Corn storage and marketing feasibility in northern Mississippi

Master of AgribusinessDepartment of Agricultural EconomicsDaniel M. O'BrienOn-farm grain storage plays a key role in the production and distribution of corn in the United States. It can have economic impacts on a farm’s profitability and production efficiency over time. With the free market system of the United States, market fundamentals are a key component of decisions made on the farm regarding construction of grain storage facilities and how they are used in marketing decisions throughout a given production and marketing year. This analysis researches how grain storage decisions in the Northern Mississippi area are effected by corn basis differentials between the Memphis, TN river market and the Northern Alabama corn market. Corn basis differentials are considered along with annual changes in corn futures market carry in response to variations in grain market fundamentals. The profitability of constructing, maintaining, and operating on-farm grain storage is analyzed based on the local history of the local corn market basis patterns and the carry priced into the corn futures market. Through this analysis it was found that the biggest obstacle affecting the profitability of on-farm grain storage was the upfront cost of the facility. As costs of the facility were incurred, grain had to be stored for longer periods of time in order to be profitable based on history of improved basis and market carry over time. On-farm storage became profitable over a shorter storage period once the upfront costs of grain storage and handling facilities were paid based on the operating costs and market conditions within the analysis. On-farm storage can be a useful tool for a farm to increase profitability over time, beyond the scope of this analysis. This analysis proves that in the Northern Mississippi area over time, grain storage can be profitable based on improved cash basis and futures market carry. However, due to ever-changing market conditions, on-farm grain storage does not replace the need for the development of grain marketing plans in order to increase the likelihood of profitability

Reconstruction of primary vertices at the ATLAS experiment in Run 1 proton–proton collisions at the LHC

This paper presents the method and performance of primary vertex reconstruction in proton–proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment during Run 1 of the LHC. The studies presented focus on data taken during 2012 at a centre-of-mass energy of √s=8 TeV. The performance has been measured as a function of the number of interactions per bunch crossing over a wide range, from one to seventy. The measurement of the position and size of the luminous region and its use as a constraint to improve the primary vertex resolution are discussed. A longitudinal vertex position resolution of about 30μm is achieved for events with high multiplicity of reconstructed tracks. The transverse position resolution is better than 20μm and is dominated by the precision on the size of the luminous region. An analytical model is proposed to describe the primary vertex reconstruction efficiency as a function of the number of interactions per bunch crossing and of the longitudinal size of the luminous region. Agreement between the data and the predictions of this model is better than 3% up to seventy interactions per bunch crossing

Search for dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks in √s = 13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for weakly interacting massive particle dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks is presented. Final states containing third-generation quarks and miss- ing transverse momentum are considered. The analysis uses 36.1 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at √s = 13 TeV in 2015 and 2016. No significant excess of events above the estimated backgrounds is observed. The results are in- terpreted in the framework of simplified models of spin-0 dark-matter mediators. For colour- neutral spin-0 mediators produced in association with top quarks and decaying into a pair of dark-matter particles, mediator masses below 50 GeV are excluded assuming a dark-matter candidate mass of 1 GeV and unitary couplings. For scalar and pseudoscalar mediators produced in association with bottom quarks, the search sets limits on the production cross- section of 300 times the predicted rate for mediators with masses between 10 and 50 GeV and assuming a dark-matter mass of 1 GeV and unitary coupling. Constraints on colour- charged scalar simplified models are also presented. Assuming a dark-matter particle mass of 35 GeV, mediator particles with mass below 1.1 TeV are excluded for couplings yielding a dark-matter relic density consistent with measurements

Isoform-specific roles for AKT in affective behavior, spatial memory, and extinction related to psychiatric disorders

AKT is implicated in neurological disorders. AKT has three isoforms, AKT1/AKT2/AKT3, with brain cell type-specific expression that may differentially influence behavior. Therefore, we examined single Akt isoform, conditional brain-specific Akt1, and double Akt1/3 mutant mice in behaviors relevant to neuropsychiatric disorders. Because sex is a determinant of these disorders but poorly understood, sex was an experimental variable in our design. Our studies revealed AKT isoform- and sex-specific effects on anxiety, spatial and contextual memory, and fear extinction. In Akt1 mutant males, viral-mediated AKT1 restoration in the prefrontal cortex rescued extinction phenotypes. We identified a novel role for AKT2 and overlapping roles for AKT1 and AKT3 in long-term memory. Finally, we found that sex-specific behavior effects were not mediated by AKT expression or activation differences between sexes. These results highlight sex as a biological variable and isoform- or cell type-specific AKT signaling as potential targets for improving treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders. </div