Genome size variation in deep-sea amphipods

Funding: This work was supported by the HADEEP projects, funded by the Nippon Foundation, Japan (2009765188); the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), UK (NE/E007171/1); Total Foundation, France; National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA), New Zealand (CO1_0906); Schmidt Ocean Institute, USA (FK141109) (A.J.J. and S.B.P); Marine Alliance for Science and Technology for Scotland (MASTS) (HR09011 and DSSG15) (H.R., A.J.J., S.B.P); and the Leverhulme Trust (S.B.P.). Acknowledgements: We thank the chief scientists, crew and company of the New Zealand RV Kaharoa (KAH1301 and KAH1310) and the United States RV Falkor (Cruise FK141109). From NIWA, we thank Malcolm Clark, Ashley Rowden, Kareen Schnabel, and Sadie Mills for logistical support at the NIWA Invertebrate Collection. We thank NOAA Marine National Monuments, Richard Hall and Eric Breuer for their support and collaboration. We also thank Attila Bebes and the Iain Fraser Cytometry Centre (IFCC) for technical assistance. Electronic supplementary material is available online at https://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.3868216.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Liquid Fuels Trust Board: Review and Commentary

Report for the EnergyScape Research Programme NIWA Scienc

Toward a multilevel representation of protein molecules: comparative approaches to the aggregation/folding propensity problem

This paper builds upon the fundamental work of Niwa et al. [34], which provides the unique possibility to analyze the relative aggregation/folding propensity of the elements of the entire Escherichia coli (E. coli) proteome in a cell-free standardized microenvironment. The hardness of the problem comes from the superposition between the driving forces of intra- and inter-molecule interactions and it is mirrored by the evidences of shift from folding to aggregation phenotypes by single-point mutations [10]. Here we apply several state-of-the-art classification methods coming from the field of structural pattern recognition, with the aim to compare different representations of the same proteins gathered from the Niwa et al. data base; such representations include sequences and labeled (contact) graphs enriched with chemico-physical attributes. By this comparison, we are able to identify also some interesting general properties of proteins. Notably, (i) we suggest a threshold around 250 residues discriminating "easily foldable" from "hardly foldable" molecules consistent with other independent experiments, and (ii) we highlight the relevance of contact graph spectra for folding behavior discrimination and characterization of the E. coli solubility data. The soundness of the experimental results presented in this paper is proved by the statistically relevant relationships discovered among the chemico-physical description of proteins and the developed cost matrix of substitution used in the various discrimination systems.Comment: 17 pages, 3 figures, 46 reference

A New Zealand case study - Open Source, Open Standards, Open Data

The National Institute for Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) is New Zealand’s leading agency providing freshwater, ocean, climate, atmosphere and fisheries related research. Open Source software is widely used internally, both infrastructurally and in desktop systems. In 2011, the New Zealand Government passed “The Declaration on Open and Transparent Government”. This requires central government agencies to make taxpayer funded information freely available to the public, and encourages regional and local government, as well as agencies such as NIWA to comply. NIWA works closely with central and regional government, utilities, NGO’s and primary industry, making information discovery and delivery using common and open standards critical. NIWA is using Open Source applications to meet these open data discovery and delivery requirements. Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards compliance ensures interoperability. Standards adopted to date include SFS (Postgis), CSW (Geonetwork), WMS/WFS (Mapserver, Geoserver, Openlayers, Quantum GIS, Quantum Map) and SOS (52 degree N, Quantum Map). Some proprietary applications are also used. These are also OGC compliant and fit within NIWA’s OGC based architecture. This paper describes the role that open source software and open standards play in NIWA’s strategies and architecture for environmental information management, discovery and delivery and gives implementation examples

Boston University Percussion Ensemble, April 17, 1970

This is the concert program of Boston University Percussion Ensemble performance on Friday, April 17, 1970 at 8:30 p.m., at the Concert Hall, 855 Commonwealth Avenue. Works performed were Really True Friends by Gary Jacober, Variations for Percussion Quintet by Richard Ettelson, Three Textures for Percussion Sextet, The Brickyard by Joseph DePaul, The Fifth World by Floyd Dardin, First Construction (In Meta!) by John Cage, Chamber Piece for Percussion Quintet by Michael Colgrass, Koke No Niwa (Moss Garden) by Alan Hovhaness, and Ionization by Edgar Varese. Digitization for Boston University Concert Programs was supported by the Boston University Humanities Library Endowed Fund

The Impact of Manpower Development on Organizational Efficiency in National Inland Waterways Authority of Nigeria (NIWA)

The manpower deficiency in NIWA, an organization that requires the competence not only to run a profitable transport outfit but also regulate the activities of private operators using the Nigeria Inland Waterways, has been a source of concern to the government over the years more so that the organization is supposed to be a ‘cash cow’ to the Federal Government. This study focussed on the skill-gaps and how they impact on efficiency and specifically interrogated the relationship between staff development and job performance in NIWA. Survey method was used. Primary and secondary data were collected through questionnaire. Three hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. Chi Square and Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient statistics were used in data analyses. Among the findings were significant relationship between skill-gaps and inefficiency and poor productivity among NIWA staff; and poor correlation between resources committed to staff development and staff productivity. Among the recommendations is that there should be mechanism for proper assessment of employee performance after training and such performance should be tied to their subsequent promotion on the job.Key Words: Manpower development, skill-gaps, human resources, performance, efficienc

Two new genera and five new species of Selachinematidae (Nematoda, Chromadorida) from the continental slope of New Zealand

Two new genera and five new species of Selachinematidae are described from the New Zealand upper continental slope (350-1240 m depth). Synonchiella rotundicauda sp. nov. is characterised by cephalic setae 0.25 cbd long, mandibles each with two pairs of hooks and two wing-like projections laterally, eight cup-shaped pre-cloacal supplements and short rounded tail. Pseudocheironchus gen. nov. is similar to Cheironchus, but differs from the latter in having a cuticle without lateral differentiation, cephalic setae only slightly longer than the outer labial sensillae, and a posterior buccal cavity with three equal mandibles. Pseudocheironchus ingluviosus gen. et sp. nov. is characterised by mandibles with eight blunt teeth, multispiral amphideal fovea with five turns, and a short rounded tail. Males of this new species with 17-19 cup-shaped pre-cloacal supplements. Males of the genus Cobbionema are described for the first time; C. trigamma sp. nov. is characterised by four long cephalic setae and six smaller outer labial setae in one circle, six rhabdions surrounding the anterior buccal cavity, each with two pairs of pointed projections at their posterior extremities, posterior buccal cavity widening posteriorly, with three pairs of rhabdions fused posteriorly and widening anteriorly, males with two testes pointing anteriorly and with reflexed posterior testis, and no pre-cloacal supplements. Gammanema agglutinans sp. nov. is characterised by a short, stout body often covered in adhering mucus and detritus, cuticle with minute spines, leaf-shaped somatic setae with ducts, sexual dimorphism in the shape of the amphideal fovea (loop-shaped in males and spiral in females), posterior buccal cavity with three pairs of broad, column-shaped rhabdions fused anteriorly, intestine cells with orange-brown granules, and small tubular pre-cloacal supplements. Bendiella gen. nov. is most similar to Halichoanolaimus, but differs from the latter, and all other genera of the family Selachinematidae, in having a cuticle with lateral differentiation consisting of longitudinal rows of larger dots, and from all other genera of the Choniolaiminae in lacking pre-cloacal supplements. Bendiella thalassa gen. et sp. nov. is characterised by amphideal fovea with 5.25 turns, anterior buccal cavity with twelve rhabdions, each with a pair of pointed projections at posterior extremity, posterior buccal cavity with three Y-shaped pairs of slender rhabdions fused from two thirds of distance from anterior ends, and conico-cylindrical tail

Do circum-Antarctic species exist in peracarid Amphipoda? A case study in the genus Epimeria Costa, 1851 (Crustacea, Peracarida, Epimeriidae)

The amphipod genus Epimeria is species rich in the Southern Ocean and at present eight of its 19 species are reported with circum-Antarctic distributions. For the first time, specimens of epimeriid species from the Antarctic Peninsula, the Weddell Sea and the Ross Sea were analysed using partial COI genes sequences and morphological characters. In total 37 specimens of 14 species of Epimeria and two species of Epimeriella were analysed and the resulting molecular topology checked by critically reviewing taxonomic characters. The genus Epimeriella, genetically grouping within Epimeria is synonymised with the genus Epimeria. Sequences distances between populations of the nominal species Epimeria robusta from the Weddell and Ross Sea led to detailed morphological investigations, resulting in the description of Epimeria robustoides sp. n. from the Weddell Sea. Epimeria robusta Barnard, 1930 from the Ross Sea is redescribed. Sequences of a damaged Epimeria specimen of a species new to science from the lower continental shelf of the eastern Weddell Sea were included. Based on the current study, the hypothesis of circum-Antarctic species' distributions in brooding amphipods proved to be unlikely