A possible mode of action of static fusimotor axons as revealed by system identification techniques

Fusimotor axons are classified by their effects on the discharge of the primary muscle spindle ending during a ramp stretch of the parent muscle. In this paper techniques of system identification and parameter estimation are used to provide an alternative approach to the development of models relating the characteristics of the discharge of the muscle spindle primary sensory ending to the stretch applied to the muscle. Results suggest that system identification methods provide useful quantitative estimates of muscle spindle parameters that could lead to the development of methods for indirect measurement of the mechanical properties of intrafusal fibres

Effect of sustained release and pulse release anthelmintic intraruminal devices on development of pathophysiological changes and parasite populations in calves infected with Ostertagia ostertagi and Cooperia oncophora

An experiment was conducted in calves to investigate the effect of sustained release and pulse release anthelmintic intraruminal boli on the development of pathophysiological changes following daily infection with Ostertagia ostertagi and Cooperia oncophora for six weeks. After infection various pathophysiological changes were detected including increases in serum pepsinogen concentration, enteric plasma protein losses and in the catabolic rate of albumin. Such changes developed rapidly in the unprotected calves following patency after 17 days and persisted until the termination of the study. There were indications that the sustained anthelmintic release device was more efficacious than the pulse anthelmintic release device in reducing the worm burdens and early pathophysiological changes associated with infection. It was found at necropsy that the release of anthelmintic by the oxfendazole pulse release bolus had been delayed in several calves

Generating Data Converters to Help Compose Services in Bioinformatics Workflows

International audienceHeterogeneity of data and data formats in bioinformatics often entail a mismatch between inputs and outputs of different services, making it difficult to compose them into workflows. To reduce those mismatches bioinformatics platforms propose ad'hoc converters written by hand. This article proposes to systematically detect convertibility from output types to input types. Convertibility detection relies on abstract types, close to XML Schema, allowing to abstract data while precisely accounting for its composite structure. Detection is accompanied by an automatic generation of converters between input and output XML data. Our experiment on bioinformatics services and datatypes, performed with an implementation of our approach, shows that the detected convertibilities and produced converters are relevant from a biological point of view. Furthermore they automatically produce a graph of potentially compatible services with a connectivity higher than with the ad'hoc approaches

A systematic survey of floral nectaries

The construction of classifications, as well as the understanding of biological diversity, depends upon a careful comparison of attributes of the organisms studied (Stuessy, 1990). It is widely known that data from diverse sources showing differences from taxon to taxon are of systematic significance. Dur-ing the 20th century, systematists have emphasized that their discipline involves a synthesis of all knowledge (Stevens, 1994) or, in other words, the variation of as many relevant characters as possible should be incorporated into the natural system to be constructed. The extent to which particular characters are constant or labile will determine their usefulness to syste-matics. In general, more conservative characters will be valuable in defining families and orders, whereas more labile characters may be useful at the ge-neric and specific levels (Webb, 1984). There is no doubt that floral characters are among the most used in the classification of flowering plants. At the same time, they constitute essential features in diagnostic keys to taxa in both taxonomic treatments and Floras (Cronquist, 1981, 1988).Fil: Bernardello, Gabriel Luis Mario. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Vegetal. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Físicas y Naturales. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Vegetal; Argentin