Wiley
Refine
Year of publication
Institute
- Fachbereich Medizintechnik und Technomathematik (46)
- INB - Institut für Nano- und Biotechnologien (36)
- Fachbereich Chemie und Biotechnologie (28)
- IfB - Institut für Bioengineering (19)
- Fachbereich Elektrotechnik und Informationstechnik (17)
- Fachbereich Energietechnik (6)
- Fachbereich Luft- und Raumfahrttechnik (3)
- Fachbereich Maschinenbau und Mechatronik (3)
- Fachbereich Bauingenieurwesen (2)
- Nowum-Energy (2)
Language
- English (101) (remove)
Document Type
- Article (99)
- Part of a Book (1)
- Conference Proceeding (1)
Keywords
- Alkalihalobacillus okhensis (1)
- Anammox (1)
- Bacillaceae (1)
- Biotechnological application (1)
- Broad pH spectrum (1)
- ES-FEM (1)
- FS-FEM (1)
- Mainstream (1)
- Nitrogen removal (1)
- Partial nitritation (1)
The development and analysis of three waveguides for the exposure of small biological in vitro samples to mobile communication signals at 900 MHz (GSM, Global System for Mobile Communications), 1.8 GHz (GSM), and 2 GHz (UMTS, Universal Mobile Telecommunications System) is presented. The waveguides were based on a fin-line concept and the chamber containing the samples bathed in extracellular solution was placed onto two fins with a slot in between, where the exposure field concentrates. Measures were taken to allow for patch clamp recordings during radiofrequency (RF) exposure. The necessary power for the achievement of the maximum desired specific absorption rate (SAR) of 20 W/kg (average over the mass of the solution) was approximately Pin = 50 mW, Pin = 19 mW, and Pin = 18 mW for the 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, and 2 GHz devices, respectively. At 20 W/kg, a slight RF-induced temperature elevation in the solution of no more than 0.3 °C was detected, while no thermal offsets due to the electromagnetic exposure could be detected at the lower SAR settings (2, 0.2, and 0.02 W/kg). A deviation of 10% from the intended solution volume yielded a calculated SAR deviation of 8% from the desired value. A maximum ±10% variation in the local SAR could occur when the position of the patch clamp electrode was altered within the area where the cells to be investigated were located.
Bacterial cell appendix formation supports cell-cell interaction, cell adhesion and cell movement. Additionally, in bioelectrochemical systems (BES), cell appendages have been shown to participate in extracellular electron transfer. In this work, the cell appendix formation of Clostridium acetobutylicum in biofilms of a BES are imaged and compared with conventional biofilms. Under all observed conditions, the cells possess filamentous appendages with a higher number and density in the BES. Differences in the amount of extracellular polymeric substance in the biofilms of the electrodes lead to the conclusion that the cathode can be used as electron donor and the anode as electron acceptor by C. acetobutylicum. When using conductive atomic force microscopy, a current response of about 15 nA is found for the cell appendages from the BES. This is the first report of conductivity for clostridial cell appendices and represents the basis for further studies on their role for biofilm formation and electron transfer.
7T MR Safety
(2021)
Subtilisins from microbial sources, especially from the Bacillaceae family, are of particular interest for biotechnological applications and serve the currently growing enzyme market as efficient and novel biocatalysts. Biotechnological applications include use in detergents, cosmetics, leather processing, wastewater treatment and pharmaceuticals. To identify a possible candidate for the enzyme market, here we cloned the gene of the subtilisin SPFA from Fictibacillus arsenicus DSM 15822ᵀ (obtained through a data mining-based search) and expressed it in Bacillus subtilis DB104. After production and purification, the protease showed a molecular mass of 27.57 kDa and a pI of 5.8. SPFA displayed hydrolytic activity at a temperature optimum of 80 °C and a very broad pH optimum between 8.5 and 11.5, with high activity up to pH 12.5. SPFA displayed no NaCl dependence but a high NaCl tolerance, with decreasing activity up to concentrations of 5 m NaCl. The stability enhanced with increasing NaCl concentration. Based on its substrate preference for 10 synthetic peptide 4-nitroanilide substrates with three or four amino acids and its phylogenetic classification, SPFA can be assigned to the subgroup of true subtilisins. Moreover, SPFA exhibited high tolerance to 5% (w/v) SDS and 5% H₂O₂ (v/v). The biochemical properties of SPFA, especially its tolerance of remarkably high pH, SDS and H₂O₂, suggest it has potential for biotechnological applications.
Halophilic and halotolerant microorganisms represent a promising source of salt-tolerant enzymes suitable for various biotechnological applications where high salt concentrations would otherwise limit enzymatic activity. Considering the current growing enzyme market and the need for more efficient and new biocatalysts, the present study aimed at the characterization of a high-alkaline subtilisin from Alkalihalobacillus okhensis Kh10-101T. The protease gene was cloned and expressed in Bacillus subtilis DB104. The recombinant protease SPAO with 269 amino acids belongs to the subfamily of high-alkaline subtilisins. The biochemical characteristics of purified SPAO were analyzed in comparison with subtilisin Carlsberg, Savinase, and BPN'. SPAO, a monomer with a molecular mass of 27.1 kDa, was active over a wide range of pH 6.0–12.0 and temperature 20–80 °C, optimally at pH 9.0–9.5 and 55 °C. The protease is highly oxidatively stable to hydrogen peroxide and retained 58% of residual activity when incubated at 10 °C with 5% (v/v) H2O2 for 1 h while stimulated at 1% (v/v) H2O2. Furthermore, SPAO was very stable and active at NaCl concentrations up to 5.0 m. This study demonstrates the potential of SPAO for biotechnological applications in the future.
The aim of the current study was to investigate the performance of integrated RF
transmit arrays with high channel count consisting of meander microstrip antennas
for body imaging at 7 T and to optimize the position and number of transmit ele-
ments. RF simulations using multiring antenna arrays placed behind the bore liner
were performed for realistic exposure conditions for body imaging. Simulations were
performed for arrays with as few as eight elements and for arrays with high channel
counts of up to 48 elements. The B1+ field was evaluated regarding the degrees of
freedom for RF shimming in the abdomen. Worst-case specific absorption rate
(SARwc ), SAR overestimation in the matrix compression, the number of virtual obser-
vation points (VOPs) and SAR efficiency were evaluated. Constrained RF shimming
was performed in differently oriented regions of interest in the body, and the devia-
tion from a target B1+ field was evaluated. Results show that integrated multiring
arrays are able to generate homogeneous B1+ field distributions for large FOVs, espe-
cially for coronal/sagittal slices, and thus enable body imaging at 7 T with a clinical
workflow; however, a low duty cycle or a high SAR is required to achieve homoge-
neous B1+ distributions and to exploit the full potential. In conclusion, integrated
arrays allow for high element counts that have high degrees of freedom for the pulse
optimization but also produce high SARwc , which reduces the SAR accuracy in the
VOP compression for low-SAR protocols, leading to a potential reduction in array
performance. Smaller SAR overestimations can increase SAR accuracy, but lead to a
high number of VOPs, which increases the computational cost for VOP evaluation
and makes online SAR monitoring or pulse optimization challenging. Arrays with
interleaved rings showed the best results in the study.
In this study, the performance of an integrated body-imaging array for 7 T with 32 radiofrequency (RF) channels under consideration of local specific absorption rate (SAR), tissue temperature, and thermal dose limits was evaluated and the imaging performance was compared with a clinical 3 T body coil.
Thirty-two transmit elements were placed in three rings between the bore liner and RF shield of the gradient coil. Slice-selective RF pulse optimizations for B1 shimming and spokes were performed for differently oriented slices in the body under consideration of realistic constraints for power and local SAR. To improve the B1+ homogeneity, safety assessments based on temperature and thermal dose were performed to possibly allow for higher input power for the pulse optimization than permissible with SAR limits.
The results showed that using two spokes, the 7 T array outperformed the 3 T birdcage in all the considered regions of interest. However, a significantly higher SAR or lower duty cycle at 7 T is necessary in some cases to achieve similar B1+ homogeneity as at 3 T. The homogeneity in up to 50 cm-long coronal slices can particularly benefit from the high RF shim performance provided by the 32 RF channels. The thermal dose approach increases the allowable input power and the corresponding local SAR, in one example up to 100 W/kg, without limiting the exposure time necessary for an MR examination.
In conclusion, the integrated antenna array at 7 T enables a clinical workflow for body imaging and comparable imaging performance to a conventional 3 T clinical body coil.
Experience has shown that a priori created static resource allocation plans are vulnerable to runtime deviations and hence often become uneconomic or highly exceed a predefined soft deadline. The assumption of constant task execution times during allocation planning is even more unlikely in a cloud environment where virtualized resources vary in performance. Revising the initially created resource allocation plan at runtime allows the scheduler to react on deviations between planning and execution. Such an adaptive rescheduling of a many-task application workflow is only feasible, when the planning time can be handled efficiently at runtime. In this paper, we present the static low-complexity resource allocation planning algorithm (LCP) applicable to efficiently schedule many-task scientific application workflows on cloud resources of different capabilities. The benefits of the presented algorithm are benchmarked against alternative approaches. The benchmark results show that LCP is not only able to compete against higher complexity algorithms in terms of planned costs and planned makespan but also outperforms them significantly by magnitudes of 2 to 160 in terms of required planning time. Hence, LCP is superior in terms of practical usability where low planning time is essential such as in our targeted online rescheduling scenario.