Extinct and endangered species in the vascular plant flora of Strzelce Opolskie (Southern Poland)

Symptoms of anthropogenic changes in the vascular plant flora include the spread of some species groups and the extinction of others. Also habitat condition changes (eutrophication, pollution etc.) and biodiversity loss (at a regional, national and even continental scale) should be mentioned. Numerous papers with rare plant species localities and endangered habitats have been published but the extinction processes and scale of this phenomenon in urban areas where environmental conservation is crucial, are not often analysed. The aim of the present study is to estimate species loss in the vascular plant flora of the town Strzelce Opolskie (Chełm, Silesian Upland) on the basis of the floristic literature and botanical surveys carried out from 2011 to 2013. A comparison has been made between the list of species reported up to 1945 and those species currently occurring in the study area. As a result, a list of 99 species included in the red list of plants of Opole and Silesian voivodeships is presented. Among this group, 45 species are not confirmed after 1945. Numerous extinct and endangered species are from families: Orchidaceae (8 species), Cyperaceae (7 species), Ranunculaceae (7 species) and Lamiaceae (6 species). Strongly represented are species associated with the communities of Festuco-Brometea and Querco- Fagetea classes. From the species presented, 18 species are included in "Red List of Vascular Plants of Poland" (MIREK ET AL. 2006). It was found that the extinct species represent about 7% of Strzelce Opolskie vascular plant flora. It is a focus point for local authorities to protect botanically valuable areas. Actually, the only Miejski Park is under the conservator's protection and there are few individual trees protected due to their age or size

Sporormiella as a tool for detecting the presence of large herbivores in the Neotropics

The reliability of using the abundance of Sporormiella spores as a proxy for the presence and abundance of megaherbivores was tested in southern Brazil. Mud-water interface samples from nine lakes, in which cattle-use was categorized as high, medium, or low, were assayed for Sporormiella representation. The sampling design allowed an analysis of both the influence of the number of animals using the shoreline and the distance of the sampling site from the nearest shoreline. Sporormiella was found to be a reliable proxy for the presence of large livestock. The concentration and abundance of spores declined from the edge of the lake toward the center, with the strongest response being in sites with high livestock use. Consistent with prior studies in temperate regions, we find that Sporormiella spores are a useful proxy to study the extinction of Pleistocene megafauna or the arrival of European livestock in Neotropical landscapes

Pre-kenophytes - species partially established in the vascular plant flora of Poland : [poster]

Among alien plant species, two groups can be distinguished: metaphytes – plants permanently established in a given region and diaphytes – plants not fully adapted to the habitat conditions in the new area. Classification of individual species into these two groups is very difficult in many cases (Fragment tekstu)

Typification of Blechnum spicant var. fallax Lange (Blechnaceae)

Blechnum spicant var. fallax Lange is a fern taxon endemic to Iceland where it occurs in the vicinity of hot springs on geothermally heated soils. Te taxon was first described by a Danish botanist Johan Martin Christian Lange in 1880 on the basis of plant material collected by Christian Grønlund in Iceland. Because its holotype was not designated in the protologue, we examined the extant original material including illustrations from Flora Danica and a single plant on sheet C10021769 (deposited in C) that was the basis for the respective plate. We select this specimen as the lectotype of Blechnum spicant var. fallax.This research was funded by the Icelandic Institute of Natural History and the University of Silesia in Katowice

Orbit determination using modern filters/smoothers and continuous thrust modeling

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 2008.This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.Includes bibliographical references (p. 389-394).The development of electric propulsion technology for spacecraft has led to reduced costs and longer lifespans for certain types of satellites. Because these satellites frequently undergo continuous thrust, predicting their motion and performing orbit determination on them has introduced complications for space surveillance networks. One way to improve orbit determination for these satellites is to make use of new estimation techniques. This has been accomplished by applying the Backward Smoothing Extended Kalman Filter (BSEKF) to the problem of orbit determination. The BSEKF outperforms other nonlinear filters because it treats nonlinearities in both the measurement and dynamic functions. The performance of this filter is evaluated in comparison to an existing Extended Semianalytic Kalman Filter (ESKF). The BSEKF was implemented in the R&D Goddard Trajectory Determination System (GTDS) for this thesis while the ESKF was implemented in 1981 and has been tested extensively since then. Radar and optical satellite tracking observations were simulated using an initial truth orbit and were processed by the ESKF and BSEKF to estimate satellite trajectories. The trajectory estimates from each filter were compared with the initial truth orbit and were evaluated for accuracy and convergence speed. The BSEKF provided substantial improvements in accuracy and convergence over the ESKF for the simulated test cases. Additionally, this study used the solutions offered by optimal thrust trajectory analysis to model the perturbations caused by continuous thrust. Optimal thrust trajectory analysis makes use of Optimal Control Theory and numerical optimization techniques to calculate minimum time and minimum fuel trajectories from one orbit to another.(cont.) Because satellite operators are motivated to save fuel, it was assumed that optimal thrust trajectories would be useful to predict thrust perturbed satellite motion. Software was developed to calculate the optimal trajectories and associated thrust plans. A new force model was implemented in GTDS to accept externally generated thrust plans and apply them to a given satellite trajectory. Test cases are presented to verify the correctness of the mathematics and software. Also, test cases involving a real satellite using electric propulsion were executed. These tests demonstrated that optimal thrust modeling could provide order of magnitude reductions in orbit determination errors for a satellite with low-thrust electric propulsion.by Zachary James Folcik.S.M

An Agent-Based Model of a Hepatic Inflammatory Response to Salmonella: A Computational Study under a Large Set of Experimental Data

Citation: Shi, Z. Z., Chapes, S. K., Ben-Arieh, D., & Wu, C. H. (2016). An Agent-Based Model of a Hepatic Inflammatory Response to Salmonella: A Computational Study under a Large Set of Experimental Data. Plos One, 11(8), 39. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0161131We present an agent-based model (ABM) to simulate a hepatic inflammatory response (HIR) in a mouse infected by Salmonella that sometimes progressed to problematic proportions, known as "sepsis". Based on over 200 published studies, this ABM describes interactions among 21 cells or cytokines and incorporates 226 experimental data sets and/or data estimates from those reports to simulate a mouse HIR in silico. Our simulated results reproduced dynamic patterns of HIR reported in the literature. As shown in vivo, our model also demonstrated that sepsis was highly related to the initial Salmonella dose and the presence of components of the adaptive immune system. We determined that high mobility group box-1, C-reactive protein, and the interleukin-10: tumor necrosis factor-a ratio, and CD4+ T cell: CD8+ T cell ratio, all recognized as biomarkers during HIR, significantly correlated with outcomes of HIR. During therapy-directed silico simulations, our results demonstrated that anti-agent intervention impacted the survival rates of septic individuals in a time-dependent manner. By specifying the infected species, source of infection, and site of infection, this ABM enabled us to reproduce the kinetics of several essential indicators during a HIR, observe distinct dynamic patterns that are manifested during HIR, and allowed us to test proposed therapy-directed treatments. Although limitation still exists, this ABM is a step forward because it links underlying biological processes to computational simulation and was validated through a series of comparisons between the simulated results and experimental studies

The bleeding into the emphysematosus bulla imitating lung tumor

Krwawienie do miąższu płucnego jest rzadkim zjawiskiem, które występuje zwykle w wyniku urazu klatki piersiowej, innymi przyczynami są powikłania leczenia antykoagulacyjnego oraz infekcje. W pracy przedstawiono historię choroby pacjenta leczonego przeciwzakrzepowo hospitalizowanego z powodu krwioplucia, będącego objawem krwawienia do pęcherza rozedmowego. Rozstrzygającym badaniem diagnostycznym było badanie rezonansu magnetycznego klatki piersiowej. Ten sposób obrazowania umożliwia w precyzyjny sposób na różnicowanie tkanek. Zastosowanie nowoczesnych technik obrazowania pozwala często na zrezygnowanie z inwazyjnych metod diagnostycznych.Bleeding into the lung parenchyma is a rare phenomenon that usually occurs as a result of chest trauma, other causes are anticoagulant therapy, and infections. The following case presents a patient admitted to the hospital due to haemoptysis, which was a symptom of bleeding into the emphysematosus bulla caused by anticoagulation therapy. The decisive diagnostic examination was chest magnetic resonance. This imaging method allows the precise differentiation of tissues. Using modern imaging techniques can often dispense with invasive diagnostic methods

Using an agent-based model to analyze the dynamic communication network of the immune response

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The immune system behaves like a complex, dynamic network with interacting elements including leukocytes, cytokines, and chemokines. While the immune system is broadly distributed, leukocytes must communicate effectively to respond to a pathological challenge. The Basic Immune Simulator 2010 contains agents representing leukocytes and tissue cells, signals representing cytokines, chemokines, and pathogens, and virtual spaces representing organ tissue, lymphoid tissue, and blood. Agents interact dynamically in the compartments in response to infection of the virtual tissue. Agent behavior is imposed by logical rules derived from the scientific literature. The model captured the agent-to-agent contact history, and from this the network topology and the interactions resulting in successful versus failed viral clearance were identified. This model served to integrate existing knowledge and allowed us to examine the immune response from a novel perspective directed at exploiting complex dynamics, ultimately for the design of therapeutic interventions.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Analyzing the evolution of agent-agent interactions at incremental time points from identical initial conditions revealed novel features of immune communication associated with successful and failed outcomes. There were fewer contacts between agents for simulations ending in viral elimination (<it>win</it>) versus persistent infection (<it>loss</it>), due to the removal of infected agents. However, early cellular interactions preceded successful clearance of infection. Specifically, more Dendritic Agent interactions with TCell and BCell Agents, and more BCell Agent interactions with TCell Agents early in the simulation were associated with the immune <it>win </it>outcome. The Dendritic Agents greatly influenced the outcome, confirming them as hub agents of the immune network. In addition, unexpectedly high frequencies of Dendritic Agent-self interactions occurred in the lymphoid compartment late in the <it>loss </it>outcomes.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>An agent-based model capturing several key aspects of complex system dynamics was used to study the emergent properties of the immune response to viral infection. Specific patterns of interactions between leukocyte agents occurring early in the response significantly improved outcome. More interactions at later stages correlated with persistent inflammation and infection. These simulation experiments highlight the importance of commonly overlooked aspects of the immune response and provide insight into these processes at a resolution level exceeding the capabilities of current laboratory technologies.</p