Isotopic Scaling of Heavy Projectile Residues from the collisions of 25 MeV/nucleon 86Kr with 124Sn, 112Sn and 64Ni, 58Ni

The scaling of the yields of heavy projectile residues from the reactions of 25 MeV/nucleon 86Kr projectiles with 124Sn,112Sn and 64Ni, 58Nitargets is studied. Isotopically resolved yield distributions of projectile fragments in the range Z=10-36 from these reaction pairs were measured with the MARS recoil separator in the angular range 2.7-5.3 degrees. The velocities of the residues, monotonically decreasing with Z down to Z~26-28, are employed to characterize the excitation energy. The yield ratios R21(N,Z) for each pair of systems are found to exhibit isotopic scaling (isoscaling), namely, an exponential dependence on the fragment atomic number Z and neutron number N. The isoscaling is found to occur in the residue Z range corresponding to the maximum observed excitation energies. The corresponding isoscaling parameters are alpha=0.43 and beta=-0.50 for the Kr+Sn system and alpha=0.27 and beta=-0.34 for the Kr+Ni system. For the Kr+Sn system, for which the experimental angular acceptance range lies inside the grazing angle, isoscaling was found to occur for Z<26 and N<34. For heavier fragments from Kr+Sn, the parameters vary monotonically, alpha decreasing with Z and beta increasing with N. This variation is found to be related to the evolution towards isospin equilibration and, as such, it can serve as a tracer of the N/Z equilibration process. The present heavy-residue data extend the observation of isotopic scaling from the intermediate mass fragment region to the heavy-residue region. Such high-resolution mass spectrometric data can provide important information on the role of isospin in peripheral and mid-peripheral collisions, complementary to that accessible from modern large-acceptance multidetector devices.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Effects of biased and unbiased illuminations on two-dimensional electron gases in dopant-free GaAs/AlGaAs

Illumination is performed at low temperature on dopant-free two-dimensional electron gases (2DEGs) of varying depths, under unbiased (gates grounded) and biased (gates at a positive or negative voltage) conditions. Unbiased illuminations in 2DEGs located more than 70 nm away from the surface result in a gain in mobility at a given electron density, primarily driven by the reduction of background impurities. In 2DEGs closer to the surface, unbiased illuminations result in a mobility loss, driven by an increase in surface charge density. Biased illuminations performed with positive applied gate voltages result in a mobility gain, whereas those performed with negative applied voltages result in a mobility loss. The magnitude of the mobility gain (loss) weakens with 2DEG depth, and is likely driven by a reduction (increase) in surface charge density. Remarkably, this mobility gain/loss is fully reversible by performing another biased illumination with the appropriate gate voltage, provided both Formula Presented-type and Formula Presented-type Ohmic contacts are present. Experimental results are modeled with Boltzmann transport theory, and possible mechanisms are discussed

Anemia prevalence in women of reproductive age in low- and middle-income countries between 2000 and 2018

Anemia is a globally widespread condition in women and is associated with reduced economic productivity and increased mortality worldwide. Here we map annual 2000–2018 geospatial estimates of anemia prevalence in women of reproductive age (15–49 years) across 82 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), stratify anemia by severity and aggregate results to policy-relevant administrative and national levels. Additionally, we provide subnational disparity analyses to provide a comprehensive overview of anemia prevalence inequalities within these countries and predict progress toward the World Health Organization’s Global Nutrition Target (WHO GNT) to reduce anemia by half by 2030. Our results demonstrate widespread moderate improvements in overall anemia prevalence but identify only three LMICs with a high probability of achieving the WHO GNT by 2030 at a national scale, and no LMIC is expected to achieve the target in all their subnational administrative units. Our maps show where large within-country disparities occur, as well as areas likely to fall short of the WHO GNT, offering precision public health tools so that adequate resource allocation and subsequent interventions can be targeted to the most vulnerable populations.Peer reviewe

Global, regional, and national under-5 mortality, adult mortality, age-specific mortality, and life expectancy, 1970–2016: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016

BACKGROUND: Detailed assessments of mortality patterns, particularly age-specific mortality, represent a crucial input that enables health systems to target interventions to specific populations. Understanding how all-cause mortality has changed with respect to development status can identify exemplars for best practice. To accomplish this, the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2016 (GBD 2016) estimated age-specific and sex-specific all-cause mortality between 1970 and 2016 for 195 countries and territories and at the subnational level for the five countries with a population greater than 200 million in 2016. METHODS: We have evaluated how well civil registration systems captured deaths using a set of demographic methods called death distribution methods for adults and from consideration of survey and census data for children younger than 5 years. We generated an overall assessment of completeness of registration of deaths by dividing registered deaths in each location-year by our estimate of all-age deaths generated from our overall estimation process. For 163 locations, including subnational units in countries with a population greater than 200 million with complete vital registration (VR) systems, our estimates were largely driven by the observed data, with corrections for small fluctuations in numbers and estimation for recent years where there were lags in data reporting (lags were variable by location, generally between 1 year and 6 years). For other locations, we took advantage of different data sources available to measure under-5 mortality rates (U5MR) using complete birth histories, summary birth histories, and incomplete VR with adjustments; we measured adult mortality rate (the probability of death in individuals aged 15-60 years) using adjusted incomplete VR, sibling histories, and household death recall. We used the U5MR and adult mortality rate, together with crude death rate due to HIV in the GBD model life table system, to estimate age-specific and sex-specific death rates for each location-year. Using various international databases, we identified fatal discontinuities, which we defined as increases in the death rate of more than one death per million, resulting from conflict and terrorism, natural disasters, major transport or technological accidents, and a subset of epidemic infectious diseases; these were added to estimates in the relevant years. In 47 countries with an identified peak adult prevalence for HIV/AIDS of more than 0·5% and where VR systems were less than 65% complete, we informed our estimates of age-sex-specific mortality using the Estimation and Projection Package (EPP)-Spectrum model fitted to national HIV/AIDS prevalence surveys and antenatal clinic serosurveillance systems. We estimated stillbirths, early neonatal, late neonatal, and childhood mortality using both survey and VR data in spatiotemporal Gaussian process regression models. We estimated abridged life tables for all location-years using age-specific death rates. We grouped locations into development quintiles based on the Socio-demographic Index (SDI) and analysed mortality trends by quintile. Using spline regression, we estimated the expected mortality rate for each age-sex group as a function of SDI. We identified countries with higher life expectancy than expected by comparing observed life expectancy to anticipated life expectancy on the basis of development status alone. FINDINGS: Completeness in the registration of deaths increased from 28% in 1970 to a peak of 45% in 2013; completeness was lower after 2013 because of lags in reporting. Total deaths in children younger than 5 years decreased from 1970 to 2016, and slower decreases occurred at ages 5-24 years. By contrast, numbers of adult deaths increased in each 5-year age bracket above the age of 25 years. The distribution of annualised rates of change in age-specific mortality rate differed over the period 2000 to 2016 compared with earlier decades: increasing annualised rates of change were less frequent, although rising annualised rates of change still occurred in some locations, particularly for adolescent and younger adult age groups. Rates of stillbirths and under-5 mortality both decreased globally from 1970. Evidence for global convergence of death rates was mixed; although the absolute difference between age-standardised death rates narrowed between countries at the lowest and highest levels of SDI, the ratio of these death rates-a measure of relative inequality-increased slightly. There was a strong shift between 1970 and 2016 toward higher life expectancy, most noticeably at higher levels of SDI. Among countries with populations greater than 1 million in 2016, life expectancy at birth was highest for women in Japan, at 86·9 years (95% UI 86·7-87·2), and for men in Singapore, at 81·3 years (78·8-83·7) in 2016. Male life expectancy was generally lower than female life expectancy between 1970 and 2016, an

Sclerospora graminicola- and arachidonic acid-induced autofluorescence in downy mildew resistant and susceptible genotypes of pearl millet

Autofluorescence of downy mildew resistant and susceptible cells of pearl millet seedlings undergoing hypersensitive reaction (HR) upon Sclerospora graminicola-inoculation and arachidonic acid (AA)-treatment was studied. Two-day-old seedlings of a highly resistant (IP 18296) and a highly susceptible (23D(2)B) genotype of pearl miller were either inoculated with zoospore suspension of S. graminicola or treated with AA for 24 h. The coleoptiles with hypersensitive necrotic spots were processed by the standard procedure, and the tissues were subjected to fluorescence microscopy. A differential accumulation of autofluorescent compounds in resistant and susceptible pearl millet genotypes was observed with most accumulation occurring in resistant cells treated with AA. The variation in the degree of fluorescence and the spatial accumulation of autofluorescent compounds among the two inoculated/treated genotypes is discussed

The Possible Involvement of Lipoxygenase in Downy Mildew Resistance in Pearl Millet

The downy mildew disease, incited by Sclerospora graminicola, is a major biotic constraint for pearl millet production in the semiarid tropics. Sources of resistance to this disease have been identified. However, the mechanism of host resistance still remains obscure. The enzyme lipoxygenase (LOX) is known to play a role in disease resistance in many host-pathosystems. In the present study, LOX activity was tested in seeds of different genotypes of pearl millet with different susceptibility to downy mildew. The LOX assay of the seeds indicated a good correlation between enzyme activity and their downy mildew reaction in the field. Maximum activity was recorded in seeds of highly resistant genotypes and minimum activity was found in the highly susceptible genotypes. Seeds obtained from plants recovered from the downy mildew disease had more LOX activity than that of the original parent seeds. Thus, in seeds, the LOX activity can be used as a biochemical marker for screening different genotypes of pearl millet for downy mildew. The study, carried out in the susceptible genotype of pearl millet seedlings, showed that LOX activity decreased after inoculating with S. graminicola zoospores when compared with uninoculated controls. However, a significant increase in the enzyme activity was observed on the second and third days after inoculation in resistant seedlings. The possible role of LOX in conferring resistance to downy mildew infection of pearl millet is discussed

Efficacy of certain plant-extracts against seed-borne infection of trichoconiella-padwickii in paddy (Oryza-Sativa)

Aqueous extracts of leaves, bark, stems, and seeds of Strychnos nux-vomica L., bulbs of Allium sativum L., rhizome of Zingiber officinale Rasc., leaves of Ocimum basilicum L., and fruits of Azadirachta indica A. Juss were used to control Trichoconiella padwickii (Ganguly) Jain in seeds of paddy (Oryza sativa L.). The seeds were soaked in 10, 20, and 30% extracts (w/v) for 12, 24, and 48h. All the extracts had significant inhibitory effects on the fungus. Stem, bark, and seed extracts (20% w/v) of S. nux-vomica were more effective than other plant extracts and 0.3% of Mancozeb in controlling the fungus. None of the plant extracts were phytotoxic at the tested concentrations

Phenylalanine Ammonia Lyase Activity in Pearl Millet Seedlings and its Relation to Downy Mildew Disease Resistance

Phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL) activity was studied in different genotypes of pearl millet with varying degrees of susceptibility to downy mildew disease, after inoculating with Pathotype 1 of Sclerospora graminicola. In resistant genotypes, the enzyme activity significantly increased 24 h after fungal inoculation while in the susceptible genotypes, the activity decreased. The increase or decrease in enzyme activity was well-correlated with the degree of host resistance to the pathogen. A time-course of change in activity of PAL after inoculation showed a considerable difference between resistant and susceptible genotypes. Studies on the activity of PAL in different parts of pearl millet seedlings revealed that in the resistant genotype, enzyme activity significantly increased at 24 h post-inoculation only in the shoot portion, whereas in mesocotyl and root the activity decreased. In susceptible seedlings, enzyme activity decreased at 24 h post-inoculation in shoot, mesocotyl and root. The activity of PAL was also found to be pathotype-specific. Histochemical tests for lignin were positive in infected cells in the resistant genotypes. The role of PAL in imparting resistance to pearl millet against downy mildew disease is discussed