Assessment of proteolysis and lipolysis in Serra cheese: effects of axial cheese location, ripening time and lactation season

The degrees of proteolysis and Iipolysis in Serra cheese were measured in cheese samples obtained from experiments laid out as a three-way facto rial design replicated twice. The independent variables studied were the location within the cheese (from the center to the surface), the position in the lactation season (from October to June) and the ripening time (from 0 to 35 days). Ali three variables had statistically significant effects on the concentration of water soluble peptides (WSP), but only the ripening time and the period within the lactation season affected the fat acidity (FA). The extents (alter the given ripening period) and the rates (averaged over the ripening period) of generation of WSP and FA were highest for spring and lowest for autumn. The lowest values for both the proteolysis extent and the proteolysis rate were obtained for the rind. The rates of proteolysis and lipolysis tended to decrease with ripening time; most of the lipolysis occurred during the first week, but proteolysis was still in progress by 35 days of ripening

Aspectos técnicos e econômicos da terminação de cordeiros a pasto e em confinamento.

SISTEMAS DE TERMINAÇÃO DE CORDEIROS; FATORES INERENTES AO CORDEIRO QUE INTERFEREM NOS RESULTADOS DA FASE DE TERMINAÇÃO; FATORES AMBIENTAIS A SEREM CONSIDERADOS NA ESCOLHA DO SISTEMA DE TERMINAÇÃO DE CORDEIROS; ASPECTOS ECONÔMICOS DA TERMINAÇÃO DE CORDEIROS À PASTO E EM CONFINAMENTO; TIPO DE TERMINAÇÃO DE CORDEIROS E AS ALTERNATIVAS PARA UMA PRODUÇÃO DE CARNE OVINA DIFERENCIADA

A simple prescription for simulating and characterizing gravitational arcs

Simple models of gravitational arcs are crucial to simulate large samples of these objects with full control of the input parameters. These models also provide crude and automated estimates of the shape and structure of the arcs, which are necessary when trying to detect and characterize these objects on massive wide area imaging surveys. We here present and explore the ArcEllipse, a simple prescription to create objects with shape similar to gravitational arcs. We also present PaintArcs, which is a code that couples this geometrical form with a brightness distribution and adds the resulting object to images. Finally, we introduce ArcFitting, which is a tool that fits ArcEllipses to images of real gravitational arcs. We validate this fitting technique using simulated arcs and apply it to CFHTLS and HST images of tangential arcs around clusters of galaxies. Our simple ArcEllipse model for the arc, associated to a S\'ersic profile for the source, recovers the total signal in real images typically within 10%-30%. The ArcEllipse+S\'ersic models also automatically recover visual estimates of length-to-width ratios of real arcs. Residual maps between data and model images reveal the incidence of arc substructure. They may thus be used as a diagnostic for arcs formed by the merging of multiple images. The incidence of these substructures is the main factor preventing ArcEllipse models from accurately describing real lensed systems.Comment: 12 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication in A&

Prospecção de metodologia para extração protéica em gramíneas forrageiras compatível com análise proteômica.

O objetivo deste estudo é avaliar metodologias de extração de proteínas de Brachiaria, visando indicar aquela que proporciona a obtenção de extratos protéicos mais concentrados e livres de contaminantes

Proteínas expressas em Brachiaria brizantha envolvidas nos mecanismos de resistência às cigarrinhas-das-pastagens.

No Brasil, o gênero Brachiaria spp. inclui as cultivares de gramíneas mais importantes para a produção de carne bovina. O monocultivo de extensas áreas com uma ou poucas cultivares contribuiu para o avanço das cigarrinhas-das-pastagens, sua principal praga. Estima-se que as cigarrinhas ocorrem em aproximadamente 10 milhões de hectares de pastagens, provocando perda na qualidade da forragem e diminuição na produção de matéria seca, resultando na redução da capacidade de suporte da mesma. A diversificação das pastagens a partir do uso alternado de cultivares com diferentes graus de resistência às cigarrinhas é uma alternativa eficiente para controlar os danos causados por essa praga. Para tanto, a avaliação de materiais quanto à resistência às cigarrinhas-das-pastagens constitui-se uma atividade fundamental, que vem sendo realizada como parte importante do programa de melhoramento de braquiária. Entretanto, esta avaliação é realizada em casa-de-vegetação e no campo, em um processo que leva aproximadamente 10 anos. Em função disso, o screening de genótipos quanto à resistência às cigarrinhas-das-pastagens, o mais cedo possível, no programa de desenvolvimento de novas cultivares de braquiária, tem sido uma prioridade. Dentro deste contexto, ressalta-se a importância em aumentar a eficiência da seleção de materiais resistentes, associando-se aos métodos tradicionais de melhoramento, tecnologias com grande potencial de predição, como a proteômica. Esta abordagem permite analisar os genes diretamente ao nível de seus produtos gênicos, o que implica em inúmeras vantagens considerando-se que as proteínas são os responsáveis definitivos pelo fenótipo da célula. O conhecimento gerado com esta proposta constituirá o primeiro passo para o desenvolvimento de uma nova metodologia de avaliação de materiais quanto à resistência às cigarrinhas, baseada em proteínas marcadoras, com vistas a contribuir para o desenvolvimento de novas cultivares de braquiária, por meio da seleção precoce.Poster 047

Phase Transition in Liquid Drop Fragmentation

A liquid droplet is fragmented by a sudden pressurized-gas blow, and the resulting droplets, adhered to the window of a flatbed scanner, are counted and sized by computerized means. The use of a scanner plus image recognition software enables us to automatically count and size up to tens of thousands of tiny droplets with a smallest detectable volume of approximately 0.02 nl. Upon varying the gas pressure, a critical value is found where the size-distribution becomes a pure power-law, a fact that is indicative of a phase transition. Away from this transition, the resulting size distributions are well described by Fisher's model at coexistence. It is found that the sign of the surface correction term changes sign, and the apparent power-law exponent tau has a steep minimum, at criticality, as previously reported in Nuclear Multifragmentation studies [1,2]. We argue that the observed transition is not percolative, and introduce the concept of dominance in order to characterize it. The dominance probability is found to go to zero sharply at the transition. Simple arguments suggest that the correlation length exponent is nu=1/2. The sizes of the largest and average fragments, on the other hand, do not go to zero but behave in a way that appears to be consistent with recent predictions of Ashurst and Holian [3,4].Comment: 10 pages, 11 figures. LaTeX (revtex4) with psfig/epsfi

The Solar Neighborhood XVII: Parallax Results from the CTIOPI 0.9m Program -- Twenty New Members of the RECONS 10 Parsec Sample

Astrometric measurements for 25 red dwarf systems are presented, including the first definitive trigonometric parallaxes for 20 systems within 10 pc of the Sun, the horizon of the RECONS sample. The three nearest systems that had no previous trigonometric parallaxes (other than perhaps rough preliminary efforts) are SO 0253+1652 (3.84 +/- 0.04 pc, the 23rd nearest system), SCR 1845-6357 AB (3.85 +/- 0.02 pc, 24th), and LHS 1723 (5.32 +/- 0.04 pc, 56th). In total, seven of the systems reported here rank among the nearest 100 stellar systems. Supporting photometric and spectroscopic observations have been made to provide full characterization of the systems, including complete VRIJHK photometry and spectral types. A study of the variability of 27 targets reveals six obvious variable stars, including GJ 1207, for which we observed a flare event in the V band that caused it to brighten by 1.7 mag. Improved parallaxes for GJ 54 AB and GJ 1061, both important members of the 10 pc sample, are also reported. Definitive parallaxes for GJ 1001 A, GJ 633, and GJ 2130 ABC, all of which have been reported to be within 10 pc, indicate that they are beyond 10 pc. From the analysis of systems with (previously) high trigonometric parallax errors, we conclude that parallaxes with errors in excess of 10 mas are insufficiently reliable for inclusion in the RECONS sample. The cumulative total of new additions to the 10 pc sample since 2000 is now 34 systems -- 28 by the RECONS team and six by other groups. This total represents a net increase of 16% in the number of stellar systems reliably known to be nearer than 10 pc.Comment: 33 pages, including 3 figures and 3 table