The main object of the present research is to make a quantitative evaluation on the microstructure of carbon materials in terms of microcrystal. The digitized images acquired from finely pulverized carbon materials un...The main object of the present research is to make a quantitative evaluation on the microstructure of carbon materials in terms of microcrystal. The digitized images acquired from finely pulverized carbon materials under HRTEM at a high magnification were processed by the image processing software so as to extract the fringes of (002) lattice of graphite crystal from the background image, and an FFT-IFFT filtering operation was performed followed by processes as binarization for the image and skeletonization for the fringes. A set of geometrical parameters including position, length and orientation was set up for every lattice fringe by calculating the binarized image. Then, the above obtained fringe parameters were put into an algorithm, which was especially developed for such fringe images so as to find fringes that could be regarded as those belonged to one single graphite microcrystal. The fringe was subjected sequentially to comparing procedures with every other fringe on aspects as parallelism, relative position and spacing, and the above comparisons were repeated till the last fringe. Eventually, the microcrystal size, its stacking number, and the distribution of the microcrystal in the whole sample, as well as other related structure information of such microcrystal in carbon materials were statistically calculated. Such microstructure information at nanometer level may contribute greatly to the interpretation of the properties of carbon materials and a better correlation with the same macrostructure.展开更多
Background Apoptosis is involved in the adaptive responses of bone to mechanical loading. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of tensile forces on osteoblast apoptosis and the related mechanism by...Background Apoptosis is involved in the adaptive responses of bone to mechanical loading. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of tensile forces on osteoblast apoptosis and the related mechanism by analyzing the expression of caspases, Bcl-2, and Bax. Methods Primary osteoblasts were harvested from neonatal rat calvaria and were subjected to cyclic tensile forces for 72 hours using Flexcell 4000 strain unit in Minimum Essential Medium （MEM） with 10% fetal calf serum （FCS） or with serum deprivation. Apoptosis was tested by flow cytometry using annexin V/PI staining. Caspase-3 activity was analyzed via Elisa. The gene expression of caspase-8, -9, Bcl-2, and Bax was quantified by reverse transcription （RT）-PCR. Results In 10% FCS condition, no significant difference in cell apoptosis was found between the stretched and non-stretched osteoblast cultures. Serum withdrawal resulted in higher apoptosis rate in the osteoblasts with increased caspase-3 activity, and elevated expression of caspase-9 and Bax. Six-percent elongation of stretch attenuated the cell apoptosis induced by serum starvation, concurrent with a decrease in caspase-3 activity, a decline of caspase-8 expression, and an elevation of Bcl-2 level. On the contrary, 12% elongation of stretch increased caspase-3 activity and promoted the apoptosis with an elevated expression of caspase-8 and Bax. No significant change of caspase-9 expression was identified upon force application. Conclusions These results suggested that tensile forces regulate cell apoptosis of primary rat osteoblasts through caspase-3 and caspase-8 signaling cascade. Light forces rescue the cells from serum deprivation-induced apoptosis by elevating Bcl-2 expression, while heavy forces promote the apoptotic insult by inducing Bax expression.展开更多
文摘The main object of the present research is to make a quantitative evaluation on the microstructure of carbon materials in terms of microcrystal. The digitized images acquired from finely pulverized carbon materials under HRTEM at a high magnification were processed by the image processing software so as to extract the fringes of (002) lattice of graphite crystal from the background image, and an FFT-IFFT filtering operation was performed followed by processes as binarization for the image and skeletonization for the fringes. A set of geometrical parameters including position, length and orientation was set up for every lattice fringe by calculating the binarized image. Then, the above obtained fringe parameters were put into an algorithm, which was especially developed for such fringe images so as to find fringes that could be regarded as those belonged to one single graphite microcrystal. The fringe was subjected sequentially to comparing procedures with every other fringe on aspects as parallelism, relative position and spacing, and the above comparisons were repeated till the last fringe. Eventually, the microcrystal size, its stacking number, and the distribution of the microcrystal in the whole sample, as well as other related structure information of such microcrystal in carbon materials were statistically calculated. Such microstructure information at nanometer level may contribute greatly to the interpretation of the properties of carbon materials and a better correlation with the same macrostructure.
基金This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China （No. 30500572）, Shanghai Municipal Education Commission （No. 09YZ75）, and Shanghai Leading Academic Discipline Project （No. S30206）.
文摘Background Apoptosis is involved in the adaptive responses of bone to mechanical loading. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of tensile forces on osteoblast apoptosis and the related mechanism by analyzing the expression of caspases, Bcl-2, and Bax. Methods Primary osteoblasts were harvested from neonatal rat calvaria and were subjected to cyclic tensile forces for 72 hours using Flexcell 4000 strain unit in Minimum Essential Medium （MEM） with 10% fetal calf serum （FCS） or with serum deprivation. Apoptosis was tested by flow cytometry using annexin V/PI staining. Caspase-3 activity was analyzed via Elisa. The gene expression of caspase-8, -9, Bcl-2, and Bax was quantified by reverse transcription （RT）-PCR. Results In 10% FCS condition, no significant difference in cell apoptosis was found between the stretched and non-stretched osteoblast cultures. Serum withdrawal resulted in higher apoptosis rate in the osteoblasts with increased caspase-3 activity, and elevated expression of caspase-9 and Bax. Six-percent elongation of stretch attenuated the cell apoptosis induced by serum starvation, concurrent with a decrease in caspase-3 activity, a decline of caspase-8 expression, and an elevation of Bcl-2 level. On the contrary, 12% elongation of stretch increased caspase-3 activity and promoted the apoptosis with an elevated expression of caspase-8 and Bax. No significant change of caspase-9 expression was identified upon force application. Conclusions These results suggested that tensile forces regulate cell apoptosis of primary rat osteoblasts through caspase-3 and caspase-8 signaling cascade. Light forces rescue the cells from serum deprivation-induced apoptosis by elevating Bcl-2 expression, while heavy forces promote the apoptotic insult by inducing Bax expression.
