Validation and Improvement of the Beef Production Sub-index in Ireland for Beef Cattle

End of project reportThe objectives of the following study were to: a. Quantify the effect of sire genetic merit for BCI on: 1. feed intake, growth and carcass traits of progeny managed under bull or steer beef production systems. 2. live animal scores, carcass composition and plasma hormone and metabolite concentrations in their progeny. b. Compare the progeny of : 1. Late-maturing beef with dairy breeds and 2. Charolais (CH), Limousin (LM), Simmental (SM) and Belgian Blue (BB) sires bred to beef suckler dams, for feed intake, blood hormones and metabolites, live animal measurements, carcass traits and carcass value in bull and steer production systems

Effect of Silane Coupling Agent Chemistry on Electrical Breakdown across Hybrid Organic–Inorganic Insulating Films

Dielectric breakdown measurements were conducted on self-assembled monolayer (SAM)/native silicon oxide hybrid dielectrics using conductive atomic force microscopy (C-AFM). By depositing silane coupling agents (SCAs) through a diffusional barrier layer, SAM roughness was decoupled from chemistry to compare the chemical effects of exposed R-group functionality on dielectric breakdown. Using Weibull and current–voltage (I–V) analysis, the breakdown strength was observed to be independent of SCA R-group length, and the addition of a SAM was seen to improve the breakdown strength relative to native silicon oxide by up to 158%. Fluorinated SCAs were observed to suppress tunneling leakage and exhibited increased breakdown strength relative to their hydrocarbon analogs. Electron trapping, scattering, or attachment processes inherent to the fluorinated moieties are thought to be the origin of the improved breakdown properties.Engineering and Applied Science

Structure of amyloid-β (20-34) with Alzheimer's-associated isomerization at Asp23 reveals a distinct protofilament interface.

Amyloid-β (Aβ) harbors numerous posttranslational modifications (PTMs) that may affect Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathogenesis. Here we present the 1.1 Å resolution MicroED structure of an Aβ 20-34 fibril with and without the disease-associated PTM, L-isoaspartate, at position 23 (L-isoAsp23). Both wild-type and L-isoAsp23 protofilaments adopt β-helix-like folds with tightly packed cores, resembling the cores of full-length fibrillar Aβ structures, and both self-associate through two distinct interfaces. One of these is a unique Aβ interface strengthened by the isoaspartyl modification. Powder diffraction patterns suggest a similar structure may be adopted by protofilaments of an analogous segment containing the heritable Iowa mutation, Asp23Asn. Consistent with its early onset phenotype in patients, Asp23Asn accelerates aggregation of Aβ 20-34, as does the L-isoAsp23 modification. These structures suggest that the enhanced amyloidogenicity of the modified Aβ segments may also reduce the concentration required to achieve nucleation and therefore help spur the pathogenesis of AD

Elasticity equations with random domains—the shape derivative approach

In this work, we discuss elasticity equations on a two-dimensional domain with random boundaries and we apply these equations to modelling human corneas. References R. C. Augustyn, D. Nankivil, A. Mohamed, B. Maceo, F. Pierre, and J.-M. Parel. Human ocular biometry. Exp. Eye Res. 102 (2012), pp. 70–75. doi: 10.1016/j.exer.2012.06.009. F. Ballarin, A. Manzoni, G. Rozza, and S. Salsa. Shape optimization by free-form deformation: Existence results and numerical solution for Stokes flows. J. Sci. Comput. 60.3 (2014), pp. 537–563. doi: 10.1007/s10915-013-9807-8. S. C. Brenner and L.-Y. Sung. Linear finite element methods for planar linear elasticity. Math. Comp. 59 (1992), pp. 321–338. doi: 10.2307/2153060. M. C. Delfour and J.-P. Zolesio. Shapes and geometries. Advances in Design and Control. SIAM, Philadelphia, 2001. doi: 10.1137/1.9780898719826. J. Dick. Higher order scrambled digital nets achieve the optimal rate of the root mean square error for smooth integrands. Ann. Statist. 39.3 (2011), pp. 1372–1398. doi: 10.1214/11-AOS880. J. Dick, F. Y. Kuo, Q. T. Le Gia, and Ch. Schwab. Multilevel higher order QMC Petrov–Galerkin discretization for affine parametric operator equations. SIAM J. Num. Anal. 4.54 (2015), pp. 2541–2568. doi: 10.1137/16M1078690 A. Eilaghi, J. G. Flanagan, I. Tertinegg, C. A. Simmons, G. W. Brodland, and C. R. Ethier. Biaxial testing of human sclera. J. Biomech. 43 (2010), pp. 1696–1701. doi: 10.1016/j.jbiomech.2010.02.031. U. Fares, A. M Otri, M. A. Al-Aqaba, and H. S. Dua. Correlation of central and peripheral corneal thickness in healthy corneas. Cont. Lens Anterior Eye 35 (2012), pp. 39–45. doi: 10.1016/j.clae.2011.07.004. R. N. Gantner and Ch. Schwab. Computational higher order quasi-Monte Carlo integration. Monte Carlo and quasi-Monte Carlo methods. Vol. 163. Springer Proc. Math. Stat. Springer, 2016, pp. 271–288. doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-33507-0_12. on p. C129). H. Harbrecht. Second moment analysis for Robin boundary value problems on random domains. Singular Phenomena and Scaling in Mathematical Models. Ed. by M. Griebel. Springer, 2014, pp. 361–381. doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-00786-1_16. H. Harbrecht, M. Peters, and M. Siebenmorgen. Analysis of the domain mapping method for elliptic diffusion problems on random domains. Numer. Math. 134.4 (2016), pp. 823–856. doi: 10.1007/s00211-016-0791-4. H. Harbrecht, R. Schneider, and Ch. Schwab. Sparse second moment analysis for elliptic problems in stochastic domains. Numer. Math. 109.3 (2008), pp. 385–414. doi: 10.1007/s00211-008-0147-9. R. Hiptmair and J. Li. Shape derivatives in differential forms I: an intrinsic perspective. Ann. Matematica Pura Appl. 192 (2013), pp. 1077–1098. doi: 10.1007/s10231-012-0259-9. C. R. de Lima, L. A. Mello, R. G. Lima, and E. C. N. Silva. Electrical impedance tomography through constrained sequential linear programming: a topology optimization approach. Meas. Sci. Tech. 18.9 (2007), pp. 2847–2858. doi: 10.1088/0957-0233/18/9/014. M. Loeve. Probability theory I. Graduate Texts in Mathematics. Springer-Verlag, 1978. doi: 10.1007/978-1-4684-9464-8. R. Martin, S. Jonuscheit, A. Rio-Cristobal, and M. J. Doughty. Repeatability of Pentacam peripheral corneal thickness measurements. Cont. Lens Anterior Eye 38 (2015), pp. 424–429. doi: 10.1016/j.clae.2015.05.001. R. von Mises. Mechanik der festen Körper im plastisch-deformablen Zustand. Nachrichten von der Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen. Mathematisch-Physikalische Klasse 1 (1913), pp. 562–592. url: https://eudml.org/doc/58894 F. Orucoglu and E. Toker. Comparative analysis of anterior segment parameters in normal and keratoconic eyes generated by Scheimpflug tomography. J. Ophthalmol., 925414 (2015), pp. 1–8. doi: 10.1155/2015/925414. D. C. Pye. A clinical method for estimating the modulus of elasticity of the human cornea in vivo. PLOS One 15 (2020), pp. 1–19. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0224824

Change over a 16-month period in the psychological well-being of mothers of girls and women with Rett syndrome

PURPOSE: There is an emerging research literature on the experiences of family members of girls and women with Rett syndrome (RTT), but a lack of longitudinal data. METHODS: Fifty mothers whose daughters had RTT were surveyed 16-17 months after an earlier cross-sectional study. Measures completed at both time points focused on maternal positive and negative psychological well-being and their daughters' behavioral and emotional problems and RTT behavioral phenotype severity. RESULTS: Maternal stress, anxiety, and depression demonstrated at least moderate levels of stability. Maternal positive perceptions were also moderately stable over 16-17 months. Longitudinal analyses suggested that their daughters' behavioral and emotional problems rather than RTT behavioral phenotype severity predicted later maternal well-being. CONCLUSION: Mothers with RTT daughters experience chronic stress (persisting over time) but also ongoing positive perceptions. Practitioners should recognize positive perceptions and also consider targeted behavioral parent training to reduce behavior problems in individuals with RTT

Imprints of radial migration on the Milky Way’s metallicity distribution functions

Recent analysis of the SDSS-III/Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE) Data Release 12 stellar catalog has revealed that the Milky Way’s (MW) metallicity distribution function (MDF) changes shape as a function of radius, transitioning from being negatively skewed at small Galactocentric radii to positively skewed at large Galactocentric radii. Using a high-resolution, N-body+SPH simulation, we show that the changing skewness arises from radial migration—metal-rich stars form in the inner disk and subsequently migrate to the metal-poorer outer disk. These migrated stars represent a large fraction (>50%) of the stars in the outer disk; they populate the high-metallicity tail of the MDFs and are, in general, more metal-rich than the surrounding outer disk gas. The simulation also reproduces another surprising APOGEE result: the spatially invariant high-[α/Fe] MDFs. This arises in the simulation from the migration of a population formed within a narrow range of radii (3.2 ±1.2 kpc) and time (8.8 ± 0.6 Gyr ago), rather than from spatially extended star formation in a homogeneous medium at early times. These results point toward the crucial role radial migration has played in shaping our MW

Reconstructing the Origins and Dispersal of the Polynesian Bottle Gourd (Lagenaria siceraria)

The origin of the Polynesian bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria), an important crop species in prehistoric Polynesia, has remained elusive. Most recently, a South American origin has been favored as the bottle gourd could have been introduced from this continent with the sweet potato by Polynesian voyagers around A.D. 1,000. To test the hypothesis of an American origin for the Polynesian bottle gourd, we developed seven markers specific to bottle gourd (two chloroplast and five nuclear). The nuclear markers were developed using a new technique where polymorphic inter simple sequence repeat (ISSR) markers are converted into single-locus polymerase chain reaction and sequencing markers—an approach that will be useful for developing markers in other taxa. All seven markers were sequenced in 36 cultivars of bottle gourd from Asia, the Americas, and Polynesia. The results support a dual origin for the Polynesian bottle gourd: the chloroplast markers are exclusively of Asian origin, but the nuclear markers show alleles originating in both the Americas and Asia. Because hybridization of Polynesian bottle gourds with post-European introductions cannot be excluded, ancient DNA from archaeological material will be useful for further elucidating the prehistoric movements of this species in Polynesia. This work has implications not only for the dispersal of the Polynesian bottle gourd but also for the domestication and dispersal of the species as a whole

Restructuring and Serving Web-Accessible Streamflow Data From the NOAA National Water Model Historic Simulations

In 2016, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration deployed the first iteration of an operational National Water Model (NWM) to forecast the water cycle in the continental United States. With many versions, an hourly, multi-decadal historic simulation is made available to the public. In all released to date, the files containing simulated streamflow contain a snapshot of model conditions across the entire domain for a single timestep which makes accessing time series a technical and resource-intensive challenge. In the most recent release, extracting a complete streamflow time series for a single location requires managing 367,920 files (~16.2 TB). In this work we describe a reproducable process for restructuring a sequential set of NWM steamflow files for efficient time series access and provide restructured datasets for versions 1.2 (1993-2018), 2.0 (1993-2020), and 2.1 (1979-2022). These datasets have been made accessible via an OPeNDAP enabled THREDDS data server for public use and a brief analysis highlights the latest version of the model should not be assumed best for all locations. Laslty, we describe an R package that expedites data retrieval with examples for multiple use-cases

The Critical Power Model as a Potential Tool for Anti-Doping

Existing doping detection strategies rely on direct and indirect biochemical measurement methods focused on detecting banned substances, their metabolites, or biomarkers related to their use. However, the goal of doping is to improve performance, and yet evidence from performance data is not considered by these strategies. The emergence of portable sensors for measuring exercise intensities and of player tracking technologies may enable the widespread collection of performance data. How these data should be used for doping detection is an open question. Herein, we review the basis by which performance models could be used for doping detection, followed by critically reviewing the potential of the critical power (CP) model as a prototypical performance model that could be used in this regard. Performance models are mathematical representations of performance data specific to the athlete. Some models feature parameters with physiological interpretations, changes to which may provide clues regarding the specific doping method. The CP model is a simple model of the power-duration curve and features two physiologically interpretable parameters, CP and W0 . We argue that the CP model could be useful for doping detection mainly based on the predictable sensitivities of its parameters to ergogenic aids and other performance-enhancing interventions. However, our argument is counterbalanced by the existence of important limitations and unresolved questions that need to be addressed before the model is used for doping detection. We conclude by providing a simple worked example showing how it could be used and propose recommendations for its implementation

Validation and Improvement of the Beef Production Sub-index in Ireland for Beef Cattle

End of Project ReportThe objectives of the following study were to: a. Quantify the effect of sire genetic merit for BCI on: 1. feed intake, growth and carcass traits of progeny managed under bull or steer beef production systems. 2. live animal scores, carcass composition and plasma hormone and metabolite concentrations in their progeny. b. Compare the progeny of : 1. Late-maturing beef with dairy breeds and 2. Charolais (CH), Limousin (LM), Simmental (SM) and Belgian Blue (BB) sires bred to beef suckler dams, for feed intake, blood hormones an