HPV18/E6E7-immortalized hepatocytes are useful for the analysis of HCV infection, anti-HCV innate immune response, and screening of antiviral agents with a variety of HCV strains.
A simple and accurate method of measuring the surface torsional anchoring strength of nematic liquid crystals is proposed. This method is based on the simultaneous determination of the actual twist angle and the cell gap (optical retardation) of a twisted nematic cell in which the easy axes of the upper and lower substrates are at a particular angle ( e.g., 90°). The TN cell is placed between two polarizers. The TN cell and the analyzer are mounted on rotatable stages. The measurement procedure consists of the following steps. (1) Using monochromatic light, we minimize the amount of light transmitted by rotating both the TN cell and the analyzer (we denote these minimizing angles of the analyzer and the TN cell from the polarizer as Ψ p
(1) and Ψ0
(1), respectively. (2) We set the TN cell at a particular angle from Ψ0
(1), and minimize the amount of light transmitted by rotating only the analyzer (we denote this minimizing angle of the analyzer as Ψ p
(2)). From the values of Ψ p
(1) and Ψ p
(2), we can determine both the actual twist angle and the optical retardation using the analytical expression for optical transmissivity based on the Jones matrix method. We discuss the accuracy of this method. Experimental examples are also shown.
Colloidal crystallization of poly(vinylidene
fluoride) (PVDF) nanoparticles
(NPs) and its β-phase transformation were studied. The pristine
PVDF NPs with an average diameter of 230 nm consist of 46% α-phase
and 54% amorphous PVDF. The PVDF NPs were assembled on a quartz substrate
by means of vertical deposition method from a tetrahydrofuran dispersion
of PVDF NPs with a few volume percentage of n-alkane.
The resultant colloidal thin films displayed a pale-greenish structural
color with the selective reflection at around 550 nm wavelength due
to closely packed PVDF NPs. The colloidal thin films were immersed
into an acetonitrile solution containing 2 wt % ionic liquid, subsequently
air-dried, and thermally annealed at 140 °C, just below the melting
point of the PVDF–IL blends. After annealing, the PVDF NPs
partially transformed into its β-phase with the volume percentages
of α-, β-, and amorphous phases of 22, 32, and 46%, respectively.
The postannealed colloidal films still maintained the face-centered-cubic
assembling structure of PVDF NPs, thus displaying the greenish structural
color and selective reflection.
Mechanism of apatite formation on anodically oxidized titanium metal in a simulated body fluid was investigated by XPS and TEM observation. The anodically oxidized metal was found to have rutile and anatase titania with a large number of Ti-OH groups on its surface. On immersion in SBF, the metal formed a bonelike apatite on its surface through formations of an amorphous calcium titanate and an amorphous calcium phosphate. The formation of the calcium titanate was induced by the Ti-OH groups, which reveals negative charge to interact selectively with positively charged calcium ions in the fluid. The calcium titanate is postulated to reveal positive charge, thereby interacting with the negatively charged phosphate ions in the fluid to form the calcium phosphate, which eventually crystallized into bonelike apatite.
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