The first Strigocis Dury (Coleoptera, Ciidae) from the southern Neotropical region and a provisional key to world species

Strigocis vicosensis Lopes-Andrade, sp. n. is described based on specimens from a single locality (type locality: Viçosa, state of Minas Gerais, southeastern Brazil), being the southernmost record of a Strigocis Dury species. Diagnostic to this new species are the dorsal vestiture consisting of stout yellowish bristles, pronotal punctures separated from each other by at least 0.75× puncture-width and sutural flange of elytra not diverging near apex. Males have both frontoclypeal ridge and anterior pronotal margin produced forward and emarginated at middle forming two small subtriangular plates, and a small abdominal sex patch. Among the New World Strigocis, it most resembles Strigocis bilimeki (Reitter), of which images of male terminalia, as far as ventral and dorsal SEM images of males are also provided. The morphological limits of Strigocis are briefly discussed and redefined, and a provisional key to the world species is provided

A new species of Neomida Latreille from Colombia, with additional records and a complementary description for Neomida suilla (Champion) (Coleoptera, Tenebrionidae, Diaperini)

Neomida diminuta sp. n. is described, based on a single male specimen from Colombia, and a redescription of Neomida suilla (Champion) is given. Data on the morphology of the aedeagus for both species, and on the female abdominal terminalia for Neomida suilla are provided. New records of Neomida suilla from Atlantic Forest remnants in the states of Espírito Santo and Minas Gerais, Brazil are given

The Cis bilamellatus species-group (Coleoptera, Ciidae) in southern Africa: Cis mooihoekite sp. n. and new distributional records

Cis mooihoekite sp. n. is described based on specimens collected at two localities in the province of Mpumalanga, South Africa. The new species is included in the Cis bilamellatus species-group, which comprises species with a single plate on both anterocephalic edge and anterior pronotal edge in males, females with pronotum usually widest near the posterior end and gradually narrowing anteriorly and both sexes with dual elytral vestiture. Cis mooihoekite sp. n. can be distinguished from the other South African species in the group by the pronotum devoid of a median impunctate line, pronotal plate angularly emarginate forming two small and triangular horns with acute apex and anterocephalic edge with very acute corners. New geographical records and information on the host fungi of Cis pickeri Lopes-Andrade, Matushkina, Buder & Klass, 2009 are provided

Comparative morphometry of katydids tegminas (ORTHOPTERA: TETTIGONIIDAE)

Objetivo: Determinar el grado de variación de los componentes estructurales de la tegmina izquierda en relación a la tegmina derecha, y como es el patrón de variación de estos dentro y entre taxones de Tettigoniidae. Métodos: Se disecaron 192 especímenes provenientes de la Región Andina colombiana, la Amazonia y la Floresta Atlántica brasilera. Las tegminas fueronfotografiadas y sobre ellas se localizaron seis puntos anatómicos, los cuales fueron usados para realizar los análisis morfométricos ANOVA Procrustes y componentes principales obtenidos de las matrices de las covarianzas del efecto simétrico y asimétrico. Resultados: La asimetría es altamente significativa tanto en la superfamilia como en las subfamilias. Sin embargo, la diferenciación de grupo por lado fue significativa para la familia y también dentro de las subfamilias, con excepción de Pseudophyllinae. Conclusiones: cada subfamilia y la mayoría de las tribus estudiadas presentan patrones morfológicos específicos que pueden ser incluso utilizados como caracteres taxonómicos.Objective: to determine the degree of variation of the structural components of the left tegmina in relation to the right tegmina, and how their pattern of variation is within and among taxa of Tettigoniidae. Methods: A total of 192 specimens from the Colombian Andean Region, the Amazon, and the Brazilian Atlantic Forest were dissected. Th e tegminas were photographed and six anatomical points were located on them, which were used to perform ANOVA Procrustes morphometric analyzes and main components obtained from the matrices of the covariance of the symmetric and asymmetric effect. Results: Asymmetry is highly significant both for the superfamily and the subfamilies level. However, the group differentiation by side was very significant for the family and in the subfamilies except for Pseudophyllinae. Conclusions: Each subfamily and most of the tribes studied present specific morphological patterns that can even be used as taxonomic characters

Influência de diferentes velocidades de semeadura no estabelecimento da cultura do milho (Zea mays L.)

Velocidades acima do recomendado podem aumentar o número de falhas e de sementes duplas na lavoura, o que acaba prejudicando a uniformidade na distribuição das sementes, bem como velocidades muito abaixo acabam reduzindo o aproveitamento do tempo de realização da semeadura da cultura. O objetivo deste trabalho foi avaliar o estabelecimento da cultura do milho em função de diferentes velocidades de semeadura. O experimento foi conduzido no Município de Nova Itaberaba, SC. Os tratamentos do experimento foram T1: 3 Km/h; T2: 6 Km/h (testemunha); T3: 9 Km/h e T4: 12 Km/h. O experimento foi realizado em um delineamento experimental em blocos casualizados com quatro repetições, arranjados em faixas. Para a determinação da velocidade de emergência da cultura foi realizada a observação do estádio germinação e emergência. Após a semeadura foi realizada a contagem das plântulas germinada na área útil de cada parcela. Para a distribuição longitudinal das sementes foi realizada a medição de todas as distâncias entre as sementes da área útil de cada parcela. Os dados coletados serão submetidos à análise de variância pelo teste F, pelo software Sisvar e análise de regressão. Nas condições estabelecidas pelo experimento foram obtidos resultados que comprovam a variabilidade da semeadura em função da velocidade de plantio sobre o sulco. O experimento determinou resultados que permitem concluir que as velocidades de semeaduras influenciam 82,2% na distribuição longitudinal das sementes, com destaque para as velocidades 3 e 6 Km/h, que apresentaram 18,63% de emergência.  Palavras-chave: Milho. Velocidades de semeadura. Estabelecimento cultural

Effect of the systemic administration of methylprednisolone on the lungs of brain-dead donor rats undergoing pulmonary transplantation

OBJECTIVE: Most lung transplants are obtained from brain-dead donors. The physiopathology of brain death involves hemodynamics, the sympathetic nervous system, and inflammatory mechanisms. Administering methylprednisolone 60 min after inducing brain death in rats has been shown to modulate pulmonary inflammatory activity. Our objective was to evaluate the effects of methylprednisolone on transplanted rat lungs from donors treated 60 min after brain death. METHODS: Twelve Wistar rats were anesthetized, and brain death was induced. They were randomly divided into two groups (n = 6), namely a control group, which was administered saline solution, and a methylprednisolone group, which received the drug 60 min after the induction of brain death. All of the animals were observed and ventilated for 2 h prior to being submitted to lung transplantation. We evaluated the hemodynamic and blood gas parameters, histological score, lung tissue levels of thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances, level of superoxide dismutase, level of tumor necrosis factor-alpha, and level of interleukin-1 beta. RESULTS: After transplantation, a significant reduction in the levels of tumor necrosis factor-alpha and IL-1β was observed in the group that received methylprednisolone (p = 0.0084 and p = 0.0155, respectively). There were no significant differences in tumor necrosis factor-alpha and superoxide dismutase levels between the control and methylprednisolone groups (p = 0.2644 and p = 0.7461, respectively). There were no significant differences in the blood gas parameters, hemodynamics, and histological alterations between the groups. CONCLUSION: The administration of methylprednisolone after brain death in donor rats reduces inflammatory activity in transplanted lungs but has no influence on parameters related to oxidative stress

An overview on ultrafiltration in food processing

Generally speaking, purification represents the most costly step within food production and biotechnological processes. Membrane-based processes, such as ultrafiltration (pore size from 10 to 1000 Å) are widely used on an industrial scale. Membrane-based processes are aligned to green chemistry concepts, that is, they are environmentally-friendly, do not generate harmful residues, show a low consumption of energy and an easy scale-up, among others. The food industry applies ultrafiltration to a wide range of fields. For instance (i) dairy - milk treatment, production of ice cream, etc. As an alternative to pasteurization of milk, ultrafiltration can be used also as pretreatment of milk for cheese production, in which large molecular weight compounds such as caseins, whey proteins, etc., are in the retentate, whereas low molecular weight compounds such as lactose and peptides are in the permeate. Similarly, low lactose yogurts can be produced (ii) beverage - during the juice clarification using membranes, pulp, pectin and essential oils are retained, whereas the juice itself is permeate. Ultrafiltration is also used in the production of clear beer and wine (concentration) (iii) degumming edible oils - (e.g., crude soybean oil, sunflower seed oil), in which phospholipids are removed (retentate) by ultrafiltration as an equivalent first step of the oil refining process (traditionally, carried out by water or dilute acid that leads to precipitation phospholipids) (iv) fish, poultry and gelatin - ultrafiltration is largely used for wastewater treatment processes, in particular for high protein content residues. Nevertheless, over the past few decades, the recovery of bioactive peptides and proteins from these wastewaters has drawn significant attention, that is, doubly advantageous (waste treatment and recovery of high added-value compounds) (v) drinking water treatment - high quality potable water implies the absence of microorganisms (e.g., Giardia), organic matter (e.g., humic substances), inorganic particles, and others hazardous substances. This water quality can be achieved by ultrafiltration, in which the main limitation is related to long-term flux decline (membrane fouling). Thus, membrane materials and membrane filtration operating systems, etc., should be better investigated (vi) recovery of specific molecules - plant proteins, enzymes (e.g., lysosyme) and phenolic compounds can be recovery and purified by ultrafiltration well-defined methodologies. Membrane-based separations, in particular ultrafiltration, are extensively used by food industry. However, improvements are still needed in virtually all applications

Use of biostimulant in the reversion of injury caused by glyphosate on conventional corn plants

O cultivo de milho convencional vem retomando espaço no panorama agrícola nacional em função da dificuldade de controle do milho tiguera em culturas subsequentes. Entretanto, a deriva de glyphosate em lavouras adjacentes passou a ser uma preocupação entre os produtores e técnicos. Dessa forma o experimento foi instalado para avaliar o efeito de baixas doses de glyphosate na cultura e a capacidade de um bioestimulante a base de hormônios vegetais em reverter as injúrias causadas pelo herbicida, avaliando-se características morfológicas e taxa fotossintética de plantas de milho. Foi utilizado o delineamento inteiramente casualizados com quatro repetições em arranjo fatorial 5 X 2, sendo que o primeiro fator correspondeu a cinco doses de glyphosate (0; 10; 20; 30 e 40 g e.a. ha-1) e o segundo a ausência e presença do bioestimulante. As características avaliadas foram fitointoxicação, diâmetro do colmo, altura plantas e massa fresca de raiz e parte aérea, índice SPAD e taxa fotossintética. A maior dose de glyphosate provocou maior fitointoxicação, além de plantas com menor altura e menor índice SPAD. O bioestimulante proporcionou acréscimos no diâmetro de colmo, índice SPAD e taxa fotossintética. A presença de bioestimulante não proporcionou efeito reparador nos efeitos deletérios provocados pelo glyphosate em plantas de milho convencional.Conventional corn cultivation has been taking up space in the national agricultural panorama due to the difficulty of controlling the corn in subsequent crops. However, glyphosate drift in adjacent crops has become a concern among producers and technicians. Thus the experiment was installed to evaluate the effect of low doses of glyphosate on the crop and the ability of a plant hormone-based biostimulant to reverse the injuries caused by the herbicide, evaluating the morphological characteristics and photosynthetic rate of corn plants. It was used a completely randomized design with four replicates in factorial arrangement 5 X 2, with the first factor corresponding to five doses of glyphosate (0, 10, 20, 30 and 40 g e.a ha-1), and the second, the absence and presence of the biostimulant. The evaluated characteristics were phytotoxification, stalk diameter, plant height and fresh root and shoot mass, SPAD index and photosynthetic rate. The higher dose of glyphosate resulted in higher phytointoxication, plants with lower height and lower SPAD index. Biostimulant provided increases in stalk diameter, SPAD index and photosynthetic rate. The presence of biostimulant did not provide a repairing effect on the deleterious effects caused by glyphosate in conventional corn plants

Probing the reciprocal lattice associated with a triangular slit to determine the orbital angular momentum for a photon

The orbital angular momentum conservation of light reveals different diffraction patterns univocally dependent on the topological charge of the incident light beam when passing through a triangular aperture. It is demonstrated that these patterns, which are accessed by observing the far-field measurement of the diffracted light, can also be obtained using few photon sources. In order to explain the observed patterns, we introduce an analogy of this optical phenomenon with the study of diffraction for the characterization of the crystal structure of solids. We demonstrate that the finite pattern can be associated with the reciprocal lattice obtained from the direct lattice generated by the primitive vectors composing any two of the sides of the equilateral triangular slit responsible for the diffraction. Using the relation that exists between the direct and reciprocal lattices, we provide a conclusive explanation as to why the diffraction pattern of the main maxima is finite. This can shed a new light on the investigation of crystallographic systems