Narrow Results

Micro-beam scanning system for PIXE analysis newly installed in National Institute of Radiological Sciences (NIRS) was introduced in this paper. Fine ring structure of a fish scale was observed using elemental mapping with proton micro-beam scanning. Pollen was analyzed as one example of single cell to demonstrate the elemental distribution. The minimum size of the proton beam is estimated as 0.4×0.65 μ m.

The following topics are under this section:

• ASIA-PACIFIC — Identification of Therapeutic Points for Genetically Diverse and Fatal Leukaemia
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Novel Microfluidic Processes for Drug Development
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Development of Anti-Microbial Coating against COVID-19
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Partnership between Arcturus Therapeutics and Duke-NUS Medical School to develop COVID-19 Vaccine
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Nanoscopic Insights to Proteins against Huntington’s Disease
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Unravelling the Impact of Marine Heatwave on Coral Reef Fishes
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Regulation of Plant Pores by MicroRNAs
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Discovering Clues to Longevity in Our Genome
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Repurposing Nature’s Products to Viable Materials
• ASIA-PACIFIC — Reverse Conversion of Oestrogens to Androgens
• REST OF THE WORLD — HER2-targeted Antibody Drug Conjugate Shows Promise in Patients with Non-Breast-Gastric Cancers
• REST OF THE WORLD — New Research finds Teeth as a Biological Archive
• REST OF THE WORLD — Finding Treatment for Muscular Dystrophy using CRISPR

Natural biotemplates — such as bacteria, fungi and viruses — are used in nanostructured metal oxide production. The pollen can be found abundantly in nature, and their microcapsules can be easily isolated from the pollen by chemical treatments. To date, pollen microcapsules are mostly used as drug carriers and catalytic agent templates. In the present study, nanoporous-structured nickel oxide is produced using Pistachio pollen microcapsules. The raw pollen, chemically treated pollen and metal-coated pollen were characterized using scanning electron microscopy, Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface area analysis, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), differential thermal analysis (DTA) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) techniques. The natural Pistachio pollen which were procured from Gaziantep, Turkey, are spherical, with a diameter of approximately 23$\mu$m. The maximum surface area obtained for nickel oxide-coated microcapsules is 228.82m²/g. This result shows that Pistachio pollen are an excellent candidate for the production of porous nanostructured materials for supercapacitor electrodes.