The Comparative Effects of Calcium Carbonate and of Calcium Silicate on the Yield of Sudan Grass Grown in a Ferruginous Latosol and a Hydrol Humic Latosol

Several current field experiments in the Hawaiian sugar industry have shown that liming has increased both yield of sugar and phosphorus uptake by the plant. This interest led to the initiation of this study, which had as its objective a comparative study of the effects of application of calcium silicate and calcium carbonate on the growth of plants and on the availability of phosphorus when applied to a soil having aluminum oxides in a fairly good state of crystallinity against a soil in which aluminum exists in a highly hydrated colloidal oxide system

The strong influence of substrate conductivity on droplet evaporation

We report the results of physical experiments that demonstrate the strong influence of the thermal conductivity of the substrate on the evaporation of a pinned droplet. We show that this behaviour can be captured by a mathematical model including the variation of the saturation concentration with temperature, and hence coupling the problems for the vapour concentration in the atmosphere and the temperature in the liquid and the substrate. Furthermore, we show that including two ad hoc improvements to the model, namely a Newton's law of cooling on the unwetted surface of the substrate and the buoyancy of water vapour in the atmosphere, give excellent quantitative agreement for all of the combinations of liquid and substrate considered

Residue level quantification of protein stability in living cells

Proteins function in a sea of macromolecules within cells, but are traditionally studied under ideal conditions in vitro. The more details we amass from experiments performed in cells, the closer we will get to understanding fundamental aspects of protein chemistry in the cellular environment. In addition to furthering our essential knowledge of biochemistry, advancements in the field of macromolecular crowding will drive efforts to stabilize protein-based therapeutics. Here, we show that protein stability can be measured at the residue level in living cells without adding destabilizing cosolutes or heat

Genetically encoded calcium indicators as probes to assess the role of calcium channels in disease and for high-throughput drug discovery

The calcium ion (Ca) is an important signaling molecule implicated in many cellular processes, and the remodeling of Ca homeostasis is a feature of a variety of pathologies. Typical methods to assess Ca signaling in cells often employ small molecule fluorescent dyes, which are sometimes poorly suited to certain applications such as assessment of cellular processes, which occur over long periods (hours or days) or in vivo experiments. Genetically encoded calcium indicators are a set of tools available for the measurement of Ca changes in the cytosol and subcellular compartments, which circumvent some of the inherent limitations of small molecule Ca probes. Recent advances in genetically encoded calcium sensors have greatly increased their ability to provide reliable monitoring of Ca changes in mammalian cells. New genetically encoded calcium indicators have diverse options in terms of targeting, Ca affinity and fluorescence spectra, and this will further enhance their potential use in high-throughput drug discovery and other assays. This review will outline the methods available for Ca measurement in cells, with a focus on genetically encoded calcium sensors. How these sensors will improve our understanding of the deregulation of Ca handling in disease and their application to high-throughput identification of drug leads will also be discussed

Imaging Transient Blood Vessel Fusion Events by Correlative Volume Electron Microscopy

Extended abstract of a paper presented at Microscopy and Microanalysis 2010 in Portland, Oregon, USA, August 1 - August 5, 201

Shoot growth of woody trees and shrubs is predicted by maximum plant height and associated traits

1. The rate of elongation and thickening of individual branches (shoots) varies across plant species. This variation is important for the outcome of competition and other plant-plant interactions. Here we compared rates of shoot growth across 44 species from tropical, warm temperate, and cool temperate forests of eastern Australia.2. Shoot growth rate was found to correlate with a suite of traits including the potential height of the species, xylem-specific conductivity, leaf size, leaf area per xylem cross-section, twig diameter (at 40 cm length), wood density and modulus of elasticity.3. Within this suite of traits, maximum plant height was the clearest correlate of growth rates, explaining 50 to 67% of the variation in growth overall (p p 4. Growth rates were not strongly correlated with leaf nitrogen or leaf mass per unit leaf area.5. Correlations between growth and maximum height arose both across latitude (47%, p p p p < 0.0001), reflecting intrinsic differences across species and sites

Reactor monitoring and safeguards using antineutrino detectors

Nuclear reactors have served as the antineutrino source for many fundamental physics experiments. The techniques developed by these experiments make it possible to use these very weakly interacting particles for a practical purpose. The large flux of antineutrinos that leaves a reactor carries information about two quantities of interest for safeguards: the reactor power and fissile inventory. Measurements made with antineutrino detectors could therefore offer an alternative means for verifying the power history and fissile inventory of a reactors, as part of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and other reactor safeguards regimes. Several efforts to develop this monitoring technique are underway across the globe.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, Proceedings of XXIII International Conference on Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics (Neutrino 2008); v2: minor additions to reference

Parsimony vs predictive and functional performance of three stomatal optimization principles in a big-leaf framework

Stomatal optimization models can improve estimates of water and carbon fluxes with relatively low complexity, yet there is no consensus on which formulations are most appropriate for ecosystem-scale applications. We implemented three existing analytical equations for stomatal conductance, based on different water penalty functions, in a big-leaf comparison framework, and determined which optimization principles were most consistent with flux tower observations from different biomes. We used information theory to dissect controls of soil water supply and atmospheric demand on evapotranspiration in wet to dry conditions and to quantify missing or inadequate information in model variants. We ranked stomatal optimization principles based on parameter uncertainty, parsimony, predictive accuracy, and functional accuracy of the interactions between soil moisture, vapor pressure deficit, and evapotranspiration. Performance was high for all model variants. Water penalty functions with explicit representation of plant hydraulics did not substantially improve predictive or functional accuracy of ecosystem-scale evapotranspiration estimates, and parameterizations were more uncertain, despite having physiological underpinnings at the plant level. Stomatal optimization based on water use efficiency thus provided more information about ecosystem-scale evapotranspiration compared to those based on xylem vulnerability and proved more useful in improving ecosystem-scale models with less complexity

Projections of global and UK bioenergy potential from Miscanthus x giganteus – feedstock yield, carbon cycling and electricity generation in the 21st century

Funding Information Natural Environment Research Council. Grant Numbers:NE/M019691/1, NE/P019951/1 Engineering and Physical Sciences Research CouncilPeer reviewedPublisher PD