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Superconducting Thin Films on Si: HTSCs Meet VLSI The integration of high temperature superconductors (HTSCs) with conventional semiconductor-based technology would have important consequences for micro-eletronics, with the promise of high […]

Ex vivolung perfusion (EVLP) is a platform to treat infected donor lungs with antibiotic therapy before lung transplantation. Human donor lungs that were rejected for transplantation because of clinical concern regarding infection were randomly assigned to two groups. In the antibiotic group (n = 8), lungs underwent EVLP for 12 h with high‐dose antibiotics (ciprofloxacin 400 mg or azithromycin 500 mg, vancomycin 15 mg/kg, and meropenem 2 g). In the control group (n = 7), lungs underwent EVLP for 12 h without antibiotics. A quantitative decrease in bacterial counts in bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) was found in all antibiotic‐treated cases but in only two control cases. Perfusate endotoxin levels at 12 h were significantly lower in the antibiotic group compared with the control group. EVLP with broad‐spectrum antibiotic therapy significantly improved pulmonary oxygenation and compliance and reduced pulmonary vascular resistance. Perfusate endotoxin levels at 12 h were strongly correlated with levels of perfusates tumor necrosis factor α, IL‐1β and macrophage inflammatory proteins 1α and 1β at 12 h. In conclusion, EVLP treatment of infected donor lungs with broad‐spectrum antibiotics significantly reduced BAL bacterial counts and endotoxin levels and improved donor lung function. Broad‐spectrum antibiotic therapy administered during ex vivolung perfusion significantly reduces bacterial burden and endotoxin levels and improves the lung function of donor lungs clinically declined due to infection.

Lentivirus‐mediated trans‐airway IL‐10 gene therapy attenuates the Th17 response and histological acute rejection in an orthotopic mouse lung transplantation.

Solitary fibrous tumor of the lung is a rare mesenchymal tumor entity that has been characterized histologically. Its CT features have not been described before in the radiologic literature. We present the clinical, radiologic, and imaging features of a solitary fibrous tumor of the lung. The lesion we describe demonstrated slow growth and well defined margins. Specifically, we demonstrate its avid heterogeneous enhancement following intravenous contrast administration. Although rare, the diagnosis should be considered in asymptomatic slow growing pulmonary nodules with similar features.

The generation of expressed sequence tags (ESTs) has proven to be a rapid and economical approach by which to identify and characterize expressed genes. We generated 5102 ESTs from a 3-d-old embryonic zebrafish heart cDNA library. Of these, 57.6% matched to known genes, 14.2% matched only to other ESTs, and 27.8% showed no match to any ESTs or known genes. Clustering of all ESTs identified 359 unique clusters comprising 1771 ESTs, whereas the remaining 3331 ESTs did not cluster. This estimates the number of unique genes identified in the data set to be approximately 3690. A total of 1242 unique known genes were used to analyze the gene expression patterns in the zebrafish embryonic heart. These were categorized into seven categories on the basis of gene function. The largest class of genes represented those involved in gene/protein expression (25.9% of known transcripts). This class was followed by genes involved in metabolism (18.7%), cell structure/motility (16.4%), cell signaling and communication (9.6%), cell/organism defense (7.1%), and cell division (4.4%). Unclassified genes constituted the remaining 17.91%. Radiation hybrid mapping was performed for 102 ESTs and comparison of map positions between zebrafish and human identified new synteny groups. Continued comparative analysis will be useful in defining the boundaries of conserved chromosome segments between zebrafish and humans, which will facilitate the transfer of genetic information between the two organisms and improve our understanding of vertebrate evolution.

InP and In0.53Ga0.47As are lattice matched and can form superlattices that are free of crystalline defects. Zn indiffusion enhances the diffusion of cations while leaving the anions unaffected; the resultant In1-xGaxP/In1-xGaxAs superlattices are strained. Since the as-grown specimens are pseudomorphic, any defects observed after Zn diffusion must be attributed to strain relaxation. Studies of the post-growth strain build-up and relaxation in this novel system suggest a new strain relief mechanism for buried strained layers of face-centred-cubic (fcc) structures. The signature defect of the proposed mechanism is a microtwin along a {111} plane spanning the buried strained layer and terminating at both interfaces with partial dislocations of 1/6<112> type. Energy analysis indicates that this new partial-dislocation strain relief mechanism is more effective than the conventional 60† perfect-dislocation mechanism for relieving the in-plane strain in buried strained layers. Therefore, the proposed mechanism is an energetically favourable relaxation channel and limits the useful thicknesses of strained layers in electronic and optoelectronic devices.

The heart, which is composed of all the cellular components of the circulatory system, is a representative organ for obtaining genes expressed in the cardiovascular system in normal and disease states. We used partial sequences of cDNA clones, or expressed sequence tags, to identify and tag genes expressed in this organ. More than 3500 partial sequences representing > 3000 cDNA clones have been obtained from either the 5' or 3' end of inserts derived from human heart cDNA libraries. Of 3132 cDNA clones analyzed by sequence similarity searching against the GenBank/EMBL data bases, 1485 (47.4%) were found to represent additional, previously undiscovered genes, whereas 267 clones were matched to human brain expressed sequence tags. Clones matching to known genes were catalogued according to their putative structural and cellular functions. cDNA probes from reverse-transcribed mRNAs of fetal and adult hearts were used to study differential expression of selected clones in cardiac development. Cataloguing genes expressed in the heart may provide insight into the genes involved in health and cardiovascular disease.

Anisotropie surface texturing of the polycrystalline yttria-stabilized zirconia substrates, prior to YBa2Cu3O7-x film deposition, is shown to promote in-plane (basal plane) ordering of the film growth in addition to thec-axis texturing. TheJc's of the films in the weak-link-dominated low-field regime are enhanced considerably, and this result is attributed to the reduction of weak links resulting from a reduction in the number of in-plane large-angle grain boundaries.

We show that high quality MBE regrowth of ZnSe can be achieved on (100) GaAs surfaces that have been passivated outside the regrowth chamber with aqueous selenides. Good epitaxial regrowth of ZnSe on these Se-modified GaAs surfaces could be seen by reflection high energy electron diffraction and lattice images obtained by transmission electron microscopy reveal GaAs/ZnSe interfaces free of structural defects. We also show that these regrown interfaces are of high electronic quality with photoluminescence intensity measurements. The relatively low regrowth temperatures (270 and 350°C) combined with the wide band gap of ZnSe should make our scheme attractive for regrowth on many GaAs-based devices.