976 research outputs found
Carbon assimilating fungi from surface ocean to subseafloor revealed by coupled phylogenetic and stable isotope analysis
Fungi are ubiquitous in the ocean and hypothesized to be important members of marine ecosystems, but their roles in the marine carbon cycle are poorly understood. Here, we use 13C DNA stable isotope probing coupled with phylogenetic analyses to investigate carbon assimilation within diverse communities of planktonic and benthic fungi in the Benguela Upwelling System (Namibia). Across the redox stratified water column and in the underlying sediments, assimilation of 13C-labeled carbon from diatom extracellular polymeric substances (13C-dEPS) by fungi correlated with the expression of fungal genes encoding carbohydrate-active enzymes. Phylogenetic analysis of genes from 13C-labeled metagenomes revealed saprotrophic lineages related to the facultative yeast Malassezia were the main fungal foragers of pelagic dEPS. In contrast, fungi living in the underlying sulfidic sediments assimilated more 13C-labeled carbon from chemosynthetic bacteria compared to dEPS. This coincided with a unique seafloor fungal community and dissolved organic matter composition compared to the water column, and a 100-fold increased fungal abundance within the subseafloor sulfide-nitrate transition zone. The subseafloor fungi feeding on 13C-labeled chemolithoautotrophs under anoxic conditions were affiliated with Chytridiomycota and Mucoromycota that encode cellulolytic and proteolytic enzymes, revealing polysaccharide and protein-degrading fungi that can anaerobically decompose chemosynthetic necromass. These subseafloor fungi, therefore, appear to be specialized in organic matter that is produced in the sediments. Our findings reveal that the phylogenetic diversity of fungi across redox stratified marine ecosystems translates into functionally relevant mechanisms helping to structure carbon flow from primary producers in marine microbiomes from the surface ocean to the subseafloor
Statistical Theory for Incoherent Light Propagation in Nonlinear Media
A novel statistical approach based on the Wigner transform is proposed for
the description of partially incoherent optical wave dynamics in nonlinear
media. An evolution equation for the Wigner transform is derived from a
nonlinear Schrodinger equation with arbitrary nonlinearity. It is shown that
random phase fluctuations of an incoherent plane wave lead to a Landau-like
damping effect, which can stabilize the modulational instability. In the limit
of the geometrical optics approximation, incoherent, localized, and stationary
wave-fields are shown to exist for a wide class of nonlinear media.Comment: 4 pages, REVTeX4. Submitted to Physical Review E. Revised manuscrip
Large-Area (over 50 cm Ă 50 cm) Freestanding Films of Colloidal InP/ZnS Quantum Dots
Cataloged from PDF version of article.We propose and demonstrate the fabrication of flexible, freestanding films of InP/ZnS quantum dots (QDs) using fatty acid ligands across very large areas (greater than 50 cm x 50 cm), which have been developed for remote phosphor applications in solid-state lighting. Embedded in a poly(methyl methacrylate) matrix, although the formation of stand alone films using other QDs commonly capped with trioctylphosphine oxide (TOPO) and oleic acid is not efficient, employing myristic acid as ligand in the synthesis of these QDs, which imparts a strongly hydrophobic character to the thin film, enables film formation and ease of removal even on surprisingly large areas, thereby avoiding the need for ligand exchange. When pumped by a blue LED, these Cd-free QD films allow for high color rendering, warm white light generation with a color rendering index of 89.30 and a correlated color temperature of 2298 K. In the composite film, the temperature-dependent emission kinetics and energy transfer dynamics among different-sized InP/ZnS QDs are investigated and a model is proposed. High levels of energy transfer efficiency (up to 80%) and strong donor lifetime modification (from 18 to 4 ns) are achieved. The suppression of the nonradiative channels is observed when the hybrid film is cooled to cryogenic temperatures. The lifetime changes of the donor and acceptor InP/ZnS QDs in the film as a result of the energy transfer are explained well by our theoretical model based on the exciton-exciton interactions among the dots and are in excellent agreement with the experimental results. The understanding of these excitonic interactions is essential to facilitate improvements in the fabrication of photometrically high quality nanophosphors. The ability to make such large-area, flexible, freestanding Cd-free QD films pave the way for environmentally friendly phosphor applications including flexible, surface-emitting light engines
Phase diffusion in graphene-based Josephson junctions
We report on graphene-based Josephson junctions with contacts made from lead.
The high transition temperature of this superconductor allows us to observe the
supercurrent branch at temperatures up to K, at which point we can
detect a small, but non-zero, resistance. We attribute this resistance to the
phase diffusion mechanism, which has not been yet identified in graphene. By
measuring the resistance as a function of temperature and gate voltage, we can
further characterize the nature of electromagnetic environment and dissipation
in our samples.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, PR
Impurity-assisted tunneling in graphene
The electric conductance of a strip of undoped graphene increases in the
presence of a disorder potential, which is smooth on atomic scales. The
phenomenon is attributed to impurity-assisted resonant tunneling of massless
Dirac fermions. Employing the transfer matrix approach we demonstrate the
resonant character of the conductivity enhancement in the presence of a single
impurity. We also calculate the two-terminal conductivity for the model with
one-dimensional fluctuations of disorder potential by a mapping onto a problem
of Anderson localization.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, final version, typos corrected, references adde
Prediction of Ideas Number During a Brainstorming Session
International audienceIn this paper, we present an approach allowing the prediction of ideas number during a brainstorming session. This prediction is based on two dynamic models of brainstorming, the non-cognitive and the cognitive models proposed by Brown and Paulus (Small Group Res 27(1):91â114, 1996). These models describe for each participant, the evolution of ideas number over time, and are formalized by differential equations. Through solution functions of these models, we propose to calculate the number of ideas of each participant on any time intervals and thus in the future (called prediction). To be able to compute solution functions, it is necessary to determine the parameters of these models. In our approach, we use optimization model for model parameters calculation in which solution functions are approximated by numerical methods. We developed two generic optimization models, one based on Eulerâs and the other on the fourth order RungeâKuttaâs numerical methods for the solving of differential equations, and we apply them to the non-cognitive and respectively to the cognitive models. Through some feasibility tests, we show the adequacy of the proposed approach to our prediction context
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