Bromate determination by X-Ray fluorescence (XRF) to identify pre-baking potassium bromate addition in bread

Wavelength-dispersive x-ray fluorescence (WDXRF) was applied to determine bromate (Br) as an indication of pre-baking bromate addition in bread. The proposed methodology needed a minimum sample preparation procedure because it was carried out directly on solid samples. The calibration of Br in bread obtained showed low detection limit and high sensitivity to distinguish precisely Br concentrations greater than natural Br. The excellent performance of the present methodology would be useful to identify pre-baking bromation in bread, which can be used to help set up a programme to control bromation in bread. Application of this methodology to bakery control caused an important reduction of bromate use in province of Cordoba, Argentina.Fil: Perez, Roberto Daniel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola; ArgentinaFil: Leon, Alberto Edel. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Ciencias Agropecuarias; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Ciencia y Tecnología de Alimentos Córdoba. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Ciencias Químicas. Instituto de Ciencia y Tecnología de Alimentos Córdoba; Argentin

Sediment transport processes in the Naposta Grande creek, Bahia Blanca, Buenos Aires province

Se presentan resultados hidráulicos y sedimentológicos de una campaña al arroyo Naposta Grande. A pesar que existe un gran número de obras hidráulicas sobre el curso inferior del arroyo, no existen aún datos publicados acerca del caudal sólido transportados por el mismo. Se ubicó una sección de aforo adecuada, sobre la cual se determinó la batimetrÌa del área. Se midieron las velocidades en verticales separadas 0.5 m en toda la sección y a partir de estos valores se determinaron las curvas de igual velocidad en la sección con las que se calculó el caudal y la distribución de los esfuerzos de corte del fondo. Se obtuvieron muestras del sedimento transportado como carga de fondo por medio de trampas, verificándose transporte diferentes en cada faja. Paralelamente se calculó el transporte como carga de fondo por medio de cuatro diferentes ecuaciones y se comparó con los valores medidos, determinándose cual de las ecuaciones predijo mejor el valor del transporte. De las muestras de sedimento en suspensión se realizaron las curvas granulométricas y se calculó la velocidad de caída ponderada de esos sedimentos. Se estimó la concentración y el transporte de sedimento en suspensión por el método de difusión, determinándose además la distribución de concentraciones en la sección de aforo. Las características particulares del transporte en el curso inferior de arroyo Naposta llevan necesaria mente a determinar el transporte como carga de fondo en distintas fajas ya que la influencia de las orillas provoca una considerable diferencia en el transporte entre la zona de mayor profundidad y las zonas cercanas a las orillas, haciendo riesgoso considerar una sola posición como representativa de la sección en su totalidad. Las comparaciones entre las fórmulas de predicción de transporte como carga de fondo sugieren como la más adecuada a la de Einstein aunque predice en defecto. Le siguen las formulas de Yalin y de Bagnold. La fórmula suiza arrojó resultados muy por encima de los reales, debiéndose esto a que la arena del arroyo es muy fina y dicha ecuación es valida para partículas relativamente grandes (D>2 mm).Hydraulic and sedimentological results of a field survey to the Napostá Grande Creek are presented. The lower, highly meandering course flows through Bahía Blanca City. This part of the creek is greatly affected by hydraulic man-made features such as railways, car and walking bridges, canalisations, a structure that separates the extreme flood water, urban rainwater collection, cleaning, etc. In addition, sand is being extracted from the channel for construction. Despite the remarkable influence that the stream has on the city, there are no quantitative records of the sediment transport within the stream. The objective of this work is to determine the liquid an solid flux over a section, evaluate the dynamic and turbulent characteristics of the flux, find a proper methodology suitable for this particular situation and define a formulation that predicts most accurately the bed load transport in the Napostá Creek. A proper cross-section after a recognition walk along several kilometres along the course of water has been done. As the stream shows several meanders it was difficult to locate an ideal cross section. The one chosen had some problems from the hydraulic point of view (partially symmetrical area, presence of a sand bar located in a rather short straight length), but on the other hand, the accessibility was excellent with available electric supply. Bathymetry of the surrounding area was carried out and a map was produced with isobaths with 0.5 m equidistance. Velocities at vertical profiles separated 0.5 m were obtained with a propeller along the cross-section and, based on these data, equal- velocity curves were drawn over the transversal section. These allowed the determination of the water flux and the bottom shear stress distribution along the cross section and wet perimeter. Within the section, bedload sediment transport was sampled using Helley-Smith kind bedload traps, at various locations, confirming different transport rates at each point. Traps gathered the sediments over 13 minute at each strip in five points, which led to a distribution of the sediment dragged close to the bottom. Higher transport rates were verified on the section thalweg diminishing shorewards. Granulometric curves were determined for the bed load samples and bottom ones. The coarser sediment was trapped only near the thalweg where there is an important velocity concentration. Close to the shores, only the finer fraction of the bedload was captured by the traps meaning that the energy available there does not involve all particle sizes in the movement. Calculation of the predicted bedload sediment transport was done, considering four well known equations (Meyer- Peter-Muller, Einstein, Bagnold and Yalin).The D50 criteria was adopted for the calculation of the bedload. The Swiss formula gave a 100% error in comparison with the measured values, whereas the rest of them showed great accuracy for the methodology employed. Einstein's formula gave the closest value to the measured one but underestimated it. On the other hand Bagnold's equation resulted in 17 % in excess. Yalin's formula produced a 15% understimation, about the same order than Einstein's formulation. Suspended sediment samples were obtained and their granulometry determined through the Oden's Curve technique. Based on them, weighted settling velocities were calculated for each sample (Perez et al., 1997). Suspended sediment concentration profiles were determined by the diffusion method. Then the concentration distribution was integrated over the area so that total flux and flux distribution were obtained. Also a grid was calculated and curves of equal flux are presented. Net suspended sediment transport across the area was found as the addition of the two kind of transports.Fil: Perez Enrri, Daniel Roberto. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Sur; ArgentinaFil: Perillo, Gerardo Miguel E.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Sur; Argentin

Two new mountain lizard species of the Phymaturus genus (Squamata: Iguania) from northwestern Patagonia, Argentina

Se describen dos especies nuevas de lagartijas saxícolas y vivíparas del género Phymaturus de Patagonia. Las nuevas especies son miembros del grupo de especies Phymaturus patagonicus distribuido solamente en mesetas y montañas volcánicas del sur de Argentina. Phymaturus sitesi sp. nov. difiere de todos los otros miembros del grupo patagonicus por su patrón dorsal único de pequeñas manchas blancas sobre un fondo marrón claro y su distribución geográfica alopátrica. La ausencia de dicromatismo sexual diferencia Phymaturus sitesi sp. nov. de P. payuniae, P. zapalensis, y P. delheyi sp. nov. y el numero de escamas alrededor del cuerpo lo diferencia de P. delheyi sp. nov. y P. nevadoi (con alguna superposición). También Phymaturus sitesi sp. nov. tiene menos escamas ventrales que P. delheyi sp. nov. Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. puede ser distinguido de otras especies del grupo patagonicus por su patrón dorsal único de manchas de mediano tamaño sobre un fondo oscuro y distribución alopátrica. La presencia de dicromatismo sexual diferencia Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. de P. sitesi sp. nov. y P. nevadoi. El numero de escamas alrededor del cuerpo diferencian Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. de P. payuniae y P. sitesi sp. nov. También el numero de escamas ventrales diferencia Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. de P. sitesi sp. nov. y P. nevadoi (con alguna superposición).Two new species of lizards of the saxicolous and viviparous genus Phymaturus from Patagonia are described. The new species are members of the Phymaturus patagonicus species group distributed only in volcanic plateaus and mountains of southern Argentina. Phymaturus sitesi sp. nov. differs from all other members of the patagonicus group in its unique dorsal pattern of small white spots on a light-gray to brown-gray background and allopatric geographical distribution. Absence of sexual dichromatism differentiated Phymaturus sitesi sp. nov. from P. payuniae, P. zapalensis, and P. delheyi n. sp. , and the midbody scales count differentiated from the P. delheyi sp. nov. and P. nevadoi (with some overlap). Also Phymaturus sitesi sp. nov. presents lower count in the ventral scales than in P. delheyi sp. nov. Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. can be distinguished from other species of the patagonicus group by unique dorsal pattern of medium size white spots on a dark-brown background and allopatric distribution. The presence of sexual dichromatism differentiates Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. from P. sitesi sp. nov. and P. nevadoi. Scales around midbody differentiated Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. from P. payuniae and P. sitesi sp. nov. Also ventral scale count differentiated Phymaturus delheyi sp. nov. from P. sitesi sp. nov. and P. nevadoi (with some overlap).Fil: Avila, Luciano Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Nacional Patagónico; ArgentinaFil: Perez, Cristian Hernan Fulvio. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Nacional Patagónico; ArgentinaFil: Perez, Daniel Roberto. Universidad Nacional del Comahue; ArgentinaFil: Morando, Mariana. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Nacional Patagónico; Argentin

Quantitative evaluation of artifact removal in real magnetoencephalogram signals with blind source separation

The magnetoencephalogram (MEG) is contaminated with undesired signals, which are called artifacts. Some of the most important ones are the cardiac and the ocular artifacts (CA and OA, respectively), and the power line noise (PLN). Blind source separation (BSS) has been used to reduce the influence of the artifacts in the data. There is a plethora of BSS-based artifact removal approaches, but few comparative analyses. In this study, MEG background activity from 26 subjects was processed with five widespread BSS (AMUSE, SOBI, JADE, extended Infomax, and FastICA) and one constrained BSS (cBSS) techniques. Then, the ability of several combinations of BSS algorithm, epoch length, and artifact detection metric to automatically reduce the CA, OA, and PLN were quantified with objective criteria. The results pinpointed to cBSS as a very suitable approach to remove the CA. Additionally, a combination of AMUSE or SOBI and artifact detection metrics based on entropy or power criteria decreased the OA. Finally, the PLN was reduced by means of a spectral metric. These findings confirm the utility of BSS to help in the artifact removal for MEG background activity

Liolaemus grosseorum : Diet

Liolaemus grosseorum is a member of the boulengeri group of Liolaemus and is an ovipa-rous and insectivorous mid-sized lizard (max SVL = 55 mm; Etheridge 2001. Cuad. Herpetol. 15:3–15). It is distributed in four of Argentina’s provinces: Mendoza, La Pampa, Neuquén, and Río Negro (Pérez et al. 2018. Cuad. Herpetol. 32:141–143).Fil: Brizio, María Victoria. Universidad Nacional del Comahue. Facultad de Ciencias del Ambiente y la Salud; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Perez, Daniel Roberto. Universidad Nacional del Comahue. Facultad de Ciencias del Ambiente y la Salud; ArgentinaFil: Avila, Luciano Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Centro Nacional Patagónico. Instituto Patagónico para el Estudio de los Ecosistemas Continentales; Argentin

Dark matter candidates in the NMSSM with RH neutrino superfields

R-parity conserving supersymmetric models with right-handed (RH) neutrinos are very appealing since they could naturally explain neutrino physics and also provide a good dark matter (DM) candidate such as the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP). In this work we consider the next-to-minimal supersymmetric standard model (NMSSM) plus RH neutrino superfields, with effective Majorana masses dynamically generated at the electroweak scale (EW). We perform a scan of the relevant parameter space and study both possible DM candidates: RH sneutrino and neutralino. Especially for the case of RH sneutrino DM we analyse the intimate relation between both candidates to obtain the correct amount of relic density. Besides the well-known resonances, annihilations through scalar quartic couplings and coannihilation mechanisms with all kind of neutralinos, are crucial. Finally, we present the impact of current and future direct and indirect detection experiments on both DM candidates.Comment: Version published in JCAP, 40 pages, 8 figures, 6 table

Molecular phylogenetic relationships of the Liolaemus rothi complex and a new species of lizard from Auca Mahuida Volcano (Squamata: Liolaemini)

A new species of lizard of the genus Liolaemus from Neuquén Province, western Argentina, is described. The new species is a member of the Liolaemus rothi species complex, and mitochondrial and nuclear molecular data show it as sister taxon of the clade composed of (L. hermannunezi (L. tromen + L. loboi)), differing in size, squamation, coloration, and sexual dimorphism from the other species of this group. Liolaemus sitesi sp. nov. has a dark body coloration with series of notched blotches on the dorsum, with bright spots, and a very iridescent yellow-green coloration in natural light. Liolaemus sitesi sp. nov. is found only in the Auca Mahuida volcano and is terrestrial, dwelling on the stony slopes with sandy soil between 1300 m and the volcano summit.Fil: Avila, Luciano Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Nacional Patagónico; ArgentinaFil: Olave, Melisa. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Nacional Patagónico; ArgentinaFil: Perez, Cristian Hernan Fulvio. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Nacional Patagónico; ArgentinaFil: Pérez, Daniel Roberto. Universidad Nacional del Comahue; ArgentinaFil: Morando, Mariana. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Nacional Patagónico; Argentin

Breast cancer analysis by confocal energy dispersive micro-XRD

In this work, the confocal energy dispersive micro-XRD technique has been employed to efficiently study differences between normal and malignant carcinomas in breast tissues. This technique has been implemented with low angular divergence glass monocapillaries in the excitation and detection channels. The microdiffractometer operates with a scattering angle of (20.3 ± 0.9)° that defines a cross section for analysis (0.178 mm × 0.175 mm), with a depth resolution of 1.18 mm. The obtained momentum transfer resolution between 3.9 and 10.9% was found to be highly useful to identify the scattering profiles of adipose tissues without any data processing. Differentiation between tissues with similar scattering profiles, such as fibroglandular and neoplastic tissues, has been achieved by processing the spectra within the framework of diffraction theory for scattering intensity. The obtained results allowed the development of a deterministic diagnostic model based on the evaluation of the depth profiles by confocal micro-XRD. In this model, the modulation of the scattering profiles caused by X-ray attenuation was analyzed to differentiate neoplastic tissues. The spatial resolution of the technique was the key aspect of the process, helping to detect variations in X-ray attenuation and to select uniform volume of analysis without superimposed scattering profiles.Fil: Escudero, Rodrigo Oscar. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola; ArgentinaFil: Cabral, María C.. Hospital Provincial Maternal Dr. Felipe Lucini; ArgentinaFil: Valladares, Mariana. Hospital Provincial Maternal Dr. Felipe Lucini; ArgentinaFil: Franco, María A.. Hospital Provincial Maternal Dr. Felipe Lucini; ArgentinaFil: Perez, Roberto Daniel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola; Argentin