic blending for the heat fluxes, which is shown to have a significant influence on the predictions.     

Picosecond time scale imaging of mechanical contacts

By means of an ultrafast opto-acoustic technique we study the nanoindentation of thin chromium films on sapphire substrates using a ceramic ball bearing. Acoustic pulses at ∼40 GHz returning from the film-indenter interface allow the film indentation profiles to be probed to sub-nanometer resolution over contact areas ∼25 μm in radius. The deformation of the films during loading is thereby revealed. Furthermore, thermal wave imaging of the contact at megahertz frequencies is simultaneously achieved.     

Isolation from pig liver microsomes, identification by tandem mass spectrometry and in vitro immunosuppressive activity of an SDZ-RAD 17,18,19,20,21,22-tris-epoxide

Macrolide immunosuppressive drugs such as tacrolimus (FK506) and sirolimus (rapamycin) are compounds largely used in modern immunosuppressive therapy and considered as powerful immunosuppressive agents. Some of these molecules are still under clinical development as, for example, SDZ-RAD (40-O-(2-hydroxyethyl)rapamycin), an immunosuppressive drug closely related to rapamycin. SDZ-RAD has a molecular mass of 957.57 Da (C53H83NO14) and shares the same common intracellular receptor as tacrolimus, the FK-506 binding protein (FKBP-12). SDZ-RAD exerts its pharmacological effect by binding to a different effector protein, inhibits the S6p 70-kinase and interrupts a different signal transduction pathway than tacrolimus. Both SDZ-RAD and rapamycin are metabolized mainly by the cytochrome P-450 3A4-dependent mixed function oxygenase enzyme system to hydroxylated and demethylated metabolites. We describe here the isolation from pig liver microsomes of a novel SDZ-RAD metabolite identified by electrospray tandam mass spectrometry as a new SDZ-RAD 17,18,19,20,21,22-tris-epoxide metabolite. The in vitro immunosuppressive activity as measured by the mixed lymphocyte reaction is more or less comparable to that of SDZ-RAD, although its pharmacological mode of action may be different from that classically described for rapamycin.     

Picosecond ultrasonics time resolved spectroscopy using a photonic crystal fiber

We present a broadband picosecond ultrasonics time resolved spectroscopy. Detection of picosecond coherent acoustic phonons using a wavelength continuum generation in a photonic crystal fiber (PCF) with femtosecond laser pulses is developed. Measurements are performed for selected wavelengths of a broad wavelength probe pulse within a bandwidth of 250 nm with an 825 nm center wavelength on two samples made of tungsten and of gallium arsenide.