Fault-ignorant Quantum Search

We investigate the problem of quantum searching on a noisy quantum computer. Taking a 'fault-ignorant' approach, we analyze quantum algorithms that solve the task for various different noise strengths, which are possibly unknown beforehand. We prove lower bounds on the runtime of such algorithms and thereby find that the quadratic speedup is necessarily lost (in our noise models). However, for low but constant noise levels the algorithms we provide (based on Grover's algorithm) still outperform the best noiseless classical search algorithm.Comment: v1: 15+8 pages, 4 figures; v2: 19+8 pages, 4 figures, published version (Introduction section significantly expanded, presentation clarified, results and order unchanged

A Test of Spielberger’s State-Trait Theory of Anger with Adolescents: Five Hypotheses

Spielberger’s state-trait theory of anger was investigated in adolescents (n = 201, ages 10-18, 53% African American, 47% European American, 48% female) using Deffenbacher’s five hypotheses formulated to test the theory in adults. Self-reported experience, heart rate (HR), systolic blood pressure (SBP), and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) responses to anger provoking imagery scripts found strong support for the application of this theory to adolescents. Compared to the low trait anger (LTA) group, adolescents with high trait anger (HTA) produced increased HR, SBP and DBP, and greater self-report of anger to anger imagery (intensity hypothesis) but not greater self-report or cardiovascular reactivity to fear or joy imagery (discrimination hypothesis). The HTA group also reported greater frequency and duration of anger episodes and had longer recovery of SBP response to anger (elicitation hypothesis). The HTA group was more likely to report negative health, social, and academic outcomes (consequence hypothesis). Adolescents with high hostility reported more maladaptive coping with anger, with higher anger in and anger-out than adolescents with low hostility (negative expression hypothesis). The data on all five hypotheses supported the notion that trait anger is firmly entrenched by the period of adolescence, with few developmental differences noted from the adult literature

Assessing the potential of autonomous submarine gliders for ecosystem monitoring across multiple trophic levels (plankton to cetaceans) and pollutants in shallow shelf seas

A combination of scientific, economic, technological and policy drivers is behind a recent upsurge in the use of marine autonomous systems (and accompanying miniaturized sensors) for environmental mapping and monitoring. Increased spatial–temporal resolution and coverage of data, at reduced cost, is particularly vital for effective spatial management of highly dynamic and heterogeneous shelf environments. This proof-of-concept study involves integration of a novel combination of sensors onto buoyancy-driven submarine gliders, in order to assess their suitability for ecosystem monitoring in shelf waters at a variety of trophic levels. Two shallow-water Slocum gliders were equipped with CTD and fluorometer to measure physical properties and chlorophyll, respectively. One glider was also equipped with a single-frequency echosounder to collect information on zooplankton and fish distribution. The other glider carried a Passive Acoustic Monitoring system to detect and record cetacean vocalizations, and a passive sampler to detect chemical contaminants in the water column. The two gliders were deployed together off southwest UK in autumn 2013, and targeted a known tidal-mixing front west of the Isles of Scilly. The gliders’ mission took about 40 days, with each glider travelling distances of >1000 km and undertaking >2500 dives to depths of up to 100 m. Controlling glider flight and alignment of the two glider trajectories proved to be particularly challenging due to strong tidal flows. However, the gliders continued to collect data in poor weather when an accompanying research vessel was unable to operate. In addition, all glider sensors generated useful data, with particularly interesting initial results relating to subsurface chlorophyll maxima and numerous fish/cetacean detections within the water column. The broader implications of this study for marine ecosystem monitoring with submarine gliders are discussed

Kaon photoproduction: background contributions, form factors and missing resonances

The photoproduction p(gamma, K+)Lambda process is studied within a field-theoretic approach. It is shown that the background contributions constitute an important part of the reaction dynamics. We compare predictions obtained with three plausible techniques for dealing with these background contributions. It appears that the extracted resonance parameters drastically depend on the applied technique. We investigate the implications of the corrections to the functional form of the hadronic form factor in the contact term, recently suggested by Davidson and Workman (Phys. Rev. C 63, 025210). The role of background contributions and hadronic form factors for the identification of the quantum numbers of ``missing'' resonances is discussed.Comment: 11 pages, 7 eps figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Rht18 semidwarfism in wheat is due to increased GA 2-oxidaseA9 expression and reduced GA content

Semidwarfing genes have improved crop yield by reducing height, improving lodging resistance, and allowing plants to allocate more assimilates to grain growth. In wheat (Triticum aestivum), the Rht18 semidwarfing gene was identified and deployed in durum wheat before it was transferred into bread wheat, where it was shown to have agronomic potential. Rht18, a dominant and gibberellin (GA) responsive mutant, is genetically and functionally distinct from the widely used GA-insensitive semidwarfing genes Rht-B1b and Rht-D1b. In this study, the Rht18 gene was identified by mutagenizing the semidwarf durum cultivar Icaro (Rht18) and generating mutants with a range of tall phenotypes. Isolating and sequencing chromosome 6A of these "overgrowth"mutants showed that they contained independent mutations in the coding region of GA2oxA9. GA2oxA9 is predicted to encode a GA 2-oxidase that metabolizes GA biosynthetic intermediates into inactive products, effectively reducing the amount of bioactive GA (GA1). Functional analysis of the GA2oxA9 protein demonstrated that GA2oxA9 converts the intermediate GA12 to the inactive metabolite GA110. Furthermore, Rht18 showed higher expression of GA2oxA9 and lower GA content compared with its tall parent. These data indicate that the increased expression of GA2oxA9 in Rht18 results in a reduction of both bioactive GA content and plant height. This study describes a height-reducing mechanism that can generate new genetic diversity for semidwarfism in wheat by combining increased expression with mutations of specific amino acid residues in GA2oxA9

Unbiased analysis of the impact of micropatterned biomaterials on macrophage behaviour provides insights beyond pre-defined polarisation states

Macrophages are master regulators of immune responses towards implanted biomaterials. The activation state adopted by macrophages in response to biomaterials determines their own phenotype and function as well as those of other resident and infiltrating immune and non-immune cells in the area. A wide spectrum of macrophage activation states exists, with M1 (pro-inflammatory) and M2 (anti-inflammatory) representing either ends of the spectrum. In biomaterials research, cellinstructive surfaces that favour or induce M2 macrophages have been considered as beneficial due to the anti-inflammatory and pro-regenerative properties of these cells. In this study, we used a gelatin methacryloyl (GelMA) hydrogel platform to determine whether micropatterned surfaces can modulate the phenotype and function of human macrophages. The effect of microgrooves/ridges and micropillars on macrophage phenotype, function, and gene expression profile were assessed using conventional methods (morphology, cytokine profile, surface marker expression, phagocytosis) and gene microarrays. Our results demonstrated that micropatterns did induce distinct gene expression profiles in human macrophages cultured on microgrooves/ridges and micropillars. Significant changes were observed in genes related to primary metabolic processes such as transcription, translation, protein trafficking, DNA repair and cell survival. However, interestingly conventional phenotyping methods, relying on surface marker expression and cytokine profile, were not able to distinguish between the different conditions, and indicated no clear shift in cell activation towards an M1 or M2 phenotypes. This highlights the limitations of studying the effect of different physicochemical conditions on macrophages by solely relying on conventional markers that are primarily developed to differentiate between cytokine polarised M1 and M2 macrophages. We therefore, propose the adoption of unbiased screening methods in determining macrophage responses to biomaterials. Our data clearly shows that the exclusive use of conventional markers and methods for determining macrophage activation status could lead to missed opportunities for understanding and exploiting macrophage responses to biomaterials

Laser produced electromagnetic pulses : Generation, detection and mitigation

This paper provides an up-to-date review of the problems related to the generation, detection and mitigation of strong electromagnetic pulses created in the interaction of high-power, high-energy laser pulses with different types of solid targets. It includes new experimental data obtained independently at several international laboratories. The mechanisms of electromagnetic field generation are analyzed and considered as a function of the intensity and the spectral range of emissions they produce. The major emphasis is put on the gHz frequency domain, which is the most damaging for electronics and may have important applications. The physics of electromagnetic emissions in other spectral domains, in particular THz and MHz, is also discussed. The theoretical models and numerical simulations are compared with the results of experimental measurements, with special attention to the methodology of measurements and complementary diagnostics. Understanding the underlying physical processes is the basis for developing techniques to mitigate the electromagnetic threat and to harness electromagnetic emissions, which may have promising applications

P-wave excited baryons from pion- and photo-induced hyperon production

We report evidence for $N(1710)P_{11}$, $N(1875)P_{11}$, $N(1900)P_{13}$, $\Delta(1600)P_{33}$, $\Delta(1910)P_{31}$, and $\Delta(1920)P_{33}$, and find indications that $N(1900)P_{13}$ might have a companion state at 1970\,MeV. The controversial $\Delta(1750)P_{31}$ is not seen. The evidence is derived from a study of data on pion- and photo-induced hyperon production, but other data are included as well. Most of the resonances reported here were found in the Karlsruhe-Helsinki (KH84) and the Carnegie-Mellon (CM) analyses but were challenged recently by the Data Analysis Center at GWU. Our analysis is constrained by the energy independent $\pi N$ scattering amplitudes from either KH84 or GWU. The two $\pi N$ amplitudes from KH84 or GWU, respectively, lead to slightly different $\pi N$ branching ratios of contributing resonances but the debated resonances are required in both series of fits.Comment: 22 pages, 28 figures. Some additional sets of data are adde

Transcriptome profiling of rabbit parthenogenetic blastocysts developed under in vivo conditions

Parthenogenetic embryos are one attractive alternative as a source of embryonic stem cells, although many aspects related to the biology of parthenogenetic embryos and parthenogenetically derived cell lines still need to be elucidated. The present work was conducted to investigate the gene expression profile of rabbit parthenote embryos cultured under in vivo conditions using microarray analysis. Transcriptomic profiles indicate 2541 differentially expressed genes between parthenotes and normal in vivo fertilised blastocysts, of which 76 genes were upregulated and 16 genes downregulated in in vivo cultured parthenote blastocyst, using 3 fold-changes as a cut-off. While differentially upregulated expressed genes are related to transport and protein metabolic process, downregulated expressed genes are related to DNA and RNA binding. Using microarray data, 6 imprinted genes were identified as conserved among rabbits, humans and mice: GRB10, ATP10A, ZNF215, NDN, IMPACT and SFMBT2. We also found that 26 putative genes have at least one member of that gene family imprinted in other species. These data strengthen the view that a large fraction of genes is differentially expressed between parthenogenetic and normal embryos cultured under the same conditions and offer a new approach to the identification of imprinted genes in rabbit. © 2012 Naturil-Alfonso et al.This work was supported by Generalitat Valenciana research programme (Prometeo 2009/125). Carmen Naturil was supported by Generalitat Valenciana research programme (Prometeo 2009/125). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.Naturil Alfonso, C.; Saenz De Juano Ribes, MDLD.; Peñaranda, D.; Vicente Antón, JS.; Marco Jiménez, F. (2012). Transcriptome profiling of rabbit parthenogenetic blastocysts developed under in vivo conditions. PLoS ONE. 7(12):1-11. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0051271S111712Harness, J. 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Chromosome-scale genome assembly provides insights into rye biology, evolution and agronomic potential

Rye (Secale cereale L.) is an exceptionally climate-resilient cereal crop, used extensively to produce improved wheat varieties via introgressive hybridization and possessing the entire repertoire of genes necessary to enable hybrid breeding. Rye is allogamous and only recently domesticated, thus giving cultivated ryes access to a diverse and exploitable wild gene pool. To further enhance the agronomic potential of rye, we produced a chromosome-scale annotated assembly of the 7.9-gigabase rye genome and extensively validated its quality by using a suite of molecular genetic resources. We demonstrate applications of this resource with a broad range of investigations. We present findings on cultivated rye's incomplete genetic isolation from wild relatives, mechanisms of genome structural evolution, pathogen resistance, low-temperature tolerance, fertility control systems for hybrid breeding and the yield benefits of rye-wheat introgressions.Peer reviewe