Fermi surface, possible unconventional fermions, and unusually robust resistive critical fields in the chiral-structured superconductor AuBe

The noncentrosymmetric superconductor (NCS) AuBe is investigated using a variety of thermodynamic and resistive probes in magnetic fields of up to 65~T and temperatures down to 0.3~K. Despite the polycrystalline nature of the samples, the observation of a complex series of de Haas-van Alphen (dHvA) oscillations has allowed the calculated bandstructure for AuBe to be validated. This permits a variety of BCS parameters describing the superconductivity to be estimated, despite the complexity of the measured Fermi surface. In addition, AuBe displays a nonstandard field dependence of the phase of dHvA oscillations associated with a band thought to host unconventional fermions in this chiral lattice. This result demonstrates the power of the dHvA effect to establish the properties of a single band despite the presence of other electronic bands with a larger density of states, even in polycrystalline samples. In common with several other NCSs, we find that the resistive upper critical field exceeds that measured by heat capacity and magnetization by a considerable factor. We suggest that our data exclude mechanisms for such an effect associated with disorder, implying that topologically protected superconducting surface states may be involved

Automatic evaluation stimuli - the most frequently used words to describe physical activity and the pleasantness of physical activity

Physical activity is partially regulated by non-conscious processes including automatic evaluations - the spontaneous affective reactions we have to physical activity that lead us to approach or avoid physical activity opportunities. A sound understanding of which words best represent the concepts of physical activity and pleasantness (as associated with physical activity) is needed to improve the measurement of automatic evaluations and related constructs (e.g., automatic self-schemas, attentional biases). The first aim of this study was to establish population-level evidence of the most common word stimuli for physical activity and pleasantness. Given that response latency measures have been applied to assess automatic evaluations of physical activity and exercise, the second aim was to determine whether people use the same behavior and pleasant descriptors for physical activity and exercise. Australian adults (N = 1,318; 54.3% women; 48.9% aged 55 years or older) were randomly assigned to one of two groups, through a computer-generated 1:1 ratio allocation, to be asked to list either five behaviors and pleasant descriptors of physical activity (n = 686) or of exercise (n = 632). The words were independently coded twice as to whether they were novel words or the same as another (i.e., same stem or same meaning). Intercoder reliability varied between moderate and strong (agreement = 50.1 to 97.8%; κ = 0.48 to 0.82). A list of the 20 most common behavior and pleasantness words were established based on how many people reported them, weighted by the ranking (1-5) people gave them. The words people described as physical activity were mostly the same as those people used to describe exercise. The most common behavior words were 'walking,' 'running,' 'swimming,' 'bike riding,' and 'gardening'; and the most common pleasant descriptor words were 'relaxing,' 'happiness,' 'enjoyment,' 'exhilarating,' 'exhausting,' and 'good.' These sets of stimuli can be utilized as resources for response latency measurement tasks of automatic evaluations and for tools to enhance automatic evaluations of physical activity in evaluative conditioning tasks.Amanda L. Rebar, Stephanie Schoeppe, Stephanie J. Alley, Camille E. Short, James A. Dimmock, Ben Jackson, David E. Conroy, Ryan E. Rhodes and Corneel Vandelanott

Targeted genome editing across species using ZFNs and TALENs

Evolutionary studies necessary to dissect diverse biological processes have been limited by the lack of reverse genetic approaches in most organisms with sequenced genomes. We established a broadly applicable strategy using zinc finger nucleases (ZFNs) and transcription activator-like effector nucleases (TALENs) for targeted disruption of endogenous genes and cis-acting regulatory elements in diverged nematode species

Is preference for mHealth intervention delivery platform associated with delivery platform familiarity?

Published online: 22 July 2016Background: The aim of this paper was to ascertain whether greater familiarity with a smartphone or tablet was associated with participants’ preferred mobile delivery modality for eHealth interventions. Methods: Data from 1865 people who participated in the Australian Health and Social Science panel study were included into two multinomial logistic regression analyses in which preference for smartphone and tablet delivery for general or personalised eHealth interventions were regressed onto device familiarity and the covariates of sex, age and education. Results: People were more likely to prefer both general and personalised eHealth interventions presented on tablets if they reported high or moderate tablet familiarity (compared to low familiarity) and people were more likely to prefer both general and personalised eHealth interventions presented on smartphones if they reported high or moderate smartphone familiarity, were younger, and had university education (compared to completing high school or less). Conclusion: People prefer receiving eHealth interventions on the mobile devices they are most familiar with. These findings have important implications that should be considered when developing eHealth interventions, and demonstrates that eHealth interventions should be delivered using multiple platforms simultaneously to optimally cater for as many people as possible.Daniel Granger, Corneel Vandelanotte, Mitch J. Duncan, Stephanie Alley, Stephanie Schoeppe, Camille Short and Amanda Reba

Genetic engineering of human ES and iPS cells using TALE nucleases

Targeted genetic engineering of human pluripotent cells is a prerequisite for exploiting their full potential. Such genetic manipulations can be achieved using site-specific nucleases. Here we engineered transcription activator–like effector nucleases (TALENs) for five distinct genomic loci. At all loci tested we obtained human embryonic stem cell (ESC) and induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) clones carrying transgenic cassettes solely at the TALEN-specified location. Our data suggest that TALENs employing the specific architectures described here mediate site-specific genome modification in human pluripotent cells with similar efficiency and precision as do zinc-finger nucleases (ZFNs).National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant R37-CA084198)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant RO1-CA087869)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant RO1-HD045022)Howard Hughes Medical Institut

Evolutionary change in the construction of the nursery environment when parents are prevented from caring for their young directly

This is the final version. Available on open access from the National Academy of Sciences via the DOI in this recordData Availability: All data, code for image analysis and statistical analysis are available in the SI Appendix.Parental care can be partitioned into traits that involve direct engagement with offspring and traits that are expressed as an extended phenotype and influence the developmental environment, such as constructing a nursery. Here, we use experimental evolution to test whether parents can evolve modifications in nursery construction when they are experimentally prevented from supplying care directly to offspring. We exposed replicate experimental populations of burying beetles (Nicrophorus vespilloides) to different regimes of posthatching care by allowing larvae to develop in the presence (Full Care) or absence of parents (No Care). After only 13 generations of experimental evolution, we found an adaptive evolutionary increase in the pace at which parents in the No Care populations converted a dead body into a carrion nest for larvae. Cross-fostering experiments further revealed that No Care larvae performed better on a carrion nest prepared by No Care parents than did Full Care larvae. We conclude that parents construct the nursery environment in relation to their effectiveness at supplying care directly, after offspring are born. When direct care is prevented entirely, they evolve to make compensatory adjustments to the nursery in which their young will develop. The rapid evolutionary change observed in our experiments suggests there is considerable standing genetic variation for parental care traits in natural burying beetle populations-for reasons that remain unclear.European Research Council (ERC)Royal Societ

Cooperative interactions within the family enhance the capacity for evolutionary change in body size

Classical models of evolution seldom predict the rate at which populations evolve in the wild. One explanation is that the social environment affects how traits change in response to natural selection. Here, we determine how social interactions between parents and offspring, and among larvae, influence the response to experimental selection on adult size. Our experiments focus on burying beetles (Nicrophorus vespilloides), whose larvae develop within a carrion nest. Some broods exclusively self-feed on the carrion while others are also fed by their parents. We found populations responded to selection for larger adults but only when parents cared for their offspring. We also found populations responded to selection for smaller adults too, but only by removing parents and causing larval interactions to exert more influence on eventual adult size. Comparative analyses revealed a similar pattern: evolutionary increases in species size within the genus Nicrophorus are associated with the obligate provision of care. Synthesising our results with previous studies, we suggest that cooperative social environments enhance the response to selection whereas excessive conflict can prevent further directional selection

Transduction of artificial transcriptional regulatory proteins into human cells

Protein transduction (PT) is a method for delivering proteins into mammalian cells. PT is accomplished by linking a small peptide tag—called a PT domain (PTD)—to a protein of interest, which generates a functional fusion protein that can penetrate efficiently into mammalian cells. In order to study the functions of a transcription factor (TF) of interest, expression plasmids that encode the TF often are transfected into mammalian cells. However, the efficiency of DNA transfection is highly variable among different cell types and is usually very low in primary cells, stem cells and tumor cells. Zinc-finger transcription factors (ZF-TFs) can be tailor-made to target almost any gene in the human genome. However, the extremely low efficiency of DNA transfection into cancer cells, both in vivo and in vitro, limits the utility of ZF-TFs. Here, we report on an artificial ZF-TF that has been fused to a well-characterized PTD from the human immunodeficiency virus-1 (HIV-1) transcriptional activator protein, Tat. This ZF-TF targeted the endogenous promoter of the human VEGF-A gene. The PTD-attached ZF-TF was delivered efficiently into human cells in vitro. In addition, the VEGF-A-specific transcriptional repressor retarded the growth rate of tumor cells in a mouse xenograft experiment

Comparing motivational, self-regulatory and habitual processes in a computer-tailored physical activity intervention in hospital employees - protocol for the PATHS randomised controlled trial

Background: Most people do not engage in sufficient physical activity to confer health benefits and to reduce risk of chronic disease. Healthcare professionals frequently provide guidance on physical activity, but often do not meet guideline levels of physical activity themselves. The main objective of this study is to develop and test the efficacy of a tailored intervention to increase healthcare professionals' physical activity participation and quality of life, and to reduce work-related stress and absenteeism. This is the first study to compare the additive effects of three forms of a tailored intervention using different techniques from behavioural theory, which differ according to their focus on motivational, self-regulatory and/or habitual processes. Methods/Design: Healthcare professionals (N = 192) will be recruited from four hospitals in Perth, Western Australia, via email lists, leaflets, and posters to participate in the four group randomised controlled trial. Participants will be randomised to one of four conditions: (1) education only (non-tailored information only), (2) education plus intervention components to enhance motivation, (3) education plus components to enhance motivation and self-regulation, and (4) education plus components to enhance motivation, self-regulation and habit formation. All intervention groups will receive a computer-tailored intervention administered via a web-based platform and will receive supporting text-messages containing tailored information, prompts and feedback relevant to each condition. All outcomes will be assessed at baseline, and at 3-month follow-up. The primary outcome assessed in this study is physical activity measured using activity monitors. Secondary outcomes include: quality of life, stress, anxiety, sleep, and absenteeism. Website engagement, retention, preferences and intervention fidelity will also be evaluated as well as potential mediators and moderators of intervention effect. Discussion: This is the first study to examine a tailored, technology-supported intervention aiming to increase physical activity in healthcare professionals. The study will evaluate whether including additional theory-based behaviour change techniques aimed at promoting motivation, self-regulation and habit will lead to increased physical activity participation relative to information alone. The online platform developed in this study has potential to deliver efficient, scalable and personally-relevant intervention that can be translated to other occupational settings. Trial Registration: Australian New-Zealand Clinical Trial Registry: ACTRN12616000462482, submitted 29/03/2016, prospectively registered 8/04/2016.Dominika Kwasnicka, Corneel Vandelanotte, Amanda Rebar, Benjamin Gardner, Camille Short, Mitch Duncan, Dawn Crook, and Martin S. Hagge