The aim of the present study was to investigate slot deformation and the equivalent torque capacity of polycarbonate brackets with and without a metal slot in comparison with those of a metal bracket. For this purpose, the expansion characteristics and, in a further investigation, the labial crown torque of an upper central incisor, were measured in a simulated intra-oral clinical situation, us...

Thermal behaviour of blends of a liquid crystalline copoly(ester amide) (Vectra B950) with two isotropic polymers has been studied by differential scanning calorimetry. One of the isotropic polymers is an amorphous polymer — polycarbonate, the other is a semi-crystalline polymer — poly(ethylene terephthalate). It was found that the glass transition temperature of polycarbonate decreases with in...

Highly efficient preconcentration is a crucial prerequisite to the identification of important protein biomarkers with extremely low abundance in target biofluids. In this work, poly(dimethylsiloxane) microchips integrated with 10 nm polycarbonate nanopore membranes were utilized as high-speed protein accumulators. Double-sided injection control of electrokinetic fluid flow in the sample channe...

The use of proton exchange membranes (PEMs) in biological fuel cells limits the diversity of novel designs for increasing output power or enabling autonomous function in unique environments. Here we show that selected nanoporous polymer filters (nylon, cellulose, or polycarbonate) can be used effectively in place of PEMs in a miniature microbial fuel cell (mini-MFC, device cross-section 2 cm2),...

In this work, we measured the time evolution of the transmission features of 10-100 keV protons transmitted through nanocapillaries in a polycarbonate (PC) membrane. After reaching equilibrium, transmitted particles with an incident energy of 100 keV were located around the direction along the incident beam but not along the capillary axis, indicating that the transport mechanism of the 100 keV...

Ferromagnetic rods containing thin sections of diamagnetic metal create intense magnetic field gradients that attract and confine magnetic nanoparticles to regions of space as small as 20 nm. The rods (80 nm diameter) comprised alternating sections of CoNi ( approximately 350 nm) and Au (20-160 nm) formed by electrodeposition into porous polycarbonate membranes. Upon magnetizing the rods, large...

The production of vesicles, spherical shells formed from lipid bilayers, is an important aspect of their recent application to drug delivery technologies. One popular production method involves pushing a lipid suspension through cylindrical pores in polycarbonate membranes. However, the actual mechanism by which the polydisperse, multilamellar lipid suspension breaks up into a relatively monodi...

Reduced erythrocyte deformability has been implicated in the causation of stroke. We have therefore tested this red cell property by filtration through polycarbonate membranes in 42 patients with either transient ischaemic attacks or completed ischaemic stroke together with age and sex paired controls. We have failed to demonstrate any difference between patients and controls suggesting that re...