Self-assembly of phosphate fluorosurfactants in carbon dioxide

Anionic phosphodiester surfactants, possessing either two fluorinated chains (F/F) or one hydrocarbon chain and one fluorinated chain (H/F), were synthesized and evaluated for solubility and self-assembly in liquid and supercritical carbon dioxide. Several surfactants, of both F/F and EUF types and having varied counterions, were found to be capable of solubilizing water-in-CO2 (W/C), via the formation of microemulsions, expanding upon the family of phosphate fluorosurfactants already found to stabilize W/C microemulsions. Small-angle neutron scattering was used to directly characterize the microemulsion particles at varied temperatures, pressures, and water loadings, revealing behavior consistent with previous results on W/C microemulsions

Осаждение покрытий из хрома и никеля с помощью магнетронного диода с «горячей» мишенью

В настоящей работе представлены результаты исследования свойств покрытий из хрома и никеля от режимов распыления "горячей" металлической мишени в плазме магнетронной распылительной системы.This work reports on the dependence of properties of Cr and Ni coatings on operation parameters of magnetron sputtering system with hot target

Neuroscience, Ethics, and National Security: The State of the Art

Military involvement and research in neuroscience generates unique ethical, legal, and social issues that require careful elucidation and consideration in order to align the potentially conflicting needs of national defense, public interest, and scientific progress

24-h sheltering behaviour of individually kept horses during Swedish summer weather

Provision of shelter for horses kept on summer pasture is rarely considered in welfare guidelines, perhaps because the benefits of shelter in warm conditions are poorly documented scientifically. For cattle, shade is a valued resource during summer and can mitigate the adverse effects of warm weather on well-being and performance. We found in a previous study that horses utilized shelters frequently in summer. A shelter with a roof and closed on three sides (shelter A) was preferred and can reduce insect pressure whereas a shelter with roof and open on three sides was not utilized. However, shelter A restricts the all-round view of a horse, which may be important for horses as flight animals. Therefore, we studied whether a shelter with roof, where only the upper half of the rear wall was closed (shelter B), would be utilized while maintaining insect protection properties and satisfying the horses’ sense for security. A third shelter was offered with walls but no roof (shelter C) to evaluate whether the roof itself is an important feature from the horse’s perspective. Eight Warmblood horses were tested each for 2 days, kept individually for 24 h in two paddocks with access to shelters A and B, or shelters A and C, respectively. Shelter use was recorded continuously during the night (1800–2400 h, 0200–0600 h) and the following day (0900–1600 h), and insect defensive behaviour (e.g., tail swish) in instantaneous scan samples at 5-min intervals during daytime

A first genome assembly of the barley fungal pathogen Pyrenophora teres f. teres

Background: Pyrenophora teres f. teres is a necrotrophic fungal pathogen and the cause of one of barley’s most important diseases, net form of net blotch. Here we report the first genome assembly for this species based solely on short Solexa sequencing reads of isolate 0-1. The assembly was validated by comparison to BAC sequences, ESTs, orthologous genes and by PCR, and complemented by cytogenetic karyotyping and the first genome-wide genetic map for P. teres f. teres. Results: The total assembly was 41.95 Mbp and contains 11,799 gene models of 50 amino acids or more. Comparison against two sequenced BACs showed that complex regions with a high GC content assembled effectively. Electrophoretic karyotyping showed distinct chromosomal polymorphisms between isolates 0-1 and 15A, and cytological karyotyping confirmed the presence of at least nine chromosomes. The genetic map spans 2477.7 cM and is composed of 243 markers in 25 linkage groups, and incorporates SSR markers developed from the assembly. Among predicted genes, non-ribosomal peptide synthetases and efflux pumps in particular appear to have undergone a P. teres f. teres-specific expansion of non-orthologous gene families. Conclusions: This study demonstrates that paired-end Solexa sequencing can successfully capture coding regions of a filamentous fungal genome. The assembly contains a plethora of predicted genes that have been implicated in a necrotrophic lifestyle and pathogenicity and presents a significant resource for examining the bases for P. teres f. teres pathogenicity

Density of ff-ideals and ff-ideals in mixed small degrees

A squarefree monomial ideal is called an $f$-ideal if its Stanley–Reisner and facet simplicial complexes have the same $f$-vector. We show that $f$-ideals generated in a fixed degree have asymptotic density zero when the number of variables goes to infinity. We also provide novel algorithms to construct $f$-ideals generated in small degrees

Mammalian target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) Is required for mouse spermatogonial differentiation in vivo

AbstractSpermatogonial stem cells (SSCs) must balance self-renewal with production of transit-amplifying progenitors that differentiate in response to retinoic acid (RA) before entering meiosis. This self-renewal vs. differentiation spermatogonial fate decision is critical for maintaining tissue homeostasis, as imbalances cause spermatogenesis defects that can lead to human testicular cancer or infertility. A great deal of effort has been exerted to understand how the SSC population is maintained. In contrast, little is known about the essential program of differentiation initiated by retinoic acid (RA) that precedes meiosis, and the pathways and proteins involved are poorly defined. We recently reported a novel role for RA in stimulating the PI3/AKT/mTOR kinase signaling pathway to activate translation of repressed mRNAs such as Kit. Here, we examined the requirement for mTOR complex 1 (mTORC1) in mediating the RA signal to direct spermatogonial differentiation in the neonatal testis. We found that in vivo inhibition of mTORC1 by rapamycin blocked spermatogonial differentiation, which led to an accumulation of undifferentiated spermatogonia. In addition, rapamycin also blocked the RA-induced translational activation of mRNAs encoding KIT, SOHLH1, and SOHLH2 without affecting expression of STRA8. These findings highlight dual roles for RA in germ cell development – transcriptional activation of genes, and kinase signaling to stimulate translation of repressed messages required for spermatogonial differentiation

Site-specific N-terminus conjugation of poly(mPEG(1100)) methacrylates to salmon calcitonin : synthesis and preliminary biological evaluation

Recent advances in polymerization strategies have led to the development of novel polymer (poly) peptide biohybrid materials with potential application in the field of macromolecular therapeutics. In this current work, comb-shaped alpha-aldehyde poly(monomethoxy polyethylene glycol)methacrylates (p(mPEG)MA) with molecular masses in the 6.5-109 kDa range were prepared and conjugated, via reductive amination, to the Cys1 N-terminus of salmon calcitonin (sCT), a calcitropic hormone currently administered for the treatment of a number of hypercalcaemia-related diseases. The conjugation site was determined by tryptic digestion of the sCT-p(mPEG(1100)) MA biohybrids in conjunction with LC-MS MALDI-TOF spectrometry. Preliminary in vitro biological tests show that the polymer conjugation does not interfere with the biological activity of the sCT