Mobile Phone-Brain Tumour Public Health Advisory

Vini G. Khurana, MBBS, BSc(Med), PhD, FRACS

[SNIPS]

At this time, precautionary but strong recommendations for members of the General Public include (whenever feasible or possible): (i) using a regular "land-line" in preference to a hand-held mobile or cordless phone; (ii) using a hand-held phone on "speaker phone" mode held > 20 cm away or "in-vehicle hands-free speaker" mode as opposed to the typical "mobile phone-to-ear" use; (iii) minimising the use of current Bluetooth devices and unshielded headphone accessories for mobile phones; (iv) minimising the amount of time spent using mobile and cordless phones for all adults; and (v) restricting the use of mobile and cordless phones by children to emergency situations. For members of the Telecommunications Industry, the author recommends expediting the development and promotion of safe, practical and ubiquitous EMR/radiofrequency shielding devices for mobile and cordless phones and their Bluetooth and headset accessories, and further refinement of the hands-free "speaker phone" option.

Key messages of this work:

• Mobile phones are convenient and frequently invaluable, yet exposure to their electromagnetic radiation is invisible. Therefore, any danger this exposure poses may be easily dismissed.
• Exposure is long-term and its effects on the body, particularly its electrical organ, the brain, are compounded by numerous other simultaneous long-term exposures including continuous waves from radio and TV transmitter towers, cordless phone base stations, power lines, and wireless/WiFi computing devices.
• A malignant brain tumour represents a life-ending diagnosis in the vast majority of those diagnosed. There is a significant and increasing body of evidence, to date at least 8 comprehensive clinical studies internationally and one long-term meta-analysis, for a link between mobile phone usage and certain brain tumours.
• Taken together, the data presented below compellingly suggest that the link between mobile phones and brain tumours should no longer be regarded as a myth. Individual and class action lawsuits have been filed in the USA, and at least one has already been successfully prosecuted, regarding the cell phone-brain tumour link.
• The "incubation time" or "latency" (i.e., the time from commencement of regular mobile phone usage to the diagnosis of a malignant solid brain tumour in a susceptible individual) may be in the order of 10-20 years. In the years 2008-2012, we will have reached the appropriate length of follow-up time to begin to definitively observe the impact of this global technology on brain tumour incidence rates.
• There is currently enough evidence and technology available to warrant Industry and Governments alike in taking immediate steps to reduce exposure of consumers to mobile phone-related electromagnetic radiation and to make consumers clearly aware of potential dangers and how to use this technology sensibly and safely.
• It is anticipated that this danger has far broader public health ramifications than asbestos and smoking, and directly concerns all of us, particularly the younger generation, including very young children.
• Scientists and physicians from some academic centres worldwide came together in mid-2007 to propose safer standards regarding public exposure to electromagnetic fields (Click the link for details).
  

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Why The Flu Virus Is More Infectious In Cold Winter Temperatures

ScienceDaily (Mar. 31, 2008) — A finding by a team of scientists at the National Institutes of Health may account for why the flu virus is more infectious in cold winter temperatures than during the warmer months.

At winter temperatures, the virus’s outer covering, or envelope, hardens to a rubbery gel that could shield the virus as it passes from person to person, the researchers have found. At warmer temperatures, however, the protective gel melts to a liquid phase. But this liquid phase apparently isn’t tough enough to protect the virus against the elements, and so the virus loses its ability to spread from person to person.

“The study results open new avenues of research for thwarting winter flu outbreaks,” said National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) Director Duane Alexander. “Now that we understand how the flu virus protects itself so that it can spread from person to person, we can work on ways to interfere with that protective mechanism.”

Influenza viruses are usually spread from person to person through coughs and sneezes. Infection with flu virus can cause mild to severe illness, and at times can lead to death.

In October of 2007, researchers working with guinea pigs showed that animals sick with the flu were more likely to get other guinea pigs sick at colder temperatures than at warmer temperatures.

In the current study, the NIH researchers used a sophisticated magnetic resonance technique, developed and previously tested in NIAAA's Laboratory of Membrane Biochemistry and Biophysics, to create a detailed fingerprint of how the virus’s outer membrane responded to variations in temperature. The virus’s outer membrane is composed chiefly of molecules known as lipids, explained the study’s senior author, Joshua Zimmerberg, Ph.D., chief of NICHD’s Laboratory of Cellular And Molecular Biophysics. This family of molecules does not mix with water, and includes oils, fats, waxes, and cholesterol.

Dr. Zimmerberg and his colleagues found that at temperatures slightly above freezing, the virus’s lipid covering solidified into a gel. As temperatures approach 60 degrees Fahrenheit, the covering gradually thaws, eventually melting to a soupy mix.

Cooler temperatures, apparently, cause the virus to form the rubbery outer covering that can withstand travel from person to person, Dr. Zimmerberg said. Once in the respiratory tract, the warm temperature in the body causes the covering to melt to its liquid form, so that the virus can infect the cells of its new host, he added.

“Like an M&M in your mouth, the protective covering melts when it enters the respiratory tract,” Dr. Zimmerberg said. “It’s only in this liquid phase that the virus is capable of entering a cell to infect it.”

In spring and summer, however, the temperatures are too high to allow the viral membrane to enter its gel state. Dr. Zimmerberg said that at these temperatures, the individual flu viruses would dry out and weaken, and this would help to account for the ending of flu season.

The finding opens up new possibilities for research, Dr. Zimmerberg said. Strategies to disrupt the virus and prevent it from spreading could involve seeking ways to disrupt the virus’s lipid membrane.

In cold temperatures, the hard lipid shell can be resistant to certain detergents, so one strategy could involve testing for more effective detergents and hand-washing protocols to hinder the spread of the virus.

Similarly, Dr. Zimmerberg added that flu researchers might wish to study whether, in areas affected by a severe form of the flu, people might better protect themselves against getting sick by remaining indoors at warmer temperatures than usual.

The findings were published online March 2 in Nature Chemical Biology. The study was a collaboration between researchers at two NIH institutes, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Other authors of the paper were I.V. Polozov and L. Bezrukov, both of the Laboratory of Cellular And Molecular Biophysics at NICHD and K. Gawrisch of the Laboratory of Membrane Biochemistry and Biophysics, National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Magnetic resonance experiments were conducted and analyzed at NIAAA under Dr. Gawrisch's guidance.

Adapted from materials provided by NIH/National Institute of Child Health.

Link

Kanzius and water as fuel

Here's a sexy story - this guy Kanzius I follow - he's a radio guy and has a device that may, likely will, cure cancer using radio waves and nanoparticles and it is actively under development by renowned cancer centers - has found that when he zaps water with salt in it (salt water - like ocean water!) with his radio wave device - the very one he developed to treat cancer patients - he gets something out of the water that burns! Is it H2? Is it something else? He doesn't know but is researching the thing to find out. Now, if he can get fuel from water and do so putting in less energy than he gets out - I'm interested to say the least. I follow this guy around the internet like a puppy dog in heat. Will I make a dime from all my 'efforts'? We shall see.

Ref:
If we could just burn salt water, we'd never run out of fuel
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.asp?message_id=23680803

High frequency radiation splits water
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.asp?message_id=20519506

Kanzius/Splitting H2O/background search results
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.asp?message_id=20513289

Kanzius and H2/Water burns
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.asp?message_id=20056619

Cheap Copper Nanograins Enable Circuits To Be Inkjet Printed

Thursday, March 27, 2008

TOKYO (Nikkei)--A research team at the Nagaoka University of Technology has developed a low-cost way to synthesize nanograins of copper that resist oxidization.

The availability of an inexpensive copper nanopowder of this type would enable wiring on circuit boards to be fabricated using inkjet printing. This would ease the process and eliminate the need for etching, which creates waste liquid.

According to the university group, the process can make copper nanograins for just a 10th the cost of existing methods. The team will continue their research in cooperation with the private sector and hopes to have a practical version of the technology ready in fiscal 2012.

Copper nanograins are currently made in an energy-intensive process that involves evaporating copper by placing it on a heater. In the new procedure, a fine copper wire is subjected to around 6,000 volts for several microseconds, instantaneously heating it to several thousand degrees C and evaporating the copper. The metal vapor is immediately cooled by a mixed gas of nitrogen and oleic acid to form nanograins of copper coated with oleic acid, which protects the metal from oxidation.

By adjusting such factors as the pressure of the cooling gas, these copper nanograins can be made in sizes ranging from 5-70 nanometers. Once made, the nanograins are recovered using filtering and liquid separation.

Link AND Link

Graphene makes for better optical displays

This should be right up Zvi and Pavlovsky's alley!

Mar 27, 2008

Transparent carbon

Graphene may be just one atom thick, but the wonder material has yet another application to add to its mounting stack of potential applications. According to the same group of researchers that first fabricated the 2D sheets of carbon nearly four years ago, graphene has the ideal optical properties to form the transparent electrodes in liquid crystal displays (LCDs). The researchers have also developed a technique that overcomes the traditional problems with manufacturing sizable quantities of graphene.

LCDs typically contain an array of many “cells”, each of which consists of a thin layer of liquid crystal sandwiched between a pair of polarizers crossed at 90° to each other. Light entering from behind a cell gets polarized in one direction when it passes through the first polarizer, so when it reaches the second it cannot get through. This makes the cell appear dark. To make the cell bright, the light must pass through the second polarizer, which requires the intervening liquid crystal to rotate the light’s polarization.

To do this, an electric field is applied across the polarizers and this twists the orientation of the long molecules in the liquid crystal. The polarization of the light is guided along the twist of the molecules, and by the time it reaches the second polarizer it has rotated through 90° so that it can pass.

Of course, the electric field has to be applied using electrodes, and these have to be both transparent and good electrical conductors. For such qualities engineers usually turn to indium tin oxide (ITO). However, this material has its drawbacks: indium is rare and therefore expensive; and ITO can release both indium and oxygen ions, which prevent the liquid crystal from aligning correctly. Now, a team including Andre Geim and Kostya Novoselov from the University of Manchester in the UK and Sergey Morozov from the Institute for Microelectronics Technology in Chernogolovka in Russia have found that graphene is generally more transparent than ITO, but with seemingly no drawbacks (arXiv:0803.3031).

Many applications

Graphene comprises a rippled sheet of carbon just one atom thick, rather like a single layer from a crystal of graphite. Indeed, graphene is often fabricated by ripping a layer off a thin piece of graphite with sticky tape, a process known as micromechanical cleavage (or the “Scotch tape method”). Since Geim and colleagues discovered graphene in 2004, researchers have found no end of desirable properties for the material — it can be an excellent electrical and thermal conductor, an equally good semiconductor, and a sensitive mass detector.

A benefit of using graphene for LCD electrodes is that, unlike ITO, it is stable. This prevents it from releasing ions into an “alignment layer”, which is sometimes applied onto LCD electrodes to encourage the liquid-crystal molecules to align properly. Such stray ions can reduce the effectiveness of the alignment layer, causing undesirable “image sticking”. Perhaps more importantly, however, graphene trumps ITO for transparency. Geim’s team used micromechanical cleavage to deposit flakes of graphene onto a glass slide, which they put under an optical microscope. They found that graphene had an optical transmission of about 98%, significantly higher than the 82–85% of standard ITO.

What is doubly impressive about graphene is that it can achieve high optical transmission with a corresponding sheet resistance (a 2D measure of resistivity) of just 6 kΩ. With an added alignment layer of polyvinyl alcohol, which has the side effect of reducing resistance, this figure drops to 400 Ω. Further chemical doping can reduce the sheet resistance to 50 Ω. ITO, on the other hand, has to trade resistance for transparency. Indeed, if an ITO electrode is made thin enough to rival the transparency of graphene, its sheet resistance skyrockets.

Faster production

The one downside with graphene is that, in the past, it has been difficult to produce. Micromechanical cleavage can only produce a few flakes at a time, and is therefore unlikely to ever be employed commercially. However, Geim’s team have developed a new production technique that can reap larger quantities.

They begin by placing crystals of graphite in a bath of dimethylformamide (DMF) and then sonicate it with ultrasound for over three hours. Graphite is hydrophobic which means it tends to clump together in water, but in DMF the sonication allows it to “dissolve” into flakes. Next, the researchers centrifuge the mixture for 10 minutes to remove thick flakes from the monolayer flakes of graphene, which they subsequently spray onto a glass slide. Finally, they anneal the slides for two hours at 250°C amid hydrogen and argon gas. Although the thickness is not consistent over the slide — it varies between one and four layers of graphene — the optical properties match those of graphene produced by micromechanical cleavage.

Geim’s team are not planning to commercialize graphene electrodes themselves. Novoselov told physicsworld.com that they have had “interest” from the LCD industry, although he could not name the companies to which he was referring. The team will shortly be publishing more fundamental results on graphene’s optical properties.

About the author

Jon Cartwright is a reporter for physicsworld.com

Link

United States Patent 7,348,274 - Samsung

Method of aligning carbon nanotubes and method of manufacturing field emission device using the same

Abstract

A method of aligning carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and a method of manufacturing a field emission device (FED) using the same, wherein a mold having an intaglio pattern is prepared, an aqueous solution containing an amphiphilic organic material and the CNTs are coated on a surface of a substrate, the mold is adhered to the substrate surface to cause the aqueous solution to flow into the intaglio pattern by a capillary force, and the mold is removed from the substrate surface to vertically align the CNTs on the substrate surface.

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Inventors:	Chung; Deuk-Seok (Seongnam-si, KR), Oh; Tae-Sik (Suwon-si, KR), Bae; Min-Jong (Anyang-si, KR)
Assignee:	Samsung SDI Co., Ltd. (Suwon-si, Gyeonggi-do, KR)
Appl. No.:	11/225,174
Filed:	September 14, 2005

Link

Tiny buckyballs squeeze hydrogen like giant Jupiter

3/23/2008 12:13:21 PM

Hydrogen could be a clean, abundant energy source, but it's difficult to store in bulk. In new research, materials scientists at Rice University have made the surprising discovery that tiny carbon capsules called buckyballs are so strong they can hold volumes of hydrogen nearly as dense as those at the center of Jupiter.

The research appears on the March 2008 cover of the American Chemical Society's journal Nano Letters.

"Based on our calculations, it appears that some buckyballs are capable of holding volumes of hydrogen so dense as to be almost metallic," said lead researcher Boris Yakobson, professor of mechanical engineering and materials science at Rice. "It appears they can hold about 8 percent of their weight in hydrogen at room temperature, which is considerably better than the federal target of 6 percent."

The Department of Energy has devoted more than $1 billion to developing technologies for hydrogen-powered automobiles, including technologies to cost-effectively store hydrogen for use in cars. Hydrogen is the lightest element in the universe, and it is very difficult to store in bulk. For hydrogen cars to be competitive with gasoline-powered cars, they need a comparable range and a reasonably compact fuel system. It's estimated that a hydrogen-powered car with a suitable range will require a storage system with densities greater than those found in pure, liquid hydrogen.

Yakobson said scientists have long argued the merits of storing hydrogen in tiny, molecular containers like buckyballs, and experiments have shown that it's possible to store small volumes of hydrogen inside buckyballs. The new research by Yakobson and former postdoctoral researchers Olga Pupysheva and Amir Farajian offers the first method of precisely calculating how much hydrogen a buckyball can hold before breaking.

Buckyballs, which were discovered at Rice more than 20 years ago, are part of a family of carbon molecules called fullerenes. The family includes carbon nanotubes, the typical 60-atom buckyball and larger buckyballs composed of 2,000 or more atoms.

"Bonds between carbon atoms are among the strongest chemical bonds in nature," Yakobson said. "These bonds are what make diamond the hardest known substance, and our research showed that it takes an enormous amount of internal pressure to deform and break the carbon-carbon bonds in a fullerene."

Using a computer model, Yakobson's research team has tracked the strength of each atomic bond in a buckyball and simulated what happened to the bonds as more hydrogen atoms were packed inside. Yakobson said the model promises to be particularly useful because it is scalable, that is it can calculate exactly how much hydrogen a buckyball of any given size can hold, and it can also tell scientists how overstuffed buckyballs burst open and release their cargo.

If a feasible way to produce hydrogen-filled buckyballs is developed, Yakobson said, it might be possible to store them as a powder.

"They will likely assemble into weak molecular crystals or form a thin powder," he said. "They might find use in their whole form or be punctured under certain conditions to release pure hydrogen for fuel cells or other types of engines."

The research was supported by the Office of Naval Research and the Department of Energy.

Link

Painkillers, other drugs found in southern Ontario drinking water

Last Updated: Monday, March 24, 2008 | 3:41 PM ET

CBC News

Traces of painkillers and other drugs can be found in the drinking water of 15 southern Ontario municipalities, a new study reports.

"This work demonstrates the potential of Ontario source waters, particularly river water sources, to contain trace levels of selected pharmaceuticals and personal-care products," says the study led by University of Waterloo biology professor Mark Servos, published in the March issue of the Water Quality Research Journal of Canada.

Researchers looked for eight types of pharmaceuticals — including ibuprofen — and the antibacterial agent triclosan in raw and treated water at 20 drinking-water treatment plants in southern Ontario.

The testing sites are not identified but all are said to be within easy reach of Environment Canada's National Water Research Institute in Burlington.

Scant trace of drugs in treated water

The researchers found that river-water samples taken downstream of sewage outfalls were the most contaminated, while raw water taken from large lakes also had low but detectable levels of several of the drugs. The study said this suggests "that these chemicals are widespread in the environment."

They did not find levels of the drugs in samples from wells.

"Most of the acidic drugs were not detectable in finished waters," the study said. It said that levels of the painkiller Naxproxen and triclosan "were detectable in finished water but were significantly reduced in concentration relative to the raw water."

Servos said the amounts of the drugs found were small, with most compounds reduced to trace or non-detectable levels after passing through water treatment plants.

"Our best scientific judgment right now is that they represent a minimal risk," he told CBC News.

Servos said people dumping medications down the toilet is only part of the problem.

"The majority of the drugs are taken by people and they're basically excreted into the toilet and they end up in the sewage treatment plant," he explained, adding the antibiotics are also leaching into the water from livestock manure.

Treatment plants not designed to remove drugs

He said sewage treatment plants are good at removing things like bacteria, but were never designed to get rid of compounds such as drugs.

He said a number of methods for removing the drugs are being explored, and that UV light, with peroxide, ozone and different kinds of carbon, can help reduce the presence.

Servos said two Ontario companies, in London and Mississauga, are on the verge of developing the technology to remove the drugs.

The study said further research is needed.

"There is a need to complete a more comprehensive assessment of these compounds in source waters and of the factors influencing their treatment and removal from finished drinking water."

Link

I suggest this NNPP patented development as a possible solution to this drug pollution of our drinking water:

United States Patent	7,300,634
Yaniv , et al.	November 27, 2007

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Photocatalytic process

Abstract

A photocatalytic cleaner for air or water includes a photocatalytic material coating a substrate. An anode, positioned a predetermined distance from the substrate, includes a phosphor that emits ultraviolet light in response to bombardment by electrons from a field emission cathode emitting electrons in response to an electric field. The field emission cathode may be a carbon based field emitter material including incorporating carbon nanotubes.

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Inventors:	Yaniv; Zvi (Austin, TX), Fink; Richard Lee (Austin, TX)
Assignee:	Nano-Proprietary, Inc. (Austin, TX)

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Polluting nanoparticles and CNPs - Questions

Study shows how ultrafine particles in air pollution may cause heart disease

Link

Nice post. I wonder if this finding hurts the claims of Nanobac?
The questions that come to mind are:
Does Nanobac need to prove that the CNP we are studying are alive?
Doesn't the claim you referenced seem to contradict that the plaque buildup in the arteries is primarily the CNPs which we believe are our living little creatures?
Does our IP cover the possible eradication processes if the nanoparticles are pollution based and not alive as we believe?
Many questions but you seem to be of better overall understanding than I so any answer or opinion would be appreciated. Thanks C

Link

It IS surprisingly similar!!

Nanoparticles from this recent study seem to cause problems. Are calcifying nanoparticles involved? They do not say the are not - perhaps they have never heard of CNPs!! It would be prudent, IMO, to get both research groups together to analyze ALL their findings and determine EXACTLY what is going on to cause this disease process.

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Air pollution may cause heart disease

By

Rachel Champeau 1/17/2008 1:00:00 PM

Patients prone to heart disease may one day be told by physicians to avoid not only fatty foods and smoking but air pollution too.

A new academic study led by UCLA researchers has revealed that the smallest particles from vehicle emissions may be the most damaging components of air pollution in triggering plaque buildup in the arteries, which can lead to heart attack and stroke. The findings appear in the Jan. 17 online edition of the journal Circulation Research.

The scientists identified a way in which pollutant particles may promote hardening of the arteries — by inactivating the protective qualities of high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol, known as "good" cholesterol.

A multicampus team from UCLA, the University of Southern California, the University of California, Irvine, and Michigan State University contributed to the research, which was led by Dr. Andre Nel, UCLA's chief of nanomedicine. The study was primarily funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

"It appears that the smallest air pollutant particles, which are the most abundant in an urban environment, are the most toxic," said first author Dr. Jesus Araujo, assistant professor of medicine and director of environmental cardiology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. "This is the first study that demonstrates the ability of nano-sized air pollutants to promote atherosclerosis in an animal model."

Nanoparticles are the size of a virus or molecule — less than 0.18 micrometers, or about one-thousandth the size of a human hair. The EPA currently regulates fine particles, which are the next size up, at 2.5 micrometers, but doesn't monitor particles in the nano or ultrafine range. These particles are too small to capture in a filter, so new technology must be developed to track their contribution to adverse health effects.

"We hope our findings offer insight into the impact of nano-sized air pollutant particles and help explore ways for stricter air quality regulatory guidelines," said Nel, principal investigator and a researcher at UCLA's California NanoSystems Institute.

Nel added that the consequences of air pollution on cardiovascular health may be similar to the hazards of secondhand smoke.

Pollution particles emitted by vehicles and other combustion sources contain a high concentration of organic chemicals that could be released deep into the lungs or even spill over into the systemic circulation.

The UCLA research team previously reported that diesel exhaust particles interact with artery-clogging fats in low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol to activate genes that cause the blood-vessel inflammation that can lead to heart disease.

In the current study, researchers exposed mice with high cholesterol to one of two sizes of air pollutant particles from downtown Los Angeles freeway emissions and compared them with mice that received filtered air that contained very few particles.

The study, conducted over a five-week period, required a complex exposure design that was developed by teams led by Dr. Michael Kleinman, professor of community and environmental medicine at UC Irvine, and Dr. Constantinos Sioutas, professor of civil and environmental engineering at USC.

Researchers found that mice exposed to ultrafine particles exhibited 55 percent greater atherosclerotic-plaque development than animals breathing filtered air and 25 percent greater plaque development than mice exposed to fine-sized particles.

"This suggests that ultrafine particles are the more toxic air pollutants in promoting events leading to cardiovascular disease," Araujo said.

Pollutant particles are coated in chemicals sensitive to free radicals, which cause the cell and tissue damage known as oxidation. Oxidation leads to the inflammation that causes clogged arteries. Samples from polluted air revealed that ultrafine particles have a larger concentration of these chemicals and a larger surface area where these chemicals thrive, compared with larger particles, Sioutas noted.

"Ultrafine particles may deliver a much higher effective dose of injurious components, compared with larger pollutant particles," Nel said.

Scientists also identified a key mechanism behind how these air pollutants are able to affect the atherosclerotic process. Using a test developed by Dr. Mohamad Navab, study co-author and a UCLA professor of medicine, researchers found that exposure to air pollutant particles reduced the anti-inflammatory protective properties of HDL cholesterol.

"HDL normally helps reduce the vascular inflammation that is part of the atherosclerotic process," said Dr. Jake Lusis, study co-author and a UCLA professor of cardiology, human genetics and microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics. "Surprisingly, we found that exposure to air pollutant particles, and especially the ultrafine size, significantly decreased the positive effects of HDL."

To explore if air particle exposure caused oxidative stress throughout the body — which is an early process triggering the inflammation that causes clogged arteries — researchers checked for an increase in genes that would have been activated to combat this inflammatory progression.

"We found greater levels of gene activation in mice exposed to ultrafine particles, compared to the other groups," Lusis said. "Our next step will be to develop a biomarker that could enable physicians to assess the degree of cardiovascular damage caused by air pollutants or measure the level of risk encountered by an exposed person."

Researchers added that previous studies assessing the cardiovascular impact of air pollution have taken place over longer periods of exposure time, such as five to six months. The current study demonstrated that ill effects can occur more quickly, in just five weeks.

"Further study will pinpoint critical chemical and toxic properties of ultrafine particles that may affect humans," Nel said.

The research team included investigators from the fields of nanomedicine, cardiology and genetics. Additional co-authors included Berenice Barajas, Xuping Wang, Brian J. Bennett and Ke Wei Gong of the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, and Jack Harkema from the department of pathobiology and diagnostic investigation at Michigan State University.

Additional grant support was provided by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases; the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute; and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Link

Cheap, Efficient Thermoelectrics

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Nanomaterials could be used for lower-emission cars and solar panels.

By Katherine Bourzac

Efficient crystals: Researchers increased the efficiency of a commonly used thermoelectric material, bismuth antimony telluride, by grinding it into a fine powder and pressing it back together. This technique creates random crystal lattices (lines in this tunneling-electron microscope image of the material) that interrupt the flow of heat. Credit: Zhifeng Ren, Boston College

Thermoelectric materials promise everything from clean power for cars to clean power from the sun, but making these materials widely useful has been a challenge. Now researchers at MIT and Boston College have developed an inexpensive, simple technique for achieving a 40 percent increase in the efficiency of a common thermoelectric material. Thermoelectric materials, which can convert heat into electricity and electricity into heat, hold promise for turning waste heat into power. But thermoelectric materials have not been efficient enough to move beyond niche applications. The new jump in efficiency, achieved with a relatively inexpensive material, may finally make possible such applications as solar panels that turn the sun's heat into electricity, and car exhaust pipes that use waste heat to power the radio and air conditioner.

The researchers started with bismuth antimony telluride, a thermoelectric material used in niche products such as picnic coolers and cooling car seats. Then Gang Chen, a professor of mechanical engineering at MIT; Institute Professor Mildred Dresselhaus; and Boston College physics professor Zhifeng Ren crushed it into a powder with a grain size averaging about 20 nanometers, and pressed it into discs and bars at high heat. The resulting material has a much finer crystalline lattice structure than the original material, which is made up of millimeter-scale grains. Chen and Ren's nanocomposite formulation of the material is 40 percent more efficient than the conventional form of the material at 100 °C, and it works at temperatures ranging from room temperature to 250 °C.

"Power-generation applications [for thermoelectrics] are not big now because the materials aren't good enough," says Chen. He believes that his group's more efficient version of the material will finally make such applications commercially viable.

Thermoelectric materials must be able to maintain a heat gradient, which means that they must be good conductors of electrons and good thermal insulators. When one end of a bar of thermoelectric material is heated, electrons move from the hot side to the cold, creating an electrical current. If a material conducts heat well, this current-generating temperature gradient will dissipate. Unfortunately, in most bulk materials, electrical conductivity and thermal conductivity "go hand in hand," says John Fairbanks, who heads thermoelectrics efforts in the Department of Energy's Vehicle Technologies Program.

One approach to making better thermoelectric materials has been to build nanostructured materials from the bottom up. Interfaces in these materials reflect the flow of heat without impeding electrical current. Researchers who have grown arrays of silicon nanowires, pressed silicon and germanium nanowires into millimeter-scale bars, and tested single organic molecules have had success on a small scale, but making such materials in bulk is a major hurdle.

The researchers' nanocomposite technique creates many interfaces in the material that reflect thermal vibrations, says Chen. Peidong Yang, a professor of chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, says that the work is "a great example of how defect engineering can significantly impact on the [vibration] transfer in solids."

Ren says that it's easy to make large amounts of the nanocomposite material: "We're not talking grams; we're not talking kilograms. We can make metric tons." Because bismuth antimony telluride is already used in commercial products, Ren and Chen predict that their technique will be integrated into commercial manufacturing in several months.

Article link

Sony/Patents/Nanowire/FED/CNT/Display

1)
United States Patent Application
20080067915

Ishida; Takehisa ; et al.

March 20, 2008
Electron emitter and a display apparatus utilizing the same

Abstract

A field effect electron emitting apparatus using nano-wire electron emitters is disclosed where each nano-wire electron emitter may be grown in a pore of an insulating layer and/or may have at least a portion exposed from the pore. A method of manufacturing a field effect electron emitting apparatus is also disclosed. The field effect electron emitting apparatus may be used in a display.

Claims
1. A field effect electron emitting apparatus comprising a cathode, an insulating layer on or adjacent to the cathode having an array of pores, and a grown nano-wire electron emitter in each pore, each nano wire electron emitter connected to the cathode.

26. A field effect display comprising a field effect electron emitting apparatus as claimed in claim 1, and a phosphor coated screen on or spaced parallel to the field effect electron emitting apparatus.

Inventors:
Ishida; Takehisa; (Singapore, SG) ; Ng; Wei B.; (Singapore, SG)

Assignee Name and Adress:
Sony Corporation
Tokyo
JP

http://tinyurl.com/yq4jgd

2)
United States Patent Application 20080067912

Ishida; Takehisa
March 20, 2008
Electron emitter and a display apparatus utilizing the same

Abstract

A field effect electron emitting apparatus is disclosed comprising an insulating layer having an array of pores, each pore has at least one nano-wire electron emitter which is shorter than the pore and/or each pore may have a plurality of nano-wire electron emitters. A method of manufacturing a electron emitting array is also disclosed. The field effect electron emitting apparatus may be used in a display.
Inventors: Ishida; Takehisa; (Singapore, SG)

Assignee Name and Adress:
Sony Corporation
Tokyo
JP

Claims
1. A field effect electron emitting apparatus comprising a cathode, an insulating layer on or adjacent to the cathode having an array of pores, at least one nano-wire electron emitter within each pore, each nano-wire electron emitter being shorter than the pore and connected to the cathode, and a gate electrode on or adjacent to the insulating layer.

2. A field effect electron emitting apparatus comprising a cathode, an insulating layer on or adjacent to the cathode having an array of pores, a plurality of nano-wire electron emitters in each pore connected to the cathode, a gate electrode on or adjacent to the insulating layer.

3. A field effect electron emitting apparatus comprising a cathode, an insulating layer on or adjacent to the cathode having an array of pores, at least one electron emitter within each pore, each electron emitter being shorter than the pore and connected to the cathode, a gate electrode on or adjacent to the insulating layer, and a secondary electron emission (SEE) layer on the sidewall of each pore.

4. The electron emitting apparatus as claimed in claim 1 wherein each nano-wire is a carbon nano-tube (CNT).

http://tinyurl.com/35e5os

Sony, god love 'em, they make Canon look like amateurs and will bury SED!!

CNTs are THE future of displays - Sony has spoken...and when Sony speaks, I listen. What was that last bit, Sony??...."Buy NNPP!!!"......???

COPYTELE/CNT/Display/Patent/Videocon

Biblio:
http://tinyurl.com/2fy9kw

Details:
http://tinyurl.com/yoz84o

This Copytele has a Technology License Agreement with an Indian TV maker Videocon:
Technology License Agreement with Videocon Industries Limited

On November 2, 2007, we entered into a Technology License Agreement (the "License Agreement") with Videocon. Under the License Agreement, we provide Videocon with a non-transferable, worldwide license of our technology for thin, flat, low voltage phosphor displays (the "Licensed Technology"), for Videocon (or a Videocon Group company) to produce and market products, including TVs, incorporating displays utilizing the Licensed Technology. Under the License Agreement, we will receive a license fee of $11 million from Videocon, payable in installments over a 27 month period, with the first installment of $2 million
payable 15 days after the License Agreement is effective. The License Agreement
will be effective after Videocon has obtained the necessary regulatory approvals
in India for the payment of the license fees and royalties and may be terminated
if the required approvals are not obtained in a reasonable period of time. We
will also receive an agreed upon royalty from Videocon based on display sales by
Videocon.

We will continue to have the right to produce and market, and to
utilize Volga Svet Ltd., a Russian display company that we have been working
with for more than ten years, and an Asian company that we have been working
with for more than four years, to produce and market, products utilizing the
Licensed Technology. Additional licenses of the Licensed Technology to third
parties require our joint agreement with Videocon.

http://tinyurl.com/32e7yk
http://biz.yahoo.com/e/080115/copy.ob10-k.html

Videocon:
http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=204803434
http://ragingbull.quote.com/mboard/boards.cgi?board=CLB01350&read=1334

Are we and/or Keesmann aware of this and what are we and/or Keesmann doing about it, now, in the past or in the future??

Copytele and nanotubes:
Link to US patent
Link to EPO patent documents

From the Copytele Annual Report

Our new technology improves on our prior carbon nanotube and proprietary
low voltage color phosphor display technology. We have developed various
engineering models using such prior technology, which demonstrated the display's
ability to show movies from DVD players by controlling the brightness of
selected individual pixels. The carbon nanotubes, which are supplied to us by a
U.S. company, require a low voltage for electron emission and are extremely
small - approximately 10,000 times thinner than the width of a human hair. The
5.5 inch (diagonal) display we developed has 960 x 234 pixels and utilizes a new
memory-based active matrix thin film technology with each pixel phosphor
activated by electrons emitted by a proprietary carbon nanotube network located
approximately 10 microns (1/10th of a human hair) from the pixels. As a result,
each pixel phosphor brightness is controlled using a maximum of only 40 volts.
The carbon nanotubes and proprietary color phosphors are precisely placed and
separated utilizing our proprietary nanotube and phosphor deposition technology.
We have developed a process of maintaining uniform carbon nanotube deposition
independent of phosphor deposition. We have also developed a method of enhancing nanotube electron emission to increase the brightness of this type of display.

Some other characteristics of our display technology are as follows:

o We have developed a proprietary system which allows us to evacuate our
display; to rapidly vacuum seal it at a low temperature to accommodate
the matrix; and to create lithographic type spacers to assemble our
display utilizing only 0.7mm glass. We thus obtain a display thickness
of approximately 1/16th of an inch, thinner than LCD (liquid crystal)
and PDP (plasma) displays.
o The display matrix, phosphor excitation system, and drivers are all on
one substrate.
o Our display is able to select and change the brightness of each
individual pixel, requiring only 40 volts on each pixel phosphor to
change the brightness from black to white. This compares to thousands
of volts required for other video phosphor based displays, which leads
to inherent breakdowns and short life.
o Our display has no backlight. Because power is only consumed when a
pixel is turned on, low power is needed to activate the whole display.
The display requires less than 20% the power required by an LCD. This
low power consumption could potentially allow use of rechargeable
batteries to operate TV products for wireless applications and extend
the battery operation time for portable devices.
o The same basic display technology could potentially be utilized in
various size applications, from hand-held to TV size displays.
o Our proprietary matrix structures can be produced by existing mass
production TFT (thin film technology) LCD facilities, or portions of
these facilities.
o Our display eliminates display flicker.
o Our display has an approximately 1,000 times faster video response
time than an LCD, and matches the response time of a cathode ray tube
(CRT).
o Our display can be viewed with high contrast over approximately a 180
degree viewing angle, in both the horizontal and vertical directions,
which exceeds the viewing angle of LCDs.
o Also like CRTs, our display is capable of operating over a temperature
range (-40(degree)C to 85(degree)C) which exceeds the range over which
LCDs can operate, especially under cold temperature conditions.

We believe our displays could potentially have a cost similar to a CRT and
thus less than current LCD or PDP displays (our display does not contain a
backlight, or color filter or polarizer, which represent a substantial portion
of the cost of an LCD).

Snow/Ice on roads - no problem

Abstract:
(EN) The present invention relates to a grit for removing and preventing road surface snow and ice. The grit has an ammonium salt of phosphoric acid.
(DE) Die vorliegende Erfindung betrifft ein Streumittel zur Beseitigung und Verhindern von Schnee- und Eisglätte. Dieses weist ein Ammoniumsalz der Phosphorsäure auf.

This was the ONLY English on file - German origins.

Biblio details:
http://tinyurl.com/36o5mj

Assignee:
Applicants: NANO GMBH SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGIES [DE/DE]; Hellbreite 1, 32971 Lage (DE)
http://www.nano-gmbh.com/
Not much info there! Would like to see any stock involvement.

Nano, too, of course!!!

(WO/2008/034080) SMOKE DETECTOR

Publication Number: WO/2008/034080 International Application No.: PCT/US2007/078530 Publication Date: 20.03.2008 International Filing Date: 14.09.2007
Int. Class.:	C12M 3/00 (2006.01)
Applicants:	NANO-PROPRIETARY, INC. [US/US]; 3006 Longhorn Blvd., Suite 107, Austin, TX 78758 (US) (All Except US). FINK, Richard, Lee [US/US]; 9306 Rolling Oaks Trail, Austin, TX 78750 (US) (US Only).
Inventor:	FINK, Richard, Lee [US/US]; 9306 Rolling Oaks Trail, Austin, TX 78750 (US).
Agent:	KORDZIK, Kelly, K.; Fish & Richardson P.C., P.O. Box 1022, Minneapolis, MN 55440-1022 (US).
Priority Data:	60/844,761 15.09.2006 US 60/891,927 27.02.2007 US 60/941,858 04.06.2007 US

Title:	SMOKE DETECTOR
Abstract:	A smoke detector replaces the americium source of alpha particles with a field emission device using carbon nanotubes as the field emitters, or some other field emitter, in order to provide an ionization of the air potentially caring[sic carrying] smoke particles through the smoke detector.
Designated States:	AE, AG, AL, AM, AT, AU, AZ, BA, BB, BG, BH, BR, BW, BY, BZ, CA, CH, CN, CO, CR, CU, CZ, DE, DK, DM, DO, DZ, EC, EE, EG, ES, FI, GB, GD, GE, GH, GM, GT, HN, HR, HU, ID, IL, IN, IS, JP, KE, KG, KM, KN, KP, KR, KZ, LA, LC, LK, LR, LS, LT, LU, LY, MA, MD, ME, MG, MK, MN, MW, MX, MY, MZ, NA, NG, NI, NO, NZ, OM, PG, PH, PL, PT, RO, RS, RU, SC, SD, SE, SG, SK, SL, SM, SV, SY, TJ, TM, TN, TR, TT, TZ, UA, UG, US, UZ, VC, VN, ZA, ZM, ZW. African Regional Intellectual Property Org. (ARIPO) (BW, GH, GM, KE, LS, MW, MZ, NA, SD, SL, SZ, TZ, UG, ZM, ZW) Eurasian Patent Organization (EAPO) (AM, AZ, BY, KG, KZ, MD, RU, TJ, TM) European Patent Office (EPO) (AT, BE, BG, CH, CY, CZ, DE, DK, EE, ES, FI, FR, GB, GR, HU, IE, IS, IT, LT, LU, LV, MC, MT, NL, PL, PT, RO, SE, SI, SK, TR) African Intellectual Property Organization (OAPI) (BF, BJ, CF, CG, CI, CM, GA, GN, GQ, GW, ML, MR, NE, SN, TD, TG).

Publication Language:	English (EN)
Filing Language:	English (EN)

Link

Anti-acne shrimp shells/Nanobac/CNPs

Acne is the scourge of modern youth. It is caused by a number of factors such as excess production of skin oil, the plugging of pores and by bacterial infection. Various over-the-counter treatments are available but these often have side effects such as causing skin to scale and drying out.

Robert Modlin [Link], a dermatologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, US, and colleagues say they have come up with an exciting new treatment based on nanoparticles of chitosan, a polysaccaride from the shells of crustaceans like crabs and shrimps.

While investigating chitosan as a carrier for antibiotics the team made the surprising discovery that the material can kill various bacteria by itself. They say that biodegradable nanoparticles could be used to treat acne and to carry other compounds such as antioxidants and collagen. How long before teenagers are smearing their faces with ground shrimp shell?

Read the full anti-acne nanoparticles patent application. Link

From the patent:
(WO/2007/149868) CONTROLLED RELEASE ENCAPSULATED ANTI-BACTERIAL AND ANTI-INFLAMMATORY NANOPARTICLES

[0032] This invention pertains to the development of anti-microbial {e.g., anti- bacterial) nanoparticle compositions that are useful therapeutics in their own right and that can further act as drug carriers and thereby enhance the antimicrobial activity of whatever drug(s) are carried therein.

[0033] In certain embodiments the nanoparticles comprise chitosan and a biocompatible polymer {e.g., alginate). The chitosan-based nanoparticles possess antimicrobial activity by themselves and can readily be used to carry other therapeutic agents including, but not limited to, antibiotics and anti-inflammatory drugs including but not limited to retinoids, fruit acids, antioxidants, dermal filler substances such as collagen and hyaluronic acid, peptides that are antimicrobial or enhance skin remodeling and healing, botox, and the like.

[0034] It is believed the antimicrobial nanoparticle systems of this invention offer a number of benefits. First, highly stable nanoparticles, provide maximum therapeutic benefit without risk of degradation. Second, both the size and physiochemical properties of the nanoparticles provide for increased epidermal penetrance. Third, the physiochemical properties of the nanoparticles can offer delayed release of the therapeutic activity {e.g., of the encapsulated drug(s)), providing the user with the benefit of prolonged impact long after its application. Fourth, the components of the nanoparticles possess minimal toxicity, and have already been approved by the FDA for other medicinal purposes.

[0035] Without being bound to a particular theory, it is believed that several mechanism may account for the therapeutic efficacy of the nanoparticles described herein. One mechanism is based on the interaction between positively charged chitosan molecules and negatively charged microbial cell membranes, which produces a leakage of intracellular components resulting in death of the bacteria. Another mechanism is based on the interaction of chitosan with the membrane of the cell to alter cell permeability. In addition, it is believed that chitosan can act as a chelating agent and bind trace elements, thereby inhibiting bacterial cell growth and toxin production.

[0036] It is also noted that in addition to antibacterial activity, the nanoparticles of the present invention also demonstrate anti-inflammatory activity as well as anti-fungal and anti-viral activity. Without being bound by a particular theory, it is believed that this activity may result from the ability of the nanoparticles to impede fungal adhesion and interferon induction.

[0037] As indicated above, the nanoparticles of this invention show significant antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory activity. Accordingly, the nanoparticles and nanoparticle compositions of this invention find uses in a wide variety of contexts. The nanoparticles, by themselves, or when they incorporate one or more drugs, are useful for providing topical antimicrobial activity and/or topical anti-inflammatory activity, or, in certain embodiments, the nanoparticles can be orally, nasally, rectally, or parenterally administered.

Article link

Would this prove efficacious in eliminating CNPs??
Nanobac - NNBP - along with The Mayo clinic and NASA are working to eliminate calcifying nanoparticles - CNPs - from our bodies to eliminate hardening of the arteries, kidney stones, gall stones and inflammatory diseases such as arthritis. Nanobac use an antibiotic such as tetracycline to kill these nanobacteria/particles. The product of the above article is inherently antibiotic and acts as a chelating agent also part of Nanobac's treatment.

Nanobac links:
Calcification & Inflammation
Discoveries
Collaborations

Better Graphene Transistors

Monday, March 17, 2008

IBM researchers have improved transistors made from single-atom-thick sheets of carbon.

By Duncan Graham-Rowe

Double-decker: IBM researchers have found that they can significantly reduce noise in graphene devices by stacking two layers together. Here, the noise produced from a single layer of graphene (left) is compared with that from two layers (right). Credit: IBM

IBM researchers have discovered a way to massively improve the performance of transistors made out of sheets of the two-dimensional carbon material graphene: they stack them up. By placing two layers of graphene on top of each other, they found that they can reduce the electrical noise of the device by a factor of 10.

The findings could help realize graphene-based chips that run faster, are more compact, and consume less power than today's silicon chips, says Yu-Ming Lin, a scientist at the IBM T. J. Watson Research Center, in Yorktown Heights, NY. IBM researchers are also investigating other promising successors to silicon, such as graphene-like carbon nanotubes. Graphene, which is made entirely out of carbon atoms arranged in a one-atom-thick honeycomb structure, has a number of properties that make it attractive for electronics, particularly for transistors that produce radio-frequency signals. But transistors created from the material have been plagued by noise, making the signals they produce less than ideal for communications. The researchers' discovery could help make graphene transistors practical.

"The semiconductor industry is looking very extensively for new materials that can outperform silicon," says Lin. Graphene is one prime candidate, he says, as "for a given voltage, graphene can carry a much higher current, because the electrons simply move faster in the graphene than in silicon."

This enhanced electron mobility, typically anywhere from 50 to 500 times faster than silicon, makes it possible to process more information with less power, enabling extremely fast switching speeds. Graphene can also potentially be cut to sizes far smaller than silicon can, making possible more-compact transistors and chips.

But there is a serious challenge to making tiny, practical devices out of graphene, says Pablo Jarillo-Herrero, a graphene researcher at MIT. "One of the major problems as devices become smaller and smaller is that the noise becomes larger and larger," he says. This is because the tiny currents trickling through the devices become increasingly susceptible to environmental influences. For example, charged particles in the substrate near the device can exert an influence on the current flowing through the graphene. This can act like a barrier to current flow, causing it to deflect and garbling the signal produced.

But Lin, working with his colleague Phaedon Avouris, discovered that placing two layers of graphene, one on top of the other, has the unexpected property of significantly reducing this problem. The results are published in the latest issue of the journal Nano Letters.

Lin makes the graphene layers using a common and surprisingly low-tech approach, known as mechanical exfoliation. "We take a piece of Scotch tape and peel off a layer from a chunk of graphite," says Lin. The structure of graphite is essentially the same as that of a large stack of graphene, and the carbon atoms have a natural tendency to want to stay in these layers. "So we then normally just repeat the process until eventually, we have a single layer," he says.

When placed between two electrodes on an oxide substrate, this arrangement forms a field-effect transistor, the basic building block of chips. The same approach is used with the two-layer transistor, only the exfoliation process is cut slightly short, with the final number of layers of graphene being determined using atomic force microscopy. Both layers retain their desirable high electron-mobility properties. But now currents running through both layers couple together so that each electron is paired with a positive charge, effectively keeping it on course, says Lin. The pair resists being deflected by random positive and negative charges in the materials.

While decreasing the noise in graphene transistors is an important step, other obstacles, such as finding ways to make high-performance graphene transistors in large numbers, need to be overcome before such devices are ready for commercialization.

Link

Magnetic bacteria drafted into the fight against cancer

Edinburgh University scientists' research into magnetic bacteria could lead to anti-cancer therapies

Bacterial culture

16 March 2008

Magnetic bacteria could one day be used to target tumours and treat cancer patients, according to a new study by University of Edinburgh scientists.

The research, involving scientists from the Schools of Biological Sciences, Chemistry and GeoSciences that worked in collaboration with other groups from England and France, has been published in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

It is thought that tiny magnets found within naturally-occurring magnetic bacteria could be used to target tumours in the body. Heat from an external magnetic field could be used to destroy the cancerous tissue, or to bring about the release of anti-cancer drugs attached to the so-called nanomagnets.

The uniform structure of these naturally occurring nanomagnets makes them potentially more suitable for medical applications than man-made nanomagnets.

The crux of this latest research the newly-developed ability to control the magnetic properties of the bacteria. Using selected strains of the bacterium Magnetospirillum, the scientists have succeeded in 'cobalt-doping' the bacterial cells, making the bio-nanomagnets stronger and more controllable.

The researchers concluded that their findings “provide an important advance in designing biologically synthesised nanoparticles with useful highly tuned magnetic properties.”

It is thought these enhanced bio-nanomagnets might also have potential applications in electronic devices and high-density data storage devices.

Study leader, Dr Sarah Staniland, of the School of Biological Sciences, told the BBC: “For nanoparticles to be used in medicine you need them to be a very uniform size and shape and bacteria are very good for that.

“This increases the scope for their use in [fighting] cancer.

“You would move them with a normal magnetic field, then heat them with the opposing field.”

Liz Baker, Science Information Officer for Cancer Research UK, said: “Targeting treatments specifically to cancer cells is an exciting area of research, but in this case work is still at a very early stage.

“It will be interesting to see if further research into nanomagnets will provide us with new and effective anti-cancer therapy.”

Link

LEDs shine in solid-state lighting

Posted : 17 Mar 2008

Related Content • LED driver with inductive boost ready for sampling (2008-03-17) • Keyboard backlight requires less power, fewer LEDs (2008-03-12) • Four-channel white LED drivers peg 98% efficiency (2008-03-10) • Illuminated pushbutton switches offer more cap styles (2008-03-07) • Leynard puts up giant LED panels at Olympics site (2008-03-07) More Related Content The use of LEDs for solid-state lighting, rather than as indicators, is poised to make inroads in applications in the automotive, architectural and general illumination markets, according to market analysis firm Yole Developpement. But for the growth to pan out, particularly in the general illumination market, there is still technical work to be accomplished. Although LEDs are prized for their energy efficiency, a great deal of color performance and design and cost optimization remains to be done, and semiconductor companies need to keep improving manufacturing processes. Billion-dollar potential Yole projects a market size for all types of LEDs of $10.3 billion by 2012. High- and ultrahigh-brightness LEDs, combined, will be responsible for about $4.45 billion of that total—almost 5.5 times the $783 million market size, based on packaged LEDs, estimated for 2007. With such a large part of the growth driven by bright-LED varieties, the two key criteria for the new market segments are luminous efficacy in lumens per watt and cost efficiency in dollars per lumen. Manufacturing advances Until now, LED manufacturers have focused on light efficiency and light output, said a spokesman for Philips Lumileds. "They are critical, but only two parts of the system," he said. Upcoming issues to address include thermal management, drive electronics and consistency, and range of color temperature. Resolving them will require manufacturing advances in optics, packaging, testing and binning. Positioning light LED-based lighting systems are often seen as an alternative to incandescent, halogen and fluorescent lights. The technology's lack of mercury and low power consumption are obvious pluses. However, LEDs are still an emerging technology in this segment. "It is a misconception that LEDs will take the place of the bulb for general lighting," said Tom Pearsall, general secretary of the European Photonics Industry Consortium. "The risk of promoting LEDs before they have reached a level of efficacy at least as good as the compact fluorescent bulb is that early adopters will be disappointed," said Rainer Beccard, director of marketing at Aixtron AG, a German supplier of manufacturing equipment for the compound semiconductors used to make LEDs. Nonetheless, "LEDs have a niche market opportunity—literally and figuratively," said Pearsall. "They can be used for lighting up shelf space or counter nooks, or the insides of drawers in a kitchen, for example." Zumtobel's Tempura LED spotlight is a 442 unit that emits 1,000 lumens of projected light, equivalent to a 100W halogen's output. Click to view full image) Emerging niches for solid-state lighting technology include the illumination of architectural elements—a staircase, for instance—as well as less glamorous but no less technology-appropriate applications such as refrigerated display units. New concepts needed Pearsall went on to add an important condition to growth in general illumination: "Until I see manufacturers coming out with a new concept for lighting and not producing LED lamps that are shaped for and fit into fixtures suitable for incandescent bulbs, then even that niche market will remain unexploited." For Pearsall, moving away from the glass envelope of the incandescent bulb should be a liberating experience. In other words, it is not a matter of designing products that enable swapping out an old incandescent bulb for an LED-based one. Such thinking leads to strange-looking creations, such as bulb-shaped LED lights encrusted with bulky heat sinks. Even in the higher end of the lighting market, industrial designers still have to go to some lengths to draw heat away from drivers and semiconductor components so that longevity and peak performance are maintained. Needed, said Pearsall, is a "revolution in lighting design" that takes advantage of the unique properties of LEDs, such as their ability to support digital color control, light shaping, and rapid and frequent on/off switching, as well as their excellence as a point-source light. - Valerie Thompson EE Times Link

Nanotechnology approach shows promise with vaccines

by Nathan Bomey | Ann Arbor Business Review

Thursday March 13, 2008, 3:37 AM

Robert Ramey
James Baker, founder of NanoBio.

Researchers have long believed that nanotechnology could one day target afflictions such as cold sores.

But University of Michigan scientists recently revealed two studies suggesting that nanoemulsion vaccines helped mice build up immunity to smallpox and HIV.

The technology, which is licensed through Ann Arbor-based firm NanoBio Corp., would use an oil-based emulsion administered through the nose rather than injecting patients using needles.

James Baker, director of the Michigan Nanotechnology Institute for Medicine and founder of NanoBio, said recent studies have indicated "that mucosal immunity may be very important in protecting individuals from AIDS."

In unrelated news, NanoBio announced that it may soon begin Phase 3 clinical trials on one of its topical lotions after getting positive clinical data and receiving a corresponding $10 million round of funding.

The firm, a spinout of the University of Michigan, has received an additional $10 million in equity funding from Perseus LLC - which has now contributed $30 million over the past 18 months to NanoBio. Perseus is a private equity investment firm with operations in New York City and Washington, D.C.

NanoBio recently said that Phase 2 clinical trial data on its topical lotion candidate NB-001 displayed positive indications that the therapy is ready for Phase 3 - the final stage before a drug reaches the market.

Company officials indicated that the firm would begin planning Phase 3 trials for NB-001 - a lotion that aims to treat cold sores using a nanotechnology-based lotion.
Baker recently spoke with Business Review reporter Nathan Bomey about the nanoemulsion studies. Excerpts:

Business Review: What was the key breakthrough in this news about the nanoemulsion vaccines?

Baker: We demonstrated that this (technology) can be used for almost any type of vaccine.

In addition, it can produce the type of immunity that's most desired for protection against viruses - that is cellular immunity that induces destruction of virally infected cells.

Have you known for quite some time that nanotechnology could eventually target HIV?

I think both of these vaccines are new in terms of how they are approached. No one has been able to produce a kill-virus smallpox vaccine before, and the uniqueness of the nanotechnology platform, I think, is very important to that.

The other thing was that recently there have been failures of a number of different AIDS vaccines. And also new evidence has come out that suggested that mucosal immunity may be very important in protecting individuals from AIDS. It makes sense.

So the fact that this vaccine produces not just cellular immunity but also mucosal immunity may make it more effective than some of the vaccines that have previously failed.

There are many different ideas about how to create a smallpox vaccine. What makes this one stand out?

The key here is that most of the applications we might use this vaccine in are really very different from what's going on with smallpox before.

There wasn't a risk with smallpox right now that justifies the risk of a live viral vaccine. So for things like a monkeypox outbreak or a suspected bioterrorism event, the risk of the vaccine may actually outweigh the risk from the event.

So having a vaccine that's safer than the current vaccine but is effective in preventing the infection if it were to occur is a really a change in the dynamic.

Talk about the market for nanotechnology-based technology. What is that market like right now?

Well the market is really wide open and there's a potential for incredible growth. We estimate that for some of the projects NanoBio is currently developing, they could be billion-dollar markets. NanoBio has at least three or four potential drugs for those markets. That gives you an idea of the potential for this technology.

What is the FDA approval process like for nanotechnology-based technology right now?

I think that it's essentially the same as any other vaccine, and we hope to be in people with at least one nanotechnology-based vaccine by the end of this year.

Has the FDA historically looked at nanotechnology suspiciously or do they see it as promising technology?

I think they see it as promising technology. Part of that's been because we've done our homework and we've made sure that anything we brought to the agency was well justified, and we've done appropriate efficacy and toxicity testing to justify their evaluation.

In the life sciences industry, we're seeing a lot of fragmentation with the big pharmas outsourcing a lot of their services. Do you think nanotechnology firms could be a target for acquisitions from the major pharmaceutical companies?

I think that's a good possibility. In some ways, it's been easier for them to evaluate traditional companies because they have milestones.

But for example, a company like NanoBio, which now has positive Phase 2 clinical trials, it (has) really breakthrough products based on nanotechnology (and) could easily be perceived as a takeover target.

Link to article

Contact Nathan Bomey at (734) 302-1725 or nathanb@mbusinessreview.com.

SED Figure with 'nanotube' indication

Does SED include carbon nanotubes? This drawing-description seems to indicate so. This was discussed today here LINK. I include this on my blog for the record and easy retrieval in the future.

NNPP now ~ $1 - going to $5, $10, $50?

I think so, in light of this CEO letter to shareholders:

[My bolding]

A Periodic Report - March 2008

I wanted to update you on our progress during the last quarter and share some insights into the current year.

First, a few administrative details. As many of you know, the company has primarily done business as Applied Nanotech Inc. on a daily operating basis and has used Nano-Proprietary, Inc. as our public face. I haven't been with the company long enough to fully understand the reasoning behind this, but I think you will agree it no longer makes sense. At the annual meeting this year, one of the items on the agenda will be a change of the name of NPI to Applied Nanotech Holdings, Inc. This change, along with a standardization of logos and stationary is designed to present a more consistent image to the world and remove some of the confusion as to who we are. Our subsidiary, Applied Nanotech, Inc. will continue to exist primarily due to ongoing contractual obligations.

We have scheduled our annual shareholder meeting for May 20, 2008 at the Austin Renaissance Hotel. Following the meeting, which will start at 10:00 am, we will be conducting tours at our headquarters facilities. For those of you who have never had the opportunity to visit us, this is the ideal opportunity.

The last quarter, bringing 2007 to a close and ending my first year at NPI, was certainly an unexpectedly busy time. The financial results are best told by reviewing the 10K, but in summary, our 4th quarter sales of $1,077,149 and net loss of $965,511 were in line with our expectations. Adding these to our already strong year to date numbers (by historical company standards) gave us our best showing from operations in the company history. Losses were, of course, impacted by our huge legal fees from on-gong litigation. We expect these type expenses to be significantly lower in 2008. On the Canon matter, we are primarily waiting for the appeals process to grind forward. Keesmann related expenses will be sharply reduced due to the additional defendants (those other than Keesmann) offer to pay a settlement to us while simultaneously withdrawing their financial support of Keesmann. We are asking the court for an expeditious trial in the Keesmann matter with the hope of resolving this matter during 2008.

Working on the Keesmann matter was only one of the things that kept the fourth quarter busy. Final work on the hydrogen sensor and supporting the integration into our customer's product occupied the sensor team. This customer, who has already entered into a royalty bearing license and technology transfer agreement, is planning an April product announcement. We expect this agreement to be royalty bearing during 2008.

I also couldn't be happier with the progress we are making on printable copper inks. We have met our customers’ design specifications and are capable of manufacturing consistent batches of material in sufficient quantity to allow the delivery of samples to our customers' prospects. Our current activity revolves around securing sufficient quantities of nano-particles to allow production lot sizes to be manufactured by our customer. We fully expect this project to leave the development phase during 2008 resulting in a production license and royalties.

Mitsui has made the initial payment extending their "option to a license" agreement with us and we are actively negotiating a Master License with Mitsui that would allow them to issue sub-licenses within their market areas. Although we do not have complete transparency through to the end potential licensee, Mitsui has asked us to approve negotiating guidelines for two of the potential sub-licensees that they are working with. We believe they are working with a total of five potential licensees.

As significant as our business results have been, the progress in obtaining new patents and expanding the geographical coverage of our portfolio overshadows them because they are at the heart of future results. We have had our first patent issued in Japan (see press release dated 1/31/08) and our recent nano-biological patent (see press release dated 2/28/08) are key milestones.

As I am writing this, we are expecting our quarterly revenue for the almost completed first quarter to be in the $800 - $900,000 range, consistent with the past few quarters. After these billings, we will have at least $3.3 million in research backlog. We, of course, have sales efforts underway across our business lines to generate additional research projects that will hopefully yield IP with lasting value.

I continue to be optimistic about the prospects for the business and hope you will make an effort to join us for our annual shareholder meeting.

Sincerely,

Thomas F. Bijou

http://www.nano-proprietary.com/InvestorRelations/ShareHolderCommunications.asp

Laser light detects disease on the breath

Feb 22, 2008

Scientists could soon be diagnosing disease by using laser spectroscopy to analyse the gas molecules in a patient's breath.

Identifying molecules

An optical spectroscopy technique that uses a laser to detect molecules in the breath could help to diagnose diseases such as asthma or cancer. According to US researchers, they have improved a technique, known as cavity-enhanced direct optical frequency comb (OFC) spectroscopy, to be more sensitive and cover a larger spectral bandwidth. (Optics Express 16 2387)

"With our current system we can detect many tens of molecules with sensitivities near the 1 part per billion level," Michael Thorpe, a researcher from JILA, a joint venture between the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the University of Colorado, both US, told optics.org. "In the next 5-10 years I expect detection capability will extend further to the mid-infrared and the spectral bandwidth will increase to detect thousands of molecules simultaneously."

Why frequency combs?

OFC technology uses a modelocked laser to create broad spectral coverage. "Unlike single frequency laser systems, a frequency comb can detect many different molecules at the same time," commented Thorpe. "What's more, it is superior to mass spectrometer systems because it is better at distinguishing individual molecules, performs more rapid detections and is relatively inexpensive."

Whilst the idea of using frequency combs is not new, it has only recently been extended thanks to the availability of user friendly modelocked femtosecond fibre lasers. "These lasers can now be used to produce robust frequency combs capable of continuous operation without user intervention," commented Thorpe.

Thorpe's team uses a modelocked erbium-doped fibre laser that generates 100 fs pulses and covers a spectrum between 1.5-1.7 µm. By coupling these pulses into an optical enhancement cavity and using a virtually imaged phased array (VIPA) detector, a high spectral resolution of 800 MHz is achieved. "It is this unique combination of optical components that provides broad spectral coverage, high sensitivity and high resolution for analyzing complex gas samples," explained Thorpe.

Light detects breath molecules

The pulses of laser light were fired into an optical cavity, which contained the breath sample. The laser beam bounces back and forth within the cavity allowing the light to sample the entire volume. This increases the light-molecule interaction time, which in turn increases the sensitivity. By comparing the light coming out of the cavity with the light that went in, the JILA team could determine which frequencies of light were absorbed and by how much.

"Light transmitted from the cavity is dispersed into a two-dimensional pattern and imaged onto a camera by the VIPA spectrometer," explained Thorpe. "Computer databases and software compares the recorded spectrum against known molecular spectra to determine the quantities of the individual molecules contained in the gas sample."

Looking to the future

Apart from disease diagnosis via breath analysis, the approach could be useful for applications such as: monitoring of atmospheric greenhouse gases and analysing ice core samples for climate studies and detecting impurities in gases used to manufacture semiconductors.

The team expects clinical trials to be carried out in the next couple of years and plans to explore new laser systems, new types of optical cavities and new methods of detecting the transmitted light. "To reach its full potential, the device's spectral bandwidth and the number of molecules available for detection need to be increased by an order of magnitude," concluded Thorpe. "I'm fairly confident that the next generation system is just over the horizon."

About the author

Marie Freebody is a reporter for Optics & Laser Europe and optics.org.

http://optics.org/cws/article/research/33006;jsessionid=D328C6DB7DAE984126EDA2305D403726

Nanotubes Show Their Strengths in Polymer Fibres

Researchers at Queen Mary, University of London and Nanoforce Technology Ltd. in the UK, have successfully produced single-walled nanotube reinforced polymer fibres and tapes that are as strong as theory predicts.

The work shows for the first time the true reinforcing potential of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) with effective properties of nanotubes in composites, which are close to their theoretical values.

Prof. Ton Peijs, who heads the research team said: "The problem with carbon nanotubes has always been that despite their amazing potential of becoming the ultimate reinforcing fibre for the next generation of high-performance composites, their success in actually delivering these mechanical properties when embedded in polymer composites has been limited. Despite promises of tensile strengths of 100 GPa or more – 15 to 40 times higher than carbon fibres – their efficiency after embedding them in polymer matrices has often been poor with effective reinforcing properties not far better than those of carbon fibres”.

Dr. Zhujuang Wang, who processed and characterized the new nanocomposite fibres and tapes during her PhD study at QMUL, says that in order to get the most out of nanotubes the composite need to exhibit a good dispersion as well as good interfacial interaction of the nanotubes with the hosting matrix. Moreover, similar to polymer molecules the excellent intrinsic mechanical properties of nanotubes can only be expected if they are all fully aligned. The QMUL team has explored many different nanotube/polymer combinations but the best results were obtained for a system based on poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) and SWNTs. Using solid-state drawing technology the team showed that they can effectively align nanotubes along the polymer fibre axis and triple the tensile strength of the PVA fibre or tape with the addition of only 1 wt.% of SWNTs. Further analysis of the materials showed that the stress carried by the SWNTs in these oriented PVA composites was very close to the theoretical tensile strength of nanotubes, indicating the exceptionally high reinforcing efficiency of the SWNTs in these materials.

In order to make the research a commercial success still some significant further developments are needed. Peijs said: “Although our work shows that indeed the impressive mechanical properties of nanotubes can effectively be translated into high-performance composites, the challenge is still to make a nanocomposite fibre of record breaking strength. We expect that in order to make such a fibre we will need to incorporate at least 5 wt.% of perfectly aligned and dispersed SWNTs in a highly oriented PVA fibre. So far we have only achieved good dispersions up to 1 wt.% of nanotubes, which makes that our current nanocomposite fibres and tapes have still significantly lower strengths than ultra-strong carbon fibres possessing strengths up to 7 GPa. If dispersion problems at high nanotube loadings can be overcome, nanocomposite fibres with strengths exceeding those of the strongest carbon fibre are possible. Such fibres can find their way in a large range of advanced composite materials, ranging from structural materials in sports equipment and aircraft to anti-ballistics.

The researchers published their work in Nanotechnology in a paper entitled “Extraordinary reinforcing efficiency of single-walled carbon nanotubes in oriented poly (vinyl alcohol) tapes”.

http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0957-4484/18/45/455709/

Publication Date: 11/03/2008

http://www.netcomposites.com/news.asp?4866

NanoBio - Nanoemulsion vaccines effective against HIV?

February 28th, 2008

Posted by Roland Piquepaille @ 10:10 am

Nanoemulsions are non-toxic lipid droplets approved for human consumption and common food substances that are defined as ‘Generally Recognized as Safe’ (GRAS) by the FDA. But they also can be used for medical applications. Researchers at the University of Michigan have developed nasal nanoemulsion vaccines for influenza which were successfully tested in animals in 2003. Now, the same team has shown that nanoemulsion vaccines are effective against smallpox and HIV — at least for mice. The scientists are using an oil-based emulsion placed in the nose instead of needles. It should take years before this technique could be approved for human usage, but it really looks promising. But read more…

You can see above how nanoemulsion particles enhance the immune response system. “Nanoemulsion particles lyse virus and incorporate viral antigens into their structure. The particles are then rapidly taken up by antigen presenting dendritic cells to enhance presentation to helper T-cells.” (Credit: NanoBio Corporation). Please note that “lysis refers to the death of a cell by breaking of the cellular membrane” (Credit: Lysis page on Wikipedia).

These research projects have been led by James Baker Jr., director of the Michigan Nanotechnology Institute for Medicine and Biological Sciences (M-NIMBS) ans some members of his team including
Anna Bielinska, a Research Assistant Professor. For more information about this specific project, please read the Nanoemulsions page at M-NIMBS.

Here is a more detailed explanation of how nanoemulsions work. “The surface tension of the nanoparticles disrupts membranes and destroys microbes but does not harm most human cells due to their location within body tissues. Nanoemulsion vaccines are highly effective at penetrating the mucous membranes in the nose and initiating strong and protective types of immune response, Baker says. U-M researchers are also exploring nasal nanoemulsion vaccines to protect against bioterrorism agents and hepatitis B.”

The smallpox results could lead to an effective human vaccine against smallpox that is safer than the present live-vaccinia virus vaccine. “When the mice were exposed to live vaccinia virus to test the vaccine’s protective effect, all of them survived, while none of the unvaccinated control mice did. The researchers conclude that the nanoemulsion vaccinia vaccine offers protection equal to that of the existing vaccine, without the risk of using a live virus or the need for an inflammatory adjuvant such as alum hydroxide.”

Regarding a possible protection about HIV, the researchers said that “the HIV nanoemulsion vaccine tested in the noses of mice in the study represents ‘a different approach in the way it produces immunity and the type of immunity produced.’ Vaccines administered in the nose are also able to induce mucosal immunity in the genital mucosa. Evidence is growing that HIV virus can infect the mucosal immune system. ‘Therefore, developing mucosal immunity may be very important for protection against HIV,’ added Baker.”

The study about a nanoemulsion vaccine protecting from smallpox has been published in Clinical and Vaccine Immunology under the name “A Novel, Killed-Virus Nasal Vaccinia Virus Vaccine” (February 2008, p. 348-358, Vol. 15, No. 2). Here is a link to the abstract.

The other study, about a vaccine showing immunity against HIV, has been published in AIDS Research and Human Retroviruses under the name “Nasal Immunization with a Recombinant HIV gp120 and Nanoemulsion Adjuvant Produces Th1 Polarized Responses and Neutralizing Antibodies to Primary HIV Type 1 Isolates” (Volume 24, Number 2, Pages 271-281, February 2008). Here are two links to the abstract and to the full paper (PDF format, 11 pages, 217 KB).

Finally, this technology about nanoemulsion vaccines is licensed to NanoBio Corporation, “an Ann Arbor-based biotech company which Baker founded in 2000 and in which he has a financial interest.” Here are some other sources of information from NanoBio Corporation.

• their latest news release, news release named “Nasal Vaccine for Smallpox Confers High Levels of Immunity without Safety Risks” (February 26, 2008)
• a page about how their NanoStat technology works
• and a page about Mucosal-Vaccines, from which the above illustration has been picked

Sources: University of Michigan Health System news release, February 26, 2008; and various websites

http://blogs.zdnet.com/emergingtech/?p=848

US patents link
EPO patents link

Diesel exhaust fumes ugly and dangerous

11 March 2008 -- If the smell of diesel exhaust isn't enough to make you avoid getting a lungful, new research now shows that even a short exposure to the fumes can affect your brain. A study published in the open access journal Particle and Fibre Toxicology reveals that an hour of sniffing exhaust induces a stress response in the brain's activity.

Previous studies have already suggested that very small particles, called nanoparticles, breathed in from polluted air can end up in the brain. But this is the first time that scientists have demonstrated that inhalation actually alters brain activity.

Ten volunteers spent one hour in a room filled with either clean air or exhaust from a diesel engine. They were wired up to an electroencephalograph (EEG), a machine that records the electrical signals of the brain, and their brain waves were monitored during the exposure period and for one hour after they left the room.

The researchers found that after about 30 minutes the diesel exhaust began to affect brain activity. The EEG data suggested that the brain displayed a stress response, indicative of changed information processing in the brain cortex, which continued to increase even after the subjects had left the exposure chamber.

The concentration of diesel exhaust that the subjects breathed was set to the highest level that people might encounter in the environment or at work, for example on a busy road or in a garage.

Lead researcher Paul Borm from Zuyd University in The Netherlands said: "We believe our findings are due to an effect nanoparticles or 'soot' particles that are major component of diesel exhaust. These may penetrate to the brain and affect brain function. We can only speculate what these effects may mean for the chronic exposure to air pollution encountered in busy cities where the levels of such soot particles can be very high."

One link to understanding the mechanism of this effect is that oxidative stress is one consequence of particles depositing in tissue and oxidative stress has also been implicated in degenerative brain diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease.

"It is conceivable that the long-term effects of exposure to traffic nanoparticles may interfere with normal brain function and information processing," noted Borm. "Further studies are necessary to explore this effect, and to assess the relationship between the amount of exposure to particles and the brain's response and, and investigate the clinical implications of these novel findings."

Studies that expose volunteers to potential toxins or require invasive techniques are limited for ethical reasons. Borm is currently conducting experiments where volunteers inhale artificially generated nanoparticles that are free from the other chemicals that are generated, along with the nanoparticles in diesel exhaust.

http://www.farmnews.co.nz/news/2008/mar/855.shtml

Can the ANI TiO2 nano air cleaner in a car/truck/vehicle interior at least cleanse the air in the car breathed during a road trip involving diesel engined vehicles in the vicinity? Has boss Bijou been in touch with GM, Ford, Mercedes et al?? Has anybody??

More to the point - install (legislate the requirement if necessary) a cleaner/converter/whatever on every diesel engine so they do not spill their death fumes into the air we breath.

Should the unit installed contain NPI IP - great. Would our TiO2 nanocleaner be capable of cleaning the exhaust from a diesel without fouling? We'll have to do a test to find out! Bijou-Zvi - what say you?

Ref on TiO2 patent filing:
The TiO.sub.2 works by creating free radicals and charged particles that will react with bio and viral contaminants and noxious chemicals near the activated TiO.sub.2, thus decomposing these contaminants into harmless compounds.
US patent link

Kanzius’ waves of change (AUDIO & VIDEO)

BY DAVID BRUCE
david.bruce@timesnews.com [more details]

Published: March 09. 2008 6:00AM

Research Assistant Katrina Briggs places a dish containing cancer cells in a laboratory machine at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, where progress is being made toward a new cancer treatment thanks to an Erie man’s idea about radio waves. In photo at top, Briggs prepares cancer cells by placing them in a centrifuge. (ROB ENGELHARDT/Erie Times-News)

HOUSTON -- It's Katrina Briggs' job to discover if John Kanzius has found a new way to treat cancer.

Deep in the basement of M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, in a lab not much bigger than a bedroom, Briggs blasts cancer cells with the Millcreek Township inventor's radio-frequency generator.

You can stand right outside the lab and have no idea what is happening. The walls are cinderblock and the only window is covered with black fabric.

"It's the only place where the radio waves won't interfere with other research projects," said Briggs, who has worked for 14 years as a research assistant on different projects. "The floor is 30 feet thick, so nothing vibrates."

Research that has grabbed the attention of 60 Minutes and other national news organizations takes place in a dungeon in Houston, and a similar lab at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.


Using radio waves to treat cancer isn't new. Surgeons have burned tumors with radio waves for years.

But targeting individual cancer cells with tiny pieces of metal and burning them with radio waves emitted from outside the body -- that is new, said Steven Curley, M.D., principal investigator for the Kanzius project at M.D. Anderson.

"It's the most exciting thing in which I have ever been involved," said Curley, who has written articles for more than 110 publications in his career.

The wrong floor

AUDIO & VIDEO

Audio: http://www.goerie.com/audio/keating, http://www.goerie.com/audio/houston Video: http://www.goerie.com/video/RFresearch -- Who's Involved John Kanzius came to Erie in 1966 to work as an engineer at WJET-TV and WJET-AM. He stayed there for 35 years, retiring as president and co-owner. Kanzius, 64, now divides his time between homes in Millcreek Township and Sanibel, Fla. He was diagnosed with chronic lymphocytic leukemia in 2002 and continues to be treated for the cancer. He invented his radio-frequency generator in 2003 after growing frustrated with the effects of traditional cancer treatments. "I knew that radio waves could heat metal you had if you stood too close to a (radio) transmitter," Kanzius said. "I thought, maybe it could do the same in cancer cells." Steven Curley, M.D., is a surgical oncologist at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, and principal investigator for John Kanzius' radio-frequency generator project. Curley, 51, divides his time between surgery and research. He has written or co-written more than 110 medical and scientific articles and 30 book chapters, mostly dealing with cancer of the gallbladder, bile duct or liver. "Patient care always comes first," Curley said. "But I get a charge out of both surgery and research. Pushing the envelope in research is very stimulating, but if I was just in the lab, with no patient care, I would be lost." Michael Keating, M.D., oversees Kanzius' treatment for leukemia at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. Keating, no age available, also played an important role in getting Kanzius together with Curley and Smalley in 2005. He treated Kanzius and Smalley, who both were diagnosed with chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Smalley died from the disease in late 2005. Boris Yakobson, Ph.D., is a professor of chemistry, materials science and computational materials science at Rice University, Houston, and an expert on nanoparticles. Yakobson, 53, was a co-writer for Curley's article on Kanzius' invention that was published in October in Cancer, the medical journal of the American Cancer Society. He worked closely with Rick Smalley, Ph.D., a Nobel Prize-winning scientist at Rice who became very interested in Kanzius' project during the last months of his life. Katrina Briggs is a research assistant at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. She works full time on Kanzius' project. Her duties include growing, harvesting and preparing cancer cells, then subjecting them to Kanzius' radio-frequency generator. She records how they respond to treatment. Briggs, 43, works on the project in three different laboratories. She is part of an eight-member research team.

How did a project that began in Kanzius' winter home in Sanibel, Fla., end up at a world-class cancer institute?

It started when Kanzius, 64, stepped on an elevator and got off on the wrong floor.

Kanzius -- who has chronic lymphocytic leukemia, an incurable type of cancer -- was between physician appointments at M.D. Anderson in 2003 when he stepped into the hospital's main elevator and mistakenly got out on the pediatric floor.

"I saw all these kids, some of them with bald heads and holding IV stands," Kanzius said. "They were going through the same type of thing I was. That's when I knew there needed to be a different way."

Kanzius is not a medical expert. He doesn't even have a bachelor's degree.

But he was a radio engineer before he became a radio and television station president and co-owner. He knew radio waves could heat metal, and that cancer cells are more vulnerable to heat than healthy cells.

So Kanzius went home to Sanibel and began tinkering with pie pans, copper wiring and other materials.

"What if we could get the metal into the cancer cells, then hit them with radio waves?" Kanzius asked. "They would heat the metal, but not the rest of the body."

Heating hot dogs
Kanzius met Curley in 2005. By then he was using his homemade RF generator to quickly heat hot dogs until they burst.


He showed the device to Michael Keating, his leukemia physician at M.D. Anderson.

Keating suggested that Kanzius talk with Curley, who had been using radio waves to kill tumors in some patients. Because Curley had to physically insert needles into tumors to deliver the radio waves, it only worked with certain types of tumors at particular sites.

Curley and Kanzius talked and exchanged e-mails. The surgeon/researcher was intrigued with Kanzius' idea, but said it wasn't much of an improvement over the technique Curley already used.

"I asked John if he could build a device that would do it noninvasively, without using the needles," Curley said. "I thought that would get rid of him. A month later he called and said he had done it. He had called my bluff."

The premise was surprisingly simple: combine nanotubes -- microscopic pieces of gold or carbon that Kanzius had read about -- with antibodies or other agents that target cancer cells, and inject them into a cancer patient.


A patient would then be placed into Kanzius' device, which emits high-powered radio waves. The waves heat the nanotubes and destroy the cancer cells, but leave healthy cells unharmed.

Eureka

(Chris Simund / Erie Times-News)

The key was finding out whether radio waves would heat nanotubes, the tiny pieces of metal that could fit inside a cancer cell.

Curley discussed Kanzius' device with Rick Smalley, Ph.D., a Rice University scientist who had won the Nobel Prize for his work with nanoparticles. Like Kanzius, Smalley had been diagnosed with chronic lymphocytic leukemia and was seriously ill.

"I had an argument with Rick in his hospital room," Curley said. "He looked at me and said it wasn't going to work, but I'll give you some (nanoparticles). It was like, 'Go away son, you're bothering me.'"


Curley took the nanoparticles to the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in August 2005, where he met Kanzius.

They blasted a small amount of nanoparticles with Kanzius' device and watched in amazement as they quickly heated to about 660 degrees -- more than hot enough to destroy cancer cells.

"It was so hot that the nanoparticles came out of solution," Curley said. "I called Smalley with the news and his answer was, 'Holy ____!'"

It was the "eureka" moment that cancer researchers wait a lifetime to discover, Curley said. Plans were made to test the device at M.D. Anderson and UPMC.

Working in different labs

(Chris Simund / Erie Times-News)

Today, an eight-person research team at M.D. Anderson investigates Kanzius' theory in three different labs.

The basement lab is where researchers blast cancer cells with radio waves and view the results on a state-of-the-art microscope that was paid for by donations from Erie and Sanibel.

They must share space in two upstairs labs with other M.D. Anderson researchers. In those cramped quarters, they grow cells of 20 different types of cancer -- from liver cancer to leukemia -- harvest them and prepare them for Kanzius' device.

"These cells are like baby birds," Briggs said as she placed a deviled-egg tray of leukemia cells into an incubator. "You really have to take care of them. If you don't feed them the right way, they die."


The researchers often work alone, though they are under the supervision of Curley and fellow researcher Paul Cherikuri, Ph.D.

"We adjust our schedules because we often need the same equipment," Briggs said. "The others often are here in the evening."

The pace of progress has been astonishing, Curley said.

They have only been working on Kanzius' devices for a little more than two years, but already have been able to kill cancer cells in human tumors grown in live rabbits without harming the animals.

"There was a fair amount of whooping and hollering in the office that day," Curley said.

Targeting is the key
Now the efforts are focused on targeting, sending nanotubes inside cancer cells and not other, healthy cells.

Curley is reluctant to talk about the progress he and his team are having. He has submitted results to a major medical journal and is under an embargo until it is published.

"I can't jeopardize that," Curley said. "A colleague of mine at another institution talked about his project with a local television station and the journal sent back his paper without publishing it. It put their project way behind. We can't afford that."

But asked how the work is going overall, Curley said there have been "no major glitches" and that "I fully believe this will get to human trials."

Fatigue faded away
But human trials are years away and work continues at M.D. Anderson.

Kanzius was in Houston in late February to see Keating, his leukemia doctor. He wasn't feeling particularly good.

Chemotherapy and a recent viral infection had stolen 10 pounds from his already slender frame.


He barely slept the previous night, then took an early morning flight from Sanibel to M.D. Anderson.

"It's the last time I do that," Kanzius said.

Kanzius then underwent bone-marrow aspiration -- a painful procedure where doctors stick a long needle into his pelvis, and remove blood and small pieces of bone. It was done to see how Kanzius responded to chemotherapy.

Instead of grabbing some sleep, Kanzius and his wife, Marianne, rode an elevator to the hospital's basement to see the devices -- his devices.

As a television crew filmed footage for an upcoming story on 60 Minutes, Kanzius slipped on a pair of reading glasses and examined one of his devices with Curley.


The fatigue faded away, at least for the moment, as Kanzius fiddled with dials and peppered Curley and Briggs with questions about how the device had been operating.

He then watched video of cancer cells rupturing when treated with his device.

"I find it humbling, that this institute and Dr. Curley have endorsed this program, and find it amazing what they have accomplished in such a short time," Kanzius said. "Just watching the cell cultures here today, I just get goose bumps from watching it. I can't see it enough times. Every time it excites me."

DAVID BRUCE can be reached at 870-1736 or by e-mail.

A look at how nanotubes may work in cancer fight
HOUSTON -- A 3-foot mesh cylinder sat in a corner of Boris Yakobson's untidy office at Rice University.

"Aha!" said Yakobson, 53, a professor of chemistry and materials science at Rice. "That is a model of a nanotube. Of course, the real ones are much, much smaller."

Yakobson studies nanotubes at Rice and has written research papers about them. Nanotubes play a vital role in John Kanzius' experimental method of treating cancer.

These tiny pieces of carbon or gold, so small that tens of thousands of them can fit across a human hair, are placed inside cancer cells, then heated by Kanzius' radio-frequency generator.

The heat destroys cells with nanotubes, while cells without them are unaffected.

"This is just one use for nanotubes," Yakobson said. "Carbon nanotubes are among the hardest substances we know, so the possibilities are many."

Nanotubes, first discovered in Japan in 1991, are hex-agonally shaped arrangements of carbon or gold formed into tubes.

They used to be expensive to manufacture, about $1,000 per gram, but new technology has cut the cost to about $10 a gram, depending on the type.

"There is a lot of work going on right now with nanotubes. It's very exciting," Yakobson said.

"The medical applications are interesting. I am looking forward to seeing how (principal investigator for the Kanzius project) Steve Curley does with them."

Concept receives media attention
HOUSTON -- One of John Kanzius' grandchildren was visiting a doctor in February, when she spotted him on a waiting-room television.

CNN was broadcasting a story about Kanzius' radio-frequency generator.

The cable network originally showed the feature in 2007, but reran it on a health show it sends to physician offices across the country.

"She told people, 'That's my grandpa on TV,'" Kanzius said with a chuckle.

You can expect to see more of Kanzius on national television in upcoming weeks.

"60 Minutes" has interviewed Kanzius and researchers at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston for a story it plans to broadcast about his invention. A date has not been announced, but Kanzius said he thinks it will run in late March.

Having Kanzius' invention broadcast on national television could boost fundraising efforts, but it also causes principal investigator Steven Curley, M.D., to worry about potential problems.

"It scares the heck out of me," Curley said with a thin smile.

"I told ("60 Minutes" reporter) Leslie Stahl that we're not ready to treat patients, but viewers might not hear that. I also don't know what John said about things."

It's not the first time a national television news show or large-circulation newspaper has reported on the Kanzius project.

Stories have run on the CBS "Early Show", "Good Morning America" and in the Los Angeles Times.

DAVID BRUCE can be reached at 870-1736 or by e-mail.

New Fundraising Organization
A new nonprofit organization is raising money for John Kanzius' radiofrequency generator.

Community united for a Cancer Cure has become the John Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation. The name has changed because the foundation is now a stand-alone nonprofit organization.

The foundation raises money and awareness for Kanzius' project. The money goes for research at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

The foundation and its predecessor, the CCC, have raised $500,000. Some of the money has been used to buy a state-of-the-art microscope at M.D. Anderson.

To donate, visit
www.johnkanziuscancerresearchfoundation.org or visit any First National Bank location.

http://www.goerie.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080309/NEWS02/803090417/-1/NEWS

Kanzius/Lee County Florida/Cancer Trials

By JENNIFER BOOTH REED • jreed@news-press.com • March 5, 2008

If a Sanibel man has indeed stumbled on the next great breakthrough in cancer treatment, the residents of Lee County will be among the first in the nation to try it out.

John Kanzius, the man who proposed using radio waves and nanoparticles to kill cancer cells, and Dr. Steven Curley, the researcher from M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, announced Tuesday that Lee Memorial Health System likely will host one of about six human trial sites in the United States.

"When we start at M.D. Anderson, you will start here at the same time," he told a packed house at the South Fort Myers High School auditorium.

Human trials are five to six years away - about half that if Curley can raise the $8 million-or-so needed to buy equipment, pay researchers' salaries and conduct the experiments.

"This clearly is an extremely exciting opportunity both for cancer care and for Southwest Florida," said Dr. James Orr, the medical director of Lee Cancer Care.

Lee Memorial President Jim Nathan said it's the expertise of such local doctors that will allow the trials to take place here.

Nathan said he hopes Curley's faith in Lee doctors will convince people they don't have to go elsewhere for cutting-edge care.

The potential treatment works like this: Doctors inject cancer patients with nanoparticles and a targeting agent that seeks the cancer cells and allows the nanoparticles to latch on.

The patient will be exposed to radio waves. The waves will heat the nanoparticles, and the release of heat will kill the cancer cells. The process has worked in some animal trials.

Curley said he is studying seven different types of cancer: breast, colon, liver, pancreas, melanoma, lymphoma and leukemia - the kind of cancer that sickens Kanzius. When it comes time to seek FDA approval, Curley will first ask to treat liver cancer using gold nanoparticles and a kind of antibody that's already won FDA approval.

Meanwhile, Kanzius will be working to adapt his radio wave machine for humans.

Kanzius said he pushed for Lee to be included in the trial.

"The people of Southwest Florida have been very supportive. Why not do something to give back to the community?" he said.

Patients like Sherry Anderson, 53, of Fort Myers are eager for progress. She was diagnosed with a kind of lymphoma in 1993 and has also battled colon and liver cancer. Curley was her initial surgeon; she is now treated at Lee Memorial.

"To think of where we could go with this," Anderson said. "I'm waiting, hoping for a cure. They keep saying, 'We're right on the edge.'"

http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080305/HEALTH/803050417/1075

Applied Materials makes big solar deal

LOWER PRODUCTION COSTS SEEN

By Matt Nauman
Mercury News

Article Launched: 03/05/2008 01:35:22 AM PST

Applied Materials announced the biggest deal in the company's history Tuesday, a $1.9 billion blockbuster that further moves the Santa Clara tech firm into the burgeoning solar space.

The deal is five times larger than any order or project that Applied Materials has ever received, one analyst reported. "It is the largest sales agreement in Applied history and quite possibly in the history of the solar industry" is how spokeswoman Patricia Zepeda-Vera described it.

The company, which makes fabrication equipment for the semiconductor and flat-panel display markets, wouldn't name its customer, only identifying it in an SEC filing as "a privately held corporation based outside the United States." The deal will provide thin-film solar-panel production equipment for "multiple solar factories," it said in its filing.

Timothy Arcuri, an analyst with Citigroup, said the deal was for a large solar manufacturing project in Suzhou, China, which he described as a "solar city." He wrote in a note to investors Tuesday that the project includes investments from "wealthy individuals related to the solar industry" as well as "some existing solar ventures" and "a big component of government sponsorship." He raised Applied Materials' rating and increased his price target for the company's stock.

The tools will be used in a factory that will manufacture enough thin-film solar panels to produce 1 gigawatt of electricity a year, said Zepeda-Vera. That's about the peak use of a city the size of San Francisco.

---

Last year, the world's solar industry produced enough panels to make 12 gigawatts of electricity, she said.

The machines that Applied Materials will supply will be able to make huge solar panels - 5.7 square meters. "Basically the size of a garage door," said Mark Pinto, the company's chief technology officer.

And the scale of the factory complex will be huge, too. "This factory is roughly the size of 15 individual factories," he said. The panels likely would be used to create ground-mounted power plants, often called solar farms.

The result, Pinto said, will be solar panels that can be produced at a much lower cost, "close" to the industry's target goal of making panels costing $1 a watt to build vs. the current $2 to $3 a watt price.

New technologies coming in 2009 would get its customer to that $1 level, and probably 80 cents a watt soon after, Pinto said. "The scale makes a big difference," he said.

The result, he said, is that solar could become more affordable "without needing some disruptive breakthrough that we sometimes like to talk about. This is a breakthrough - using these huge, huge pieces of glass."

Applied Materials took $260 million worth of orders in its division that sells solar-panel-production equipment in its first fiscal quarter of 2008, up from $31 million in its first fiscal quarter of 2007.

Most of those orders came from companies outside the United States, it said - 24 percent from Taiwan, 19 percent from Korea, 13 percent from Japan, 12 percent from Europe and 10 percent from China and Southeast Asia. North American companies placed 22 percent of the orders.

Applied Materials' shares rose 7.6 percent on the news of the $1.9 billion sales agreement, closing at $20.32. Arcuri forecast that the deal could add 20 cents a share to the company's earnings, mostly in fiscal 2010.

Contact Matt Nauman at mnauman@mercurynews.com or (408) 920-5701.

http://www.mercurynews.com/greenenergy/ci_8459465?nclick_check=1

Cure for cancer? Sanibel man may be on to something

Cancer patient came up with treatment while sick

By JENNIFER BOOTH REED • jreed@news-press.com • March 3, 2008

In a laboratory at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Texas, researchers injected nanoparticles into tumors they had grown in rabbits. They placed the animals on a special machine that would direct radio waves at the tumor site. They flipped a switch.

The waves heated the nanoparticles and bang! Within seconds, the nanoparticles released enough heat to kill the cancer cells. No drugs, no radiation, no surgery, no apparent side effects and the healthy tissue surrounding the tumor remained unscathed.

In a laboratory at the University of Pittsburgh, another research team tried a similar experiment, this time on rats. It, too, was a success.

Imagine the implications for humans.

It looks like John Kanzius was right.

The part-time Sanibel resident dreamed up the radio wave therapy four-plus years ago, sick from chemotherapy himself and saddened by a glimpse of children receiving the drugs at the hospital where he underwent treatment.

Now, the research is emerging to back his theory.

Kanzius was diagnosed with leukemia in 2002. As he went through those initial rounds of chemotherapy, he told himself there had to be a better way.

Kanzius, 64, is a former radio and television station owner from Pennsylvania with no medical background but, clearly, an uncanny mind for figuring things out.Sick and sleepless, Kanzius built his prototype at his Sanibel home in eight weeks during the fall of 2003. It’s still in his garage.

His first experiments had been on hot dogs injected with copper sulfate. Could he, he wondered, “transmit” the radio frequency directly to the afflicted areas?

Radio waves have been used before in a cancer treatment known as ablation. Doctors insert needles into a tumor and deliver radio waves to the site. The energy heats and destroys the malignant tissue. But the technique can damage healthy tissue, not to mention force the patient to endure the invasive insertions.

Kanzius’ model solves both problems.

Dr. Steven Curley of M.D. Anderson published his team’s results in the December 2007 issue of the journal Cancer. Dr. David Geller at the University of Pittsburgh presented his team’s research abstract two weeks ago at the annual Academic Surgical Congress in Huntington Beach, Calif.

“It is far enough along that we’re talking about human trials,” Kanzius said on a recent afternoon.

Kanzius and Curley will give a public talk Tuesday at South Fort Myers High School where they’ll recount the tale of this businessman-turned-patient-turned-inventor-turned-researcher, tell the community about ongoing research and outline what’s next in turning Kanzius’ idea into medical reality.

“It’s a pretty remarkable story,” said Curley from his lab in Texas. “In 20 years, I’ve never run into somebody who had something that I thought was viable.”

“In the last year we’ve made excellent progress,” Geller said.

The doctors are heartened.

So is Kanzius.

“If you got the treatment, you wouldn’t even know it,” he said.

Promising as it is, the research is just beginning.

“Does it just stun the cancer or does it disappear?” asked Geller, posing one of many questions his team must answer.

Other questions: Will the machine need to be adapted for larger animals and then for humans? Will there be different strategies to treat different kinds of cancer? And, how can doctors get the nanoparticles to seek out and latch onto only the cancer cells? So far, they have injected the particles directly into tumors, which is of limited value if a cancer has spread.

In Texas, Curley ticked off another list of questions: What’s the best kind of nanoparticle to use and in what dose? How should the nanoparticle be shaped and do some shapes conduct heat better than others? Are the nanoparticles nontoxic, as they appear to be? Only longer-term toxicity studies will tell.

He continued: Is the therapy better suited for some kinds of cancer over others? Should any drugs be taken along with the radio wave therapy to increase its effectiveness?

He’s encouraged by the early success.

“The heating was unbelievable,” Curley said. “We’re literally thinking in terms where this lasts no more than 30 to 60 seconds.”

Six months before his diagnosis, Kanzius had intended to retire.

Cancer — both his ongoing treatment and his search for an alternative — has become a full-time job.

His story by now has been played out in media ranging from local outfits in Lee County and hometown Erie, Pa., to The Los Angeles Times to Readers Digest to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. You can watch a video of a television interview replay on MySpaceTV. The posted description begins “This guy rocks.”

In his spare time, Kanzius works on an equally promising find in alternative fuel development. He discovered that salt water will burn when it’s subjected to the radio field his machine casts and lit with a match. But that’s a story for another day.

Kanzius doesn’t want to be known as the guy who cured cancer.

“I just want to be the guy that comes up with the idea and is working with the researchers,” he said.

Last week he went to M.D. Anderson for another round of tests for his own cancer and to see the progress Curley had made.

“It’s just phenomenal,” Kanzius said.

He wants to offer encouragement — that’s why he holds public talks — but doesn’t want to give false hope.

His cancer appears to be at bay. Preliminary results suggest his last round of treatment was effective. And Curley’s research is speeding at rates uncommon in the medical world.

“Nobody could have ever thought this was possible,” Kanzius said.

http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080303/HEALTH/80302048/1075

Composite of carbon nanotubes and graphene

Atsugi, Japan, March 3, 2008 — Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd. today announced the successful formation of a new nano-scale carbon composite featuring a self-organizing structure⁽¹⁾, by combining carbon nanotubes and graphene⁽²⁾ which are both nano-scale carbon structures. The newly-discovered composite structure is synthesized at a temperature of 510 °C, cooler than for conventional graphene formed at temperatures too high for electronic device applications, thereby paving the way for the feasible use of graphene as a material suitable for future practical use in electronic devices which are vulnerable to heat. Carbon nanotubes have properties including high thermal conductivity and high current-density tolerance⁽³⁾, while graphene is known for its high electron mobility. Carbon nanostructures combining these two materials hold the promise of creating new potential for material research and applications.

Details of this technology will be presented at the 34th Fullerene Nanotubes General Symposium to be held from March 3 to March 5 in Nagoya, Japan.

Larger View	Larger View
Figure 1. (a) Electron microscopic image (cross-sectional) of the new nano-scale carbon composite (b) Electron microscopic image of the graphene multi-layers	Figure 2. Schematic view of the new nano-scale carbon composite (Lower image: Diagram of anticipated structure)

Background

Carbon nanotubes and graphene are both nano-scale structures consisting of carbon atoms. Graphene is a sheet-like hexagonal lattice of carbon atoms, while nanotubes can be described as graphene wrapped into a cylinder with a nano-scale diameter.

Despite the fact that both are made from the same carbon atoms, each has very distinct characteristics. Of any material found in nature, carbon nanotubes feature the highest thermal conductivity and mechanical strength as well as the ability to withstand the highest current density, making them an attractive material for wiring, heat dissipation, field electron emitters⁽⁴⁾, and other potential applications. Research and development is underway to find technologies to synthesize carbon nanotubes at temperatures as low as approximately 400°C, a temperature that would enable its use in electronic devices vulnerable to heat. Since the discovery of its high electron mobility in 2004, graphene has become attractive as a channel material for future transistors. However, conventional methods for synthesizing graphene only work at temperatures over 700°C - considered too high for use in electronic devices - or involve a time-consuming and unreliable process of stripping away graphite crystals.

Fujitsu Laboratories is researching ways to develop electronic devices that take advantage of the superior properties of carbon nanostructures.

Overview of the new technology

In order to better understand the growth mechanism of carbon nanotubes, Fujitsu Laboratories conducted experiments using chemical vapor deposition, a technique in which a feedstock gas is heat-cracked in a vacuum chamber to synthesize film or structures on a substrate. This resulted in the formation and discovery of aligned growth⁽⁵⁾multi-walled carbon nanotubes⁽⁶⁾ featuring layers of graphene (from a few layers to a few dozen) on top formed in a self-organizing way, thereby forming a complex composite (see Figure 1).

Carbon-based materials come in a variety of different forms that depend on how their atoms link together, such as zero-dimensional fullerenes⁽⁷⁾, one-dimensional nanotubes, two-dimensional (2-D) graphene, and three-dimensional (3-D) diamonds. Complex structures consisting of zero-dimensional and one-dimensional elements, known as "peapod⁽⁸⁾" structures, have already been created. The new complex composite developed by Fujitsu Laboratories is the world's first composite featuring one-dimensional and two-dimensional elements based on graphene layers and nanotubes, which are perpendicularly connected. The composite was synthesized at the relatively low temperature of 510°C.

Results

Due to the fact that carbon nanotubes are linear, one-dimensional structures, in the two-dimensional directions perpendicular to the tube axis they have nearly no thermal or electrical conductivity between tubes. Graphene, on the other hand, possesses electrical and thermal conductivity across two dimensions. The newly-discovered carbon nanostructure is expected to have electrical conduction and thermal dissipation in all directions. Conventionally aligned-growth carbon nanotubes have had relatively poor uniformity in length, thus being inconsistent when joined in the upper areas and resulting in increased thermal and electrical resistance. As the new carbon nanostructures from Fujitsu Labs feature carbon nanotubes that nearly all connect to the graphene with good uniformity at their endpoints (see Figure 2), and since the graphene surface is planar, it is anticipated that the new carbon nanostructures will enable excellent electrical and thermal conductivity. This technology brings the application of graphene for electronic devices one step closer to practical use.

Future Developments

Fujitsu Laboratories will continue to explore the mechanisms by which complex carbon nanostructures form and elucidate their physical characteristics, in order to develop electronic device application technologies that take advantage of those characteristics. In addition, in the field of material sciences Fujitsu Laboratories will pursue the development of technologies to enable the formation of high-quality carbon nanostructures at a lower temperature.

Glossary and notes

1 Self-organizing structure:

Refers to a desired structure that self-forms naturally, without the need for complex controls.

2 Graphene:

A hexagonal lattice of carbon atoms. Graphite consists of layers of graphene stacked on top of each other.

3 Current-density tolerance:

The limit of high-density current that can flow through a material without changing its physical structure.

4 Field electron emitter:

A device that extracts electrons from a fixed surface employing an electrical field. Displays referred to as field-emission displays (FED) operate on the principle of electrons bumping up against fluorescent bodies, and causing them to emit light.

5 Aligned growth:

A growth pattern that grows perpendicular to a substrate.

6 Multi-walled carbon nanotube:

A type of carbon nanotube in which multiple graphene layers are arranged concentrically as a cylinder. Sizes vary in diameter from a few nanometers, to a few tens of nanometers.

7 Fullerene:

A molecule consisting of 60 carbon atoms arranged in a soccer-ball like structure.

8 Peapod:

A complex nanostructure consisting of fullerene laid out in a row inside a carbon nanotube. Named for its resemblance to a peapod.

For more information:

• 34th Fullerene Nanotubes General Symposium
• Fujitsu Laboratories

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About Fujitsu Laboratories

Founded in 1968 as a wholly owned subsidiary of Fujitsu Limited, Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd. is one of the premier research centers in the world. With a global network of laboratories in Japan, China, the United States and Europe, the organization conducts a wide range of basic and applied research in the areas of Multimedia, Personal Systems, Networks, Peripherals, Advanced Materials and Electronic Devices.
For more information, please see:http://jp.fujitsu.com/group/labs/en/

---

Press contacts:

Fujitsu Limited
Public and Investor Relations

Inquiries

Technical contacts:
Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd.
Nanotechnology R&D Center
Tel: +81-46-250-8234
E-mail:nano-mate@labs.fujitsu.com

http://www.fujitsu.com/global/news/pr/archives/month/2008/20080303-01.html

Ref:
http://www.japancorp.net/Article.Asp?Art_ID=17179

Doc Nano - with a little help from Google

Doctor!...Doctor Nano!!...What does Doc Nano say????

United States Patent Application 20070167832

Yaniv; Zvi ; et al. July 19, 2007

Assignee Name: NANO-PROPRIETARY, INC.

Analysis of Gases

Abstract

Systems and techniques for the analysis of gases for medical purposes are described. In one aspect, a system includes a sample collector to collect a physical sample associated with an individual and present a gas sample for analysis, a gas analysis device to analyze the gas sample presented by the sample collector to determine a concentration of one or more non-aqueous gases in the gas sample, a data storage device that includes information reflecting a correlation between concentration of the one or more non-aqueous gases in the gas sample and a disease state, and a data analysis device to determine a medical condition of the individual based on the concentration of one or more non-aqueous gases in the gas sample and the information.

[0015] Sample collector 105 is a device for collecting a sample that is relevant to the analysis of a gas. The sample may be a solid sample, a liquid sample, or a gaseous sample. The design and structure of sample collector 105 may reflect the nature of the sample to be collected. For example, when gaseous samples such as breath are collected, sample collector 105 may include a balloon or other concentrator. As another example, when liquid samples such as urine, blood, sweat, or saliva are collected, sample collector 105 may include a bowl, a capillary tube, or other receptacle that is suitable for collecting a liquid. As yet another example, when solid samples such as feces or tissue are collected, sample collector 105 may include a plate, a sheet, or other receptacle that is suitable for collecting a solid.

Inventors: Yaniv; Zvi; (Austin, TX) ; Soundarrajan; Prabhu; (Austin, TX)

http://tinyurl.com/2h84ah

'Doc Nano'$£¥©®™ is all you really need. And Google, of course, to keep the records. Us and Google!! Which will reach $1000 first??! What will medical schools teach, now? RESEARCH. We have most everything else covered re history (with GOOG), analysis and treatment.

Adhesin - what is it?

See:
Burton's Microbiology for the Health Sciences
Describes what adhesin is and how it is handled by a vaccination and ones immune system
here(p276)

And:
Bacterial Adhesion to Animal Cells and Tissues By Itzhak Ofek, David L. Hasty, Ronald J. Doyle
here(p1 et seq)