The protein-coding region of an intronless human calmodulin-like gene [Koller, M., & Strehler, E. E. (1988) FEBS Lett. 239, 121-128] has been inserted into a pKK233-2 expression vector, and the 148-residue, M(r) = 16,800 human protein was purified to apparent homogeneity by phenyl-Sepharose affinity chromatography from cultures of Escherichia coli JM105 transformed with the recombinant vector. Several milligrams of the purified protein were obtained from 1 L of bacterial culture. A number of properties of human CLP were compared to those of bacterially expressed human calmodulin (CaM) and of bovine brain CaM. CLP showed a characteristic Ca(2+)-dependent electrophoretic mobility shift on SDS-polyacrylamide gels, although the magnitude of this shift was smaller than that observed with CaM. CLP was able to activate the 3',5'-cyclic nucleotide phosphodiesterase to the same Vmax as normal CaM, albeit with a 7-fold higher Kact. In contrast, the erythrocyte plasma membrane Ca(2+)-ATPase could only be stimulated to 62% of its maximal CaM-dependent activity by CLP. CLP was found to contain four Ca(2+)-binding sites with a mean affinity constant of 10(5) M-1, a value about 10-fold lower than that for CaM under comparable conditions. The highly tissue-specifically-expressed CLP represents a novel human Ca(2+)-binding protein showing characteristics of a CaM isoform.

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This work presents an approach to monitoring the State-Of-Charge of Lithium-Ion battery cells via piezo disc-based ultrasonic Time-Of-Flight measurement by measuring the traveling time of a mechanical pulse through the cell between two surface-mounted sensors. The main advantage of this approach is the simplicity and the resulting low cost, which makes it suitable for future application in battery management systems. In detail, the excitation of the piezo actuator is done using a single semiconductor switch instead of a power amplifier, and the received signal is processed with an amplifier and Schmitt-trigger combination to condition the signal for the microprocessor, which is part of a battery management system. Both the functionality and the limits of the design are evaluated with a high energy density Lithium-Ion pouch cell under different operational scenarios. Several parameters such as temperature, current rates, and excitation frequency are varied to prove the design concept. For validation purposes, an estimation function is generated and a real-world driving cycle applied. An estimation with an error of 1.29 % of the Time-Of-Flight total value or 16.85 % of the State-Of-Charge value under challenging conditions is achieved with the current setup.INDEX TERMS Battery management system, diagnostics, lithium-ion battery, piezoelectric transducers, state-of-charge, time-of-flight, ultrasonic.