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“The novel film mainly composed of zein and poly(propylene carbonate) (PPC) was developed to study its feasibility as an alternative to petroleum-based plastics for food or non-food packaging, in combination with the acetone-pretreatment along with extrusion process using a conical twin-screw extruder. The effects of film formulation (the ratio of corn-zein to PPC, and plasticizer concentration) on physicochemical properties of extruded films were investigated. The results indicate that the addition of buy BEZ235 PPC with an appropriate concentration could

improve the tensile strength and water resistance of the extruded zein-PPC film. In addition, PPC has a minor role in the film transparency and in contrast, the film transparency is highly dependent on the concentration of glycerol. Moreover, different models were used to describe the relationship

between the tensile strength and humidity conditions. The Halsey model was identified as an ideal model LY2835219 molecular weight perfectly fitting the experimental data, suggesting that the tensile strength of zein-PPC film was decreased with increasing equilibrium moisture content (EMC) of films. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) revealed that the extruded film consisted of a single phase and also, the presence of PPC has a significant impact on the internal and external structures of the films. Furthermore, the results obtained from thermogravimetric analysis (TGA)

showed the improved thermal stability of extruded zein-PPC film when compared to either the pure PPC or zein film. In conclusion, zein-PPC film could be considered a promising candidate to replace conventional petroleum-based plastic used in composite for packaging applications. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.”
“Objective: To elucidate in vivo hip instability by comparing normal hips to hips with acetabular dysplasia by evaluating three-dimensional (3D) translations of the femoral Blebbistatin head center (FHC) at different hip positions using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

Design: Forty normal hips and 22 dysplastic female hips were examined. MRI was performed at four different positions bilaterally: neutral, 45 degrees of flexion, 15 degrees of extension, and the Patrick position. Femoral and pelvic bones were separately extracted at the neutral position and superimposed over the images of each different position using voxel-based registration. The distance between the acetabular center and FHC at neutral position was defined as 3D-migration. The distance between FHC at neutral position and that at each different position was defined as 3D-translation. Two-way repeated measures analysis of variance was performed to consider the dependency between right and left-side data, and multiple linear regression analyses were performed to assess independent relationships.