Immunomodulation with Probiotics Against Aeromonas veronii in Grass Carp (Ctenopharyngodon idellus)

Aeromonas comprisea wide range of opportunistic bacteria that cause septicemia (blood poisoning)in fish.Withexpandingaquaculture, myriad methods have been used to combat these pathologiesincludingprobiotics and plant extracts which canpotentiallyaddress these diseases without harmingthe environment. Inthis study, four strains of opportunistic pathogens were isolated from diseased fish, thenmolecular identification of 16SrDNA was performed. Results identifiedthe four strains asAeromonas veronii, Shewanella sp., Bacillus cereus, and Aeromonas salmonicida. Experimental trialsrevealed that A.veroniiwas the primary strain. Multiple virulence-related factors were discovered, includingaerolysin (Aer), cytotoxic enterotoxin (Act), and the outer membrane protein (OmpAII).Thesewere foundonly in A.veronii. LC50 in grass carp was 3.6×104CFU/mLover 96 h, whereas the safe concentration was 9.11×103CFU/mL.Grass carp were challenged with 3 differentconcentrations of A.veronii. Following a 48h incubation period they were treated for 24 h, 48 h, and 72 h with 8.1×106CFU/mLconcentrations.The expression ofInterleukin-8(IL-8)andTumor Necrosis Factor-α(TNF-α)was up-regulated in the kidney, liver, spleen, and heart using qRT-PCR. Simultaneously, enzyme activity involving Pyruvate Kinase(PK),Alkaline Phosphatase(AKP), Alanine aminotransferase (ALT),Succinate Dehydrogenase (SDH), and Lysozyme (Lsz)inserum and liver tissues was significantly up-regulated.We found that probiotics enhancedgrowth of grass carp, improvedhealth status,and was beneficial in reducing the prevalence of this disease. Subsequent to feeding mixed probiotics,IL-8 and TNF-α geneexpression was significantly lower (p>0.05)than inthe infected group,at 16 and 31 days. Expression of these genes in the liver, spleen, and intestines of healthy grass carp fed probiotics wassignificantly up-regulated in contrast to grass carp fed a basal diet (p<0.05).Our results suggestthat use of probiotics as immune stimulator may improve the control of fish diseases in aquaculture

Study of e+e−→ppˉe^+e^- \rightarrow p\bar{p} in the vicinity of ψ(3770)\psi(3770)

Using 2917 $\rm{pb}^{-1}$ of data accumulated at 3.773~$\rm{GeV}$, 44.5~$\rm{pb}^{-1}$ of data accumulated at 3.65~$\rm{GeV}$ and data accumulated during a $\psi(3770)$ line-shape scan with the BESIII detector, the reaction $e^+e^-\rightarrow p\bar{p}$ is studied considering a possible interference between resonant and continuum amplitudes. The cross section of $e^+e^-\rightarrow\psi(3770)\rightarrow p\bar{p}$, $\sigma(e^+e^-\rightarrow\psi(3770)\rightarrow p\bar{p})$, is found to have two solutions, determined to be ($0.059\pm0.032\pm0.012$) pb with the phase angle $\phi = (255.8\pm37.9\pm4.8)^\circ$ ($<$0.11 pb at the 90% confidence level), or $\sigma(e^+e^-\rightarrow\psi(3770)\rightarrow p\bar{p}) = (2.57\pm0.12\pm0.12$) pb with $\phi = (266.9\pm6.1\pm0.9)^\circ$ both of which agree with a destructive interference. Using the obtained cross section of $\psi(3770)\rightarrow p\bar{p}$, the cross section of $p\bar{p}\rightarrow \psi(3770)$, which is useful information for the future PANDA experiment, is estimated to be either ($9.8\pm5.7$) nb ($<17.2$ nb at 90% C.L.) or $(425.6\pm42.9)$ nb

Dry Sliding-Friction and Wear Behavior of Hot-Extruded Al6061/Si3N4/Cf Hybrid Metal Matrix Composite.

The effects of reinforcement addition and hot extrusion on the microstructures, micro hardness, friction, and wear behavior of aluminium (Al) hybrid composite were investigated. Al6061 dispersed with electroless nickel-coated Si3N4 (6wt.%) and copper-coated carbon fiber (Cf) (1wt.%) hybrid composites was developed through stir casting followed by hot extrusion. Optical micro structural studies confirmed that the size of reinforcements decreased, and their orientations were in the extrusion direction. The decrease in the grain size (29%) of hybrid composites was larger than that in the grain size of matrix alloys under hot-extruded conditions. The synthesized hot-extruded Al6061 hybrid composite exhibited a lower coefficient of friction (51%) and high wear resistance (39%) compared with the hotextruded Al6061base alloy

Measurement of the D--->K^-\pi^+ strong phase difference in \psi(3770)--->D^0\antiD^0

n/

Conducting Polymer Nanomaterials and Their Applications

A paradigm shift takes place in the fabrication of conducting polymers from bulky features with microsize to ultrafine features with nanometer range. Novel conducting polymer nanomaterials require the potential to control synthetic approaches of conducting polymer on molecular and atomic levels. In this article, the synthetic methodology of conducting polymer has been briefly considered with chemical oxidation polymerization and electrochemical polymerization. The recent achievements in the fabrication of conducting polymer nanomaterials have been extensively reviewed with respect to soft template method, hard template method and template-free method. It also details the morphological spectrum of conducting polymer nanomaterials such as nanoparticle, core-shell nanomaterial, hollow nanosphere, nanofiber/nanorod, nanotube, thin film and nanopattern and nanocomposite. In addition, their applications are discussed under nanometer-sized dimension.This work has been financially supported by the Brain Korea 21 program of the Korean Ministry of Education and the Hyperstructured Organic Materials Research Center supported by Korea Science and Engineering Foundation