The posterior dorsomedial striatum (pDMS) is essential for the acquisition and expression of the specific response-outcome (R-O) associations that underlie goal-directed action. Here we examined the role of a pathway linking the basolateral amygdala (BLA) and pDMS in such goal-directed learning. In Experiment 1, rats received unilateral lesions of the BLA and were implanted with cannula targeti...

Stretchable devices with good transparency offer exciting new applications over the existing technologies, but remarkable difficulties remain in the fabrication of transparent and stretchable devices. In this paper, we report an effective method to fabricate transparent elastic photodetectors which combines the merits of the transparent polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) polymer with its stretchabilit...

The conventional fabrication methods for microfluidic devices require cleanroom processes that are costly and time-consuming. We present a novel, facile, and low-cost method for rapid fabrication of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) molds and devices. The method consists of three main fabrication steps: female mold (FM), male mold (MM), and chip fabrication. We use a CO2 laser cutter to pattern a thi...

Strain-dependent cracking behaviors in thin titanium (Ti) films on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) substrates were systematically investigated for their application to sensitive, flexible, transparent, and portable strain sensors. When uniaxially elongated, vertical cracks were developed in the low-strain range, and beyond a critical strain, tilted cracks appeared to intersect the vertical cracks. ...

The flame plasma treatment studied in this thesis was able to oxidize the surface of Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) in a fraction of a second. It was found to be a much faster way to modify PDMS surface wettability than the current technologies. The surface wettability of Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) treated with flame plasma was studied. The surface wettability was characterized by contact angle m...

Nowadays, durable protective coatings receive more attention in the field of conservation for several reasons (they are cost effective, time consuming, resistance, etc.). Hence, this study was focused on producing a multi-functional, coating to protect different stone materials, especially, Lecce stone, bricks, and marble. For purpose, ZrO2-doped-ZnO-PDMS nanocomposites (PDMS, polydimethylsilox...

Transport across the membranes of polymersomes remains difficult in part due to the great thickness of the polymer bilayers. Here, we report that dynamic polyion-counterion transport systems are active in fluorogenic polymersomes composed of poly(dimethylsiloxane)-b-poly(2-methyloxazoline) (PDMS-PMOXA). These results suggest that counterion-activated calf-thymus DNA can act as cation carrier th...

The use of thermo-reversible Lewis Pair (LP) interactions in the formation of transient polymer networks is still greatly underexplored. In this work, we describe the synthesis and characterization of polydimethylsiloxane/polystyrene (PDMS/PS) blends that form dynamic Lewis acid-Lewis base adducts resulting in reversible crosslinks. Linear PS containing 10 mol % of di-2-thienylboryl pendant gro...

BACKGROUND Precise spatial control and patterning of cells is an important area of research with numerous applications in tissue engineering, as well as advancing an understanding of fundamental cellular processes. Poly (dimethyl siloxane) (PDMS) has long been used as a flexible, biocompatible substrate for cell culture with tunable mechanical characteristics. However, fabrication of suitable p...

One of the key issues associated with the utilization of block copolymer (BCP) thin films in nanoscience and nanotechnology is control of their alignment and orientation over macroscopic dimensions. We have recently reported a method, solvent vapor annealing with soft shear (SVA-SS), for fabricating unidirectional alignment of cylindrical nanostructures. This method is a simple extension of the...