| 1/14 |
Dr. Tiglet Besara |
Introduction to research at PAMS |
| 1/21 |
Dr. Jason Jackiewicz
New Mexico State University
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Seismology of Sun and Stars |
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Abstract: For over 100 years, Earth seismologists have been compiling a detailed understanding of our planet’s interior from earthquake data and theoretical modeling. When oscillations in the Sun were first observed about 50 years ago, solar seismologists were in the fortunate position to “adopt” the tools geoseismologists had developed to peer inside our nearest star. Only within the past 10 years, seismology of distant pulsating stars has become possible, and very powerful. The coming decade holds promise for exploiting oscillations of giant planets to probe their (currently unknown) internal structure.
Seismology of these distinct objects is in principle equivalent: it comprises a set of tools to measure and interpret oscillation data with the aim of making inferences of sub-surface structure and dynamics at the highest spatial and temporal resolution possible. This talk will discuss the techniques (measurements, modeling, inversions, etc.) that seismologists employ, and present some exciting results in the context of solar/stellar structure and evolution that make this an era of precision astrophysics.
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| 1/28 |
Dr. Michael Gordon
Æsir Technologies |
Nickel-Zinc Battery Research Opportunities |
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Abstract: Æsir Technologies, a company that has developed a Nickel Zinc (NiZn) battery chemistry to address a broad range of industries including defense, data center, and automotive.
The NiZn chemistry has a variety of advantages over lead acid and Li-ion batteries. Æsir’s production G31 battery has 1.5 times the capacity, 3 times the cycle-life, and two-thirds the mass of the top-of-the-line G31 lead acid AGM battery. Additionally, the NiZn chemistry is aqueous making it inherently safer and less expensive than Li-ion.
NiZn chemistry was first patented by Thomas Edison in 1901, but the technology remained mostly idle for 100 years due to low cycle life. Æsir has made significant progress over the past 10 years and is now scaling up production of its 140 Ah G31 battery capable of over 800 cycles at 100% DOD. However, there is still ample room for improving the performance for the NiZn chemistry. The amount of research resources put into the NiZn chemistry is miniscule compared that of lead-acid and li-ion chemistries.
This presentation will review the history of nickel-zinc batteries, recent advances made by Æsir, and areas of future research.
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| 2/4 |
Kwabena Asante Boahen (PAMS) |
Modeling of Argon Bombardment and Densification of Low-temperature Organic Precursors using Reactive Molecular Dynamics Simulations and Machine Learning |
| Abiodun Odusanya |
A Study of Laser-assisted Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) Technique to Grow Carbon-based Materials
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| 2/11 |
Dr. Oliver C. Grant
Complex Carbohydrate Research Center, University of Georgia |
Virus-Receptor Interactions of Glycosylated SARS-CoV-2 Spike and Human ACE2 Receptor |
| Note! This seminar will be at 12:00 pm (noon), a so-called brown bag seminar. |
Abstract: Cellular infection by the 2019 severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) is initiated by binding of the viral spike glycoprotein (S) to its receptor, the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), which is present on the cellular membrane of human tissues and organs including the lung, intestine and kidney. The SARS-CoV-2 S trimer contains 66 N-linked glycosylation sites, which have been implicated in immune evasion and modulating receptor binding affinity. All sites are occupied by glycans when the spike protein is produced recombinantly in HEK-293 cells, or isolated from virus-derived trimers, or from trimers derived from a viral vectored SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidate. The human ACE2 (hACE2) receptor contains 6 potential N-linked glycosylation sites that were also found to be occupied under equivalent expression conditions. Recently, we combined a glycoproteomic analysis of the S glycoprotein and hACE2 with molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to generate 3D models of glycosylated hACE2 bound to the S glycoprotein trimer. An analysis of the MD simulations of these 3D structures led to the prediction that ACE2 glycans directly with the S glycoprotein. Thus differences in the occupancy or composition of glycans at these positions may modulate the strength of the S protein - ACE2 interaction, which may in turn impact infectivity, disease severity and transmissibility.
Our results highlight roles for glycans in sterically masking polypeptide epitopes and directly modulating Spike-ACE2 interactions. Furthermore, our results illustrate the impact of viral evolution and divergence on Spike glycosylation, as well as the influence of natural variants on ACE2 receptor glycosylation that, taken together, can facilitate immunogen design to achieve antibody neutralization and inform therapeutic strategies to inhibit viral infection. |
| 2/18 |
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| 2/25 |
Dr. Cathy Wong
University of Oregon |
TBA |
| 3/4 |
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| 3/11 |
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| 3/18 |
Spring break: no seminar |
| 3/25 |
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| 4/1 |
Joshua Kern
Clemson University |
TBA |
| 4/8 |
Shannon Dulz
University of Notre Dame |
TBA |
| 4/15 |
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| 4/22 |
Dr. Marilu Perez
Ames National Laboratory |
TBA |
| 4/29 |
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| 5/6 |
Finals week: No seminar |
