Classifications

• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A01—AGRICULTURE; FORESTRY; ANIMAL HUSBANDRY; HUNTING; TRAPPING; FISHING
  • A01N—PRESERVATION OF BODIES OF HUMANS OR ANIMALS OR PLANTS OR PARTS THEREOF; BIOCIDES, e.g. AS DISINFECTANTS, AS PESTICIDES OR AS HERBICIDES; PEST REPELLANTS OR ATTRACTANTS; PLANT GROWTH REGULATORS
  • A01N1/00—Preservation of bodies of humans or animals, or parts thereof
  • A01N1/10—Preservation of living parts
  • A01N1/16—Physical preservation processes
  • A01N1/168—Physical preservation processes using electromagnetic fields or radiation; using acoustic waves or corpuscular radiation
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A01—AGRICULTURE; FORESTRY; ANIMAL HUSBANDRY; HUNTING; TRAPPING; FISHING
  • A01N—PRESERVATION OF BODIES OF HUMANS OR ANIMALS OR PLANTS OR PARTS THEREOF; BIOCIDES, e.g. AS DISINFECTANTS, AS PESTICIDES OR AS HERBICIDES; PEST REPELLANTS OR ATTRACTANTS; PLANT GROWTH REGULATORS
  • A01N1/00—Preservation of bodies of humans or animals, or parts thereof
  • A01N1/10—Preservation of living parts
  • A01N1/14—Mechanical aspects of preservation; Apparatus or containers therefor
  • A01N1/142—Apparatus
  • A01N1/144—Apparatus for temperature control, e.g. refrigerators or freeze-drying apparatus
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A23—FOODS OR FOODSTUFFS; TREATMENT THEREOF, NOT COVERED BY OTHER CLASSES
  • A23B—PRESERVATION OF FOODS, FOODSTUFFS OR NON-ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES; CHEMICAL RIPENING OF FRUIT OR VEGETABLES
  • A23B2/00—Preservation of foods or foodstuffs, in general
  • A23B2/60—Preservation of foods or foodstuffs, in general by treatment with electric currents without heating effect
• • A—HUMAN NECESSITIES
  • A23—FOODS OR FOODSTUFFS; TREATMENT THEREOF, NOT COVERED BY OTHER CLASSES
  • A23B—PRESERVATION OF FOODS, FOODSTUFFS OR NON-ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES; CHEMICAL RIPENING OF FRUIT OR VEGETABLES
  • A23B2/00—Preservation of foods or foodstuffs, in general
  • A23B2/80—Freezing; Subsequent thawing; Cooling
  • A23B2/805—Materials not being transported through or in the apparatus with or without shaping, e.g. in the form of powders, granules or flakes

Definitions

• the present disclosure relates to electromagnetic freezing and enhancement of electromagnetic freezing by the application of magnetic fields that cause the elliptically to circularly-polarized oscillation of tiny magnetic particles (usually biogenic magnetite), inhibiting the nucleation of ice crystals on their surface. More in particular, it relates to enhancement of electromagnetic freezing by stabilization and oscillation of biogenic magnetite particles.
• a system to freeze biological tissues comprising: a container, configured to contain biological tissues; a static magnetic field generator, configured to apply a static magnetic field to biological tissues in the container; an oscillating magnetic field generator, configured to apply an oscillating magnetic field to the biological tissues in the container; a freezing element, configured to freeze the biological tissues in the container.
• a method to freeze biological tissues comprising: providing a refrigerating container, configured to contain and freeze biological tissues; aligning magnetic particles in biological tissues by applying a static magnetic field to the biological tissues in the container; vibrating the magnetic particles in the biological tissues by applying an oscillating magnetic field to the biological tissues in the container, wherein the oscillating magnetic field is perpendicular to the static magnetic field; freezing the biological tissues while the static and oscillating magnetic fields are active.
• a method to freeze biological tissues comprising: providing a refrigerating container configured to contain and freeze biological tissues, the refrigerating container having a plurality of needle-shaped electrodes pointing at the biological tissues, the needle-shaped electrodes being substantially close to, but separated from, the biological tissues; aligning magnetic particles in the biological tissues by applying a static magnetic field to the biological tissues in the container; vibrating the magnetic particles in the biological tissues in an elliptical or circular manner by applying an oscillating magnetic field to the biological tissues in the container, wherein the oscillating magnetic field is perpendicular to the static magnetic field with a component of rotation around it; applying a voltage difference between the needle-shaped electrodes and the biological tissues, thereby producing ions in an air layer surrounding the biological tissues; freezing the biological tissues while the voltage difference and the static and oscillating magnetic fields are active.
• FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary freezing container with magnetic fields.
• FIG. 2 illustrates an exemplary method for freezing tissues. DETAILED DESCRIPTION
• the present disclosure relates to enhancement of electromagnetic freezing by the application of magnetic fields that cause the elliptically to circularly-polarized oscillation of tiny magnetic particles (usually biogenic magnetite), inhibiting the nucleation of ice crystals on their surface.
• Freezing is an important technological process in a variety of fields, including but not limited to the food industry. Freezing reduces the time rate of biological and chemical processes, therefore it can be used, for example, to reduce the rate of microbial activity which spoils food consumable by humans or animals.
• Refrigeration and freezing technologies can have difficulty in preserving plant and animal tissues for shipping because of the damage that ice crystals produce when the material freezes. For example, freezing fruits and vegetables is a particular problem.
• CAS cells alive system
• the CAS system employs a combination of conventional freezer technology coupled with selected oscillating electrical and magnetic fields, as well as the application of sound waves.
• the ABI Corporation claims to have improved the ability to freeze much larger volumes of animal and vegetable matter with minimal damage to cellular ultrastructure from ice crystal growth.
• the programmable CAS freezers expose samples to low-frequency oscillating electric and magnetic fields, and weak sound, while controlling the supercooling of the materials in the critical temperature interval from 0 ° C to - 20°C by blowing refrigerated air on the samples (see, for example, references [1], [2], and [3]).
• Electromagnetic freezing techniques such as the CAS technique, can be used to cryopreserve many 'liquid' tissues like blood, semen, human eggs, fertilized embryos, and cell cultures.
• the addition of suitably tailored ferromagnetic particles could improve the efficiency of electromagnetic freezing techniques by increasing the density of magnetic vibrating sites that would act to inhibit the ice crystal formation process, and correspondingly increase the number of point nucleation sites when the initiation of freezing is desired. Therefore, adding ferromagnetic particles, additional to ferromagnetic clusters naturally present in biological tissues, can enhance cryopreservation methods and systems.
• the exemplary embodiments of the present disclosure show that such explanation is not scientifically sound.
• heat transport during electromagnetic freezing with applied sound waves is a result of an electrostatic 'corona' wind effect.
• the electrostatic corona wind effect could be enhanced by the addition of an array of needle electrodes (for example, see reference [1 1]).
• the array of needle electrodes could apply a high- voltage electric field and maximize the electrostatic corona effect by generating more ions to move the air that surrounds the biological tissues to be frozen. Therefore, needle electrodes could be used to increase heat transport in electromagnetic freezers.
• the needle electrodes generate ions due to electrostatic effects. In such cases pointed electrodes create a localized electrostatic field of higher value, where ions are more likely to be created. The movement of the ions in the electrostatic field can then disturb the air layer around the biological tissues to be frozen.
• the possible inhibitory action of electromagnetic fields on ice nucleation and crystallization during cryopreservation can be the starting point of several industrial methods. These methods can originate a major advance in global food-storage techniques. For example, strong electric fields can disrupt the surface boundary layer of inert air on the surface of materials that need to be frozen (e.g. as biological tissues), thus promoting higher rates of evaporation and greater heat transport.
• the exemplary embodiments of the present disclosure describe how low-frequency acoustic waves produced by the oscillating ferromagnetic clusters in biological tissues may cause the inhibition of ice crystal nucleation, while allowing tissues to reach supercritical states before crystallization sets in. In such a way, biological tissues can be better preserved, as it is known to a person skilled in the art that crystallization may damage biological tissue and degrade their status upon defreezing.
• pre-treatment of fresh tissues with strong, static magnetic fields may enhance freezing by inhibition and reversal of magnetosome chain collapse.
• the simultaneous application of oscillating and static magnetic fields may preserve magnetosome chains.
• a magnetic field rotating at a low- frequency perpendicular to a static magnetic field with a higher intensity than the oscillating field can be advantageously applied to biological tissues to preserve chains of magnetic particles, thereby improving the freezing of biological tissues.
• magnetosomes are membrane-bound structures present in magnetotactic microorganisms. They are able to orient along the magnetic field lines of Earth's magnetic field, due to the permanent magnetic dipole moment of their encapsulated single-domain magnetite crystals, which are spontaneously ferrimagnetic. Individual cells can contain from a single to thousands of discrete magnetosomes, depending on the species or tissues. Each magnetite crystal within a magnetosome is surrounded by a lipid bilayer, and specific soluble and transmembrane proteins are sorted to the membrane.
• magnetictosome may be used as a general term to indicate any magnetic particle or cluster of magnetic particles that are present in biological tissues, whether naturally or artificially introduced.
• electromagnetic freezing such as the CAS technology
• Electromagnetic freezing can also promote whole-organism survival of small animals like drosophila (see, for example, reference [7]) when frozen.
• references [1], [2], [3], and [8] postulate two mechanisms of action that do not agree with basic biophysics.
• a first argument presented in references [1], [2], [3] and [8] states that the oscillating electric and magnetic fields are supposed to directly 'wiggle' water molecules to inhibit the nucleation of ice crystals in the supercooled state, as well as promoting rapid and isothermal cooling of the sample interiors.
• the second argument presented in references [1], [2], [3] and [8] states that weak sounds are supposed to enhance heat conduction into the samples by disrupting the thermal boundary layers of inert air.
• Table 1 Order of magnitude energetic analysis of the sound wave component of CAS freezers at standard temperature and pressure (STP)
• Electrostatic fields comparable to those used in CAS freezers are able to disrupt the inert surface boundary layer of air molecules and dramatically shorten drying times [1 1].
• the high-voltage electrostatic fields applied in the CAS freezers are increasing cooling efficiency by disrupting the surface boundary layer of inert gas at the surface of their materials.
• the cooling enhancements shown by Owada et al. [2] are, in fact, similar in style to those reported previously [1 1].
• either DC or AC high-voltage electric fields would be expected to promote rapid heat removal needed for supercooling, but generation of AC fields is certainly easier with the use of transformers.
• the addition of spiked shapes on the electrodes might enhance the cooling of the CAS effect by promoting mobile ion formation, as previously observed [1 1].
• ferromagnetic materials of inorganic origin which are also ubiquitously present in the environment (see, for example, reference [44]), can work their way into biological tissues (see, for example, reference [45]).
• Typical animal tissues have background concentrations of ferromagnetic materials in the 1-1000 ng/g range, with typical levels of about 4 ng/g.
• Tissues with elevated levels are thought to host cells involved in magnetoreception, while others might be related to iron storage products, or perhaps even have a role in magnetochemistry (see, for example, reference [46]).
• the ability on the part of animals to sense magnetic fields has been demonstrated relatively recently. For example, migrating birds have been demonstrated to possess magnetoreception organs.
• Table 3 Estimated average spacing of magnetosome clusters in tissue samples 4E-09 g Typical magnetite in animal tissues, per gram
• the electrostatic enhancement observed during the CAS freezing process is a simple disruption of the surface boundary effect of inert air, with as a consequence, more efficient, heat transport process.
• the enhanced removal of heat from the tissues may be one factor in producing the supercritical cooling observed.
• enhancing the freezers with an array of sharp needle points to promote the generation of a Corona wind might enhance this effect, as observed in earlier studies (see, for example, reference [1 1]).
• the low-frequency acoustic waves from the oscillating particles may radiate outwards from the magnetite-containing cells. Unlike acoustic waves from outside the object (which can trigger ice crystal nucleation), acoustic waves close to the oscillating ferromagnetic particles can dissipate rapidly into the surrounding tissue with spatially large gradients. These gradients may act to disrupt the aggregates of water molecules that organize into ice crystal nucleation structures [(see, for example, reference 48]) by differentially shearing them apart.
• the mechanical coupling of the ferromagnetic clusters to the surrounding cytoplasm would be an important feature for transducing the magnetic energy to the adjacent tissue.
• the magnetic exposure conditions of these freezers could be tailored to maximize the coupling of biological magnetite for this transduction; the existing literature is not hypothesis-driven to the point where this has been attempted.
• the application of a moderately strong static magnetic field can act to inhibit the collapse of magnetosome chains during the freezing process, and thereby enhance the efficiency of energy transduction from the magnetic field to acoustic waves. It might even be possible to force particle assemblages that have already clumped to re-assemble into linear chains by exposing them to a strong external DC field, and gently tickling the crystals so that they move relative to each other. This would remove them from the pool of nucleation sites, and enhance their magnetic interaction with the external fields. Such 'tickling' could be done either ultrasonically, or by the application of an AC (oscillating) magnetic field aligned perpendicular to the DC (static) field.
• having an AC field perpendicular to the DC field can be advantageous as the DC field aligns the magnetosome chains in one direction, and the AC field can vibrate the particles constituting the chain in a direction perpendicular to the alignment direction.
• the particles may be in close contact and therefore vibrating in the direction of alignment might be impeded.
• Magnetic oscillations during cooling could be achieved by applying the low- frequency AC magnetic fields perpendicular to the static magnetic field, with suitable amplitude (for example, 10% of the static field) to ensure substantial physical motion.
• suitable amplitude for example, 10% of the static field
• cryopreservation of important animal tissue cells like blood, sperm, or even small embryos could be enhanced by the addition of stabilized ferromagnetic particles like bacterial magnetosomes to the liquid media, providing more distributed sites for this magnetoacoustic transduction to occur.
• ferromagnetic particles tend to clump together into large aggregates that may not be a very effective transducer of magnetic oscillations.
• FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary container (105) wherein a biological tissue (1 10) is placed.
• the biological tissue contains magnetic particles (1 15), either naturally or artificially introduced.
• a DC magnetic field is applied (120) aligning the magnetic particles (1 15).
• An AC magnetic field is applied (125) perpendicular to the DC field (120).
• needle-shaped electrodes (130) may be present to apply a voltage between the biological tissue and the electrode in order to produce ions.
• an electrode may be present in the container in contact with the biological tissues, in order to provide a way to apply a voltage difference between the needles and the tissues.
• the biological tissue may be simply left at the voltage level of the container (for example, the ground level), and a voltage may be applied to the needles.
• FIG. 2 illustrates an exemplary method for freezing tissues: aligning magnetic particles in the biological tissues by applying a static magnetic field to the biological tissues in the container (205); vibrating the magnetic particles in the biological tissues by applying an oscillating magnetic field to the biological tissues in the container, wherein the oscillating magnetic field is perpendicular to the static magnetic field and oscillates around it in 2 or 3 -dimensions (210); freezing the biological tissues while the static and oscillating magnetic fields are active (220).
• a voltage may be applied with needle-shaped electrodes to create an ionic wind (215).
• the exemplary method of FIG. 2 may also comprise additional steps.
• magnetic particles may be introduced in the biological tissues prior to freezing, and orthogonal coils driven with sinusoidally-oscillating fields phased to produce a resultant field vector that oscillates in 3 dimensions.
• a freezing element is any apparatus configured to freeze the biological tissues in the container, and can be referred to, for example, as a freezer.
• air boundary layer refers to the layer of air that surrounds a sample to be frozen.
• applying an electric field to the biological tissues in the container can refer to, for example, the method of surrounding the biological tissues with needle electrodes, to which a voltage is applied. As a result, when a voltage difference is created between the tissues and the electrode, an electric field is applied to the tissues.
• Winklhofer Magnetic characterization of isolated candidate vertebrate magnetoreceptor cells. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 109 (2012) 12022-12027.

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• 2014
  • 2014-07-10 US US14/328,602 patent/US9339027B2/en active Active
  • 2014-07-23 JP JP2016531762A patent/JP2016529466A/ja active Pending
  • 2014-07-23 WO PCT/US2014/047884 patent/WO2015017221A1/en not_active Ceased
• 2016
  • 2016-04-18 US US15/131,657 patent/US20160227763A1/en not_active Abandoned
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