Invasion impact is conditioned by initial vegetation states

Abstract Biological invasion is a crucial problem in the world because of its negative consequences for protected areas. The degradation stage of vegetation might affect the success of invasion. One of the most abundant and threatening invasive species is the common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca L.) which has invaded already 23 countries of Europe and in several habitat types its further spreading is promoted by climate change. Pannonian sand grassland is one of the most threatened habitat by common milkweed invasion. Therefore, invasion in sand grassland vegetation is an important issue. However, the effects of the invasive plant in the open sand grassland are rather controversial. In order to clarify the existing contradictory results, the study was carried out in a strictly protected area, near Fülöpháza (Hungary) in a reserve core area in a UNESCO biosphere reserve. Microcoenological study was applied to determinate the fine-scale community characteristics of non-invaded and invaded stands in natural and seminatural vegetation and data were processed by Juhász-Nagy's information theory models. Shannon diversity of species combinations (compositional diversity) which describes the ways of the coexistence of species, and the number of realized species combinations were used for measuring beta diversity. Differences between stands were analyzed by two-way ANOVA. The maximum compositional diversity of species and main life-forms (annuals, perennials and cryptogams) did not differ significantly between the non-invaded and invaded stands. In contrast, significantly larger characteristic areas of compositional diversity were detected in the invaded stands. Based on these results, it could be concluded that diversity of species combinations did not change but those values have shifted to coarser scales in case of invaded stands. The direction of this change suggests a kind of impoverishment in the presence of Asclepias. Thus, it is worth mentioning from the invasion management point of view that protection of the habitats against disturbance is a more cost-effective and successful way than protection against the establishment or extirpation of invasive species, since disturbance facilitates the invasions throughout the impoverishment of the community

Portable Instrument for Detection of Surface Flaws Using EMATs

The work reported here is the development of a first prototype portable ultrasonic inspection instrument based on EMAT (electromagnetic acoustic transducer) technology. The goal was to demonstrate EMAT inspection capabilities for small-size flaws in metal parts and to build a self-contained NDE unit that had a high degree of signal processing on-board so that human interpretation was minimized. The unit also served as a test bed, so that a number of new concepts could be evaluated. This instrument is viewed as an important step in the development of future NDE equipment

Time evolution in the Morse potential using supersymmetry: dissociation of the NO molecule

We present an algebraic method for treating molecular vibrations in the Morse potential perturbed by an external laser field. By the help of a complete and normalizable basis we transform the Schr\"{o}dinger equation into a system of coupled ordinary differential equations. We apply our method to calculate the dissociation probability of the NO molecule excited by chirped laser pulses. The dependence of the molecular dipole-moment on the interatomic separation is determined by a quantum-chemical method, and the corresponding transition dipole moments are given by approximate analytic expressions. These turn out to be very small between neighboring stationary states around the vibrational quantum number $m=42$, therefore we propose to use additional pulses in order to skip this trapping state, and to obtain a reasonable dissociation probability.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Retroviral activation of the mir-106a microRNA cistron in T lymphoma

Retroviral insertion into a host genome is a powerful tool not only for the discovery of cancer genes, but also for the discovery of potential oncogenic noncoding RNAs. In a large-scale mouse T lymphocyte tumor screen we found a high density of integrations upstream of the mir-106a microRNA cistron. In tumors containing an integration, the primary transcript encoding the mir-106a cistron was overexpressed five to 20-fold compared with that of control tumors; concomitantly, the mature mir-106a and mir-363 microRNAs were highly overexpressed as well. These findings suggest the mir-106a cistron plays an important role in T cell tumorigenesis

Combination of memantine and vitamin D prevents axon degeneration induced by amyloid-beta and glutamate

The currently available drugs for treatment of Alzheimer\u27s disease are symptomatic and only temporarily slow down the natural history of the disease process. Recently, its has been proposed that the combination of memantine with vitamin D, a neurosteroid hormone, may prevent amyloid-beta and glutamate neurotoxicity. Here, our purpose was to examine the potential protective effects of memantine and vitamin D against amyloid-beta peptide and glutamate toxicity in cortical neuronal cultures. We provide the first evidence that cortical axons degenerate less after exposure to amyloid-beta peptide or glutamate in microfluidic neuronal cultures enriched with memantine plus vitamin D compared to control medium and cultures enriched with only memantine or only vitamin D. The reported synergistic neuroprotective effect of memantine plus vitamin D -the combination originating an effect stronger than the sum- corroborate previous clinical finding that Alzheimer\u27s disease patients using this drug combination have improved cognition. This finding reinforces the pharmacological potential of a new drug combining memantine plus vitamin D for the treatment or the prevention of Alzheimer\u27s disease

Development of Backscatter X-Ray Imaging Techniques for Space Vehicle Applications

This slide presentation reviews the development of backscatter x ray (BSX) imaging techniques to perform inspection of spacecraft components. The techniques are currently being enhanced to advance Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) methods for future space vehicle applications. The presentation includes an overview of x ray techniques, a description of current BSX applications used on the space shuttle, the development for Constellation applications, and the use of the system for foam applications

Amino acid variation in HLA class II proteins is a major determinant of humoral response to common viruses

The magnitude of the human antibody response to viral antigens is highly variable. To explore the human genetic contribution to this variability, we performed genome-wide association studies of the immunoglobulin G response to 14 pathogenic viruses in 2,363 immunocompetent adults. Significant associations were observed in the major histocompatibility complex region on chromosome 6 for influenza A virus, Epstein-Barr virus, JC polyomavirus, and Merkel cell polyomavirus. Using local imputation and fine mapping, we identified specific amino acid residues in human leucocyte antigen (HLA) class II proteins as the most probable causal variants underlying these association signals. Common HLA-DRβ1 haplotypes showed virus-specific patterns of humoral-response regulation. We observed an overlap between variants affecting the humoral response to influenza A and EBV and variants previously associated with autoimmune diseases related to these viruses. The results of this study emphasize the central and pathogen-specific role of HLA class II variation in the modulation of humoral immune response to viral antigens in humans