Development of acoustically lined ejector technology for multitube jet noise suppressor nozzles by model and engine tests over a wide range of jet pressure ratios and temperatures

An experimental program comprising model nozzle and full-scale engine tests was undertaken to acquire parametric data for acoustically lined ejectors applied to primary jet noise suppression. Ejector lining design technology and acoustical scaling of lined ejector configurations were the major objectives. Ground static tests were run with a J-75 turbojet engine fitted with a 37-tube, area ratio 3.3 suppressor nozzle and two lengths of ejector shroud (L/D = 1 and 2). Seven ejector lining configurations were tested over the engine pressure ratio range of 1.40 to 2.40 with corresponding jet velocities between 305 and 610 M/sec. One-fourth scale model nozzles were tested over a pressure ratio range of 1.40 to 4.0 with jet total temperatures between ambient and 1088 K. Scaling of multielement nozzle ejector configurations was also studied using a single element of the nozzle array with identical ejector lengths and lining materials. Acoustic far field and near field data together with nozzle thrust performance and jet aerodynamic flow profiles are presented

Sequence variation and haplotypes of lipoxygenase gene LOX-1 in the Australian barley varieties

Background Lipoxygenases are a family of enzymes which catalyse the hydroperoxidation of polyunsaturated fatty acids with a cis, cis-1,4-pentadiene to form conjugated hydroperoxydienes. Lipoxygenase-1 (LOX-1) in barley worsens the flavour and foam stability of beer. It has become a major selection criteria for malting quality in the last few years. Results Lipoxygenase activity was investigated in 41 Australian barley cultivars and advanced breeding lines released since the 1950s; the cultivars differed markedly, ranging from 22.3 to 46.5 U/g. The structural gene and its promoter of lipoxygenase-1 were sequenced from the barley varieties representing different levels of LOX. Based on the analysis of nucleotide and deduced amino acid sequences, two major haplotypes were identified. Barley varieties with lower LOX were classified into three categories based on their pedigrees and sequence variations in the structural gene: (1) barley varieties derived from Canadian varieties with the pre-harvest sprouting susceptible allele, (2) Skiff and Hindmarsh with unique haplotype in the structural gene, and (3) Gairdner and Onslow with an unknown mechanism. Conclusion Lipoxygenase activity has been reduced in the malting barley cultivars in the last 60 years although it is only recognized as a malting quality trait recently. There are clear haplotypes of the lipoxygenase structual gene. The polymorphisms detected in the structural gene can be used to design molecular markers for selection of low LOX haplotype. Other mechanisms also existed for controlling lipoxygenase activity. The results suggest that it is possible to develop barley varieties with lower LOX by combination of low LOX-1 haplotype and other trans-regulation factors

Genotype-informed estimation of risk of coronary heart disease based on genome-wide association data linked to the electronic medical record

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Susceptibility variants identified by genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have modest effect sizes. Whether such variants provide incremental information in assessing risk for common 'complex' diseases is unclear. We investigated whether measured and imputed genotypes from a GWAS dataset linked to the electronic medical record alter estimates of coronary heart disease (CHD) risk.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Study participants (<it>n </it>= 1243) had no known cardiovascular disease and were considered to be at high, intermediate, or low 10-year risk of CHD based on the Framingham risk score (FRS) which includes age, sex, total and HDL cholesterol, blood pressure, diabetes, and smoking status. Of twelve SNPs identified in prior GWAS to be associated with CHD, four were genotyped in the participants as part of a GWAS. Genotypes for seven SNPs were imputed from HapMap CEU population using the program MACH. We calculated a multiplex genetic risk score for each patient based on the odds ratios of the susceptibility SNPs and incorporated this into the FRS.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The mean (SD) number of risk alleles was 12.31 (1.95), range 6-18. The mean (SD) of the weighted genetic risk score was 12.64 (2.05), range 5.75-18.20. The CHD genetic risk score was not correlated with the FRS (<it>P </it>= 0.78). After incorporating the genetic risk score into the FRS, a total of 380 individuals (30.6%) were reclassified into higher-(188) or lower-risk groups (192).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>A genetic risk score based on measured/imputed genotypes at 11 susceptibility SNPs, led to significant reclassification in the 10-y CHD risk categories. Additional prospective studies are needed to assess accuracy and clinical utility of such reclassification.</p

Assessing Biofuel Crop Invasiveness: A Case Study

BACKGROUND: There is widespread interest in biofuel crops as a solution to the world's energy needs, particularly in light of concerns over greenhouse-gas emissions. Despite reservations about their adverse environmental impacts, no attempt has been made to quantify actual, relative or potential invasiveness of terrestrial biofuel crops at an appropriate regional or international scale, and their planting continues to be largely unregulated. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Using a widely accepted weed risk assessment system, we analyzed a comprehensive list of regionally suitable biofuel crops to show that seventy percent have a high risk of becoming invasive versus one-quarter of non-biofuel plant species and are two to four times more likely to establish wild populations locally or be invasive in Hawaii or in other locations with a similar climate. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Because of climatic and ecological similarities, predictions of biofuel crop invasiveness in Hawaii are applicable to other vulnerable island and subtropical ecosystems worldwide. We demonstrate the utility of an accessible and scientifically proven risk assessment protocol that allows users to predict if introduced species will become invasive in their region of interest. Other evidence supports the contention that propagule pressure created by extensive plantings will exacerbate invasions, a scenario expected with large-scale biofuel crop cultivation. Proactive measures, such as risk assessments, should be employed to predict invasion risks, which could then be mitigated via implementation of appropriate planting policies and adoption of the "polluter-pays" principle

Crop Updates 2001 - Grower Booklet

1. Strategies for leaf disease management in wheat, Jatinderpal Bhathal1, Cameron Weeks2, Kith Jayasena1 and Robert Loughman1, 1Agriculture Western Australia. 2Mingenew-Irwin Group Inc. 2. Burn stubble windrows: to diagnose soil fertility problems, Bill Bowden, Chris Gazey and Ross Brennan, Agriculture Western Australia 3. Rainfall – what happened in 2000 and the prospects for 2001, Ian Foster, Agriculture Western Australia 4. Strategies for leaf disease management in malting barley, K. Jayasena1, Q. Knight2 and R. Loughman1, 1Agriculture Western Australia, 2IAMA Agribusiness 5. Planning your cropping program in season 2001, Dr Ross Kingwell, Agriculture Western Australia and University of Western Australia 6. Rotational crops and varieties for management of root lesion nematodes in Western Australia, S.B. Sharma, S. Kelly and R. Loughman, Crop Improvement Institute, Agriculture Western Australia 7. When and where to grow oats, Glenn McDonald, Agriculture Western Australia 8. Managing Gairdner barley for quality, Kevin Young and Blakely Paynter, Agriculture Western Australia FARMING SYSTEMS, PASTURES AND WEEDS 9.Evaluation of pasture species for phase pasture systems, Keith Devenish, Agriculture Western Australia 10. Competitiveness of wild radish in a wheat – lupin rotation, Abul Hashem, Nerys Wilkins, and Terry Piper, Agriculture Western Australia 11. Can we eradicate barley grass? Sally Peltzer, Agriculture Western Australia 12. Short term pasture phase for weed control, Clinton Revell and Candy Hudson, Agriculture Western Australia 13. Herbicide tolerance of some annual pasture legumes adapted to coarse textured sandy soils, Clinton Revell and Ian Rose, Agriculture Western Australia 14. Integrated weed management: Cadoux, Alexandra Wallace, Agriculture Western Australia LUPINS 15. Inter-row knockdowns for profitable lupins, Paul Blackwell, Agriculture Western Australia and Miles Obst, farmer, Mingenew 16.. Wild radish – the implications for our rotations, Dr David Bowran, Centre for Cropping Systems 17. Lupin variety performance: Are you making the most of it? Bevan J. Buirchell, Senior Plant Breeder, Agriculture Western Australia 18. Anthracnose in lupins – understanding the risk, Moin Salam, Art Diggle, Geoff Thomas, Mark Sweetingham and Bill O’Neill, Agriculture Western Australia OILSEEDS 19. Effect of stubble, seeding technique and seed size on crop establishment and yield of canola, Rafiul Alam, Glen Riethmuller and Greg Hamilton, Agriculture Western Australia 20. Canola – More responses to lime, Chris Gazey and Paul Carmody,Agriculture Western Australia 22. Performance of new canola varieties in AGWEST variety trials in 2000, G. Walton, Crop Improvement Institute, Agriculture Western Australia PULSES 23. The ascochyta management package for 2001, B. MacLeod, Agriculture Western Australia 24. Herbicide tolerance of new field pea varieties and lines, M. Seymour, H. Dhammu, T. Piper, D. Nicholson, M. D\u27Antuono, Agriculture Western Australi

Genome-Wide Association Studies in Atherosclerosis

Cardiovascular disease remains the major cause of worldwide morbidity and mortality. Its pathophysiology is complex and multifactorial. Because the phenotype of cardiovascular disease often shows a marked heritable pattern, it is likely that genetic factors play an important role. In recent years, large genome-wide association studies have been conducted to decipher the molecular mechanisms underlying this heritable and prevalent phenotype. The emphasis of this review is on the recently identified 17 susceptibility loci for coronary artery disease. Implications of their discovery for biology and clinical medicine are discussed. A description of the landscape of human genetics in the near future in the context of next-generation sequence technologies is provided at the conclusion of this review

Predicting the Risk of Rheumatoid Arthritis and Its Age of Onset through Modelling Genetic Risk Variants with Smoking

The improved characterisation of risk factors for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) suggests they could be combined to identify individuals at increased disease risks in whom preventive strategies may be evaluated. We aimed to develop an RA prediction model capable of generating clinically relevant predictive data and to determine if it better predicted younger onset RA (YORA). Our novel modelling approach combined odds ratios for 15 four-digit/10 two-digit HLA-DRB1 alleles, 31 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and ever-smoking status in males to determine risk using computer simulation and confidence interval based risk categorisation. Only males were evaluated in our models incorporating smoking as ever-smoking is a significant risk factor for RA in men but not women. We developed multiple models to evaluate each risk factor's impact on prediction. Each model's ability to discriminate anti-citrullinated protein antibody (ACPA)-positive RA from controls was evaluated in two cohorts: Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium (WTCCC: 1,516 cases; 1,647 controls); UK RA Genetics Group Consortium (UKRAGG: 2,623 cases; 1,500 controls). HLA and smoking provided strongest prediction with good discrimination evidenced by an HLA-smoking model area under the curve (AUC) value of 0.813 in both WTCCC and UKRAGG. SNPs provided minimal prediction (AUC 0.660 WTCCC/0.617 UKRAGG). Whilst high individual risks were identified, with some cases having estimated lifetime risks of 86%, only a minority overall had substantially increased odds for RA. High risks from the HLA model were associated with YORA (P<0.0001); ever-smoking associated with older onset disease. This latter finding suggests smoking's impact on RA risk manifests later in life. Our modelling demonstrates that combining risk factors provides clinically informative RA prediction; additionally HLA and smoking status can be used to predict the risk of younger and older onset RA, respectively

Crop Updates 2001 - Cereals

This session covers forty two papers from different authors: PLENARY 1. Planning your cropping program in season 2001, Dr Ross Kingwell, Agriculture Western Australia and University of Western Australia WORKSHOP 2. Can we produce high yields without high inputs? Wal Anderson, Centre for Cropping Systems, Agriculture Western Australia VARIETIES 3. Local and interstate wheat variety performance and $ return to WA growers, Eddy Pol, Peter Burgess and Ashley Bacon, Agritech Crop Research CROP ESTABLISHMENT 4 Soil management of waterlogged soils, D.M. Bakker, G.J. Hamilton, D. Houlbrooke and C. Spann, Agriculture Western Australia 5. Effect of soil amelioration on wheat yield in a very dry season, M.A Hamza and W.K. Anderson, Agriculture Western Australia 6. Fuzzy tramlines for more yield and less weed, Paul Blackwell1 and Maurice Black2 1Agriculture Western Australia, 2Harbour Lights Estate, Geraldton 7. Tramline farming for dollar benefits, Paul Blackwell, Agriculture Western Australia NUTRITION 8. Soil immobile nutrients for no-till crops, M.D.A. Bolland1, R.F. Brennan1,and W.L. Crabtree2, 1Agriculture Western Australia, 2Western Australian No-Tillage Farmers Association 9. Burn stubble windrows: to diagnose soil fertility problems, Bill Bowden, Chris Gazey and Ross Brennan, Agriculture Western Australia 10. Calcium: magnesium ratios; are they important? Bill Bowden1, Rochelle Strahan2, Bob Gilkes2 and Zed Rengel2 1Agriculture Western Australia, 2Department of Soil Science and Plant Nutrition, UWA 11. Responses to late foliar applications of Flexi-N, Stephen Loss, Tim O’Dea, Patrick Gethin, Ryan Guthrie, Lisa Leaver, CSBP futurefarm 12. A comparison of Flexi-N placements, Stephen Loss, Tim O’Dea, Patrick Gethin, Ryan Guthrie, Lisa Leaver, CSBP futurefarm 13. What is the best way to apply potassium? Stephen Loss, Tim O’Dea, Patrick Gethin, Ryan Guthrie, CSBP futurefarm 14. Claying affects potassium nutrition in barley, Stephen Loss, David Phelps, Tim O’Dea, Patrick Gethin, Ryan Guthrie, Lisa Leaver, CSBP futurefarm 15. Nitrogen and potassium improve oaten hay quality, Stephen Loss, Tim O’Dea, Patrick Gethin, Ryan Guthrie, Lisa Leaver, CSBP futurefarm AGRONOMY 16. Agronomic responses of new wheat varieties in the northern wheatbelt, Darshan Sharma and Wal Anderson, Agriculture Western Australia 17. Wheat agronomy research on the south coast, Mohammad Amjad and Wal Anderson, Agriculture Western Australia 18. Influence of sowing date on wheat yield and quality in the south coast environment, Mohammad Amjadand Wal Anderson, Agriculture Western Australia 19. More profit from durum, Md.Shahajahan Miyan and Wal Anderson, Agriculture Western Australia 20. Enhancing recommendations of flowering and yield in wheat, JamesFisher1, Senthold Asseng2, Bill Bowden1 and Michael Robertson3 ,1AgricultureWestern Australia, 2CSIRO Plant Industry, 3CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems 21. When and where to grow oats, Glenn McDonald, Agriculture Western Australia 22. Managing Gaidner barley for quality, Kevin Young and Blakely Paynter, Agriculture Western Australia PESTS AND DISEASES 23. Strategies for leaf disease management in wheat, Jatinderpal Bhathal1, Cameron Weeks2, Kith Jayasena1 and Robert Loughman1 ,1Agriculture Western Australia. 2Mingenew-Irwin Group Inc 24. Strategies for leaf disease management in malting barley, K. Jayasena1, Q. Knight2 and R. Loughman1, 1Agriculture Western Australia, 2IAMA Agribusiness 25. Cereal disease diagnostics, Dominie Wright and Nichole Burges, Agriculture Western Australia 26. The big rust: Did you get your money back!! Peter Burgess, Agritech Crop Research 27. Jockey – winning the race against disease in wheat, Lisa-Jane Blacklow, Rob Hulme and Rob Giffith, Aventis CropScience 28. Distribution and incidence of aphids and barley yellow dwarf virus in over-summering grasses in WA wheatbelt, Jenny Hawkes and Roger Jones, CLIMA and Agriculture Western Australia 29. Further developments in forecasting aphid and virus risk in cereals, Debbie Thackray, Jenny Hawkes and Roger Jones, Agriculture Western Australia and Centre for Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture 30. Effect of root lesion nematodes on wheat yields in Western Australia, S. B. Sharma, S. Kelly and R. Loughman, Crop Improvement Institute, Agriculture Western Australia 31. Rotational crops and varieties for management of root lesion nematodes in Western Australia, S.B. Sharma, S. Kelly and R. Loughman, Crop Improvement Institute, Agriculture Western Australia WEEDS 32. Phenoxy herbicide tolerance of wheat, Peter Newman and Dave Nicholson, Agriculture Western Australia 33. Tolerance of wheat to phenoxy herbicides,Harmohinder S. Dhammu, Terry Piper and Mario F. D\u27Antuono, Agriculture Western Australia 34. Herbicide tolerance of durum wheats, Harmohinder S. Dhammu, Terry Piper and David Nicholson, Agriculture Western Australia 35. Herbicide tolerance of new wheats, Harmohinder S. Dhammu, Terry Piper and David F. Nicholson, Agriculture Western Australia BREEDING 36. Towards molecular breeding of barley: construction of a molecular genetic map, Mehmet Cakir1, Nick Galwey1, David Poulsen2, Garry Ablett3, Reg Lance4, Rob Potter5 and Peter Langridge6,1Plant Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture, UWA, 2Queensland Department of Primary Industries, Qld, 3Centre for Plant Conservation Genetics Southern Cross University, Lismore NSW, 5SABC Murdoch University, WA, 6Department of Plant Science University of Adelaide, Glen Osmond SA 37. Toward molecular breeding of barley: Identifying markers linked to genes for quantitative traits, Mehmet Cakir1, Nick Galwey1, David Poulsen2, Reg Lance3, Garry Ablett4, Greg Platz2, Joe Panozzo5, Barbara Read6, David Moody5, Andy Barr7 and Peter Langridge7 , 1Plant Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture, UWA, 2Queensland Department of Primary Industries, Warwick, QLD,3Agriculture Western Australia, 4Centre for Plant Conservation Genetics, Southern Cross University, Lismore NSW, 5VIDA Private Bag 260, Horsham VIC, 6NSW Dept. of Agriculture, Wagga Wagga NSW, 7Department of Plant Science, University of Adelaide, Glen Osmond SA 38. Can we improve grain yield by breeding for greater early vigour in wheat? Tina Botwright1, Tony Condon1, Robin Wilson2 and Iain Barclay2, 1CSIRO Plant Industry, 2Agriculture Western Australia MARKETING AND QUALITY 39. The Crop Improvement Royalty, Howard Carr, Agriculture Western Australia 40. GrainGuardÔ - The development of a protection plan for the wheat industry, Greg Shea, Agriculture Western Australia CLIMATE 41. Rainfall – what happened in 2000 and the prospects for 2001, Ian Foster, Agriculture Western Australia 42. Software for climate management issues, David Tennant,Agriculture Western Australia CONTRIBUTING AUTHOR CONTACT DETAIL

Genetic Signatures of Exceptional Longevity in Humans

Like most complex phenotypes, exceptional longevity is thought to reflect a combined influence of environmental (e.g., lifestyle choices, where we live) and genetic factors. To explore the genetic contribution, we undertook a genome-wide association study of exceptional longevity in 801 centenarians (median age at death 104 years) and 914 genetically matched healthy controls. Using these data, we built a genetic model that includes 281 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and discriminated between cases and controls of the discovery set with 89% sensitivity and specificity, and with 58% specificity and 60% sensitivity in an independent cohort of 341 controls and 253 genetically matched nonagenarians and centenarians (median age 100 years). Consistent with the hypothesis that the genetic contribution is largest with the oldest ages, the sensitivity of the model increased in the independent cohort with older and older ages (71% to classify subjects with an age at death>102 and 85% to classify subjects with an age at death>105). For further validation, we applied the model to an additional, unmatched 60 centenarians (median age 107 years) resulting in 78% sensitivity, and 2863 unmatched controls with 61% specificity. The 281 SNPs include the SNP rs2075650 in TOMM40/APOE that reached irrefutable genome wide significance (posterior probability of association = 1) and replicated in the independent cohort. Removal of this SNP from the model reduced the accuracy by only 1%. Further in-silico analysis suggests that 90% of centenarians can be grouped into clusters characterized by different “genetic signatures” of varying predictive values for exceptional longevity. The correlation between 3 signatures and 3 different life spans was replicated in the combined replication sets. The different signatures may help dissect this complex phenotype into sub-phenotypes of exceptional longevity

The severity of pandemic H1N1 influenza in the United States, from April to July 2009: A Bayesian analysis

Background: Accurate measures of the severity of pandemic (H1N1) 2009 influenza (pH1N1) are needed to assess the likely impact of an anticipated resurgence in the autumn in the Northern Hemisphere. Severity has been difficult to measure because jurisdictions with large numbers of deaths and other severe outcomes have had too many cases to assess the total number with confidence. Also, detection of severe cases may be more likely, resulting in overestimation of the severity of an average case. We sought to estimate the probabilities that symptomatic infection would lead to hospitalization, ICU admission, and death by combining data from multiple sources. Methods and Findings: We used complementary data from two US cities: Milwaukee attempted to identify cases of medically attended infection whether or not they required hospitalization, while New York City focused on the identification of hospitalizations, intensive care admission or mechanical ventilation (hereafter, ICU), and deaths. New York data were used to estimate numerators for ICU and death, and two sources of data - medically attended cases in Milwaukee or self-reported influenza-like illness (ILI) in New York - were used to estimate ratios of symptomatic cases to hospitalizations. Combining these data with estimates of the fraction detected for each level of severity, we estimated the proportion of symptomatic patients who died (symptomatic case-fatality ratio, sCFR), required ICU (sCIR), and required hospitalization (sCHR), overall and by age category. Evidence, prior information, and associated uncertainty were analyzed in a Bayesian evidence synthesis framework. Using medically attended cases and estimates of the proportion of symptomatic cases medically attended, we estimated an sCFR of 0.048% (95% credible interval [CI] 0.026%-0.096%), sCIR of 0.239% (0.134%-0.458%), and sCHR of 1.44% (0.83%-2.64%). Using self-reported ILI, we obtained estimates approximately 7-96lower. sCFR and sCIR appear to be highest in persons aged 18 y and older, and lowest in children aged 5-17 y. sCHR appears to be lowest in persons aged 5-17; our data were too sparse to allow us to determine the group in which it was the highest. Conclusions: These estimates suggest that an autumn-winter pandemic wave of pH1N1 with comparable severity per case could lead to a number of deaths in the range from considerably below that associated with seasonal influenza to slightly higher, but with the greatest impact in children aged 0-4 and adults 18-64. These estimates of impact depend on assumptions about total incidence of infection and would be larger if incidence of symptomatic infection were higher or shifted toward adults, if viral virulence increased, or if suboptimal treatment resulted from stress on the health care system; numbers would decrease if the total proportion of the population symptomatically infected were lower than assumed.published_or_final_versio