What is the future potential of CCS in Brazil? An expert elicitation study on the role of CCS in the country

This article presents the results of an expert elicitation about the role of carbon capture and storage (CCS) in Brazil as a measure to reduce greenhouse gases emissions, its costs, and the most appropriate policies to develop this technology at a commercial scale. Experts were elicited based on a scenario oriented towards net-zero emissions in Brazil by 2050. Five parameters were elicited, and all present great uncertainty. Results show that experts believe CCS has the potential to reduce CO2 emissions in Brazil. Still, with the current lack of supporting market, policy and regulatory frameworks in place, it could take another five years to begin implementation, reaching commercial scale not earlier than 12 years from the time of writing. Experts say that the chance of Brazil reaching the elicited value of 190 million tons of CO2 per year is very low. This indicates that though CCS can play a role in achieving net-zero emissions in the country, many other measures will be necessary. Policy-wise, the experts bet on a carbon market as the most probable policy instrument to help CCS development in Brazil. The experts also estimated the total investment necessary to reach 190 million tons of CO2 per year captured at USD 58 billion. When it comes to public expenditures, experts believe the role of the government in funding CCS in the country would be approximately 25% of total investments coming from different sources of public investment

MicroRNA expression in lymphocyte development and malignancy

This article is available open access through the publisher’s website. Copyright @ 2008 Macmillan Publishers Limited.No abstract available.The Leukemia Research Fund, the Julian Starmer-Smith Memorial Fund, and the Medical Research Council

Dimensionality and dynamics in the behavior of C. elegans

A major challenge in analyzing animal behavior is to discover some underlying simplicity in complex motor actions. Here we show that the space of shapes adopted by the nematode C. elegans is surprisingly low dimensional, with just four dimensions accounting for 95% of the shape variance, and we partially reconstruct "equations of motion" for the dynamics in this space. These dynamics have multiple attractors, and we find that the worm visits these in a rapid and almost completely deterministic response to weak thermal stimuli. Stimulus-dependent correlations among the different modes suggest that one can generate more reliable behaviors by synchronizing stimuli to the state of the worm in shape space. We confirm this prediction, effectively "steering" the worm in real time.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures, minor correction

PHYSIOLOGICAL QUALITY OF Araucaria angustifolia (Bertol.) Kuntze SEEDS SUBMITTED TO DIFFERENT STORAGE CONDITIONS AND ESCARIFICATION

As sementes de Araucaria angustifolia (Bertol.) Kuntze(pinheiro-do-Paran\ue1) s\ue3o recalcitrantes e, portanto, perdem rapidamente a viabilidade ap\uf3s a colheita, o que dificulta a sua utiliza\ue7\ue3o na produ\ue7\ue3o de mudas. Este trabalho teve como objetivos avaliar os efeitos do tempo de armazenamento refrigerado, do m\ue9todo de conserva\ue7\ue3o e da escarifica\ue7\ue3o na germina\ue7\ue3o e vigor das sementes de Araucaria angustifolia. As sementes foram submetidas a 0, 60, 120 e 180 dias de armazenamento refrigerado (0-1\ub0C/90-95% de UR), em condi\ue7\uf5es de ar normal (AN), atmosfera modificada (AM) e atmosfera controlada (AC). Em cada per\uedodo de remo\ue7\ue3o da c\ue2mara fria, as sementes foram escarificadas (pelo do corte de uma pequena parte da ponta do tegumento, sem danificar o endosperma) ou n\ue3o, e colocadas para germinar em condi\ue7\uf5es controladas de c\ue2mara de crescimento, em bandejas contendo vermiculita, durante 60 dias. O trabalho seguiu o delineamento inteiramente casualizado, segundo um fatorial 4 x 3 x 2, correspondendo a quatro tempos de armazenamento (0, 60, 120 e 180 dias), tr\ueas m\ue9todos de conserva\ue7\ue3o (AN, AM e AC), com e sem escarifica\ue7\ue3o, com quatro repeti\ue7\uf5es. Foi observada a manuten\ue7\ue3o da qualidade fisiol\uf3gica de sementes de Araucaria angustifolia armazenadas sob diferentes m\ue9todos de conserva\ue7\ue3o, em condi\ue7\uf5es de refrigera\ue7\ue3o, durante o per\uedodo de at\ue9 180 dias. No entanto, a velocidade da germina\ue7\ue3o e o crescimento inicial das pl\ue2ntulas foi maior em sementes armazenadas em c\ue2mara refrigerada durante 60 dias do que em sementes utilizadas imediatamente ap\uf3s a colheita ou armazenadas durante per\uedodos maiores de tempo, de 120-180 dias. O armazenamento de sementes em condi\ue7\uf5es de AN, acondicionadas em embalagem perfurada, mostrou-se igual ou ligeiramente superior aos m\ue9todos de armazenamento em AM e AC na preserva\ue7\ue3o da qualidade das sementes. A escarifica\ue7\ue3o das sementes ap\uf3s o armazenamento refrigerado aumentou o vigor e promoveu o crescimento inicial de pl\ue2ntulas de Araucaria angustifolia.The seeds of Araucaria angustifolia (Bertol.) Kuntzeare recalcitrants and, therefore, they lose rapidly the viability after the harvest, limiting their use for nursery production of seedlings. This work was carried out to investigate the effects of cold storage duration, conservation method, and escarification on germination and vigour of seeds of Araucaria angustifolia. The seeds were cold stored (0-1\ub0C/90-95% RH) for 0, 60, 120, and 180 days, under normal air condictions (NA), modified atmosphere (MA), and controlled atmosphere (CA) storage. For each cold storage duration, after removal from cold storage, the seeds were submitted or not to scarification (by cutting a small portion of the apical seed tegument, avoiding the damage of the endosperm), letting the germinate in a chamber with controlled environment, in plastic trays filled with vermiculite, for 60 days. The experiment followed the completely randomized factorial design (4x3x2), with four cold storage durations (0, 60, 120, and 180 days), three storage methods (NA, MA, and CA), with or without escarification, and four replicates. There was a good preservation of physiological quality for seeds submitted to different conservation methods in cold storage along the 180-day period. However, there was a faster germination and initial growth of seedlings for seeds left in cold storage for 60 days than in seeds assessed at harvest or left in cold storage for 120-180 days. The NA storage of seeds in perfurated plastic bags was as efficient as MA and CA storage to preserve seeds quality. Seeds scarification increased vigor and promoted seedlings initial growth of Araucaria angustifolia after being removed from cold storage

Whole-genome sequencing for prediction of Mycobacterium tuberculosis drug susceptibility and resistance: a retrospective cohort study

Background Diagnosing drug-resistance remains an obstacle to the elimination of tuberculosis. Phenotypic drug-susceptibility testing is slow and expensive, and commercial genotypic assays screen only common resistance-determining mutations. We used whole-genome sequencing to characterise common and rare mutations predicting drug resistance, or consistency with susceptibility, for all first-line and second-line drugs for tuberculosis. Methods Between Sept 1, 2010, and Dec 1, 2013, we sequenced a training set of 2099 Mycobacterium tuberculosis genomes. For 23 candidate genes identified from the drug-resistance scientific literature, we algorithmically characterised genetic mutations as not conferring resistance (benign), resistance determinants, or uncharacterised. We then assessed the ability of these characterisations to predict phenotypic drug-susceptibility testing for an independent validation set of 1552 genomes. We sought mutations under similar selection pressure to those characterised as resistance determinants outside candidate genes to account for residual phenotypic resistance. Findings We characterised 120 training-set mutations as resistance determining, and 772 as benign. With these mutations, we could predict 89·2% of the validation-set phenotypes with a mean 92·3% sensitivity (95% CI 90·7–93·7) and 98·4% specificity (98·1–98·7). 10·8% of validation-set phenotypes could not be predicted because uncharacterised mutations were present. With an in-silico comparison, characterised resistance determinants had higher sensitivity than the mutations from three line-probe assays (85·1% vs 81·6%). No additional resistance determinants were identified among mutations under selection pressure in non-candidate genes. Interpretation A broad catalogue of genetic mutations enable data from whole-genome sequencing to be used clinically to predict drug resistance, drug susceptibility, or to identify drug phenotypes that cannot yet be genetically predicted. This approach could be integrated into routine diagnostic workflows, phasing out phenotypic drug-susceptibility testing while reporting drug resistance early

Efficient mitochondrial biogenesis drives incomplete penetrance in Leber's hereditary optic neuropathy

Leber's hereditary optic neuropathy is a maternally inherited blinding disease caused as a result of homoplasmic point mutations in complex I subunit genes of mitochondrial DNA. It is characterized by incomplete penetrance, as only some mutation carriers become affected. Thus, the mitochondrial DNA mutation is necessary but not sufficient to cause optic neuropathy. Environmental triggers and genetic modifying factors have been considered to explain its variable penetrance. We measured the mitochondrial DNA copy number and mitochondrial mass indicators in blood cells from affected and carrier individuals, screening three large pedigrees and 39 independently collected smaller families with Leber's hereditary optic neuropathy, as well as muscle biopsies and cells isolated by laser capturing from post-mortem specimens of retina and optic nerves, the latter being the disease targets. We show that unaffected mutation carriers have a significantly higher mitochondrial DNA copy number and mitochondrial mass compared with their affected relatives and control individuals. Comparative studies of fibroblasts from affected, carriers and controls, under different paradigms of metabolic demand, show that carriers display the highest capacity for activating mitochondrial biogenesis. Therefore we postulate that the increased mitochondrial biogenesis in carriers may overcome some of the pathogenic effect of mitochondrial DNA mutations. Screening of a few selected genetic variants in candidate genes involved in mitochondrial biogenesis failed to reveal any significant association. Our study provides a valuable mechanism to explain variability of penetrance in Leber's hereditary optic neuropathy and clues for high throughput genetic screening to identify the nuclear modifying gene(s), opening an avenue to develop predictive genetic tests on disease risk and therapeutic strategies.TelethonAssociazione Serena Talarico per i giovani nel mondo and Fondazione Giuseppe Tomasello O.N.L.U.S.Mitocon OnlusResearch to Prevent BlindnessInternational Foundation for Optic Nerve Diseases (IFOND)Struggling Within Leber'sPoincenot FamilyEierman FoundationNational Eye InstituteUniv Rome, Dept Radiol Oncol & Pathol, Rome, ItalyUniv Bologna, Dept Biomed & NeuroMotor Sci DIBINEM, Bologna, ItalyUniv Bari, Dept Biosci Biotechnol & Biopharmaceut, Bari, ItalyBellaria Hosp, IRCCS Ist Sci Neurol Bologna, I-40139 Bologna, ItalyUSC, Keck Sch Med, Dept Ophthalmol, Los Angeles, CA USAUSC, Keck Sch Med, Dept Neurosurg, Los Angeles, CA USAUniv Trieste, Dept Reprod Sci Dev & Publ Hlth, Trieste, ItalyUniv Trieste, IRCCS Burlo Garofolo Children Hosp, Trieste, ItalyNewcastle Univ, Inst Med Genet, Newcastle Upon Tyne NE1 7RU, Tyne & Wear, EnglandFdn Ist Neurol Carlo Besta IRCCS, Unit Mol Neurogenet, Milan, ItalyMRC Mitochondrial Biol Unit, Cambridge, EnglandFed Univ São Paulo UNIFESP, Dept Ophthalmol, São Paulo, BrazilUniv São Paulo, Inst Psychol, Dept Expt Psychol, São Paulo, BrazilStudio Oculist dAzeglio, Bologna, ItalyOsped San Giovanni Evangelista, Tivoli, ItalyAzienda Osped San Camillo Forlanini, Rome, ItalyUniv Rome, Dipartimento Metodi & Modelli Econ Finanza & Terr, Rome, ItalyUniv Rome, Dept Mol Med, Rome, ItalyFed Univ São Paulo UNIFESP, Dept Ophthalmol, São Paulo, BrazilTelethon: GGP06233Telethon: GGP11182Telethon: GPP10005National Eye Institute: EY03040Web of Scienc

Dung removal increases under higher dung beetle functional diversity regardless of grazing intensification

Dung removal by macrofauna such as dung beetles is an important process for nutrient cycling in pasturelands. Intensification of farming practices generally reduces species and functional diversity of terrestrial invertebrates, which may negatively affect ecosystem services. Here, we investigate the effects of cattle-grazing intensification on dung removal by dung beetles in field experiments replicated in 38 pastures around the world. Within each study site, we measured dung removal in pastures managed with low- and high-intensity regimes to assess between-regime differences in dung beetle diversity and dung removal, whilst also considering climate and regional variations. The impacts of intensification were heterogeneous, either diminishing or increasing dung beetle species richness, functional diversity, and dung removal rates. The effects of beetle diversity on dung removal were more variable across sites than within sites. Dung removal increased with species richness across sites, while functional diversity consistently enhanced dung removal within sites, independently of cattle grazing intensity or climate. Our findings indicate that, despite intensified cattle stocking rates, ecosystem services related to decomposition and nutrient cycling can be maintained when a functionally diverse dung beetle community inhabits the human-modified landscape