Development of ternary diagrams for estimating water retention properties using geostatistical approaches

Most pedotransfer functions (PTFs) have adopted soil texture information as the main predictor to estimate soil hydraulic properties, whether inputs are defined in terms of the relative proportion of different grain size particles or texture-based classifications. The objective of this studywas to develop ternary diagrams for estimating soil water retention (θ) at−33 and−1500 kPa matric potentials, corresponding to the field capacity and wilting point, respectively, from particle size distribution using two geostatistical approaches. The texture triangle was divided into a 1% grid of soil texture composition resulting in 4332 different soil textures. Measured soil water retention values determined in 742 soil horizons/layers located in Portugal were then used to develop and validate the hydraulic ternary diagrams. The development subset included two-thirds of the data, and the validation subset the remaining samples. The measured soil water content values were displayed in the ternary diagram according to the coordinates given by the particles size distribution determined in the same soil samples. The volumetric water content values were then predicted for the entire ternary diagram using two different geostatistical interpolation algorithms (ordinary kriging and the empirical best linear unbiased predictor). Uncertainty analysis resulted in a root mean square error below 0.040 and 0.034 cm3 cm−3 when comparing the interpolated water contents at −33 and −1500 kPa matric potential values, respectively, with the measured ones included in the validation dataset. The estimation variance calculated with both methods was also considered to access the uncertainty of the predictions. The available water content of Portuguese soils was then derived from θ−33 kPa and θ−1500 kPa ternary diagrams developed with both approaches. The hydraulic ternary diagrams may thus serve as simplified tools for estimating water retention properties from particle size distribution and eventually serve as an alternative to the traditional statistical regression and data mining techniques used to derive PTFsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

From Microalgae Growth Promotion to the Production of Secondary Metabolites

Funding Information: F.Q.-N. and P.R.B. acknowledge receiving a Ph.D. fellowship (2022.10633.BD; 2021.07927.BD514, respectively) funded by FCT/MCTES. Funding Information: This research was conducted in the scope of the project “PhycoµBiome: Understanding and harnessing the power of the microalgae microbiome aiming the maximization of marine microalgae productivity” funded by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia/Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia e Ensino Superior (FCT/MCTES, Portugal), grant number PTDC/BAA-BIO/1262/2020. The research was performed with the support of iNOVA4Health (UIDB/04462/2020 and UIDP/04462/2020) and the Associate Laboratory LS4FUTURE (LA/P/0087/2020) also funded by the FCT/MCTES. Publisher Copyright: © 2023 by the authors.Marine bacteria are a significant source of bioactive compounds for various biotechnological applications. Among these, actinomycetes have been found to produce a wide range of secondary metabolites of interest. Saccharopolyspora is one of the genera of actinomycetes that has been recognized as a potential source of these compounds. This study reports the characterization and genomic analysis of Saccharopolyspora sp. NFXS83, a marine bacterium isolated from seawater from the Sado estuary in Portugal. The NFXS83 strain produced multiple functional and stable extracellular enzymes under high-salt conditions, showed the ability to synthesize auxins such as indole-3-acetic acid, and produced diffusible secondary metabolites capable of inhibiting the growth of Staphylococcus aureus. Furthermore, when Phaeodactylum tricornutum was co-cultivated with strain NFXS83 a significant increase in microalgae cell count, cell size, auto-fluorescence, and fucoxanthin content was observed. Detailed analysis revealed the presence of clusters involved in the production of various secondary metabolites, including extracellular enzymes, antimicrobial compounds, terpenes, and carotenoids in the genome of strain NFXS83. Ultimately, these findings indicate that Saccharopolyspora sp. NFXS83 has a significant potential for a wide range of marine biotechnological applications.publishersversionpublishe

Bartolosides E-K from a Marine coccoid cyanobacterium

The glycosylated and halogenated dialkylresorcinol (DAR) compounds bartolosides A-D (1-4) were recently discovered from marine cyanobacteria and represent a novel family of glycolipids, encoded by the brt biosynthetic gene cluster. Here, we report the isolation and NMR- and MS-based structure elucidation of monoglycosylated bartolosides E-K (5-11), obtained from Synechocystis salina LEGE 06099, a strain closely related to the cyanobacterium that produces the diglycosylated 2-4. In addition, a genome region containing orthologues of brt genes was identified in this cyanobacterium. Interestingly, the major bartoloside in S. salina LEGE 06099 was 1 (above 0.5% dry wt), originally isolated from the phylogenetically distant filamentous cyanobacterium Nodosilinea sp. LEGE 06102. Compounds 5-11 are analogues of 1, with different alkyl chain lengths or halogenation patterns. Their structures and the organization of the brt genes suggest that the DAR-forming ketosynthase BrtD can generate structural diversity by accepting fatty acyl-derived substrates of varying length. Compound 9 features a rare midchain gem-dichloro moiety, indicating that the putative halogenase BrtJ is able to act twice on the same midchain carbon. © 2016 The American Chemical Society and American Society of Pharmacognosy.We would like to thank CEMUP for NMR and HRMS analyses, I. Dias, A. Kijoa, and S. Buttachon for optical rotation measurements, and B. Jarrais for IR measurements. This work was supported by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) through grants PTDC/MAR-BIO/2818/2012 and IF/01358/2014 to P.N.L. and partially by project NOVELMAR (NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000035) supported by the NORTE2020 Program and the European Regional Development Fund

Parental attendance in two early-childhood training programmes to improve nurturing care: a randomized controlled trial

Parent training programmes have significant potential to improve the quality of children's early environments and thereby their development and life-course outcomes. The aim of this study was to identify and explain the extent to which parents engaged in two group-based training programmes, offered to high-risk families enrolled in a randomized controlled trial study called PIÁ in Southern Brazil. The programmes were: (1) ACT: Raising Safe Kids, a 9-week programme aiming to reduce harsh parenting and maltreatment and improve positive parenting practices; (2) Dialogic book-sharing (DBS), an 8-week programme aiming to promote parental sensitivity and improve child cognitive development and social understanding. Of the 123 mothers randomly allocated to the ACT programme, 64.2% (n = 79) completed the course, and of 124 mothers allocated to DBS, 76.6% (n = 95) completed the course. After the interventions, mothers were very positive about the experience of both programmes but highlighted practical difficulties in attending. In adjusted regression analyses, only two variables significantly predicted ACT course completion (maternal age and distance between the intervention site and household); no significant predictor was found for DBS attendance. We conclude that although high completion rates are possible, there are important challenges to engaging parents of young children in training programmes, and practical difficulties occurring during training courses may be more important for attendance than baseline participant characteristics

Measurement of the polarisation of W bosons produced with large transverse momentum in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS experiment

This paper describes an analysis of the angular distribution of W->enu and W->munu decays, using data from pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV recorded with the ATLAS detector at the LHC in 2010, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of about 35 pb^-1. Using the decay lepton transverse momentum and the missing transverse energy, the W decay angular distribution projected onto the transverse plane is obtained and analysed in terms of helicity fractions f0, fL and fR over two ranges of W transverse momentum (ptw): 35 < ptw < 50 GeV and ptw > 50 GeV. Good agreement is found with theoretical predictions. For ptw > 50 GeV, the values of f0 and fL-fR, averaged over charge and lepton flavour, are measured to be : f0 = 0.127 +/- 0.030 +/- 0.108 and fL-fR = 0.252 +/- 0.017 +/- 0.030, where the first uncertainties are statistical, and the second include all systematic effects.Comment: 19 pages plus author list (34 pages total), 9 figures, 11 tables, revised author list, matches European Journal of Physics C versio

Observation of a new chi_b state in radiative transitions to Upsilon(1S) and Upsilon(2S) at ATLAS

The chi_b(nP) quarkonium states are produced in proton-proton collisions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV and recorded by the ATLAS detector. Using a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.4 fb^-1, these states are reconstructed through their radiative decays to Upsilon(1S,2S) with Upsilon->mu+mu-. In addition to the mass peaks corresponding to the decay modes chi_b(1P,2P)->Upsilon(1S)gamma, a new structure centered at a mass of 10.530+/-0.005 (stat.)+/-0.009 (syst.) GeV is also observed, in both the Upsilon(1S)gamma and Upsilon(2S)gamma decay modes. This is interpreted as the chi_b(3P) system.Comment: 5 pages plus author list (18 pages total), 2 figures, 1 table, corrected author list, matches final version in Physical Review Letter