Manganese-56 coincidence-counting facility precisely measures neutron-source strength

Precise measurement of neutron-source strength is provided by a manganese 56 coincidence-counting facility using the manganese-bath technique. This facility combines nuclear instrumentation with coincidence-counting techniques to handle a wide variety of radioisotope-counting requirements

Time-resolved and time-integrated radiography of fast reactor fuel elements

The fast-reactor safety program has some unusual requirements in radiography. Applications may be divided into two areas: time-resolved or time-integrated radiography. The fast-neutron hodoscope has supplied all recent time-resolved cineradiographic in-pile fuel-motion data, and various x-ray and photographic techniques have been used for out-of-pile experiments. Thick containers and the large number of radioactive fuel pins involved in safety research have been responsible for some nonconventional applications of time-integrated radiography of stationary objects. Hodoscopes record fuel-motion during transient experiments at the TREAT reactor in the United States and CABRI in France. Other special techniques have been under development for out-of-pile nondestructive radiography of fuel element subassemblies, including fast-neutron and gamma-ray tomographic methods

The pgip family in soybean and three other legume species: evidence for a birth-and-death model of evolution

Polygalacturonase-inhibiting proteins (PGIPs) are leucine-rich repeat (LRR) plant cell wall glycoproteins involved in plant immunity. They are typically encoded by gene families with a small number of gene copies whose evolutionary origin has been poorly investigated. Here we report the complete characterization of the full complement of the pgip family in soybean (Glycine max [L.] Merr.) and the characterization of the genomic region surrounding the pgip family in four legume species. Results: BAC clone and genome sequence analyses showed that the soybean genome contains two pgip loci. Each locus is composed of three clustered genes that are induced following infection with the fungal pathogen Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (Lib.) de Bary, and remnant sequences of pgip genes. The analyzed homeologous soybean genomic regions (about 126 Kb) that include the pgip loci are strongly conserved and this conservation extends also to the genomes of the legume species Phaseolus vulgaris L., Medicago truncatula Gaertn. and Cicer arietinum L., each containing a single pgip locus. Maximum likelihood-based gene trees suggest that the genes within the pgip clusters have independently undergone tandem duplication in each species. Conclusions: The paleopolyploid soybean genome contains two pgip loci comprised in large and highly conserved duplicated regions, which are also conserved in bean, M. truncatula and C. arietinum. The genomic features of these legume pgip families suggest that the forces driving the evolution of pgip genes follow the birth-and-death model, similar to that proposed for the evolution of resistance (R) genes of NBS-LRR-type

No evidence of family history as a risk factor for herpes zoster in patients with post-herpetic neuralgia

Little is known about reactivation of latent varicella zoster virus as herpes zoster in individuals with no underlying immunosuppression. Risk factors include age, sex, ethnicity, exogenous boosting of immunity from varicella contacts, underlying cell-mediated immune disorders, mechanical trauma, psychological stress, and immunotoxin exposure. An association between herpes zoster and family history of zoster has been proposed. A case-control study involving patients affected by post-herpetic neuralgia, which usually follows more severe acute herpes zoster, was performed. The patients with post-herpetic neuralgia were enrolled at the Pain Clinic of the Policlinico Tor Vergata in Rome, Italy, within 1 year from the onset of acute zoster. The controls matched for sex and age were chosen among healthy subjects without a history of herpes zoster presenting at the Internal Medicine Outpatient Clinic for hypertension in the same time period. All the participants in the study gave informed consent and were interviewed by medically trained and blinded investigators using a questionnaire. Similar proportions of the patients and the controls reported a family history of herpes zoster irrespective of the degree of relationship, i.e., 17.4% and 18.2%, respectively, by analyzing only the first-degree relatives [RR 1.03 (CI 95%: 0.78-1.37)], and 28.4% and 29.6%, respectively, by analyzing the total number of relatives [RR 1.03 (CI 95%: 0.81-1.31)]. Further and larger prospective cohort studies are needed to ascertain whether a family history of herpes zoster is really an independent predictor of zoster in different geographical settings

Molecular vibration in cold collision theory

Cold collisions of ground state oxygen molecules with Helium have been investigated in a wide range of cold collision energies (from 1 $\mu$K up to 10 K) treating the oxygen molecule first as a rigid rotor and then introducing the vibrational degree of freedom. The comparison between the two models shows that at low energies the rigid rotor approximation is very accurate and able to describe all the dynamical features of the system. The comparison between the two models has also been extended to cases where the interaction potential He - O$_2$ is made artificially stronger. In this case vibration can perturb rate constants, but fine-tuning the rigid rotor potential can alleviate the discrepancies between the two models.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figure

Composição química de café conilon (Coffea canephora).

O objetivo neste trabalho foi estudar a composição química de um grupo de clones de Coffea canephora pertencentes ao programa de pesquisa em melhoramento genético da espécie no Instituto Capixaba de Pesquisa e Extensão Rural - Incaper, no Estado do Espírito Santo. Foram avaliados, em 49 clones, os teores de cafeína, trigonelina, ácidos clorogênicos e sólidos solúveis totais. Verificou-se a existência de expressiva variação entre os diferentes clones analisados, com valores extremos variando entre de 1,51 a 2,64% para cafeína; de 0,64 a 1,30% para trigonelina; de 3,61 a 5,64% para ácidos clorogênicos e de 29,36 a 36,36% para sólidos solúveis. Esses resultados indicam a existência de variabilidade genética para as características estudadas, bem como a possibilidade de seleção de plantas possuidoras de características qualitativas de maior interesse comercial