Electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide is a promising approach to decrease the amount of anthropogenic CO2 being released into the atmosphere, provided that a surplus of renewable electrical energy is available. Copper based materials are at the cente ...
Dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) are interesting soft actuators compared to other actuation technologies owing to large achievable actuation strains, high energy density and fast actuation. However, because DEAs need to be operated under high electric ...
The objective of this PhD thesis is the development of a microfluidic platform for the real-time measurements of the mechanical properties of biological analytes at the single entity level.
The systems developed for these purposes consist of piezoelectrica ...
DNA fragmentation is an essential process in developing genetic sequencing strategies, genetic research, as well as for the diagnosis of diseases with a genetic signature like cancer. Efficient on-chip DNA fragmentation protocols would be beneficial to pro ...
Why biological quality-control systems fail is often mysterious. Specifically, checkpoints such as the DNA damage checkpoint or the spindle assembly checkpoint are overriden after prolonged arrests allowing cells to continue dividing despite the continued ...
Natural competence for transformation is an important driver of horizontal DNA exchange between different organisms. This can result in accumulation of dangerous genetic features, such as antibiotic resistance genes, in a single organism. One example of an ...
Difficulties to replicate telomeres - the ends of our chromosomes - can cause telomere shortening and
genome instability. These difficulties are due to the repetitive DNA sequence and distinct structures at telomeres
that challenge the semi-conservative DN ...
Type I CRISPR-Cas systems typically rely on a two-step process to degrade DNA. First, an RNA-guided complex named Cascade identifies the complementary DNA target. The helicase-nuclease fusion enzyme Cas3 is then recruited in trans for processive DNA degrad ...
We report an experimental investigation of the lifetime of dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) under constant DC actuation, with a characterization setup which allows the monitoring of strain and resistance over time for 6 DEAs in parallel. We show how t ...
Nucleic acid sensing through pattern recognition receptors is critical for immune recognition of microbial infections. Microbial DNA is frequently methylated at the N-6 position of adenines (m6A), a modification that is rare in mammalian host DNA. We show ...
Sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) have developed rapidly owing to the high natural abundance, wide distribution, and low cost of sodium. Among the various materials used in SIBs, sodium superion conductor (NASICON)-based electrode materials with remarkable struc ...