Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy for food authentication

With the globalisation of food markets, food authentication has become a significant concern worldwide to ensure food safety and to avoid origin and quality fraud. A multi-elemental fingerprint is a powerful tool for detection of adulterants and geographical origin of foods. Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) is a promising technique that can provide a mineral fingerprint of food products. LIBS allows a rapid, high-throughput, micro-destructive and multi-elemental analysis of a wide range of samples type. It has already been demonstrated by several authors that LIBS can be successfully used for food authentication. Although LIBS shows excellent potential for at-line or portable applications, improvement in sensitivity of trace elements detection, sample preparation, data analysis and instrument miniaturisation are needed

Rapid analysis of magnesium in infant formula powder using laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy

Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) was investigated to determine magnesium (Mg) content in infant formula powder. To predict Mg content in the range established by the Codex Alimentarius, a partial least squares regression (PLSR) model was developed using a calibration data set (n = 30) based on full cross-validation and validated using an independent validation data set (n = 21). The prediction model performance was evaluated using the regression coefficients of determination (Rcv2 = 0.94 and Rp2 = 0.85) with the root mean square errors on cross-validation and prediction (RMSECV = 60 mg kg−1 and RMSEP = 80 mg kg−1). The limit of detection (150 mg kg−1) was also calculated. In addition, LIBS successfully predicted the Mg content distributed within a pellet. This study demonstrated that LIBS is suitable as a rapid reagent-free method for the quantification of Mg in powdered infant formula and can provide spatial information with acceptable accuracy

Sampling effects on the quantification of sodium content in infant formula using laser induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS)

Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) was employed to predict the sodium content of infant formula (IF) over the range 0.5–4 mg Na g−1. Calibration models were built using partial least squares regression (PLS), correlating the LIBS spectral data with reference Na content quantified by atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS). The main aim of this study was to demonstrate the ability of LIBS as a rapid tool for quantifying sodium in IF, but also to explore strategies concerning the acquisition and pre-processing of LIBS spectra. A range of different pre-processing techniques, measuring depths (repetition of laser shots) and accumulations were conducted and evaluated in terms of PLS performance. The best calibration model was developed using the third-layer spectra normalised by the H I 656.29 nm emission line, yielding a coefficient of determination (R2) of 0.93, and root-mean-square errors (RMSE) of 0.37 and 0.13 mg g−1 for cross-validation and validation, respectively

Quantification of calcium in infant formula using laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS), Fourier transform mid-infrared (FT-IR) and Raman spectroscopy combined with chemometrics including data fusion

peer-reviewedLaser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS), Fourier transform mid-infrared (FT-IR) and Raman spectroscopy combined with chemometrics were investigated to quantify calcium (Ca) content in infant formula powder (INF). INF samples (n = 51) with calcium content levels (ca. 6.5–30 mg Ca/100 kJ) were prepared in accordance with the guidelines of Commission Directive 2006/125/EC. Atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS) was used as the reference method for Ca content determination. To predict Ca content in INF samples, partial least squares regression (PLSR) models that developed based on LIBS, Raman and FT-IR spectral data, respectively. The model developed using LIBS data achieved the best performance for the quantification of Ca content in INF (R2 (cross-validation (CV))-0.99, RMSECV-0.29 mg/g; R2 (prediction (P))-1, RMSEP-0.63 mg/g). PLSR models that developed based on data fusion of Raman and FT-IR spectral features obtained the second best performance (R2CV-0.97, RMSECV-0.38 mg/g; R2P-0.97, RMSEP-0.36 mg/g). This study demonstrated the potential of LIBS, FT-IR and Raman spectroscopy to accurately quantify Ca content in INF.Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Irelan

Overview of the conservation status of Mediterranean anthozoans

The IUCN Red List of Threatened SpeciesTM – Regional AssessmentThis report presents the conservation status of the anthozoans occurring in the Mediterranean Sea, based on the assessment of 136 species using the IUCN Red List methodology. It identifies those species that are threatened with extinction at the regional level to guide appropriate conservation actions in order to improve their statusVersión del edito

Ligand-receptor co-evolution shaped the jasmonate pathway in land plants

The phytohormone jasmonoyl-isoleucine (JA-Ile) regulates defense, growth and developmental responses in vascular plants. Bryophytes have conserved sequences for all JA-Ile signaling pathway components but lack JA-Ile. We show that, in spite of 450 million years of independent evolution, the JA-Ile receptor COI1 is functionally conserved between the bryophyte Marchantia polymorpha and the eudicot Arabidopsis thaliana but COI1 responds to different ligands in each species. We identified the ligand of Marchantia MpCOI1 as two isomeric forms of the JA-Ile precursor dinor-OPDA (dinor-cis-OPDA and dinor-iso-OPDA). We demonstrate that AtCOI1 functionally complements Mpcoi1 mutation and confers JA-Ile responsiveness and that a single-residue substitution in MpCOI1 is responsible for the evolutionary switch in ligand specificity. Our results identify the ancestral bioactive jasmonate and clarify its biosynthetic pathway, demonstrate the functional conservation of its signaling pathway, and show that JA-Ile and COI1 emergence in vascular plants required co-evolution of hormone biosynthetic complexity and receptor specificity

2D-Tasks for Cognitive Rehabilitation

Neuropsychological Rehabilitation is a complex clinic process which tries to restore or compensate cognitive and behavioral disorders in people suffering from a central nervous system injury. Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in Biomedical Engineering play an essential role in this field, allowing improvement and expansion of present rehabilitation programs. This paper presents a set of cognitive rehabilitation 2D-Tasks for patients with Acquired Brain Injury (ABI). These tasks allow a high degree of personalization and individualization in therapies, based on the opportunities offered by new technologies

Measurement of the cross-section and charge asymmetry of WW bosons produced in proton-proton collisions at s=8\sqrt{s}=8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

This paper presents measurements of the $W^+ \rightarrow \mu^+\nu$ and $W^- \rightarrow \mu^-\nu$ cross-sections and the associated charge asymmetry as a function of the absolute pseudorapidity of the decay muon. The data were collected in proton--proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 8 TeV with the ATLAS experiment at the LHC and correspond to a total integrated luminosity of 20.2~\mbox{fb^{-1}}. The precision of the cross-section measurements varies between 0.8% to 1.5% as a function of the pseudorapidity, excluding the 1.9% uncertainty on the integrated luminosity. The charge asymmetry is measured with an uncertainty between 0.002 and 0.003. The results are compared with predictions based on next-to-next-to-leading-order calculations with various parton distribution functions and have the sensitivity to discriminate between them.Comment: 38 pages in total, author list starting page 22, 5 figures, 4 tables, submitted to EPJC. All figures including auxiliary figures are available at https://atlas.web.cern.ch/Atlas/GROUPS/PHYSICS/PAPERS/STDM-2017-13