Social environment, emotions, and impulse buying: A mediational analysis

Previous research has shown relationships between variables of the retailing environment, such as design and ambiance, and impulse buying. However, little is known about the influence of social environment on this type of purchase. Therefore, the main purpose of this current study is to examine the effect of social environment variables on emotions felt in the point of sale and on achieving an impulse buying. Following a survey conducted in a hypermarket, the results show direct and indirect effects of social environment on making an impulse purchase decision. The pleasure mediates the influence of sales staff on impulse buying. Otherwise arousal has a mediating role in the variables of social environment - pleasure link. Hence, this study provides practical guidance for how retailing firms can manage social environment and emotions felt on the point of sale to induce a rewarding impulse buying experience

High-throughput sequencing of the T-cell receptor repertoire: pitfalls and opportunities.

T-cell specificity is determined by the T-cell receptor, a heterodimeric protein coded for by an extremely diverse set of genes produced by imprecise somatic gene recombination. Massively parallel high-throughput sequencing allows millions of different T-cell receptor genes to be characterized from a single sample of blood or tissue. However, the extraordinary heterogeneity of the immune repertoire poses significant challenges for subsequent analysis of the data. We outline the major steps in processing of repertoire data, considering low-level processing of raw sequence files and high-level algorithms, which seek to extract biological or pathological information. The latest generation of bioinformatics tools allows millions of DNA sequences to be accurately and rapidly assigned to their respective variable V and J gene segments, and to reconstruct an almost error-free representation of the non-templated additions and deletions that occur. High-level processing can measure the diversity of the repertoire in different samples, quantify V and J usage and identify private and public T-cell receptors. Finally, we discuss the major challenge of linking T-cell receptor sequence to function, and specifically to antigen recognition. Sophisticated machine learning algorithms are being developed that can combine the paradoxical degeneracy and cross-reactivity of individual T-cell receptors with the specificity of the overall T-cell immune response. Computational analysis will provide the key to unlock the potential of the T-cell receptor repertoire to give insight into the fundamental biology of the adaptive immune system and to provide powerful biomarkers of disease

Sorption du produit de traitement de bois par l'argile dans la construction en terre : cas de l'octaborate disodique tétrahydraté (DOT)

L'utilisation de la construction en terre crue est idéale pour l’architecture écologique car elle a un impact environnemental positif. Le torchis représente la méthode et le matériau de remplissage d'une structure en bois. Pour pouvoir supporter la charge des bâtiments, il doit avoir une capacité puissante. Le bois utilisé dans ce projet a été traité avec l'octaborate disodique tétrahydraté DOT, qui offre la capacité de protéger à la fois du feu et des agents de détérioration biologiques. Le but ultime de cette étude est d’évaluer la capacité du bois à conserver la durabilité accordée au contact avec le torchis en fonction du temps, du pourcentage d’humidité, des essences de bois (épinette et sapin), et de l’axe de remplissage. Les résultats en fonction de temps montrent un profil de mouvement DOT décroissant dans l’argile allant de la partie en contact avec le bois vers la surface. Ce profil disparaît généralement si un contact dure plus de deux mois. L’expérience à long terme a montré que la quantité de DOT sorbée a tendance à se stabiliser avec le temps même si la concentration initiale de DOT est différente. Les résultats en fonction de l’humidité de conditionnement (9 et 19 %) montrent que cette dernière n’a pas un effet significatif sur la quantité de DOT sorbée par l’argile. Afin d’identifier les différentes phases présentes et de déterminer les changements microstructuraux provoqués par le traitement et le contact avec l’argile, une étude spectroscopique a été menée sur quelques échantillons de bois traités avec et sans contact avec l’argile ainsi que sur certains échantillons de bois non traités. À partir de cette étude, nous n’avons pas pu détecter la présence du bore sur le sapin de façon statistiquement significative alors que les résultats pour l’épinette nous ont permis d’identifier le mécanisme de fonctionnement de l’argile sur le bois

Ankylose de l'articulation temporo-mandibulaire post-arthrosique

L'ankylose de l'articulation temporo-mandibulaire (ATM) est définie comme une constriction permanente des mâchoires avec ouverture buccale inférieure à 30 mm mesurée entre les incisives, survenant en raison d'une fusion osseuse, fibreuse ou fibro-osseuse. L'arthrose est une cause rare de l'ankylose de L'ATM. Nous rapportons un cas d'ankylose de l'ATM d'origine arthrosique, afin de préciser les particularités diagnostiques et thérapeutiques de cette entité pathologique assez rare

Observed and Predicted Geographic Distribution of Acer monspessulanum L. Using the MaxEnt Model in the Context of Climate Change

Acer monspessulanum (Montpellier Maple) is an important deciduous tree species native to the Mediterranean region. It is largely distributed in the southern part of western Europe; however, it is geographically less present in north Africa and western Asia. The effects of the most significant environmental variables for its habitat suitability, and climate change, are unclear in terms of the future changes to its distribution. The objective of the present study was to model the current and future geographical potential distribution of the Montpellier Maple in the Mediterranean basin and West Asia using maximum entropy modeling software (MaxEnt). The value of the Area Under the Curve (AUC) of MaxEnt was used to analyze the model’s performance. More than 5800 well-distributed presence points, elevation, slope, aspect, topographic wetness index (TWI), natural vegetation characteristics from MODIS products, and 19 bioclimatic variables were used to conduct the study. Regarding the projections of the species distribution under climate change, 17 global climatic models were used under two RCP scenarios (4.5 and 8.5) for the 2040–2060 and the 2060–2080 time periods. The results show that temperature seasonality (40% contribution to the model), elevation (33.5%), mean annual temperature (6.9%), mean annual precipitation (6.2%), and max temperature of the warmest month (4.5%) were identified as the primary factors that accounted for the current distribution of the Montpellier Maple. Under the climate change scenarios, MaxEnt predicts a large decrease in the species suitability area, with a shift towards the southwestern regions of the species distribution, especially to the mountainous zones of the Moroccan Atlas. Our results show that climate largely limits the distribution of the Montpellier Maple in the Mediterranean basin, as its change in the future is expected to significantly reduce the suitable area by more than 99% from the historical climate conditions, to reach only 16,166.9 and 9874.7 km2 under the moderate RCP4.5 and extreme RCP8.5 scenarios, respectively, by the end of the 21st century. Our study can provide a good view of the future changes in the distribution of Montpellier Maple for its protection and sustainable management.Funding support for this research was provided by the project titled “Eating the wild: Improving the value-chain of Mediterranean Wild Food Products (WFP)”—WildFood (Reference Number: 2019-SECTION2-29) and the project: HYDROMED (PID-2019-111332RB-C21). Hassane Moutahir is supported by the Generalitat Valenciana and the European Social Fund (APOSTD20/2019-7956)

Chemical composition and antioxidant activity of essential oil, various organic extracts of Cistus ladanifer and Cistus libanotis growing in Eastern Morocco

In the present work, we studied the chemical composition of the essential oil of Cistus ladanifer and Cistus libanotis growing in Eastern Morocco. The essential oils were obtained by hydrodistillation and their chemical composition was analysed using gas chromatography- mass spectrometry (GC–MS). Camphene, borneol, cyclohexanol-2, 2, 6 tremethyl, terpineol-4 and α-pinene were the main constituents of the essential oil of C. ladanifer, while in the essential oil of C. libanotis we obtained terpineol-4, γ-terpinene, camphene, sabinene, α-terpinene and α-pinene. The antioxidant potential of various extracts (water, ethanol, ethanol: water (50:50), methanol, methanol: water (50:50), acetonitrile) and essential oils of C. ladanifer and C. libanotis were carried out by the method of 1,1-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazylhydrate (DPPH) free radical scavenging. Total phenolic and flavonoid contents were determined. The result show that C. ladanifer of the leaves of methanol: water (50:50) extract had the highest value of total phenolic content and the lowest was present in ethanol: water (50:50) extract of the stem and acetonitrile extract of the flowers of C. libanotis. From our experimental results, the extract of flowers, fruit, stem and leaves of those plants showed highest potential as free radical scavengers.Keywords: Antioxidant, phenolics, flavonoids, essential oil, extracts, gas chromatography- mass spectrometry (GC–MS).African Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(34), pp. 5314-532

Plasma treatment in textile industry

Plasma technology applied to textiles is a dry, environmentally- and worker-friendly method to achieve surface alteration without modifying the bulk properties of different materials. In particular, atmospheric non-thermal plasmas are suited because most textile materials are heat sensitive polymers and applicable in a continuous processes. In the last years plasma technology has become a very active, high growth research field, assuming a great importance among all available material surface modifications in textile industry. The main objective of this review is to provide a critical update on the current state of art relating plasma technologies applied to textile industryFernando Oliveira (SFRH/BD/65254/2009) acknowledges Fundacao para a Cioncia e Tecnologia, Portugal, for its doctoral grant financial support. Andrea Zille (C2011-UMINHO-2C2T-01) acknowledges funding from Programa Compromisso para a Cioncia 2008, Portugal