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Plasma diagnostics is important to identify plasma parameters and generate reproducible plasma in magnetron sputtering. Langmuir probes have been used to measure local plasma parameters such as electron temperature (Te), charge densities (ne and ni), and plasma potential (Vp). Pulsed direct current (dc) power in the midfrequency range (50–250 kHz) has been used in growing insulating films without charging accumulations at target. Recent investigations showed increased energetic particle bombardment of the substrate in pulsed power. In this work, aluminum nitride thin films were fabricated by pulsed dc power sputter deposition. The argon and nitrogen plasma was characterized by Langmuir probe measurement. The electron temperature in argon and nitrogen plasma was observed to increased from 3.06 to 5.32 eV when the pulsed dc frequency increased from 75 to 250 kHz. The ion density and energy flux were found to increase with frequency. This is believed to be from the stochastic heating generated by the fast oscillation in the target voltage wave form. The measured plasma characteristics were correlated with the crystal orientation of AlN thin films. The crystal structure of AlN thin films changed to (002) preferred orientations as the ion and energy flux increased.

Ten-day sequential therapy is found to effectively eradicate H. pylori infection as first-line treatment in Korea.

Glycogen synthase kinase 3b (GSK3b), which is abundantly present in the brain, is known to contribute to psychomotor stimulant-induced locomotor behaviors. However, most studies have been focused in showing that GSK3b is able to attenuate psychomotor stimulants-induced hyperactivity by increasing its phosphorylation levels in the nucleus accumbens (NAcc). So, here we examined in the opposite direction about the effects of decreased phosphorylation of GSK3b in the NAcc core on both basal and cocaine-induced locomotor activity by a bilateral microinjection into this site of an artificially synthesized peptide, S9 (0.5 or 5.0 lg/lL), which contains sequences around N-terminal serine 9 residue of GSK3b. We found that decreased levels of GSK3b phosphorylation in the NAcc core enhance cocaine-induced hyper-locomotor activity, while leaving basal locomotor activity unchanged. This is the first demonstration, to our knowledge, that the selective decrease of GSK3b phosphorylation levels in the NAcc core may contribute positively to cocaine-induced locomotor activity, while this is not sufficient for the generation of locomotor behavior by itself without cocaine. Taken together, these findings importantly suggest that GSK3b may need other molecular targets which are co-activated (or deactivated) by psychomotor stimulants like cocaine to contribute to generation of locomotor behaviors.

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