Electrodermal activity (EDA) measurements are influenced by various factors. Age-related psychological and physiological changes may be considered as one of the possible factors which may influence EDA measurements. In order to properly investigate the effects of such factors on EDA, techniques of precisely and simultaneously recording more than one EDA parameter are recommended. This study aims to

Nanobodies are special derivatives of antibodies, which consist of single domain fragments. They have become of considerable interest as next-generation biotechnological tools for antigen recognition. They can be easily engineered due to their high stability and compact size. Nanobodies have three complementarity-determining regions, CDRs, which are enlarged to provide a similar binding surface to

Dynamic light scattering (DLS) and nanoparticle tracking analysis (NTA) are widely used to determine the size of biological nanoparticles in liquid. In both cases, one first measures the nanoparticle diffusion coefficient and then converts it to the nanoparticle radius via the Stokes-Einstein relation. This relation is based on the no-slip boundary condition. Now, there is evidence that this condition

Autophagy is an important cell activity which is the process of formation of autophagosomes, docking with lysosomes and degradation. The intrinsic pathway of apoptosis involves mitochondrial outer membrane permeabilization (MOMP) and cytochrome c release followed by caspase activation. Many molecules, e.g., Ca2+ and mTOR, and different stresses such as endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress and nutritional

Continuous exposure of 395 nm light increases the fluorescence emission intensity of photosynthetic purple non-sulphur bacteria, Rhodobacter capsulatus (SB1003). We show that such an increase in fluorescence emission of extracellular pigment complexes (PC) from these photosynthetic bacteria depends on the concentration of the pigment and temperature and can also be modulated by the static magnetic

In this study, we model avascular tumour growth in epithelial tissue. This can help us to understand that how an avascular tumour interacts with its microenvironment and what type of physical changes can be observed within the tumour spheroid before angiogenesis. This understanding is likely to assist in the development of better diagnostics, improved therapies, and prognostics. In biological systems

In any ecosystem, chaotic situations may arise from equilibrium state for different reasons. To overcome these chaotic situations, sometimes the system itself exhibits some mechanisms of self-adaptability. In this paper, we explore an eco-epidemiological model consisting of three aquatic groups: phytoplankton, zooplankton, and marine free viruses. We assume that the phytoplankton population is infected

We recently developed a new light source that allows for the continuous monitoring of light-induced changes using common spectrophotometric devices adapted for microplate analyses. This source was designed primarily to induce photodynamic processes in cell models. Modern light components, such as LED chips, were used to improve the irradiance homogeneity. In addition, this source forms a small hermetic

In an analogous manner as occurred during the development of a connected metabolism that at some point reached characteristics associated with what is called “life”―due mainly to a catalytic closure phenomenon when chemicals started to autocatalyze themselves forming a closed web of chemical reactions―it is here proposed that cognition and consciousness (or features associated with them) arose as a

The study of heat and electroosmotic characteristics in the flow of a third-order fluid regulated by peristaltic pumping is examined by using governing equations, i.e., the continuity equation, momentum equation, energy equation, and concentration equation. The wavelength is considered long compared to its height and a low Reynolds number is assumed. The velocity slip condition is employed. Analytical

For investigations of ongoing processes in plants, such as photosynthesis in conifer leaves, nondestructive and noninvasive measuring techniques are needed. In this paper, a novel approach has been developed for the measurement of chloroplasts' numbers and pigment contents in conifer leaves based on the measurements of leaf absorption spectra using optical fibers and an array spectrophotometer. To

In this paper, we analyze several cancer cell types from two seemingly independent angles: (a) the over-expression of various proteins participating in protein-protein interaction networks and (b) a metabolic shift from oxidative phosphorylation to glycolysis. We use large data sets to obtain a thermodynamic measure of the protein-protein interaction network, namely the associated Gibbs free energy

During cell migration, forces applied to a cell from its environment influence the motion. When the cell is placed on a substrate, such a force is provided by the cell-substrate adhesion. Modulation of adhesivity, often performed by the modulation of the substrate stiffness, tends to cause common responses for cell spreading, cell speed, persistence, and random motility coefficient. Although the reasons

The Fåhræus-Lindqvist effect is usually explained from a physical point of view with the so-called Haynes' marginal zone theory, i.e., migration of red blood cells (RBCs) to a core layer surrounded by an annular RBCs-free plasma layer. In this paper we show that the marginal layer, though causing a substantial reduction in flow resistance and increasing discharge, does not reduce the rate of energy

The conventional mean-field kinetic models describing the interplay of cancer and the immune system are temporal and predict exponential growth or elimination of the population of tumour cells provided their number is small and their effect on the immune system is negligible. More complex kinetics are associated with non-linear features of the response of the immune system. The generic model presented

The intensity of erythrocyte membrane fluctuations was studied by laser interference microscopy (LIM), which provide information about mechanical properties of the erythrocyte membrane. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) was used to study erythrocyte surface relief; it is related to the cytoskeleton structure of erythrocyte membrane. Intact human erythrocytes and erythrocytes with a destroyed cytoskeleton

Pertussis (or whooping cough) is a contagious disease mainly affecting infants and children and predominantly caused by Bordetella pertussis followed by Bordetella parapertussis. B. parapertussis causes a milder cough but usually symptomatically appears like B. pertussis infection. Thus the epidemiology of illness caused by B. parapertussis is not well understood. In this study, a sensitive and specific

Diatoms are microalgae encased in highly structured and regular frustules of porous silica. A long-standing biological question has been the function of these frustules, with hypotheses ranging from them acting as photonic light absorbers to being particle filters. While it has been observed that the girdle band pores of the frustule of Coscinodiscus sp. resemble those of a hydrodynamic drift ratchet

To explore engineering platforms towards 'active bacterial baths', we grow and characterize native and commercial strains of Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans to promote swimming locomotion. Three different energy sources were used, namely elemental sulfur, ferrous sulfate, and pyrite. The characteristics of the culture, such as pH, Eh, and the concentration of cells and ions, are monitored to seek correlations

To strengthen the detailed understanding of arterial stenosis, we construct a novel hemodynamic model. Frequently used symmetric stenosis is employed in this work. Being different from a traditional model, this numerical model adopts microcirculation resistance as an outlet boundary condition, which is called a seepage condition. Meanwhile, fluid-structure interactions are used in the numerical simulation

The results of thermal studies of denaturation of hen egg white lysozyme (HEWL) in water and an aqueous solution of N-butylurea (BU) are presented. High-precision densimetric measurements were used to characterize and analyze the changes of the specific volume, v, during temperature elevation. The temperature of the midpoint of protein denaturation was also determined by nanoDSF technique (differential

Herein, I illustrate analytically how the global diffusion limitations can influence the first phase of the protein-corona formation at nanoparticles under conditions of intravascular injection. In particular, the concentrations of proteins near the boundaries of the injection region are shown to be comparable with those far from the region. In contrast, the concentrations of proteins inside the injection

The objective of this study is to observe the echo feature curves, vibrational dephasing, and heat capacity of a protein-hormone system taking thyroid hormone receptor-beta (THR-β) as an example. Constrained and unconstrained molecular dynamics simulations are performed by implementing the theory of velocity reassignments to probe the phase coherent state in terms of echo pulses. The constrained vibrations

In this work, the effect of two organic polyamines (spermine and spermidine) on the fluorescence intensity and activity of bovine intestinal alkaline phosphatase (BIALP) are investigated. The interaction of BIALP with spermine and spermidine was studied in a diethanolamine buffer with 0.5 mM magnesium chloride (pH 9.8) and at two temperatures by using the fluorescence quenching method. Furthermore

The antibacterial effect of ZnO nanoparticles is tested against Staphylococcus aureus, (a Gram-positive pathogenic bacterium) from a particle-size, concentration, and surface-defects point of view. Activation of antibacterial activity was achieved by standard well diffusion agar and minimum inhibitory concentration procedures. Our results show that smaller-sized particles are more effective inhibitors

Modeling a biological process equips us with more comprehensive insight into the process and a more advantageous experimental design. Non-homologous end joining (NHEJ) is a major double-strand break (DSB) repair pathway that occurs throughout the cell cycle. The objective of the current work is to model the fast and slow phases of NHEJ in G1 phase of the cell cycle following exposure to ionizing radiation

In this study, we investigate the binding interactions of two synthetic antiviral peptides (DET2 and DET4) on type II dengue virus (DENV2) envelope protein domain III. These two antiviral peptides are designed based on the domain III of the DENV2 envelope protein, which has shown significant inhibition activity in previous studies and can be potentially modified further to be active against all dengue

Dissolution of cortical bone mineral under demineralization in 0.1 M HCl and 0.1 M EDTA solutions is studied by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The bone specimens (in the form of planar oriented pieces) were cut from a diaphysial fragment of a mature mammal bone so that a cross-section surface and a longitudinal section surface could be analyzed individually. This permitted to compare the dissolution behavior

The Goldman-Hodgkin-Katz equation (GHK equation), one of the most successful achievements of membrane theory in electrophysiology, can precisely predict the membrane potential. Its conceptual foundation lies in the idea that the transmembrane ion transport across the plasma membrane is responsible for the membrane potential generation. However, the potential virtually equivalent to the membrane potential

The control of nonlinear dynamical systems is always a notable problem in science. According to control theory, suitable inputs for a controllable dynamical system are critical. Previous studies have shown some principles to determine control nodes and design control function. In this work, we propose a new control strategy of nonlinear systems by constructing impulsive control functions, i.e., we

In this paper, we perform flexible and reliable dynamics simulations on different sizes of two or more particles' interactive motions, where they encounter positive or negative dielectrophoresis (DEP) forces. The particles with identical or non-identical size are in close proximity suspended freely in a solution under a homogeneous electric field. According to the description of classic dipole moment

The impact of gamma irradiation on growth and physiology of Euryale ferox was described in the present investigation. E. ferox is an underutilized aquatic food crop that grows in shallow-water bodies in lower Assam regions and north Bihar of India. The seeds of E. ferox were irradiated with different doses of gamma irradiation ranging from 0 to 500 Gy. It was observed that the germination and survival

Like any other kind of cell, muscle cells produce energy by oxidizing the fuel substrate that they absorb together with the needed oxygen from the surroundings. Oxidation occurs entirely within the cell. It means that the reactants and products of reaction must at some time be dissolved in the cell's cytosol. If a cell operates at steady state, its cytosol composition remains constant. Therefore, the

Blood flow in micro capillaries of diameter approximately 15-500 μm is accompanied with a lower tube hematocrit level and lower apparent viscosity as the diameter decreases. These effects are termed the Fåhraeus and Fåhraeus-Lindqvist effects, respectively. Both effects are linked to axial accumulation of red blood cells. In the present investigation, we extend previous works using a shear-induced

When nanoparticles are introduced into a physiological environment, proteins and lipids immediately cover their surface, forming a protein "corona". It is well recognized that the corona structure influences the biological response of the body. Two deterministic models for corona formation of the human blood serum proteins around a single nanoparticle are presented and studied numerically in this paper

Sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) is a binding protein that regulates the availability of steroid hormones in the plasma. Although best known as a steroid carrier, recent studies have associated SHBG in modulating behavioral aspects related to sexual receptivity. Among steroids, estradiol (17β-estradiol, oestradiol or E2), documented as the most active endogenous female hormone, exerts important

The charge transport in the modified DNA model is studied by taking into account the factor of solvent and the effect of coupling motions of nucleotides. We report on the presence of the modulational instability (MI) of a plane wave for charge migration in DNA and the generation of soliton-like excitations in DNA nucleotides. By applying the continuum approximation, we show that the original differential-difference

In this paper, radiation shielding parameters such as mass attenuation coefficients and half value layer (HVL) of some antioxidants are investigated using MCNPX (version 2.4.0). The validation of the generated MCNPX simulation geometry for antioxidant structures is provided by comparing the results with standard WinXcom data for radiation mass attenuation coefficients of antioxidants. Very good agreement

In earlier work, we laid out the foundation for explaining the quantum-like behavior of neural systems in the basic kinematic case of clusters of neuron-like units. Here we extend this approach to networks and begin developing a dynamical theory for them. Our approach provides a novel mathematical foundation for neural dynamics and computation which abstracts away from lower-level biophysical details

The industry of açai-based products has been growing in the last few years. Knowledge about the physical properties of açai pulp, including its rheology, is essential to the optimization of industrial processes. This work presents the rheological behavior of açai berry pulp in relation to the effects of shear rate, temperature, and time of shearing. The entire study was carried out in the temperature

The electromagnetic field (EMF) is newly considered as an exogenous environmental stimulus that is closely related to ion transportation on the cellular membrane, maintaining the internal ionic homeostasis. Cation transports of Ca2+ and other metal ions, Cd2+, Zn2+, and Mn2+were studied in terms of the external Ca2+ stress, [Ca2+]ext, and exposure to the physical EMF. A specific yeast strain K667 was

We present a theoretical study aiming at model fitting for sensory neurons. Conventional neural network training approaches are not applicable to this problem due to lack of continuous data. Although the stimulus can be considered as a smooth time-dependent variable, the associated response will be a set of neural spike timings (roughly the instants of successive action potential peaks) that have no

The Mn2+ concentrations in the sagittae otoliths of 12 fish families (and 19 species) that co-occur in a coastal area of southeastern Brazil (~21°S) were quantified using electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR). Inferences were made about the relationship between fish habitat and trace element incorporation. Inferences were made on the relationship between trace element concentration and otolith shape

The present work addresses transvascular and interstitial fluid transport inside a solid tumor surrounded by normal tissue (close to an in vivo mimicking setup). In general, biological tissues behave like a soft porous material and show mechanical behavior towards the fluid motion through the interstitial space. In general, forces like viscous drag that are associated with the fluid flow may compress

We measured temporal oscillations in thermodynamic variables such as temperature, heat flux, and cellular volume in suspensions of non-dividing yeast cells which exhibit temporal glycolytic oscillations. Oscillations in these variables have the same frequency as oscillations in the activity of intracellular metabolites, suggesting strong coupling between them. These results can be interpreted in light

Using an original laser interferometer of enhanced sensitivity, an increase in the refractive index of a protein solution was observed during the reaction of proteolysis catalyzed by pepsin. The increase in the refractive index of the protein solution at a concentration of 4 mg/ml was [Formula: see text] for bovine serum albumin and [Formula: see text] for lysozyme. The observed effect disproves the

The interaction of amyloid β-peptide (Aβ) with the iron-storage protein ferritin was studied in vitro. We have shown that Aβ during fibril formation process is able to reduce Fe(III) from the ferritin core (ferrihydrite) to Fe(II). The Aβ-mediated Fe(III) reduction yielded a two-times-higher concentration of free Fe(II) than the spontaneous formation of Fe(II) by the ferritin itself. We suggest that

Employing optical spectroscopy we have performed a comparative study of the dielectric response of extracellular matrix and filaments of electrogenic bacteria Shewanella oneidensis MR-1, cytochrome c, and bovine serum albumin. Combining infrared transmission measurements on thin layers with data of the terahertz spectra, we obtain the dielectric permittivity and AC conductivity spectra of the materials

Computer experiments that mirror the evolutionary dynamics of sexual and asexual organisms as they occur in nature were used to test features proposed to explain the evolution of sexual recombination. Results show that this evolution is better described as a network of interactions between possible sexual forms, including diploidy, thelytoky, facultative sex, assortation, bisexuality, and division

Virus families have evolved different strategies for genome uncoating, which are also followed by recombinant vectors. Vectors derived from adeno-associated viruses (AAV) are considered as leading delivery tools for in vivo gene transfer, and in particular gene therapy. Using a combination of atomic force microscopy (AFM), biochemical experiments, and physical modeling, we investigated here the physical

We use the nano-dissection capabilities of atomic force microscopy to induce structural alterations on individual virus capsids in liquid milieu. We fracture the protein shells either with single nanoindentations or by increasing the tip-sample interaction force in amplitude modulation dynamic mode. The normal behavior is that these cracks persist in time. However, in very rare occasions they self-recuperate

Flock House virus (FHV) is a well-characterized model system to study infection mechanisms in non-enveloped viruses. A key stage of the infection cycle is the disruption of the endosomal membrane by a component of the FHV capsid, the membrane active γ peptide. In this study, we perform all-atom molecular dynamics simulations of the 21 N-terminal residues of the γ peptide interacting with membranes

The beauty, symmetry, and functionality of icosahedral virus capsids has attracted the attention of biologists, physicists, and mathematicians ever since they were first observed. Viruses and protein cages assemble into functional architectures in a range of sizes, shapes, and symmetries. To fulfill their biological roles, these structures must self-assemble, resist stress, and are often dynamic. The

The spontaneous encapsulation of genomic and non-genomic polyanions by coat proteins of simple icosahedral viruses is driven, in the first instance, by electrostatic interactions with polycationic RNA binding domains on these proteins. The efficiency with which the polyanions can be encapsulated in vitro, and presumably also in vivo, must in addition be governed by the loss of translational and mixing

The P2X receptor is a trimeric transmembrane protein that acts as an ATP-gated ion channel. Its transmembrane domain (TMD) contains only six helices and three of them, the M2 helices, line the ion conduction pathway. Here, using molecular dynamics simulation, I identify four conformational states of the TMD that are associated with four types of packing between M2 helices. Packing in the extracellular

Molecular dynamics simulation is used to model the self-assembly of polyhedral shells containing 180 trapezoidal particles that correspond to the T = 3 virus capsid. Three kinds of particle, differing only slightly in shape, are used to account for the effect of quasi-equivalence. Bond formation between particles is reversible and an explicit atomistic solvent is included. Under suitable conditions

The use of pesticides in agriculture can make their way into the earth and wash into the amphibian system causing ecological stress. This study aims to understand the changes occurring in gill tissues as a result of fenvalerate exposure using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy. The intensity ratio of the selected bands I1545/I1657, I2924/I2853, and I1045/I1545 measures changes in proteins, lipids

Tissue engineering is a multidisciplinary field of research in which the cells, biomaterials, and processes can be optimized to develop a tissue substitute. Three-dimensional (3D) architectural features from electrospun scaffolds, such as porosity, tortuosity, fiber diameter, pore size, and interconnectivity have a great impact on cell behavior. Regarding tissue development in vitro, culture conditions

The impact of confinement of DNA molecules in a limited volume of the cavity of photonic crystals (PC) on the vibrational properties of the DNA molecule and its conformation is studied. According to our preliminary study, the aqueous shell is removed when the DNA molecules are infiltrated into the PC cavities. Raman scattering (RS) DNA marker lines showed a dramatic conformational change of DNA in