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Micrographs of metallographic sections show that additive manufacturing, with its local heat input and rapid cooling rates, brings about microstructures in metal components that differ from those generated in conventional manufacturing processes, such as casting or forging. The example of samples/components made from the material Alloy 718 and manufactured using a laser (Laser Powder Bed Fusion, abbr.: LPBF, designation according to DIN EN ISO ASTM 52900 [1]) shows a very low coarsely distributed porosity. The porosity is limited to the gas porosity already introduced during the atomization step of the powder manufacturing process. As opposed to the microstructure of conventionally produced Alloy 718, the precipitates formed are very small and can only be revealed in the light microscope when high magnifications are applied. Evenly distributed, cruciform γ” precipitates are formed. The grain structure is formed independent of the LPBF-typical melting zones. Isolated dendritic structures can be observed at the interfaces of the melting zones. In the samples manufactured by LPBF, grain structures in the longitudinal section differ from those in the cross section: It can be observed that the grains are elongated in the build direction, which explains the anisotropic behavior of the materials in the tensile test. The width of the melting zones and the laser track spacing can easily be measured in the cross section, while the depth of the melting zones is well recognizable in the longitudinal section. Mechanical properties such as those found in cast or forged Alloy 718 are already present in the stress relief annealed condition.

Herein we present a systematic study demonstrating to which extent exciton formation can amplify fluorescence based on a series of ethylene-bridged oligo-BODIPYs. A set of non- and weakly fluorescent BODIPY motifs was selected and transformed into discrete, chain-like oligomers by linkage via a flexible ethylene tether. The prepared superstructures constitute excitonically active entities with non-conjugated, Coulomb-coupled oscillators. The non-radiative deactivation channels of Internal Conversion (IC), also combined with an upstream reductive Photoelectron Transfer (rPET) and Intersystem Crossing (ISC) were addressed at the monomeric state and the evolution of fluorescence and (non-)radiative decay rates studied along the oligomeric series. We demonstrate that a “masked” fluorescence can be fully reactivated irrespective of the imposed conformational rigidity. This work challenges the paradigm that a collective fluorescence enhancement is limited to sterically induced motional restrictions.

Herein, we present a new method to efficiently calculate electronically excited states in large molecular assemblies, consisting of hundreds of molecules. For this purpose, we combine the long-range corrected tight-binding density-functional fragment molecular orbital method (FMO-LC-DFTB) with an excitonic Hamiltonian, which is constructed in the basis of locally excited and charge-transfer configuration state functions calculated for embedded monomers and dimers and accounts explicitly for the electronic coupling between all types of excitons. We first evaluate both the accuracy and efficiency of our fragmentation approach for molecular dimers and aggregates by comparing with the full LC-TD-DFTB method. The comparison of the calculated spectra of an anthracene cluster shows a very good agreement between our method and the LC-TD-DFTB reference. The effective computational scaling of our method has been explored for anthracene clusters and for perylene bisimide aggregates. We demonstrate the applicability of our method by the calculation of the excited state properties of pentacene crystal models consisting of up to 319 molecules. Furthermore, the participation ratio of the monomer fragments to the excited states is analyzed by the calculation of natural transition orbital (NTO) participation numbers, which are verified by the hole and particle density for a chosen pentacene cluster. The use of our FMO-LC-TDDFTB method will allow for future studies of excitonic dynamics and charge transport to be performed on complex molecular systems consisting of thousands of atoms., Comment: 17 pages, 10 figures

UNSTRUCTURED Real-world data (RWD) collected in routine health care processes and transformed to real-world evidence have become increasingly interesting within the research and medical communities to enhance medical research and support regulatory decision-making. Despite numerous European initiatives, there is still no cross-border consensus or guideline determining which qualities RWD must meet in order to be acceptable for decision-making within regulatory or routine clinical decision support. In the absence of guidelines defining the quality standards for RWD, an overview and first recommendations for quality criteria for RWD in pharmaceutical research and health care decision-making is needed in Austria. An Austrian multistakeholder expert group led by Gesellschaft für Pharmazeutische Medizin (Austrian Society for Pharmaceutical Medicine) met regularly; reviewed and discussed guidelines, frameworks, use cases, or viewpoints; and agreed unanimously on a set of quality criteria for RWD. This consensus statement was derived from the quality criteria for RWD to be used more effectively for medical research purposes beyond the registry-based studies discussed in the European Medicines Agency guideline for registry-based studies. This paper summarizes the recommendations for the quality criteria of RWD, which represents a minimum set of requirements. In order to future-proof registry-based studies, RWD should follow high-quality standards and be subjected to the quality assurance measures needed to underpin data quality. Furthermore, specific RWD quality aspects for individual use cases (eg, medical or pharmacoeconomic research), market authorization processes, or postmarket authorization phases have yet to be elaborated.

Real-world data (RWD) collected in routine health care processes and transformed to real-world evidence have become increasingly interesting within the research and medical communities to enhance medical research and support regulatory decision-making. Despite numerous European initiatives, there is still no cross-border consensus or guideline determining which qualities RWD must meet in order to be acceptable for decision-making within regulatory or routine clinical decision support. In the absence of guidelines defining the quality standards for RWD, an overview and first recommendations for quality criteria for RWD in pharmaceutical research and health care decision-making is needed in Austria. An Austrian multistakeholder expert group led by Gesellschaft für Pharmazeutische Medizin (Austrian Society for Pharmaceutical Medicine) met regularly; reviewed and discussed guidelines, frameworks, use cases, or viewpoints; and agreed unanimously on a set of quality criteria for RWD. This consensus statement was derived from the quality criteria for RWD to be used more effectively for medical research purposes beyond the registry-based studies discussed in the European Medicines Agency guideline for registry-based studies. This paper summarizes the recommendations for the quality criteria of RWD, which represents a minimum set of requirements. In order to future-proof registry-based studies, RWD should follow high-quality standards and be subjected to the quality assurance measures needed to underpin data quality. Furthermore, specific RWD quality aspects for individual use cases (eg, medical or pharmacoeconomic research), market authorization processes, or postmarket authorization phases have yet to be elaborated.