Evidence for Metabolic Provisioning by a Common Invertebrate Endosymbiont, Wolbachia pipientis, during Periods of Nutritional Stress

Wolbachia are ubiquitous inherited endosymbionts of invertebrates that invade host populations by modifying host reproductive systems. However, some strains lack the ability to impose reproductive modification and yet are still capable of successfully invading host populations. To explain this paradox, theory predicts that such strains should provide a fitness benefit, but to date none has been detected. Recently completed genome sequences of different Wolbachia strains show that these bacteria may have the genetic machinery to influence iron utilization of hosts. Here we show that Wolbachia infection can confer a positive fecundity benefit for Drosophila melanogaster reared on iron-restricted or -overloaded diets. Furthermore, iron levels measured from field-collected flies indicated that nutritional conditions in the field were overall comparable to those of flies reared in the laboratory on restricted diets. These data suggest that Wolbachia may play a previously unrecognized role as nutritional mutualists in insects

Collinear Cluster Tri-partition of 252Cf(sf) - evidences in neutron gated data

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Large Shape Staggering in Neutron-Deficient Bi Isotopes

The changes in the mean-square charge radius (relative to Bi-209), magnetic dipole, and electric quadrupole moments of Bi-187,Bi-188,Bi-189,Bi-191 were measured using the in-source resonance-ionization spectroscopy technique at ISOLDE (CERN). A large staggering in radii was found in Bi-187,188,189(g), manifested by a sharp radius increase for the ground state of Bi-188 relative to the neighboring Bi-187,189(g). A large isomer shift was also observed for Bi-188(m). Both effects happen at the same neutron number, N = 10(5), where the shape staggering and a similar isomer shift were observed in the mercury isotopes. Experimental results are reproduced by mean-field calculations where the ground or isomeric states were identified by the blocked quasiparticle configuration compatible with the observed spin, parity, and magnetic moment.Peer reviewe

Producing gold at ISOLDE-CERN

The yield of 18 ion beams of radioactive gold nuclei produced in the thick uranium target at ISOLDE (CERN) by 1.4-GeV protons was measured. The production-efficiency dependence on the half-life (efficiency curve) was derived using the in-target production calculations by the FLUKA-CERN code. The irregularities in the efficiency curve for long-lived high-spin gold isomers (187,191,193Aum) were found. Three release models were tested for the efficiency-curve description