Torres¹ YA, CA Busso¹, OA Montenegro², HD Giorgetti², HD Rodríguez², D Bentivegna³

Phyton-International Journal of Experimental Botany, Vol.79, pp. 195-198, 2010, DOI:10.32604/phyton.2010.79.195

Abstract Osmotic adjustment has been recognized to be an important adaptive response to water stress in higher plants. Although Leymus cinereus cv. “Trailhead” is reputedly a very drought-tolerant rangeland plant, its ability to adjust osmotically in the field has not previously been reported. This study examined the occurrence or not of osmotic adjustment in field-grown plants of Leymus cinereus cv. “Trailhead” during late spring in an arid zone of Patagonia. Plants of this species had been established in the field three years before. With this purpose, leaf laminae of this species were collected and pressure-volume curves made. Results More >

C.S. Lin, T.C. Chen, C.C. Yu ,M.E. Wu, Y.H. Tu¹

The International Conference on Computational & Experimental Engineering and Sciences, Vol.15, No.3, pp. 103-110, 2010, DOI:10.3970/icces.2010.015.103

Abstract Most old apartments in Taiwan lack fire prevention equipment, making fire awareness and escape difficult, as well as timely fire fighting, which leads to increased death tolls from fire incidents. This research utilizes Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS) software to analyze and simulate the fire accident that occurred in a single old-style five-story apartment on Siu-Lang Road, Chung-Ho City. In this event, many occupant vehicles were parked at the front door of the apartment building or in nearby parking lanes. The fire engine can only drive in after vehicles were cleared from the fire area, a More >

Rami K Korhonen^∗,†, Sang-Kuy Han^‡, Walter Herzog^‡

Molecular & Cellular Biomechanics, Vol.7, No.3, pp. 125-134, 2010, DOI:10.3970/mcb.2010.007.125

Abstract Changes in the osmotic environment cause changes in volume of isolated cells and cells in tissue explants, and the osmotic environment becomes hypotonic in cartilage diseases such as osteoarthritis (OA). However, it is not known how cells respond to a hypotonic osmotic challenge when situated in the fully intact articular cartilage.
A confocal laser scanning microscope was used to image chondrocytes of intact rabbit patellae in an isotonic (300 mOsm) and hypotonic (172 mOsm) immersion medium. Cell volumes were calculated before and 5, 15, 60, 120 and 240 minutes after the change in saline concentration. Local… More >

Q Wang^*, YP Zheng^∗,†, HJ Niu^∗,‡

Molecular & Cellular Biomechanics, Vol.7, No.1, pp. 45-58, 2010, DOI:10.3970/mcb.2010.007.045

Abstract This study aims to obtain osmosis-induced swelling strains of normal and proteoglycan (PG) depleted articular cartilage using an ultrasound system and to investigate the changes in its mechanical properties due to the PG depletion using a layered triphasic model. The swelling strains of 20 cylindrical cartilage-bone samples collected from different bovine patellae were induced by decreasing the concentration of bath saline and monitored by the ultrasound system. The samples were subsequently digested by a trypsin solution for approximately 20 min to deplete proteoglycans, and the swelling behaviors of the digested samples were measured again. The… More >

Sunilkumar N¹, D Roy^1,2

CMES-Computer Modeling in Engineering & Sciences, Vol.65, No.2, pp. 107-154, 2010, DOI:10.3970/cmes.2010.065.107

Abstract The element-based piecewise smooth functional approximation in the conventional finite element method (FEM) results in discontinuous first and higher order derivatives across element boundaries. Despite the significant advantages of the FEM in modelling complicated geometries, a motivation in developing mesh-free methods has been the ease with which higher order globally smooth shape functions can be derived via the reproduction of polynomials. There is thus a case for combining these advantages in a so-called hybrid scheme or a 'smooth FEM' that, whilst retaining the popular mesh-based discretization, obtains shape functions with uniform C^p(p ≥ 1) continuity. One… More >

MARIA TERESA MARTIN^2*, HILDA PEDRANZANI³, PATRICIA GARCÍA-MOLINERO², VALENTIN PANDO⁴, ROSARIO SIERRA-DE-GRADO¹

BIOCELL, Vol.33, No.3, pp. 141-148, 2009, DOI:10.32604/biocell.2009.33.141

Abstract Two independent parameters, epicotyl height (cm) and number of induced buds were studied on Pinus pinaster explants to analyse the effects of three phytohormones (6-benzylaminopurine, jasmonic acid, ethylene) which were combined or not in 11 different treatments. Epicotyle length diminished significantly in relation to the control medium (medium without exogen phytohormones) in presence of jasmonic acid, 6-benzylaminopurine or Ethephon (which is converted to ethylene in plants) in any of treatments. Concentrations of 100 μM of jasmonic acid and Ethephon had a greater inhibitory effect than the treatments with 10 μM. In addition to that, jasmonic acid… More >

Masanori Kobayashi, Myron Spector

Molecular & Cellular Biomechanics, Vol.6, No.4, pp. 217-228, 2009, DOI:10.3970/mcb.2009.006.217

Abstract In order to achieve successful wound repair by regenerative tissue engineering using mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), it is important to understand the response of stem cells in the scaffold matrix to mechanical stress.
To investigate the clinical effects of mechanical stress on the behavior of cells in scaffolds, bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) were grown on a type-I collagen-glycosaminoglycan (GAG) scaffold matrix for one week under cyclic stretching loading conditions.
The porous collagen-GAG scaffold matrix for skin wound repair was prepared, the harvested canine MSCs were seeded on the scaffold, and cultured under… More >

A. Colombo¹, U. Galvanetto²

CMES-Computer Modeling in Engineering & Sciences, Vol.53, No.3, pp. 235-254, 2009, DOI:10.3970/cmes.2009.053.235

Abstract The paper addresses the problem of computing the stable manifolds of equilibria and limit cycles of saddle type in piecewise smooth dynamical systems. All singular points that are generically present along one-dimensional or two-dimensional manifolds are classified and such a classification is then used to define a method for the numerical computation of the stable manifolds. Finally the proposed method is applied to the case of a stick-slip oscillator. More >

H.Nguyen-Van¹, N.Mai-Duy¹ and T.Tran-Cong¹

CMES-Computer Modeling in Engineering & Sciences, Vol.49, No.2, pp. 81-112, 2009, DOI:10.3970/cmes.2009.049.081

Abstract This paper reports the development of a simple and efficient 4-node flat shell element with six degrees of freedom per node for the analysis of arbitrary shell structures. The element is developed by incorporating a strain smoothing technique into a flat shell finite element approach. The membrane part is formulated by applying the smoothing operation on a quadrilateral membrane element using Allman-type interpolation functions with drilling DOFs. The plate-bending component is established by a combination of the smoothed curvature and the substitute shear strain fields. As a result, the bending and a part of membrane More >

V.V. Zozulya¹

CMES-Computer Modeling in Engineering & Sciences, Vol.42, No.3, pp. 187-216, 2009, DOI:10.3970/cmes.2009.042.187

Abstract The mathematical statement for contact problem with unilateral restrictions and friction is done in classical and weak forms. Different variational formulation of unilateral contact problems with friction based on principles of virtual displacements and virtual stresses are considered. Especially boundary variational functionals that are used with boundary integral equations have been established. Nonsmooth optimization algorithms of Udzawa type for solution of unilateral contact problem with friction have been developed. Some theoretical results of existence and uniqueness in elastostatic unilateral contact problem with friction are outlined. More >