Bodily Complexity:Integrated Multicellular Organizations for Contraction-Based Motility

Compared to other forms of multicellularity, the animal case is unique. Animals—barring some exceptions—consist of collections of cells that are connected and integrated to such an extent that these collectives act as unitary, large free-moving entities capable of sensing macroscopic properties and events. This animal configuration is so well known that it is often taken as a natural one that ‘must’ have evolved, given environmental conditions that make large free-moving units ‘obviously’ adaptive. Here we question the seemingly evolutionary inevitableness of animals and introduce a thesis of bodily complexity: The multicellular organization characteristic for typical animals requires the integration of a multitude of intrinsic bodily features between its sensorimotor, physiological, and developmental aspects, and the related contraction-based tissue- and cellular-level events and processes. The evolutionary road toward this bodily complexity involves, we argue, various intermediate organizational steps that accompany and support the wider transition from cilia-based to contraction/muscle-based motility, and which remain insufficiently acknowledged. Here, we stress the crucial and specific role played by muscle-based and myoepithelial tissue contraction—acting as a physical platform for organizing both the multicellular transmission of mechanical forces and multicellular signaling—as key foundation of animal motility, sensing and maintenance, and development. We illustrate and discuss these bodily features in the context of the four basal animal phyla—Porifera, Ctenophores, Placozoans, and Cnidarians—that split off before the bilaterians, a supergroup that incorporates all complex animals

Visual Perception and the Emergence of Minimal Representation

There is a long-lasting quest of demarcating a minimally representational behavior. Based on neurophysiologically-informed behavioral studies, we argue in detail that one of the simplest cases of organismic behavior based on low-resolution spatial vision-the visually-guided obstacle avoidance in the cubozoan medusa Tripedalia cystophora-implies already a minimal form of representation. We further argue that the characteristics and properties of this form of constancy-employing structural representation distinguish it substantially from putative representational states associated with mere sensory indicators, and we reply to some possible objections from the liberal representationalists camp by defending and qualitatively demarcating the minimal nature of our case. Finally, we briefly discuss the implications of our thesis within a naturalistic framework.This work was supported by the Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovacion y Universidades, Spain (AA, RYC-2015-18437 for the stages of the conception and researching); the University of the Basque Country (AA, PES18/92, for the stages of the conception and researching), (AM, PES18/92), the Basque Government (AM, IT 1228-19), and MINECO (AM, PID2019-104576GB-I00

The asymptotic behaviour of the π0\pi^0 γ∗\gamma^\ast γ∗\gamma^\ast vertex

The Bjorken-Johnson-Low theorem applied to the $\gamma^\ast \to \gamma^\ast \pi^0$ process provides us with a rather remarkable asymptotic behaviour for the $\pi^0 \gamma^\ast \gamma^\ast$ vertex. We compare our result with previous QCD- inspired estimates and argue that the predicted behaviour is quite consistent with the present data on hadronic $J/\Psi$ decays and ensures the matching of long- and short-distance radiative corrections to $\pi^+ \to e^+ \nu_e$.Comment: 10 pages, latex, no figure

Autonomy as a property that characterizes organisms among other multicellular systems

ABSTRACTBiology is full of examples of multicellular (MC) systems which may demonstrate some organism-like properties but not all of them. Thus, it remains unclear if and when such systems should be considered as MC organisms, parts of organisms or groups of organisms. We suggest the notion of autonomy as a possible candidate to ground conceptually MC organisms and distinguish them from other forms of multicellularity. Considering unicellular systems as autonomous organisms on the basis of the functional integration required for their metabolic organization, we argue that MC systems should be also identified as autonomous, but on the basis of exhibiting a special kind of functionally integrated and differentiated developmental organization, which unfolds through a self-constructed set of mechanisms regulating the highly plastic processes that bring about their own constitution as such MC entities.KEYWORDSAUTONOMY, ORGANISM, MULTICELLULARITY, FUNCTIONAL INTEGRATION, FUNCTIONAL DIFFERENTIATION, DEVELOPMENTAL CONSTRAINTS, EPIGENETICS, SIGNALING NETWORKSRESUMENLa biología está llena de ejemplos de sistemas multicelulares que pueden mostrar algunas propiedades de organismos, pero no todas. De este modo, no está muy claro si estos sistemas deben ser considerados como organismos multicelulares y cuándo deben serlo. Aquí sugerimos que la noción de autonomía es un candidato posible para fundamentar conceptualmente los organismos multicelulares y para distinguirlos de otras formas de multicelularidad. Considerando a los sistemas unicelulares como organismos autónomos sobre la base de la integración funcional requerida para su organización metabólica, argüimos que los sistemas multicelulares deben ser también identificados como autónomos, pero sobre la base de que exhiben un tipo especial de organización del desarrollo funcionalmente integrada y diferenciada, la cual se despliega a través de un conjunto auto-construido de mecanismos que regulan los procesos enormemente plásticos que dan lugar a su propia constitución como tales entidades multicelulares.PALABRAS CLAVEAUTONOMÍA, ORGANISMO, MULTICELULARIDAD, INTEGRACIÓN FUNCTIONAL, DIFERENCIACIÓN FUNCTIONAL, CONSTRICCIONES DEL DESARROLLO, EPIGENÉTICA, REDES DE SEÑALE

Some Implications of Neutron Mirror Neutron Oscillation

We comment on a recently discussed possibility of oscillations between neutrons and degenerate mirror neutrons in the context of mirror models for particles and forces. It has been noted by Bento and Berezhiani that if these oscillations occurred at a rate of $\tau^{-1}_{NN'}\sim sec^{-1}$, it would help explain putative super GKZ cosmic ray events provided the temperature of the mirror radiation is $\sim 0.3-0.4$ times that of familiar cosmic microwave background radiation. We discuss how such oscillation time scales can be realized in mirror models and find that the simplest nonsupersymmetric model for this idea requires the existence of a low mass (30-3000 GeV) color triplet scalar or vector boson. A supersymmetric model, where this constraint can be avoided is severely constrained by the requirement of maintaining a cooler mirror sector. We also find that the reheat temperature after inflation in generic models that give fast $n-n'$ oscillation be less than about 300 GeV in order to maintain the required relative coolness of the mirror sector.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures; minor changes in the text; accepted for publication in Phys. Lett.

Axial Anomaly and Transition Form Factors

We investigate the properties of the amplitude induced by the anomaly. In a relatively high energy region those amplitudes are constructed by the vector meson poles and the anomaly terms, in which the anomaly terms can be essentially evaluated by the triangle quark graph. We pay our attention to the anomaly term and make intensive analysis of the existing experimental data, i.e., the electromagnetic $\pi^0$ and $\omega$ transition form factors. Our result shows that it is essential to use the constituent quark mass instead of the current quark mass in evaluating the anomaly term from the triangle graph.Comment: LaTeX, 14 pages + 4 figures, (figures are included as uuencoded files), KUNS-1210 HE(TH) 93/0

Genomics of Staphylococcus aureus and Staphylococcus epidermidis from periprosthetic joint infections and correlation to clinical outcome

The approach of sequencing or genotyping to characterize the pathogenic potential of staphylococci from orthopedic device-related infection (ODRI) has been applied in recent studies. These studies described the genomic carriage of virulence in clinical strains and compared it with those in commensal strains. Only a few studies have directly correlated genomic profiles to patient outcome and phenotypic virulence properties in periprosthetic joint infections (PJIs). We investigated the association between genomic variations and virulence-associated phenotypes (biofilm-forming ability and antimicrobial resistance) in 111 staphylococcal strains isolated from patients with PJI and the infection outcome (resolved/unresolved). The presence of a strong biofilm phenotype in Staphylococcus aureus and an antibiotic-resistant phenotype in Staphylococcus epidermidis were both associated with treatment failure of PJI. In S. epidermidis, multidrug resistance (MDR) and resistance to rifampicin were associated with unresolved infection. Sequence type 45 (ST45) and ST2 were particularly enriched in S. aureus and S. epidermidis, respectively. S. epidermidis ST2 caused the majority of relapses and was associated with MDR and strong biofilm production, whereas ST215 correlated with MDR and non/weak biofilm production. S. aureus agr II correlated with resolved infection, while S. epidermidis agr I was associated with strong biofilm production and agr III with non/weak production. Collectively, our results highlight the importance of careful genomic and phenotypic characterization to anticipate the probability of the strain causing treatment failure in PJI. Due to the high rate of resistant S. epidermidis strains identified, this study provides evidence that the current recommended treatment of rifampicin and a fluoroquinolone should not be administered without knowledge of the resistance pattern

Bodily Complexity:Integrated Multicellular Organizations for Contraction-Based Motility

Compared to other forms of multicellularity, the animal case is unique. Animals—barring some exceptions—consist of collections of cells that are connected and integrated to such an extent that these collectives act as unitary, large free-moving entities capable of sensing macroscopic properties and events. This animal configuration is so well known that it is often taken as a natural one that ‘must’ have evolved, given environmental conditions that make large free-moving units ‘obviously’ adaptive. Here we question the seemingly evolutionary inevitableness of animals and introduce a thesis of bodily complexity: The multicellular organization characteristic for typical animals requires the integration of a multitude of intrinsic bodily features between its sensorimotor, physiological, and developmental aspects, and the related contraction-based tissue- and cellular-level events and processes. The evolutionary road toward this bodily complexity involves, we argue, various intermediate organizational steps that accompany and support the wider transition from cilia-based to contraction/muscle-based motility, and which remain insufficiently acknowledged. Here, we stress the crucial and specific role played by muscle-based and myoepithelial tissue contraction—acting as a physical platform for organizing both the multicellular transmission of mechanical forces and multicellular signaling—as key foundation of animal motility, sensing and maintenance, and development. We illustrate and discuss these bodily features in the context of the four basal animal phyla—Porifera, Ctenophores, Placozoans, and Cnidarians—that split off before the bilaterians, a supergroup that incorporates all complex animals

Form factor π0→γ∗+γ∗\pi^0\to \gamma^* +\gamma^* at different photon virtualities

The $\pi^0 \gamma\gamma$ vertex for virtual photons of squared masses $q_1^2$ and $q_2^2$ plays a vital r\^ole in several physical processes; for example for $q_1^2<0$, $q_2^2<0$, in the two-photon physics reaction $e^+ e^-\to e^+ e^- \pi^0$, and for $q_1^2>0$, $q_2^2>0$, in the annihilation process $e^+ e^-\to \pi^0 l^+ l^-$. It is also of interest because of its link to the axial anomaly. We suggest a new approach to this problem. We have obtained a closed analytic expression for the vertex in the limit in which at least one of $|q_1^2|$ and $|q_2^2|$ is large for arbitrary fixed values of the ratio $q_1^2/q_2^2$. We compare our results with those obtained previously by Brodsky and Lepage. It should be straightforward to test our predictions experimentally.Comment: harvmac tex, 30 pages, 11 figures; references are correcte