A comparison of emulsifiers for the formation of oil-in-water emulsions: stability of the emulsions within 9 h after production and MR signal properties

Objective

To provide a basis for the selection of suitable emulsifiers in oil-in-water emulsions used as tissue analogs for MRI experiments. Three different emulsifiers were investigated with regard to their ability to stabilize tissue-like oil-in-water emulsions. Furthermore, MR signal properties of the emulsifiers themselves and influences on relaxation times and ADC values of the aqueous phase were investigated.

Materials and methods

Polysorbate 60, sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) and soy lecithin were used as emulsifiers. MR characteristics of emulsifiers were assessed in aqueous solutions and their function as a stabilizer was examined in oil-in-water emulsions of varying fat content (10, 20, 30, 40, 50%). Stability and homogeneity of the oil-in-water emulsions were evaluated with a delay of 3 h and 9 h after preparation using T₁ mapping and visual control. Signal properties of the emulsifiers were investigated by ¹H-MRS in aqueous emulsifier solutions. Relaxometry and diffusion weighted MRI (DWI) were performed to investigate the effect of various emulsifier concentrations on relaxation times (T₁ and T₂) and ADC values of aqueous solutions.

Results

Emulsions stabilized by polysorbate 60 or soy lecithin were stable and homogeneous across all tested fat fractions. In contrast, emulsions with SDS showed a significantly lower stability and homogeneity. Recorded T₁ maps revealed marked creaming of oil droplets in almost all of the emulsions with SDS. The spectral analysis showed several additional signals for polysorbate and SDS. However, lecithin remained invisible in ¹H-MRS. Relaxometry and DWI revealed different influences of the emulsifiers on water: Polysorbate and SDS showed only minor effects on relaxation times and ADC values of aqueous solutions, whereas lecithin showed a strong decrease in both relaxation times (r_1,lecithin = 0.11 wt.%⁻¹ s⁻¹, r_2,lecithin = 0.57 wt.%⁻¹ s⁻¹) and ADC value (Δ(ADC)_lecithin =  − 0.18 × 10^–3 mm²/s⋅wt.%) with increasing concentration.

Conclusion

Lecithin is suggested as the preferred emulsifier of oil-in-water emulsions in MRI as it shows a high stabilizing ability and remains invisible in MRI experiments. In addition, lecithin is suitable as an alternative means of adjusting relaxation times and ADC values of water.

     

Correction to: Matrix spectral factorization for SA4 multiwavelet

Multidimensional Systems and Signal Processing - After a careful review of the published version of our paper, we discovered that some references to the number of multiwavelet decomposition and...     

Development and validation of a new friction model for cutting processes

The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology - The friction model in the tool-chip interface has significant influences on predicting chip forms, cutting forces, and cutting tool...     

Design of 25 Gbit/s half-rate CDR with 1:2 demultiplexer for 100 GbE optical interconnects

A 25 Gbit/s clock and data recovery(CDR) circuit with 1:2 demultiplexer for 100 Gbit/s Ethernet(100 Gb E) optical interconnects has been designed and fabricated in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacture Company(TSMC) 65 nm complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor(CMOS) technology. A novel quadrature voltage-controlled-oscillator(QVCO) structure adopts two pairs of transconductance cell and inverters to acquire rail-to-rail output swing. A half-rate bang-bang phase detector adopts four flip-flops array to sample the 25 Gbit/s input data and align the data phase, so the 25 Gbit/s data are retimed and demultiplexed into two paths 12.5 Gbit/s output data. Experimental results show that the recovered clock exhibits a peak-to-peak jitter of 7.39 ps and the recovered data presents a peak-to-peak jitter of 7.56 ps, in response to 312-1 pseudorandom bit sequence(PRBS) input. For 1.2 V voltage supply, the CDR circuit consumes 92 m W(excluding output buffers).     

适应新常态,引领新常态,开创涂料行业新局面——2015年中国涂料、颜料行业工作年会在杭州隆重召开

草长莺飞的季节,春意盎然。3月26日,在素有"上有天堂下有苏杭"美誉之一的杭州,迎来了一年一度的涂料行业盛会——由中国涂料工业协会主办、为期两天的以"绿色环保,政策引导,共建未来"为主题的"2015年中国涂料、颜料行业工作年会"。有来自全国涂料、颜料、原材料及相关行业的约560名代表齐聚一堂,回眸2014,展望2015,共同探讨新常态下涂料行业产业升级、结构调整、节能减排,围绕涂料行业经济运行、涂料消费税、绿色建材政策、工业涂装VOC控制、水性工业涂料、全球涂料发展等热点进行探讨与交流。中国涂料工业协会会长孙莲英女士、国家工信部原材料司副司长潘爱华先生、国家税务总局领导、浙江省涂料行业协会理事长程磊楠先生、中国涂料工业协会秘书长杨渊德先生等领导嘉宾出席了会议。大会先后由中国涂料工业协会副秘书长刘丹、副秘书长刘杰,专家委员会主任桂泰江主持。     

Ultrastrong Medium‐Entropy Single‐Phase Alloys Designed via Severe Lattice Distortion

Severe lattice distortion is a core effect in the design of multiprincipal element alloys with the aim to enhance yield strength, a key indicator in structural engineering. Yet, the yield strength values of medium‐ and high‐entropy alloys investigated so far do not substantially exceed those of conventional alloys owing to the insufficient utilization of lattice distortion. Here it is shown that a simple VCoNi equiatomic medium‐entropy alloy exhibits a near 1 GPa yield strength and good ductility, outperforming conventional solid‐solution alloys. It is demonstrated that a wide fluctuation of the atomic bond distances in such alloys, i.e., severe lattice distortion, improves both yield stress and its sensitivity to grain size. In addition, the dislocation‐mediated plasticity effectively enhances the strength–ductility relationship by generating nanosized dislocation substructures due to massive pinning. The results demonstrate that severe lattice distortion is a key property for identifying extra‐strong materials for structural engineering applications.     

Preparation of Silver Nanowires via a Rapid,Scalable and Green Pathway

Rapid synthesis of silver nanowires(Ag NWs) with high quality and a broad processing window is challenging because of the low selectivity of the formation of multiply twinned particles at the nucleation stage for subsequent Ag NWs growth.Herein we report a systematic study of the water-involved heterogeneous nucleation of Ag NWs with high rate(less than 20 min) in a simple and scalable preparation method.Using glycerol as a reducing agent and a solvent with a high boiling point,the reaction is rapidly heated to 210 ℃ in air to synthesize Ag NWs with a very high yield in gram level.It is noted that the addition of a small dose of water plays a key role for obtaining highly pure Ag NWs in high yield,and the optimal water/glycerol ratio is0.25%.After investigating a series of forming factors including reaction temperature and dose of catalysts,the formation kinetics and mechanism of the Ag NWs are proposed.Compared to other preparation methods,our strategy is simple and reproducible.These Ag NWs show a strong Raman enhancement effect for organic molecules on their surface.     

WIRELESS BODY-AREA NETWORKS

The last decade has witnessed the convergence of three giant worlds:electronics,computer science and telecommunications.The next decade should follow this convergence in most of our activities with the generalization of sensor networks.In particular with the progress in medicine,people live longer and the aging of population will push the development of wireless person-     

影像导引肝脏恶性肿瘤多模态消融治疗技术专家共识

影像导引肝脏恶性肿瘤多模态消融治疗是以医学影像技术为导引，在冷冻消融与热消融交替转换过程中，通过对病灶区温度精准控制和消融过程定量规划，彻底破坏原位肿瘤细胞及其循环系统，同时最大程度释放活性肿瘤抗原，从而达到控制肝脏恶性肿瘤复发转移的目的。为规范肝脏恶性肿瘤多模态消融治疗技术操作，便于不同层级医院开展实施，确保医疗安全和临床疗效，中国抗癌协会肿瘤介入学专业委员会和上海市抗癌协会实体肿瘤聚焦诊疗专业委员会组织国内肿瘤治疗领域的多学科专家共同参与，认真讨论，最终达成本共识。