Search

We present the results of a study of the electric field properties in the auroral oval (AO) region. We exploit more than one year of electric field measurements taken by the EFD instrument onboard the China-Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite 01 (CSES-01) spacecraft, orbiting sun-synchronously at around 500 km of altitude inside the Earth ionosphere. To exploit the high temporal resolution of EFD, we devise a new technique that allows to detect the crossing of the AO by CSES-01 using electric field measurements only. This new technique combines a median-weighted local variance measure and Iterative Filtering to automatically isolate high levels of electromagnetic activity caused by, e.g., particle precipitation and Field Aligned Currents (FAC) at auroral latitudes. We validate this new method on few selected orbits against other standard proxies, such as the SWARM single-FAC product and the auroral radiance emission measured by SSUSI onboard the DMSP constellation. Furthermore, we identify ~3 000 orbits (on a dataset of ~10 000) of high geomagnetic activity where CSES either crossed the AO boundary or the polar cap region and characterize the multiscale (down to characteristic electron scales) statistical properties of the electric field. This work represents the first systematic study of the Auroral electric field, with many potential applications to space-weather studies, thanks to the large amount of continuous observations of the ionosphere carried out by CSES-01.

In the last few decades, the efforts of the scientific community to search earthquake signatures in the Earth atmosphere, ionosphere and magnetosphere have grown rapidly. The increasing amount of good quality data from ground stations and satellites allowed the detection of specific signatures with high statistical significance such as ionospheric plasma density perturbations and/or atmospheric temperature and pressure changes. In addition, the recent development of a magnetospheric–ionospheric–lithospheric coupling (M.I.L.C.) analytical model has provided promising results in the identification of causal links between the observed anomalies and their possible seismic origin. With the aim of statistical validating such a model, we have performed a multi-instrument analysis of a mid-latitude seismic event, including also the investigation of atmospheric activity, in order to validate the identification of confounders and possibly explain any observed anomalous signal. Specifically, we have investigated the earthquake (Mw 4.2) occurred in Italy (Marche) on November 20th 2022 by using high-quality data from both ground-based detectors and satellites, preserving their statistical significance, that we have compared with the predictions of the M.I.L.C. model.

We model plasma turbulence in the near-Sun solar wind by means of a high-resolution fully kinetic simulation initialised with average plasma conditions measured by Parker Solar Probe during its first solar encounter. Once turbulence is fully developed, the power spectra of the plasma and electromagnetic fluctuations exhibit clear power-law intervals down to sub-electron scales. Our simulation models the electron-scale electric field fluctuations with unprecedented accuracy. This allows us to perform the first detailed analysis of the different terms of the electric field in the generalised Ohm's law (MHD, Hall, and electron pressure terms) at ion and electron scales, both in physical space and in Fourier space. Such analysis suggests rewriting the Ohm’s law in a different form, which disentangles the contribution of different underlying plasma mechanisms, characterising the nature of the electric field fluctuations in the different range of scales. This provides a new insight on how energy in the turbulent electromagnetic fields is transferred through ion and electron scales and seems to favour the role of pressure-balanced structures versus waves. We finally test our assumptions and numerical results by means of a statistical analysis using magnetic field, electric field, and electron density data from Solar Orbiter and Parker Solar Probe. Preliminary results show good agreement with our theoretical expectations inspired by our simulation.

The complement system, professional phagocytes and other cells such as Natural killer cells and mast cells are among the important components of the innate arm of the immune system. These constituents provide an orchestrated array of defences and responses against tissue injury and foreign particles, including nanopharmaceuticals. While interception of nanopharmaceuticals by the immune system is beneficial for immunomodulation and treatment of phagocytic cell disorders, it is imperative to understand the multifaceted mechanisms by which nanopharmaceuticals interacts with the immune system and evaluate the subsequent balance of beneficial versus adverse reactions. An example of the latter is adverse infusion reactions to regulatory-approved nanopharmaceuticals seen in human subjects. Here, we discuss collective opinions and findings from our laboratories in mapping nanoparticle-mediated complement and leucocyte/macrophage responses.

We present results from a multiscale spatiotemporal analysis of 3D Hall-MHD and hybrid kinetic numerical simulations of decaying plasma turbulence. By combining Fourier analysis and Fast Iterative Filtering, we compute the 3D k-ω power spectrum of the magnetic and velocity fluctuations at the time when turbulence has fully developed. We find that the magnetic fluctuations around and just below the ion characteristic scales mainly consist of strongly anisotropic perturbations, with temporal frequencies smaller than the ion-cyclotron frequency and with wave vectors almost perpendicular to the ambient magnetic field. Further analysis reveals that such perturbations cannot be described in terms of wave-like fluctuations, but rather consist of localized structures that are organized in a filamentary network of current sheets, which continuously form and disrupt as a consequence of magnetic reconnection, spontaneously induced by the interaction of turbulent structures. We discuss similarities and differences with respect to previous findings from 2D simulations, and we put our results in the context of spacecraft observations in the solar wind.

We model the development of plasma turbulence in the near-Sun solar wind with high-resolution fully-kinetic particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations, initialised with plasma conditions measured by Parker Solar Probe during its first solar encounter (ion and electron plasma beta ≤ 1 and a large amplitude of the turbulent fluctuations). The power spectra of the plasma and electromagnetic fluctuations are characterized by multiple power-law intervals, with a transition and a considerable steepening in correspondence of the electron scales. In the same range of scales, the kurtosis of the magnetic fluctuations is observed to further increase, hinting at a higher level of intermittency. We observe a number of electron-only reconnection events, which are responsible for an increase of the electron temperature in the direction parallel to the ambient field. The total electron temperature, however, exhibits only a small increase due to the cooling of electrons in the perpendicular direction, leading to a strong temperature anisotropy. We also analyse the power spectra of the different terms of the electric field in the generalised Ohm’s law, their linear and nonlinear components, and their alignment, to get a deeper insight on the nature of the turbulent cascade. Finally, we compare our results with those from hybrid simulations with the same parameters, as well as with spacecraft observations.

On May 12, 2021 the interplanetary counterpart of the May 9, 2021 coronal mass ejection impacted the Earth’s magnetosphere, giving rise to a strong geomagnetic storm. This work discusses the evolution of the various events linking the solar activity to the Earth’s ionosphere with special focus on the effects observed in the circumterrestrial environment. We investigate the propagation of the interplanetary coronal mass ejection and its interaction with the magnetosphere - ionosphere system in terms of both magnetospheric current systems and particle redistribution, by jointly analysing data from interplanetary, magnetospheric, and low Earth orbiting satellites. The principal magnetospheric current system activated during the different phases of the geomagnetic storm is correctly identified through the direct comparison between geosynchronous orbit observations and model predictions. From the particle point of view, we have found that the primary impact of the storm development is a net and rapid loss of relativistic electrons from the entire outer radiation belt. Our analysis shows no evidence for any short-term recovery to pre-storm levels during the days following the main phase. Storm effects also included a small Forbush decrease driven by the interplay between the interplanetary shock and subsequent magnetic cloud arrival.

Spectral transfer equations allow to quantify the value of the energy flux of a turbulent flow across concentric shells in Fourier space. Karman-Howarth-Monin equations serve as a complement to the Spectral Transfer analysis, since they quantify as well the energy transfer rate of turbulence across scales via third-order structure functions, but also provide information on the directionality of the flux. We have extended the use of these methods to study the cascade of cross-helicity and compare it to the energy cascade in 3D compressible MHD simulations. Our results show that the cross-helicity cascade reaches stationarity after the energy cascade, thus indicating a slower turbulence development for this invariant. Once fully developed, the cross-helicity cascade matches the main features of the energy one.

The definition of the statistical distribution of the ionospheric electromagnetic (EM) waves energy in absence of seismic activity and other anomalous inputs (such as the ones derived by solar forcing) is a necessary step in order to determine a background in the ionospheric EM emissions over seismic regions. An EM signal which differs from the background (exceeding a statistically meaningful threshold) should be considered as a potential event to be investigated. In this work, by means of the FIF (Fast Iterative Filtering) data analysis technique, we performed a multiscale analysis of the ionospheric environmental background, using almost the entire CSES01 (China Seismo-ElectroMagnetic Satellite) electric and magnetic field dataset (2019 - 2021), by creating the map of the averaged relative energy (εrel) over a 3° x 3° latitude-longitude cell, depending on both spatial and temporal scale of the ionospheric medium.In order to make a robust discrimination between external (atmospheric, ionospheric, magnetospheric, solar activities) and internal (earthquakes, volcanoes) sources generating anomalous signals, we took into account geomagnetic activity conditions in terms of the Sym-H index.Here we present the results obtained for the August 14, 2021 Haitian earthquake (7.2 MW) and the September 27, 2021 Crete (Greece) earthquake (6.0 MW).

In the last few decades, the effort of the scientific community to clarify the issue of short-term forecasting of earthquakes has grown fast also thanks to the increasing number of data coming from networks of ground stations and satellites. This led to the discovery of several atmospheric and ionospheric anomalies statistically related to seismic activity, such as ionospheric plasma density perturbations and/or atmospheric temperature and pressure changes. With the aim to contribute in the understanding of the physical mechanisms behind the coupling between the lithosphere, lower atmosphere, ionosphere and magnetosphere during an earthquake, this paper presents a multi-instrumental analysis of a low latitude seismic event (Mw = 7.2), occurred in the Caribbean region on 14 August 2021. The earthquake happened during both super solar quiet and fair weather conditions, representing an optimal case study to the attempt of reconstructing the seismic scenario in terms of the link between lithosphere, atmosphere, ionosphere and magnetosphere. The proposed reconstruction based on ground and satellites high quality observations, suggests that the fault break generated an atmospheric gravity wave able to perturb mechanically the ionospheric plasma density, which, in turn, drove the generation of both electromagnetic waves and magnetospheric field line resonance frequency variation. The comparison between observations and the recent analytical Magnetospheric Ionospheric Lithospheric Coupling (M.I.L.C.) model confirms the activation of the lithosphere–atmosphere–ionosphere–magnetosphere chain. In addition, the observations of the China Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite (CSES-01), which was flying over the epicentre some hours before the earthquake, confirms both the presence of electromagnetic wave activity coming from the lower ionosphere and plasma density variation consistent with the anomaly distribution of plasma density detected at ground by a chain of Global Navigation Satellite System stations located around the epicentre.

Considering the multifaceted protective and homeostatic roles of the complement system, many consequences arise when drug carriers, and particulate pharmaceutical formulations clash with complement proteins, and trigger complement cascade. Complement activation may induce formulation destabilization, promote opsonization, and affect biological and therapeutic performance of pharmaceutical nano- and micro-particles. In some cases, complement activation is beneficial, where complement may play a role in prophylactic protection, whereas uncontrolled complement activation is deleterious, and contributes to disease progression. Accordingly, design initiatives with particulate medicines should consider complement activation properties of the end formulation within the context of administration route, dosing, systems biology, and therapeutic perspective. Here we examine current progress in mechanistic processes underlying complement activation by pre-clinical and clinical particles, identify opportunities and challenges ahead, and suggest future directions in nanomedicine-complement interface research.

In plasma turbulence, energy and cross helicity are transferred across scales at a constant rate as a consequence of nonlinear interactions. In incompressible magnetohydrodynamics (MHD), the energy cascade rate of both quantities can be computed by means of the temporal evolution of second-order structure functions, known as Karman–Howarth–Monin (KHM) equations. In the present work, we derive the KHM equation to compute the energy cascade rate of cross helicity in compressible MHD. Using three-dimensional direct numerical simulations, we validate the equation and use it to measure the cross-helicity turbulence properties. Our results show a slower development of the cross-helicity cascade with respect to the energy one and the presence of inverse cascades of energy and cross helicity at large scales when in the presence of a strong mean field. We propose the relation of these phenomena with the longer duration of geomagnetic storms after the arrival of solar winds with large cross helicity and the observation of patchy inertial ranges displaying positive and negative cascade rates for certain solar wind intervals.

Pluronic-coated polylipoic acid-based nanoparticles (F127@PLA-NPs) have great potential as biodegradable nanovectors for delivering active molecules to different organs in complex diseases. In this study we describe the in vivo biodistribution, safety and ability to deliver molecules of F127@PLA-NPs in healthy rats following intravenous administration. Adult rats were injected with 10 mg/kg of rhodamine B-labeled F127@PLA-NPs, and NPs fluorescence and MFI rate were measured by confocal microscopy in whole collected organs. The NPs accumulation rate was maximal in the heart, compared to the other organs. At the cellular level, myocytes and kidney tubular cells showed the highest NPs uptake. Neither histopathological lesion nor thrombogenicity were observed after NPs injection. Finally, F127@PLA-NPs were tested in vitro as miRNAs delivery nanosystem, and they showed good ability in targeting cardiomyocytes. These results demonstrated that our F127@PLA-NPs constitute a biological, minimally invasive and safe delivery tool targeting organs and cells, such as heart and kidney.

We derive two new forms of the K\'arm\'an-Howarth-Monin equation for decaying compressible Hall magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence. We test them on results of a weakly-compressible, two-dimensional, moderate-Reynolds-number Hall MHD simulation and compare them with an isotropic spectral transfer (ST) equation. The KHM and ST equations are automatically satisfied during the whole simulation owing to the periodic boundary conditions and have complementary cumulative behavior. They are used here to analyze the onset of turbulence and its properties when it is fully developed. These approaches give equivalent results characterizing: the decay of the kinetic + magnetic energy at large scales, the MHD and Hall cross-scale energy transfer/cascade, the pressure dilatation, and the dissipation. The Hall cascade appears when the MHD one brings the energy close to the ion inertial range and is related to the formation of reconnecting current sheets. At later times, the pressure-dilation energy-exchange rate oscillates around zero with no net effect on the cross-scale energy transfer when averaged over a period of its oscillations. A reduced one-dimensional analysis suggests that all three methods may be useful to estimate the energy cascade rate from in situ observations., Comment: 11 pages, 7 figues

Turbulence in the solar wind is developed along a vast range of scales, generally under weakly compressible and strong magnetic field plasma conditions. The effects of weakly and moderate compressibility (Mach ≤1) and turbulence anisotropy on the energy transfer rate are investigated at MHD and Hall MHD scales. For this purpose, the results of two and three-dimensional compressible Hall MHD simulations are analyzed using a new form of the Karman-Howarth-Monin (KHM) equations that accounts for compressible effects down to Hall MHD scales.The KHM are dynamic equations directly derived from the basic fluid equations that describe the plasma, such as the Hall MHD equations. They provide a relation between the two-point cross-correlations in real space or II-order structure functions, the III-order structure functions and the energy cascade rate of turbulence. These relations depend upon turbulence anisotropy. The effects of compressibility and the Hall term on anisotropy and the estimation of the energy cascade rate via the KHM equations are discussed.

We present the results from a spacetime study of Hall-MHD and Hybrid-kinetic numerical simulations of decaying turbulence. By combining Fourier analysis and Multivariate Iterative Filtering (a new technique developed for the analysis of nonstationary nonlinear signals) we calculate the kω-power spectrum of magnetic, velocity, and density fluctuations at the maximum of turbulent activity. Results show that the magnetic power spectrum at sub-ion scales is formed by localized structures and/or perturbations with temporal frequencies much smaller than the ion-cyclotron frequency Ωi. Going toward smaller ion-kinetic scales, the contribution of low-medium frequency perturbations (ω < 3Ωi) to the magnetic spectrum becomes important. Our analysis clearly indicates that such low-frequency perturbations have no kinetic-Alfvén neither Ion-cyclotron origin. At higher frequencies, we clearly identify signatures of both whistler and kinetic-Alfvén wave activity. However, their energetic contribution to the turbulent cascade is negligible. We conclude that the dynamics of turbulence at sub-ion scales is mainly shaped by localized intermittent structures, with no contribution of wavelike perturbations.

We present numerical results from high-resolution fully kinetic simulations of plasma turbulence under the near-Sun conditions encountered by Parker Solar Probe during its first perihelion, characterized by a low plasma beta and a large level of turbulent fluctuations. The recovered spectral properties are in agreement with those from PSP observations and recent high-resolution hybrid simulations just below the ion characteristic scales, i.e., the spectrum of the magnetic field exhibits a steep transition region with a spectral index compatible with -11/3. When the electron scales are reached a spectral break is observed and the spectrum steepens while still showing a clear power law. We discuss theoretical predictions for such a spectral behavior, based on a two-fluid model which assumes that a self-similar energy transfer across scales is occurring, without the need to include any kinetic process. We also analyse the role of magnetic reconnection and the statistics of reconnection events, as well as signatures in the proton and electron distribution functions hinting at mechanisms for energy dissipation. The results of this work represent a step forward in understanding the processes responsible for particle heating and acceleration and therefore on the origin of the solar wind and coronal heating. Furthermore, they allow for reliable predictions for future spacecraft missions investigating electron-scale physics in low-beta plasmas.

Herein we present an innovative approach to produce biocompatible, degradable, and stealth polymeric nanoparticles based on poly(lipoic acid), stabilized by a PEG-ended surfactant. Taking advantage of the well-known thiol-induced polymerization of lipoic acid, a universal and nontoxic nanovector consisted of a solid cross-linked polymeric matrix of lipoic acid monomers was prepared and loaded with active species with a one-step protocol. The biological studies demonstrated a high stability in biological media, the virtual absence of "protein" corona in biological fluids, the absence of acute toxicity in vitro and in vivo, complete clearance from the organism, and a relevant preference for short-term accumulation in the heart. All these features make these nanoparticles candidates as a promising tool for nanomedicine.

We investigate properties of the scale dependence and cross-scale transfer of kinetic energy in compressible three-dimensional hydrodynamic turbulence, by means of two direct numerical simulations of decaying turbulence with initial Mach numbers M = 1/3 and M = 1, and with moderate Reynolds numbers, R_lambda ~ 100. The turbulent dynamics is analyzed using compressible and incompressible versions of the dynamic spectral transfer (ST) and the Karman-Howarth-Monin (KHM) equations. We find that the nonlinear coupling leads to a flux of the kinetic energy to small scales where it is dissipated; at the same time, the reversible pressure-dilatation mechanism causes oscillatory exchanges between the kinetic and internal energies with an average zero net energy transfer. While the incompressible KHM and ST equations are not generally valid in the simulations, their compressible counterparts are well satisfied and describe, in a quantitatively similar way, the decay of the kinetic energy on large scales, the cross-scale energy transfer/cascade, the pressure dilatation, and the dissipation. There exists a simple relationship between the KHM and ST results through the inverse proportionality between the wave vector k and the spatial separation length l as k l ~ 3^1/2. For a given time the dissipation and pressure-dilatation terms are strong on large scales in the KHM approach whereas the ST terms become dominant on small scales; this is owing to the complementary cumulative behavior of the two methods. The effect of pressure dilatation is weak when averaged over a period of its oscillations and may lead to a transfer of the kinetic energy from large to small scales without a net exchange between the kinetic and internal energies. Our results suggest that for large-enough systems there exists an inertial range for the kinetic energy cascade ..., Comment: 14 pages, 10 figures

Spatiotemporal properties of two-dimensional (2D) Hall-magnetohydrodynamic turbulence at intermediate plasma $\beta=2$ are studied by means of Fast Iterative Filtering, a new technique for the decomposition of nonstationary nonlinear signals. Results show that the magnetic energy at sub-ion scales is concentrated in perturbations with frequencies smaller than the ion-cyclotron (IC) frequency and with polarization properties that are incompatible with both kinetic Alfv\'en waves (KAWs) and IC waves. At higher frequencies, we clearly identify signatures of both whistler waves and KAWs, however their energetic contribution to the magnetic power spectrum is negligible. We conclude that the dynamics of 2D Hall-MHD turbulence at sub-ion scales is mainly driven by localized intermittent structures, with no significant contribution of wavelike fluctuations., Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures. Accepted for publication on The Astrophysical Journal Letters

Turbulence in space and astrophysical plasmas is an intrinsically chaotic and multiscale phenomenon that involves nonlinear coupling across different temporal and spatial scales. There is growing evidence that plasma instabilities, such as magnetic reconnection taking place in localized current sheets, enhance the energy dissipation toward small sub-ion scales. However, it is hotly debated whether the dominant contribution to the scale-to-scale energy transfer at kinetic scales is due to non-linear wave interactions or to coherent structures. Here we present the results from a multiscale study of 2D Hall-MHD and hybrid Particle-in-cell (PIC) numerical simulations of decaying turbulence, performed by means of Multidimensional Iterative Filters (MIF), a new technique developed for the spatio-temporal analysis of non-stationary non-linear multidimensional signals. Results show that, at the maximum of turbulent activity, the power spectrum of magnetic fluctuations at sub-ion scales is formed by localized structures and/or perturbations with temporal frequencies smaller than the ion-cyclotron frequency. Going toward smaller kinetic scales, the contribution of low-medium frequency perturbations to the magnetic spectrum becomes important. However, the dispersion relation and polarization properties of such perturbations are not consistent with those of Kinetic Alfvèn Waves (KAW). We conclude that the dynamics of turbulence at sub-ion scales is mainly shaped by localized intermittent structures, with no apparent contribution of KAW-like interactions at small scales.

We employ 2D and 3D high-resolution hybrid kinetic simulations of plasma turbulence to explore the physical conditions encountered by the Parker Solar Probe (PSP) spacecraft during its first two orbits, modelling the turbulent cascade self-consistently from large fluid scales down to kinetic scales. By varying key parameters (e.g., the ion and electron plasma beta, the level of fluctuations with respect to the ambient magnetic field, the injection scale), we explore different plasma conditions. We identify a new kinetic-scale regime with respect to what has previously been found in both hybrid simulations and spacecraft observations of the solar wind and of the near-Earth environment, characterized among other things by a steeper magnetic field spectrum. Our simulations reproduce PSP observations and thus offer the opportunity to investigate the physical mechanism(s) behind such change in the turbulent cascade properties. We discuss our results in the framework of theoretical models of the nonlinear interaction of dispersive wave modes, field-particle interactions, and magnetic reconnection in low-beta plasmas.We also analyse intermittency, magnetic compressibility, polarization of wave-like fluctuations, and statistics of magnetic reconnection events by means of iterative filters, a new method for the analysis of nonlinear nonstationary signals.Together with our previous numerical results in quantitative agreement with MMS observations in the Earth’s magnetosheath, our new findings confirm the ability of the hybrid approach to model in-situ observations, which is fundamental for interpreting observational results and for planning future spacecraft missions.

Poly(2-methyl-2-oxazoline) (PMOXA) is an alternative promising polymer to poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) for design and engineering of macrophage-evading nanoparticles (NPs). Although PMOXA-engineered NPs have shown comparable pharmacokinetics and in vivo performance to PEGylated stealth NPs in the murine model, its interaction with elements of the human innate immune system has not been studied. From a translational angle, we studied the interaction of fully characterized PMOXA-coated vinyltriethoxysilane-derived organically modified silica NPs (PMOXA-coated NPs) of approximately 100 nm in diameter with human complement system, blood leukocytes, and macrophages and compared their performance with PEGylated and uncoated NP counterparts. Through detailed immunological and proteomic profiling, we show that PMOXA-coated NPs extensively trigger complement activation in human sera exclusively through the classical pathway. Complement activation is initiated by the sensing molecule C1q, where C1q binds with high affinity (K(d) = 11 ± 1 nM) to NP surfaces independent of immunoglobulin binding. C1q-mediated complement activation accelerates PMOXA opsonization with the third complement protein (C3) through the amplification loop of the alternative pathway. This promoted NP recognition by human blood leukocytes and monocyte-derived macrophages. The macrophage capture of PMOXA-coated NPs correlates with sera donor variability in complement activation and opsonization but not with other major corona proteins, including clusterin and a wide range of apolipoproteins. In contrast to these observations, PMOXA-coated NPs poorly activated the murine complement system and were marginally recognized by mouse macrophages. These studies provide important insights into compatibility of engineered NPs with elements of the human innate immune system for translational steps. [Image: see text]

Turbulent space and astrophysical plasmas exhibit a complex dynamics, which involves nonlinear coupling across different temporal and spatial scales. There is growing evidence that impulsive events, such as magnetic reconnection instabilities, lead to a spatially localized enhancement of energy dissipation, thus speeding up the energy transfer at small scales. Capturing such a diverse dynamics is challenging. Here, we employ the Multidimensional Iterative Filtering (MIF) method, a novel technique for the analysis of nonstationary multidimensional signals. Unlike other traditional methods (e.g., based on Fourier or wavelet decomposition), MIF does not require any previous assumption on the functional form of the signal to be identified. Using MIF, we carry out a multiscale analysis of Hall-magnetohydrodynamic (HMHD) and hybrid particle-in-cell (HPIC) numerical simulations of decaying plasma turbulence. The results assess the ability of MIF to spatially identify and separate the different scales (the MHD inertial range, the sub-ion kinetic, and the dissipation scales) of the plasma dynamics. Furthermore, MIF decomposition allows to detect localized current structures and to characterize their contribution to the statistical and spectral properties of turbulence. Overall, MIF arises as a very promising technique for the study of turbulent plasma environments., Comment: 19 pages, 9 figures, submitted to Journal of Plasma Physics

The relationship between a decaying plasma turbulence and proton fire hose instabilities in a slowly expanding plasma is investigated using three-dimensional (3-D) hybrid expanding box simulations. We impose an initial ambient magnetic field along the radial direction, and we start with an isotropic spectrum of large-scale, linearly-polarized, random-phase Alfvenic fluctuations with zero cross-helicity. A turbulent cascade rapidly develops and leads to a weak proton heating that is not sufficient to overcome the expansion-driven perpendicular cooling. The plasma system eventually drives the parallel and oblique fire hose instabilities that generate quasi-monochromatic wave packets that reduce the proton temperature anisotropy. The fire hose wave activity has a low amplitude with wave vectors quasi-parallel/oblique with respect to the ambient magnetic field outside of the region dominated by the turbulent cascade and is discernible in one-dimensional power spectra taken only in the direction quasi-parallel/oblique with respect to the ambient magnetic field; at quasi-perpendicular angles the wave activity is hidden by the turbulent background. These waves are partly reabsorbed by protons and partly couple to and participate in the turbulent cascade. Their presence reduces kurtosis, a measure of intermittency, and the Shannon entropy but increases the Jensen-Shannon complexity of magnetic fluctuations; these changes are weak and anisotropic with respect to the ambient magnetic field and it's not clear if they can be used to indirectly discern the presence of instability-driven waves., Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures

We analyse velocity fluctuations in the solar wind at magneto-fluid scales in two datasets, extracted from Wind data in the period 2005-2015, that are characterised by strong or weak expansion. Expansion affects measurements of anisotropy because it breaks axisymmetry around the mean magnetic field. Indeed, the small-scale three-dimensional local anisotropy of magnetic fluctuations ({\delta}B) as measured by structure functions (SF_B) is consistent with tube-like structures for strong expansion. When passing to weak expansion, structures become ribbon-like because of the flattening of SFB along one of the two perpendicular directions. The power-law index that is consistent with a spectral slope -5/3 for strong expansion now becomes closer to -3/2. This index is also characteristic of velocity fluctuations in the solar wind. We study velocity fluctuations ({\delta}V) to understand if the anisotropy of their structure functions (SF_V ) also changes with the strength of expansion and if the difference with the magnetic spectral index is washed out once anisotropy is accounted for. We find that SF_V is generally flatter than SF_B. When expansion passes from strong to weak, a further flattening of the perpendicular SF_V occurs and the small-scale anisotropy switches from tube-like to ribbon-like structures. These two types of anisotropy, common to SF_V and SF_B, are associated to distinct large-scale variance anisotropies of {\delta}B in the strong- and weak-expansion datasets. We conclude that SF_V shows anisotropic three-dimensional scaling similar to SF_B, with however systematic flatter scalings, reflecting the difference between global spectral slopes., Comment: accepted in MNRAS

Fluorescence is a powerful tool for mapping biological events in real-time with high spatial resolution. Ultra-bright probes are needed in order to achieve high sensitivity: these probes are typically obtained by gathering a huge number of fluorophores in a single nanoparticle (NP). Unfortunately this assembly produces quenching of the fluorescence because of short-range intermolecular interactions. Here we demonstrate that rational structural modification of a well-known molecular fluorophore N-(7-nitrobenz-2-oxa-1,3-diazol-4-yl) (NBD) produces fluorophores that self-assemble in nanoparticles in the biocompatible environment without any dramatic decrease of the fluorescence quantum yield. Most importantly, the resulting NP show, in an aqueous environment, a brightness which is more than six orders of magnitude higher than the molecular component in the organic solvent. Moreover, the NP are prepared by nanoprecipitation and they are stabilized only via non-covalent interaction, they are surprisingly stable and can be observed as individual bright spots freely diffusing in solution at a concentration as low as 1 nM. The suitability of the NP as biocompatible fluorescent probes was demonstrated in the case of HeLa cells by fluorescence confocal microscopy and MTS assays.

Peptaibiotics are a group of membrane active peptides of fungal origin. They typically contain α-aminoisobutyric acid (Aib; 1-letter code, U) and other non-coded residues (Toniolo and Brückner, 2009; Neumann et al., 2015; Benedett et al., 1982) [1–3] stabilizing their helical structure. Peptaibols are peptaibiotics carrying a 1, 2-aminoalcohol at the C-terminus. When a fatty acid chain (of 8–10 carbon atoms) is present at their N-terminus, they are called lipopeptaibols (Toniolo et al., 2001; Degenkolb et al., 2003) [4,5]. We found (Tavano et al., 2015) [6] that the lipopeptaibol trichogin displays no antibacterial effects up to 64 µM, against both Gram− and Gram+ bacteria, but kills tumor and healthy human cells via a mechanism requiring both the C-terminal primary alcohol group and the N-terminal n-octanoyl moiety, with EC50s around 4–5 µM. However, the substitution of single Gly residues with Lys strongly improves anti-Gram+ activity (Tavano et al., 2015; De Zotti, Biondi, Park et al., 2012; De Zotti, Biondi, Peggion et al., 2012) [6–8]. To further characterize the activity of trichogin analogs as antibiotics and cytotoxic agents, we here manipulated the peptide helix amphipathicity by means of two different substitutions: (i) Aib to Leu (De Zotti et al., 2012) [7] or (ii) multiple Gly to Lys changes (Tavano et al., 2015; De Zotti, Biondi, Park et al., 2012; De Zotti, Biondi, Peggion, Formaggio et al., 2012; De Zotti, Biondi, Peggion, De Poli et al., 2012) [6–9]. The antibacterial activity against four commensal or opportunistic bacterial species and the cytotoxicity against a panel of 9 healthy and tumor-derived eukaryotic cell types (including erythrocytes) are reported as MIC and EC50 (MTS - [3-(4, 5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-5-(3-carboxymethoxyphenyl)-2-(4-sulfophenyl)]-2H-tetrazolium- reduction and LDH - lactate dehydrogenase - release assay). Keywords: Peptaibols, Trichogin, Antibaterial activity, Cytotoxicity