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Selected Works

Engineering

2004

Articles 1 - 3 of 3

Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Biomimetic Actuators: Where Technology And Cell Biology Merge [Review Article], Michael Knoblauch, Winfried Peters Nov 2004

Biomimetic Actuators: Where Technology And Cell Biology Merge [Review Article], Michael Knoblauch, Winfried Peters

Winfried S. Peters

The structural and functional analysis of biological macromolecules has reached a level of resolution that allows mechanistic interpretations of molecular action, giving rise to the view of enzymes as molecular machines. This machine analogy is not merely metaphorical, as bio-analogous molecular machines actually are being used as motors in the fields of nanotechnology and robotics. As the borderline between molecular cell biology and technology blurs, developments in the engineering and material sciences become increasingly instructive sources of models and concepts for biologists. In this review, we provide a – necessarily selective – summary of recent progress in the usage of …

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Food Based Approaches For A Healthy Nutrition In Africa, Mamoudou Hama Dicko May 2004

Food Based Approaches For A Healthy Nutrition In Africa, Mamoudou Hama Dicko

Pr. Mamoudou H. DICKO, PhD

The latest estimates of the FAO demonstrate the problems of the fight against hunger. These problems are manifested by the ever-increasing number of chronically undernourished people worldwide. Their numbers during the 1999-2001 period were estimated at about 840 million of which 798 million live in developing countries. Sub-Saharan Africa alone represented 198 million of those. In this part of Africa the prevalence of undernourishment ranges from 5-34%, causing growth retardation and insufficient weight gain among one third of the children under five years of age and resulting in a mortality of 5-15% among these children. Malnutrition resulting from undernourishment is …

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Forisomes, A Novel Type Of Ca2+-Dependent Contractile Protein Motor [Review Article], Michael Knoblauch, Winfried Peters Apr 2004

Forisomes, A Novel Type Of Ca2+-Dependent Contractile Protein Motor [Review Article], Michael Knoblauch, Winfried Peters

Winfried S. Peters

This paper has no abstract; this is the first paragraph. Motility of cell components in both animal and plant cells is mostly based on the movement of motor proteins along actin filaments or microtubules [Boal, 2002]. The dominance of ATP hydrolysis as the energy source for such movements is so complete, that modern textbooks define “motor proteins” as nucleoside triphosphate-dependent actuators [e.g., Alberts et al., 2002]. In only one known case, a reversible mechanism of cell motility is driven by the interaction of Ca2+ and the responsive protein(s). Some sessile ciliates control the effective length of their stalk by means …

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