914 research outputs found
What factors determine placental glucose transfer kinetics?
Introduction: transfer of glucose across the human placenta is directly proportional to maternal glucose concentrations even when these are well above the physiological range. This study investigates the relationship between maternal and fetal glucose concentrations and transfer across the placenta.Methods: transfer of d-glucose, 3H-3-o-methyl-d-glucose (3H-3MG) and 14C-l-glucose across the isolated perfused human placental cotyledon was determined for maternal and fetal arterial d-glucose concentrations between 0 and 20 mmol/l.Results: clearance of 3H-3MG or 14C-l-glucose was not affected by maternal or fetal d-glucose concentrations in either circulation.Discussion: based on the arterial glucose concentrations and the reported KM for GLUT1, the transfer of d-glucose and 3H-3MG would be expected to show signs of saturation as d-glucose concentrations increased but this did not occur. One explanation for this is that incomplete mixing of maternal blood and the rate of diffusion across unstirred layers may lower the effective concentration of glucose at the microvillous membrane and subsequently at the basal membrane. Uncertainties about the affinity of GLUT1 for glucose, both outside and inside the cell, may also contribute to the difference between the predicted and observed kinetics.Conclusion: these factors may therefore help explain why the observed and predicted kinetics differ and they emphasise the importance of understanding the function of transport proteins in their physiological context. The development of a computational model of glucose transfer may improve our understanding of how the determinants of placental glucose transfer interact and function as a syste
Mid-Miocene cooling and the extinction of tundra in continental Antarctica
A major obstacle in understanding the evolution of Cenozoic climate has been the lack of well dated terrestrial evidence from high-latitude, glaciated regions. Here, we report the discovery of exceptionally well preserved fossils of lacustrine and terrestrial organisms from the McMurdo Dry Valleys sector of the Transantarctic Mountains for which we have established a precise radiometric chronology. The fossils, which include diatoms, palynomorphs, mosses, ostracodes, and insects, represent the last vestige of a tundra community that inhabited the mountains before stepped cooling that first brought a full polar climate to Antarctica. Paleoecological analyses, 40Ar/39Ar analyses of associated ash fall, and climate inferences from glaciological modeling together suggest that mean summer temperatures in the region cooled by at least 8°C between 14.07 ± 0.05 Ma and 13.85 ± 0.03 Ma. These results provide novel constraints for the timing and amplitude of middle-Miocene cooling in Antarctica and reveal the ecological legacy of this global climate transition
A hybrid GA–PS–SQP method to solve power system valve-point economic dispatch problems
Competition between quantum-liquid and electron-solid phases in intermediate Landau levels
On the basis of energy calculations we investigate the competition between
quantum-liquid and electron-solid phases in the Landau levels n=1,2, and 3 as a
function of their partial filling factor. Whereas the quantum-liquid phases are
stable only in the vicinity of quantized values 1/(2s+1) of the partial filling
factor, an electron solid in the form of a triangular lattice of clusters with
a few number of electrons (bubble phase) is energetically favorable between
these fillings. This alternation of electron-solid phases, which are insulating
because they are pinned by the residual impurities in the sample, and quantum
liquids displaying the fractional quantum Hall effect explains a recently
observed reentrance of the integral quantum Hall effect in the Landau levels
n=1 and 2. Around half-filling of the last Landau level, a uni-directional
charge density wave (stripe phase) has a lower energy than the bubble phase.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figures; calculation of exact exchange potential for
n=1,2,3 included, energies of electron-solid phases now calculated with the
help of the exact potential, and discussion of approximation include
Quadratic forms of dimension 8 with trivial discrimiand and Clifford algebra of index 4
Izhboldin and Karpenko proved in 2000 that any quadratic form of dimension 8
with trivial discriminant and Clifford algebra of index 4 is isometric to the
transfer, with respect to some quadratic \'etale extension, of a quadratic form
similar to a 2-fold Pfister form. We give a new proof of this result, based on
a theorem of decomposability for degree 8 and index 4 algebras with orthogonal
involution
Heritable risk factors associated with language impairments
There is a strong genetic contribution to children’s language and literacy impairments. The aim of this study was to determine which aspects of the phenotype are familial by comparing 34 parents of probands with language/literacy impairments and 33 parents of typically developing probands. The parents responded to questionnaires regarding previous history for language/reading impairment and participated in psychometric testing. The psychometric test battery consisted of tests assessing non-verbal IQ, short-term memory, articulation, receptive grammar, reading abilities and spelling. Self-report measures demonstrated a higher prevalence of language and literacy impairments in parents of affected probands (32%) compared with parents of unaffected probands (6%). The two groups of parents differed significantly in their performance on the non-word repetition, oromotor and digit span tasks. Non-word repetition gave the best discrimination between the parent groups even when the data from the parents who actually were impaired as ascertained by direct testing or self-report were removed from the analyses. This suggests that non-word repetition serves as a marker of a family risk for language impairment. The paper concludes with a discussion of issues associated with ascertainment of specific language impairment (SLI)
Canonical quantization of so-called non-Lagrangian systems
We present an approach to the canonical quantization of systems with
equations of motion that are historically called non-Lagrangian equations. Our
viewpoint of this problem is the following: despite the fact that a set of
differential equations cannot be directly identified with a set of
Euler-Lagrange equations, one can reformulate such a set in an equivalent
first-order form which can always be treated as the Euler-Lagrange equations of
a certain action. We construct such an action explicitly. It turns out that in
the general case the hamiltonization and canonical quantization of such an
action are non-trivial problems, since the theory involves time-dependent
constraints. We adopt the general approach of hamiltonization and canonical
quantization for such theories (Gitman, Tyutin, 1990) to the case under
consideration. There exists an ambiguity (not reduced to a total time
derivative) in associating a Lagrange function with a given set of equations.
We present a complete description of this ambiguity. The proposed scheme is
applied to the quantization of a general quadratic theory. In addition, we
consider the quantization of a damped oscillator and of a radiating point-like
charge.Comment: 13 page
Application of pattern search method to power system valve-point economic load dispatch
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