Effects of Heavy-ion Beams Irradiation on Survival Rate and Antioxidant Enzymes of Sweet Sorghum Seedlings

[Objective] This study aimed to investigate the effects of heavy-ion beams irradiation on the seed germination potential, survival rate, antioxidant enzyme activi- ties and lipid peroxidation of sweet sorghum. [Method] The dry seeds were irradiated by ＇2（36. heavy ion beams with absorbed doses： 0, 40, 80, 120, 160 and 200 Gy, respectively. Then, the seed germination potential, survival rate, antioxidant enzyme activities and lipid peroxidation of sweet sorghum were measured. [Result] Heavy-ion beams irradiation exhibited different influence on germination potential and survival rates. Germination rate showed a downward trend, but the corresponding survival curve of seedlings was saddle-shaped. The activities of SOD, POD, CAT and ASA- POD changed in different trends as well. The MDA content rose toward increasing irradiation dose, suggesting that high dose of heavy-ion beams irradiation enhanced the damage to membrane of sweet sorghum seedlings. [Conclusion] After being irra- diated, germination potential and survival rates of sweet sorghum were decreased, and antioxidant enzymes activity changed greatly. This study laid the basis for fur- ther work on breeding and improvement of sweet sorghum irradiated by ,^（12）C^（6＋） heavy ion beams.

Storage Stability in Reversion Mutation of a Rice Line Devoid of LOX-1, 2 Acquired by Ion Beam Irradiation

The effect of absence of lipoxygenase isoenzyme （LOX） on storage stability was investigated. Rice mutant 1297 without lipoxygenase isoenzyme-1 （LOX-1） or lipoxygenase isoenzyme-2 （LOX-2） generated by ion beam irradiation from Wanjian2090 and reversion mutant RM1297 with LOX-1 and LOX-2 were subjected to an accelerated-aging experiment. Shanyou63 （with LOX-1 and LOX-2 ） served as control. Results showed that the germination and dehydrogenase activity decreased while the electrical conductivity and free fatty acid content increased in all varieties with accelerated aging. In 1297 that lacked LOX-1 and 2, there were slight changes in germination, dehydrogenase activity, membrane permeability and free fatty acid content during the thirty-day accelerated-aging experiment. But in varieties with LOX-1 and LOX-2, significant changes were observed, suggesting that LOX-1, 2 might be a definite factor which influenced seed lifespan. This study also indicates that ion beam irradiation may be used as mutagen to generate mutant and reversion mutants for biological study and could become a new direction in ion beam application.

Protective Effects of Shikonin on Brain Injury Induced by Carbon Ion Beam Irradiation in Mice

Radiation encephalopathy is the main complication of cranial radiotherapy. It can cause necrosis of brain tissue and cognitive dysfunction. Our previous work had proved that a natural antioxidant shikonin possessed protective effect on cerebral ischemic injury. Here we investigated the effects of shikonin on carbon ion beam induced radiation brain injury in mice. Pretreatment with shikonin significantly increased the SOD and CAT activities and the ratio of GSH/GSSG in mouse brain tissues compared with irradiated group （P〈0.01）, while obviously reduced the MDA and PCO contents and the RO$ levels derived from of the brain mitochondria.

Damage of low-energy ion irradiation on copper nanowire:molecular dynamics simulation

Physical and chemical phenomena of low-energy ion irradiation on solid surfaces have been studied systematically for many years, due to the wide applications in surface modification, ion implantation and thin-film growth. Recently the bombardment of nano-scale materials with low-energy ions gained much attention. Comared to bulk materials, nano-scale materials show different physical and chemical properties. In this article, we employed molecular dynamics simulations to study the damage caused by low-energy ion irradiation on copper nanowires. By simulating the ion bombardment of 5 different incident energies, namely, 1 keV, 2 keV, 3 keV, 4 keV and 5 keV, we found that the sputtering yield of the incident ion is linearly proportional to the energies of incident ions. Low-energy impacts mainly induce surface damage to the nanowires, and only a few bulk defects were observed. Surface vacancies and adatoms accumulated to form defect clusters on the surface, and their distribution are related to the type of crystal plane, e.g. surface vacancies prefer to stay on （100） plane, while adatoms prefer （110） plane. These results reveal that the size effect will influence the interaction between low-energy ion and nanowire.

Study on Screening of TaGA2ox1 Mutants in Wheat by Ion Beam Irradiation

As a kind of mutagen, ion beam irradiation can create abundant biological mutations. A population of about 2000 lines was generated by irradiating dry wheat seeds of XiaoYan 81 with low-energy nitrogen ion beams. The traits of the plant, such as height, spike type, fertility, stem color and awn length, were investigated. The mutation rate in terms of the plant height in M2 was 2.9%. Eighteen deletion mutants of TaGA2ox1 were obtained. Associate analysis showed that TaGA2ox1 was closely related to the plant height. Most of the TaGA2ox1-deleted mutants were higher than the control, suggesting that the biological function of TaGA2ox1 is similar to its homologues in other plants. These results demonstrate that ion beam irradiation is an efficient tool in the construction of a mutant library for wheat.

Quantitative Assessment of Amino Acid Damage upon keV Ion Beam Irradiation Through FTIR Spectroscopy

Ion beam irradiation induces important biological effects and it is a long-standing task to acquire both qualitative and quantitative assessment of these effects. One effective way in the investigation is to utilize Fourier transformation infrared （FTIR） spectroscopy because it can offer sensitive and non-invasive measurements. In this paper a novel protocol was employed to prepare biomolecular samples in the form of thin and transversely uniform solid films that were suitable for both infrared and low-energy ion beam irradiation experiments. Under the irradiation of N^＋ and Ar^＋ ion beams of 25 keV with fluence ranging from 5×10^15 ions/cm^2 to 2.5×10^16 ions/cm^2, the ion radio-sensitivity of four amino acids, namely, glycine, tyrosine, methionine and phenylalanine, were evaluated and compared. The ion beam irradiation caused biomolecular decomposition accompanied by molecular desorption of volatile species and the damage was dependent on ion type, fiuence, energy and types of amino acids. The effectiveness of application of FTIR spectroscopy to the quantitative assessment of biomolecular damage dose effect induced by low-energy ion radiation was thus demonstrated.

Influence of high-intensity pulsed ion beams irradiation on oxidation behavior of 316L stainless steel at 700℃

316L stainless steel samples, as a widespread used material, were irradiated with HIPIB at the beam parameters of ion energy 300 keV, current density 100, 200 and 300 A/cm2, shot number 10 and pulse duration 75 ns. The surface morphology and the phase structure in the near surface region of original and treated samples were analyzed with scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffractometry (XRD). It is shown that the HIPIB irradiation can smooth the surface of the samples, and the preferred orientation is present in the surface layer of irradiated coupons. The influence of HIPIB irradiation on the oxidation behavior of 316L stainless steel at 700℃for up to 100 h was investigated. Electron probe microanalysis (EPMA) was used to study the distribution of elements in the oxidation products. It is found that the oxidation behavior of the irradiated coupons depends greatly on the ion current density of HIPIB. HIPIB irradiation with ion current density of 100 A/cm2 slightly reduces the oxidation rate with respect to the unirradiated coupon. The improvement of the oxidation resistance can be attributed to more oxide of Cr that forms on the surface of the irradiated coupons. In contrast, HIPIB irradiation with ion current density of 200 or 300 A/cm2 is proved to be detrimental, causing a higher oxidation rate.

Study on DNA Damage Induced by Neon Beam Irradiation in Saccharomyces Cerevisiae

Yeast strain Saccharornyces cerevisiae was irradiated with different doses of 85 MeV/u 20 Ne 10＋ to investigate DNA damage induced by heavy ion beam in eukaryotic microorganism. The survival rate, DNA double strand breaks （DSBs） and DNA polymorphic were tested after irradiation. The results showed that there were substantial differences in DNA between the control and irradiated samples. At the dose of 40 Gy, the yeast cell survival rate approached 50%, DNA double-strand breaks were barely detectable, and significant DNA polymorphism was observed. The alcohol dehydrogenase II gene was amplified and sequenced. It was observed that base changes in the mutant were mainly transversions of T-G and T-C. It can be concluded that heavy ion beam irradiation can lead to change in single gene and may be an effective way to induce mutation.

Non-Uniformity of Heavy-Ion Beam Irradiation on a Direct-Driven Pellet in Inertial Confinement Fusion

Heavy-ion-driven fusion （HIF） is a scheme to achieve inertial confinement fusion （ICF）. Investigation of the non-uniformity of heavy-ion beam （HIB） irradiation is one of the key issues for ICF driven by powerful heavy-ion beams. Ions in HIB impinge on the pellet surface and deposit their energy in a relatively deep and wide area. Therefore, the non-uniformity of HIB irradiation should be evaluated in the volume of the deposition area in the absorber layer. By using the OK1 code with some corrections, the non-uniformity of heavy-ion beam irradiation for the different ion beams on two kinds of targets were evaluated in 12-beam, 20-beam, 60-beam and 120-beam irradiation schemes. The root-mean-square （RMS） non-uniformity value becomes aRMS = 8.39% in an aluminum mono-layer pellet structure and aRMS = 6.53% in a lead-aluminum layer target for the 12-uranium-beam system. The RMS non-uniformity for the lead-aluminum layer target was lower than that for the mono-layer target. The RMS and peak-to-valley （PTV） non-uniformities are reduced with the increase in beam number, and low at the Bragg peak layer.

Breeding of High-Yield Salinomycin-Producing Streptomyces albus Strains by Low Energy N^+ Ion Beam Irradiation

[Objective] This study aimed to explore the mutagenesis effects of N＋ ion beam implantation on Streptomyces a/bus and obtain high-yield salinomycin- producing mutant strain. [ Method ] Streptomyces a/bus strain S-11-04 was mutated with different doses of N ＋ implantation. The effects of low energy N ＊ implantation on the survival rate, colony morphology and salinomycin-producing ability were investigated. [ Result] The results showed that low energy N ＋ implantation can efficiently improve the positive mutation rate of Streptomyces albus; 13 mutant strains with high yield of salinomycin were isolated; to be specific, mutant strain N3- 6 has relatively good genetic stability with four continuous generations, and the titres of salinomycin were increased by 41% in the shake-flask culture and 20.5% in mass production compared with the control. [ Conclusion ] N ＋ ion beam irradiation is an effective method to obtain high-yield salinomycin-producing Streptomy- ces albus strain.

3-29 Microstructure and Raman Spectra of Third Generation SiC Fibers by 410 MeV Sn Ion Beam Irradiation

Third generation SiC fibers have significantly improved the thermo-mechanical properties of SiC ceramic matrix composites which are considered as advanced materials for nuclear system application. In the present work, the Raman spectra presented in Fig. 1 give information related to the structural parameters of Sn-ion irradiated and unirradiated fibers.

3-35 ISSR Assay of M2 Mutants of Lotus japonicus Induced by Carbon Ion Beam Irradiations

To investigate the DNA polymorphism of M2 plants of Lotus japonicus induced by heavy ion beam, dry seeds were irradiated by carbon ion beams accelerated by Heavy Ion Research Facility in Lanzhou (HIRFL). Inter simple sequence repeat (ISSR) assay were utilized to explore the DNA variation of M2 plants irradiated by 400 Gy carbon ion beams. ISSR technique is an effective molecular marker method based on polymerase chain reaction amplification of template DNA by a single primer with 1626 bp[1]. ISSR can detect the differences of genetic structure of various life materials rapidly.

Hydrodynamic Effects on Surface Morphology Evolution of Titanium Alloy under Intense Pulsed Ion Beam Irradiation

The hydrodynamic effects of molten surface of titanium alloy on the morphology evolution by intense pulsed ion beam （IPIB） irradiation are studied. It is experimentally revealed that under irradiation of IPIB pulses, the surface morphology of titanium alloy in a spatial scale of μm exhibits an obvious smoothening trend. The mechanism of this phenomenon is explained by the mass transfer caused by the surface tension of molten metal. Hydrodynamic simulation with a combination of the finite element method and the level set method reveals that the change in curvature on the molten surface leads to uneven distribution of surface tension. Mass transfer is caused by the relief of surface tension, and meanwhile a flattening trend in the surface morphology evolution is achieved.

Impact of Low-Energy Ion Beam Implantation on the Expression of Ty1-copia-like Retrotransposons in Wheat(Triticum aestivum)

Retrotransposon-like elements are major constituents of most eukaryotic genomes. For example, they account for roughly 90% of the wheat （Triticum aestivum） genome, Previous study on a wheat strain treated by low-energy N^＋ ions indicated the variations in AFLP （Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphism ） markers, One such variation was caused by the re-activation of Tyl-copia-like retrotransposons, implying that the mutagenic effects of lowenergy ions might work through elevated activation of retrotransposons, In this paper an expression profile of Tyl-copia-like retrotransposons in wheat treated by low-energy N^＋ ions is reported, The reverse transcriptase （RT） domains of these retrotransposons were amplified by reverse-transcriptional polymerase chain reaction （RT-PCR） and sequentially cloned, 42 and 65 clones were obtained from the treated （CL） and control materials （CK）, respectively, Sequence analysis of each clone was performed by software. Phylogeny and classification were calculated responding to the sequences of the RT domains. All the results show that there is much difference in the RT domain between the control sample and the treated sample, Especially, the RT domains from the treated group encode significantly more functional ORF （open reading frames） than those from the control sample, This observation suggests that the treated sample has higher activation of retrotransposons, possibly as a consequence of low-energy ion beam irradiation, It also suggests that retrotransposons in the two groups impact the host gene expression in two different ways and carry out different functions in wheat cells.

Analysis of a Partial Male-Sterile Mutant of Arabidopsis thaliana Isolated from a Low-Energy Argon Ion Beam Mutagenized Pool

A screen for Arabidopsis fertility mutants, mutagenized by low-energy argon ion beam, yielded two partial male-sterile mutants tc243-1 and tc243-2 which have similar phenotypes. tc243-2 was investigated in detail. The segregation ratio of the mutant phenotypes in the M2 pools suggested that mutation behaved as single Mendelian recessive mutations, tc243 showed a series of mutant phenotypes, among which partial male-sterile was its striking mutant characteristic. Phenotype analysis indicates that there are four factors leading to male sterility, a. Floral organs normally develop inside the closed bud, but the anther filaments do not elongate sufficiently to position the locules above the stigma at anthesis, b. The anther locules do not dehisce at the time of flower opening （although limited dehiscence occurs later）, c. Pollens of mutant plants develop into several types of pollens at the trinucleated stage. as determined by staining with DAPI （4＇,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole）. which shows a variable size. shape and number of nucleus. d. The viability of pollens is lower than that of the wild type on the germination test in vivo and vitro.

Effects of irradiation on superconducting properties of small-grained MgB_(2) thin films

We investigate the effect of ion irradiation on MgB_(2) thin films with small grains of approximately 122 nm and 140 nm.The flux pinning by grain boundaries is insignificant in the pristine MgB_(2) films due to good inter-grain connectivity,but is significantly improved after 120-keV Mn-ion irradiation.The scaling behavior of the flux pinning force density for the ion-irradiated MgB_(2) thin films with nanoscale grains demonstrates the predominance of pinning by grain boundaries,in contrast to the single-crystalline MgB_(2) films where normal point pinning was dominant after low-energy ion irradiation.These results suggest that irradiation-induced defects can accumulate near the grain boundaries in metallic MgB_(2) superconductors.

Analysis of products of thymine irradiated by ^(18)O^(8+) ion beam in N_2O saturated aqueous solution

Some methods of capillary gas chromatography, such as GC, GC-MS,GC-FT-IR, are used to analyze the products of thymine irradiated by 18O8+ ion beam in N2O saturated aqueous solution. From the results of GC-MS the molecular weight of products can be determined, and from the results of GC-FT-IR some molecular structure information of products can be obtained. By this way the products,5,6-Dihydrothyndne, 5-Hydroxyl-5-Methylhydantoin, 5-Hydroxyl-6-Hydrothymine, 5-Hydro-6-Hydroxylthymine, 5-Hydroxymethyluracil, Trans-Thymine glycol, Cis-Thymine glycol and dimers are determined without separation of them from samples. Though these products are as same as those products of thymine irradiated by γ rays in N2O saturated aqueous solution, the mechanism of thymine irradiated by heavy ion beam in aqueous solution is different from that by γ rays. The main products of thymine irradiated by 18O8+ ion beam in N2O saturated aqueous solution are hydroxyl adducts at 5-6 band of thymine, while the main products of thymine irradiated by γ ray in N2O saturated aqueous solution are dimers of thymine.

Gene Chip Analysis for Rice MicroRNA Response to Low Energy N^+ Beam Radiation

[Objective] The aim of this study was to explore the expression differences of miRNA response to low energy N＋ beam radiation in rice.[Method]Three groups of ion beam irradiation rice seeds and untreated rice seeds were selected respectively,and then the total RNA of seedlings after 96 h of germination was extracted at 30 ℃.Agilent gene chip was used to screen the differentially expressed genes of two groups of rice seedlings.The chip contained 510 miRNA probes;and about two times of expression differences between two samples were considered as the threshold range.[Result]14 miRNA molecules showed significant expression differences between the irradiated group and the control group,and all of them were decreased.[Conclusion]The miRNAs showed expression differences between irradiated group and the control group,which might regulate the expression of certain genes to respond to ion irradiation,thus producing physiological,biochemical and phenotypic differences.

Pigment analysis of a color-leaf mutant in Wandering Jew (Tradescantia fluminensis) irradiated by carbon ions

Many mutants of plant induced by heavy ion beam irradiation have been reported in recent years,but leaf anthocyan mutants induced by ion irradiation in evergreen were rarely found.In this study,a color-leaf mutant with purple leaves,stems and petals was isolated from clones of Wandering Jew irradiated by 95.8 MeV/u carbon ion beam.The concentration and histological distribution of leaf pigment were surveyed in wild type and mutant.In mutant,contents of total chlorophylls (Chl),chlorophyll a (Chl a),chlorophyll b (Chl b) and carotenoids (Car) decreased significantly,while concentration of the anthocyanins was 6.2-fold higher than that of wild type.Further composition analysis of anthocyanins by electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (ESI-MS) indicated that the purple pigmentation of leaves in mutant was caused by accumulation of petunidin anthocyanin.Microscopic examination showed that most petunidin anthocyanin accumulated in the lower epidermis,and little in vascular parenchyma of mutant,while there was no pigment in wild type.Meanwhile,in spongy parenchyma of mutant we observed little Chl,which the wild type abounds in.In conclusion,the color-leaf mutant of Wandering Jew induced by irradiation of carbon ions was improved in ornamental value,and it could be contribute to variation in level,component and distribution of foliar pigment.The possible mutation mechanisms were discussed.

Sequence analysis of lacZ^- mutations induced by ion beam irradiation in double-stranded M13mp18DNA

While M13mpl8 double-stranded DNA was irradiated with ion beam, and transfected into E. coli JM103, a decrease of transfecting activity was discovered. The lacZ-mutation frequency at 20% survival could reach (3.6-16.8) × 104, about 2.3-10 times that of unirradiated M13DNA. Altogether, 27 lacZ~ mutants were select-ed, 10 of which were used for sequencing. 7 of the sequenced mutants show base changes in 250-bp region examined (the remaining 3 mutants probably have base changes outside the regions sequenced). 5 of the base-changed mutants contain more than one mutational base sites (some of them even have 5-6 mutational base sites in 250-bp region ex-amined) ; this dense distribution of base changes in polysites has seldom been seen in X-rays, γ-rays or UV induced DNA mutations. Our experiments also showed that the types of base changes include transitions( 50 % ), transversions (45% ) and deletion (5% ); no addition or duplication was observed. The transitions were mainly C→T and A→G; the transversions were mainly C→A and C→G. The mutations involving cytosine residue (in the template strand) con-stitute about 60% of all the base changes observed. In comparison with the surrounding sequences of mutational base sites, the base located between TG and CT is found to be easily substituted.