Hands across the border: cross-border cooperation in the making and enforcing of secure accommodation orders

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Gut symbionts from distinct hosts exhibit genotoxic activity via divergent colibactin biosynthetic pathways.

Secondary metabolites produced by nonribosomal peptide synthetase (NRPS) or polyketide synthase (PKS) pathways are chemical mediators of microbial interactions in diverse environments. However, little is known about their distribution, evolution, and functional roles in bacterial symbionts associated with animals. A prominent example is "colibactin", a largely unknown family of secondary metabolites produced by Escherichia coli via a hybrid NRPS-PKS biosynthetic pathway, inflicting DNA damage upon eukaryotic cells and contributing to colorectal cancer and tumor formation in the mammalian gut. Thus far, homologs of this pathway have only been found in closely related Enterobacteriaceae, while a divergent variant of this gene cluster was recently discovered in a marine alphaproteobacterial Pseudovibrio strain. Herein, we sequenced the genome of Frischella perrara PEB0191, a bacterial gut symbiont of honey bees, and identified a homologous colibactin biosynthetic pathway related to those found in Enterobacteriaceae. We show that the colibactin genomic island (GI) has conserved gene synteny and biosynthetic module architecture across F. perrara, Enterobacteriaceae and the Pseudovibrio strain. Comparative metabolomics analyses of F. perrara and E. coli further reveal that these two bacteria produce related colibactin pathway-dependent metabolites. Finally, we demonstrate that F. perrara, like E. coli, causes DNA damage in eukaryotic cells in vitro in a colibactin pathway-dependent manner. Together, these results support that divergent variants of the colibactin biosynthetic pathway are widely distributed among bacterial symbionts, producing related secondary metabolites and likely endowing its producer with functional capabilities important for diverse symbiotic associations

Naturaliste plateau: constraints on the timing and evolution of the Kerguelen Large Igneous Province and its role in Gondwana breakup

Volcanism associated with the Kerguelen Large Igneous Province is found scattered in southwestern Australia (the ca 136 to ca 130 Ma Bunbury Basalts, and ca 124 Ma Wallaby Plateau), India (ca 118 Ma Rajmahal Traps and Cona Basalts), and Tibet (the ca 132 Ma Comei Basalts), but apart from the ∼70 000 km2 Wallaby Plateau, these examples are spatially and volumetrically minor. Here, we report dredge, geochronological and geochemical results from the ∼90 000 km2 Naturaliste Plateau, located ∼170 to ∼500 km southwest of Australia. Dredged lavas and intrusive rocks range from mafic to felsic compositions, and prior geophysical analyses indicate these units comprise much of the plateau substrate. 40Ar/39Ar plagioclase ages from mafic units and U–Pb zircon ages from silicic rocks indicate magmatic emplacement from 130.6 ± 1.2 to 129.4 ± 1.3 Ma for mafic rocks and 131.8 ± 3.9 to 128.2 ± 2.3 Ma for silicic rocks (2σ). These Cretaceous Naturaliste magmas incorporated a significant component of continental crust, with relatively high 87Sr/86Sr (up to 0.78), high 207Pb/204 Pb ratios (15.5–15.6), low 143Nd/144Nd (0.511–0.512) and primitive-mantle normalised Th/Nb of 11.3 and La/Nb of 3.97. These geochemical results are consistent with the plateau being underlain by continental basement, as indicated by prior interpretations of seismic and gravity data, corroborated by dredging of Mesoproterozoic granites and gneisses on the southern plateau flank. The Cretaceous Naturaliste Plateau igneous rocks have signatures indicative of extraction from a depleted mantle, with trace-element and isotopic values that overlap with Kerguelen Plateau lavas reflect crustal contamination. Our chemical and geochronological results therefore show the Naturaliste Plateau contains evidence of an extensive igneous event representing some of the earliest voluminous Kerguelen hotspot magmas. Prior work reports that contemporaneous correlative volcanic sequences underlie the nearby Mentelle Basin, and the Enderby Basin and Princess Elizabeth Trough in the Antarctic. When combined, the igneous rocks in the Naturaliste, Mentelle, Wallaby, Enderby, Princess Elizabeth, Bunbury and Comei-Cona areas form a 136–124 Ma Large Igneous Province covering >244 000 km2

Analytical methods manual. Part I. Methods used by the Remote and Service Analysis Laboratory

The Analytical Methods Manual Part I describes the methods used in the Remote and Service Analysis Laboratory at the Idaho Chemical Processing Plant

Structural phase control of (La1.48_{1.48}Nd0.40_{0.40}Sr0.12_{0.12})CuO4_4 thin films by epitaxial growth technique

Epitaxial growth of (La$_{1.48}$Nd$_{0.40}$Sr$_{0.12}$)CuO$_4$ thin films was studied by pulsed-laser deposition technique on three different substrates, SrTiO$_3$ (100), LaSrAlO$_4$ (001), and YAlO$_3$ (001). The (Nd,Sr,Ce)$_2$CuO$_4$-type structure appears at the initial growth stage on SrTiO$_3$ (100) when the film is deposited under the growth conditions optimized for (La,Sr)$_2$CuO$_4$. This (Nd,Sr,Ce)$_2$CuO$_4$-type structure can be eliminated by increasing the substrate temperature and the laser repetition frequency. Films on LaSrAlO$_4$ (001) maintain a La$_2$CuO$_4$-type structure as bulk samples, but those on YAlO$_3$ (001) show phase separation into La$_2$CuO$_4$- and Nd$_2$CuO$_4$-type structures. Such complicated results are explained in terms of the competition between lattice misfit and thermodynamic conditions. Interestingly the films with La$_2$CuO$_4$-type structure prepared on SrTiO$_3$ and LaSrAlO$_4$ show different surface structures and transport properties. The results indicate the possibility of controlling charge stripes of (La$_{1.48}$Nd$_{0.40}$Sr$_{0.12}$)CuO$_4$ as was demonstrated in (La,Ba)$_2$CuO$_4$ thin films by Sato et al. (Phys. Rev. B {\bf 62}, R799 (2000)).Comment: 5 pages, 6 EPS figure, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

Charge Stripes and Antiferromagnetism in Insulating Nickelates and Superconducting Cuprates

Neutron and X-ray scattering studies have provided strong evidence for coupled spatial modulations of charge and spin densities in layered nickelates and cuprates. The accumulated results for La(2-x)Sr(x)NiO(4+d) are consistent with the strongly-modulated topological-stripe concept. Clues from Nd-doped La(2-x)Sr(x)CuO(4) suggest similar behavior for the cuprates. The experimental results are summarized, and features that conflict with an interpretation based on a Fermi-surface instability are emphasized. A rationalization for the differences in transport properties between the cuprates and nickelates is given.Comment: 10pp., uses elsart.sty, 3 eps figures embedded with psfig; for proceedings of Spectroscopies in Novel Superconductors '97, J. Phys. Chem. Solid

Parent and child mental health during COVID-19 in Australia: The role of pet attachment

Restrictions, social isolation, and uncertainty related to the global COVID-19 pandemic have disrupted the ways that parents and children maintain family routines, health, and wellbeing. Companion animals (pets) can be a critical source of comfort during traumatic experiences, although changes to family routines, such as those caused by COVID-19, can also bring about challenges like managing undesirable pet behaviours or pet-human interactions. We aimed to examine the relationship between pet attachment and mental health for both parents and their children during the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia. A total of 1,034 parents living with a child under 18 years and a cat or dog completed an online cross-sectional survey between July and October 2020. Path analysis using multivariate linear regression was conducted to examine associations between objective COVID-19 impacts, subjective worry about COVID-19, human-pet attachment, and mental health. After adjusting for core demographic factors, stronger pet-child attachment was associated with greater child anxiety (parent-reported, p < .001). Parent-pet attachment was not associated with self-reported psychological distress (p = .42), however, parents who reported a strong emotional closeness with their pet reported greater psychological distress (p = .002). Findings highlight the role of pets during times of change and uncertainty. It is possible that families are turning to animals as a source of comfort, during a time when traditional social supports are less accessible. Alternatively, strong pet attachment is likely to reflect high levels of empathy, which might increase vulnerability to psychological distress. Longitudinal evidence is required to delineate the mechanisms underpinning pet attachment and mental health

Hall coefficient of La1.88−y_{1.88-y}Yy_ySr0.12_{0.12}CuO4_4 (y=0,0.04y=0, 0.04) at low temperatures under high magnetic fields

The Hall coefficient in the low-temperature tetragonal phase and the mid-temperature orthorhombic phase of La$_{1.88-y}$Y$_y$Sr$_{0.12}$CuO$_4$ ($y=0, 0.04$) single crystals is measured under high magnetic fields up to 9 T in order to investigate the detailed behavior of the transport properties at low temperatures in the stripe phase. When the superconductivity is suppressed by high magnetic fields, the Hall coefficient has negative values in low temperatures, and the temperature region of the negative values spreads as increasing magnetic fields. This result indicates that the Hall coefficient in the stripe phase around $x=0.12$ is a finite negative value, not zero.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures. to be published to Physical Review

Provenance explorer: Customized provenance views using semantic inferencing

This paper presents Provenance Explorer, a secure provenance visualization tool, designed to dynamically generate customized views of scientific data provenance that depend on the viewer's requirements and/or access privileges. Using RDF and graph visualizations, it enables scientists to view the data, states and events associated with a scientific workflow in order to understand the scientific methodology and validate the results. Initially the Provenance Explorer presents a simple, coarse-grained view of the scientific process or experiment. However the GUI allows permitted users to expand links between nodes (input states, events and output states) to reveal more fine-grained information about particular sub-events and their inputs and outputs. Access control is implemented using Shibboleth to identify and authenticate users and XACML to define access control policies. The system also provides a platform for publishing scientific results. It enables users to select particular nodes within the visualized workflow and drag-and-drop them into an RDF package for publication or e-learning. The direct relationships between the individual components selected for such packages are inferred by the rule-inference engine

Analysis of a Drum Chopper for Use on a New Small Angle Diffractometer at IPNS

Light-weight drum choppers rotating at 15 Hz have been in use on the IPNS powder diffractometers for several years, where they serve to eliminate the delayed-neutron background from much of the spectral region of interest. Monte Carlo simulations indicate that a similar chopper operated at 15 Hz should do an excellent job of delayed-neutron removal in the new small-angle diffractometer being designed at IPNS. The simulations also show that when the same chopper is operated at 7.5 Hz it performs quite successfully as a frame-elimination chopper, effectively eliminating neutrons from alternate pulses and allowing extension of the useful wavelength range of the instrument to {approximately}28 {Angstrom}. Thus the incorporation of such a chopper should add considerably to the range and flexibility of the new instrument. 7 refs., 9 figs