The effect of cadmium on the bovine in vitro oocyte maturation and early embryo development

Common pollutants such as heavy metals and cadmium is among those with high environmental concerns. In vivo studies had shown that cadmium (Cd) causes oocyte degeneration and embryo mortality, and lowers pregnancy rates in mammals. However, there is limited information available about direct effects of Cd on oocyte maturation and/or embryo development. This study was aimed to investigate if Cd has any effect on the oocyte maturation and/or embryo development in vitro. Bovine COCs were collected from the slaughter house and cultured for 24 h in serum-free media only (Controls) or supplemented with 0.2, 2.0 and 20.0 μM CdCl2. At 24 h cumulus cell expansion was assessed in all COCs. COCs were either denuded and stained for determination of nuclear maturation or fertilized for assessment of subsequent embryo development. Cd at the lowest concentration (0.2 μM) did not affect any of the parameters studied. However, at higher concentrations (2.0 and 20.0 μM) it significantly (P < 0.05) reduced the percentage of fully-expanded COCs and significantly (P < 0.05) increased the percentage of partially and/or non-expanded COCs compared to controls and 0.2 μM. Cadmium at higher concentrations (2.0 and 20.0 μM) also significantly (P < 0.01) reduced the percentage of oocytes reaching metaphase II stage compared to controls and 0.2 μM. Post-fertilization cleavage rate in presumptive zygotes and blastocyst development significantly (P < 0.05) reduced 0.2, 2.0 and 20.0 μM CdCl2 compared to the controls (0.0 μM). In conclusion, these results suggest that Cd had direct detrimental effects on the bovine oocyte maturation and its developmental competence

A study on range gated temporal reference acoustical holography Final technical report

Acoustical holographic imaging techniques for noninvasive visualization of soft tissue structures in ma

Multiple introductions, polyploidy and mixed reproductive strategies are linked to genetic diversity and structure in the most widespread invasive plant across Southern Ocean archipelagos

This work received support from the Swiss Polar Institute and Ferring Pharmaceuticals through the Antarctic Circumnavigation Expedition (“ACE”). Additional fi- nancial and logistical support was provided by the South African National Research Foundation (NRF) and by the South African National Antarctic Programme (SANAP). MM and CH were also supported by the National Research Foundation (grant 89967). We thank Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service for granting ac- cess and collection permits for Macquarie Island and the Australian Antarctic Program for logistical support. We thank Institut polaire français Paul- Émile Victor for logistical support for sampling on Iles Kerguelen and Ile de la Possession. We thank wintering staff for sam- ple collection on Ile de la Possession. We thank the Department of Conservation for granting access and collection permits for the New Zealand islands. We thank Heritage Expeditions for providing logis- tics and voyage support. Collections were undertaken on the ACE expedition under permits granted to the expedition and its research- ers. Collections at the Prince Edward Islands, and at the Tristan da Cunha and Gough islands were permitted through the South African National Antarctic Program, notably via the Prince Edward Islands Management Committee for the former and the Tristan da Cunha Conservation Department for the latter.Biological invasions in remote areas that experience low human activity provide unique opportunities to elucidate processes responsible for invasion success. Here we study the most widespread invasive plant species across the isolated islands of the Southern Ocean, the annual bluegrass, Poa annua. To analyse geographical variation in genome size, genetic diversity and reproductive strategies, we sampled all major sub-Antarctic archipelagos in this region and generated microsatellite data for 470 individual plants representing 31 populations. We also estimated genome sizes for a subset of individuals using flow cytometry. Occasional events of island colonization are expected to result in high genetic structure among islands, overall low genetic diversity and increased self-fertilization, but we show that this is not the case for P. annua. Microsatellite data indicated low population genetic structure and lack of isolation by distance among the sub-Antarctic archipelagos we sampled, but high population structure within each archipelago. We identified high levels of genetic diversity, low clonality and low selfing rates in sub-Antarctic P. annua populations (contrary to rates typical of continental populations). In turn, estimates of selfing declined in populations as genetic diversity increased. Additionally, we found that most P. annua individuals are probably tetraploid and that only slight variation exists in genome size across the Southern Ocean. Our findings suggest multiple independent introductions of P. annua into the sub-Antarctic, which promoted the establishment of genetically diverse populations. Despite multiple introductions, the adoption of convergent reproductive strategies (outcrossing) happened independently in each major archipelago. The combination of polyploidy and a mixed reproductive strategy probably benefited P. annua in the Southern Ocean by increasing genetic diversity and its ability to cope with the novel environmental conditions.National Research Foundation 89967Antarctic Circumnavigation Expedition “ACE”South African National Research Foundation (NRF)South African National Antarctic Programme (SANAP

Pembuatan Aplikasi Audience Response System Berbasis Web Dan Android

Audience Response Systems are widely used in various events as a media to gather information, to collect data, and to know the opinions of the general public towards particular issues, topics, news. Audience Response System can also be used to find out the client or customer satisfaction to the quality of products or services. Unfortunately most of the audience response systems that exist today are in the form of a physical (or remote) device which is severely limited in use. Along with the development of technology, almost all people have a smartphone to support their daily activities. The physical remote device called a clicker can be replaced with an application or program that can be installed on smartphones, while the polls are created through the website. In this research, the Audience response system was built using Node.js, PhoneGap platform, and the WebSocket Socket.IO as Javascript library to support bi-directional data communications. Based on testing result, this application can run properly all the functionalities that have been mentioned such as login to the system, create a poll, join a poll, and give a vote. The realiability of the system is 93%.

Cross-layer H.264 scalable video downstream delivery over WLANs

Thanks to its in-network drop-based adaptation capabilities, H.264 Scalable Video Coding is perceived as an effective approach for delivering video over networks characterized by sudden large bandwidth fluctuations, such as Wireless LANs. Performance may be boosted by the adoption of application-aware/cross-layer schedulers devised to intelligently drop video data units (NALUs), so that i) decoding dependencies are preserved, and ii) the quality perceived by the end users is maximized. In this paper, we provide a theoretical formulation of a QoE utility-optimal cross-layer scheduling problem for H.264 SVC downlink delivery over WLANs. We show that, because of the unique characteristics of the WLAN MAC operation, this problem significantly differs from related approaches proposed for scheduled wireless technologies, especially when the WLAN carries background traffic in the uplink direction. From these theoretical insights, we derive, design, implement and experimentally assess a simple practical scheduling algorithm, whose performance is very close to the optimal solution

Development status of a Laue lens project for gamma-ray astronomy

We report the status of the HAXTEL project, devoted to perform a design study and the development of a Laue lens prototype. After a summary of the major results of the design study, the approach adopted to develop a Demonstration Model of a Laue lens is discussed, the set up described, and some results presented.Comment: 11 pages, 11 figures, 2007 SPIE Conference on Optics for EUV, X-Ray, and Gamma-Ray Astronomy II

Exploring the Hard X-/soft gamma-ray Continuum Spectra with Laue Lenses

The history of X-ray astronomy has shown that any advancement in our knowledge of the X-ray sky is strictly related to an increase in instrument sensitivity. At energies above 60 keV, there are interesting prospects for greatly improving the limiting sensitivity of the current generation of direct viewing telescopes (with or without coded masks), offered by the use of Laue lenses. We will discuss below the development status of a Hard X-Ray focusing Telescope (HAXTEL) based on Laue lenses with a broad bandpass (from 60 to 600 keV) for the study of the X-ray continuum of celestial sources. We show two examplesof multi-lens configurations with expected sensitivity orders of magnitude better ($\sim 1 \times 10^{-8}$ photons cm$^{-2}$ s$^{-1}$ keV$^{-1}$ at 200 keV) than that achieved so far. With this unprecedented sensitivity, very exciting astrophysical prospects are opened.Comment: 4 pages, 10 figures, to be published in the Proc. of the 39th ESLAB Symosium, 19-21 April 200

Source region and growth analysis of narrowband Z-mode emission at Saturn

Intense Z-mode emission is observed in the lower density region near the inner edge of the Enceladus torus at Saturn, where these waves may resonate with MeV electrons. The source mechanism of this emission, which is narrow-banded and most intense near 5 kHz, is not well understood. We survey the Cassini Radio and Plasma Wave Science data to isolate several probable source regions near the inner edge of the Enceladus density torus. Electron phase space distributions are obtained from the Cassini Electron Spectrometer, part of the Cassini Plasma Spectrometer investigation. We perform a plasma wave growth analysis to conclude that an electron temperature anisotropy and possibly a weak loss cone can drive the Z mode as observed. Electrostatic electron acoustic waves and perhaps weak beam modes are also found to be unstable coincident with the Z mode. Quasi-steady conditions near the Enceladus density torus may result in the observations of narrowband Z-mode emission at Saturn