Nematic Fermi Fluids in Condensed Matter Physics

Correlated electron fluids can exhibit a startling array of complex phases, among which one of the more surprising is the electron nematic, a translationally invariant metallic phase with a spontaneously generated spatial anisotropy. Classical nematics generally occur in liquids of rod-like molecules; given that electrons are point-like, the initial theoretical motivation for contemplating electron nematics came from thinking of the electron fluid as a quantum melted electron crystal, rather than a strongly interacting descendent of a Fermi gas. That such phases exist in nature was established by dramatic transport experiments in ultra-clean quantum Hall systems in 1999 and in Sr3Ru2O7 in a strong magnetic field in 2007. In this paper, we briefly review the theoretical considerations governing nematic order, summarize the quantum Hall and Sr3Ru2O7 experiments that unambiguously establish the existence of this phase, and survey some of the current evidence for such a phase in the cuprate and Fe-based high temperature superconductors.Comment: 30 pages, 7 figures (some in color); to appear in Annual Reviews of Condensed Matter Physics. Edited version

Synthesis of a Series of Diaminoindoles

[Image: see text] A selection of 3,4-diaminoindoles were required for a recent drug discovery project. To this end, a 10-step synthesis was developed from 4-nitroindole. This synthesis was subsequently adapted and used to synthesize 3,5-; 3,6-; and 3,7-diaminoindoles from the corresponding 5-, 6-, or 7-nitroindole. These novel intermediates feature orthogonal protecting groups that allow them to be further diversified. This is the first reported synthesis of these types of compounds

Large Differences in Small RNA Composition Between Human Biofluids.

Extracellular microRNAs (miRNAs) and other small RNAs are implicated in cellular communication and may be useful as disease biomarkers. We systematically compared small RNAs in 12 human biofluid types using RNA sequencing (RNA-seq). miRNAs and tRNA-derived RNAs (tDRs) accounted for the majority of mapped reads in all biofluids, but the ratio of miRNA to tDR reads varied from 72 in plasma to 0.004 in bile. miRNA levels were highly correlated across all biofluids, but levels of some miRNAs differed markedly between biofluids. tDR populations differed extensively between biofluids. Y RNA fragments were seen in all biofluids and accounted for >10% of reads in blood plasma, serum, and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). Reads mapping exclusively to Piwi-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) were very rare, except in seminal plasma. These results demonstrate extensive differences in small RNAs between human biofluids and provide a useful resource for investigating extracellular RNA biology and developing biomarkers

Variation in morpho‑physiological and metabolic responses to low nitrogen stress across the sorghum association panel

Background: Access to biologically available nitrogen is a key constraint on plant growth in both natural and agricultural settings. Variation in tolerance to nitrogen deficit stress and productivity in nitrogen limited conditions exists both within and between plant species. However, our understanding of changes in different phenotypes under long term low nitrogen stress and their impact on important agronomic traits, such as yield, is still limited. Results: Here we quantified variation in the metabolic, physiological, and morphological responses of a sorghum association panel assembled to represent global genetic diversity to long term, nitrogen deficit stress and the relationship of these responses to grain yield under both conditions. Grain yield exhibits substantial genotype by environment interaction while many other morphological and physiological traits exhibited consistent responses to nitrogen stress across the population. Large scale nontargeted metabolic profiling for a subset of lines in both conditions identified a range of metabolic responses to long term nitrogen deficit stress. Several metabolites were associated with yield under high and low nitrogen conditions. Conclusion: Our results highlight that grain yield in sorghum, unlike many morpho-physiological traits, exhibits substantial variability of genotype specific responses to long term low severity nitrogen deficit stress. Metabolic response to long term nitrogen stress shown higher proportion of variability explained by genotype specific responses than did morpho-pysiological traits and several metabolites were correlated with yield. This suggest, that it might be possible to build predictive models using metabolite abundance to estimate which sorghum genotypes will exhibit greater or lesser decreases in yield in response to nitrogen deficit, however further research needs to be done to evaluate such model

Differences in chronic conditions and lifestyle behaviour between people with a history of cancer and matched controls

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether people with a history of cancer have a higher prevalence of chronic conditions or different lifestyle behaviour compared with controls.  DESIGN, SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: Cross-sectional, self-reported data from a telephone survey conducted between 1 January 2010 and 31 March 2012 of adult residents of South Australia who self-reported a previous cancer diagnosis (cases) and randomly selected age- and sex-matched residents with no cancer diagnosis (controls).  MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Self-reported medically diagnosed cardiovascular disease, hypertension, hyperlipidaemia, diabetes and osteoporosis; lifestyle behaviour (smoking, physical activity and diet); body mass index (BMI); psychological distress and self-reported health.  RESULTS: A total of 2103 cases and 4185 controls were included in the analyses. For men, after adjusting for age, cancer survivors were more likely than controls to have ever had cardiovascular disease (P<0.001), high blood pressure (P=0.001), high cholesterol (P<0.001) and diabetes (P=0.04). These associations remained significant after controlling for socioeconomic status (SES), with the exception of high blood pressure (P=0.09). For women, there was an increased prevalence of high cholesterol (P=0.005), diabetes (P=0.02) and osteoporosis (P=0.005) in cancer cases, but after adjusting for SES, these associations were no longer significant. Women with a previous cancer diagnosis were more likely than controls to have ever smoked, after adjusting for SES (P=0.001). There were no other differences in lifestyle behaviour or BMI between cases and controls for men or women.  CONCLUSION: Despite similar lifestyle habits and BMI, the prevalence of chronic conditions was significantly higher among people with a history of cancer than among controls without cancer. This supports the importance of chronic disease management as part of health care after a diagnosis of cancer

Law, politics and the governance of English and Scottish joint-stock companies 1600-1850

This article examines the impact of law on corporate governance by means of a case study of joint-stock enterprise in England and Scotland before 1850. Based on a dataset of over 450 company constitutions together with qualitative information on governance practice, it finds little evidence to support the hypothesis that common-law regimes such as England were more supportive of economic growth than civil-law jurisdictions such as Scotland: indeed, levels of shareholder protection were slightly stronger in the civil-law zone. Other factors, such as local political institutions, played a bigger role in shaping organisational forms and business practice

3D reconstruction identifies loci linked to variation in angle of individual sorghum leaves

Selection for yield at high planting density has reshaped the leaf canopy of maize, improving photosynthetic productivity in high density settings. Further optimization of canopy architecture may be possible. However, measuring leaf angles, the widely studied component trait of leaf canopy architecture, by hand is a labor and time intensive process. Here, we use multiple, calibrated, 2D images to reconstruct the 3D geometry of individual sorghum plants using a voxel carving based algorithm. Automatic skeletonization and segmentation of these 3D geometries enable quan- tification of the angle of each leaf for each plant. The resulting measurements are both heritable and correlated with manually collected leaf angles. This automated and scaleable reconstruction approach was employed to measure leaf-by-leaf angles for a population of 366 sorghum plants at multiple time points, resulting in 971 successful reconstructions and 3,376 leaf angle measurements from individual leaves. A genome wide association study conducted using aggregated leaf angle data identified a known large effect leaf angle gene, several previously identified leaf angle QTL from a sorghum NAM population, and novel signals. Genome wide association studies conducted separately for three individual sorghum leaves identified a number of the same signals, a previously unreported signal shared across multiple leaves, and signals near the sorghum orthologs of two maize genes known to influence leaf angle. Automated measurement of individual leaves and mapping variants associated with leaf angle reduce the barriers to engineering ideal canopy architectures in sorghum and other grain crops

An 11.5 W Yb:YAG planar waveguide laser fabricated via pulsed laser deposition

We present details of the homo-epitaxial growth of Yb:YAG onto a &lt;100&gt; oriented YAG substrate by pulsed laser deposition. Material characterization and initial laser experiments are also reported, including the demonstration of laser action from the 15 µm-thick planar waveguide generating 11.5 W of output power with a slope efficiency of 48%. This work indicates that under appropriate conditions, high-quality single-crystal Yb:YAG growth via pulsed laser deposition is achievable with characteristics comparable to those obtained via conventional crystal growth techniques

Investigating the Effect of an Oxytetracycline Treatment on the Gut Microbiome and Antimicrobial Resistance Gene Dynamics in Nile Tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus)

Antibiotics play a vital role in aquaculture where they are commonly used to treat bacterial diseases. However, the impact of antibiotic treatment on the gut microbiome and the development of antimicrobial resistance in Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) over time remains to be fully understood. In this study, fish were fed a single treatment of oxytetracycline (100 mg/kg/day) for eight days, followed by a 14-day withdrawal period. Changes in the distal gut microbiome were measured using 16S rRNA sequencing. In addition, the abundance of antimicrobial resistance genes was quantified using real-time qPCR methods. Overall, the gut microbiome community diversity and structure of Nile tilapia was resilient to oxytetracycline treatment. However, antibiotic treatment was associated with an enrichment in Plesiomonas, accompanied by a decline in other bacteria taxa. Oxytetracycline treatment increased the proportion of tetA in the distal gut of fish and tank biofilms of the treated group. Furthermore, the abundance of tetA along with other tetracycline resistance genes was strongly correlated with a number of microbiome members, including Plesiomonas. The findings from this study demonstrate that antibiotic treatment can exert selective pressures on the gut microbiome of fish in favour of resistant populations, which may have long-term impacts on fish health