Drilling of shallow marine sulfide-sulfate mineralisation in south-eastern Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy; Seafloor sulfides, Tyrrhenian Sea, highsulfidation; hydrothermal systems, Palinuro

Semi-massive to massive sulfides with abundant late native sulfur were drilled in a shallowwater hydrothermal system in an island arc volcanic setting at the Palinuro volcanic complex in the Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy. Overall, 12.7 m of sulfide mineralisation were drilled in a sediment-filled depression at a water depth of 630 - 650 m using the lander-type Rockdrill I drill rig of the British Geological Survey. Polymetallic (Zn, Pb, Sb, As, Ag) sulfides overlie massive pyrite. The massive sulfide mineralisation contains a number of atypical minerals, including enargite-famatinite, tennantite-tetrahedrite, stibnite, bismuthinite, and Pb-,Sb-, and Ag-sulfosalts, that do not commonly occur in mid-ocean ridge massive sulfides. Analogous to subaerial epithermal deposits, the occurrence of these minerals and the presence of abundant native sulfur suggest an intermediate to high sulfidation and/or high oxididation state of the hydrothermal fluids in contrast to the near-neutral and reducing fluids from which base metal-rich massive sulfides along mid-ocean ridges typically form. Oxidised conditions during sulfide deposition are likely related to the presence of magmatic volatiles in the mineralising fluids that were derived from a degassing magma chamber below the Palinuro volcanic complex

Differential patterns of PMN-elastase and type III procollagen peptide in knee joint effusions due to acute and chronic sports injuries

In 38 traumatic knee joint effusions the proteolytic enzyme PMN-elastase (PMN-E) and the repair marker procollagen III aminoterminal peptide (PIIINP) were determined. According to the period between trauma and first aspiration of the effusion, the patients were divided into 3 groups. Group I (17 patients; period between trauma and first aspiration not longer than 72 hours) showed high concentrations of PMN-E (up to 5400 ng/ml) and low concentrations of PIIINP (<13 U/ml). Group II (11 patients; aspiration within 4 to 14 days) had mean PMN-E and PIIINP concentrations of 125.6 ng/ml and 52.1 U/ ml, respectively. In group III (10 patients, aspiration after 14 days) mean PMN-E concentration was 123.8 ng/ml and mean PIIINP concentration was 63.4 U/ml. Graphic depiction of PMN-E and PIIINP levels in each individual sample as a function of time between trauma and fluid collection revealed highly increasing PMN-E levels during the first 24 posttraumatic hours, followed by rapidly decreasing levels within 72 hours post trauma, and no change after the 4th posttraumatic day. In contrast, PIIINP increased continuously up to the first posttraumatic week and stayed at high levels up to 90 days (end of the observation period). The differential patterns of PMN-E and PIIINP concentration in knee joint effusions may be useful in estimating the period between trauma and first treatment (aspiration of effusion) and should, therefore, be helpful in detecting degenerative lesions, which seem to be characterized by low PMN-E concomitantly with high PIIINP levels

An unstructured CD-grid variational formulation for sea ice dynamics

For the numerical simulation of earth system models, Arakawa grids are largely employed. A quadrilateral mesh is assumed for their classical definition, and different types of grids are identified depending on the location of the discretized quantities. The B-grid has both velocity components at the center of a cell, the C-grid places the velocity components on the edges in a staggered fashion, and the D-grid is a ninety-degree rotation of a C-grid. Historically, B-grid formulations of sea ice dynamics have been dominant because they have matched the grid type used by ocean models. In recent years, as ocean models have increasingly progressed to C-grids, sea ice models have followed suit on quadrilateral meshes, but few if any implementations of unstructured C-grid sea ice models have been developed. In this work, we present an unstructured CD-grid type formulation of the elastic-viscous-plastic rheology, where the velocity unknowns are located at the edges, rather than at the vertices, as in the B-grid. The notion of a CD-grid has been recently introduced and assumes that the velocity components are co-located at the edges. The mesh cells in our analysis have $n$ sides, with $n$ greater than or equal to four. Numerical results are included to investigate the features of the proposed method. Our framework of choice is the Model for Prediction Across Scales (MPAS) within E3SM, the climate model of the U.S. Department of Energy, although our approach is general and could be applied to other models as well. While MPAS-Seaice is currently defined on a B-grid, MPAS-Ocean runs on a C-grid, hence interpolation operators are heavily used when coupled simulations are performed. The discretization introduced here aims at transitioning the dynamics of MPAS-Seaice to a CD-grid, to ultimately facilitate improved coupling with MPAS-Ocean and reduce numerical errors associated with this communication

Effects of Supplementation Strategy and Dormant Season Grazing on Cattle Use of Mixed-Grass Prairie Habitats

Dormant season grazing reduces reliance on harvested feeds, but typically requires protein supplementation to be successful. However, information relating supplementation strategies to individual resource utilization on dormant forage is lacking.  Thus, the intent of this research is to examine cattle resource utilization, residual cover of vegetation and utilization on rangelands grazed during the dormant season under two supplementation strategies. Thirty transects were randomly located within each pasture for measuring vegetation composition, production, canopy cover and visual obstruction readings (VOR) pre and post grazing.  Grazing locations were monitored for seven individuals within each treatment with Lotek GPS collars containing head position sensors that record daily space use. Resource utilization effect size was variable by treatment and time period. Vegetation response to treatment was similar for both cake and protein treatments across time periods (44.2 ± 4.8% vs 41.7 ± 4.5%, 36.7 ± 4.8% vs 30.7 ± 4.3%, 10.4 ± 3.1% vs 16.5 ± 3.5%). VOR was affected by supplementation treatment during time period 1, such that protein treatment significantly decreased VOR in comparison to the Cake treatment (36.6 ± 5.6% vs 15.7 ± 3.6%). Herbaceous and ground cover effects were similar across both supplementation treatments during time periods 1 and 3, while time period 2, cake supplementation had greater percent decrease of litter cover than the protein treatment (28.2 ± 4.4% vs 10.4 ± 2.9%). This research addresses comprehensive agro-ecosystem responses of dormant season grazing while providing multidimensional insight to stakeholders concerning grazing behavior and the ecological impacts on Montana rangelands

On the Role of Global Warming on the Statistics of Record-Breaking Temperatures

We theoretically study long-term trends in the statistics of record-breaking daily temperatures and validate these predictions using Monte Carlo simulations and data from the city of Philadelphia, for which 126 years of daily temperature data is available. Using extreme statistics, we derive the number and the magnitude of record temperature events, based on the observed Gaussian daily temperatures distribution in Philadelphia, as a function of the number of elapsed years from the start of the data. We further consider the case of global warming, where the mean temperature systematically increases with time. We argue that the current warming rate is insufficient to measurably influence the frequency of record temperature events over the time range of the observations, a conclusion that is supported by numerical simulations and the Philadelphia temperature data.Comment: 11 pages, 6 figures, 2-column revtex4 format. For submission to Journal of Climate. Revised version has some new results and some errors corrected. Reformatted for Journal of Climate. Second revision has an added reference. In the third revision one sentence that explains the simulations is reworded for clarity. New revision 10/3/06 has considerable additions and new results. Revision on 11/8/06 contains a number of minor corrections and is the version that will appear in Phys. Rev.

Metabolic correlates of prevalent mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease in adults with Down syndrome.

IntroductionDisruption of metabolic function is a recognized feature of late onset Alzheimer's disease (LOAD). We sought to determine whether similar metabolic pathways are implicated in adults with Down syndrome (DS) who have increased risk for Alzheimer's disease (AD).MethodsWe examined peripheral blood from 292 participants with DS who completed baseline assessments in the Alzheimer's Biomarkers Consortium-Down Syndrome (ABC-DS) using untargeted mass spectrometry (MS). Our sample included 38 individuals who met consensus criteria for AD (DS-AD), 43 who met criteria for mild cognitive impairment (DS-MCI), and 211 who were cognitively unaffected and stable (CS).ResultsWe measured relative abundance of 8,805 features using MS and 180 putative metabolites were differentially expressed (DE) among the groups at false discovery rate-corrected q&lt; 0.05. From the DE features, a nine-feature classifier model classified the CS and DS-AD groups with receiver operating characteristic area under the curve (ROC AUC) of 0.86 and a two-feature model classified the DS-MCI and DS-AD groups with ROC AUC of 0.88. Metabolite set enrichment analysis across the three groups suggested alterations in fatty acid and carbohydrate metabolism.DiscussionOur results reveal metabolic alterations in DS-AD that are similar to those seen in LOAD. The pattern of results in this cross-sectional DS cohort suggests a dynamic time course of metabolic dysregulation which evolves with clinical progression from non-demented, to MCI, to AD. Metabolomic markers may be useful for staging progression of DS-AD

¿Cómo monitorear el movimiento del ganado en un mosaico de áreas boscosas con GPS en combinación con SIG?

El manejo de bosques de Piñon-Juniper (PJ) ocupa más de 30 millones de hectáreas en el oeste de Estados Unidos. Este ecosistema constituye un importante recurso para la producción y conservación de vida silvestre. Sin embargo, estos han cambiado considerablemente los últimos 30 años, principalmente para manejar ganado en pastoreo. El objetivo fue determinar la cobertura de dosel (TCC) y monitorear, durante la primavera, el uso del ganado del paisaje arbolado. El estudio se realizó en una pastura de 146 ha de la zona central de Nuevo México. La TCC de PJ se determinó a partir de ortofotos digitales recientes usando Feature Analyst® para ArcGIS® 9.1. El sitio de estudio fue segmentado en celdas de 1 ha para mapear cobertura arbórea. Ocho vacas, equipadas con GPS, fueron rastreadas durante 31 días a intervalos de 5 min. Una sección de la pastura con cobertura arbórea mayor que 30 % se utilizó para describir la relación distribución de pastoreo y cobertura de dosel. Se encontró una relación exponencial negativa significativa entre TCC y el uso relativo del ganado (y = 450,41e-12,329x). La cubierta arbórea explicó 50,1 % de la variación en la utilización relativa por el ganado de las celdas. La mayoría de las posiciones animales registradas en áreas dominadas por PJ ocurrieron en celdas con 30-50 % de TCC. Una cobertura del dosel de 50 % podría proporcionar un equilibrio adecuado entre la permanencia y el consumo de  forraje para el ganado durante la primavera

Evaluating the Impact of a HIV Low-Risk Express Care Task-Shifting Program: A Case Study of the Targeted Learning Roadmap

In conducting studies on an exposure of interest, a systematic roadmap should be applied for translating causal questions into statistical analyses and interpreting the results. In this paper we describe an application of one such roadmap applied to estimating the joint effect of both time to availability of a nurse-based triage system (low risk express care (LREC)) and individual enrollment in the program among HIV patients in East Africa. Our study population is comprised of 16;513 subjects found eligible for this task-shifting program within 15 clinics in Kenya between 2006 and 2009, with each clinic starting the LREC program between 2007 and 2008. After discretizing followup into 90-day time intervals, we targeted the population mean counterfactual outcome (i.e. counterfactual probability of either dying or being lost to follow up) at up to 450 days after initial LREC eligibility under three fixed treatment interventions. These were (i) under no program availability during the entire follow-up, (ii) under immediate program availability at initial eligibility, but non-enrollment during the entire follow-up, and (iii) under immediate program availability and enrollment at initial eligibility. We further estimated the controlled direct effect of immediate program availability compared to no program availability, under a hypothetical intervention to prevent individualenrollment in the program. Targeted minimum loss-based estimation was used to estimate the mean outcome, while Super Learning was implemented to estimate the required nuisance parameters. Analyses were conducted with the ltmle R package; analysis code is available at an online repository as an R package. Results showed that at 450 days, the probability of in-care survival for subjects with immediate availability and enrollment was 0:93 (95% CI: 0.91, 0.95) and 0:87 (95% CI: 0.86, 0.87) for subjects with immediate availability never enrolling. For subjects without LREC availability, it was 0:91 (95% CI: 0.90, 0.92). Immediate program availability without individualenrollment, compared to no program availability, was estimated to slightly albeit significantly decrease survival by 4% (95% CI 0.03,0.06, p\u3c 0:01). Immediately availability and enrollment resulted in a 7% higher in-care survival compared to immediate availability with non-enrollment after 450 days (95% CI -0.08,-0.05, p\u3c 0:01). The results are consistent with a fairly small impact of both availability and enrollment in the LREC program on in-care survival

Novel mutations in penicillin-binding protein genes in clinical Staphylococcus aureus isolates that are methicillin resistant on susceptibility testing, but lack the mec gene.

OBJECTIVES: Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is an important global health problem. MRSA resistance to β-lactam antibiotics is mediated by the mecA or mecC genes, which encode an alternative penicillin-binding protein (PBP) 2a that has a low affinity to β-lactam antibiotics. Detection of mec genes or PBP2a is regarded as the gold standard for the diagnosis of MRSA. We identified four MRSA isolates that lacked mecA or mecC genes, but were still phenotypically resistant to pencillinase-resistant β-lactam antibiotics. METHODS: The four human S. aureus isolates were investigated by whole genome sequencing and a range of phenotypic assays. RESULTS: We identified a number of amino acid substitutions present in the endogenous PBPs 1, 2 and 3 that were found in the resistant isolates but were absent in closely related susceptible isolates and which may be the basis of resistance. Of particular interest are three identical amino acid substitutions in PBPs 1, 2 and 3, occurring independently in isolates from at least two separate multilocus sequence types. Two different non-conservative substitutions were also present in the same amino acid of PBP1 in two isolates from two different sequence types. CONCLUSIONS: This work suggests that phenotypically resistant MRSA could be misdiagnosed using molecular methods alone and provides evidence of alternative mechanisms for β-lactam resistance in MRSA that may need to be considered by diagnostic laboratories

A three-season comparison of match performances among selected and unselected elite youth rugby league players

This is an author's accepted manuscript of an article published in Journal of Sports Sciences, 28 February 2014, available online: http:www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/02640414.2014.889838This study compared technical actions, movements, heart rates and perceptual responses of selected and unselected youth rugby league players during matches (under-15 to under-17). The players’ movements and heart rates were assessed using 5 Hz Global Positioning Systems (GPS), while their technical actions were analysed using video analysis. The maturity of each player was predicted before each season for statistical control. There were no differences (P > 0.05) between selected and unselected players in the under-15 or the under-17 age groups for any variables. However, in the under-16 group, the selected players (57.1 ± 11.9 min) played for longer than the unselected players (44.1 ± 12.3 min; P = 0.017; ES = 1.08 ± CI = 0.87), and covered more distance (5,181.0 ± 1063.5 m cf. 3942.6 ± 1,108.6m, respectively; P = 0.012; ES = 1.14 ± CI = 0.88) and high intensity distance (1,808.8 ± 369.3 m cf. 1,380.5 ± 367.7 m, respectively; P = 0.011; ES = 1.16 ± CI = 0.88). Although successful carries per minute was higher in the selected under-15 group, there were no other differences (P > 0.05) in match performance relative to playing minutes between groups. Controlling for maturity, the less mature, unselected players from the under-16 group performed more high-intensity running (P < 0.05). Our findings question the use of match- related measurements in differentiating between selected and unselected players, showing that later maturing players were unselected, even when performing greater high-intensity running during matches