Science Daily December 12, 2022 The role of hydrodynamic interactions (HIs) play in the self-organization of colloidal suspensions and biological solutions has remained elusive particularly for charged soft matter systems. Researchers in Japan studied the role of HIs in the self-assembly of oppositely charged colloidal particles, which is a promising candidate for electrical tunable soft materials. In many-body HIs and the coupling between the colloid, ion, and fluid motions they found that, under a constant electric field, oppositely charged colloidal particles formed clusters and percolated into a gel network. They revealed that the cluster-forming tendency originates from the incompressibility-induced “inverse […]
Tag Archives: Biotechnology
Flexible strain sensor enabled by carbon nanofibers can ‘read lips’
Phys.org November 29, 2022 While high sensitivity and wide working range are desired key parameters for a strain sensor, they are usually contrary to each other to be achieved on the same sensor due to the tight structure dependence of both. Researchers in China used an integrated membrane containing both parallel aligned and randomly aligned carbon nanofibers (CNFs) to design a flexible strain sensor with high sensitivity and wide strain detection range. The parallel aligned CNF membrane (p-CNF) exhibited a low strain detection limit and high sensitivity, while the random aligned CNF membrane (r-CNF) exhibits a large strain detection range. […]
Seeing concentrations of toxins with the naked eye
Phys.org November 3, 2022 Current detection methods can only respond to changes in a droplet’s bulk wetting properties, leading to poor detection limits. A team of researchers in the US (Harvard University, Ohio State University) has developed a design principle that overcomes this fundamental limitation by locally concentrating analytes within a droplet’s contact line to modulate the local surface roughness, which further affects droplet mobility. They designed surfaces enabled the ultrasensitive, naked-eye detection of amphiphiles through changes in the droplets’ sliding angles, even when the concentration is four to five orders of magnitude below their critical micelle concentration. They developed […]
Team develops method to identify future SARS-CoV-2 mutations that could affect rapid antigen test performance
Science Daily September 15, 2022 To evaluate the impact of mutations on 17 antibodies used in 11 commercially available antigen tests with emergency use authorization a team of researchers in the US (Emory University, Baylor College, industry) measured antibody binding for all possible Nucleocapsid point mutations using a mammalian surface-display platform and deep mutational scanning. The results provided a complete map of the antibodies’ epitopes and their susceptibility to mutational escape. Their data predicted no vulnerabilities for detection of mutations found in variants of concern. They confirmed this using the commercial tests and sequence-confirmed COVID-19 patient samples. The antibody escapes […]
Billion-dollar US health agency gets new chief — but its direction remains in limbo
Nature September 13, 2022 President Joe Biden has selected Renee Wegrzyn, a biologist and former government scientist, as the inaugural director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H). Launched in March with a US$1-billion budget, ARPA-H aims to shake up the conventional model of funding biomedical research by funding high-risk, high-reward research in the life sciences. The Biden administration intends the agency to emulate the DARPA. Researchers applaud Biden’s choice, but say Wegrzyn will have her work cut out for her — there are many details about the agency that are still in limbo…read more.
Researchers help reveal a ‘blueprint’ for photosynthesis
Science Daily September 9, 2022 The cyanobacterial antenna structures, which are called phycobilisomes, are complex collections of pigments and proteins, which assemble into relatively massive complexes. Researchers have been unable to get the high-resolution images of intact antennae needed to understand how they capture and conduct light energy. An international team of researchers (USA – Michigan State University, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, UC Berkeley, Czech Republic) documented several notable results, including finding a new phycobilisome protein, observing two new ways that the phycobilisome orients its light-capturing rods that hadn’t been resolved before, and the structure of the antenna is available […]
Researchers create biosensor by turning spider silk into optical fiber
Phys.org August 2, 2022 Researchers in Taiwan harvested dragline spider silk from the giant wood spider Nephila pilipes, which is native to Taiwan. They enveloped the silk, which is just 10 microns in diameter, with a biocompatible photocurable resin and cured it to form a smooth protective surface creating an optical fiber structure that was 100 microns in diameter, with the spider silk acting as the core and the resin as the cladding. They added a biocompatible nano-layer of gold to enhance the fiber’s sensing abilities. This process formed a thread-like structure with two ends. To use the fiber to […]
3 Billion Bases of Our DNA: First Complete, Gapless Sequence of a Human Genome
SciTech Daily April 17, 2022 According to researchers, having a complete, gap-free sequence of the roughly 3 billion bases (or “letters”) in our DNA is critical for understanding the full spectrum of human genomic variation and for understanding the genetic contributions to certain diseases. The work was done by the Telomere to Telomere (T2T) consortium, which included leadership from researchers at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health. These studies provide more accurate information about the genomic variants within 622 medically relevant genes…read more. Open Access TECHNICAL ARTICLE
Send in the Blow Flies: Using Insects to Sample Areas for Chemical Warfare Agents
Global Biodefense April 11, 2022 Blow flies sample the environment as they search for water and food sources and can be trapped from kilometers away using baited traps. Under a program sponsored by DARPA a team of researchers at Indiana University-Purdue University investigated blow flies as environmental chemical sample collectors following a chemical warfare attack (CWA). They exposed three species of blow flies to CWA simulants dimethyl methylphosphonate and diethyl phosphoramidate as well as the pesticide dichlorvos, followed by treatment-dependent temperature and humidity conditions to determine the persistence and detectability of these compounds under varying environmental conditions. Flies were sacrificed […]
New Kind of Ultraviolet Light Safely Kills Airborne Pathogens Indoors, Scientists Say
Science Alert March 28, 2022 One potential solution for controlling airborne pathogens is Krypton Chloride (KrCl) excimer lamps (often referred to as Far-UVC), which can efficiently inactivate pathogens, such as coronaviruses and influenza, in air. Research has demonstrated that Krypton Chloride (KrCl) lamps do not induce acute reactions in the skin or eyes, nor delayed effects such as skin cancer. An international team of researchers has shown that Far-UVC deployed in a room-sized chamber effectively inactivates aerosolized Staphylococcus aureus. At a room ventilation rate of 3 air-changes-per-hour (ACH), with 5 filtered-sources the steady-state pathogen load was reduced by 98.4% providing […]