The 5'-3' exoribonuclease Pacman (Xrn1) regulates expression of the heat shock protein Hsp67Bc and the microRNA miR-277-3p in Drosophila wing imaginal discs

Pacman/Xrn1 is a highly conserved exoribonuclease known to play a critical role in gene regulatory events such as control of mRNA stability, RNA interference and regulation via miRNAs. Although Pacman has been well studied in Drosophila tissue culture cells, the biologically relevant cellular pathways controlled by Pacman in natural tissues are unknown. This study shows that a hypomorphic mutation in pacman (pcm5) results in smaller wing imaginal discs. These tissues, found in the larva, are known to grow and differentiate to form wing and thorax structures in the adult fly. Using microarray analysis, followed by quantitative RT-PCR, we show that eight mRNAs were increased in level by >2 fold in the pcm5 mutant wing discs compared to the control. The levels of pre mRNAs were tested for five of these mRNAs; four did not increase in the pcm5 mutant, showing that they are regulated at the post-transcriptional level and therefore could be directly affected by Pacman. These transcripts include one that encodes the heat-shock protein Hsp67Bc, which is upregulated 11.9-fold at the post-transcriptional level and 2.3-fold at the protein level. One miRNA, miR-277-3p, is 5.6-fold downregulated at the post-transcriptional level in mutant discs, suggesting that Pacman affects its processing in this tissue. Together, these data show that a relatively small number of mRNAs and miRNAs substantially change in abundance in pacman mutant wing imaginal discs. Since Hsp67Bc is known to regulate autophagy and protein synthesis, it is possible that Pacman may control the growth of wing imaginal discs by regulating these processes

Emotional Freedom Techniques (Tapping) to Improve Wellbeing and Reduce Anxiety in Primary School Classrooms

The use of Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) as a class exercise was investigated to ascertain its effectiveness for student wellbeing. Although EFT has been validated in clinical settings, studies have not yet established whether this approach could be applied in classrooms to curb anxiety and improve wellbeing. A pragmatic, mixed methods study was conducted with 138 students in northern Australian primary schools. Student anxiety dissipated over two stages of intervention. Aside from class tapping sessions, students sometimes tapped surreptitiously, and teachers applied tapping for themselves on occasions. Students generally preferred a quieter, individual approach during class tapping sessions. Broader themes derived from student and teacher data suggested that tapping is a mechanism for change, the skills are transferable, and unsurprisingly, tapping is not always effective. EFT supports social and emotional learning and aligns with the Australian school curriculum. Findings suggest EFT used in classrooms can benefit students and teacher

Integrating children's perspectives in policy-making to combat poverty and social exclusion experienced by single-parent families: a transnational comparative approach

This is the final report of a research project that addressed social exclusion and poverty as it relates to single parent families and their children in particular. The rising numbers of single parent families and children throughout the EU and the increased likelihood that these families will live in poverty and experience many different forms of social exclusion in their daily lives brings in sharp focus the need to address the issue as an urgent one in our efforts to eradicate poverty and social exclusion. The focus on the children of single parent families seeks to rectify a long-standing problem in our knowledge and understanding of single parent families and the social problems they face, namely, the fact that little, if anything, is known about how these children experience and understand their lives as members of these families. The research set out to contribute to policy development and the transnational exchange of best practice by adding a much-neglected dimension on single parent families. The project used a cross-national comparative qualitative research design and methods (Mangen 1999) which involved all partners in the design of each research phase including the analysis; partners were England, Cyprus and Greece

Uptake of silicon in barley under contrasting drought regimes

Purpose: Silicon (Si) accumulation in plant tissues plays a vital role in alleviating biotic and abiotic stresses, including drought. Temperate regions are predicted to experience reductions in the quantity and frequency of rainfall events, potentially impacting plant Si uptake via the transpiration stream. Despite the importance for predicting plant responses to Si amendments, the effects of changes in rainfall patterns on Si uptake in cereals have not been characterised. Methods: Five watering regimes were applied based on predicted precipitation scenarios, varying the quantity of water delivered (ambient, 40% or 60% reduction) and watering frequency (40% reduction in quantity, applied 50% or 25% of ambient frequency), and the effects on growth and leaf Si concentrations of a barley landrace and cultivar were determined. Results: Reductions in the quantity of water reduced plant growth and yield, whereas reducing the watering frequency had little impact on growth, and in some cases partially ameliorated the negative effects of drought. Reductions in quantity of water lowered leaf Si concentrations in both the cultivar and landrace, although this effect was alleviated under the drought/deluge watering regime. The landrace had greater leaf Si concentration than the cultivar regardless of watering regime, and under ambient watering deposited Si in all cells between trichomes, whereas the cultivar exhibited gaps in Si deposition. Conclusion: The impact of future reductions in rainfall on barley productivity will depend upon how the water is delivered, with drought/deluge events likely to have smaller effects on yield and on Si uptake than continuous drought

Parametrizing horizontally-averaged wind and temperature profiles in the urban roughness sublayer

Tower-based measurements from within and above the urban canopy in two cities are used to evaluate several existing approaches that parametrize the vertical profiles of wind speed and temperature within the urban roughness sublayer (RSL). It is shown that current use of Monin–Obukhov similarity theory (MOST) in numerical weather prediction models can be improved upon by using RSL corrections when modelling the vertical profiles of wind speed and friction velocity in the urban RSL using MOST. Using anisotropic building morphological information improves the agreement between observed and parametrized profiles of wind speed and momentum fluxes for selected methods. The largest improvement is found when using dynamically-varying aerodynamic roughness length and displacement height. Adding a RSL correction to MOST, however, does not improve the parametrization of the vertical profiles of temperature and heat fluxes. This is expected since sources and sinks of heat are assumed uniformly distributed through a simple flux boundary condition in all RSL formulations, yet are highly patchy and anisotropic in a real urban context. Our results can be used to inform the choice of surface-layer representations for air quality, dispersion, and numerical weather prediction applications in the urban environment

On a class of invariant coframe operators with application to gravity

Let a differential 4D-manifold with a smooth coframe field be given. Consider the operators on it that are linear in the second order derivatives or quadratic in the first order derivatives of the coframe, both with coefficients that depend on the coframe variables. The paper exhibits the class of operators that are invariant under a general change of coordinates, and, also, invariant under the global SO(1,3)-transformation of the coframe. A general class of field equations is constructed. We display two subclasses in it. The subclass of field equations that are derivable from action principles by free variations and the subclass of field equations for which spherical-symmetric solutions, Minkowskian at infinity exist. Then, for the spherical-symmetric solutions, the resulting metric is computed. Invoking the Geodesic Postulate, we find all the equations that are experimentally (by the 3 classical tests) indistinguishable from Einstein field equations. This family includes, of course, also Einstein equations. Moreover, it is shown, explicitly, how to exhibit it. The basic tool employed in the paper is an invariant formulation reminiscent of Cartan's structural equations. The article sheds light on the possibilities and limitations of the coframe gravity. It may also serve as a general procedure to derive covariant field equations

How many cows do I need? Sample size calculations for testing co-infection using existing study data

Background There is little empirical research on the co-infection of Fasciola hepatica and Escherichia coli O157 in cattle. E. coli is controlled in the gut by a Type 1 immune response, whereas F. hepatica is known to suppress these immune responses and induce an anti-inflammatory environment in the host. We evaluate the statistical feasibility of re-testing isolates from a planned UK Food Standards Agency study on E. coli prevalence for F. hepatica presence, in order to establish whether there is an association. Methods We simulate synthetic datasets representing the proposed FSA sampling strategy. Sample sizes within farms and F. hepatica infections are simulated using Beta-Binomial distributions. E. coli infections are simulated using a logistic random-intercepts model under an alternative hypothesis that the odds ratio of E. coli presence is double when F. hepatica is present, with farm- and isolate-level prevalence rates constrained to current estimates. Statistical power is calculated by fitting models to each of the simulated datasets assuming a type I error rate of 5%. Owing to the E. coli status being known in advance of the F. hepatica test, we restrict the sampling strategy to only test farms with >0% an

The Confounding Effects of Particle Size and Substrate Bulk Density on \u3cem\u3ePhanerochaete chrysosporium\u3c/em\u3e Pretreatment on \u3cem\u3ePanicum virgatum\u3c/em\u3e

Phanerochaete chrysosporium treatment is less effective as a biological pretreatment on feedstock with larger particle sizes. We hypothesized that the improved effectiveness of the pretreatment when smaller particle sizes are used may be due to the inherently higher bulk density with smaller particle sizes. The effects of substrate bulk density and particle size on the efficacy of P. chrysosporium pretreatment of switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) was tested experimentally. Phanerochaete chrysosporium was grown on senesced switchgrass (2 different particle sizes) with various bulk densities. In all treatments, the fungal-pretreated samples released more glucose during enzymatic saccharification than the control sample. Substrate bulk density was a statistically significant factor in explaining the variation in the amount of glucose released per gram of substrate used. However, the particle size was not found to be a significant factor. On-farm switchgrass pretreatment may not require particle size reduction if the switchgrass is supplied in high-density bales

Affinities of the family Sollasellidae (Porifera, Demospongiae). II. Molecular evidence

This is the second part of a revision and re-classification of the demosponge family Sollasellidae, and an example of a successful use of combined morphological and molecular data. Sollasella had been a poorly known, long forgotten taxon, placed incertae sedis in the order Hadromerida in the last major revision of the demosponges. It has recently been suggested to belong to Raspailiidae in the order Poecilosclerida due to striking morphological similarities. The present analysis verified this re-classification using molecular markers. Comparing 28S rDNA fragments of Sollasella cervicornis, a newly described species S. moretonensis and a representative set of raspailiid and hadromerid samples. In our analyses Sollasella clearly clusters inside the Raspailiidae clade, and distantly from hadromerid taxa. Supporting morphological hypothesis of Van Soest et al. (2006), that Sollasella is a raspailiid sponge