Electrospun fiber - Hydrogel composites for nucleus pulposus tissue engineering

New materials are needed to replace degenerated intervertebral disc tissue and to provide longer-term solutions for chronic back-pain. Replacement tissue potentially could be engineered by seeding cells into a scaffold that mimics the architecture of natural tissue. Many natural tissues, including the nucleus pulposus (the central region of the intervertebral disc) consist of collagen nanofibers embedded in a gel-like matrix. Recently it was shown that electrospun micro- or nano-fiber structures of considerable thickness can be produced by collecting fibers in an ethanol bath. Here, randomly aligned polycaprolactone electrospun fiber structures up to 50 mm thick are backfilled with alginate hydrogels to form novel composite materials that mimic the fiber-reinforced structure of the nucleus pulposus. The composites are characterized using both indentation and tensile testing. The composites are mechanically robust, exhibiting substantial strain-to-failure. The method presented here provides a way to create large biomimetic scaffolds that more closely mimic the composite structure of natural tissue. © 2012 Materials Research Society.

Residual plastids of bleached mutants of Euglena gracilis and their effects on the expression of nucleus-encoded genes

Bleached mutants of Euglena gracilis were obtained by treatment with ofloxacin (Ofl) and streptomycin (Sm) respectively. As shown by electron microscopy, the residual plastids contain prothylakoids in an Ofl mutant, and the highly developed and tightly stacked membranous structure found in cells of two Sm, mutants. Nine genes of the plastid genome were examined with PCR, showing that ribosomal protein genes and most other plastid genes were lost in all but one Sm mutant. Using differential display and RT-PCR, it was shown that chloroplast degeneration could cause changes in transcription of certain nucleus-encoded genes during heterotrophic growth in darkness.

Properties of the rotational bands in the transitional nucleus 189Pt

High-spin states in 189Pt have been studied experimentally using the 176Yb(18O,5n) reaction at beam energies of 88 and 95 MeV. The level scheme of189Pt has been revised significantly and extended to high-spin states.Rotational bands have been analyzed in the framework of triaxial particle-rotor model, and a γ ≈−30◦triaxial shape and a near-prolate shape have been proposed to the νi−113/2 and νf5/2(p3/2) bands, respectively. Two ΔI = 2 transition sequences with similar energies have been observed, and they have been proposed to be associated with the νi−213/2νf5/2(p3/2) configuration. The structure built on the νi−213/2νf5/2(p3/2) configuration could be interpreted theoretical calculations of the triaxial particle-rotor model if a near-oblate shape is assumed.