Modelling wine astringency from its chemical composition using machine learning algorithms

Aims: The present work aims to predict sensory astringency from wine chemical composition using machine learning algorithms. Material and results: Moristel grapes from different vineblocks and at different stages of ripening were collected. Eleven different wines were produced in 75 L tanks in triplicate, and further sensory factors were described by the rate-all-that-apply method with a trained panel of participants. The polyphenolic composition was characterised in wines by measuring the concentration and activity of tannins using UHPLC-UV/VIS, the mean degree of polymerisation (mDP. and the composition of tannins using thiolysis followed by UHPLC-MS. Conventional oenological parameters were analysed using FTIR and UV-Vis. Machine learning was applied to build models for predicting a wines astringency from its chemical composition. The best model was obtained using the support vector regressor (radial kernel) algorithm presenting a root-mean-square error (RMSE) value of 0.190. Conclusions: The main variables of the astringency model were the % of procyanidins constituting tannins and ethanol content, followed by other eight variables related to tannin structure and acidity. Significance of the study: These results increase the knowledge of chemical variables related to the perception of wine astringency and provide tools to control and optimise grape and wine production stages to modulate astringency and maximise quality and the consumer appeal of wines

Medical students learning styles in Latin American and Spanish universities: relation with geographical and curricular contexts

Objetivo. Determinar si los estilos de aprendizaje (EA) de los estudiantes de medicina se correlacionan con el contexto geográfico, con el contexto curricular o con el nivel de la carrera. Sujetos y métodos. El estudio se realizó en 490 estudiantes de las Escuelas de Medicina de las Universidades de Chile (Santiago, Chile), Nacional de Cuyo (Mendoza, Argentina), San Francisco Xavier (Sucre, Bolivia), Zaragoza y País Vasco (España). Se aplicó el cuestionario Honey-Alonso, que valora la preferencia por cada uno de cuatro EA: activo, reflexivo, teórico y pragmático. También se evaluó el EA de acuerdo al modelo de Kolb. Resultados. Al relacionar el EA con el contexto geográfico se observó que mientras los estudiantes de universidades españolas muestran un estilo preferentemente asimilador, siguiendo la denominación de Kolb, para Chile fue el acomodador y para Bolivia los estudiantes se distribuyen entre los estilos asimilador y divergente. Al comparar la distribución de los EA durante el tercer curso de medicina en dos facultades que poseen diferente currículo, no se observaron diferencias significativas. Los EA en una Facultad de Medicina con un currículo basado en asignaturas (Chile) no mostraron diferencias en los tres cursos del estudio (1.o, 3.o y 5.o), siendo preferentes los estilos reflexivo y teórico. Conclusiones. El estudio permitió establecer diferencias significativas entre los estilos de aprendizaje de los estudiantes de Medicina en relación con el contexto geográfico, más que con los diferentes currículos, o a lo largo de los distintos cursos de la carrera.Aim. To establish a correlation between medical student learning styles (LS) and the geographical context, the curricular context and different academic levels. Subjects and methods. The study was performed in 490 undergraduate students from Medical Schools of the Universities of Chile (Santiago, Chile), Nacional de Cuyo (Mendoza, Argentina), San Francisco Xavier (Sucre, Bolivia), Zaragoza and País Vasco (Spain). The instrument used was the Honey-Alonso learning style questionnaire that assesses the student preference for one of four LS: active, reflexive, theoretic and pragmatic. In addition, LS according to the Kolb inventory were also assessed. Results. Using the Kolb inventory, significant differences were found when the LS were correlated with the geographical context. While Spanish students showed a high preference for the assimilator style of learning, Chilean students resulted to be mainly accommodators, and Bolivian students were both assimilators and divergent. Comparing the LS distribution during the third course in two universities with different curricula (problem and lecture based learning), there were no significant differences. LS of medical students from a Medical School with a lecture based curriculum (University of Chile) were not significantly different during the first, the third and the fifth level of their undergraduate students. They showed a significant preference for reflexive and theoretic styles of learning. Conclusions. The present study allowed demonstrating that significant differences among the styles of learning of medical students correlated with the geographical context more than with the different curricula, or along the different courses of the career.Fil: Diaz Veliz, G.. Universidad de Chile; ChileFil: Mora, S.. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Facultad de Ciencias Médicas; ArgentinaFil: Lafuente Sanchez, J. V.. Universidad del País Vasco; EspañaFil: Gargiulo, Pascual Angel. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Facultad de Ciencias Médicas; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza; ArgentinaFil: Bianchi, R.. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Facultad de Ciencias Médicas; ArgentinaFil: Teran, C.. Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar; BoliviaFil: Gorena, D.. Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar; BoliviaFil: Arce, J.. Universidad San Francisco Xavier; BoliviaFil: Escanero Marcen, J. F.. Universidad de Zaragoza; Españ

Endothelial damage, inflammation and immunity in chronic kidney disease

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients have an accelerated atherosclerosis, increased risk of thrombotic-ischemic complications, and excessive mortality rates when compared with the general population. There is also evidence of an endothelial damage in which the proinflammatory state, the enhanced oxidative stress, or the accumulation of toxins due to their reduced renal clearance in uremia play a role. Further, there is evidence that uremic endothelial cells are both involved in and victims of the activation of the innate immunity. Uremic endothelial cells produce danger associated molecular patterns (DAMPS), which by binding to specific pattern recognition receptors expressed in multiple cells, including endothelial cells, induce the expression of adhesion molecules, the production of proinflammatory cytokines and an enhanced production of reactive oxygen species in endothelial cells, which constitute a link between immunity and inflammation. The connection between endothelial damage, inflammation and defective immunity in uremia will be reviewed here

Trieste: Efficiently Exploring The Depths of Black-box Functions with TensorFlow

We present Trieste, an open-source Python package for Bayesian optimization and active learning benefiting from the scalability and efficiency of TensorFlow. Our library enables the plug-and-play of popular TensorFlow-based models within sequential decision-making loops, e.g. Gaussian processes from GPflow or GPflux, or neural networks from Keras. This modular mindset is central to the package and extends to our acquisition functions and the internal dynamics of the decision-making loop, both of which can be tailored and extended by researchers or engineers when tackling custom use cases. Trieste is a research-friendly and production-ready toolkit backed by a comprehensive test suite, extensive documentation, and available at https://github.com/secondmind-labs/trieste

Mapping the ionized gas of the metal-poor HII galaxy PHL 293B with MEGARA

Here we report the first spatially resolved spectroscopic study for the galaxy PHL293B using the high-resolution GTC/MEGARA IFU. PHL293B is a local, extremely metal-poor, high ionization galaxy. This makes PHL 293B an excellent analogue for galaxies in the early Universe. The MEGARA aperture (~12.5''x 11.3'') covers the entire PHL 293B main body and its far-reaching ionized gas. We created and discussed maps of all relevant emission lines, line ratios and physical-chemical properties of the ionized ISM. The narrow emission gas appears to be ionized mainly by massive stars according to the observed diganostic line ratios, regardless of the position across the MEGARA aperture. We detected low intensity broad emission components and blueshifted absorptions in the Balmer lines (H$\alpha$,H$\beta$) which are located in the brightest zone of the galaxy ISM. A chemically homogeneity, across hundreds of parsecs, is observed in O/H. We take the oxygen abundance 12+log(O/H)=7.64 $\pm$ 0.06 derived from the PHL293B integrated spectrum as the representative metallicity for the galaxy. Our IFU data reveal for the first time that the nebular HeII4686 emission from PHL 293B is spatially extended and coincident with the ionizing stellar cluster, and allow us to compute its absolute HeII ionizing photon flux. Wolf-Rayet bumps are not detected excluding therefore Wolf-Rayet stars as the main HeII excitation source. The origin of the nebular HeII4686 is discussed.Comment: 14 pages, 9 Figures, 3 Tables; Accepted for publication in MNRA

Impacts of El Niño Southern Oscillation and Indian Ocean Dipole on dengue incidence in Bangladesh

Dengue dynamics are driven by complex interactions between hosts, vectors and viruses that are influenced by environmental and climatic factors. Several studies examined the role of El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in dengue incidence. However, the role of Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD), a coupled ocean atmosphere phenomenon in the Indian Ocean, which controls the summer monsoon rainfall in the Indian region, remains unexplored. Here, we examined the effects of ENSO and IOD on dengue incidence in Bangladesh. According to the wavelet coherence analysis, there was a very weak association between ENSO, IOD and dengue incidence, but a highly significant coherence between dengue incidence and local climate variables (temperature and rainfall). However, a distributed lag nonlinear model (DLNM) revealed that the association between dengue incidence and ENSO or IOD were comparatively stronger after adjustment for local climate variables, seasonality and trend. The estimated effects were nonlinear for both ENSO and IOD with higher relative risks at higher ENSO and IOD. The weak association between ENSO, IOD and dengue incidence might be driven by the stronger effects of local climate variables such as temperature and rainfall. Further research is required to disentangle these effects

Characterization of the adaptive response of grapevine (cv. Tempranillo) to UV-B radiation under water deficit conditions

This work aims to characterize the physiological response of grapevine (Vitis vinifera L.) cv. Tempranillo to UV-B radiation under water deficit conditions. Grapevine fruit-bearing cuttings were exposed to three levels of supplemental biologically effective UV-B radiation (0, 5.98 and 9.66 kJ m−2 day−1) and two water regimes (well watered and water deficit), in a factorial design, from fruit-set to maturity under glasshouse-controlled conditions. UV-B induced a transient decrease in net photosynthesis (Anet), actual and maximum potential efficiency of photosystem II, particularly on well watered plants. Methanol extractable UV-B absorbing compounds (MEUVAC) concentration and superoxide dismutase activity increased with UV-B. Water deficit effected decrease in Anet and stomatal conductance, and did not change non-photochemical quenching and the de-epoxidation state of xanthophylls, dark respiration and photorespiration being alternative ways to dissipate the excess of energy. Little interactive effects between UV-B and drought were detected on photosynthesis performance, where the impact of UV-B was overshadowed by the effects of water deficit. Grape berry ripening was strongly delayed when UV-B and water deficit were applied in combination. In summary, deficit irrigation did not modify the adaptive response of grapevine to UV-B, through the accumulation of MEUVAC. However, combined treatments caused additive effects on berry ripening

Mapping the planet’s critical natural assets

Sustaining the organisms, ecosystems and processes that underpin human wellbeing is necessary to achieve sustainable development. Here we define critical natural assets as the natural and semi-natural ecosystems that provide 90% of the total current magnitude of 14 types of nature’s contributions to people (NCP), and we map the global locations of these critical natural assets at 2 km resolution. Critical natural assets for maintaining local-scale NCP (12 of the 14 NCP) account for 30% of total global land area and 24% of national territorial waters, while 44% of land area is required to also maintain two global-scale NCP (carbon storage and moisture recycling). These areas overlap substantially with cultural diversity (areas containing 96% of global languages) and biodiversity (covering area requirements for 73% of birds and 66% of mammals). At least 87% of the world’s population live in the areas benefitting from critical natural assets for local-scale NCP, while only 16% live on the lands containing these assets. Many of the NCP mapped here are left out of international agreements focused on conserving species or mitigating climate change, yet this analysis shows that explicitly prioritizing critical natural assets and the NCP they provide could simultaneously advance development, climate and conservation goals.We thank all the participants of two working groups hosted by Conservation International and the Natural Capital Project for their insights and intellectual contributions. For further advice or assistance, we thank A. Adams, K. Brandon, K. Brauman, A. Cramer, G. Daily, J. Fisher, R. Gould, L. Mandle, J. Montgomery, A. Rodewald, D. Rossiter, E. Selig, A. Vogl and T. M. Wright. The two working groups that provided the foundation for this analysis were funded by support from the Marcus and Marianne Wallenberg Foundation to the Natural Capital Project (R.C.-K. and R.P.S.) and the Betty and Gordon Moore to Conservation International (R.A.N. and P.M.C.)

Measurement of the cross-section and charge asymmetry of WW bosons produced in proton-proton collisions at s=8\sqrt{s}=8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

This paper presents measurements of the $W^+ \rightarrow \mu^+\nu$ and $W^- \rightarrow \mu^-\nu$ cross-sections and the associated charge asymmetry as a function of the absolute pseudorapidity of the decay muon. The data were collected in proton--proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 8 TeV with the ATLAS experiment at the LHC and correspond to a total integrated luminosity of 20.2~\mbox{fb^{-1}}. The precision of the cross-section measurements varies between 0.8% to 1.5% as a function of the pseudorapidity, excluding the 1.9% uncertainty on the integrated luminosity. The charge asymmetry is measured with an uncertainty between 0.002 and 0.003. The results are compared with predictions based on next-to-next-to-leading-order calculations with various parton distribution functions and have the sensitivity to discriminate between them.Comment: 38 pages in total, author list starting page 22, 5 figures, 4 tables, submitted to EPJC. All figures including auxiliary figures are available at https://atlas.web.cern.ch/Atlas/GROUPS/PHYSICS/PAPERS/STDM-2017-13