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The snow may be melting, but it is leaving pollution behind in the form of micro- and nano-plastics according to a McGill study that was recently published in
Environmental Pollution. The pollution is largely due to the relatively soluble plastics found in antifreeze products (polyethylene glycols) that can become airborne and picked up by the snow.
The researchers used a new technique that they have developed to analyze snow samples collected in April 2019 in Montreal for both micro- and nano-sized particles of various plastics. The McGill technique is orders of magnitude more sensitive than any of the other current methods used for tracing plastic in the environment. It allows scientists to detect ultra-trace quantities of many of the most common soluble and insoluble plastics in snow, water, rainfall, and even in soil samples once they have been separated - down to the level of a picogram (or one trillionth of a gram). It is based on using nano-structured mass spectr
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IMAGE: An illustration depicting a topological surface state with an energy band gap (an energy range where electrons are forbidden) between the apices of the top and corresponding bottom cones (allowed. view more
Credit: Dan Nevola, Brookhaven National Laboratory
UPTON, NY Electrons in a solid occupy distinct energy bands separated by gaps. Energy band gaps are an electronic no man s land, an energy range where no electrons are allowed. Now, scientists studying a compound containing iron, tellurium, and selenium have found that an energy band gap opens at a point where two allowed energy bands intersect on the material s surface. They observed this unexpected electronic behavior when they cooled the material and probed its electronic structure with laser light. Their findings, reported in the
Credit: Serebrennikov et al. / Results in Physics, 2021
Precision or invar alloys have been developed by scientists for many centuries. These iron and nickel-based alloys are capable of keeping their size unchanged within a given range of temperatures. Because of this, they are used in the manufacture of precision gages, standards of length, details for mechanical dial plates, and similar devices. However, invar alloys lack many other useful physical characteristics, and this limits their use in other areas, for example, those that require high thermal conductivity of materials. Therefore, scientists have long been trying to create a unique composite material based on other metals that would combine thermal expansion typical for invar alloys with additional physical properties.
Credit: POSTECH
Alchemy, which attempted to turn cheap metals such as lead and copper into gold, has not yet succeeded. However, with the development of alloys in which two or three auxiliary elements are mixed with the best elements of the times, modern alchemy can produce high-tech metal materials with high strength, such as high entropy alloys. Now, together with artificial intelligence, the era of predicting the crystal structure of high-tech materials has arrived without requiring repetitive experiments.
A joint research team of Professor Ji Hoon Shim and Dr. Taewon Jin (first author, currently at KAIST) of POSTECH s Department of Chemistry, and Professor Jaesik Park of POSTECH Graduate School of Artificial Intelligence have together developed a system that predicts the crystal structures of multi-element alloys with expandable features without needing massive training data. These research findings were recently published in
These authors characterized genomic and neoantigen changes between 23 paired primary and recurrent head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) tumors.
Within these tumors, they identified 6 genes which have predicted neoantigens in 4 or more patients.
Within HNSCC tumors examined in this Oncotarget research paper, there are neoantigens in shared genes by a subset of patients.
The presence of neoantigens in these shared genes may promote an anti-tumor immune response which controls tumor progression.
Head and neck cancer are a group of heterogeneous tumors with an estimated 644,000 new cases per year worldwide.
The infiltration of immune cells, including T cells, into tumors is associated with improved outcomes and longer survival in HNSCC.