Highly Conductive Nanocrystalline Diamond Films and Electronic Metallization Scheme.

By using a methane and hydrogen process gas mixture in an appropriate hot-filament CVD process without further dopant, high electrical conductivity of over 100 S/cm has been achieved in nanocrystalline diamond films deposited on silicon single-crystalline substrates. Furthermore, it was found that an oxygen reactive-ion etching process (O-RIE) can improve the diamond film surface's electron affinity, thus reducing the specific contact resistance. The reduction of the specific contact resistance by a factor of up to 16 was realized by the oxygen ion etching process, down to 6×10-6 Ωcm2. We provide a qualitative explanation for the mechanism behind the contact resistance reduction in terms of the electron affinity of the diamond surface. With the aid of XPS, AFM, and surface wetting measurements, we confirmed that a higher surface electron affinity is responsible for the lower specific contact resistance of the oxygen-terminated nanocrystalline diamond films.

Potential Use of Gluconate in Cancer Therapy.

We have recently discovered that cancer cells take up extracellular citrate through plasma membrane citrate transporter (pmCiC) and advantageously use citrate for their metabolism. Citrate uptake can be blocked with gluconate and this results in decreased tumor growth and altered metabolic characteristics of tumor tissue. Interestingly, gluconate, considered to be physiologically neutral, is incidentally used in medicine as a cation carrier, but not as a therapeutically active substance. In this review we discuss the results of our recent research with available literature and suggest that gluconate may be useful in the treatment of cancer.

Surface tension and viscosity of liquid Pd43Cu27Ni10P20 measured in a levitation device under microgravity.

Here we present measurements of surface tension and viscosity of the bulk glass-forming alloy Pd43Cu27Ni10P20 performed during containerless processing under reduced gravity. We applied the oscillating drop method in an electromagnetic levitation facility on board of parabolic flights. The measured viscosity exhibits a pronounced temperature dependence following an Arrhenius law over a temperature range from 1100 K to 1450 K. Together with literature values of viscosity at lower temperatures, the viscosity of Pd43Cu27Ni10P20 can be well described by a free volume model. X-ray diffraction analysis on the material retrieved after the parabolic flights confirm the glassy nature after vitrification of the bulk samples and thus the absence of crystallization during processing over a wide temperature range.

The effects of polymer concentration, shear rate and temperature on the gelation time of aqueous Silica-Poly(ethylene-oxide) "Shake-gels".

HYPOTHESIS: Aqueous mixtures of silica and Poly(ethylene-oxide) (PEO) are known as "Shake-gels" due to the formation of reversible gels when subject to an applied force, such as shaking. This shear-thickening effect can be observed using a rheometer, via distinct and abrupt increases in the viscosity of the material. Preliminary experiments qualitatively showed that the time elapsed before this occurs, termed the gelation time, varied depending on the conditions used. This paper reports on a systematic study into the effects of polymer concentration, shear rate and temperature on the gelation time, to quantify any relationships that exist between the variables and develop understanding of the gelation mechanism and kinetics. EXPERIMENTS: Different constant shear rates were applied to samples at various polymer concentrations and temperatures using a rheometer with concentric cylinder geometry. FINDINGS: The gelation time varied significantly from several seconds to an hour or more and was exponentially accelerated by shear rate. A peak in gelation time occurred at medium polymer concentrations of 0.35-0.40% (25% silica) and at a temperature about 20 °C. Higher temperatures also exponentially accelerated the gelation time as kinetic effects dominated the thermodynamic and structural resistances to gel formation.

Carbon fiber-ZnO nanowire hybrid structures for flexible and adaptable strain sensors.

We report the flexible piezotronic strain sensors fabricated using carbon fiber-ZnO nanowire hybrid structures by a novel and reliable method. The I-V characteristic of the sensor shows high sensitivity to external strain due to the change in Schottky barrier height (SBH), which has a linear relationship with strain. This fabricated strain sensor has a quick, real-time current response under both static and dynamic mechanical loads. The change in SBH resulted from the strain-induced piezoelectric potential is investigated by band gap theory. In this work we develop a new feasible method to fabricate a flexible strain sensor within the fabric adapted to textile structures, able to measure their strain.

The Tinnitus Research Initiative (TRI) database: a new approach for delineation of tinnitus subtypes and generation of predictors for treatment outcome.

Tinnitus, the phantom perception of sound, is a frequent disorder that causes significant morbidity and treatment is elusive. A large variety of different treatment options have been proposed and from most of them some patients benefit. However, a particular treatment that helps one patient may fail for others. This suggests that there are different forms of tinnitus which differ in their pathophysiology and their response to specific treatments. Therefore, it is a major challenge for tinnitus treatment to identify the most promising therapy for a specific patient. However, most published clinical treatment studies have enrolled only relatively small patient samples, making it difficult to identify predictors of treatment response for specific approaches. Furthermore, inter-study comparability is limited because of varying methods of tinnitus assessment and different outcome parameters. Performing clinical trials according to standardized methodology and pooling the data in a database should facilitate both clinical subtypisation of different forms of tinnitus, and identification of promising treatments for different types of tinnitus. This would be an important step towards the goal of individualized treatment of tinnitus.For these reasons, an international database of tinnitus patients, who undergo specific treatments, and are assessed during the course of this treatment with standardized instruments (e.g., psychoacoustic measures, questionnaires) has been established. The primary objectives of this database are (1) collecting a standardized set of data on patient characteristics, treatments, and outcomes from tinnitus patients consulting specialized tinnitus clinics all over the world (at present 13 centers in 8 countries), (2) delineating different subtypes of tinnitus based on data that has been systematically collected and (3) identifying predictors for individual treatment response based on the clinical profile. Starting in 2008, the database currently contains data from more than 400 patients. It is expected that more centers will join the project and that the patient numbers will rapidly grow, so that this international database will further facilitate future research and contribute to the development of evidence based on individualized treatment.

Telemedicine in oncology: European perspective.

Telemedicine in oncology or teleoncology integrates many so far well-known telemedicine elements such as teleconsultation, telesupport, telesurgery and telerobotics, teleeducation, and many others and is integral part of many disciplines such as internal medicine, surgery, dermatology, but also dentistry and psychooncology/psychiatry. Changes in ICT, new developments in oncology, the need to think and work interdisciplinarily, geographic and economic challenges as well as the transgression of sectoral boundaries as elements of modern teleoncology. Whereas the northern parts of Europe show a well-developed telemedicine infrastructure with a growing tendency to incorporate teleoncology for documentation, data analysis and quality assurance, in more southern countries this process is still underway and often marked by project status. Modern technology using xDSL and other terrestrial network lines but also satellite connectivity is at hand to cover a wide variety of telemedicine applications and services from which teleoncology benefits. More and more specifically designed software applications can be used to assess the medical workflow of an oncological patient and determine a life-long oncological electronic patient record. The trend, however, goes to the systemic integration of single applications and services into clinical information systems with a telemedicine approach. Although past evaluations of telemedicine applications and services have shown very positive results, only the right financial funding determines their survival and wide-spread usability in daily routine medical use. Formerly identifiable barriers for this use nowadays can be overcome more easily.

Data analysis now and then: significant changes in approaches and results.

Modern data analysis is one of the many prerequisites for telemedical applications. Classical statistical methods alone are no longer sufficient to fulfill the various demands of modern analytical procedures. Cluster and association analysis among others have filled this gap and are capable of producing more adequate and better suitable results as well as to provide information not detectable in the past.

Software agents in surgery: an update.

Intelligent and, thus, autonomously reacting software programs are capable of handling a lot of different tasks as has been realized in economics and network administration. The same so-called software agents can be used for a variety of organizational tasks in medicine. Some software agents already manage an individual patient's health care record from documentation to ambulant or stationary admission, surgical planning, and many other tasks which currently consume more than half of a physician's daily working time. Hence, not only a large potential of time, but also of economical savings result to the physicians' new disposition.

A communication-theory based view on telemedical communication.

Communication theory based analysis sheds new light on the use of health telematics. This analysis of structures in electronic medical communication shows communicative structures with special features. Current and evolving telemedical applications are analyzed. The methodology of communicational theory (focusing on linguistic pragmatics) is used to compare it with its conventional counterpart. The semiotic model, the roles of partners, the respective message and their relation are discussed. Channels, sender, addressee, and other structural roles are analyzed for different types of electronic medical communication. The communicative processes are shown as mutual, rational action towards a common goal. The types of communication/texts are analyzed in general. Furthermore the basic communicative structures of medical education via internet are presented with their special features. The analysis shows that electronic medical communication has special features compared to everyday communication: A third participant role often is involved: the patient. Messages often are addressed to an unspecified partner or to an unspecified partner within a group. Addressing in this case is (at least partially) role-based. Communication and message often directly (rather than indirectly) influence actions of the participants. Communication often is heavily regulated including legal implications like liability, and more. The conclusion from the analysis is that the development of telemedical applications so far did not sufficiently take communicative structures into consideration. Based on these results recommendations for future developments of telemedical applications/services are given.