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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Local Heating With Lithographically Fabricated Plasmonic Titanium Nitride Nanoparticles, Urcan Guler, Justus Ndukaife, Gururaj Naik, Agbai Nnanna, Alexander Kildishev, V. Shalaev, Alexandra Boltasseva Jul 2015

Local Heating With Lithographically Fabricated Plasmonic Titanium Nitride Nanoparticles, Urcan Guler, Justus Ndukaife, Gururaj Naik, Agbai Nnanna, Alexander Kildishev, V. Shalaev, Alexandra Boltasseva

U. Guler

Titanium nitride is considered a promising alternative plasmonic material and is known to exhibit localized surface plasmon resonances within the near-infrared biological transparency window. Here, local heating efficiencies of disk-shaped nanoparticles made of titanium nitride and gold are compared in the visible and near-infrared regions numerically and experimentally with samples fabricated using e-beam lithography. Results show that plasmonic titanium nitride nanodisks are efficient local heat sources and outperform gold nanodisks in the biological transparency window, dispensing the need for complex particle geometries.


Acrylamide Production Using Encapsulated Nitrile Hydratase From Pseudonocardia Thermophila In A Sol–Gel Matrix, Salette Martinez, Misty Kuhn, James Russell, Richard Holz, Timothy Elgren Mar 2015

Acrylamide Production Using Encapsulated Nitrile Hydratase From Pseudonocardia Thermophila In A Sol–Gel Matrix, Salette Martinez, Misty Kuhn, James Russell, Richard Holz, Timothy Elgren

Richard C. Holz

The cobalt-type nitrile hydratase from Pseudonocardia thermophila JCM 3095 (PtNHase) was successfully encapsulated in tetramethyl orthosilicate sol–gel matrices to produce a PtNHase:sol–gel biomaterial. The PtNHase:sol–gel biomaterial catalyzed the conversion of 600 mM acrylonitrile to acrylamide in 60 min at 35 °C with a yields of >90%. Treatment of the biomaterial with proteases confirmed that the catalytic activity is due to the encapsulated enzyme and not surface bound NHase. The biomaterial retained 50% of its activity after being used for a total of 13 consecutive reactions for the conversion of acrylonitrile to acrylamide. The thermostability and long-term storage of the PtNHase:sol–gel …