Water Contaminants Associated With Unconventional Oil and Gas Extraction Cause Immunotoxicity to Amphibian Tadpoles

Chemicals associated with unconventional oil and gas (UOG) operations have been shown to contaminate surface and ground water with a variety of endocrine disrupting compounds (EDCs) inducing multiple developmental alteration in mice. However, little is known about the impacts of UOG-associated contaminants on amphibian health and resistance to an emerging ranavirus infectious disease caused by viruses in the genus Ranavirus, especially at the vulnerable tadpole stage. Here we used tadpoles of the amphibian Xenopus laevis and the ranavirus Frog virus 3 (FV3) as a model relevant to aquatic environment conservation research for investigating the immunotoxic effects of exposure to a mixture of 23 UOG-associated chemicals with EDC activity. Xenopus tadpoles were exposed to an equimass mixture of 23 UOG-associated chemicals (range from 0.1 to 10 µg/l) for 3 weeks prior to infection with FV3. Our data show that exposure to the UOG chemical mixture is toxic for tadpoles at ecological doses of 5 to 10 µg/l. Lower doses significantly altered homeostatic expression of myeloid lineage genes and compromised tadpole responses to FV3 through expression of TNF-α, IL-1β, and Type I IFN genes, correlating with an increase in viral load. Exposure to a subset of 6 UOG chemicals was still sufficient to perturb the antiviral gene expression response. These findings suggest that UOG-associated water pollutants at low but environmentally relevant doses have the potential to induce acute alterations of immune function and antiviral immunity

Improving the cost-effectiveness of visual devices for the control of Riverine tsetse flies, the major vectors of Human African Trypanosomiasis

Control of the Riverine (Palpalis) group of tsetse flies is normally achieved with stationary artificial devices such as traps or insecticide-treated targets. The efficiency of biconical traps (the standard control device), 161 m black targets and small 25625 cm targets with flanking nets was compared using electrocuting sampling methods. The work was done on Glossina tachinoides and G. palpalis gambiensis (Burkina Faso), G. fuscipes quanzensis (Democratic Republic of Congo), G. f. martinii (Tanzania) and G. f. fuscipes (Kenya). The killing effectiveness (measured as the catch per m2 of cloth) for small targets plus flanking nets is 5.5–15X greater than for 1 m2 targets and 8.6–37.5X greater than for biconical traps. This has important implications for the costs of control of the Riverine group of tsetse vectors of sleeping sickness

Staged cardiovascular magnetic resonance for differential diagnosis of Troponin T positive patients with low likelihood for acute coronary syndrome

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Cardiac Troponin-T (cTnT) is a cardio-specific indicator of myocardial necrosis due to ischemic or non-ischemic events. Considering the multiple causes of myocardial injury and treatment consequences there is great clinical need to clarify the underlying reason for cTnT release. We sought to implement acute CMR as a non-invasive imaging method for differential diagnosis of elevated cTnT in chest-pain unit (CPU) patients with non-conclusive symptoms and ECG-changes and a low to intermediate probability for coronary artery disease (CAD).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>CPU patients (n = 29) who had positive cTnT were scanned at 1.5T with a new step-by-step CMR algorithm including cine-, perfusion-, T2-, angiography-and late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) imaging. For comparison patients also underwent echocardiography and coronary angiography if necessary. CMR was conducted successfully in all patients and detected 93% of cTnT releases of unknown cause, without adverse hemodynamic or arrhythmic events. Acute myocardial infarction was detected in 11, pulmonary embolism in 6, myocarditis in 5, renal disease and cardiomyopathy in 2, storage disorder in 1 patient. In 2 patients CMR was unable to reveal the cause of cTnT elevations. Mean CMR scan-time was 35 ± 8 min. In 4 patients, CMR led to immediate coronary angiography with correct prediction of the infarct related artery.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>We implemented a novel CMR algorithm to show the clinical value and practical feasibility of acute CMR in a non-conclusive patient cohort with unclear cTnT elevation. Since this pilot study has shown the feasibility of CMR in CPU patients, further prospective studies are warranted to compare CMR with other imaging modalities.</p

MRI and CT in the diagnosis of coronary artery disease: indications and applications

In recent years, technical advances and improvements in cardiac computed tomography (CT) and cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) have provoked increasing interest in the potential clinical role of these techniques in the non-invasive work-up of patients with suspected coronary artery disease (CAD) and correct patient selection for these emerging imaging techniques. In the primary detection or exclusion of significant CAD, e.g. in the patient with unspecific thoracic complaints, and also in patients with known CAD or advanced stages of CAD, both CT and MRI yield specific advantages. In this review, the major aspects of non-invasive MR and CT imaging in the diagnosis of CAD will be discussed. The first part describes the clinical value of contrast-enhanced non-invasive CT coronary angiography (CTCA), including the diagnostic accuracy of CTCA for the exclusion or detection of significant CAD with coronary artery stenoses that may require angioplastic intervention, as well as potentially valuable information on the coronary artery vessel wall. In the second section, the potential of CT for the imaging of myocardial viability and perfusion will be highlighted. In the third and final part, the range of applications of cardiac MRI in CAD patients will be outlined

A mobile ELF4 delivers circadian temperature information from shoots to roots

Extended Data and Source Data can be found at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41477-020-0634-2Ajuts: the Mas laboratory is funded by the FEDER/Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, the Ramon Areces Foundation and the Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR). The P.M. laboratory also acknowledges financial support from the CERCA Program, Generalitat de Catalunya and by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through the Severo Ochoa Program for Centers of Excellence in R&D 2016-2019 (SEV-2015-0533).The circadian clock is synchronized by environmental cues, mostly by light and temperature. Explaining how the plant circadian clock responds to temperature oscillations is crucial to understanding plant responsiveness to the environment. Here, we found a prevalent temperature-dependent function of the Arabidopsis clock component EARLY FLOWERING 4 (ELF4) in the root clock. Although the clocks in roots are able to run in the absence of shoots, micrografting assays and mathematical analyses show that ELF4 moves from shoots to regulate rhythms in roots. ELF4 movement does not convey photoperiodic information, but trafficking is essential for controlling the period of the root clock in a temperature-dependent manner. Low temperatures favour ELF4 mobility, resulting in a slow-paced root clock, whereas high temperatures decrease movement, leading to a faster clock. Hence, the mobile ELF4 delivers temperature information and establishes a shoot-to-root dialogue that sets the pace of the clock in root

A Search for Dark Higgs Bosons

Recent astrophysical and terrestrial experiments have motivated the proposal of a dark sector with GeV-scale gauge boson force carriers and new Higgs bosons. We present a search for a dark Higgs boson using 516 fb-1 of data collected with the BABAR detector. We do not observe a significant signal and we set 90% confidence level upper limits on the product of the Standard Model-dark sector mixing angle and the dark sector coupling constant.Comment: 7 pages, 5 postscript figures, published version with improved plots for b/w printin

The “minimal boundary curve for endothermy” as a predictor of heterothermy in mammals and birds: a review

According to the concept of the “minimal boundary curve for endothermy”, mammals and birds with a basal metabolic rate (BMR) that falls below the curve are obligate heterotherms and must enter torpor. We examined the reliability of the boundary curve (on a double log plot transformed to a line) for predicting torpor as a function of body mass and BMR for birds and several groups of mammals. The boundary line correctly predicted heterothermy in 87.5% of marsupials (n = 64), 94% of bats (n = 85) and 82.3% of rodents (n = 157). Our analysis shows that the boundary line is not a reliable predictor for use of torpor. A discriminate analysis using body mass and BMR had a similar predictive power as the boundary line. However, there are sufficient exceptions to both methods of analysis to suggest that the relationship between body mass, BMR and heterothermy is not a causal one. Some homeothermic birds (e.g. silvereyes) and rodents (e.g. hopping mice) fall below the boundary line, and there are many examples of heterothermic species that fall above the boundary line. For marsupials and bats, but not for rodents, there was a highly significant phylogenetic pattern for heterothermy, suggesting that taxonomic affiliation is the biggest determinant of heterothermy for these mammalian groups. For rodents, heterothermic species had lower BMRs than homeothermic species. Low BMR and use of torpor both contribute to reducing energy expenditure and both physiological traits appear to be a response to the same selective pressure of fluctuating food supply, increasing fitness in endothermic species that are constrained by limited energy availability. Both the minimal boundary line and discriminate analysis were of little value for predicting the use of daily torpor or hibernation in heterotherms, presumably as both daily torpor and hibernation are precisely controlled processes, not an inability to thermoregulate

Creationism and Intelligent Design

Until recently, little attention has been paid in the school classroom to creationism and almost none to intelligent design. However, creationism and intelligent design appear to be on the increase and there are indications that there are more countries in which schools are becoming battlegrounds over them. I begin by examining whether creationism and intelligent design are controversial issues, drawing on Robert Dearden’s epistemic criterion of the controversial and more recent responses to and defences of this. I then examine whether the notion of ‘worldviews’ in the context of creationism is a useful one by considering the film March of the Penguins. I conclude that the ‘worldviews’ perspective on creationism is useful for two reasons: first, it indicates the difficulty of using the criterion of reason to decide whether an issue is controversial or not; secondly, it suggests that standard ways of addressing the diversity of student views in a science classroom may be inadequate. I close by examining the implications of this view for teaching in science lessons and elsewhere, for example in religious education lessons and at primary level where subject divisions cannot be made in so clear-cut a manner

Observation of associated near-side and away-side long-range correlations in √sNN=5.02 TeV proton-lead collisions with the ATLAS detector

Two-particle correlations in relative azimuthal angle (Δϕ) and pseudorapidity (Δη) are measured in √sNN=5.02  TeV p+Pb collisions using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements are performed using approximately 1  μb-1 of data as a function of transverse momentum (pT) and the transverse energy (ΣETPb) summed over 3.1<η<4.9 in the direction of the Pb beam. The correlation function, constructed from charged particles, exhibits a long-range (2<|Δη|<5) “near-side” (Δϕ∼0) correlation that grows rapidly with increasing ΣETPb. A long-range “away-side” (Δϕ∼π) correlation, obtained by subtracting the expected contributions from recoiling dijets and other sources estimated using events with small ΣETPb, is found to match the near-side correlation in magnitude, shape (in Δη and Δϕ) and ΣETPb dependence. The resultant Δϕ correlation is approximately symmetric about π/2, and is consistent with a dominant cos⁡2Δϕ modulation for all ΣETPb ranges and particle pT