A planar lipid bilayer (BLM) workstation, used to record currents through actively gating, ion conducting single channels, is a complex apparatus requiring several components working in concert. These components include a means to support the lipid membrane, high gain amplification, shielding of electromagnetic interference and mechanical vibration, mechanisms for stirring and changing solution...

Silica nanoparticle/mesoporous silica composite films were prepared by direct mixing with mechanical stirring and thermal imidization. The structural morphology was elucidated by scanning electron microscopy and the surface of the film was imaged by atomic force microscopy. The functional groups and desorption process of the films were elucidated by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and t...

In this paper, new numerical modeling of material flow in the thermo-mechanical friction stir welding process is presented. In this numerical model, the discretization in space is derived by the meshfree Galerkin method using a Lagrangian meshfree convex approximation. The discrete thermal and mechanical equations are weakly coupled as the time advances using a forward difference scheme. A mort...

We analyze an example system of four coupled phase oscillators and discover a novel phenomenon that we call a “heteroclinic ratchet”; a particular type of robust heteroclinic network on a torus where connections wind in only one direction. The coupling structure has only one symmetry, but there are a number of invariant subspaces and degenerate bifurcations forced by the coupling structure, and...

Excellent mechanical properties of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) make them outstanding candidate reinforcements to enhance mechanical properties of conventional composites. The glass/polyester composites are widely used in many industries and applications. Improving the mechanical properties of such composites with addition of CNTs can increase their applications. In this research, multi-walled carbo...

Botulinum neurotoxins (BoNTs) and their fragments are targets of therapeutic developments and are increasingly used as therapeutic, prophylactic, and research reagents. However, published data on their properties vary widely. In order to gain a better understanding of these variations, we initiated a systematic investigation of the stability parameters of catalytic light chains (Lc) as well as ...