Expanding the genetic resources of lentils and Rhizobium to increase nitrogen fixation (BNF) in the lentil crop

Non-Peer Reviewe

Do Hummingbirds See in Ultraviolet?

We present a numerical model to fit the electroretinogram (ERG), a gross evoked eye visual potential, that originate in the retina through photons absorption by photoreceptors and then involve the contribution form others retinal neurons. We use the ERG measured in a hummingbird, to evaluate the most likely retinal mechanism - cones visual pigments and oil-droplets - that participate in their high dimensional tetra or pentachromatic color hyperspace. The model - a nonlinear fit - appears to be a very useful tool to predict the underlying contribution visual mechanism for a variety of retinal preparation

Gibbs distribution analysis of temporal correlations structure in retina ganglion cells

We present a method to estimate Gibbs distributions with \textit{spatio-temporal} constraints on spike trains statistics. We apply this method to spike trains recorded from ganglion cells of the salamander retina, in response to natural movies. Our analysis, restricted to a few neurons, performs more accurately than pairwise synchronization models (Ising) or the 1-time step Markov models (\cite{marre-boustani-etal:09}) to describe the statistics of spatio-temporal spike patterns and emphasizes the role of higher order spatio-temporal interactions.Comment: To appear in J. Physiol. Pari

Processing and characterisation of standard and doped alite-belite-ye'elimite ecocement pastes and mortars

Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cemconres.2019.105911.Cement and Concrete Research 127 (2020) 105911Here, we report the processing optimisation of two laboratory-prepared alite-belite-ye'elimite ecocements (standard and doped) that release to the atmosphere ~13% less CO2 than Portland Cement during fabrication. The processing was optimised through rheological measurements, where homogeneous pastes and mortars were finally prepared through the study and optimisation of both the superplasticiser content and the water-to-cement ratio. Both parameters were correlated with the phase assembly of selected pastes and compressive strength of the corresponding mortars. After optimisation, mortars with high compressive strengths (~72 and ~77 MPa for the standard mortar, and ~41 and ~75 MPa for the doped one, at 7 and 28 days, respectively) were prepared. Furthermore, the important increase in compressive strength from 7 to 28 days of the optimised mortar prepared from the doped ecocement is due to its composition (the higher content of belite jointly with the reaction of its active polymorph (α'H-belite)).This work is part of the PhD of Mr. Jesus D. Zea-Garcia. This research has been supported by Spanish MINECO and FEDER [BIA2017- 82391-R research project and I3 (IEDI-2016-0079) program]

Search for composite and exotic fermions at LEP 2

A search for unstable heavy fermions with the DELPHI detector at LEP is reported. Sequential and non-canonical leptons, as well as excited leptons and quarks, are considered. The data analysed correspond to an integrated luminosity of about 48 pb^{-1} at an e^+e^- centre-of-mass energy of 183 GeV and about 20 pb^{-1} equally shared between the centre-of-mass energies of 172 GeV and 161 GeV. The search for pair-produced new leptons establishes 95% confidence level mass limits in the region between 70 GeV/c^2 and 90 GeV/c^2, depending on the channel. The search for singly produced excited leptons and quarks establishes upper limits on the ratio of the coupling of the excited fermio

Search for charginos in e+e- interactions at sqrt(s) = 189 GeV

An update of the searches for charginos and gravitinos is presented, based on a data sample corresponding to the 158 pb^{-1} recorded by the DELPHI detector in 1998, at a centre-of-mass energy of 189 GeV. No evidence for a signal was found. The lower mass limits are 4-5 GeV/c^2 higher than those obtained at a centre-of-mass energy of 183 GeV. The (\mu,M_2) MSSM domain excluded by combining the chargino searches with neutralino searches at the Z resonance implies a limit on the mass of the lightest neutralino which, for a heavy sneutrino, is constrained to be above 31.0 GeV/c^2 for tan(beta) \geq 1.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure

Search for lightest neutralino and stau pair production in light gravitino scenarios with stau NLSP

Promptly decaying lightest neutralinos and long-lived staus are searched for in the context of light gravitino scenarios. It is assumed that the stau is the next to lightest supersymmetric particle (NLSP) and that the lightest neutralino is the next to NLSP (NNLSP). Data collected with the Delphi detector at centre-of-mass energies from 161 to 183 \GeV are analysed. No evidence of the production of these particles is found. Hence, lower mass limits for both kinds of particles are set at 95% C.L.. The mass of gaugino-like neutralinos is found to be greater than 71.5 GeV/c^2. In the search for long-lived stau, masses less than 70.0 to 77.5 \GeVcc are excluded for gravitino masses from 10 to 150 \eVcc . Combining this search with the searches for stable heavy leptons and Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model staus a lower limit of 68.5 \GeVcc may be set for the stau mas

Hadronization properties of b quarks compared to light quarks in e+e- -> q qbar from 183 to 200 GeV

The DELPHI detector at LEP has collected 54 pb^{-1} of data at a centre-of-mass energy around 183 GeV during 1997, 158 pb^{-1} around 189 GeV during 1998, and 187 pb^{-1} between 192 and 200 GeV during 1999. These data were used to measure the average charged particle multiplicity in e+e- -> b bbar events, _{bb}, and the difference delta_{bl} between _{bb} and the multiplicity, _{ll}, in generic light quark (u,d,s) events: delta_{bl}(183 GeV) = 4.55 +/- 1.31 (stat) +/- 0.73 (syst) delta_{bl}(189 GeV) = 4.43 +/- 0.85 (stat) +/- 0.61 (syst) delta_{bl}(200 GeV) = 3.39 +/- 0.89 (stat) +/- 1.01 (syst). This result is consistent with QCD predictions, while it is inconsistent with calculations assuming that the multiplicity accompanying the decay of a heavy quark is independent of the mass of the quark itself.Comment: 13 pages, 2 figure