Classification of Grassland Successional Stages Using Airborne Hyperspectral Imagery

Plant communities differ in their species composition, and, thus, also in their functional trait composition, at different stages in the succession from arable fields to grazed grassland. We examine whether aerial hyperspectral (414–2501 nm) remote sensing can be used to discriminate between grazed vegetation belonging to different grassland successional stages. Vascular plant species were recorded in 104.1 m2 plots on the island of Öland (Sweden) and the functional properties of the plant species recorded in the plots were characterized in terms of the ground-cover of grasses, specific leaf area and Ellenberg indicator values. Plots were assigned to three different grassland age-classes, representing 5–15, 16–50 and >50 years of grazing management. Partial least squares discriminant analysis models were used to compare classifications based on aerial hyperspectral data with the age-class classification. The remote sensing data successfully classified the plots into age-classes: the overall classification accuracy was higher for a model based on a pre-selected set of wavebands (85%, Kappa statistic value = 0.77) than one using the full set of wavebands (77%, Kappa statistic value = 0.65). Our results show that nutrient availability and grass cover differences between grassland age-classes are detectable by spectral imaging. These techniques may potentially be used for mapping the spatial distribution of grassland habitats at different successional stages

Modeling the Space Debris Environment with MASTER-2009 and ORDEM2010

Spacecraft analysis using ORDEM2010 uses a high-fidelity population model to compute risk to on-orbit assets. The ORDEM2010 GUI allows visualization of spacecraft flux in 2-D and 1-D. The population was produced using a Bayesian statistical approach with measured and modeled environment data. Validation of sizes 1mm is on-going

Predictive Markers of Honey Bee Colony Collapse

Across the Northern hemisphere, managed honey bee colonies, Apis mellifera, are currently affected by abrupt depopulation during winter and many factors are suspected to be involved, either alone or in combination. Parasites and pathogens are considered as principal actors, in particular the ectoparasitic mite Varroa destructor, associated viruses and the microsporidian Nosema ceranae. Here we used long term monitoring of colonies and screening for eleven disease agents and genes involved in bee immunity and physiology to identify predictive markers of honeybee colony losses during winter. The data show that DWV, Nosema ceranae, Varroa destructor and Vitellogenin can be predictive markers for winter colony losses, but their predictive power strongly depends on the season. In particular, the data support that V. destructor is a key player for losses, arguably in line with its specific impact on the health of individual bees and colonies

Instrumented Activity Dice for Assessing Throwing Performance: A Pilot Study

Assessment tests are crucial but often viewed as tedious work by the participants and the experimentalists. Consequently, research has been done to integrate assessments into serious games and to automate observations using computer vision or wearable sensors. However, the use of camera generates privacy concerns. Moreover, the behavior of a person can change when the person feels being recorded or when the person has to wear sensors. Hence, we investigate a different methodology to assess the physical status of a person by integrating sensors into a tangible toy commonly used by the participants - an activity dice that can be embedded in serious games. We demonstrate that with this instrumented activity dice, limitations of throwing performance of a person can be assessed purely based on the recording taken from the activity dice when the person throws the activity dice. We further demonstrate that variables extracted from the dice are similar to the variables extracted from a video

Asymmetric dimethylarginine predicts outcome and time of stay in hospital in patients attending an internal medicine emergency room

Introduction: For patients attending the emergency room (ER) valid diagnostic criteria which identify patients at risk for an adverse outcome are needed. We investigated the predictive value of asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA) in unselected patients attending an internal medicine ER regarding outcome of the patients and duration of stay in the hospital.\ud \ud Patients and methods: Patients (n = 417) attending the ER were classified according to their primary diagnosis. Routine laboratory tests were performed and ADMA was determined. Patients were followed for a primary endpoint of in hospital death and complicated outcome.\ud \ud Results: ADMA levels were highest in patients with a cancer-related diagnosis (0.76 (0.63–0.93) µmol/L) and in patients with a cardiovascular diagnosis (0.69 (0.60–0.80) µmol/L; p < 0.001). Overall, we found increasing proportions of patients experiencing the primary end point over the quartiles of ADMA (4.6%, 8.2%, 9.6%, and 15.8%; p = 0.007). ADMA had the highest predictive value for the primary endpoint in patients with cardiovascular disease (odds ratio 19.4; p = 0.029). In a Cox proportional hazard model ADMA was an independent predictor of the length of hospitalization (hazard ratio 2.0 (95% CI: 1.3–3.3); p = 0.006) in the entire cohort.\ud \ud Conclusion: We conclude that ADMA independently predicts future complications and hospitalization in patients attending an ER

Pyruvate carboxylase is a major bottleneck for glutamate and lysine production by Corynebacterium glutamicum

Peters-Wendisch P, Schiel B, Wendisch VF, et al. Pyruvate carboxylase is a major bottleneck for glutamate and lysine production by Corynebacterium glutamicum. Journal of Molecular Microbiology and Biotechnology. 2001;3(2):295-300.Corynebacterium glutamicum possesses both phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase (PEPCx) and pyruvate carboxylase (PCx) as anaplerotic enzymes for growth on carbohydrates. To analyze the significance of PCx for the amino acid production by this organism, the wild-type pyc gene, encoding PCx, was used for the construction of defined pyc-inactive and pyc-overexpressing strains and the glutamate, lysine and threonine production capabilities of these recombinant strains of C. glutamicum were tested in comparison to the respective host strains. No PCx activity was observed in the pyc-inactive mutants whereas the pyc-overexpressing strains showed eight-to elevenfold higher specific PCx activity when compared to the host strains. In a detergent-dependent glutamate production assay, the pyc-overexpressing strain showed more than sevenfold higher, the PCx-deficient strain about twofold lower glutamate production than the wild-type, Overexpression of the pyc gene and thus increasing the PCx activity in a lysine-producing strain of C. glutamicum resulted in approximately 50% higher lysine accumulation in the culture supernatant whereas inactivation of the pyc gene led to a decrease by 60%, In a threonine-producing strain of C. glutamicum, the overexpression of the pyc gene led to an only 10 to 20% increase in threonine production, however, to a more than 150% increase in the production of the threonine precursor homoserine. These results identify the anaplerotic PCx reaction as a major bottleneck for amino acid production by C. glutamicum and show that the enzyme is an important target for the molecular breeding of hyperproducing strains

Expression of genes of lipid synthesis and altered lipid composition modulates L-glutamate efflux of Corynebacterium glutamicum

L-Glutamate is made with Corynebacterium glutamicum on a scale of more than 10(6) tons/year. Nevertheless, formation of this amino acid is enigmatic and there is very limited molecular information available to unravel the apparently complex conditions leading to L-glutamate efflux. Here, we report the isolation and overexpression of the genes involved in lipid synthesis: acp, fadD15, cma, cls, pgsA2, cdsA, gpsA, and plsC, and the inactivation of cma and cls. In addition, the consequences for phospholipid content, temperature sensitivity, as well as detergent-independent and detergent-dependent L-glutamate efflux were quantified. An in part strong alteration of the phospholipid composition was achieved; for instance, overexpression of fadD15 encoding an acyl-CoA ligase resulted in an increase of phosphatidyl inositol from 12.6 to 30.2%. All strains, except that overexpressing acp (acyl carrier protein), exhibited increased temperature sensitivity, with the strongest sensitivity present upon cls (cardiolipin synthetase) inactivation. As a consequence of the genetically modified lipid synthesis, L-glutamate efflux changed quite dramatically; for instance, overexpression of plsC (acylglycerolacyl transferase) resulted in a detergent-triggered increase of L-glutamate accumulation from 92 mM to 108 mM, whereas acp overexpression reduced the accumulation to 24 mM. With some of the overexpressed genes, substantial L-glutamate excretion even without detergent addition was obtained when the fermentation temperature was elevated. These data show that the chemical and physical properties of the cytoplasmic membrane are altered and suggest that this is a necessary precondition to achieve L-glutamate efflux

Pharmacological Modulation of the Retinal Unfolded Protein Response in Bardet-Biedl Syndrome Reduces Apoptosis and Preserves Light Detection Ability

Ciliopathies, a class of rare genetic disorders, present often with retinal degeneration caused by protein transport defects between the inner segment and the outer segment of the photoreceptors. Bardet-Biedl syndrome is one such ciliopathy, genetically heterogeneous with 17 BBS genes identified to date, presenting early onset retinitis pigmentosa. By investigating BBS12-deprived retinal explants and the Bbs12(-/-) murine model, we show that the impaired intraciliary transport results in protein retention in the endoplasmic reticulum. The protein overload activates a proapoptotic unfolded protein response leading to a specific Caspase12-mediated death of the photoreceptors. Having identified a therapeutic window in the early postnatal retinal development and through optimized pharmacological modulation of the unfolded protein response, combining three specific compounds, namely valproic acid, guanabenz, and a specific Caspase12 inhibitor, achieved efficient photoreceptor protection, thereby maintaining light detection ability in viv

Mid-regional pro-adrenomedullin (MR-proADM) Improves Disposition Strategies for Patients with Acute Dyspnoea: Results from the BACH trial

Objectives: To assess the value of Mid-regional pro-adrenomedullin (MR-proADM) in guiding patient disposition from the Emergency Department (ED), as one of the key factors of hospital resource utilization, in undifferentiated patients with acute dyspnoea. Methods: We used clinical and outcome data from a large international biomarker study (BACH trial) and analyzed data of all 1557 patients of the European and US sites presenting with acute dyspnoea. Patients were discharged or transferred from the ED to different levels of care (general ward, monitoring unit, intensive care unit). This original patient disposition was compared with the hypothetical disposition based on an adapted method of net reclassification improvement (NRI), which up-or downgraded patients from one level of care to the other based on the MR-proADM test result. Results: MR-pro-ADM was significantly higher in patients who died during the follow-up than in survivors (p<0.0001). When applying the adapted NRI model, 30 additional patients from the EU and 55 additional patients from the US were theoretically discharged (increase of 16.5%) had MR-proADM been used for patient management. The overall NRI, adding up the rates of up-and downgrades, in the EU was 16.0% (95% CI 8.2%-23.9%). A total of n=72 (9.9%) patients changed disposition when adding MR-pro ADM. In the US, the overall NRI was 12.0% (5.7%-18.4%) and a total of n=81 (11.2%) patients changed disposition. Conclusions: MR-proADM has the potential to guide initial disposition of undifferentiated ED patients with acute dyspnoea and might therefore be helpful to improve resource utilization and patient care