In this account recent progress in enhancing the complexity of liquid crystal self-assembly is highlighted. The discussed superstructures are formed mainly by polyphilic T-shaped and X-shaped molecules composed of a rod-like core, tethered with glycerol units at both ends and flexible non-polar chain(s) in lateral position, but also related inverted molecular structures are considered. A series...

A new class of star-shaped coil–rod diblock copolymer polystyrene-block-poly(3-hexylthiophene) (PS-bP3HT) with well-defined structures and the ratio of coil to rod blocks were synthesized by a combination of atom transfer radical polymerization, the Grignard metathesis method, and click reaction. The star-shaped PS-b-P3HT diblock copolymers covalently connected to a b-cyclodextrin (b-CD) core w...

An orthogonal drawing of a plane graph G is a planar drawing of G, denoted by D(G), such that each vertex of G is drawn as a point on the plane, and each edge of G is drawn as a sequence of horizontal and vertical line segments with no crossings. An orthogonal polygon P is called orthogonally convex if the intersection of any horizontal or vertical line L and P is either a single line segment o...

Ring-shaped structures containing seven Sm or Sm-like proteins are stable components of several small nuclear ribonucleoprotein particles that function in pre-mRNA splicing. Recent reports describe a role for a distinct complex of seven Sm-like proteins in a very different process: mRNA degradation.

RNA has enormous potential as a therapeutic, yet, the successful application depends on efficient delivery strategies. In this study, we demonstrate that a designed artificial viral coat protein, which self-assembles with DNA to form rod-shaped virus-like particles (VLPs), also encapsulates and protects mRNA encoding enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) and luciferase, and yields cellular ...

FeCe nanoparticles were synthesized by simple co-precipitation method using Iron chloride hexahydrate (FeCl3.6H2O) and cerium chloride (CeCl2•5H2O) as precursors in the presence of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) surfactant. The samples were characterized by high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), X-ray diffraction (XR...

Recent findings show that colour processing, like most other sensory attributes, is shaped by experience. While such studies can reveal the mechanisms of development, can they also help uncover the mechanisms of perception?

We present numerical studies on twisted polygon-shaped core fibers for achieving single mode operation with a large area propagation in this paper. These can achieve due to twisting-induced high losses higher order modes and coupling leaky modes. A tail-like profile will appear when they couple modes, the also indicates that these carry angular momentum. Numerical simulations show octagon-shape...

Most studies on hydrogel swelling instability have been focused on a constrained boundary condition. In this paper, we studied the mechanical instability of a piece of disc-shaped hydrogel during free swelling. The fast swelling of the gel induces two swelling mismatches; a surface-inner layer mismatch and an annulus-disc mismatch, which lead to the formation of a surface crease pattern and a s...

For a class of two-point boundary value problems we prove exactness of S-shaped bifurcation curve. Our result applies to a problem from combustion theory, which involves nonlinearities like e for a > 0.