A wastewater bacterium 'Bacillus' sp. KUJM2 acts as an agent for remediation of potentially toxic elements and promoter of plant ('Lens culinaris') growth

This study investigated the role of an allochthonous Gram-positive wastewater bacterium (Bacillus sp. KUJM2) selected through rigorous screening, for the removal of potentially toxic elements (PTEs; As, Cd, Cu, Ni) and promotion of plant growth under PTE-stress conditions. The dried biomass of the bacterial strain removed PTEs (5 mg L−1) from water by 90.17–94.75 and 60.4–81.41%, whereas live cells removed 87.15–91.69 and 57.5–78.8%, respectively, under single-PTE and co-contaminated conditions. When subjected to a single PTE, the bacterial production of indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) reached the maxima with Cu (67.66%) and Ni (64.33%), but Cd showed an inhibitory effect beyond 5 mg L−1 level. The multiple-PTE treatment induced IAA production only up to 5 mg L−1 beyond which inhibition ensued. Enhanced germination rate, germination index and seed production of lentil plant (Lens culinaris) under the bacterial inoculation indicated the plant growth promotion potential of the microbial strain. Lentil plants, as a result of bacterial inoculation, responded with higher shoot length (7.1–27.61%), shoot dry weight (18.22–36.3%) and seed production (19.23–29.17%) under PTE-stress conditions. The PTE uptake in lentil shoots decreased by 67.02–79.85% and 65.94–78.08%, respectively, under single- and multiple-PTE contaminated conditions. Similarly, PTE uptake was reduced in seeds up to 72.82–86.62% and 68.68–85.94%, respectively. The bacteria-mediated inhibition of PTE translocation in lentil plant was confirmed from the translocation factor of the respective PTEs. Thus, the selected bacterium (Bacillus sp. KUJM2) offered considerable potential as a PTE remediating agent, plant growth promoter and regulator of PTE translocation curtailing environmental and human health risks

The innocuousness of adiabatic instabilities in coupled scalar field-dark matter models

Non-minimally coupled scalar field models suffer of unstable growing modes at the linear perturbation level. The nature of these instabilities depends on the dynamical state of the scalar field. In particular in systems which admit adiabatic solutions, large scale instabilities are suppressed by the slow-roll dynamics of the field. Here we review these results and present a preliminary likelihood data analysis suggesting that along adiabatic solutions coupled models with coupling of order of gravitational strength can provide viable cosmological scenarios satisfying constraints from SN Ia, CMB and large scale structure data.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures; to be published in the AIP proceedings of the 'Invisible Universe International Conference', UNESCO-Paris, June 29-July 3, 200

On representations of dialgebras and conformal algebras

In this note, we observe a relation between dialgebras (in particular, Leibniz algebras) and conformal algebras. The purpose is to show how the methods of conformal algebras help solving problems on dialgebras, and, conversely, how the ideas of dialgebras work for conformal algebras.Comment: 11 page

Decomposition of Pascal’s Kernels Mod \u3cem\u3ep\u3csup\u3es\u3c/sup\u3e\u3c/em\u3e

For a prime p we define Pascal\u27s Kernel K(p,s) = [k(p,s)ij]∞i,j=0 as the infinite matrix satisfying k(p,s)ij = 1/px(i+jj) mod p if (i+jj) is divisible by ps and k(p,s)ij = 0 otherwise. While the individual entries of Pascal\u27s Kernel can be computed using a formula of Kazandzidis that has been known for some time, our purpose here will be to use that formula to explain the global geometric patterns that occur in K(p,s). Indeed, if we consider the finite (truncated) versions of K(p,s), we find that they can be decomposed into superpositions of tensor products of certain primitive p x p matrices