RNA has emerged as the prime target for diagnostics, therapeutics and the development of personalized medicine. In particular, the non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) that do not encode proteins, display remarkable biochemical versatility. They can fold into complex structures and interact with proteins, DNA and other RNAs, modulating the activity, DNA targets or partners of multiprotein complexes. Thus, ncRNAs confer regulatory plasticity and represent a new layer of epigenetic control that is dysregulated in disease. Intriguingly, for long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs, >200 nucleotides length) structural conservation rather than nucleotide sequence conservation seems to be crucial for maintaining their function. LncRNAs tend to acquire complex secondary and tertiary structures and their functions only impose very subtle sequence constraints. In the present review we will discuss the biochemical assays that can be employed to determine the lncRNA structural configurations. The implications and challenges of linking function and lncRNA structure to design novel RNA therapeutic approaches will also be analyzed.

Printing technologies to produce conductive films and electronic devices are well established and employ only inexpensive materials and devices as well as rapid post-processing methods.

Realising controlled quantum dynamics via the magnetic interactions between colour centers in diamond remains a challenge despite recent demonstrations for nanometer separated pairs. Here we propose to use the intrinsic acoustical phonons in diamond as a data bus for accomplishing this task. We show that for nanodiamonds the electron-phonon coupling can take significant values that together with mode frequencies in the THz range, can serve as a resource for conditional gate operations.Based on these results we analyze how to use this phonon-induced interaction for constructing quantum gates among the electron-spin triplet ground states, introducing the phonon dependence via Raman transitions. Combined with decoupling pulses this offers the possibility for creating entangled states within nanodiamonds on the scale of several tens of nanometers, a promising prerequisite for quantum sensing applications.

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Interferometry with massive particles may have the potential to explore the limitations of standard quantum mechanics in particular where it concerns its boundary with general relativity and the yet to be developed theory of quantum gravity. This development is hindered considerably by the lack of experimental evidence and testable predictions. Analyzing effects that appear to be common to many of such theories, such as a modification of the energy dispersion and of the canonical commutation relation within the standard framework of quantum mechanics, has been proposed as a possible way forward. Here we analyze in some detail the impact of a modified energy-momentum dispersion in a Ramsey-Bordé setup and provide achievable bounds of these correcting terms when operating such an interferometer with nanodiamonds. Thus, taking thermal and gravitational disturbances into account will show that without specific prerequisites, quantum gravity modifications may in general be suppressed requiring a revision of previously estimated bounds. As a possible solution we propose a stable setup which is rather insensitive to these effects. Finally, we address the problems of decoherence and pulse errors in such setups and discuss the scalings and advantages with increasing particle mass.A framework, unifying classical general relativity with quantum mechanics, remains a crucial scientific challenge to date. As incompatibilities hinder the straightforward inclusion of gravity into the standard framework of quantum field theory, the development of a new theory, the quantum gravity, seems essential. Spacetime quantization is a natural ingredient of such a theory stemming from its dynamical nature in general relativity. This has led to the notion of minimal length-and maximal energy scales [1,2], commonly ascribed to the Planck-scales: The Planck-length l p as the length where the Compton radius of quantum mechanics meets the Schwarzschild equivalent of gravitation l p = G /(c 3 ) 1.6·10 −35 m and the Planck mass M p = /(c L p ) = c/G 2.1 · 10 −8 kg. More abstract, these scales arise in a combination of three fundamental constants, thereby forming new quantities that may or may not be of fundamental importance in nature. This minimal lengthscale plays a crucial role in candidates for quantum gravity theories [1] such as string theory [3,4], loop quantum gravity [5], doubly special relativity [6,7] and in the field of black hole physics [8]. The complete frameworks however are rather complex and incomplete in their physical interpretation. It has therefore been proposed to test common impacts of a spacetime quantization on standard quantum mechanics instead, such as the modification of the energy dispersion relation [9] or the change of quantum mechanical commutation relations [2,[10][11][12]. Incorporating such 'universal' effects into existing frameworks inspired the proposal of numerous verification experiments both in the relativistic and non-relativistic regime. This has led to bounds on the magnitude of the anticipated fundamen...

Objective To determine whether erosions appearing in MRI in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) represent true erosions. Methods 50 RA patients received 1.5 T MRI and microCT (μCT) of the dominant hand. Erosion counts were assessed in coronal T1 weighted MRI sections and in coronal as well as axial μCT sections of the metacarpophalangeal (MCP) joints II-IV. Extent of erosions was assessed by RA MRI Score (RAMRIS) erosion score (MRI) and by three-dimensional assessment of erosion volume (μCT). Results 111 of the 600 evaluated joint regions showed erosions in the MRI and 137 in the μCT. In only 28 regions false negative lesions (μCT positive, MRI negative) were found, all of which were very small lesions with a volume of less than 10 mm 3 . Only two results were false-positive (μCT negative, MRI positive). RAMRIS erosion scores were strongly correlated to erosion volumes in the μCT (Pearson's r=0.514, p<0.001). Mean RAMRIS erosion scores were below 1 with erosion volumes up to 1.5 mm 3 , below 2 with erosion volumes up to 20 mm 3 and over 2 with volumes of more than 20 mm 3 . Discussion MRI erosions are generally based on true cortical breaks as shown by μCT. MRI is sensitive to detect bone erosions and only very small lesions escape detection. Moreover, RAMRIS erosion scores are closely linked to the absolute size of bone erosions in the μCT.

This work presents a detailed study of the photothermal ablation of Kapton® polyimide by a laser diode targeting its electrical conductivity enhancement. Laser-treated samples were structurally characterized using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Raman spectroscopy, X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), as well as Diffuse Reflectance Infrared Fourier Transform (DRIFT) spectroscopy. The results show that the laser-assisted ablation constitutes a simple one-step and environmental friendly method to induce graphene-derived structures on the surface of polyimide films. The laser-modified surface was also electrically characterized through the Transmission Line Method (TLM) aiming at the improvement of the conductivity of the samples by tuning the laser power and the extraction of the contact resistance of the electrodes. Once the laser-ablation process is optimized, the samples increase their conductivity up to six orders of magnitude, being comparable to that of graphene obtained by chemical vapor deposition or by the reduction of graphene-oxide. Additionally, we show that the contact resistance can be decreased down to promising values of ∼2 Ω when using silver-based electrodes.

The realization of scalable arrangements of nitrogen vacancy (NV) centers in diamond remains a key challenge on the way towards efficient quantum information processing, quantum simulation and quantum sensing applications. Although technologies based on implanting NV-centers in bulk diamond crystals or hybrid device approaches have been developed, they are limited by the achievable spatial resolution and by the intricate technological complexities involved in achieving scalability. We propose and demonstrate a novel approach for creating an arrangement of NV-centers, based on the self-assembling capabilities of biological systems and their beneficial nanometer spatial resolution. Here, a self-assembled protein structure serves as a structural scaffold for surface functionalized nanodiamonds, in this way allowing for the controlled creation of Content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 licence. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI.NV-structures on the nanoscale and providing a new avenue towards bridging the bio-nano interface. One-, two-as well as three-dimensional structures are within the scope of biological structural assembling techniques. We realized experimentally the formation of regular structures by interconnecting nanodiamonds using biological protein scaffolds. Based on the achievable NV-center distances of 11 nm, we evaluate the expected dipolar coupling interaction with neighboring NV-centers as well as the expected decoherence time. Moreover, by exploiting these couplings, we provide a detailed theoretical analysis on the viability of multiqubit quantum operations, suggest the possibility of individual addressing based on the random distribution of the NV intrinsic symmetry axes and address the challenges posed by decoherence and imperfect couplings. We then demonstrate in the last part that our scheme allows for the high-fidelity creation of entanglement, cluster states and quantum simulation applications.