75wt% and 0.075wt% for PEG 10kDa and PEG 20kDa, respectively. The human serum albumin adsorption was only 2.5wt% when PEGylated silica nanoparticles were tested compared to 18.7% for non-PEGylated nanoparticles [184]. PEG coating on silica nanoparticles can also be achieved via electrostatic adsorption of polyethyleneimine-polyethylene

Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical glycol (PEI-PEG) copolymer. The polymeric coating was stable and tightly associated with the particle surface by virtue of the strong electrostatic interactions between the polyamino backbone of the copolymer and the negatively charged silica surface. The PEI-PEG copolymer investigated had 34 PEG chains (5kDa) per PEI chain. The efficiency of the PEG coating Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical in preventing the adsorption of serum proteins on the nanoparticle surface was remarkably high. Protein adsorption was at the limit of sensitivity for X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) detection and no aggregation was observed for the coated nanoparticles [185]. The synthesis of PEO on silica nanoparticles has also been performed resulting in a 40wt% of grafted PEO. The method has been carried out first by a two-step conjugation process of prehydrolyzed 3-glycidoxypropyl trimethoxysilane and aluminium isopropoxide to the particle surface. The subsequent polymerization of ethylene oxide was carried

Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical out at 55°C. The density of the polymer chains was found to be strictly dependent on the conjugation efficiency of the metal alkoxide on the particle surface [186, 187]. 3. Conclusions

The therapeutic advantages of nanotechnology-based drug delivery selleck catalog systems include improved drug bioavailability, extended duration of action, reduced Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical frequency of administration, and lower systemic toxicity with beneficial effects on the patient acceptance. The medical management of malignancies has already benefited from the outcomes of few nanotechnology-based delivery systems. However, following intravenous administration, drug-loaded nanocarriers are rapidly opsonised by a variety of proteins, most of them belonging to the complement system, and undergo very rapid clearance AV-951 via the MPS cells. Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical In this paper, the main aspects of polymer coating technology applied to colloidal drug delivery systems have been reviewed. A number of studies and examples reported in the literature showing that stealthiness can be conferred to nanocarriers by a proper formulation design and predicated by precise physicochemical determinants have been detailed and critically discussed. The evidence reported in the literature shows that the residence time in the blood of nanocarriers can be www.selleckchem.com/products/Axitinib.html prolonged by surface coating with neutral or zwitterionic polymers characterized by high hydrophilicity and high flexibility. Furthermore, the stealth character of the nanocarriers depends on the polymer organization on the particle surface, namely, density, thickness, and association stability.

Thus, an age-related decrease in NR2B expression could account for agerelated shortening of the excitatory postsynaptic potential duration of the NMDA channel.144,145 As mentioned above, overexpression of NR2B receptor subunits in transgenic mice enhances the activation of NMDA receptors, facilitating

Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical synaptic potentiation as well as learning and memoir}’.22 This overexpression has also been reported to prevent, age-related decreases in memory and learning performance. These results support, the hypothesis that age-related decreases in NMDA receptor Tofacitinib Citrate JAK inhibitor function could account for age-related decreases in memory and learning. This suggests that strategies to prevent, those agerelated changes, or strategies to prevent, downstream or other events related Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical to those changes, could have important therapeutic implications for the prevention or treatment of age-related memory impairments. NRHypo

hypothesis of AD In addition to age-related increases in NRHypo, it was recently shown in humans that a more severe degree of www.selleckchem.com/products/U0126.html NRHypo is present in the AD brain than in agematched normal controls.97 Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical Thus, in the aging human brain the stage may already be set for widespread corticolimbic neurodegeneration to occur. All that is required to explain why it occurs to a more severe degree in the AD brain than in the “normal” aging brain is to identify one or more adjunctive conditions peculiar to the AD brain that may serve as catalysts Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical or promoters of the NRHypo state. In our animal model of NRHypo using otherwise healthy brain, no evidence of amyloidosis or amyloid plaque formation is observed. Therefore, we

propose that genetic or other predisposing factors peculiar to the AD condition are primarilyresponsible for the amyloidopathy in the AD brain and that when amyloidopathy occurs alongside NRHypo, the pathological process known as AD develops. How then does amyloidosis interact Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical with NRHypo? Over the past decade, major strides have been made in discovering important genetic abnormalities in AD. Mutations on four different chromosomes, each of which can promote amyloidopathy, have now been identified as etiologic factors in familial AD Drug_discovery and the role of apoE genotype as a risk factor in sporadic AD has been established. While recent research has elucidated the basic neurochemistry of beta-amyloid and it is clear that. abnormal deposition of beta-amyloid in the brain occurs early in AD, it. is not. at all clear how beta-amyloid deposition contributes to the neurodegenerative events in AD. Based on evidence that a severe degree of NRHypo is present in the human AD brain, that.

The advantage of postoperative therapy is the knowledge of the pathological stage to appropriately select patients for therapy. The pros and cons of preoperative versus postoperative therapy are further discussed in Table 1. Table 1 Pros and Cons of preoperative versus postoperative therapy for http://www.selleckchem.com/products/Lenalidomide.html esophageal cancer ((5)) With preoperative therapy, optimal tumor downstaging can result in complete pathological response of the tumor, portending improved survival outcomes for esophageal carcinoma. Pathological complete response (pCR) has often been used as a surrogate Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical for efficacy of therapy and a measure by which various neoadjuvant therapies in esophageal

cancer can be compared. Rohatgi et al retrospectively analyzed 235 patients who underwent preoperative CRT for adenocarcinoma (82%) or squamous cell (18%) carcinoma of the esophagus and found that patients who experienced pCR had longer overall and disease free survival rates, fewer distant metastases, and less disease recurrences Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical (6). At 37-month follow-up, patients with pCR had a 74% overall survival, compared to 65% for those with <50% residual disease after CRT, and 40%

for those with >50% residual disease after CRT. In addition, pCR may be more predictive of survival for patients with adenocarcinoma than squamous Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical cell carcinoma in those Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical receiving preoperative CRT (7). Preoperative chemotherapy Investigators have evaluated multiple neoadjuvant regimens consisting of preoperative chemotherapy or perioperative chemotherapy. Despite the available studies, biases may still remain

about the benefit of perioperative chemotherapy versus CRT. RTOG 8911 compared surgery alone with chemotherapy followed by surgery, revealing no overall survival difference between the two arms. Patients who underwent less than an R0 resection had an ominous prognosis (5-year overall survival for R0 resection 32%, and R1 resection 5%) (8). Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical Cunningham et al evaluated surgery alone compared to a regimen consisting of 3 cycles of both preoperative and postoperative epirubicin, cisplatin, and 5-fluorouracil (ECF) for resectable gastroesophageal cancer and showed significant downstaging, but pathological complete GSK-3 response rates were zero. With the addition of chemotherapy, 5-year survival was improved from 23% to 36% with chemotherapy and progression free survival was also significantly improved (9). The Medical Research Council also demonstrated a significant 2-year overall survival benefit from 34% to 43% with the addition of 2 cycles of preoperative cisplatin and 5-FU (p=0.004) (10). A selleck chemical meta-analysis by Urschel et al evaluated 11 randomized clinical trials including nearly 2,000 patients treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy compared to surgery alone (11).

In contrast, in a retrospective study by Chen et al of 366 patients with squamous cell carcinoma of

the mid-thoracic esophagus, local recurrence rates were significantly lower with adjuvant radiation therapy compared to chemotherapy or observation (20%, 32%, 43%, respectively) (33). Postoperative chemoradiation versus surgery alone The INT-0116 trial published by MacDonald et al prospectively randomized 556 patients with gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) (approximately 20%) Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical or gastric adenocarcinoma patients, Stage IB-IV (AJCC 3th Edition) who had undergone curative resection with negative margins to receive no further therapy or to postoperative chemoradiation (one cycle of 5-FU and leucovorin followed by Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical concurrent radiation to 45 Gy with the same agents, followed by two additional cycles of 5-FU and leucovorin) (34). Patients were required to have sufficient caloric intake of 1500 Kcal per day. Because of the complicated nature of RT field design for gastric carcinomas, RT quality assurance was conducted prior to radiation delivery, and both minor and major deviations were detected in 35% of cases and corrected. Three-year overall Erlotinib clinical survival improved with addition of chemoradiation from 41% to 50% as well as median survival from 27 http://www.selleckchem.com/products/AZD2281(Olaparib).html months to 36 months with chemoradiation.(HR

Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical 1.35 for death with surgery alone group compared to adjuvant CRT, 95% CI 1.09-1.66, p=0.005). Local recurrence rates were also reduced from 29% with surgery alone to 19% with

the addition of CRT. This trial provides the rationale for the use of postoperative Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical CRT for GEJ adenocarcinomas. In patients with GEJ adenocarcinomas, CRT is appropriate to improve survival and local control. Table 4 Prospective trials of postoperative chemoradiation Of note, in the 6th Edition of the AJCC manual, GEJ carcinomas could be included in esophageal or gastric Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical stage groupings and could produce different stage groupings depending on either the use of the esophageal or gastric stage groupings. GEJ carcinoma also previously included the locally advanced stages of T4 Nx or Tx N3 (Stage IV as stated above) when grouped with gastric cancer (35). In the AJCC 7th Edition, the GEJ carcinomas are now staged with esophageal, rather than gastric cancers, and include cancer within the first 5 cm of the stomach AV-951 that extends into the GEJ or distal thoracic esophagus (2),(36). In addition, Stage IV disease currently only refers to M1 staging and does not include any locally advanced disease. A phase II trial of postoperative CRT for poor prognosis esophagus and GEJ adenocarcinoma (86%) and squamous cell carcinomas (14%) investigated postoperative 5-FU, cisplatin and RT to 50.4-59.4 Gy in 50 patients with node positive or T3/T4 tumors (5). 4-year freedom from recurrence was 50%, distant metastatic control 56%, and locoregional control 86%, with a median survival of 53 months, comparing favorably with a historical median survival of 28 months in prior trials (37).

2001), anxiety (Marazziti et al. 2007), and emotional expression (Tops et al. 2007). The oxytocin peptide also acts directly on maternal care (Richard et

al. 1991). The release of oxytocin during delivery triggers maternal behavior in rodents (Pedersen et al. 1982). Oxytocin-deficient female mice fail to provide milk to offspring (Nishimori et al. 1996; Young et al. 1996), although they display otherwise normal maternal behaviors. Oxytocin may also have a role in motivating Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical the mother to retrieve her pups (Pedersen et al. 2006), and deficits in this hormone can lead to deficient offspring care (Collins et al. 2004). The FosB gene belongs to the fos gene family known as immediate early genes (Herschman 1991; Yen et al. 1991) and is induced rapidly in specific brain regions in response to various stimuli. This induction is temporary and returns rapidly to basal levels after being triggered (Nestler et al. 1999). FosB has been associated with addictive Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical behavior (Hiroi et al. 1997), response to hormones (Lin et al. 2003), and social behaviors, including pair bonding (Curtis and Wang 2003) and maternal care (Brown et al. 1996). In fact, FosB was the first gene described in mice to be related to maternal care (Brown et al. 1996). FosB

knockout females Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical fail to retrieve their pups and do not crouch over the nest. Peg3 encodes a zinc-finger protein (Kuroiwa et al. 1996) and is highly expressed in brain regions crucial for maternal behavior, including the medial preoptic area of the hypothalamus, the medial amygdala, the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, the hippocampus, and olfactory bulb (Li Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical et al. 1999). Peg3 is a paternally expressed imprinted gene that promotes cell survival, in contrast to p53-mediated apoptosis (Relaix et al. 1998, 2000). Peg3 affects body temperature regulation, feeding behavior, and obesity in mice (Curley et al. 2005), and its disruption can lead to aberrant maternal behavior. Peg3-deficient mice are viable but are smaller than wild type, and females do not build nests, fail to retrieve pups, and have lactation problems, Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical resulting in the death

of their progeny (Li et al. 1999). We found the same maternal behavior abnormalities reported for Oxt-, FosB-, and Peg3-deficient females (Brown et al. 1996; Nishimori et al. 1996; Young et al. 1996; Li et al. 1999) to be segregated in the intercross of LG/J and SM/J inbred mouse strains (Peripato et al. 2002). Because we have previously identified Carfilzomib these genes as positional candidates for main effect QTLs, we here investigate an association between maternal selleck catalog behaviors in SM/J and LG/J postpartum females and two www.selleckchem.com/products/Paclitaxel(Taxol).html properties of these candidate genes, DNA sequence variation and hypothalamic mRNA expression. We also tested for an effect of the Peg3 gene in/del variant on maternal care in F2 females derived from a LG/J and SM/J intercross. Materials and Methods Animals Breeding pairs of the SM/J and LG/J inbred strains (see Hrbek et al.

Three different point mutations in α-synuclein, A.53T, A30P, and E46K, have been associated with PD in separate families with dominantly transmitted PD.5,10,11 These are gain-of-function mutations. There is also evidence that oc-synuclcin promoter variants contribute to the lifetime risk of sporadic PD.12-14 In general, alleles that increase α-synuclein expression are associated with an increased risk for PD. Recent work has shown that, triplication of the α-synuclcin gene is sufficient to cause PD and, in human postmortem

brain, is accompanied by doubling of α-synuclein protein expression.15,16 Similarly, postmortem studies in sporadic PD show that Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical α-synuclein mRNA is upregulatcd in the SNpc of affected individuals.17 The link between α-synuclein and sporadic PD is found in Lewy bodies (LBs), the pathological hallmark of PD, since α-synuclein has been shown to be the primary constituent of LBs.18-22 LBs are eosinophilic fibrillar cytoplasmic inclusions in DA neurons that can be detected in both the SNpc and the cortex of PD patients (Figure Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical 2). LBs are located in the cell body, axons, and dendrites of Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical neurons, and are composed of neurofilaments 7 to 25 nm in diameter; these neurofilaments

are believed to be inappropriately phosphorylated, proteolytically truncated, and ubiquitinatcd.23 LBs have been meantime reported to include a wide range of proteins (including ubiquitin, parkin, and tau), heat, shock proteins (HSPs), torsin A, neurofilaments, oxidized/nitrated proteins, proteasomal elements, and others.22,24-31 Interestingly, many proteins that interact with α-synuclein and parkin have also been identified as components of LBs, for instance, parkinassociated endothelin-like Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical receptor (Pael-R; a transmembrane polypeptide),32 synphilin-1,33 and p38 (a structural component of the mammalian am.inoacyl-t.RNA synthetase complex).34 LBs ectopically express the cell cycle protein cyclin B; this may be related to cyclin B’s interaction with oc-synuclcin, which predisposes nigral LB-bearing

Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical DA neurons to undergo apoptosis.35 Another protein colocalized with α-synuclein in LBs is inhibitor Seliciclib tissue transglutaminase (tTGase), which induces cross-linking of oc-synuclcin in vitro.36 tTGase inhibition could therefore be a novel therapeutic target in PD, provided that. LB formation is indeed a cytotoxic event. Figure 2. A Lewy body (LB). The LB is shown as a dense eosinophilic Cilengitide inclusion bordered by neuromelanin, the auto-oxidation product of dopamine (DA), which allows identification of DA neurons in the human substantia nigra pars compacta (SNpc). Parkin is widely distributed protein in DA and non-DA neurons in normal human brain and in sporadic PD. It is mostly located in large cytoplasmic vesicles and in the endoplasmic reticulum (RR).37 The initial postmortem studies from five parkin-positive cases initially failed to find LBs – an observation used to argue that parkin is required for LB formation.

These elution conditions may, however, affect MS-based detection by reducing the ionization yield of the target analyte [63,68]. In general, highly polar compounds can be separated by (i) hydrophilic interaction chromatography (HILIC), (ii) the addition of ion-pairing agents to the mobile phase, and (iii) the incorporation of ion ligands within conventional RP surfaces to selleck chemical Brefeldin A enable mixed mode separation [33]. In particular, HILIC, which was developed by Alpert for the separation of highly polar compounds in 1990 [69], is a powerful separation technique. HILIC-MS

was employed to separate and quantify highly polar compounds in Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical biological samples [70,71,72]. In HILIC, retention increases with increasing polarity of the stationary phase and solutes and with decreasing polarity of the organic solvent systems used for elution; this contrasts with the trend observed with RPLC. Recently, HILIC was coupled to MS and used in metabolomics studies [73]. Analytical methods for biological samples were developed [74,75,76,77], the focus of Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical which was on metabolic pathways. Metabolic profiling offers important information for interpreting the efficacy Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical outcome, explaining the toxicity of lead compounds, and rationalizing the toxicity of specific drugs during drug discovery or development [78]. HILIC clearly provides different selectivity from RPLC for the separation of highly polar

compounds [73,79]. Therefore, HILIC is useful for determining polar metabolic compounds. LC-MS applications are summarized in Table 2. Table 2 Summary of LC-MS Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical applications in metabolomics. 4. Applications 4.1. Amino Acids Amino acids are precursors for the synthesis of proteins, other nitrogenous substances, glucose, and fatty acids [90,91]. Amino acids play a major role in energy metabolism, neurotransmission, and lipid transport, and are important in disease diagnostics, and in elucidating nutritional influences Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical on physiology [92,93]. Amino acids not only act as building blocks of proteins but also serve as key regulators of metabolic

pathways in cells. However, the mechanisms responsible for the effects of amino acids are largely unknown. Metabolomics studies are very difficult to perform because of the wide variability of biological fluids (mainly urine) in association with different confounding factors, such as gender, age, time of day, state of health, lifestyle, diet, and phenotype [94]. Therefore, the Drug_discovery integration of various omics technologies and LDC000067? bioinformatics with conventional techniques is expected to provide comprehensive information about amino acid metabolism and nutrition in organisms. Waldhier et al. applied GC×GC-TOFMS to the separation of amino acid enantiomers after derivatization with methyl chloroformate [95], and were able to successfully separate 10 amino acid enantiomers from serum and urine matrix. On the other hand, Williams et al.

[6] Efficacy: In the PATENT-1 trial, the overall difference in the 6MWD with riociguat as compared with placebo, was 36 m at 12 weeks. This change in 6MWD is consistent with the increases compound library on 96 well plate observed in previous studies (22.4 m; 95% confidence interval: 17.4–27.5 m). 17 In comparison with PDE-5 inhibitors, this change in 6MWD is less than that observed with sildenafil in the SUPER trial, 18 where the mean placebo-corrected treatment on 6MWD was 45 m, 46 m, and

50 m for patients receiving 20, 40, and 80 mg of sildenafil, respectively. On the other hand, the improvement in 6MWD reported in PATENT-1 is close to that reported with tadalafil in the PHIRST trial, where tadalafil in 40 mg was associated with 33 m increase in 6MWD relative to placebo. 19 Improvement

in WHO functional class in PATENT-1 is modest where 21% of patients moved to lower class. In SUPER trial, the proportions of patients with an improvement of at least one functional class were 7%, 36%, and 42% for patients receiving 20, 40, and 80 mg of sildenafil, respectively. 18 In the PHIRST trial, no significant differences in the proportions of patients with and without improvement of WHO functional class were observed with tadalafil compared with placebo. 19 Importantly, many variables should be considered when comparing changes in 6MWD or WHO functional class among different studies (e.g., population characteristics, baseline 6MWD and WHO functional class, duration of study, proportion of patients on background therapy). For example, in the PHIRST study, 19 about half of patients were receiving bosentan as a background therapy, while in SUPER background therapy was not

permitted. 18 This is important since the use of background effective therapy may reduce the ability to demonstrate a statistically significant difference in 6MWD or WHO functional class between the placebo and the active treatment groups. [7] Safety: Riociguat was well tolerated and had a favorable safety profile. Batimastat Two adverse events appear to be common among patients receiving the highest tolerated dose of riociguat: hypotension (10%) and anemia (8%). 6 The risk of hypotension should be minimized by a gradual individual dose titration to the highest tolerated dose (in PATENT-1, riociguat was titrated over 8 weeks), and by contraindicating concomitant use with other drugs affecting the NO-sGC-cGMP pathway (e.g., PDE-5 inhibitors, nitrates). The apparent increased risk of bleeding has been addressed by means of a prominent warning and a description of bleeding events in the adverse reactions section of the Product Monograph. [8] Drug-drug interaction: So far, the interaction potential of riociguat with other drugs is virtually unknown.

e., glucose) allowing steady state growth of cells (i.e., at steady state the specific growth rate of cells is equal to the dilution rate). At these conditions, transient growth effects and other stress-induced responses are avoided that could mask effects resulting specifically from nutrient limitation. Three dilution rates were chosen based on previous results obtained in our laboratory that suggest that the effect of the Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical nutrient

limitation and, consequently, the RelA activity, is much lower at higher dilution rates. Thus, the steady state metabolism analyses of the wild-type and ΔrelA mutant cultures were performed at two low (0.05 and 0.1 h−1) and one higher (0.2 h−1) dilution rates. The aim of this study was to analyse the growth rate-dependent behaviour of E. coli cells and observe how the mutation in the relA gene affects the cellular responses to nutrient-limiting conditions. This will provide us further information to evaluate ppGpp-deficient strains as potential hosts for recombinant E. coli bioprocesses. 2. Experimental Section 2.1. Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical Bacterial Strains and Growth Conditions E. coli K12 W3110 (F-, LAM-, IN[rrnD-rrnE]1, rph-1) and the isogenic Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical mutant ΔrelA (obtained from M. Cashel [13]) were grown under controlled conditions in a chemostat culture at 37 ºC, pH 7 and dissolved oxygen above 30%. The minimal medium consisted of 5 g·L−1 of glucose, 6 g·L−1 of Na2HPO4, 3 g·L−1 of KH2PO4, 0.5 g·L−1 of NaCl,

1 g·L−1 of NH4Cl, 0.015 g·L−1 of CaCl2, 0.12 g·L−1 of MgSO4•7H2O, 0.34 g·L−1 of thiamine, 2 mL·L−1 of trace-element Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical solution (described elsewhere [16]) and 2 mL·L−1

of vitamins solution (described elsewhere [16]). The minimal medium was further supplemented with 20 mg·L−1 of L-isoleucine to grow the W3110 strain and 20 mg·L−1 of L-isoleucine and L-valine along with 25 mg·L−1 of kanamycin to grow the ΔrelA mutant strain. Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical Chemostat cultivations were carried out in a 3 L fermenter (BioFlo 3000, New Brunswick Scientific, USA) with a working volume of 1.5 L. The described minimal medium was continuously fed to the respective E. coli culture, at least for five residence times, at a given dilution rate (0.05, 0.1 and 0.2 h−1), and the working volume was kept constant by withdrawing the culture broth through level control. Steady-state conditions were verified by constant optical density Cilengitide and glucose measurements. The pH of the culture was maintained at 7.0 by adding 2.0 M NaOH and 2.0 M HCl. Dissolved oxygen was maintained above 30% saturation through a cascade mode controlling the agitation speed and airflow. 2.2. Analytical Techniques The biomass concentration was determined by measuring culture absorbance (OD600nm) in a Jenway 6300 spectrophotometer and using a standard calibration curve (OD600nm against cell dry weight (CDW)). In order to determine CDW, 10 mL of broth were filtered using 0.2 µm membrane filters and the filters with cell biomass were dried in the microwave to a constant weight [17].

The measurement method yielded 5% accuracy for dielectric constant (�š�) and 3% for dielectric loss (�š�). Like other methods presented here this capacitive method requires supporting equipment and is not suitable for outdoor testing. In the selleck chemicals prevailing research works from the literature, the inductive concept has not been proposed and attempted for maturity determination of FFBs [20]. The proposed inductive concept is a non destructive testing method and show potentiality for outdoor testing [21,22]. The detection concept is based on the moisture content of the fruitlet, where the permeability value of water is 1.2566270 �� 10?6. With a low permeability value compared to other materials especially metals, a high frequency range is used to assist the detection. Theoretically, it is expected that the value of inductance for unripe fruitlets will be higher than that of ripe fruitlets due to the moisture content of the fruitlet. In this paper, the investigation of an oil palm fruit sensor based on a novel resonant frequency technique is presented. The study approach involves the use of inductance values in the high frequency range that are used in determining the maturity of the oil palm FFBs, specifically the ripe and unripe fruitlets. Further research on the categories of maturity such as under-ripe and overripe categories are to be investigated and will be reported in our future works. Since the value of inductance measured is very small (on the order of ��H), therefore resonant frequency is used for analysis in this investigation. The investigations on the frequency characteristics of the air coils of the sensor are studied to observe the effects of coil diameter as a preliminary evaluation. As for the inductance characteristics, the effect of the coil diameter on differences between samples non-distinguishable with the increase of the coil diameter value was studied. The effects of the variations in the coil diameter yields a significant difference of 0.02643 between unripe samples to air and 0.01084 for ripe samples to air. Results from this study would be useful in designing an oil palm fruit sensor based on the inductive concept and enhancing the potential of the sensor in classifying oil p
Mid-infrared (MIR) laser spectroscopy is an extremely useful tool to identify chemical and biological substances. In this so called ��fingerprint�� region (3�C20 ��m) most molecules have their vibrational and rotational resonances, which can be observed by narrow optical absorption lines or changes of the refractive index. Much effort has been devoted to reducing the size of spectroscopic setups down to chip-scale dimensions. However, the goal of monolithic integration has not been reached yet. To build monolithic integrated photonic sensors, it is necessary to emit and detect light with the proper wavelength, as well as to provide sufficient interaction with the observed substance.