Modelling agronomic properties of Technosols constructed with urban wastes

International audienceThe greening of urban and suburban areas requires large amounts of arable earth that is a non-renewable resource. However, concentration of population in cities leads to the production of high amounts of wastes and by-products that are nowadays partly recycled as a resource and quite systematically exported out of urban areas. To preserve natural soil resources, a strategy of waste recycling as fertile substitutes is proposed. Eleven wastes are selected for their environmental harmlessness and their contrasted physico-chemical properties for their potential use in pedological engineering. The aim is (i) to demonstrate the feasibility of the formulation of fertile substrates exclusively with wastes and (ii) to model their physico-chemical properties following various types, number and proportions of constitutive wastes. Twenty-five binary and ternary combinations are tested at different ratios for total carbon, Olsen available phosphorus, cation exchange capacity, water pH, water retention capacity and bulk density. Dose-response curves describe the variation of physico-chemical properties of mixtures depending on the type and ratio of selected wastes. If these mixtures mainly mimic natural soils, some of them present more extreme urban soil features, especially for pH and P Olsen. The fertility of the new substrates is modelled by multilinear regressions for the main soil properties

The inner craniodental anatomy of the Papio specimen U.W. 88-886 from the Early Pleistocene site of Malapa, Gauteng, South Africa

Cercopithecoids represent an essential component of the Plio-Pleistocene faunal assemblage. However, despite the abundance of the cercopithecoid fossil remains in African Plio-Pleistocene deposits, the chronological and geographic contexts from which the modern baboons (i.e. Papio hamadryas ssp.) emerged are still debated. The recently discovered Papio (hamadryas) angusticeps specimen (U.W. 88-886) from the Australopithecus sediba-bearing site of Malapa, Gauteng, South Africa, may represent the first modern baboon occurrence in the fossil record. Given the implication of U.W. 88-886 for the understanding of the papionin evolutionary history and the potential of internal craniodental structures for exploring evolutionary trends in fossil monkey taxa, we use X-ray microtomography to investigate the inner craniodental anatomy of this critical specimen. Our goal is to provide additional evidence to examine the origins of modern baboons. In particular,we explore (i) the tissue proportions and the dentine topographic distribution in dental roots and (ii) the endocranial organization. Consistent with the previous description and metrical analyses of its external cranial morphology, U.W. 88-886 shares internal craniodental anatomy similarities with Plio-Pleistocene and modern Papio, supporting its attribution to Papio (hamadryas) angusticeps. Interestingly, average dentine thickness and distribution in U.W. 88-886 fit more closely to the extinct Papio condition, while the sulcal pattern and relative dentine thickness are more like the extant Papio states. Besides providing additional evidence for characterizing South African fossil papionins, our study sheds new light on the polarity of inner craniodental features in the papionin lineage.Palaeontological Scientific Trust (PAST) Occitanie Region and the French Ministry of Higher Education and ResearchJNC201

Sequence and structure of the mouse gene coding for the largest neurofilament subunit.

We have determined the complete nucleotide sequence of the mouse gene encoding the neurofilament NF-H protein. The C-terminal domain of NF-H is very rich in charged amino acids (aa) and contains a 3-aa sequence, Lys-Ser-Pro, that is repeated 51 times within a stretch of 368 aa. The location of this serine-rich repeat in the phosphorylated domain of NF-H indicates that it represents the major protein kinase recognition site. The nfh gene shares two common intron positions with the nfl and nfm genes, but has an additional intron that occurs at a location equivalent to one of the introns in non-neuronal intermediate filament-coding genes. This additional nfh intron may have been acquired via duplication of a primordial intermediate filament gene

Molecular dynamics study of melting of a bcc metal-vanadium II : thermodynamic melting

We present molecular dynamics simulations of the thermodynamic melting transition of a bcc metal, vanadium using the Finnis-Sinclair potential. We studied the structural, transport and energetic properties of slabs made of 27 atomic layers with a free surface. We investigated premelting phenomena at the low-index surfaces of vanadium; V(111), V(001), and V(011), finding that as the temperature increases, the V(111) surface disorders first, then the V(100) surface, while the V(110) surface remains stable up to the melting temperature. Also, as the temperature increases, the disorder spreads from the surface layer into the bulk, establishing a thin quasiliquid film in the surface region. We conclude that the hierarchy of premelting phenomena is inversely proportional to the surface atomic density, being most pronounced for the V(111) surface which has the lowest surface density

Effects of growth rate, size, and light availability on tree survival across life stages: a demographic analysis accounting for missing values and small sample sizes.

The data set supporting the results of this article is available in the Dryad repository, http://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.6f4qs. Moustakas, A. and Evans, M. R. (2015) Effects of growth rate, size, and light availability on tree survival across life stages: a demographic analysis accounting for missing values.Plant survival is a key factor in forest dynamics and survival probabilities often vary across life stages. Studies specifically aimed at assessing tree survival are unusual and so data initially designed for other purposes often need to be used; such data are more likely to contain errors than data collected for this specific purpose

Active-Sterile neutrino oscillations and BBN+CMBR constraints

We show how active-sterile neutrino oscillations in the early Universe can play an interesting role in explaining the current observations of CMBR anisotropies and light element abundances. We describe different possible phenomenological scenarios in the interpretation of present data and how active-sterile neutrino oscillations can provide a viable theoretical framework.Comment: Some changes, to appear in Phys. Rev.

Association of risk assessment at diagnosis with healthcare resource utilization and health‐related quality of life outcomes in pulmonary arterial hypertension

We aimed to describe the clinical characteristics, healthcare resource utilization (HCRU) and costs, health‐related quality of life (HRQoL), and survival for patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH), stratified by 1‐year mortality risk at diagnosis. Adults diagnosed with PAH at the Sheffield Pulmonary Vascular Disease Unit between 2012 and 2019 were included. Patients were categorized as low, intermediate, or high risk for 1‐year mortality at diagnosis. Demographics, clinical characteristics, comorbidities, HCRU, costs, HRQoL, and survival were analyzed. Overall, 1717 patients were included: 72 (5%) at low risk, 941 (62%) at intermediate risk, and 496 (33%) at high risk. Low‐risk patients had lower HCRU prediagnosis and 1‐year postdiagnosis than intermediate‐ or high‐risk patients. Postdiagnosis, there were significant changes in HCRU, particularly inpatient hospitalizations and accident and emergency (A&E) visits among high‐risk patients. At 3 years postdiagnosis, HCRU for all measures was similar across risk groups. Low‐risk patients had lower EmPHasis‐10 scores (indicating better HRQoL) at diagnosis and at 1‐year follow‐up compared with intermediate‐ and high‐risk patients; only the score in the high‐risk group improved. Median overall survival decreased as risk category increased in analyzed subgroups. Low‐risk status was associated with better 1‐year survival and HRQoL compared with intermediate‐ and high‐risk patients. HCRU decreased in high‐risk patients postdiagnosis, with the most marked reduction in A&E admissions. The pattern of decreased per‐patient inpatient hospitalizations and A&E visits at 3 years postdiagnosis suggests that a diagnosis of PAH helps to decrease HCRU in areas that are key drivers of costs

Erratum: Author Correction: Identification of genes required for eye development by high-throughput screening of mouse knockouts.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1038/s42003-018-0226-0.]