Nutrient Digestibility and Productivity of Bali Cattle Fed Fermented Hymenachne Amplexia­calis Based Rations Supplemented with Leucaena Leucocephala

An experiment was conducted to study the effects of lamtoro (Leucaena leucocephala) leaf supplementation in fermented kumpai grass (Hymenachne amplexia­calis) based rations on the productivity of Bali cattle. Variables measured were dry matter and organic matter intakes, nutrient digestibility (dry matter, organic matter, crude protein, and crude fiber), body weight gain, and feed efficiency. The types of rations were: Ration A= 45% fermented kumpai grass + 40% benggala grass + 15% concentrate + 0% lamtoro leaf, Ration B= 45% fermented kumpai grass + 30% benggala grass + 15% concentrate + 10% lamtoro leaf, Ration C= 45% fermented kumpai grass + 20% benggala grass + 15% concentrate + 20% lamtoro leaf, and Ration D= 45% fermented kumpai grass + 10% benggala grass + 15% concentrate + 30% lamtoro leaf. The supplementation of lamtoro leaf up to 30% into the ration could increase (P<0.05) dry matter and organic matter intakes, and crude protein digestibility. The highest body weight gain and feed efficiency were found in Bali cattle fed ration with 20% lamtoro leaf supplementation. The level of lamtoro leaf supplementation in the ration did not affect the digestibility of dry matter, organic matter, and crude fiber. It was concluded that the supplementation of lamtoro leaf in the ration could increase dry matter, organic matter, and crude protein intakes. Addition of 20% lamtoro leaf gave the best effect on the increased body weight gain and feed efficiency in Bali cattle

Hunting for the alpha: B→ρρB\to \rho\rho, B→ππB \to \pi\pi, B→πρB \to\pi\rho

The hypothesis of the smallness of penguin contribution to charmless strangeless $B_d (\bar B_d)$ decays allows to determine with high accuracy the value of angle $\alpha$ from the currently available $B \to \rho\rho$, $B \to \pi\pi$ and $B\to \rho\pi$ decay data.Comment: 9 page

CENP-C unwraps the human CENP-A nucleosome through the H2A C-terminal tail

Centromeres are defined epigenetically by nucleosomes containing the histone H3 variant CENP-A, upon which the constitutive centromere-associated network of proteins (CCAN) is built. CENP-C is considered to be a central organizer of the CCAN. We provide new molecular insights into the structure of human CENP-A nucleosomes, in isolation and in complex with the CENP-C central region (CENP-C-CR), the main CENP-A binding module of human CENP-C. We establish that the short alpha N helix of CENP-A promotes DNA flexibility at the nucleosome ends, independently of the sequence it wraps. Furthermore, we show that, in vitro, two regions of human CENP-C (CENP-C-CR and CENP-C-motif) both bind exclusively to the CENP-A nucleosome. We find CENP-C-CR to bind with high affinity due to an extended hydrophobic area made up of CENP-A(V)(532) and CENP-A(V)(533). Importantly, we identify two key conformational changes within the CENP-A nucleosome upon CENP-C binding. First, the loose DNA wrapping of CENP-A nucleosomes is further exacerbated, through destabilization of the H2A C-terminal tail. Second, CENP-C-CR rigidifies the N-terminal tail of H4 in the conformation favoring H4(K20) monomethylation, essential for a functional centromere

Distance and Similarity Measures for Soft Sets

In [P. Majumdar, S. K. Samanta, Similarity measure of soft sets, New Mathematics and Natural Computation 4(1)(2008) 1-12], the authors use matrix representation based distances of soft sets to introduce matching function and distance based similarity measures. We first give counterexamples to show that their Definition 2.7 and Lemma 3.5(3) contain errors, then improve their Lemma 4.4 making it a corllary of our result. The fundamental assumption of Majumdar et al has been shown to be flawed. This motivates us to introduce set operations based measures. We present a case (Example 28) where Majumdar-Samanta similarity measure produces an erroneous result but the measure proposed herein decides correctly. Several properties of the new measures have been presented and finally the new similarity measures have been applied to the problem of financial diagnosis of firms.Comment: 14 pages, accepted manuscript, to appear in New Mathematics and Natural Computatio

Large electroweak penguin contribution in B -> K pi and pi pi decay modes

We discuss about a possibility of large electroweak penguin contribution in B -> K pi and pi pi from recent experimental data. The experimental data may be suggesting that there are some discrepancies between the data and theoretical estimation in the branching ratios of them. In B -> K pi decays, to explain it, a large electroweak penguin contribution and large strong phase differences seem to be needed. The contributions should appear also in B -> pi pi. We show, as an example, a solution to solve the discrepancies in both B -> K pi and B -> pi pi. However the magnitude of the parameters and the strong phase estimated from experimental data are quite large compared with the theoretical estimations. It may be suggesting some new physics effects are including in these processes. We will have to discuss about the dependence of the new physics. To explain both modes at once, we may need large electroweak penguin contribution with new weak phases and some SU(3) breaking effects by new physics in both QCD and electroweak penguin type processes.Comment: 23 pages, 9 figure

1/m_b^2 correction to the left-right lepton polarization asymmetry in the decay B -> X_s mu^+ mu^-

Using a known result by Falk et al. for the 1/m_b^2 correction to the dilepton invariant mass spectrum in the decay B \rightarrow X_s \mu^+ \mu^-, we calculate the 1/m_b^2 correction to the left-right muon polarization asymmetry in this decay. Employing an up-to-date range of values for the non-perturbative parameter \lambda_1, we find that the correction is much smaller than it should have been expected from the previous work by Falk et al.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures included. Uses epsf.sty and rotate.sty. To appear in Physical Review D. The complete postscript file is also available from URL ftp://feynman.t30.physik.tu-muenchen.de/pub/preprints/ tum_t31_98_96.ps.g