Comparative Genomic Analysis of Drosophila melanogaster and Vector Mosquito Developmental Genes

Genome sequencing projects have presented the opportunity for analysis of developmental genes in three vector mosquito species: Aedes aegypti, Culex quinquefasciatus, and Anopheles gambiae. A comparative genomic analysis of developmental genes in Drosophila melanogaster and these three important vectors of human disease was performed in this investigation. While the study was comprehensive, special emphasis centered on genes that 1) are components of developmental signaling pathways, 2) regulate fundamental developmental processes, 3) are critical for the development of tissues of vector importance, 4) function in developmental processes known to have diverged within insects, and 5) encode microRNAs (miRNAs) that regulate developmental transcripts in Drosophila. While most fruit fly developmental genes are conserved in the three vector mosquito species, several genes known to be critical for Drosophila development were not identified in one or more mosquito genomes. In other cases, mosquito lineage-specific gene gains with respect to D. melanogaster were noted. Sequence analyses also revealed that numerous repetitive sequences are a common structural feature of Drosophila and mosquito developmental genes. Finally, analysis of predicted miRNA binding sites in fruit fly and mosquito developmental genes suggests that the repertoire of developmental genes targeted by miRNAs is species-specific. The results of this study provide insight into the evolution of developmental genes and processes in dipterans and other arthropods, serve as a resource for those pursuing analysis of mosquito development, and will promote the design and refinement of functional analysis experiments

Erratum: Corrigendum To “Mechanical Properties And Residual Stresses In Zrb2–Sic Spark Plasma Sintered Ceramic Composites” (J. Eur. Ceram. Soc. (2016) 36(7) (1527–1537))

The authors regret that the original online version of the above article contained the following errors: M. Lugovy\u27s affiliation was incorrectly listed. His affiliation should be with the University of Central Florida in Orlando. There should only be one email address for the corresponding author N. Orlovskaya: [email protected]. The Publisher decided to ‘resupply’ (repost and replace) the XML and online PDF of the article. Unfortunately the discovery of the errors was too late to correct the printed issue. The authors would like to apologize for any inconvenience caused. Elsevier regrets and apologizes for any inconvenience caused by posting a new version of this article online, but hopes that the reader will understand the reasons for doing so

Mechanical Properties And Residual Stresses In Zrb2-Sic Spark Plasma Sintered Ceramic Composites

ZrB2-17 vol% SiC, ZrB2-32 vol% SiC, and ZrB2-45 vol% SiC ultra-high temperature particulate ceramic composites were sintered using Spark Plasma Sintering (SPS). The mechanical performance of the ZrB2-SiC composites was investigated using 4-point bending to determine their instantaneous flexural strength and fracture toughness. Resonant Ultrasound Spectroscopy was used to determine the Young\u27s, shear, and bulk moduli as well as Poisson\u27s ratio of all examined composites. The distribution of thermal residual stresses and the effect of applied external load on their re-distribution was studied using micro-Raman spectroscopy. Piezospectroscopic coefficients were determined for all three ZrB2-SiC ceramic composites and their experimentally obtained values were compared with the piezospectroscopic coefficients both published in the literature and calculated theoretically. Finally an attempt was made to evaluate the redistribution of thermal residual stresses under external applied stress in order to estimate their contribution to the mechanical behavior of the material

Old and New Unsolved Problems in Lattice-Ordered Rings that need not be f-Rings

Recall that a lattice-ordered ring or l-ring A(+, •, ∨, ∧) is a set together with four binary operations such that A(+, •) is a ring, A(∨, ∧) is a lattice, and letting P = {a ∈ A : a ∨ 0 = a{, we have both P + P and P • P contained in P. For a ∈ A, we let a + = a ∨ 0, a - = (-a) and |a| = a ∨ (-a). It follows that a = a + - a -, |a| = a + + a -, and for any a, b ∈ A, |aa+b| \u3c |a|+ |b| and |ab| \u3c |a| |b|. As usual a \u3c b means (b–a) ∈ P. We leave it to the reader to fill in what is meant by a lattice-ordered algebra over a totally ordered field