BACKGROUND Anti-angiogenic therapy is a crucial step in cancer treatment. The discovery of new anti-angiogenic compounds from marine organisms has become an attractive concept in anti-cancer therapy. Because little data correlated to the pro- and anti-angiogenic efficacies of Ophiuroidea, which include brittle star, the current study was designed to explore the anti-angiogenic potential of brit...

Fibre-reinforced plastic (FRP) composites are widely used in ship hull, airframe and wind turbine structural applications where they are subjected to various types of constant and variable amplitude cyclic-fatigue loads. Hence, fatiguedurability is one of the important requirements for such composite materials. These FRPs, generally, contain continuous fibres of carbon or glass reinforced in a ...

High performance epoxy resin (tetra-glycidyl-4,4’diamino-diphenyl methane-TGDDM) is brittle and is sensitive to moisture absorption and thermooxidative effects. An approach to mitigate polymer sensitivity towards moisture and thermal effects is to add clay. The addition of clay to resin systems (e.g. diglycidyl ether bisphenol A-DGEBA) has often yielded an overall improvement in properties of t...

This letter describes a newly discovered phenomenon: ductile fracture in cementitious materials. The brittle nature of materials such as concrete and ceramics has prompted the development of various approaches to enhance their fracture toughness. Fibre reinforcement has been the common focus in the toughening of the brittle materials. Two types of fracture have been observed to date in cementit...

Due to periodic variations in temperature and heavy traffic loading, hot-mix asphalt (HMA) pavements undergo considerable distress during their service life. The rheological properties of binder, when subjected complex physical chemical processes, make it stiff sometimes brittle, which ultimately plays a huge part pavement deterioration. This phenomenon is commonly known as aging. Incorporating...

The massive use of synthetic plastics, in particular in the food packaging area, has a great environmental impact, and alternative more ecologic materials are being required. Poly(lactic) acid (PLA) and starch have been extensively studied as potential replacements for non-degradable petrochemical polymers on the basis of their availability, adequate food contact properties and competitive cost...

The conventional anode for organic photovoltaics (OPVs), indium tin oxide (ITO), is expensive and brittle, and thus is not suitable for use in roll-to-roll manufacturing of OPVs. In this study, fully solution-processed polymer bulk heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells with anodes made from silver nanowires (Ag NWs) have been successfully fabricated with a configuration of Ag NWs/poly(3,4-ethylenedi...

The influence of thermal history on the properties of commercial P(3HB-co-l2%-3HV) was studied. Thermogravimetric analysis and differential scanning calorimetry revealed that the plasticizer evaporated at 140°C or higher. The loss of plasticizer during thermal treatment at 170 and 180°C resulted in a slight increase of the melting temperature of the polymer. The processing time and temperature,...

Microencapsulated dicyclopentadiene (DCPD) healing agent and Grubbs’ Ru catalyst are incorporated into an epoxy matrix to produce a polymer composite capable of self-healing. The fracture toughness and healing efficiency of this composite are measured using a tapered double-cantilever beam (TDCB) specimen. Both the virgin and healed fracture toughness depend strongly on the size and concentrati...