Highly efficient generation of 0.2 mJ terahertz pulses in lithium niobate at room temperature with sub-50 fs chirped Ti:sapphire laser pulses.

We demonstrate generation of 0.2 mJ terahertz (THz) pulses in lithium niobate driven by Ti:sapphire laser pulses at room temperature. Employing tilted pulse front technique, the 800 nm-to-THz energy conversion efficiency has been optimized to 0.3% through chirping the sub-50 fs pump laser pulses to overcome multi-photon absorption and to extend effective interaction length for phase matching. Our approach paves the way for mJ-level THz generation via optical rectification using existing Ti:sapphire laser systems which can deliver Joule-level pulse energy with sub-50 fs pulse duration.

[Ginkgo biloba extract 50 inhibited beta-amyloid-induced oxidative stress in rats' hippocampal neurons: an experimental study].

OBJECTIVE To study the in vitro effect and mechanism of Ginkgo biloba Extract 50 (GBE50) for inhibiting beta-amyloid (Abeta)-induced oxidative stress in rats' hippocampal neurons. METHODS: The primary hippocampal neurons were cultured in vitro and divided into 4 groups, i. e. the normal control group (Ctrl), the Abeta group, the propanediol control group (PDO), and the six GBE50 concentrations groups (5, 10, 25, 50, 100, and 200 microg/mL). Excepted the Ctrl group, neurons were induced to oxidative stress by 20 gmolLAbeta25-35. The MTT and fluorescent probes labeling were used to observe the effect of GBE50 with different concentrations on the cell viability and the generation of intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) in neurons. Furthermore, Western blot was used to detect the cytoplasmic/total cytochrome C (Cyto C) ratio and total intracytoplasmal Cyto C, and the effect of the expression of oxidative stress-related protein Cyto C and activated Caspase-3 in three GBE50 concentrations groups (25, 50, and 100 microg/mL). RESULTS: Compared with the Ctrl group, the cell vitality was obviously lowered and intracellular ROS generation significantly increased after induction of 20 micromol/L Abeta25-35 (both P < 0.05). Compared with the Abeta group, the cell vitality was evidently improved after treated with different GBE50 doses. Except for 10 microg/mL, the cell vitality could be obviously elevated along with increased drug concentrations (P < 0.05). Meanwhile, the intracellular ROS generation decreased significantly in each GBE50 dose groups (P < 0.05). Abeta could increase the cytoplasmic/total Cyto C ratio and enhance the activated Caspase-3 expression significantly (P < 0.05). Compared with the Abeta group, among the three concentrations of GBE50, the Cyto C ratio was obviously lowered in the 100 microg/mL GBE50 group (P < 0.05), and the expression of activated Caspase-3 significantly decreased in 50 microg/mL and 100 microg/mL GBE50 groups (P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: 20 micromol/L Abeta25-35 could induce the generation of intracellular ROS in hippocampal neurons. GBE50 could inhibit Abeta induced intracellular oxidative stress of neurons through lowering the cytoplasmic/total Cyto C ratio and inhibiting the activation of apoptosis protein Caspase-3 expression.

Decision support for personalized cloud service selection through multi-attribute trustworthiness evaluation.

Facing a customer market with rising demands for cloud service dependability and security, trustworthiness evaluation techniques are becoming essential to cloud service selection. But these methods are out of the reach to most customers as they require considerable expertise. Additionally, since the cloud service evaluation is often a costly and time-consuming process, it is not practical to measure trustworthy attributes of all candidates for each customer. Many existing models cannot easily deal with cloud services which have very few historical records. In this paper, we propose a novel service selection approach in which the missing value prediction and the multi-attribute trustworthiness evaluation are commonly taken into account. By simply collecting limited historical records, the current approach is able to support the personalized trustworthy service selection. The experimental results also show that our approach performs much better than other competing ones with respect to the customer preference and expectation in trustworthiness assessment.

Galanin inhibits the proliferation of glial olfactory ensheathing cells.

The effect of galanin (GAL) on neural proliferation was studied in this article using olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs). OECs were isolated from newborn rat olfactory bulb and cultured in vitro. RT-PCR was used to determine the expression of GAL and its receptors in these cells. MTT analysis and LDH assay were used to detect the effects of GAL and the agonist, antagonist of GAL receptors on the proliferation of OECs. Results show that OECs express mRNAs for GAL and GAL receptor2 (GalR2) but not for the two other GAL receptors, GalR1 and GalR3. In addition, GAL and two receptor agonists, GAL1-11 and GAL2-11, can inhibit the proliferation of OECs significantly, but cause no cytotoxicity in the OECs population. Moreover, the influence can be blocked by M35, a nonspecific antagonist of GAL receptors. It is suggested that GAL is an inhibitory factor in regulating OECs proliferation.

[The expression of galanin and galanin receptors in olfactory ensheathing cells and effects of galanin on cells proliferation].

Olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs) were isolated from newborn rat olfactory bulb and cultured in vitro. RT-PCR was used to determine the expression of galanin and it's receptors in these cells. MTT analysis was used to detect the effects of galanin and agonist, antagonist of galanin receptors on the proliferation of OECs. Results show that OECs express mRNAs for galanin and GalR2 but not for two another receptors, GalR1 and GalR3. In addition, galanin and two receptor agonists, GAL1-11 and GAL2-11, can significantly inhibit the proliferation of OECs. But the influence can be blocked by M35, nonspecific antagonist of galanin receptors.