314 research outputs found
Production of triploid Sandersonia aurantiaca plants
Triploid plants of Sandersonia aurantiaca were produced by crossing diploid and tetraploid forms of S. aurantiaca. Enlarged ovules were transferred to in vitro culture 14–30 days after pollination. The triploid nature of the embryo derived plants was determined by flow cytometry and chromosome counts both of which showed that the triploid plants had features that were midway between those of the two parents. The mean nuclear DNA contents of 2C nuclei from diploid, triploid and tetraploid forms of S. aurantiaca were 6.86pg, 10.04pg and 13.55pg, respectively. The nuclear DNA content of 1C nuclei of sperm cells from pollen grains was 2.94pg. Mitotic chromosome counts from the three plants gave 2n = 24, 36 and 48 chromosomes for the diploid, triploid and tetraploid forms, respectively. Meiotic chromosome counts for the diploid and tetraploid plants were n = 12 and n = 24, respectively. The triploid showed mainly bivalents, but lagging chromosomes led to micronuclei and infertility in gametes. The morphological features of the various plants corroborated other evidence indicating that the triploid plants were the result of a cross between diploid and tetraploid plants
Weak Poisson structures on infinite dimensional manifolds and hamiltonian actions
We introduce a notion of a weak Poisson structure on a manifold modeled
on a locally convex space. This is done by specifying a Poisson bracket on a
subalgebra \cA \subeq C^\infty(M) which has to satisfy a non-degeneracy
condition (the differentials of elements of \cA separate tangent vectors) and
we postulate the existence of smooth Hamiltonian vector fields. Motivated by
applications to Hamiltonian actions, we focus on affine Poisson spaces which
include in particular the linear and affine Poisson structures on duals of
locally convex Lie algebras. As an interesting byproduct of our approach, we
can associate to an invariant symmetric bilinear form on a Lie algebra
\g and a -skew-symmetric derivation a weak affine Poisson
structure on \g itself. This leads naturally to a concept of a Hamiltonian
-action on a weak Poisson manifold with a \g-valued momentum map and hence
to a generalization of quasi-hamiltonian group actions
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Soft topographic map for clustering and classification of bacteria
In this work a new method for clustering and building a
topographic representation of a bacteria taxonomy is presented. The method is based on the analysis of stable parts of the genome, the so-called “housekeeping genes”. The proposed method generates topographic maps of the bacteria taxonomy, where relations among different
type strains can be visually inspected and verified. Two well known DNA alignement algorithms are applied to the genomic sequences. Topographic maps are optimized to represent the similarity among the sequences according to their evolutionary distances. The experimental analysis is carried out on 147 type strains of the Gammaprotebacteria
class by means of the 16S rRNA housekeeping gene. Complete sequences of the gene have been retrieved from the NCBI public database. In the experimental tests the maps show clusters of homologous type strains and present some singular cases potentially due to incorrect classification
or erroneous annotations in the database
Quintessence from Shape Moduli
We show that shape moduli in sub-millimeter extra dimensional scenarios,
addressing the gauge hierarchy problem, can dominate the energy density of the
universe today. In our scenario, the volume of the extra dimensions is
stabilized at a sufficiently high scale to avoid conflicts with nucleosynthesis
and solar-system precision gravity experiments, while the shape moduli remain
light but couple extremely weakly to brane-localized matter and easily avoid
these bounds. Nonlocal effects in the bulk of the extra dimension generate a
potential for the shape moduli. The potential has the right form and order of
magnitude to account for the present day cosmic acceleration, in a way
analogous to models of quintessence as a pseudo Nambu-Goldstone boson.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figur
A Planck-scale axion and SU(2) Yang-Mills dynamics: Present acceleration and the fate of the photon
From the time of CMB decoupling onwards we investigate cosmological evolution
subject to a strongly interacting SU(2) gauge theory of Yang-Mills scale
eV (masquerading as the factor of the SM at
present). The viability of this postulate is discussed in view of cosmological
and (astro)particle physics bounds. The gauge theory is coupled to a spatially
homogeneous and ultra-light (Planck-scale) axion field. As first pointed out by
Frieman et al., such an axion is a viable candidate for quintessence, i.e.
dynamical dark energy, being associated with today's cosmological acceleration.
A prediction of an upper limit for the duration of the
epoch stretching from the present to the point where the photon starts to be
Meissner massive is obtained: billion years.Comment: v3: consequences of an error in evolution equation for coupling
rectified, only a minimal change in physics results, two refs. adde
Synthesis of organic inorganic hybrids based on the conjugated polymer P3HT and mesoporous silicon
Organic inorganic hybrids are a class of functional materials that combine favorable properties of their constituents to achieve an overall improved performance for a wide range of applications. This article presents the synthesis route for P3HT porous silicon hybrids for thermoelectric applications. The conjugated polymer P3HT is incorporated into the porous silicon matrix by means of melt infiltration. Gravimetry, sorption isotherms and energy dispersive X ray spectroscopy EDX mapping indicate that the organic molecules occupy more than 50 of the void space in the inorganic host. We demonstrate that subsequent diffusion based doping of the confined polymer in a FeCl3 solution increases the electrical conductivity of the hybrid by five orders of magnitude compared to the empty porous silicon hos
Anisotropic optical response of the diamond (111)-2x1 surface
The optical properties of the 21 reconstruction of the diamond (111)
surface are investigated. The electronic structure and optical properties of
the surface are studied using a microscopic tight-binding approach. We
calculate the dielectric response describing the surface region and investigate
the origin of the electronic transitions involving surface and bulk states. A
large anisotropy in the surface dielectric response appears as a consequence of
the asymmetric reconstruction on the surface plane, which gives rise to the
zigzag Pandey chains. The results are presented in terms of the reflectance
anisotropy and electron energy loss spectra. While our results are in good
agreement with available experimental data, additional experiments are proposed
in order to unambiguously determine the surface electronic structure of this
interesting surface.Comment: REVTEX manuscript with 6 postscript figures, all included in uu file.
Also available at http://www.phy.ohiou.edu/~ulloa/ulloa.html Submitted to
Phys. Rev.
The Featureless HST/WFC3 Transmission Spectrum of the Rocky Exoplanet GJ 1132b:No Evidence for a Cloud-free Primordial Atmosphere and Constraints on Starspot Contamination
Image labeling and grouping by minimizing linear functionals over cones
We consider energy minimization problems related to image labeling, partitioning, and grouping, which typically show up at mid-level stages of computer vision systems. A common feature of these problems is their intrinsic combinatorial complexity from an optimization pointof-view. Rather than trying to compute the global minimum - a goal we consider as elusive in these cases - we wish to design optimization approaches which exhibit two relevant properties: First, in each application a solution with guaranteed degree of suboptimality can be computed. Secondly, the computations are based on clearly defined algorithms which do not comprise any (hidden) tuning parameters. In this paper, we focus on the second property and introduce a novel and general optimization technique to the field of computer vision which amounts to compute a sub optimal solution by just solving a convex optimization problem. As representative examples, we consider two binary quadratic energy functionals related to image labeling and perceptual grouping. Both problems can be considered as instances of a general quadratic functional in binary variables, which is embedded into a higher-dimensional space such that sub optimal solutions can be computed as minima of linear functionals over cones in that space (semidefinite programs). Extensive numerical results reveal that, on the average, sub optimal solutions can be computed which yield a gap below 5% with respect to the global optimum in case where this is known
Active Amplification of the Terrestrial Albedo to Mitigate Climate Change: An Exploratory Study
This study explores the potential to enhance the reflectance of solar
insolation by the human settlement and grassland components of the Earth's
terrestrial surface as a climate change mitigation measure. Preliminary
estimates derived using a static radiative transfer model indicate that such
efforts could amplify the planetary albedo enough to offset the current global
annual average level of radiative forcing caused by anthropogenic greenhouse
gases by as much as 30 percent or 0.76 W/m2. Terrestrial albedo amplification
may thus extend, by about 25 years, the time available to advance the
development and use of low-emission energy conversion technologies which
ultimately remain essential to mitigate long-term climate change. However,
additional study is needed to confirm the estimates reported here and to assess
the economic and environmental impacts of active land-surface albedo
amplification as a climate change mitigation measure.Comment: 21 pages, 3 figures. In press with Mitigation and Adaptation
Strategies for Global Change, Springer, N
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