Wolf-Rayet Central Stars of Planetary Nebulae: Their Evolution and Properties

Over the past decade, the number of planetary nebula central stars (CSPN) known to exhibit the Wolf-Rayet (WR) phenomenon has grown substantially. Many of these discoveries have resulted from the Macquarie/AAO/Strasbourg Ha (MASH) PN Survey. While WR CSPN constitute a relatively rare stellar type (<10% of CS), there are indications that the proportion of PN harbouring them may increase as spectroscopy of more central stars is carried out. In addition, with new and better distances from the Ha surface brightness-radius relationship of Frew (2008), we can attempt a dynamical age sequence which may provide insight into the evolution of these stars.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures. Presented at the Asymmetric Planetary Nebulae V Conference in Bowness-on-Windermere, UK, June 201

Monolith formation and ring-stain suppression in low-pressure evaporation of poly(ethylene oxide) droplets

When droplets of dilute suspensions are left to evaporate the final dry residue is typically the familiar coffee-ring stain, with nearly all material deposited at the initial triple line (Deegan et al, Nature, vol. 389, 1997, pp. 827-829). However, aqueous poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) droplets only form coffee-ring stains for a very narrow range of the experimental parameters molecular weight, concentration and drying rate. Instead, over a wide range of values they form either a flat disk or a very distinctive tall central monolith via a four-stage deposition process which includes a remarkable bootstrap-building step. To predict which deposit will form, we present a quantitative model comparing the effects of advective build-up at the triple line to diffusive flux and use this to calculate a dimensionless number χ. By experimentally varying concentration and flux (using a low-pressure drying chamber), the prediction is tested over nearly two orders of magnitude in both variables and shown to be in good agreement with the boundary between disks and monoliths at χ ≈ 1.6

Methods for Surveying Stable Fly Populations

Stable flies are among the most important pests of livestock throughout much of the world. Their painful bites induce costly behavioral and physiological stress responses and reduce productivity. Stable flies are anthropogenic and their population dynamics vary depending on agricultural and animal husbandry practices. Standardized sampling methods are needed to better identify the factors controlling stable fly populations, test novel control technologies, and determine optimal management strategies. The current study reviewed methods used for a long-term study of stable fly population dynamics in the central Great Plains. An additional study compared the relative size of flies sampled from the general population with that of flies sampled emerging from substrates associated with livestock production. Flies developing in livestock associated substrates are significantly larger than those in the general population indicating that other types of developmental sites are contributing significant numbers of flies to the general population. Because efforts to identify those sites have yet to be successful, we speculate that they may be sites with low densities of developing stable flies, but covering large areas such as croplands and grasslands. The stable fly surveillance methods discussed can be used and further improved for monitoring stable fly populations for research and management programs

Combination of herbivore removal and nitrogen deposition increases upland carbon storage

© 2015 The Authors. Global Change Biology Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Acknowledgements We thank Ruth Mitchell, Alison Hester, Bob Mardon, Eoghain Maclean, David Welch, National Trust for Scotland, Scottish Natural Heritage and the Woodland Trust for helping find appropriate exclosures and granting access permission. We thank Nick Littlewood and Antonio Lopez Nogueira for their assistance in the field and processing samples in the lab and Ron Smith and Tony Dore for providing N deposition data. SWS was funded by a BBSRC studentship.Non peer reviewedPublisher PD

FAST: FAST Analysis of Sequences Toolbox.

FAST (FAST Analysis of Sequences Toolbox) provides simple, powerful open source command-line tools to filter, transform, annotate and analyze biological sequence data. Modeled after the GNU (GNU's Not Unix) Textutils such as grep, cut, and tr, FAST tools such as fasgrep, fascut, and fastr make it easy to rapidly prototype expressive bioinformatic workflows in a compact and generic command vocabulary. Compact combinatorial encoding of data workflows with FAST commands can simplify the documentation and reproducibility of bioinformatic protocols, supporting better transparency in biological data science. Interface self-consistency and conformity with conventions of GNU, Matlab, Perl, BioPerl, R, and GenBank help make FAST easy and rewarding to learn. FAST automates numerical, taxonomic, and text-based sorting, selection and transformation of sequence records and alignment sites based on content, index ranges, descriptive tags, annotated features, and in-line calculated analytics, including composition and codon usage. Automated content- and feature-based extraction of sites and support for molecular population genetic statistics make FAST useful for molecular evolutionary analysis. FAST is portable, easy to install and secure thanks to the relative maturity of its Perl and BioPerl foundations, with stable releases posted to CPAN. Development as well as a publicly accessible Cookbook and Wiki are available on the FAST GitHub repository at https://github.com/tlawrence3/FAST. The default data exchange format in FAST is Multi-FastA (specifically, a restriction of BioPerl FastA format). Sanger and Illumina 1.8+ FastQ formatted files are also supported. FAST makes it easier for non-programmer biologists to interactively investigate and control biological data at the speed of thought