Direct observation of molecular cooperativity near the glass transition

We describe direct observations of molecular cooperativity near the glass transition in poly-vinyl-acetate (PVAc), through nanometer-scale probing of dielectric fluctuations. Molecular clusters switched spontaneously between two to four distinct configurations, producing complex random-telegraph-signals (RTS). Analysis of the RTS and their power spectra shows that individual clusters exhibit both transient dynamical heterogeneity and non-exponential kinetics.Comment: 14 pages pdf, need Acrobat Reade

The influence of providing perches and string on activity levels, fearfulness and leg health in commercial broiler chickens

The aim of this study was to assess the effect of providing environmental enrichment in the form of perches and string on the behaviour and welfare of commercial broiler chickens. Houses containing ~23 000 broiler chickens were assigned to one of four treatments in a 2×2 factorial design. Treatments involved two levels of access to perches (P) (present (24/house) ‘+P’ or absent ‘−P’) and two levels of access to string (S) (present (24/house) ‘+S’ or absent ‘−S’). All houses contained windows, and 30 straw bales were provided from day 10 of the rearing cycle. Treatments were applied in one of four houses on a single farm, and were replicated over four production cycles. Behaviour and leg health were observed in weeks 3 to 5 of the rearing cycle. Production performance and environmental parameters were also measured. There was an interaction between perches and age in the percentage of birds observed lying, with higher percentages of birds observed lying in the +P treatment than in the −P treatment during weeks 4 and 5. There was also a significant interaction between string and age in the percentage of birds observed in locomotion, with higher percentages observed in locomotion in the −S treatment than in the +S treatment during weeks 4 and 5. There was also an interaction between string and age in average gait scores, with lower gait scores in the +S treatment than in the −S treatment during weeks 3 and 5 but not within week 4. Daytime observations showed that perches and strings were used frequently, with one bout of perching occurring approximately every 80 s/perch, and one bout of pecking at string occurring every 78 s/string on average. There was a significant effect of age on use of perches (P<0.001) and string (P<0.001), with perching peaking during week 5 and string pecking peaking during week 3. We conclude that commercial broilers in windowed houses with access to straw bales display an interest in additional enrichment stimuli in the form of perches and string, and therefore that these stimuli have the potential to improve welfare. In addition, provision of string as a pecking device appeared to positively influence walking ability. However, this effect was numerically small, was only shown in certain weeks and was not reflected in the other leg health measure (latency to lie). The results also showed an apparent negative effect of string and perches on the activity levels of birds (recorded away from the immediate vicinity of these enrichments) towards the end of the production cycle. These results emphasise the need for further research into optimum design and layout of enrichment stimuli for modern broilers in windowed houses to ensure that their provision leads to clear welfare benefits

Verified and potential pathogens of predatory mites (Acari: Phytoseiidae)

Several species of phytoseiid mites (Acari: Phytoseiidae), including species of the genera Amblyseius, Galendromus, Metaseiulus, Neoseiulus, Phytoseiulus and Typhlodromus, are currently reared for biological control of various crop pests and/or as model organisms for the study of predator¿prey interactions. Pathogen-free phytoseiid mites are important to obtain high efficacy in biological pest control and to get reliable data in mite research, as pathogens may affect the performance of their host or alter their reproduction and behaviour. Potential and verified pathogens have been reported for phytoseiid mites during the past 25 years. The present review provides an overview, including potential pathogens with unknown host effects (17 reports), endosymbiotic Wolbachia (seven reports), other bacteria (including Cardinium and Spiroplasma) (four reports), cases of unidentified diseases (three reports) and cases of verified pathogens (six reports). From the latter group four reports refer to Microsporidia, one to a fungus and one to a bacterium. Only five entities have been studied in detail, including Wolbachia infecting seven predatory mite species, other endosymbiotic bacteria infecting Metaseiulus (Galendromus, Typhlodromus) occidentalis (Nesbitt), the bacterium Acaricomes phytoseiuli infecting Phytoseiulus persimilis Athias-Henriot, the microsporidium Microsporidium phytoseiuli infecting P. persimilis and the microsporidium Oligosproridium occidentalis infecting M. occidentalis. In four cases (Wolbachia, A. phytoseiuli, M. phytoseiuli and O. occidentalis) an infection may be connected with fitness costs of the host. Moreover, infection is not always readily visible as no obvious gross symptoms are present. Monitoring of these entities on a routine and continuous basis should therefore get more attention, especially in commercial mass-production. Special attention should be paid to field-collected mites before introduction into the laboratory or mass rearing, and to mites that are exchanged among rearing facilities. However, at present general pathogen monitoring is not yet practical as effects of many entities are unknown. More research effort is needed concerning verified and potential pathogens of commercially reared arthropods and those used as model organisms in research

Strongly correlating liquids and their isomorphs

This paper summarizes the properties of strongly correlating liquids, i.e., liquids with strong correlations between virial and potential energy equilibrium fluctuations at constant volume. We proceed to focus on the experimental predictions for strongly correlating glass-forming liquids. These predictions include i) density scaling, ii) isochronal superposition, iii) that there is a single function from which all frequency-dependent viscoelastic response functions may be calculated, iv) that strongly correlating liquids are approximately single-parameter liquids with close to unity Prigogine-Defay ratio, and v) that the fictive temperature initially decreases for an isobaric temperature up jump. The "isomorph filter", which allows one to test for universality of theories for the non-Arrhenius temperature dependence of the relaxation time, is also briefly discussed

Can Systemic Interventions Designed to Reduce Reoffending by Youth also Reduce their Victimization?

Previous research indicates considerable overlap between populations of boys who are victimized and boys who victimize others. This study was concerned with whether a systems-focused treatment program designed to address individual and systemic risk factors associated with the perpetration of sexual and violent crimes might also be successful in reducing boys’ victimization by others. Boys adjudicated for sexual offences who received ‘treatment as usual’ (TAU; n = 335) were compared with similarly adjudicated boys who completed the treatment program (n = 200) on their histories of contact with police either as offenders or victims. Despite their higher rates of pre-intervention victimization, the treatment group were victimized less frequently post-intervention than the TAU group. Continued offending was the strongest predictor of victimization post-intervention. These findings suggest that offending and victimization share common risk factors that may be addressed simultaneously within offence-focused treatment

Mating dynamics in a nematode with three sexes and its evolutionary implications

Nematodes have diverse reproductive strategies, which make them ideal subjects for comparative studies to address how mating systems evolve. Here we present the sex ratios and mating dynamics of the free-living nematode Rhabditis sp. SB347, in which males, females and hermaphrodites co-exist. The three sexes are produced by both selfing and outcrossing, and females tend to appear early in a mother’s progeny. Males prefer mating with females over hermaphrodites, which our results suggest is related to the female-specific production of the sex pheromones ascr#1 and ascr#9. We discuss the parallels between this system and that of parasitic nematodes that exhibit alternation between uniparental and biparental reproduction

Impact of Novel Sorghum Bran Diets on DSS-Induced Colitis.

We have demonstrated that polyphenol-rich sorghum bran diets alter fecal microbiota; however, little is known regarding their effect on colon inflammation. Our aim was to characterize the effect of sorghum bran diets on intestinal homeostasis during dextran sodium sulfate (DSS)-induced colitis. Male Sprague-Dawley rats (N = 20/diet) were provided diets containing 6% fiber from cellulose, or Black (3-deoxyanthocyanins), Sumac (condensed tannins) or Hi Tannin Black (both) sorghum bran. Colitis was induced (N = 10/diet) with three separate 48-h exposures to 3% DSS, and feces were collected. On Day 82, animals were euthanized and the colon resected. Only discrete mucosal lesions, with no diarrhea or bloody stools, were observed in DSS rats. Only bran diets upregulated proliferation and Tff3, Tgfβ and short chain fatty acids (SCFA) transporter expression after a DSS challenge. DSS did not significantly affect fecal SCFA concentrations. Bran diets alone upregulated repair mechanisms and SCFA transporter expression, which suggests these polyphenol-rich sorghum brans may suppress some consequences of colitis

Varieties of living things: Life at the intersection of lineage and metabolism

publication-status: Publishedtypes: Articl

Group B Streptococcus vaccine development: present status and future considerations, with emphasis on perspectives for low and middle income countries.

Globally, group B Streptococcus (GBS) remains the leading cause of sepsis and meningitis in young infants, with its greatest burden in the first 90 days of life. Intrapartum antibiotic prophylaxis (IAP) for women at risk of transmitting GBS to their newborns has been effective in reducing, but not eliminating, the young infant GBS disease burden in many high income countries. However, identification of women at risk and administration of IAP is very difficult in many low and middle income country (LMIC) settings, and is not possible for home deliveries. Immunization of pregnant women with a GBS vaccine represents an alternate pathway to protecting newborns from GBS disease, through the transplacental antibody transfer to the fetus in utero. This approach to prevent GBS disease in young infants is currently under development, and is approaching late stage clinical evaluation. This manuscript includes a review of the natural history of the disease, global disease burden estimates, diagnosis and existing control options in different settings, the biological rationale for a vaccine including previous supportive studies, analysis of current candidates in development, possible correlates of protection and current status of immunogenicity assays. Future potential vaccine development pathways to licensure and use in LMICs, trial design and implementation options are discussed, with the objective to provide a basis for reflection, rather than recommendations

A mere instrument of production:Representing domestic labour in Westworld

This interdisciplinary chapter seeks to engage with gender through its manifestations in the political economy of HBO’s Westworld. This approach is necessary not only because of recent debates around gender, power and the “economics of consent” but also because Westworld intersects with those debates through its creative representation of a structural power that is striated by gendered social relations. For its hosts—those “mere instrument[s] of production”—Westworld entwines sexual labour and sexual violence and manages their lives through virtual family ties, all to extract value through their suffering. In Dolores’s relationship to her father(s), Ford’s simulated childhood, and Maeve’s and Bernard’s synthetic memories of parenthood, Westworld fixates upon the power relations of its virtual families which complexly blur contemporary capitalist production, prostitution, sexual violence, and, ultimately, revolutionary uprising. This final element of uprising—which ambivalently arises, not from the female hosts alone, but from implants given to them by their male progenitors (the ‘Reveries’ update and the synthetic residue of Maeve’s motherhood)—leads to my central research question: does Westworld’s account of revolution ultimately sentimentalise gendered social relations and absolve gender of its inherently exploitative violence under capitalism