Road traffic and landscape characteristics predict the occurrence of native halophytes on roadside verges

Road management practices, such as winter de-icing create ideal habitats and competitive advantage for salt-tolerant species. We aimed to map the occurrences of halophytes along roads in Hungary. Furthermore, we tested factors that might play a role in the roadside occurrences of five chosen native halophytes from rare to common, we encountered during our field surveys. These were Festuca pseudovina, Limonium gmelinii subsp. hungaricum, Podospermum canum, Puccinellia distans and Spergularia media. We found, that at least one halophyte species was documented in 71% of the total sampling points. Germination experiments indicated that substrate salt concentration significantly decreased germination rates in each of the five species, but in case of L. gmelinii subsp. hungaricum, or P. distans germination occurred on extremely high salt concentrations. Traffic intensity, the presence of other halophytes at the sampling point and the presence of a given species in the surrounding landscape had a significant positive effect on the occurrence of four of the five model species. Our results suggest that the studied species are mostly in the early stage of their roadside spread, colonizing roadsides close to their native distribution ranges. The possibility of a future range expansion along roads cannot be excluded

Quenched invariance principle for random walks in balanced random environment

We consider random walks in a balanced random environment in $\mathbb{Z}^d$, $d\geq 2$. We first prove an invariance principle (for $d\ge2$) and the transience of the random walks when $d\ge 3$ (recurrence when $d=2$) in an ergodic environment which is not uniformly elliptic but satisfies certain moment condition. Then, using percolation arguments, we show that under mere ellipticity, the above results hold for random walks in i.i.d. balanced environments.Comment: Published online in Probab. Theory Relat. Fields, 05 Oct 2010. Typo (in journal version) corrected in (26

Interplaying Cassandra NoSQL Consistency and Performance: A Benchmarking Approach

This experience report analyses performance of the Cassandra NoSQL database and studies the fundamental trade-off between data consistency and delays in distributed data storages. The primary focus is on investigating the interplay between the Cassandra performance (response time) and its consistency settings. The paper reports the results of the read and write performance benchmarking for a replicated Cassandra cluster, deployed in the Amazon EC2 Cloud. We present quantitative results showing how different consistency settings affect the Cassandra performance under different workloads. One of our main findings is that it is possible to minimize Cassandra delays and still guarantee the strong data consistency by optimal coordination of consistency settings for both read and write requests. Our experiments show that (i) strong consistency costs up to 25% of performance and (ii) the best setting for strong consistency depends on the ratio of read and write operations. Finally, we generalize our experience by proposing a benchmarking-based methodology for run-time optimization of consistency settings to achieve the maximum Cassandra performance and still guarantee the strong data consistency under mixed workloads

Realistic Earth escape strategies for solar sailing

With growing interest in solar sailing comes the requirement to provide a basis for future detailed planetary escape mission analysis by drawing together prior work, clarifying and explaining previously anomalies. Previously unexplained seasonal variations in sail escape times from Earth orbit are explained analytically and corroborated within a numerical trajectory model. Blended-sail control algorithms, explicitly independent of time, which providenear-optimal escape trajectories and maintain a safe minimum altitude and which are suitable as a potential autonomous onboard controller, are then presented. These algorithms are investigated from a range of initial conditions and are shown to maintain the optimality previously demonstrated by the use of a single-energy gain control law but without the risk of planetary collision. Finally, it is shown that the minimum sail characteristic acceleration required for escape from a polar orbit without traversing the Earth shadow cone increases exponentially as initial altitude is decreased

Fabry-betegség – terápiás útmutató

A Fabry-kór a lizoszomális tárolási betegségek csoportjába tartozó, X-kromoszómához kötötten, recesszív módon öröklődő betegség, amely a globotriaozilceramid felhalmozódásához vezet a szervezet legkülönbözőbb szöveteiben. A betegség első tünetei többnyire gyermekkorban jelentkeznek, a progresszió során a betegek súlyos szervi károsodásokkal és korai halálozással számolhatnak. Elsősorban férfiak érintettek, azonban a betegség tüneteit heterozigóta nők esetében is megfigyelhetjük, de náluk a kórkép súlyossága változó, általában enyhébb lefolyású. Az enzimpótló kezelések megjelenése szükségessé tette, hogy részletes diagnosztikus és terápiás protokollt dolgozzunk ki. A jelen dolgozatban megjelenő ajánlásokat egy, a magyarországi Fabry-kóros betegek kezelésében részt vevő orvosokból, a diagnosztika területén dolgozó biológosukból és egyéb szakemberekből álló multidiszciplináris munkacsoport foglalta össze. A munkacsoport áttekintette a korábbi klinikai tanulmányokat, a publikált vizsgálatokat és a közelmúltban megjelent nemzetközi és nemzeti útmutatókat. | Fabry disease is a rare, X-linked lysosomal storage disorder that leads to accumulation of globotriaosylceramide in different tissues of the body. The disease is progressive and the first symptoms usually present in childhood. Consequences of the disease are disability and premature death. The disease in females could be as severe as in males although women may be asymptomatic. The possibility of enzyme replacement therapy has made it necessary to elaborate a comprehensive guideline for the diagnosis and treatment follow-up. The guideline has been summarized by a Hungarian multi-disciplinary working group consisting of physicians who are involved in diagnosis and care of Fabry patients. Previous clinical studies, published articles, and recently established international treatment guidelines were reviewed by the group

Genomic analysis of the function of the transcription factor gata3 during development of the Mammalian inner ear

We have studied the function of the zinc finger transcription factor gata3 in auditory system development by analysing temporal profiles of gene expression during differentiation of conditionally immortal cell lines derived to model specific auditory cell types and developmental stages. We tested and applied a novel probabilistic method called the gamma Model for Oligonucleotide Signals to analyse hybridization signals from Affymetrix oligonucleotide arrays. Expression levels estimated by this method correlated closely (p<0.0001) across a 10-fold range with those measured by quantitative RT-PCR for a sample of 61 different genes. In an unbiased list of 26 genes whose temporal profiles clustered most closely with that of gata3 in all cell lines, 10 were linked to Insulin-like Growth Factor signalling, including the serine/threonine kinase Akt/PKB. Knock-down of gata3 in vitro was associated with a decrease in expression of genes linked to IGF-signalling, including IGF1, IGF2 and several IGF-binding proteins. It also led to a small decrease in protein levels of the serine-threonine kinase Akt2/PKB beta, a dramatic increase in Akt1/PKB alpha protein and relocation of Akt1/PKB alpha from the nucleus to the cytoplasm. The cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor p27(kip1), a known target of PKB/Akt, simultaneously decreased. In heterozygous gata3 null mice the expression of gata3 correlated with high levels of activated Akt/PKB. This functional relationship could explain the diverse function of gata3 during development, the hearing loss associated with gata3 heterozygous null mice and the broader symptoms of human patients with Hearing-Deafness-Renal anomaly syndrome

An unprecedented arctic ozone depletion event during spring 2020 and its impacts across Europe

The response of the ozone column across Europe to the extreme 2020 Arctic ozone depletion was examined by analyzing ground-based observations at 38 European stations. The ozone decrease at the northernmost site, Ny-Ålesund (79°N) was about 43% with respect to a climatology of more than 30&nbsp;years. The magnitude of the decrease declined by about 0.7%&nbsp;deg−1 moving south to reach nearly 15% at 40°N. In addition, it was found that the variations of the ozone column at each of the selected stations in March-May were similar to those observed at Ny-Ålesund but with a delay increasing to about 20&nbsp;days at mid-latitudes with a gradient of approximately 0.5&nbsp;days&nbsp;deg−1. The distributions of reconstructed ozone column anomalies over a sector covering a large European area show decreasing ozone that started from the north at the beginning of April 2020 and spread south. Such behavior was shown to be similar to that observed after the Arctic ozone depletion in 2011. Stratospheric dynamical patterns in March–May 2011 and during 2020 suggested that the migration of ozone-poor air masses from polar areas to the south after the vortex breakup caused the observed ozone responses. A brief survey of the ozone mass mixing ratios at three stratospheric levels showed the exceptional strength of the 2020 episode. Despite the stronger and longer-lasting Arctic ozone loss in 2020, the analysis in this work indicates a similar ozone response at latitudes below 50°N to both 2011 and 2020 phenomena

Elliptic flow of charged particles in Pb-Pb collisions at 2.76 TeV

We report the first measurement of charged particle elliptic flow in Pb-Pb collisions at 2.76 TeV with the ALICE detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The measurement is performed in the central pseudorapidity region (|$\eta$|<0.8) and transverse momentum range 0.2< $p_{\rm T}$< 5.0 GeV/$c$. The elliptic flow signal v$_2$, measured using the 4-particle correlation method, averaged over transverse momentum and pseudorapidity is 0.087 $\pm$ 0.002 (stat) $\pm$ 0.004 (syst) in the 40-50% centrality class. The differential elliptic flow v$_2(p_{\rm T})$ reaches a maximum of 0.2 near $p_{\rm T}$ = 3 GeV/$c$. Compared to RHIC Au-Au collisions at 200 GeV, the elliptic flow increases by about 30%. Some hydrodynamic model predictions which include viscous corrections are in agreement with the observed increase.Comment: 10 pages, 4 captioned figures, published version, figures at http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/389