Single-Layer Line-Fed Broadband Microstrip Patch Antenna on Thin Substrates

In this work, the issue of limited bandwidth typical of microstrip antennas realized on a single thin substrate is addressed. A simple yet effective design approach is proposed based on the combination of traditional single-resonance patch geometries. Two novel shaped microstrip patch antenna elements with an inset feed are presented. Despite being printed on a single-layer substrate with reduced thickness, both radiators are characterized by a broadband behavior. The antennas are prototyped with a low-cost and fast manufacturing process, and measured results validate the simulations. State-of-the-art performance is obtained when compared to the existing literature, with measured fractional bandwidths of 3.71% and 6.12% around 10 GHz on a 0.508-mm-thick Teflon-based substrate. The small feeding line width could be an appealing feature whenever such radiating elements are to be used in array configurations.

Myosin Head Configurations in Resting and Contracting Murine Skeletal Muscle

Transgenic mouse models have been important tools for studying the relationship of genotype to phenotype for human diseases, including those of skeletal muscle. We show that mouse skeletal muscle can produce high quality X-ray diffraction patterns establishing the mouse intact skeletal muscle X-ray preparation as a potentially powerful tool to test structural hypotheses in health and disease. A notable feature of the mouse model system is the presence of residual myosin layer line intensities in contracting mouse muscle patterns. This provides an additional tool, along with the I1,1/I1,0 intensity ratio, for estimating the proportions of active versus relaxed myosin heads under a given set of conditions that can be used to characterize a given physiological condition or mutant muscle type. We also show that analysis of the myosin layer line intensity distribution, including derivation of the myosin head radius, Rm, may be used to study the role of the super-relaxed state in myosin regulation. When the myosin inhibitor blebbistatin is used to inhibit force production, there is a shift towards a highly quasi-helically ordered configuration that is distinct from the normal resting state, indicating there are more than one helically ordered configuration for resting crossbridges.

Crystal Structure of Locally Available Tassar Fibers Based on Amino Acid Sequence: Using X-Ray Data and LALS Method

X-ray diffraction pattern from locally available Tassar fibers was recorded using imaging plate system (Dip-100S). The pattern was used along with fiber processing software to identify the reflections and to compute X-ray intensities. A molecular model was first constructed with standard bond lengths and angles using helical symmetry and layer-line spacing observed in the X-ray pattern. The model was then refined against observed X-ray data using linked-atom least-squares (LALS) method. The crystal and molecular structure of Tassar fibers is reported. It is concluded that the sheet structures formed by hydrogen bonds assume the antipolar-antiparallel arrangement.

Deduction of the single-myosin-filament transforms from partially sampled layer lines in the X-ray diffraction pattern from vertebrate striated muscle

A novel method to correct a partial sampling effect, due to the hexagonal filament array of a statistical superlattice form, on the thick (myosin)-filament-based layer lines in X-ray diffraction patterns from higher-vertebrate striated muscle has been developed using the cylindrically averaged difference Patterson function [ΔQ(r, z)]. The method involves cutting off the inter-filament vector peaks that appear in the radial region beyond ∼32 nm on the ΔQ(r, z) map calculated from the observed layer-line intensities, and then deducing the single-myosin-filament transforms by inverse Fourier transformation of the truncated ΔQ(r, z). The accuracy of the cut-off method was tested using a single-myosin-filament model and a hexagonal filament-array model with a size of one superlattice unit cell. The layer-line intensities calculated from the truncated ΔQ(r, z) of the hexagonal filament-array model showed few sampling peaks, the layer lines being effectively coincident with those from the single-filament model except for the intensities close to the meridian. Some residual differences were caused by the face-to-face inter-crossbridge vectors between closest neighboring filaments, which correspond to ∼27.5% of the total number of crossbridge vectors in the truncated ΔQ(r, z) map, but the face-to-face inter-crossbridge vectors contributed mainly to the intensities close to the meridian. Their remnant off-meridional layer-line intensity components did not significantly affect a search for the optimum azimuthal orientation of myosin crossbridges in the resting state of muscle.