neuronal and astrocytic activation in somatosensory cortex by acupuncture stimuli.

Acupuncture is a medical treatment that has been widely practiced in China for over 3000 years, yet the neural mechanisms of acupuncture are not fully understood. We hypothesized that neurons and astrocytes act independently and synergistically under acupuncture stimulation. To investigate this, we used two-photon in vivo calcium recording to observe the effects of acupuncture stimulation at ST36 (Zusanli) in mice.

Low-Temperature-Processed High-Performance Pentacene OTFTs with Optimal Nd-Ti Oxynitride Mixture as Gate Dielectric.

When processed at a low temperature of 200 °C, organic thin-film transistors (OTFTs) with pentacene channel adopting high-k Neodymium-Titanium oxynitride mixtures (NdTiON) with various Ti contents as gate dielectrics are fabricated. The Ti content in the NdTiON is varied by co-sputtering a Ti target at 0 W, 10 W, 20 W and 30 W, respectively, while fixing the sputtering power of an Nd target at 45 W. High-performance OTFT is obtained for the 20 W-sputtered Ti, including a small threshold voltage of -0.

Improved subthreshold swing of MoS negative-capacitance transistor by fluorine-plasma treatment on ferroelectric HfZrO gate dielectric.

In this work, the ferroelectricity of hafnium zirconium oxide (HfZrO, HZO) is enhanced by fluorine (F)-plasma treatment, which is used to fabricate MoS negative-capacitance field-effect transistor. Measurements show that the subthreshold swing of the transistor is significantly reduced to 17.8 mV dec over almost four orders of output current, as compared to its counterpart without the F-plasma treatment (37.

Optimizing Al-doped ZrO as the gate dielectric for MoS field-effect transistors.

In this work, we investigate the effects on the electrical properties of few-layered MoS field-effect transistors (FETs) following Al incorporation into ZrO as the gate dielectrics of the devices. A large improvement in device performance is achieved with the Al-doped ZrO gate dielectric when Zr:Al = 1:1. The relevant MoS transistor exhibits the best electrical characteristics: high carrier mobility of 40.

Damage-free mica/MoS interface for high-performance multilayer MoS field-effect transistors.

For top-gated MoS field-effect transistors, damaging the MoS surface to the MoS channel are inevitable due to chemical bonding and/or high-energy metal atoms during the vacuum deposition of gate dielectric, thus leading to degradations of field-effect mobility (μ ) and subthreshold swing (SS). A top-gated MoS transistor is fabricated by directly transferring a 9 nm mica flake (as gate dielectric) onto the MoS surface without any chemical bonding, and exhibits excellent electrical properties with an on-off ratio of ∼10, a low threshold voltage of ∼0.2 V, a record μ of 134 cm V s, a small SS of 72 mV dec and a low interface-state density of 8.

Effects of HfO encapsulation on electrical performances of few-layered MoS transistor with ALD HfO as back-gate dielectric.

The carrier mobility of MoS transistors can be greatly improved by the screening role of high-k gate dielectric. In this work, atomic-layer deposited (ALD) HfO annealed in NH is used to replace SiO as the gate dielectric to fabricate back-gated few-layered MoS transistors, and good electrical properties are achieved with field-effect mobility (μ) of 19.1 cm V s, subthreshold swing (SS) of 123.

Design of superparamagnetic nanoparticles for magnetic particle imaging (MPI).

Magnetic particle imaging (MPI) is a promising medical imaging technique producing quantitative images of the distribution of tracer materials (superparamagnetic nanoparticles) without interference from the anatomical background of the imaging objects (either phantoms or lab animals). Theoretically, the MPI platform can image with relatively high temporal and spatial resolution and sensitivity. In practice, the quality of the MPI images hinges on both the applied magnetic field and the properties of the tracer nanoparticles.