Evaluation of phosphorus, calcium, and magnesium content in commercially available foods formulated for healthy cats.

BackgroundHigh dietary phosphorus (P) and low calcium-to-phosphorus ratio (Ca:P) are associated with kidney damage in cats. There are no established guidelines for dietary P maximum for cats.ObjectivesTo quantify crude protein, P, Ca, and magnesium (Mg) concentrations in cat foods and compare among food formats (dry, canned, raw), primary protein ingredients, protein concentrations (low, moderate, high), grain-free versus grain-containing foods, foods intended for adult maintenance versus all life stages, and cost.SamplesEighty-two commercial nonprescription cat foods.MethodsDescriptive study. Mineral concentrations were measured using inductively coupled argon plasma-optical emission spectroscopy. Crude protein was measured using the Dumas nitrogen combustion method. Mineral and crude protein concentrations were compared among food categories.ResultsTwenty-seven foods contained ≥3.6 g P/1000 kcal metabolizable energy (ME), of which 7 exceeded 4.8 g/1000 kcal ME. Thirteen foods had low Ca:P ratio (≤1.0). The low-protein diet group had no products ≥3.6 g P/1000 kcal ME, which was significantly different compared to the high-protein diet group (52% of products had ≥3.6 g P/1000 kcal ME; P = .01). No significant differences in P content and Ca:P ratio were found among other diet categories. Canned foods had significantly lower Mg compared to dry (P < .001) and raw (P = .007) foods. Declared minimum P and Ca were significantly lower than analyzed concentrations (P = .0005 and P = .003, respectively).Conclusions and clinical importanceThe high number of foods with high P and low Ca suggest that pet food regulatory reform should be considered

Tourism innovation policy: Implementation and outcomes

The paper opens the “black box” of tourism innovation policy implementation through an analysis of the Spanish Programme of Innovative Business Groups that foster innovation through hybrid top-down bottom-up collaboration embedded in clusters. The focus is on three main issues: process of policy implementation, types of innovation that emerged, and the outcomes and barriers. The findings show the contradictions of this hybrid model of implementation with mixed outcomes of successful collaborations and abandoned trajectories. The Programme has stimulated the ‘propensity’ to innovate resulting in different types of innovation but has revealed the existence of mutually-reinforcing barriers. Some suggestions for future improvements of tourism innovation policies are offered including the importance of polycentricity in effective policy formulation and implementation.The research paper has been supported by the Spanish National R&D&I Plan 2008-2011 (CSO2011-26396). The authors are grateful to the state owned company "Innovation Management and Tourism Technologies, SEGITTUR" for their generous support and data provision. Isabel Rodriguez thanks the University of Alicante who funded her visit to the University of Surrey, facilitating the author’s collaboration

Preliminary optical design of PANIC, a wide-field infrared camera for CAHA

In this paper, we present the preliminary optical design of PANIC (PAnoramic Near Infrared camera for Calar Alto), a wide-field infrared imager for the Calar Alto 2.2 m telescope. The camera optical design is a folded single optical train that images the sky onto the focal plane with a plate scale of 0.45 arcsec per 18 micron pixel. A mosaic of four Hawaii 2RG of 2k x 2k made by Teledyne is used as detector and will give a field of view of 31.9 arcmin x 31.9 arcmin. This cryogenic instrument has been optimized for the Y, J, H and K bands. Special care has been taken in the selection of the standard IR materials used for the optics in order to maximize the instrument throughput and to include the z band. The main challenges of this design are: to produce a well defined internal pupil which allows reducing the thermal background by a cryogenic pupil stop; the correction of off-axis aberrations due to the large field available; the correction of chromatic aberration because of the wide spectral coverage; and the capability of introduction of narrow band filters (~1%) in the system minimizing the degradation in the filter passband without a collimated stage in the camera. We show the optomechanical error budget and compensation strategy that allows our as built design to met the performances from an optical point of view. Finally, we demonstrate the flexibility of the design showing the performances of PANIC at the CAHA 3.5m telescope.Comment: This paper has been presented in the SPIE of Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation 2008 in Marseille (France

Voltage dip generator for testing wind turbines connected to electrical networks

This paper describes a new voltage dip generator that allows the shape of the time profile of the voltage generated to be configured. The use of this device as a tool to test the fault ride-through capability of wind turbines connected to the electricity grid can provide some remarkable benefits: First, this system offers the possibility of adapting the main features of the time–voltage profile generated (dip depth, dip duration, the ramp slope during the recovery process after clearing fault, etc.) to the specific requirements set forth by the grid operation codes, in accordance with different network electrical systems standards. Second, another remarkable ability of this system is to provide sinusoidal voltage and current wave forms during the overall testing process without the presence of harmonic components. This is made possible by the absence of electronic converters. Finally, the paper includes results and a discussion on the experimental data obtained with the use of a reduced size laboratory prototype that was constructed to validate the operating features of this new device

Moonlighting function of Phytochelatin synthase1 in extracellular defense against fungal pathogens

Phytochelatin synthase (PCS) is a key component of heavy metal detoxification in plants. PCS catalyzes both the synthesis of the peptide phytochelatin from glutathione and the degradation of glutathione conjugates via peptidase activity. Here, we describe a role for PCS in disease resistance against plant pathogenic fungi. The pen4 mutant, which is allelic to cadmium insensitive1 (cad1/pcs1) mutants, was recovered from a screen for Arabidopsis mutants with reduced resistance to the nonadapted barley fungal pathogen Blumeria graminis f. sp. hordei. PCS1, which is found in the cytoplasm of cells of healthy plants, translocates upon pathogen attack and colocalizes with the PEN2 myrosinase on the surface of immobilized mitochondria. pcs1 and pen2 mutant plants exhibit similar metabolic defects in the accumulation of pathogen-inducible indole glucosinolate-derived compounds, suggesting that PEN2 and PCS1 act in the same metabolic pathway. The function of PCS1 in this pathway is independent of phytochelatin synthesis and deglycination of glutathione conjugates, as catalytic-site mutants of PCS1 are still functional in indole glucosinolate metabolism. In uncovering a peptidase-independent function for PCS1, we reveal this enzyme to be a moonlighting protein important for plant responses to both biotic and abiotic stresses

Recovery of active pathogenesis-related enzymes from the apoplast of Musa acuminata infected by Mycosphaerella fijiensis

The fungus Mycosphaerella fijiensis causes black Sigatoka (BS) disease, a major pathogen in the banana industry worldwide. Numerous molecular and biochemical studies have been done for the M. fijiensis, Musa acuminata interaction, but this is the first study describing the zymographic behavior of β-1,3-glucanase, chitinase and protease in the apoplast and symplast of healthy, BS-infected but asymptomatic and BS diseased banana leaves. In BS-infected tissues, β-1,3-glucanase enzymatic activity was associated with two polypeptides with retention index (Ri) values of 0.43 and 0.56. These were more notable in the apoplast than in the symplast. Chitinase activity in BS-infected tissue in both the apoplast and symplast was mainly associated with a single polypeptide (Ri = 0.89). Both β-1,3-glucanase and chitinase activities were apparently more intense in BS-infected leaves than in healthy leaves. Protease activity was associated with two polypeptides (Ri = 0.04 and 0.14). In both the apoplast and symplast, the Ri 0.04 polypeptide increased in intensity with disease progression, whereas Ri 0.14 polypeptide intensity decreased. Overall protease activity intensity was higher in the symplast. Maximum symplast contamination of the apoplast was 2% as estimated by glucose 6-phosphate dehydrogenase activity, a biochemical marker for symplast. Accumulation of pathogenesis-related enzymatic activities in the apoplast of M. acuminata leaf tissue was caused by hostcontrolled enzyme downloading in response to M. fijiensis infection. Clear differences were identified in the electrophoretic profiles of healthy and diseased banana plants. The results further support a putative role of these enzymes in the extracellular defense repertoire of banana and, more importantly, suggest that M. fijiensis possesses a mechanism for suppression and delay of defense response in M. acuminata.Key words: Black Sigatoka, glucose 6-phosphate dehydrogenase, pathogenesis-related (PR) proteins, polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE), retention index (Ri), sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE)