Distribution and Population Dynamics of Plant-Parasitic Nematodes in Oregon Vineyards, and Their Effects on Vine Growth [1994-1995]

Objectives 1. Survey Oregon vineyards for the presence, identity and abundance of plant-parasitic nematodes. 2. Relate the distribution and abundance of potentially pathogenic species to viticultural practices and site characteristics. 3. Evaluate the efficacy of Nemacur for reducing populations of plant-parasitic nematodes. 4. Document seasonal changes in the abundance of potentially pathogenic species of plant-parasitic nematodes in order to identify optimum times for sampling

Monophyletic group of unclassified γ-Proteobacteria dominates in mixed culture biofilm of high-performing oxygen reducing biocathode

International audienceSeveral mixed microbial communities have been reported to show robust bioelectrocatalysis of oxygen reduction over time at applicable operation conditions. However, clarification of electron transfer mechanism(s) and identification of essential micro-organisms have not been realised. Therefore, the objective of this study was to shape oxygen reducing biocathodes with different microbial communities by means of surface modification using the electrochemical reduction of two different diazonium salts in order to discuss the relation of microbial composition and performance. The resulting oxygen reducing mixed culture biocathodes had complex bacterial biofilms variable in size and shape as observed by confocal and electron microscopy. Sequence analysis of ribosomal 16S rDNA revealed a putative correlation between the abundance of certain microbiota and biocathode performance. The best performing biocathode developed on the unmodified graphite electrode and reached a high current density for oxygen reducing biocathodes at neutral pH (0.9A/m(2)). This correlated with the highest domination (60.7%) of a monophyletic group of unclassified γ-Proteobacteria. These results corroborate earlier reports by other groups, however, higher current densities and higher presence of these unclassified bacteria were observed in this work. Therefore, members of this group are likely key-players for highly performing oxygen reducing biocathodes.[on SciFinder (R)

Marine Sediment Mixed With Activated Carbon Allows Electricity Production and Storage From Internal and External Energy Sources: A New Rechargeable Bio-Battery With Bi-Directional Electron Transfer Properties

Marine sediment has a great potential to generate electricity with a bioelectrochemical system (BES) like the microbial fuel cell (MFC). In this study, we investigated the potential of marine sediment and activated carbon (AC) to generate and store electricity. Both internal and external energy supply was validated for storage behavior. Four types of anode electrode compositions were investigated. Two types were mixtures of different volumes of AC and Dutch Eastern Scheldt marine sediment (67% AC and 33% AC) and the others two were 100% AC or 100% marine sediment based. Each composition was duplicated. Operating these BES’s under MFC mode with solely marine sediment as the anode electron donor resulted in the creation of a bio-battery. The recharge time of such bio-battery does depend on the fuel content and its usage. The results show that by usage of marine sediment and AC electricity was generated and stored. The 100% AC and the 67% AC mixed with marine sediment electrode were over long term potentiostatic controlled at -100 mV vs. Ag/AgCl which resulted in a cathodic current and an applied voltage. After switching back to the MFC operation mode at 1000 Ω external load, the electrode turned into an anode and electricity was generated. This supports the hypothesis that external supply electrical energy was recovered via bi-directional electron transfer. With open cell voltage experiments these AC marine bioanodes showed internal supplied electric charge storage up to 100 mC at short self-charging times (10 and 60 s) and up to 2.4°C (3,666 C/m3 anode) at long charging time (1 h). Using a hypothetical cell voltage of 0.2 V, this value represents an internal electrical storage density of 0.3 mWh/kg AC marine anode. Furthermore it was remarkable that the BES with 100% marine sediment based electrode also acted like a capacitor similar to the charge storage behaviors of the AC based bioanodes with a maximum volumetric storage of 1,373 C/m3 anode. These insights give opportunities to apply such BES systems as e.g., ex situ bio-battery to store and use electricity for off-grid purpose in remote areas

Long-term performance of a plant microbial fuel cell with Spartina anglica

The plant microbial fuel cell is a sustainable and renewable way of electricity production. The plant is integrated in the anode of the microbial fuel cell which consists of a bed of graphite granules. In the anode, organic compounds deposited by plant roots are oxidized by electrochemically active bacteria. In this research, salt marsh species Spartina anglica generated current for up to 119 days in a plant microbial fuel cell. Maximum power production was 100 mW m−2 geometric anode area, highest reported power output for a plant microbial fuel cell. Cathode overpotential was the main potential loss in the period of oxygen reduction due to slow oxygen reduction kinetics at the cathode. Ferricyanide reduction improved the kinetics at the cathode and increased current generation with a maximum of 254%. In the period of ferricyanide reduction, the main potential loss was transport loss. This research shows potential application of microbial fuel cell technology in salt marshes for bio-energy production with the plant microbial fuel cell

A comparison of acoustic and linguistics methodologies for Alzheimer’s dementia recognition

In the light of the current COVID-19 pandemic, the need for remote digital health assessment tools is greater than ever. This statement is especially pertinent for elderly and vulnerable populations. In this regard, the INTERSPEECH 2020 Alzheimer’s Dementia Recognition through Spontaneous Speech (ADReSS) Challenge offers competitors the opportunity to develop speech and language-based systems for the task of Alzheimer’s Dementia (AD) recognition. The challenge data consists of speech recordings and their transcripts, the work presented herein is an assessment of different contemporary approaches on these modalities. Specifically, we compared a hierarchical neural network with an attention mechanism trained on linguistic features with three acoustic-based systems: (i) Bag-of-Audio-Words (BoAW) quantising different low-level descriptors, (ii) a Siamese Network trained on log-Mel spectrograms, and (iii) a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) end-to-end system trained on raw waveforms. Key results indicate the strength of the linguistic approach over the acoustics systems. Our strongest test-set result was achieved using a late fusion combination of BoAW, End-to-End CNN, and hierarchical-attention networks, which outperformed the challenge baseline in both the classification and regression tasks

Microbial community structure elucidates performance of Glyceria maxima plant microbial fuel cell

The plant microbial fuel cell (PMFC) is a technology in which living plant roots provide electron donor, via rhizodeposition, to a mixed microbial community to generate electricity in a microbial fuel cell. Analysis and localisation of the microbial community is necessary for gaining insight into the competition for electron donor in a PMFC. This paper characterises the anode–rhizosphere bacterial community of a Glyceria maxima (reed mannagrass) PMFC. Electrochemically active bacteria (EAB) were located on the root surfaces, but they were more abundant colonising the graphite granular electrode. Anaerobic cellulolytic bacteria dominated the area where most of the EAB were found, indicating that the current was probably generated via the hydrolysis of cellulose. Due to the presence of oxygen and nitrate, short-chain fatty acid-utilising denitrifiers were the major competitors for the electron donor. Acetate-utilising methanogens played a minor role in the competition for electron donor, probably due to the availability of graphite granules as electron acceptors

Height and timing of growth spurt during puberty in young people living with vertically acquired HIV in Europe and Thailand.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to describe growth during puberty in young people with vertically acquired HIV. DESIGN: Pooled data from 12 paediatric HIV cohorts in Europe and Thailand. METHODS: One thousand and ninety-four children initiating a nonnucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor or boosted protease inhibitor based regimen aged 1-10 years were included. Super Imposition by Translation And Rotation (SITAR) models described growth from age 8 years using three parameters (average height, timing and shape of the growth spurt), dependent on age and height-for-age z-score (HAZ) (WHO references) at antiretroviral therapy (ART) initiation. Multivariate regression explored characteristics associated with these three parameters. RESULTS: At ART initiation, median age and HAZ was 6.4 [interquartile range (IQR): 2.8, 9.0] years and -1.2 (IQR: -2.3 to -0.2), respectively. Median follow-up was 9.1 (IQR: 6.9, 11.4) years. In girls, older age and lower HAZ at ART initiation were independently associated with a growth spurt which occurred 0.41 (95% confidence interval 0.20-0.62) years later in children starting ART age 6 to 10 years compared with 1 to 2 years and 1.50 (1.21-1.78) years later in those starting with HAZ less than -3 compared with HAZ at least -1. Later growth spurts in girls resulted in continued height growth into later adolescence. In boys starting ART with HAZ less than -1, growth spurts were later in children starting ART in the oldest age group, but for HAZ at least -1, there was no association with age. Girls and boys who initiated ART with HAZ at least -1 maintained a similar height to the WHO reference mean. CONCLUSION: Stunting at ART initiation was associated with later growth spurts in girls. Children with HAZ at least -1 at ART initiation grew in height at the level expected in HIV negative children of a comparable age