Filtration of Carbon Particulate Emissions from a Plasma Pyrolysis Assembly

NASA is investigating plasma pyrolysis as a candidate technology that will enable the recovery of hydrogen from the methane produced by the ISS Sabatier Reactor. The Plasma Pyrolysis Assembly (PPA) is the current prototype of this technology which converts the methane product from the Carbon Dioxide Reduction Assembly (CRA) to acetylene and hydrogen with 90% or greater conversion efficiency. A small amount of solid carbon particulates are generated as a side product and must be filtered before the acetylene is removed and the hydrogen-rich gas stream is recycled back to the CRA. We discuss developmental work on several options for filtering out the carbon particulate emissions from the PPA exit gas stream. The filtration technologies and concepts investigated range from fibrous media to monolithic ceramic and sintered metal media. This paper describes the different developed filter prototypes and characterizes their performance from integrated testing at the Environmental Chamber (E-Chamber) at MSFC. In addition, characterization data on the generated carbon particulates, that help to define filter requirements, are also presented

Selenoprotein gene nomenclature

The human genome contains 25 genes coding for selenocysteine-containing proteins (selenoproteins). These proteins are involved in a variety of functions, most notably redox homeostasis. Selenoprotein enzymes with known functions are designated according to these functions: TXNRD1, TXNRD2, and TXNRD3 (thioredoxin reductases), GPX1, GPX2, GPX3, GPX4 and GPX6 (glutathione peroxidases), DIO1, DIO2, and DIO3 (iodothyronine deiodinases), MSRB1 (methionine-R-sulfoxide reductase 1) and SEPHS2 (selenophosphate synthetase 2). Selenoproteins without known functions have traditionally been denoted by SEL or SEP symbols. However, these symbols are sometimes ambiguous and conflict with the approved nomenclature for several other genes. Therefore, there is a need to implement a rational and coherent nomenclature system for selenoprotein-encoding genes. Our solution is to use the root symbol SELENO followed by a letter. This nomenclature applies to SELENOF (selenoprotein F, the 15 kDa selenoprotein, SEP15), SELENOH (selenoprotein H, SELH, C11orf31), SELENOI (selenoprotein I, SELI, EPT1), SELENOK (selenoprotein K, SELK), SELENOM (selenoprotein M, SELM), SELENON (selenoprotein N, SEPN1, SELN), SELENOO (selenoprotein O, SELO), SELENOP (selenoprotein P, SeP, SEPP1, SELP), SELENOS (selenoprotein S, SELS, SEPS1, VIMP), SELENOT (selenoprotein T, SELT), SELENOV (selenoprotein V, SELV) and SELENOW (selenoprotein W, SELW, SEPW1). This system, approved by the HUGO Gene Nomenclature Committee, also resolves conflicting, missing and ambiguous designations for selenoprotein genes and is applicable to selenoproteins across vertebrates

Allopreening in birds is associated with parental cooperation over offspring care and stable pair bonds across years

Individuals of many species form bonds with their breeding partners, yet the mechanisms maintaining these bonds are poorly understood. In birds, allopreening is a conspicuous feature of interactions between breeding partners and has been hypothesized to play a role in strengthening and maintaining pair bonds within and across breeding attempts. Many avian species, however, do not allopreen and the relationship between allopreening and pair bonding across species remains unexplored. In a comparative analysis of allopreening and pair bond behavior, we found that allopreening between breeding partners was more common among species where parents cooperate to rear offspring. The occurrence of allopreening was also associated with an increased likelihood that partners would remain together over successive breeding seasons. However, there was no strong evidence for an association between allopreening and sexual fidelity within seasons or time spent together outside the breeding season. Allopreening between partners was also no more common in colonial or cooperatively breeding species than in solitary species. Analyses of evolutionary transitions indicated that allopreening evolved from an ancestral state of either high parental cooperation or high partner retention, and we discuss possible explanations for this. Overall, our results are consistent with an important role for allopreening in the maintenance of avian pair bonds

Abstracts from the NIHR INVOLVE Conference 2017

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Popular Science and Modernist Poetry

Popular Science and Modernist Poetry studies the influence of popular science on modernist poetry and conceptions of literary value. It takes I.A. Richards’s Science and Poetry as its primary object, using the 1926 book—which was published in two popular science series and reviewed in The Dial, at editor Marianne Moore’s request, by T.S. Eliot—to examine the surprising connections between popular science and modernist poetry and criticism. I include chapters on each of these writers, using archival material to better understand the sources of their scientific knowledge. I argue that popular science writers, in response to increasing difficulty and specialization, sought to explicate their subjects by way of metaphor; in doing so, they fashioned a version of science that was as capacious and interdisciplinary any “encyclopedic” modernist text. Metaphor became, to Richards, a “transaction between contexts,” as he, Moore, and Eliot sought to defend the value of poetry in an increasingly scientific world

Data from: Allopreening in birds is associated with parental cooperation over offspring care and stable pair bonds across years

Individuals of many species form bonds with their breeding partners, yet the mechanisms maintaining these bonds are poorly understood. In birds, allopreening is a conspicuous feature of interactions between breeding partners and has been hypothesized to play a role in strengthening and maintaining pair bonds within and across breeding attempts. Many avian species, however, do not allopreen and the relationship between allopreening and pair bonding across species remains unexplored. In a comparative analysis of allopreening and pair bond behavior, we found that allopreening between breeding partners was more common among species where parents cooperate to rear offspring. The occurrence of allopreening was also associated with an increased likelihood that partners would remain together over successive breeding seasons. However, there was no strong evidence for an association between allopreening and sexual fidelity within seasons or time spent together outside the breeding season. Allopreening between partners was also no more common in colonial or cooperatively breeding species than in solitary species. Analyses of evolutionary transitions indicated that allopreening evolved from an ancestral state of either high parental cooperation or high partner retention, and we discuss possible explanations for this. Overall, our results are consistent with an important role for allopreening in the maintenance of avian pair bonds

Kenny_ESM_PhylogeneticTrees

100 phylogenetic trees downloaded from http://birdtree.org. The birdtree.org website accompanies the following study: Jetz W, Thomas GH, Joy JB, Hartmann K, Mooers AO (2012) The global diversity of birds in space and time. Nature 491: 444-448. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature11631, and the Jetz et al. article in Nature should be cited in the primary reference list of any publication that uses data culled from birdtree.or

Measurements of pair bond strength in birds

Collated from published sources found using Web of Science, Google Scholar and the Alexander Library of Ornithology (Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, UK), and from contacting researchers involved in long-term, detailed behavioural studies of the species in question. Parental cooperation scores were calculated by Remeš et al. (2015, PNAS). Data were collated in Excel

State of Digitisation and Gap Analysis Surveys

Recent developments in digitisation technologies and equipment have enabled advances in the rate of natural history specimen digitisation. However Europe’s Natural History Collection Institutions are home to over one billion specimens and currently only a small fraction of these have been digitally catalogued with fewer imaged. It is clear that institutions still face huge challenges when digitising the vast number of specimens in their collections. I will present the results of two surveys that aimed to discover the main successes and challenges facing institutions in their digitisation programmes. The first survey was undertaken in 2014 within the SYNTHESYS 3 project and gathered information from project partners on their current digitisation facilities, equipment and workflows providing some key recommendations based on these findings. The second survey was completed more recently in 2017, through the Consortium of European Taxonomic Facilities (CETAF) Digitisation Working Group. This survey aimed to discover the successful protocols and implementation of digitisation, and to identify the shortfalls in resources and protocols. Results from both surveys will be fed into the future programme of the CETAF Digitisation Working Group as well as forthcoming and proposed EU projects, including Innovation and Consolidation for large-scale Digitisation of natural heritage (ICEDIG)