Local volume fraction distributions of axons, astrocytes, and myelin in deep subcortical white matter

This study aims to statistically describe histologically stained white matter brain sections to subsequently inform and validate diffusion MRI techniques. For the first time, we characterise volume fraction distributions of three of the main structures in deep subcortical white matter (axons, astrocytes, and myelinated axons) in a representative cohort of an ageing population for which well-characterized neuropathology data is available. We analysed a set of samples from 90 subjects of the Cognitive Function and Ageing Study (CFAS), stratified into three groups of 30 subjects each, in relation to the presence of age-associated deep subcortical lesions. This provides volume fraction distributions in different scenarios relevant to brain diffusion MRI in dementia. We also assess statistically significant differences found between these groups. In agreement with previous literature, our results indicate that white matter lesions are related with a decrease in the myelinated axons fraction and an increase in astrocytic fraction, while no statistically significant changes occur in axonal mean fraction. In addition, we introduced a framework to quantify volume fraction distributions from 2D immunohistochemistry images, which is validated against in silico simulations. Since a trade-off between precision and resolution emerged, we also performed an assessment of the optimal scale for computing such distributions

The relation of the concentration of macronutrients in the substrate and in the foliage to cell wall thickness and cellulose concentration in the xylem of slash pine (Pinus elliotti)

Sand culture experiments, using a sub-irrigation technique, were installed in order to find out the effects of the macronutrients N, P, K, Ca, Mg and S on growth, aspect, mineral composition, length of fibers, thickness of cell wall and cellulose concentration in slash pine. The aim was to obtain, under controlled conditions, basic information which could eventually lead to practical means designed to increase the rate of growth and to make of slash pine a richer source of cellulose. Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium Experiment A 3 x 3 x 3 factorial design with two replicates was used. Nitrogen was supplied initially at the levels of 25, 50 and 100 ppm; phosphorus was given at the rates of 5, 10 and 20 ppm; potassium was supplied at the rates of 25, 50 and 100 ppm; six months after the experiment was started the first level for each element was dropped to zero. Others macro and all micronutrients were supplied at uniform rates. Fifteen hours of illumination per day were provided. The experimental technique for growing the slash pine seedlings proved quite satisfactory. Symptoms of deficiency of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium were observed, described and recorded in photographs and water colors. These informations will help to identify abnormalities which may appear under field conditions. Chemical analysis of the several plant parts, on the other hand, give a valuable means to assess the nutritional status of slash pine, thus confirming when needed, the visual diagnosis. The correctness of manurial pratices, on the other hand, can be judged with the help of the analytical data tabulated. Under the experimental conditions nitrogen caused the highest increases on growth, as measured by increments in height and dry weights, whereas the effects of phosphorus and potassium were less marked. Cellulose concentration was not significantly affected by the treatments used. Higher levels of N seemed to decrease both length of fiber elements and the thickness of cell wall. The effects of P and K were not well defined. Calcium, Magnesium, Sulfur Experiment A 3 x 3 x 3 factorial design with two replicates was used. Calcium was supplied initially at the levels of 12.5, 25 and 50 ppm; magnesium and sulfur were given at the rates of 6, 12.5 and 25 ppm. Other macro and micronutrients were supplied at uniform rates, common to all treatments. Three months after starting the experiment the first level for each element was dropped to zero. Symptoms of deficiency of calcium, magnesium and sulfur were observed, described and recorded as in the case of the previous experiment. Chemical analysis were made, both for mineral content and cellulose concentration. Length of fibers and thickness of cell wall were measured. Both calcium and magnesium increase height, sulfur failing to give significant response. Dry weight was beneficially affected by calcium and sulfur. The levels of calcium, magnesium and sulfur in the needles associated with deficiency and maximum growth are comparable with those found in the literature. Cellulose concentration increased when the level of sulfur in the substrate was raised. The thickness of cell wall was negatively affected by the treatments; no effect was observed with regards to length of fibers.Foram conduzidos experimentos fatoriais cultivando P. elliottii em solução nutritiva destinados a estudar o efeito de macronutrientes na composição mineral, grossura da parede celular e concentração da celulose no xilema. Os sintomas de deficiencia dos elementos foram descri tos e registrados. O crescimento foi estimulado por N, P, K, Ca e Mg, sendo a maior resposta devida ao N. Somente o enxofre aumentou significativamente o teor de celulose. A grossura da parede celular diminuiu com altos níveis de N, Ca, Mg e S; os primeiros diminuiram o comprimento das fibras

MOCAT2: a metagenomic assembly, annotation and profiling framework

MOCAT2 is a software pipeline for metagenomic sequence assembly and gene prediction with novel features for taxonomic and functional abundance profiling. The automated generation and efficient annotation of non-redundant reference catalogs by propagating pre-computed assignments from 18 databases covering various functional categories allows for fast and comprehensive functional characterization of metagenomes. Availability and Implementation: MOCAT2 is implemented in Perl 5 and Python 2.7, designed for 64-bit UNIX systems and offers support for high-performance computer usage via LSF, PBS or SGE queuing systems; source code is freely available under the GPL3 license at http://mocat.embl.de. Contact: [email protected]

VINHOS QUE PENSAM - parte I/III GESTÃO DO VIGOR VEGETATIVO DA VINHA A PARTIR DE SENSORES ATIVOS MUTIESPECTRAIS PRÓXIMOS

Costumo dizer que o projeto “Vinhos que pensam” nasceu de um aperto de mão entre a equipa de Agricultura de Precisão da Universidade de Évora e a Fundação Eugénio de Almeida, nasceu sem financiamento próprio mas com uma visão muito clara de criar valor social na área da vitivinicultura Alentejana. Passados 6 anos, julgamos que o conhecimento produzido é relevante para a atividade e gestão vitivinícola Alentejana, no entanto, novas perguntas surgem todos os anos e dessa forma somos alimentados na motivação de prosseguir com este projeto, ao qual, outras entidades e vontades se vão agora também associando. A Agrobótica, muito recentemente, desafiou-nos a apresentar os resultados mais relevantes do projeto “Vinhos que pensam” e com o maior prazer lhe dissemos que sim, no entanto, colocou-se-nos um problema, os resultados mais relevantes, muito dificilmente caberiam num único artigo, como tal, decidimos dividir tais resultados em três artigos, este primeiro mais virado para os aspetos da gestão do vigor da vegetação da vinha; o segundo mais virado para os sensores geoelétricos do solo e sua aplicação na gestão e estudo do solo; e por fim, um terceiro mais virado para aspetos da nutrição das plantas considerando a interação solo/planta e a utilização dos sensores multiespectrais

VINHOS QUE PENSAM - parte II/III UTILIZAÇÃO DA CONDUTIVIDADE ELÉTRICA APARENTE DO SOLO NA INSTALAÇÃO E GESTÃO DAS CULTURAS: EXEMPLIFICAÇÃO NA VINHA

o principal objetivo deste trabalho passou por verificar: • a relação entre a CEa do solo e os indicadores de textura; • se a CEa do solo poderá ser um parâmetro importante na instalação e gestão de parcelas de vinha ou outro tipo de culturas

Multi-objective energy storage power dispatching using plug-in vehicles in a smart-microgrid

This paper describes a multi-objective power dispatching problem that uses Plug-in Electric Vehicle (PEV) as storage units. We formulate the energy storage planning as a Mixed-Integer Linear Programming (MILP) problem, respecting PEV requirements, minimizing three different objectives and analyzing three different criteria. Two novel cost-to-variability indicators, based on Sharpe Ratio, are introduced for analyzing the volatility of the energy storage schedules. By adding these additional criteria, energy storage planning is optimized seeking to minimize the following: total Microgrid (MG) costs; PEVs batteries usage; maximum peak load; difference between extreme scenarios and two Sharpe Ratio indices. Different scenarios are considered, which are generated with the use of probabilistic forecasting, since prediction involves inherent uncertainty. Energy storage planning scenarios are scheduled according to information provided by lower and upper bounds extracted from probabilistic forecasts. A MicroGrid (MG) scenario composed of two renewable energy resources, a wind energy turbine and photovoltaic cells, a residential MG user and different PEVs is analyzed. Candidate non-dominated solutions are searched from the pool of feasible solutions obtained during different Branch and Bound optimizations. Pareto fronts are discussed and analyzed for different energy storage scenarios. Perhaps the most important conclusion from this study is that schedules that minimize the total system cost may increase maximum peak load and its volatility over different possible scenarios, therefore may be less robust

dc-Hydrogen plasma induced defects in bulk n-Ge

Bulk antimony doped germanium (n-Ge) has been exposed to a dc-hydrogen plasma. Capacitance-voltage depth profiles revealed extensive near surface passivation of the shallow donors as evidenced by ˜ a 1.5 orders of magnitude reduction in the free carrier concentration up to depth of ˜ 3.2 µm. DLTS and Laplace-DLTS revealed a prominent electron trap 0.30 eV below the conduction (Ec-0.30 eV). The concentration of this trap increased with plasma exposure time. The depth profile for this defect suggested a uniform distribution up to 1.2 µm. Annealing studies show that this trap, attributed to a hydrogen-related complex, is stable up to 200 °C. Hole traps, or vacancy-antimony centers, common in this material after high energy particle irradiation, were not observed after plasma exposure, an indication that this process does not create Frenkel (V-I) pairs.The South African Research Chair’s Initiative of the Department of Science and Technology, National Research Foundation, as well as by the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU).http://www.elsevier.com/locate/phys

Field dependence of the E1' and M3' electron traps in inductively coupled Ar plasma treated n-Gallium Arsenide

Inductively coupled Ar plasma etching of n-type (Si doped) Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) introduces several electron traps, Ec – 0.04 eV (labelled E10), Ec – 0.19 eV, Ec – 0.31 eV, Ec – 0.53 eV, and Ec – 0.61 eV (behaving like the well documented M3 and labelled M30 in this study), of which the metastable defects Ec – 0.04eV (E10 ), and Ec – 0.07 eV are novel. Furthermore, E10 and M30 exhibit strong field enhanced carrier emission. Double-correlation deep level transient spectroscopy was used to investigate the field dependent emission behaviour of these two defects. It is shown that for both traps, the observed enhanced emission is due to phonon assisted tunnelling. The latter observation is contrary to the literature reports suggesting that enhanced carrier emission for M3 occurs via the Poole-Frenkel mechanism.http://jap.aip.org/nf201

Fauna de flebotomíneos (Diptera: Psychodidae: Phlebotominae) em terra firme e planície fluvial na área de influência do gasoduto Coari-Manaus, Amazonas, Brasil

The object of this work was to make a preliminary survey of the entomofauna sandflies in the areas under the influence of the Coari-Manaus (AM) gas pipeline. The collections were made from 4 to 8 August 2003, in five of the seven municipal districts under the influence of the gas pipeline, using light traps of the type CDC. We captured 205 individuals, distributed in 25 species, belonging to eight subgenera (151 - 73.7%) and four groups (54 - 26.3%). The Lutzomyia umbratilis was the most numerous species found (43 - 21.0%). The species Lutzomyia preclara, collected in the municipal districts of Caapiranga and Manacupuru, was registered for the first time in the state of Amazonas, and the second time in Brasil.Este trabalho teve como objetivo realizar um levantamento preliminar da entomofauna de flebotomíneos nas áreas de influência do gasoduto Coari-Manaus (AM). As coletas foram realizadas no período de 4 a 8 de agosto (2003), em cinco dos sete municípios da área de influência do gasoduto, utilizando-se de armadilhas de luz do tipo CDC. Foram capturados 205 indivíduos, distribuídos em 25 espécies, pertencentes a oito subgêneros (151 - 73,7%) e quatro grupos (54 - 26,3%). A espécie Lutzomyia umbratilis foi a mais numerosa encontrando-se 21,0% (43) do total coletado. Nestas coletas foi registrada pela primeira vez no Amazonas e segunda no Brasil a espécie Lutzomyia preclara, coletada nos municípios de Caapiranga e Manacapuru