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Many thermal measurements in high magnetic fields—including heat capacity, thermal conductivity, thermopower, magnetocaloric and thermal Hall effect measurements—require thermometers that are sensitive over a wide temperature range, are low mass, have a rapid thermal response and have a minimal, easily correctable magnetoresistance. We recently reported the development of a new granular-metal oxide ceramic composite (cermet) for this purpose formed by co-sputtering of the metallic alloy nichrome (Ni 0.8 Cr 0.2 ) and the insulator silicon dioxide (SiO 2 ). In this earlier work, we found that co-sputtering of NiCr alloy and SiO 2 in a reactive oxygen and inert argon gas mixture can produce resistive thin-film thermometers sensitive enough to be used in calorimetry and related measurements from room temperature down to below 100 mK in magnetic fields up to at least 35 T. In this work, we present results for thin cermet films grown with Cu 0.55 Ni 0.45 and Ti 0.05 Cr 0.95 . Growth of CuNi-based thin-film cermets generally requires more oxygen in the working gas compared to NiCr and TiCr and yields thermometers that are much less sensitive than comparable NiCr-based thermometers. TiCr-based cermet thin-film thermometers have somewhat higher resistivity for similar sensitivities compared to NiCr-based cermet thin-film thermometers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An emerging research area in biophotonics with potentially near-term clinical applications in early stage cancer detection involves the investigation of possible correlations of the elastic light scattering properties of tissues with alterations in their cellular composition and nanostructure. Until recently, exploring these correlations has been impeded by a lack of robust and accurate mathematical models of the light scattering properties of complex structures. In this paper, we review recent progress in this area. Topics include: 1) development of accurate reduced-order expressions for the total scattering cross section spectra of a wide range of nonspherical and inhomogeneous particles; 2) rigorous finite-difference time-domain modeling results showing how the backscattering of light can be sensitive to nanometer scale features embedded within micrometer-scale particles; and 3) development of accurate reduced-order expressions for the backscattering depolarization properties of a wide range of inhomogeneous particles. These advances provide an improved science base for cellular level biophotonics, and have promise to accelerate the development of novel corresponding clinical technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Background: Increased premalignant epithelial microvascular blood content is a common theme in neoplastic transformation; however, demonstration of this phenomenon in colon carcinogenesis has been stymied by methodological limitations. Our group has recently developed a novel optics technology, four dimensional elastic light scattering fingerprinting (40-ELF), which allows examination of the colonic mucosal architecture with unprecedented accuracy. In this study, we utilised 40-ELF to probe the preneoplastic colonic microvasculature. Methods: Colonic mucosal blood content was assessed by 4D-ELF at serial preneoplastic time points from azoxymethane (AOM) treated Fisher 344 rots and age matched control animals. We also examined the pretumorigenic intestinal mucosa of the MIN mouse, and compared with wild-type mice. Finally, in a pilot study, we examined superficial blood content from the endoscopically normal mid transverse colon in 37 patients undergoing screening colonoscopy. Results: In the AOM treated rat model, augmentation of superficial mucosal and total mucosal/superficial submucosal blood supply preceded the appearance of aberrant crypt foci (ACF) and temporally and spatially correlated with future ACF occurrence. These findings were replicated in MIN mice. The 40-ELF based results were corroborated with immunoblot analysis for haemoglobin on mucosal scrapings from AOM treated rats. Moreover, 40-ELF analysis of normal human colonic mucosa indicated that there was a threefold increase in superficial blood in patients who harboured advanced adenomas. Conclusion: We report, for the first time, that blood content is increased in the colonic microvasculature at the earliest stages of colon carcinogenesis. These findings may provide novel insights into early biological events in colorectal carcinogenesis and have potential applicability for screening. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a novel instrument to measure the spectral, angular, azimuthal, and polarization dependence of light backscattered by living biological tissues, thus providing the most comprehensive description of the light scattering to obtain unique quantitative information about the microarchitecture of living cells and tissues. We show the potential of this technique to characterize and diagnose early premalignant changes in the epithelia. In studies with a rodent model of colon carcinogenesis, we show that several parameters obtained using this technique, such as the number density of red blood cells in the capillary network immediately underlying the epithelium, the fractal dimension of the tissue, and the average roundness of subcellular structures, are significant for detection of precancerous changes at a very early stage of the carcinogenic process, at which no other histological or molecular markers have been identified. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We present a novel instrument for imaging the angular distributions of light backscattered by biological cells and tissues. The intensities in different regions of the image are due to scatterers of different sizes. We exploit this to study scattering from particles smaller than the wavelength of light used, even when they are mixed with larger particles. We show that the scattering from subcellular structure in both normal and cancerous human cells is best fitted to inverse power-law distributions for the sizes of the scattering objects, and propose that the distribution of scattering objects may be different in normal versus cancerous cells [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We report an in situ method of probing the structure of living epithelial cells, based on light scattering spectroscopy with polarized light. The method makes it possible to distinguish between single backscattering from uppermost epithelial cells and multiply scattered light. The spectrum of the single backscattering component can be further analyzed to provide histological information about the epithelial cells such as the size distribution of the cell nuclei and their refractive index. These are valuable quantities' to detect and diagnose precancerous changes in human tissues [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Polarization analysis of vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) radiation, especially the analysis of elliptical polarization is of considerable scientific interest in many areas of physics including solar physics. Polarization measurements in the VUV region are much less developed than those in visible and infrared spectral regions. It is due to lack of efficient phase shifting elements and small reflection coefficients of polarizers for VUV radiation. We propose two techniques, to determine the arbitrary polarization of VUV radiation with photon energies in the range 10 - 100 eV, which seem to be more efficient and precise than the known techniques, especially to study the polarization of atomic or molecular spectral lines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This letter presents a scattered-field formulation for modeling dispersive media using the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. Specifically, the auxiliary differential equation method is applied to Drude and Lorentz media for a scattered field FDTD model. The present technique can also be applied in a straightforward manner to Debye media. Excellent agreement is achieved between the FDTD-calculated and exact theoretical results for the reflection coefficient in half-space problems. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The 30 articles in this special section cover a broad range among the following areas: advanced bioimaging; multifunctional endoscopy; novel approaches in biophotonic diagnostics and therapeutics; advanced biophotonic sensing techniques; laser-cell interactions; photoacoustics and terahertz biophotonics; nanobiophotonics; and novel laser, fiber-optics and electrooptics biophotonic tools, and devices. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The eighteen papers in this special issue are devoted to the topic of biophotonics - new techniques that have been developed as alternatives to conventional medical methods for diagnostics, sensing, monitoring, and treatment of diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The success of reef-building corals for >200 million years has been dependent on the mutualistic interaction between the coral host and its photosynthetic endosymbiont dinoflagellates (family Symbiodiniaceae) that supply the coral host with nutrients and energy for growth and calcification. While multiple light scattering in coral tissue and skeleton significantly enhance the light microenvironment for Symbiodiniaceae, the mechanisms of light propagation in tissue and skeleton remain largely unknown due to a lack of technologies to measure the intrinsic optical properties of both compartments in live corals. Here we introduce ISOCT (inverse spectroscopic optical coherence tomography), a non-invasive approach to measure optical properties and three-dimensional morphology of living corals at micron- and nano-length scales, respectively, which are involved in the control of light propagation. ISOCT enables measurements of optical properties in the visible range and thus allows for characterization of the density of light harvesting pigments in coral. We used ISOCT to characterize the optical scattering coefficient (μs) of the coral skeleton and chlorophyll a concentration of live coral tissue. ISOCT further characterized the overall micro- and nano-morphology of live tissue by measuring differences in the sub-micron spatial mass density distribution (D) that vary throughout the tissue and skeleton and give rise to light scattering, and this enabled estimates of the spatial directionality of light scattering, i.e., the anisotropy coefficient, g. Thus, ISOCT enables imaging of coral nanoscale structures and allows for quantifying light scattering and pigment absorption in live corals. ISOCT could thus be developed into an important tool for rapid, non-invasive monitoring of coral health, growth and photophysiology with unprecedented spatial resolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most of what we know about gene transcription comes from the view of cells as molecular machines: focusing on the role of molecular modifications to the proteins carrying out transcriptional reactions at a loci-by-loci basis. This view ignores a critical reality: biological reactions do not happen in an empty space, but in a highly complex, interrelated, and dense nanoenvironment that profoundly influences chemical interactions. We explored the relationship between the physical nanoenvironment of chromatin and gene transcription in vitro. We analytically show that changes in the fractal dimension, D, of chromatin correspond to simultaneous increases in chromatin accessibility and compaction heterogeneity. Using these predictions, we demonstrate experimentally that nanoscopic changes to chromatin D within thirty minutes correlate with concomitant enhancement and suppression of transcription. Further, we show that the increased heterogeneity of physical structure of chromatin due to increase in fractal dimension correlates with increased heterogeneity of gene networks. These findings indicate that the higher order folding of chromatin topology may act as a molecular-pathway independent code regulating global patterns of gene expression. Since physical organization of chromatin is frequently altered in oncogenesis, this work provides evidence pairing molecular function to physical structure for processes frequently altered during tumorigenesis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extended abstract of a paper presented at Microscopy and Microanalysis 2012 in Phoenix, Arizona, USA, July 29 – August 2, 2012. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Presents a letter to the editor regarding the frequency and distribution of the HLA class II alleles and haplotypes in the Icelandic population and Icelandic Type I diabetic patients.

Presents a new optical-lobe technique based on light-scattering spectroscopy that is able to detect precancerous and early cancerous changes in cell-rich epithelia. Description of cell architecture at the dysplasia and carcinoma stages; Method and technique; Testing of the technique in vivo to diagnose dysplasia and carcinoma in situ in human organs; Results; Advantages over traditional detection techniques.