A 3-year-old boy had a history of cor triatriatum, which was diagnosed incidentally when he was 1 year old during workups for failure to thrive and funnel chest. Initial echocardiographic evaluation revealed no evidence of obstruction through the orifice (mean pressure gradient, 3 mm Hg). However, progressive flow obstruction was noted at follow-up. At 3 years of age, 2-dimensional echocardiogr...

The photoinduced isomerization and thermal back relaxation of an azobenzene-functionalized polymer poly(disperse red 1 acrylate) were investigated at increasing external pressures up to 1.5 GPa inside a diamond-anvil spectroscopic cell. The thermal cis-trans isomerization was monitored by laser pump-probe spectroscopy, which demonstrated an increase in the half-life of the isomerization process...

A vibrating membrane bioreactor, in which the fouling problems are reduced by vibrating a hollow fiber membrane module, has been tested in constant flux microfiltration above (supra-critical) and below (sub-critical) an experimentally determined critical flux. Suspensions of bakers yeast cells were chosen as filtration medium (dry weight 4 g/l). The influence of extracellular polymeric substanc...

The biomechanical interaction between the leg stump and the prosthetic socket is critical in achieving close-to-normal ambulation. Although many investigations have been performed to understand the biomechanics of trans-tibial sockets, few studies have measured the socket interface pressure for transfemoral amputees. Furthermore, no report has examined how the residual muscle activities in the ...

the current study presents synthesis and characterization of high impact polystyrene - tio2 nanoparticles mixed matrix membranes for separation of carbon dioxide from nitrogen. the solution-casting method was used for preparation of membranes. the nano mixed matrix membranes were characterized using scanning electron microscopy to ensure the suitable dispersion of nano particles in high impact ...

A finite element based numerical model has been employed to describe momentum and mass transfer in open and spacer-filled crossflow membrane channels. Simulations considering operating conditions typical of seawater (SW), brackish water (BW), and reuse water (RW) reverse osmosis (RO) applications are employed for optimization of hypothetical spiral wound element feed spacer designs. Preliminary...

Before exocytosis, vesicles must first become docked to the plasma membrane. The SNARE complex was originally hypothesized to mediate both the docking and fusion steps in the secretory pathway, but previous electron microscopy (EM) studies indicated that the vesicular SNARE protein synaptobrevin (syb) was dispensable for docking. In this paper, we studied the function of syb in the docking of l...

Reverse osmosis (RO) technology has been widely applied to water treatment such as seawater desalination, and large RO plants are many in operation around the world. Moreover, much larger plants will be required to secure sufcient water resource in the near future because global water shortage and quality problems are still getting more serious. Mega-ton Water System pr...

Direct contact membrane distillation (DCMD) which emerges as an alternative separation technology can effectively perform a colloidal separation process under thermal driven force. DCMD is capable of extracting pure water from aqueous solutions containing non-volatile nanoparticles through the hydrophobic microporous membrane when a vapour pressure difference was established across the membrane...