The performance of a novel thermal cycler has been characterized in a 30-cycle PCR. The device consists of a microcapillary equipped with bidirectional pressure-driven flow and in situ optical position sensors. A 1-microL droplet of reaction mixture moves between three heat zones in a 1-mm i.d., oil-filled capillary using a multi-element scattered light detector and active feedback. The design ...

The basalar muscle of the beetle Cotinus mutabilis is a large, fibrillar flight muscle composed of approximately 90 fibers. The paired basalars together make up approximately one-third of the mass of the power muscles of flight. Changes in twitch force with changing stimulus intensity indicated that a basalar muscle is innervated by at least five excitatory axons and at least one inhibitory axo...

The Optimal Estimation (OE) technique is developed within the European Space Agency Climate Change Initiative (ESA-CCI) to retrieve subskin Sea Surface Temperature (SST) from AQUA’s Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer—Earth Observing System (AMSR-E). A comprehensive matchup database with drifting buoy observations is used to develop and test the OE setup. It is shown that it is essential to ...

We perform an exhaustive analysis of genome statistics for organisms, particularly extremophiles, growing in a wide range of physicochemical conditions. Specifically, we demonstrate how the correlation between the frequency of amino acids and their molecular weight, preserved on average, typically decreases as optimal growth temperature increases. We show how the relation between codon degenera...

Background: Bovine follicle-stimulating hormone (bFSH) is a heterodimer hormone that consists of a common -subunit which noncovalently associated with the hormone-specific -subunit. During the past 15 years, the methylotrophic yeast Pichia pastoris has become an important host organism for recombinant protein production because it is able to use methanol as a sole carbon and energy source. Th...

We present a tile system for assembling a counter of width K and height N = 2 on top of a seed-row in optimum time Θ(N). Our counter works at temperature 2. Earlier known constructions either took sub-optimal time or required temperature 3. Using existing techniques, our system for assembling a counter from a seed row can be extended into a system for assembling an N × N square in optimum time ...

BACKGROUND The nasopharyngeal temperature probe should be placed in the upper nasopharynx to reflect accurate core temperature. However, there have been no studies conducted to predict parameters for the optimal depth of the nasopharyngeal temperature probe. The purpose of this study was to examine the correlation between the optimal depth to the upper nasopharynx and the distance from the phil...

Metabolism of proteoglycans and hyaluronic acid has been shown to be temperature-dependent in cartilage explants, with optimal anabolic effects between 36°C and 38°C. At rest, the temperature of human knee has a value of around 33°C. We aim to show in this study that viscoelastic properties of healthy human cartilage allow its temperature to reach those optimal temperatures during physiological...