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The phase diagram for graphene growth was obtained to understand the physics of the growth mechanism and control the layer number or coverage of graphene deposited on copper via low-pressure chemical vapor deposition (LPCVD). Management of the number of graphene layers and vacancies is essential for producing defect-free monolayer graphene and engineering multilayered functionalized graphene. In this work, the effects of the CH4 and H2 flow rates were investigated to establish the phase diagram for graphene growth. Using this phase diagram, we selectively obtained fully covered and partially grown monolayer graphene, graphene islands through Volmer–Weber growth, and multilayer graphene through Stranski–Krastanov-like growth. The layer numbers and coverage were determined using optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy and Raman spectroscopy. The growth modes were determined by the competition between catalytic growth with CH4 and catalytic etching with H2 on the copper surface during CVD growth. Intriguingly, this phase diagram showed that multilayer graphene flakes can be grown via LPCVD even with low CH4 and H2 flows. The role of CH4 and H2 gas flow rates on the graphene growth via CVD on copper was studied. The various growth phases with different CH4 and H2 gas flow rates are marked on the growth phase diagram. The graphene growth on copper is dominated by the island growth mode for low H2 gas flow rates. The quality and the number of graphene layers can be controlled by the gas flow rates of CH4 and H2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Localization and electron correlation play significant roles in understanding the electronic states of low-dimensional systems. We carried out the tunneling spectroscopy measurements on a crystalline nano-sized island and a disordered two-dimensional metal film. The low temperature zero-bias anomaly was studied using theory and statistical analysis of the spatial distribution of the local density of states in both the systems. The effective capacitance and resistance of the tunnel junction extracted from theory gives the energy and temperature dependency of the measured ZBA. Statistical analysis reveals the electron correlation effect and the electron correlation length. By combining theory and the statistical analysis, we found that the microscopic origin of ZBA formation in the disordered two-dimensional film is strongly related to the electron localization and the correlations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We describe the design, construction, and performance of an ultra-high vacuum (UHV) scanning tunneling microscope (STM) capable of imaging at dilution-refrigerator temperatures and equipped with a vector magnet. The primary objective of our design is to achieve a high level of modularity by partitioning the STM system into a set of easily separable, interchangeable components. This naturally segregates the UHV needs of STM instrumentation from the typically non-UHV construction of a dilution refrigerator, facilitating the usage of non-UHV materials while maintaining a fully bakeable UHV chamber that houses the STM. The modular design also permits speedy removal of the microscope head from the rest of the system, allowing for repairs, modifications, and even replacement of the entire microscope head to be made at any time without warming the cryostat or compromising the vacuum. Without using cryogenic filters, we measured an electron temperature of 184 mK on a superconducting Al(100) single crystal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Condensed-matter systems provide a rich setting to realize Dirac and Majorana fermionic excitations as well as the possibility to manipulate them for potential applications. It has recently been proposed that chiral, massless particles known as Weyl fermions can emerge in certain bulk materials or in topological insulator multilayers and give rise to unusual transport properties, such as charge pumping driven by a chiral anomaly. A pair of Weyl fermions protected by crystalline symmetry effectively forming a massless Dirac fermion has been predicted to appear as low-energy excitations in a number of materials termed three-dimensional Dirac semimetals. Here we report scanning tunnelling microscopy measurements at sub-kelvin temperatures and high magnetic fields on the II-V semiconductor Cd3As2. We probe this system down to atomic length scales, and show that defects mostly influence the valence band, consistent with the observation of ultrahigh-mobility carriers in the conduction band. By combining Landau level spectroscopy and quasiparticle interference, we distinguish a large spin-splitting of the conduction band in a magnetic field and its extended Dirac-like dispersion above the expected regime. A model band structure consistent with our experimental findings suggests that for a magnetic field applied along the axis of the Dirac points, Weyl fermions are the low-energy excitations in Cd3As2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study presents a new and effective downstream process to recover 2,3-butanediol (2,3-BD) from fermentation broth which is produced by a recombinant Klebsiella pneumoniae strain. The ldhA-deficient K. pneumoniae strain yielded about 90 g/L of 2,3-BD, along with a number of by-products, such as organic acids and alcohols, in a 65 h fed-batch fermentation. The pH-adjusted cell-free fermentation broth was firstly concentrated until 2,3-BD reached around 500 g/L by vacuum evaporation at 50°C and 50 mbar vacuum pressure. The concentrated solution was further treated using light alcohols, including methanol, ethanol, and isopropanol, for the precipitation of organic acids and inorganic salts. Isopropanol showed the highest removal efficiency, in which 92.5% and 99.8% of organic acids and inorganic salts were precipitated, respectively. At a final step, a vacuum distillation process enabled the recovery of 76.2% of the treated 2,3-BD, with 96.1% purity, indicating that fermentatively produced 2,3-BD is effectively recovered by a simple alcohol precipitation and vacuum distillation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SQLite is a small-sized database engine largely used in embedded devices and local application software. The availability of portable devices, such as smartphones, has been extended over the recent years and has contributed to growing adaptation of SQLite. This implies a high likelihood of digital evidences acquired during forensic investigations to include SQLite database files. Where intentional deletion of sensitive data can be made by a suspect, forensic investigators need to recover deleted records in SQLite at the best possible. This study analyzes data management rules used by SQLite and the structure of deleted data in the system and in turn suggests a recovery tool of deleted data. Further, the study examines major SQLite suited software as it validates feasible possibility of deleted data recovery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To reduce carbon emissions during heating in the manufacturing processes, microwave technology has attracted significant attention. Microwaves have considerable advantages over traditional heating methods, including more rapid heating, lower thermal damage, and eco-friendly processes. To apply microwaves to the manufacturing process, uniform and efficient heating is required. We analyzed the effect of various design parameters for uniform and efficient heating by changing the cavity heights, application of the reflector, and number and positions of waveguides. We conducted a numerical simulation and verified the findings by experiments. The results showed that a slight change in the cavity height altered the electromagnetic field distribution and heating parameters, such as the coefficient of variance and power absorption efficiency. With reflectors installed, 66% of cases exhibited better comprehensive evaluation coefficient (CEC) with consideration of uniform heating and power absorption. The spherical reflector showed 81% of cases, better than those of the ordinary model without a reflector. Furthermore, when double waveguides were installed, the average coefficient of variance (COV) was improved by 22%, and power absorption efficiency was increased by 53% compared to the single waveguide case. When the power applied to the waveguides was doubled, the average COV values improved by 18%. This large-scale analysis will be helpful in applying microwaves to actual industrial sites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The hallmark of a topologically insulating state of matter in two dimensions protected by time-reversal symmetry is the existence of chiral edge modes propagating along the perimeter of the sample. Among the first systems predicted to be a two-dimensional topological insulator are bilayers of bismuth. Here we report scanning tunnelling microscopy experiments on bulk Bi crystals that show that a subset of the predicted Bi-bilayers' edge states are decoupled from the states of the substrate and provide direct spectroscopic evidence of their one-dimensional nature. Moreover, by visualizing the quantum interference of edge-mode quasi-particles in confined geometries, we demonstrate their remarkable coherent propagation along the edge with scattering properties consistent with strong suppression of backscattering as predicted for the propagating topological edge states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The structure of Cd3As2, a high-mobility semimetal reported to host electrons that act as Dirac particles, is reinvestigated by single-crystal X-ray diffraction. It is found to be centrosymmetric rather than noncentrosymmetric as previously reported. It has a distorted superstructure of the antifluorite (M2X) structure type with a tetragonal unit cell of a = 12.633(3) and c = 25.427(7) Å in the centrosymmetric I41/acd space group. The antifluorite superstructure can be envisioned as consisting of distorted Cd6⌗2 cubes (where ⌗ = an empty cube vertex) in parallel columns, stacked with opposing chirality. Electronic structure calculations performed using the experimentally determined centrosymmetric structure are similar to those performed with the inversion symmetry absent but with the important implication that Cd3As2 is a three-dimensional (3D)-Dirac semimetal with no spin splitting; all bands are spin degenerate and there is a 4-fold degenerate bulk Dirac point at the Fermi energy along G-Z in the Brillouin zone. This makes Cd3As2 a 3D electronic analogue of graphene. Scanning tunneling microscopy experiments identify a 2 × 2 surface reconstruction in the (112) cleavage plane of single crystals; needle crystals grow with a [110] long axis direction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Serine protease 14 (Prss14)/epithin is a transmembrane serine protease that plays essential roles in tumor progression and metastasis and therefore represents a promising target for managing cancer. Prss14/epithin shedding may underlie its activity in cancer and may worsen outcomes; accordingly, a detailed understanding of the molecular mechanisms in Prss14/epithin shedding may inform the design of future cancer therapies. On the basis of our previous observation that an activator of protein kinase C (PKC), phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA), induces Prss14/epithin shedding, here we further investigated the intracellular signaling pathway involved in this process. While using mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) inhibitors to investigate possible effectors of downstream PKC signaling, we unexpectedly found that an inhibitor of JUN N-terminal kinase (JNK), SP600125, induces Prss14/epithin shedding, even in the absence of PMA. SP600125-induced shedding, like that stimulated by PMA, was mediated by tumor necrosis factor-α-converting enzyme (TACE). In contrast, a JNK activator, anisomycin, partially abolished the effects of SP600125 on Prss14/epithin shedding. Moreover, results from loss-of-function experiments with specific inhibitors, short hairpin RNA-mediated knockdown, and overexpression of dominant-negative PKCβII variants indicated that PKCβII is a major player in both JNK inhibition- and PMA-mediated Prss14/epithin shedding. SP600125 increased phosphorylation of PKCβII and TACE and induced their translocation into the plasma membrane. Finally, in vitro cell invasion experiments and bioinformatics analysis of data in the TCGA breast cancer database revealed that JNK and PKCβII both are important for Prss14/epithin-mediated cancer progression. These results provide important information regarding strategies against tumor metastasis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Superconducting proximity pairing in helical edge modes, such as those of topological insulators, is predicted to provide a unique platform for realizing Majorana zero modes (MZMs). We used scanning tunneling microscopy measurements to probe the influence of proximity-induced superconductivity and magnetism on the helical hinge states of bismuth(111) films grown on a superconducting niobium substrate and decorated with magnetic iron clusters. Consistent with model calculations, our measurements revealed the emergence of a localized MZM at the interface between the superconducting helical edge channel and the iron clusters, with a strong magnetization component along the edge. Our experiments also resolve the MZM’s spin signature, which distinguishes it from trivial in-gap states that may accidentally occur at zero energy in a superconductor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The crystal structure of Cd3As2 is redetermined by single crystal XRD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In order to develop a new immunotherapeutic agent targeting metastatic breast cancers, we chose to utilize autocatalytic feature of the membrane serine protease Prss14/ST14, a specific prognosis marker for ER negative breast cancer as a target molecule. Methods: The study was conducted using three mouse breast cancer models, 4 T1 and E0771 mouse breast cancer cells into their syngeneic hosts, and an MMTV-PyMT transgenic mouse strain was used. Prss14/ST14 knockdown cells were used to test function in tumor growth and metastasis, peptides derived from the autocatalytic loop for activation were tested as preventive metastasis vaccine, and monoclonal and humanized antibodies to the same epitope were tested as new therapeutic candidates. ELISA, immunoprecipitation, Immunofluorescent staining, and flow cytometry were used to examine antigen binding. The functions of antibodies were tested in vitro for cell migration and in vivo for tumor growth and metastasis. Results: Prss14/ST14 is critically involved in the metastasis of breast cancer and poor survival rather than primary tumor growth in two mouse models. The epitopes derived from the specific autocatalytic loop region of Prss14/ST14, based on structural modeling acted as efficient preventive metastasis vaccines in mice. A new specific monoclonal antibody mAb3F3 generated against the engineered loop structure could reduce cell migration, eliminate metastasis in PyMT mice, and can detect the Prss14/ST14 protein expressed in various human cancer cells. Humanized antibody huAb3F3 maintained the specificity and reduced the migration of human breast cancer cells in vitro. Conclusion: Our study demonstrates that Prss14/ST14 is an important target for modulating metastasis. Our newly developed hybridoma mAbs and humanized antibody can be further developed as new promising candidates for the use in diagnosis and in immunotherapy of human metastatic breast cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]