THEORETICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION IN RELATIONSHIP OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAS-TO-GAS HEAT PIPE EXCHANGER FAMILY

The Chemical and Food Engineering Department of the Technical University of Budapest has developed a gas-to-gas heat exchanger family with closed two-phase-thermosyphons (CTT) or heat pipes. This paper reports the theoretical fundamentals and the experimental investigations of the CTT heat exchanger family

Proline accumulation is regulated by transcription factors associated with phosphate starvation

Proline accumulation in plants is a well-documented physiological response to osmotic stress caused by drought or salinity. In Arabidopsis thaliana the stress and ABA-induced Delta1-PYRROLINE-5-CARBOXYLATE SYNTHETASE 1 (P5CS1) gene was previously shown to control proline biosynthesis in such adverse conditions. To identify regulatory factors which control the transcription of P5CS1, yeast one hybrid (Y1H) screens were performed with a genomic fragment of P5CS1, containing 1.2 kB promoter and 0.8 kB transcribed regions. The transcription factors PHOSPHATE STARVATION RESPONSE 1 (PHR1) and PHR1-LIKE 1 (PHL1) were identified to bind to P5CS1 sequences in the first intron, which carry a conserved PHR1-binding site (P1BS) motif. PHR1 and PHL1 binding to P1BS was confirmed by Y1H, electrophoretic mobility assay (EMSA) and chromatin immune precipitation (ChIP). Phosphate starvation led to gradual increase in proline content in wild type Arabidopsis plants as well as transcriptional activation of P5CS1 and PROLINE DEHYDROGENASE 2 (PDH2) genes. Induction of P5CS1 transcription and proline accumulation during phosphate deficiency was considerably reduced by phr1 and phl1 mutations and was impaired in the ABA deficient aba2-3 and ABA insensitive abi4-1 mutants. Growth and viability of phr1phl1 double mutant was reduced in phosphate-depleted medium, it was slightly diminished in the aba2-3 mutant, suggesting that ABA mediates growth retardation in such stress. Our results reveal a previously unknown link between proline metabolism and phosphate nutrition, and show that proline biosynthesis is target of crosstalk between ABA signaling and regulation of phosphate homeostasis through PHR1 and PHL1-mediated transcriptional activation of the P5CS1 gene

The assessment of neural injury following open heart surgery by physiological tremor analysis

INTRODUCTION: The appearance of post-operative cognitive dysfunction as a result of open heart surgery has been proven by several studies. Focal and/or sporadic neuron damage emerging in the central nervous system may not only appear as cognitive dysfunction, but might strongly influence features of physiological tremor. MATERIAL AND METHODS: We investigated 110 patients (age: 34-73 years; 76 male, 34 female; 51 coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG), 25 valve replacement, 25 combined open heart surgery, 9 off-pump CABG) before surgery and after open-heart surgery on the 3(rd) to 5(th) post-operative day. The assessment of the physiological tremor analysis was performed with our newly developed equipment based on the Analog Devices ADXL 320 JPC integrated accelerometer chip. Recordings were stored on a PC and spectral analysis was performed by fast Fourier transformation (FFT). We compared power integrals in the 1-4 Hz, 4-8 Hz and 8-12 Hz frequency ranges and these were statistically assessed by the Wilcoxon rank correlation test. RESULTS: We found significant changes in the power spectrum of physiological tremor. The spectrum in the 8-12 Hz range (neuronal oscillation) decreased and a shift was recognised to the lower spectrum (p < 0.01). The magnitude of the shift was not significantly higher for females than for males (p < 0.157). We found no significant difference between the shift and the cross-clamp or perfusion time (p < 0.6450). CONCLUSIONS: The assessment of physiological tremor by means of our novel, feasible method may provide a deeper insight into the mechanism of central nervous system damage associated with open heart surgery