Development and Evaluation of \u3cem\u3ePennisetum Purpureum\u3c/em\u3e Mutants Through Irradiation With \u3csup\u3e60\u3c/sup\u3eCo

The development of plant mutants is a commonly used procedure nowadays. One way of obtaining mutant plants has been seed irradiation with gamma rays. As these studies are not common in tropical pasture species (Micke et al., 1993, Herrera, 2001), the objective of this study was the development and evaluation of Pennisetum purpureum mutants through irradiation with 60Co

A model for the biochemical degradation of inosine monophosphate in hake (Merluccius merluccius)

7 páginas, 3 tablas, 3 figuras, 1 apéndiceATP-derived products are typically used as early indicators of fish quality loss during storage. In this work, we explore different biochemical routes that are potentially relevant in contributing to nucleotide degradation in hake (Merluccius merluccius). A major motivation of this study is to get more insight on the biochemical degradation mechanisms of nucleotide catabolites in hake muscle at fish storage and transport conditions. This requires the identification of its relevant pathways. To that purpose, different degradation routes proposed in the literature are considered and a mathematical model for the degradation process is derived. First order kinetics are assumed for all the reactions and temperature dependence is taken into account through the Arrhenius equation. Unknown model parameters, namely activation energies and pre-exponential Arrhenius coefficients, are estimated via fitting to experimental data. From the estimation results, relevant routes are identified. The kinetic study is performed on sterile fish juice to avoid coupling with microbial degradation mechanisms or possible interferences of the food matrix that might hide biochemical interactions. The proposed scheme adequately describes biochemical changes in nucleotide catabolites under variable temperature profiles. It also reveals a pathway which at least seems relevant for nucleotide degradation in hakeThe authors acknowledge financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (Projects ISFORQUALITY AGL2012-39951-C02-01, PIE 201230E042 and RESISTANCE DPI2014-54085-JIN)Peer reviewe

Variabilidad de la Respuesta de las Células Dendríticas Estimuladas in vitro con Porphyromonas gingivalis y Aggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitans

ResumenLas células dendríticas son células presentadoras de antígeno capaces de inducir la activación y maduración de linfocitos T CD4+ vírgenes hacia un fenotipo efector especifico Th1 o Th2, dependiendo del tipo de antigeno presentado, las senales co-estimuladoras que expresan y el ambiente de citoquinas en el cual se produce la interaccion celula-celula. El objetivo del presente trabajo es analizar la respuesta de las celulas dendriticas estimuladas in vitro con distintas concentraciones de las bacterias periodontopatógenas Pg y Aa. En celulas dendriticas derivadas de monocitos de sangre periferica estimuladas con 101 a 109 bacterias/mL de Pg y Aa se evaluo la expresion del marcador de maduracion CD80 mediante citometria de flujo y de las citoquinas IL1β, IL2, IL5, IL6, IL10, IL12, IL13, IFNγ, TNFα y TNFβ mediante RT-PCR cuantitativa. Aa y Pg indujeron maduracion de las celulas dendriticas, detectandose significativamente mayor expresion de CD80 con la estimulacion de Aa, e indujeron predominantemente la expresion de citoquinas propias de una respuesta Th1. Dependiendo de la carga bacteriana, fueron detectados distintos umbrales de induccion de expresion de citoquinas. Aa indujo la sintesis de IL1β, IL12, IFNγ, TNFα y TNFβ a menor carga bacteriana que Pg. Tomados en conjunto, estos datos nos permiten especular un mayor potencial antigenico y proyectar una mayor capacidad patogenica durante la infeccion periodontal de Aa en comparación a Pg.AbstractDendritic cells are potent antigen-presenting cells able to prime naive T cells and polarize them towards a Th1 or Th2 response, depending on the type of the antigen presented to the TCR, the type of costimulatory signals, and the cytokine pattern in the environment. The aim of this work was to analyze the response of dendritic cells to in vitro stimulation with Pg and Aa. In monocyte-derived dendritic cells stimulated with 101 to 109 bacteria/mL of Pg or Aa were evaluated both the expression of the maturation marker CD80 by flow cytometry and the expression of the cytokines IL1β, IL2, IL5, IL6, IL10, IL12, IL13, IFNγ, TNFα and TNFβ by quantitative RT-PCR. Both Pg and Aa led to dendritic cell maturation, detecting higher CD80 expression upon Aa-stimulation, and induced a Th1 pattern of cytokine expression. Aa-stimulated dendritic cells expressed IL1β, IL12, IFNγ, TNFα and TNFβ mRNAs with lower bacterial charge than with Pg. Furthermore, our data indicated the existence of distinct thresholds for the induction of the different cytokines analyzed. Taken together, these data allow us to speculate a higher antigenic potential and higher pathogenic capacity of Aa than Pg during periodontal infections

Influence of seat-belt use on the severity of injury in traffic accidents

ABSTRACT: Background: About 1.35 million people died in traffic accidents around the world in 2018, make this type of accidents the 8th cause of death in the world. Particularly, in Spain, there were 204,596 traffic accidents during 2016 and 2017, out of which 349,810 drivers were injured. The objective of this study was to understand to what extent seat belt non-use and human factors contribute to drivers injury severity. Methodology: The results are based on the information and 2016-17 data provided by the Spain national traffic department "Dirección General de Tráfico" (DGT). The discretization model and Bayesian Networks were developed based on important variables from the literature. These variables were classified as; human factor, demographic factor, conditioning factor and seat belt use. Results: The results showed that failure to wear the seat belt by drivers are likely to increase the risk of fatal and sever injury significantly. Moreover, distraction and road type road can contribute to the accident severity

CLIWOC multilingual meteorological dictionary

This dictionary is the first attempt to express the wealth of archaic logbook wind force terms in a form that is comprehensible to the modern-day reader. Oliver and Kington (1970) and Lamb (1982) have drawn attention to the importance of logbooks in climatic studies, and Lamb (1991) offered a conversion scale for early eighteenth century English wind force terms, but no studies have thus far pursued the matter to any greater depth. This text attempts to make good this deficiency, and is derived from the research undertaken by the CLIWOC project1 in which British, Dutch, French and Spanish naval and merchant logbooks from the period 1750 to 1850 were used to derive a global database of climatic information. At an early stage in the project it was apparent that many of the logbook weather terms, whilst conforming to a conventional vocabulary, possessed meanings that were unclear to twenty-first century readers or had changed over time. This was particularly the case for the important element of wind force; but no special plea is entered for the evolution in nautical vocabulary, which often reflected more wide-ranging changes in the respective native languages.The key objective was to translate the archaic vocabulary of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century mariner into expressions directly comparable with the Beaufort Scale (see Appendix I). Only then could the projects scientific programme be embarked upon. This dictionary is the result of the largest undertaking into logbook studies that has yet been carried out. Several thousand logbooks from British, Dutch, French and Spanish archives were examined, and the exercise offered a unique opportunity to explore the vocabulary of the one hundred year period beginning in 1750. The logbooks from which the raw data have been abstracted range widely across the North and South Atlantic and the Indian Oceans. Only the Pacific, largely in consequence of the paucity of regular naval activity in that area, is not well represented. The range of climates encountered in this otherwise wide geographic domain gives ample opportunity for the full range of the mariners nautical weather vocabulary to be assessed, from the calms of the Equatorial regions, through the gales of the mid-latitude systems to the fearsome storms of the tropical latitudes. The Trade Winds belts, the Doldrums, the unsettled mid-latitudes, even the icy wastes of the high latitudes, are all embraced in this study. It is not here intended to pass any judgements on the climatological record of the logbooks, and this text seeks only to provide a means of understanding archaic wind force terms and, other than to indicate those items that were not commonly used, no information is given on the frequency with which different terms appeared in the logbooks. Attention is, furthermore, confined to Dutch, English, French and Spanish because these once great imperial powers were the only nations able to support wide-ranging ocean-going fleets with their attendant collections of logbooks and documents over this long period of time. The work is offered to the wider academic community in the hope that they will prove to be of as much value as it has been to the CLIWOC team

Structure of the medium formed in heavy ion collisions

We investigate the structure of the medium formed in heavy ion collisions using three different models: the Color String Percolation Model (CSPM), the Core-Shell-Color String Percolation Model (CSCSPM), and the Color Glass Condensate (CGC) framework. We analyze the radial distribution function of the transverse representation of color flux tubes in each model to determine the medium's structure. Our results indicate that the CSPM behaves as an ideal gas, while the CSCSPM exhibits a structural phase transition from a gas-like to a liquid-like structure. Additionally, our analysis of the CGC framework suggests that it produces systems that behave like interacting gases for AuAu central collisions at RHIC energies and liquid-like structures for PbPb central collisions at LHC energies.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figure

Dynamical laws of superenergy in General Relativity

The Bel and Bel-Robinson tensors were introduced nearly fifty years ago in an attempt to generalize to gravitation the energy-momentum tensor of electromagnetism. This generalization was successful from the mathematical point of view because these tensors share mathematical properties which are remarkably similar to those of the energy-momentum tensor of electromagnetism. However, the physical role of these tensors in General Relativity has remained obscure and no interpretation has achieved wide acceptance. In principle, they cannot represent {\em energy} and the term {\em superenergy} has been coined for the hypothetical physical magnitude lying behind them. In this work we try to shed light on the true physical meaning of {\em superenergy} by following the same procedure which enables us to give an interpretation of the electromagnetic energy. This procedure consists in performing an orthogonal splitting of the Bel and Bel-Robinson tensors and analysing the different parts resulting from the splitting. In the electromagnetic case such splitting gives rise to the electromagnetic {\em energy density}, the Poynting vector and the electromagnetic stress tensor, each of them having a precise physical interpretation which is deduced from the {\em dynamical laws} of electromagnetism (Poynting theorem). The full orthogonal splitting of the Bel and Bel-Robinson tensors is more complex but, as expected, similarities with electromagnetism are present. Also the covariant divergence of the Bel tensor is analogous to the covariant divergence of the electromagnetic energy-momentum tensor and the orthogonal splitting of the former is found. The ensuing {\em equations} are to the superenergy what the Poynting theorem is to electromagnetism. See paper for full abstract.Comment: 27 pages, no figures. Typos corrected, section 9 suppressed and more acknowledgments added. To appear in Classical and Quantum Gravit