Damping Characteristics of Carbon Nanotube-Epoxy Composites via Multiscale Analysis

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83585/1/AIAA-2010-2896-684.pd

Potential Uses of Wild Germplasms of Grain Legumes for Crop Improvement

Challenged by population increase, climatic change, and soil deterioration, crop improvement is always a priority in securing food supplies. Although the production of grain legumes is in general lower than that of cereals, the nutritional value of grain legumes make them important components of food security. Nevertheless, limited by severe genetic bottlenecks during domestication and human selection, grain legumes, like other crops, have suffered from a loss of genetic diversity which is essential for providing genetic materials for crop improvement programs. Illustrated by whole-genome-sequencing, wild relatives of crops adapted to various environments were shown to maintain high genetic diversity. In this review, we focused on nine important grain legumes (soybean, peanut, pea, chickpea, common bean, lentil, cowpea, lupin, and pigeonpea) to discuss the potential uses of their wild relatives as genetic resources for crop breeding and improvement, and summarized the various genetic/genomic approaches adopted for these purposes.Instituto de Fisiología y Recursos Genéticos VegetalesFil: Muñoz, Nacira Belen. Chinese University of Hong Kong. Centre for Soybean Research of the Partner State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology and School of Life Sciences; China. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Instituto de Fisiología y Recursos Genéticos Vegetales; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Físicas y Naturales. Cátedra de Fisiología Vegetal; ArgentinaFil: Ailin, Liu. Chinese University of Hong Kong. Centre for Soybean Research of the Partner State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology and School of Life Sciences; ChinaFil: Leo, Kan. Chinese University of Hong Kong. Centre for Soybean Research of the Partner State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology and School of Life Sciences; ChinaFil: Man-Wah, Li. Chinese University of Hong Kong. Centre for Soybean Research of the Partner State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology and School of Life Sciences; ChinaFil: Hon-Ming, Lam. Chinese University of Hong Kong. Centre for Soybean Research of the Partner State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology and School of Life Sciences; Chin

0^-+ Trigluon Glueball and its Implication for a Recent BES Observation

We calculate the mass of $0^{-+}$ triple-valence-gluon resonance, the trigluon glueball, with QCD sum rules. Its mass is found to be approximately in the region between 1.9 GeV and 2.7 GeV with some theoretical uncertainties. Moreover, it is likely that the new BES measurement of the $p \bar{p}$ enhancement near threshold in the $J/\psi$ decays exhibits the behavior of this trigluon state. Our analyzes favor the baryonium-gluonium mixing picture for the BES observation.Comment: 14 text pages; 2 eps-form figures.To appear in Phys.Lett.

Interaction and Regulation of Carbon, Nitrogen, and Phosphorus Metabolisms in Root Nodules of Legumes

Members of the plant family Leguminosae (Fabaceae) are unique in that they have evolved a symbiotic relationship with rhizobia (a group of soil bacteria that can fix atmospheric nitrogen). Rhizobia infect and form root nodules on their specific host plants before differentiating into bacteroids, the symbiotic form of rhizobia. This complex relationship involves the supply of C4-dicarboxylate and phosphate by the host plants to the microsymbionts that utilize them in the energy-intensive process of fixing atmospheric nitrogen into ammonium, which is in turn made available to the host plants as a source of nitrogen, a macronutrient for growth. Although nitrogen-fixing bacteroids are no longer growing, they are metabolically active. The symbiotic process is complex and tightly regulated by both the host plants and the bacteroids. The metabolic pathways of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphate are heavily regulated in the host plants, as they need to strike a fine balance between satisfying their own needs as well as those of the microsymbionts. A network of transporters for the various metabolites are responsible for the trafficking of these essential molecules between the two partners through the symbiosome membrane (plant-derived membrane surrounding the bacteroid), and these are in turn regulated by various transcription factors that control their expressions under different environmental conditions. Understanding this complex process of symbiotic nitrogen fixation is vital in promoting sustainable agriculture and enhancing soil fertility

Planning Model for Integrated Energy Supply System in Park Level Regions Under the Energy Internet

With the reduction of traditional fossil fuels and the increasing severity of environmental issues, it is of great significance to study energy system planning and optimization models that complement and integrate multiple energy utilization methods in the context of the energy internet for building an integrated energy supply system. Firstly, this article divides the planning indicators of the regional integrated energy supply system into four categories based on the goal of “two highs and three lows”; Secondly, analyze the three key issues of exergy efficiency, economy, and multi energy coupling in regional integrated energy planning; Finally, a multi-objective planning model for regional integrated energy systems that takes into account equipment capacity planning and operation scheduling optimization is proposed, with the optimization objectives of minimizing the annual value of full life cycle cost and maximizing efficiency, and a double-layer optimization structure is designed for efficient solution

Evidence for gill slits and a pharynx in Cambrian vetulicolians: implications for the early evolution of deuterostomes.

BACKGROUND: Vetulicolians are a group of Cambrian metazoans whose distinctive bodyplan continues to present a major phylogenetic challenge. Thus, we see vetulicolians assigned to groups as disparate as deuterostomes and ecdysozoans. This divergence of opinions revolves around a strikingly arthropod-like body, but one that also bears complex lateral structures on its anterior section interpreted as pharyngeal openings. Establishing the homology of these structures is central to resolving where vetulicolians sit in metazoan phylogeny. RESULTS: New material from the Chengjiang Lagerstätte helps to resolve this issue. Here, we demonstrate that these controversial structures comprise grooves with a series of openings. The latter are oval in shape and associated with a complex anatomy consistent with control of their opening and closure. Remains of what we interpret to be a musculature, combined with the capacity for the grooves to contract, indicate vetulicolians possessed a pumping mechanism that could process considerable volumes of seawater. Our observations suggest that food captured in the anterior cavity was transported to dorsal and ventral gutters, which then channeled material to the intestine. This arrangement appears to find no counterpart in any known fossil or extant arthropod (or any other ecdysozoan). Anterior lateral perforations, however, are diagnostic of deuterostomes. CONCLUSIONS: If the evidence is against vetulicolians belonging to one or other group of ecdysozoan, then two phylogenetic options seem to remain. The first is that such features as vetulicolians possess are indicative of either a position among the bilaterians or deuterostomes but apart from the observation that they themselves form a distinctive and recognizable clade current evidence can permit no greater precision as to their phylogenetic placement. We argue that this is too pessimistic a view, and conclude that evidence points towards vetulicolians being members of the stem-group deuterostomes; a group best known as the chordates (amphioxus, tunicates, vertebrates), but also including the ambulacrarians (echinoderms, hemichordates), and xenoturbellids. If the latter, first they demonstrate that these members of the stem group show few similarities to the descendant crown group representatives. Second, of the key innovations that underpinned deuterostome success, the earliest and arguably most seminal was the evolution of openings that define the pharyngeal gill slits of hemichordates (and some extinct echinoderms) and chordates.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are