High-throughput vector-borne disease environmental surveillance by polymerase chain reaction according to international accreditation requirements.

Although vector-borne diseases are specific to the region of the host, there is a necessity for surveillance or reference laboratories to perform standardized, high-throughput testing capable of meeting the needs of a changing military environment and response efforts. The development of standardized, high-throughput, semiquantitative real-time and reverse transcription real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) methods allows for the timely dissemination of data to interested parties while providing a platform in which long-term sample storage is possible for the testing of new pathogens of interest using a historical perspective. PCR testing allows for the analysis of multiple pathogens from the same sample, thus reducing the workload of entomologists in the field and increasing the ability to determine if a pathogen has spread beyond traditionally defined locations.

Determination and simulation of nanoscale energy dissipation processes in amplitude modulation AFM.

We develop a theoretical framework that explains the use of amplitude modulation AFM to measure and identify energy dissipation processes at the nanoscale. The variation of the dissipated energy on a surface by a vibrating tip as a function of its amplitude has a shape that singles out the dissipative process. The method is illustrated by calculating the dynamic-dissipation curves for surface adhesion energy hysteresis, long-range interfacial interactions and viscoelastic processes.

Molecular scale energy dissipation in oligothiophene monolayers measured by dynamic force microscopy.

We perform a combined experimental and theoretical approach to establish the atomistic origin of energy dissipation occurring while imaging a molecular surface with an amplitude modulation atomic force microscope. We show that the energy transferred by a single nano-asperity to a sexithiophene monolayer is about 0.15 eV/cycle.