2,886 research outputs found
Inheritance of seedlessness in grapevine (Vitis vinifera L.)
Despite considerable efforts made by breeders for over 70 years, inheritance of seedlessness in grapevine is not clearly defined. None of the numerous hypotheses proposed until now is satisfying, whether they are based on recessive or dominant genes. We measured precisely the phenotypic expression of the seeded/seedless character in a progeny obtained by crossing two partially seedless selections and using in ovulo and in vitro culture to rescue embryos. We propose the hypothesis that inheritance of seedlessness in grapevine is based on a complex system whereby the expression of three independently inherited recessive genes is controlled by a dominant regulator gene. This hypothesis was compared to other results published in the scientific literature and appeared coherent enough to be used as a theoretical basis for further work on seedlessness inheritance in grapevine. Attempts to explain the control of seedlessness involve interactions with endogenous gibberellins. The consequences of such a model for the development of breeding programs for seedless table grapes, and particularly for the use of molecular biology techniques, are discussed
Specific heat of single crystal MgB_2: a two-band superconductor with two different anisotropies
Heat-capacity measurements of a 39 microgramm MgB_2 single crystal in fields
up to 14 T and below 3 K allow the determination of the low-temperature linear
term of the specific heat, its field dependence and its anisotropy. Our results
are compatible with two-band superconductivity, the band carrying the small gap
being isotropic, that carrying the large gap having an anisotropy of ~ 5. Three
different upper critical fields are thus needed to describe the superconducting
state of MgB2.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures - V2: Bibliography updated and some typo
corrected. One reference added - V3: version accepted for publication in PRL,
changes made in the tex
Metagenomic-based Surveillance of Pacific Coast tick Dermacentor occidentalis Identifies Two Novel Bunyaviruses and an Emerging Human Ricksettsial Pathogen.
An increasing number of emerging tick-borne diseases has been reported in the United States since the 1970s. Using metagenomic next generation sequencing, we detected nucleic acid sequences from 2 novel viruses in the family Bunyaviridae and an emerging human rickettsial pathogen, Rickettsia philipii, in a population of the Pacific Coast tick, Dermacentor occidentalis in Mendocino County sampled annually from 2011 to 2014. A total of 250 adults of this human-biting, generalist tick were collected from contiguous chaparral and grassland habitats, and RNA from each individually extracted tick was deep sequenced to an average depth of 7.3 million reads. We detected a Francisella endosymbiont in 174 ticks (70%), and Rickettsia spp. in 19 ticks (8%); Rickettsia-infected ticks contained R. rhipicephali (16 of 250, 6.4%) or R. philipii (3 of 250,1.2%), the agent of eschar-associated febrile illness in humans. The genomes of 2 novel bunyaviruses (>99% complete) in the genera Nairovirus and Phlebovirus were also identified and found to be present in 20-91% of ticks, depending on the year of collection. The high prevalence of these bunyaviruses in sampled Dermacentor ticks suggests that they may be viral endosymbionts, although further studies are needed to determine whether they are infectious for vertebrate hosts, especially humans, and their potential role in tick ecology
Calorimetric Investigation of CeRu2Ge2 up to 8 GPa
We have developed a calorimeter able to give a qualitative picture of the
specific heat of a sample under high pressure up to approximately 10 GPa. The
principle of ac-calorimetry was adapted to the conditions in a high pressure
clamp. The performance of this technique was successfully tested with the
measurement of the specific heat of CeRu2Ge2 in the temperature range 1.5
K<T<12 K. The phase diagram of its magnetic phases is consistent with previous
transport measurements.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Differentiation enhances Zika virus infection of neuronal brain cells.
Zika virus (ZIKV) is an emerging, mosquito-borne pathogen associated with a widespread 2015-2016 epidemic in the Western Hemisphere and a proven cause of microcephaly and other fetal brain defects in infants born to infected mothers. ZIKV infections have been also linked to other neurological illnesses in infected adults and children, including Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS), acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) and meningoencephalitis, but the viral pathophysiology behind those conditions remains poorly understood. Here we investigated ZIKV infectivity in neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y cells, both undifferentiated and following differentiation with retinoic acid. We found that multiple ZIKV strains, representing both the prototype African and contemporary Asian epidemic lineages, were able to replicate in SH-SY5Y cells. Differentiation with resultant expression of mature neuron markers increased infectivity in these cells, and the extent of infectivity correlated with degree of differentiation. New viral particles in infected cells were visualized by electron microscopy and found to be primarily situated inside vesicles; overt damage to the Golgi apparatus was also observed. Enhanced ZIKV infectivity in a neural cell line following differentiation may contribute to viral neuropathogenesis in the developing or mature central nervous system
Nonmagnetic impurity effects in MgB
We study nonmagnetic impurity effects in MgB using the quasiclassical
equations of superconductivity for a weak-coupling two-band model. Parameters
in the model are fixed so as to reproduce experiments on MgB as closely
as possible. The quasiparticle density of states and the specific heat are
calculated for various values of the interband impurity scattering. The density
of states changes gradually from a two-gap structure into the conventional
single-gap structure as the interband scattering increases. It is found that
the excitation threshold is not a monotonic function of the interband
scattering. Calculated results for the specific heat are in good agreements
with experiments on samples after irradiation
Anomalous Flux Flow Resistivity in Two Gap Superconductor MgB_2
The flux flow resistivity associated with purely viscous motion of vortices
in high-quality MgB_2 was measured by microwave surface impedance. Flux flow
resistivity exhibits unusual field dependence with strong enhancement at low
field, which is markedly different to conventional s-wave superconductors. A
crossover field which separates two distinct flux flow regimes having different
flux flow resistivity slopes was clearly observed in H//ab-plane. The unusual
H-dependence indicates that two very differently sized superconducting gaps in
MgB_2 manifest in the vortex dynamics and almost equally contribute to energy
dissipation. The carrier scattering rate in two different bands is also
discussed with the present results, compared to heat capacity and thermal
conductivity results.Comment: 4 pages, 3figure
Transition Spectra for a BCS Superconductor with Multiple Gaps: Model Calculations for MgB_2
We analyze the qualitative features in the transition spectra of a model
superconductor with multiple energy gaps, using a simple extension of the
Mattis-Bardeen expression for probes with case I and case II coherence factors.
At temperature T = 0, the far infrared absorption edge is, as expected,
determined by the smallest gap. However, the large thermal background may mask
this edge at finite temperatures and instead the secondary absorption edges
found at Delta_i+Delta_j may become most prominent. At finite T, if certain
interband matrix elements are large, there may also be absorption peaks at the
gap difference frequencies | Delta_i-Delta_j | . We discuss the effect of
sample quality on the measured spectra and the possible relation of these
predictions to the recent infrared absorption measurement on MgB_2
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