Combining pot, atom and step economy (PASE) in organic synthesis. Synthesis of tetrahydropyran-4-ones

The combination of pot, atom and step economy (PASE) in the synthesis of organic molecules of medium complexity can lead to a significant 'greening' of a synthetic route. This is demonstrated by the synthesis of highly substituted tetrahydropyran-4-ones and is quantified by a series of recognised metrics, which demonstrate the efficiency of combining PASE over conventional synthetic strategies

Report on church finances and accounting

Business-like methods in the financial administration of a church are of vital importance to the welfare of the society. Inefficient administration, hand-to-mouth ways of raising money, carelessness or tardiness in the payment of bills, usually indicate low vitality in a church, and are a constant source of danger and invitation to financial calamity. They are the result sometimes of ignorance or of timidity on the part of the minister, but more commonly of negligence and indifference on the part of the laymen, who do not consult the minister about the business affairs of the church and who resent or disregard any suggestions from him. The financial problems of many a church would be well on the way toward solution if the business men of the parish would hold themselves responsible for the establishment and faithful administration of sound business methods in the parish.The theory that the minister should have nothing to do with the business affairs of the church is a sound one in so far as it means that he should be relieved of all responsibility for raising or administering the income of the church. His relation to the trustees of the church, however, is not very unlike that of the manager of a cotton mill to its board of directors. He should feel free to sit with the board and enter into its counsels save on exceptional occasions, and he is entitled to a thorough acquaintance with the affairs of the parish to which he ministers. It is true that a minister of deeply spiritual nature and gifted with unusual preaching ability may cause his church to grow in spite of the handicaps of inefficient administration by the laymen, but poor business methods will be an unnecessary drag upon an otherwise successful ministry. Fortunately it sometimes happens that vigor and spiritual power in the minister so stimulate his people that they develop into a careful and well-managed church. Such a result is almost certain evidence that the church is spiritually sound, whereas continuance in slipshod methods is almost equally positive evidence of spiritual decay. Efficient administration in raising money so that an adequate income is secured for the work of the church, in prompt payment of bills, and in making a complete public report of income and expenditure, will build up the self-respect of the parish, and the respect of the community, which unhappily has only too good reason for surprise when a church transacts its affairs with scrupulous care

A data-driven review of thermoelectric materials: Performance and resource considerations

In this review, we describe the creation of a large database of thermoelectric materials prepared by abstracting information from over 100 publications. The database has over 18,000 data points from multiple classes of compounds, whose relevant properties have been measured at several temperatures. Appropriate visualization of the data immediately allows certain insights to be gained with regard to the property space of plausible thermoelectric materials. Of particular note is that any candidate material needs to display an electrical resistivity value that is close to 1 mΩcm at 300 K, i.e., samples should be significantly more conductive than the Mott minimum metallic conductivity. The Herfindahl-Hirschman index, a commonly accepted measure of market concentration, has been calculated from geological data (known elemental reserves) and geopolitical data (elemental production) for much of the periodic table. The visualization strategy employed here allows rapid sorting of thermoelectric compositions with respect to important issues of elemental scarcity and supply risk.Engineering and Applied Science

Adaptation of Proteins to the Cold in Antarctic Fish: A Role for Methionine?

The evolution of antifreeze glycoproteins has enabled notothenioid fish to flourish in the freezing waters of the Southern Ocean. Whereas successful at the biodiversity level to life in the cold, paradoxically at the cellular level these stenothermal animals have problems producing, folding, and degrading proteins at their ambient temperatures of -1.86 °C. In this first multi-species transcriptome comparison of the amino acid composition of notothenioid proteins with temperate teleost proteins, we show that, unlike psychrophilic bacteria, Antarctic fish provide little evidence for the mass alteration of protein amino acid composition to enhance protein folding and reduce protein denaturation in the cold. The exception was the significant overrepresentation of positions where leucine in temperate fish proteins was replaced by methionine in the notothenioid orthologues. We hypothesize that these extra methionines have been preferentially assimilated into the genome to act as redox sensors in the highly oxygenated waters of the Southern Ocean. This redox hypothesis is supported by analyses of notothenioids showing enrichment of genes associated with responses to environmental stress, particularly reactive oxygen species. So overall, although notothenioid fish show cold-associated problems with protein homeostasis, they may have modified only a selected number of biochemical pathways to work efficiently below 0 °C. Even a slight warming of the Southern Ocean might disrupt the critical functions of this handful of key pathways with considerable impacts for the functioning of this ecosystem in the future

Efficient Parallel Statistical Model Checking of Biochemical Networks

We consider the problem of verifying stochastic models of biochemical networks against behavioral properties expressed in temporal logic terms. Exact probabilistic verification approaches such as, for example, CSL/PCTL model checking, are undermined by a huge computational demand which rule them out for most real case studies. Less demanding approaches, such as statistical model checking, estimate the likelihood that a property is satisfied by sampling executions out of the stochastic model. We propose a methodology for efficiently estimating the likelihood that a LTL property P holds of a stochastic model of a biochemical network. As with other statistical verification techniques, the methodology we propose uses a stochastic simulation algorithm for generating execution samples, however there are three key aspects that improve the efficiency: first, the sample generation is driven by on-the-fly verification of P which results in optimal overall simulation time. Second, the confidence interval estimation for the probability of P to hold is based on an efficient variant of the Wilson method which ensures a faster convergence. Third, the whole methodology is designed according to a parallel fashion and a prototype software tool has been implemented that performs the sampling/verification process in parallel over an HPC architecture

Genomics reveals historic and contemporary transmission dynamics of a bacterial disease among wildlife and livestock

Whole-genome sequencing has provided fundamental insights into infectious disease epidemiology, but has rarely been used for examining transmission dynamics of a bacterial pathogen in wildlife. In the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE), outbreaks of brucellosis have increased in cattle along with rising seroprevalence in elk. Here we use a genomic approach to examine Brucella abortus evolution, cross-species transmission and spatial spread in the GYE. We find that brucellosis was introduced into wildlife in this region at least five times. The diffusion rate varies among Brucella lineages (∼3 to 8 km per year) and over time. We also estimate 12 host transitions from bison to elk, and 5 from elk to bison. Our results support the notion that free-ranging elk are currently a self-sustaining brucellosis reservoir and the source of livestock infections, and that control measures in bison are unlikely to affect the dynamics of unrelated strains circulating in nearby elk populations

Ceratoscopelus maderensis : pecular sound-scattering layer identified with this myctophid fish

Reprint. Science, vol. 160, no. 3831, 1968, pp. 991-993. Originally issued as Reference No. 68-58, series later renamed WHOI-.A sound- scattering layer, composed of discrete hyperbolic echo-sequences and apparently restricted to the Slope Water region of the western North Atlantic, has been identified from the Deep Submergence Research Vehicle ALVIN with schools of the myctophid fish Ceratoscopelus maderensis. By diving into the layer and using ALVIN's echo-ranging sonar, we approached and visually identified the sound scatterers. The number of echo sequences observed with the surface echo-sounder (1 /23. 76 x 105 cubic meters of water) checked roughly with the number of sonar targets observed from the submarine (1/7. 45 x 105 cubic meters) . The fish schools appeared to be 5 to 10 meters thick, 10 to 100 meters in diameter, and on centers 100 to 200 meters apart. Density within schools was estimated at 10 to 15 fish per cubic meter.Supported in part by contracts Nonr-3484(00) and Nonr-4029(00) and by NSF grant GB-4431

The Cell Surface Receptor SLAM Controls T Cell and Macrophage Functions

Signaling lymphocyte activation molecule (SLAM), a glycoprotein expressed on activated lymphocytes and antigen-presenting cells, has been shown to be a coregulator of antigen-driven T cell responses and is one of the two receptors for measles virus. Here we show that T cell receptor–induced interleukin (IL)-4 secretion by SLAM−/− CD4+ cells is down-regulated, whereas interferon γ production by CD4+ T cells is only slightly up-regulated. Although SLAM controls production of IL-12, tumor necrosis factor, and nitric oxide in response to lipopolysaccharide (LPS) by macrophages, SLAM does not regulate phagocytosis and responses to peptidoglycan or CpG. Thus, SLAM acts as a coreceptor that regulates signals transduced by the major LPS receptor Toll-like receptor 4 on the surface of mouse macrophages. A defective macrophage function resulted in an inability of SLAM−/− C57Bl/6 mice to remove the parasite Leishmania major. We conclude that the coreceptor SLAM plays a central role at the interface of acquired and innate immune responses

ACE-ASIA - Regional climatic and atmospheric chemical effects of Asian dust and pollution

Although continental-scale plumes of Asian dust and pollution reduce the amount of solar radiation reaching the earth's surface and perturb the chemistry of the atmosphere, our ability to quantify these effects has been limited by a lack of critical observations, particularly of layers above the surface. Comprehensive surface, airborne, shipboard, and satellite measurements of Asian aerosol chemical composition, size, optical properties, and radiative impacts were performed during the Asian Pacific Regional Aerosol Characterization Experiment (ACE-Asia) study. Measurements within a massive Chinese dust storm at numerous widely spaced sampling locations revealed the highly complex structure of the atmosphere, in which layers of dust, urban pollution, and biomass-burning smoke may be transported long distances as distinct entities or mixed together. The data allow a first-time assessment of the regional climatic and atmospheric chemical effects of a continental-scale mixture of dust and pollution. Our results show that radiative flux reductions during such episodes are sufficient to cause regional climate change