The Conceptual Design of a Roadway SFT in Baja California, Mexico

Abstract The Submerged Floating Tunnel (SFT) is an innovative water crossing solution under development. It is considered convenient against conventional structures for wide and deep water crossings. SFT is environmentally friendly, as it is submerged, and cheap over long distances thanks to modularity. No SFT has been constructed yet, however many feasibility studies have been proposed worldwide. The improvement of offshore and tunnel engineering provides important tools for making SFT a reality in a near future. This paper describes the conceptual design of a SFT for crossing the Gulf of California linking the mainland of the northwest of Mexico to the Baja California peninsula. This represents a great challenge due to the severe environmental and territorial conditions, with distance longer than 100 km and sea depth up to 3 km. Together with structural and environmental design issues, leading to the selection of the location of the SFT, the cross section types, the anchorage and foundation systems, the access structures are defined also through a focus on the specific structural safety measures and safety equipment required for the tunnel service

Electrochemical cell

The present invention pertains to an electrochemical cell (1) comprising: - an anolyte space with an anode (11); - a catholyte space with a cathode (12); and - a separator disc (2) separating the anolyte space from the catholyte space; wherein the anolyte space and/or the catholyte space comprise at least one wall (2) which is rotatable about an axis of rotation crossing the separator disc, wherein the electrochemical cell comprises at least one stator (6, 7) in the anolyte space and/or the catholyte space

Overlap and diversity in antimicrobial peptide databases: Compiling a non-redundant set of sequences

Motivation: The large variety of antimicrobial peptide (AMP) databases developed to date are characterized by a substantial overlap of data and similarity of sequences. Our goals are to analyze the levels of redundancy for all available AMP databases and use this information to build a new nonredundant sequence database. For this purpose, a new software tool is introduced. Results: A comparative study of 25 AMP databases reveals the overlap and diversity among them and the internal diversity within each database. The overlap analysis shows that only one database (Peptaibol) contains exclusive data, not present in any other, whereas all sequences in the LAMP-Patent database are included in CAMP-Patent. However, the majority of databases have their own set of unique sequences, as well as some overlap with other databases. The complete set of non-duplicate sequences comprises 16 990 cases, which is almost half of the total number of reported peptides. On the other hand, the diversity analysis identifies the most and least diverse databases and proves that all databases exhibit some level of redundancy. Finally, we present a new parallel-free software, named Dover Analyzer, developed to compute the overlap and diversity between any number of databases and compile a set of non-redundant sequences. These results are useful for selecting or building a suitable representative set of AMPs, according to specific needs. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.Antimicrobial Cationic Peptide

Evaluation of polyherbal methionine and choline in feedlot rations for lambs

Requirements of lambs for choline and methionine have not been clearly established, but because of their metabolic relationship, the availability of these two nutrients may affect protein synthesis and energy balance. Therefore, a trial was carried out to evaluate the effect on productive performance and blood metabolites of including methionine and choline from polyherbal mixtures in finishing lamb diets. Forty Hampshire x Suffolk lambs weighing 26.9 ± 2.8 kg were used for a 45-day experiment. The treatments were arranged as a 2x2 factorial, in which the factors were dietary supplementation with herbal methionine and choline at two levels (0% and 0.4% of dry matter (DM)). The treatments had no effects on the lambs’ productive variables (daily feed intake, average daily gain, and feed to gain ratio), carcass characteristics and lipid metabolites (P >0.05). The results indicated that the inclusion of polyherbal mixtures containing methionine, choline and their combination at 0.4% of DM in finishing lamb diets showed no benefits in productive response or in blood metabolites related to lipid metabolism. Keywords: amino acid, lipid metabolites, productive performance, ruminally protected, vitami

Spatial and temporal variability of discards indicators and fishery factors affecting otter-trawl fishery in the spanish Mediterranean sea

A set of diversity indices were studied from data of observers on board two Mediterranean trawlers from 2001 to 2009. These diversity indices comprise relationships between total catch, landing and discard fractions to explore the accuracy of the estimates and to analyse the series trends using different methods, such as ARIMA. The hypothesis tested was that diversity indicators give a good representation of the changes produced in impacted bottom‐trawl areas, providing a reasonable fit of the data. ARIMA models are useful because they handle time-correlated modelling and forecasting. These techniques can also reveal changes in total catch as well changes in catch composition, probably induced by changes in effort fishery, seasonal (time) fluctuations, and environmental or climatic processes. Contrasted trends were also compared with survey data by MEDITS Mediterranean trawl survey time‐series indicator

Predicción de lesiones coronarias significativas mediante perfusión miocárdica con SPECT. Resultados de un centro de referencia nacional en Lima-Perú

Objective. To determine the discriminative capacity of myocardial perfusion with single photon emission tomography (SPECT) to predict coronary obstructions by coronary angiography. To determine mortality and major cardiovascular events at follow-up. Materials and methods. Retrospective observational study with clinical follow-up in patients undergoing SPECT and then coronary angiography. We excluded patients with myocardial infarction and percutaneous and/or surgical revascularization in the previous 6 months. Results: 105 cases were included in the study. The most commonly used SPECT protocol was pharmacological (70%). Patients with perfusion defect ≥10% of total ventricular mass (TVM) had significant coronary lesions (SCL) in 88% of cases (sensitivity 87.5% and specificity 83%). On the other hand, having ischemia ≥10% of the TVM was associated with 80% SCL (sensitivity: 72%, specificity: 65%). Clinical follow-up at 48 months evidenced that a perfusion defect ≥ 10% was predictive of major cardiovascular events (MACE) in both univariate (HR=5.3; 95%CI 1.2 - 22.2; p=0.022) and multivariate (HR= 6.1; 95%CI 1.3 - 26.9; p= 0.017) analyses. Conclusions. Having a perfusion defect ≥10% of the MVT in the SPECT study predicted with high probability and sensitivity the existence ofSCL (>80%); moreover, this group had higher MACE at follow-up.Objetivo. Determinar la capacidad discriminativa de la perfusión miocárdica con tomografía de emisión de fotón único (SPECT) para predecir obstrucciones coronarias por coronariografía. Determinar la mortalidad y eventos cardiovasculares mayores en el seguimiento. Materiales y métodos. Estudio observacional retrospectivo con seguimiento clínico en pacientes sometidos a SPECT y luego coronariografía. Excluimos pacientes con infarto de miocardio y revascularización percutánea y/o quirúrgica en los seis meses previos. Resultados. Se incluyeron 105 casos en el estudio. El protocolo de SPECT más usado fue el farmacológico (70%). Los pacientes que tenían defecto de perfusión mixto (isquemia e infarto) ≥10% de la masa ventricular total (MVT) presentaron en el 88% de los casos lesiones coronarias significativas (LAS) (sensibilidad 87,5% y especificidad 83%). Por otro lado, el tener isquemia ≥10% de la MVT se relacionó con 80% de LAS (sensibilidad: 72%, especificidad: 65%). El seguimiento clínico a 48 meses evidenció que un defecto de perfusión ≥ 10% fue predictor de eventos cardiovasculares mayores (ECM) tanto en el análisis univariado (HR=5,3; IC95% 1,2 - 22,2; p=0,022) como multivariado (HR= 6,1; IC95% 1,3 - 26,9; p= 0,017). Conclusiones. El tener un defecto de perfusión ≥10% de la MVT en el estudio SPECT predijo con alta probabilidad y sensibilidad la existencia de LAS (>80%); además, este grupo tuvo mayores ECM en el seguimiento

Towards the high-accuracy determination of the 238U fission cross section at the threshold region at CERN - N-TOF

The 238U fission cross section is an international standard beyond 2 MeV where the fission plateau starts. However, due to its importance in fission reactors, this cross-section should be very accurately known also in the threshold region below 2 MeV. The 238U fission cross section has been measured relative to the 235U fission cross section at CERN - n-TOF with different detection systems. These datasets have been collected and suitably combined to increase the counting statistics in the threshold region from about 300 keV up to 3 MeV. The results are compared with other experimental data, evaluated libraries, and the IAEA standards