Determination of sulfur dioxide in wine using a quartz crystal microbalance

A new method for the analysis of both total and bound SO2 in wine is proposed, based on a quartz crystal microbalance (QCM), and it is compared with the widely used Ripper method. The proposed method is faster than the Ripper's, and the instrumentation is either homemade or widely available. When both methods are applied to the same sample, the results obtained using the QCM method are bracketed in an interval less than one-tenth the size of that obtained using the Ripper method. Although the SO2 concentrations found using the QCM method correlate well with the ones obtained with the Ripper method, the results are systematically higher, which can be explained as due to the absence of interferences known to affect the Ripper method

Early and late outcomes after cord blood transplantation for pediatric patients with inherited leukodystrophies

Leukodystrophies (LD) are devastating inherited disorders leading to rapid neurological deterioration and premature death. Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) can halt disease progression for selected LD. Cord blood is a common donor source for transplantation of these patients because it is rapidly available and can be used without full HLA matching. However, precise recommendations allowing care providers to identify patients who benefit from HSCT are lacking. In this study, we define risk factors and describe the early and late outcomes of 169 patients with globoid cell leukodystrophy, X-linked adrenoleukodystrophy, and metachromatic leukodystrophy undergoing cord blood transplantation (CBT) at an European Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation center or at Duke University Medical Center from 1996 to 2013. Factors associated with higher overall survival (OS) included presymptomatic status (77% vs 49%; P = .006), well-matched (80 preCBT, 50% remained stable, 20% declined to 60 to 80, and 30% to, 60. Overall, an encouraging OS was found for LD patients after CBT, especially for those who are presymptomatic before CBT and received adequately dosed grafts. Early identification and fast referral to a specialized center may lead to earlier treatment and, subsequently, to improved outcomes

Insights from two decades of the Student Conference on Conservation Science

Conservation science is a crisis-oriented discipline focused on reducing human impacts on nature. To explore how the field has changed over the past two decades, we analyzed 3245 applications for oral presentations submitted to the Student Conference on Conservation Science (SCCS) in Cambridge, UK. SCCS has been running every year since 2000, aims for global representation by providing bursaries to early-career conservationists from lower-income countries, and has never had a thematic focus, beyond conservation in the broadest sense. We found that the majority of projects submitted to SCCS were based on primary biological data collected from local scale field studies in the tropics, contrary to established literature which highlights gaps in tropical research. Our results showed a small increase over time in submissions framed around how nature benefits people as well as a small increase in submissions integrating social science. Our findings suggest that students and early-career conservationists could provide pathways to increase availability of data from the tropics and address well-known biases in the published literature towards wealthier countries. We hope this research will motivate efforts to support student projects, ensuring data and results are published and data made publicly available.The project was made possible through funding from: JG: EUs Horizon 2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie program (No 676108) and VILLUM FONDEN (VKR023371), HA-P; National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) (203407/2017-2), TA: The Australian Research Council Future Fellowship (FT180100354), The Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment and The Kenneth Miller Trust, APC: the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC DTP [NE/L002507/1]), LC: Cambridge International Scholarship from the Cambridge Trust, FH: the Newton International Fellowship of the Royal Society, DM: the Australian Government, Endeavor Postgraduate Scholarhip, HM: Branco Weiss Fellowship Administered by the ETH Zürich and Drapers' Company Fellowship, Pembroke College BIS: the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC DTP[NE/L002507/1 and NE/S001395/1]) and the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 Research Fellowship, HW: Cambridge Trust Cambridge-Australia Poynton Scholarship and Cambridge Department of Zoology J. S. Gardiner Scholarship

Planck intermediate results. XLI. A map of lensing-induced B-modes

The secondary cosmic microwave background (CMB) $B$-modes stem from the post-decoupling distortion of the polarization $E$-modes due to the gravitational lensing effect of large-scale structures. These lensing-induced $B$-modes constitute both a valuable probe of the dark matter distribution and an important contaminant for the extraction of the primary CMB $B$-modes from inflation. Planck provides accurate nearly all-sky measurements of both the polarization $E$-modes and the integrated mass distribution via the reconstruction of the CMB lensing potential. By combining these two data products, we have produced an all-sky template map of the lensing-induced $B$-modes using a real-space algorithm that minimizes the impact of sky masks. The cross-correlation of this template with an observed (primordial and secondary) $B$-mode map can be used to measure the lensing $B$-mode power spectrum at multipoles up to $2000$. In particular, when cross-correlating with the $B$-mode contribution directly derived from the Planck polarization maps, we obtain lensing-induced $B$-mode power spectrum measurement at a significance level of $12\,\sigma$, which agrees with the theoretical expectation derived from the Planck best-fit $\Lambda$CDM model. This unique nearly all-sky secondary $B$-mode template, which includes the lensing-induced information from intermediate to small ($10\lesssim \ell\lesssim 1000$) angular scales, is delivered as part of the Planck 2015 public data release. It will be particularly useful for experiments searching for primordial $B$-modes, such as BICEP2/Keck Array or LiteBIRD, since it will enable an estimate to be made of the lensing-induced contribution to the measured total CMB $B$-modes.Comment: 20 pages, 12 figures; Accepted for publication in A&A; The B-mode map is part of the PR2-2015 Cosmology Products; available as Lensing Products in the Planck Legacy Archive http://pla.esac.esa.int/pla/#cosmology; and described in the 'Explanatory Supplement' https://wiki.cosmos.esa.int/planckpla2015/index.php/Specially_processed_maps#2015_Lensing-induced_B-mode_ma

Controlling spins in adsorbed molecules by a chemical switch

The development of chemical systems with switchable molecular spins could lead to the architecture of materials with controllable magnetic or spintronic properties. Here, we present conclusive evidence that the spin of an organometallic molecule coupled to a ferromagnetic substrate can be switched between magnetic off and on states by a chemical stimulus. This is achieved by nitric oxide (NO) functioning as an axial ligand of cobalt(II)tetraphenylporphyrin (CoTPP) ferromagnetically coupled to nickel thin-film (Ni(001)). On NO addition, the coordination sphere of Co2+ is modified and a NO–CoTPP nitrosyl complex is formed, which corresponds to an off state of the Co spin. Thermal dissociation of NO from the nitrosyl complex restores the on state of the Co spin. The NO-induced reversible off–on switching of surface-adsorbed molecular spins observed here is attributed to a spin trans effect