Tunneling effects on impurity spectral function in coupled asymmetric quantum wires

The impurity spectral function is studied in coupled double quantum wires at finite temperatures. Simple anisotropy in the confinement direction of the wires leads to finite non-diagonal elements of the impurity spectral function matrix. These non-diagonal elements are responsible for tunneling effects and result in pronounced extra peak in the impurity spectral function up to temperatures as high as 20 K.Comment: Accepted in Phys. Rev.

Tuberculosis in a child - search for the infected adult nearby; case report, Portugal, 2007

Case ReportsTuberculosis (TB) transmission in a non-household setting is difficult to detect, because contact with the source case is often not obvious. Here, we report on a case of a four-year-old child who got infected through sporadic non-household exposure at a coffee shop. The source case was a woman who had suffered from weight loss, productive cough and fatigue for two months before being diagnosed with TB. Screening the child s contacts revealed two active TB cases within its family. Overall 148 contacts were screened for both cases and 18 cases of latent TB infection detected. The connection between the child and the source case, who were not aware of their contact, was confirmed by molecular fingerprinting. Our case report illustrates the difficulty in detecting non-household transmission between individuals that do not have significant contact, and draws attention to the need to look for the infected adult whenever a child falls ill with TB. This report is a reminder of the importance to consider possibly neglected ways of TB transmission and highlights once again the need of early diagnosis of TB.N/

The hypersensitive response of Olea europaea L. elicitates by Pseudomonas savastanoi

Poster apresentado no 14th Federation of European Societies for Plant Biology Congress, Cracóvia, Polónia.In plants, the Hypersensitive Response (HR) is an early defense mechanism that is elicited by the recognition of an incompatible pathogen, with the objective of restricting its spread. One of the earliest events in the HR is the rapid and significant increase in Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) levels in the cells. This Oxidative Burst has various consequences, in particular the induction of the synthesis of secondary metabolites like phythoalexins (compounds with anti-microbial activity) and lignin (to reinforce the cell wall), and the triggering of a programmed cell death. We used a previously established in vitro elicitation system to study the interaction between Olea europaea L. and its pathogen Pseudomonas savastanoi, responsible for the olive knot, a disease that drastically affects olive oil production in Portugal. Material and Methods: The in vitro elicitation system used in this work was composed of suspension cell cultures of the resistant Olea europaea variety Galega Vulgar and by an avirulent strain of the pathogen Pseudomonas savastanoi. ROS detection was performed using a modification of the method described by Parsons et al. (1999), lipid peroxidation was measured using the TBA test and phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL) activity was evaluated by the quantification of trans-cinnamic acid determined spectrophotometrically at 290 nm. Results and Conclusions: Evaluation of ROS levels show a significant increase in production by the elicitated O. europaea cells, with a pattern typical of incompatible interactions, indicating that the Galega Vulgar variety is in fact resistant to the pathogen. This OB leads to significant cellular damage, illustrated by increased levels of lipid peroxidation. PAL activity also increased in elicitated cells, pointing toward changes in the phenylpropanoid pathway and, therefore, in the production of secondary metabolites. Quantification of lignin and of the total soluble phenolics allowed us to assess these changes. In order to evaluate the programmed cell death of the challenged cells, the T.U.N.E.L. assay was carried out during the time course of elicitation. References: Parsons HL, Yip YHJ, Vanlerberghe GC. 1999. Increased Respiratory Restriction during Phosphate Limited Growth in Transgenic Tobacco Cells Lacking Alternative Oxidase. Plant Physiol 121; 1309-1320. Since the ROS produced in the OB function mainly as an intracellular signal, we studied the effect of Hydrogen peroxide as a signal molecule. Various concentrations of H2O2 were added to suspension cell cultures of O. europaea and PAL activity was measured. The increase in PAL activity when the added concentrations were low indicates that hydrogen peroxide may in fact function as a transduction signal during the HR. Heath RL, Packer L. 1968. Photoperoxidation in isolated chloroplasts. I. Kinetics and stoichiometry of fatty acid peroxidation. Arch Biochem Biophys 125(1); 189-98.Projecto Olea - ref. POCTI/AGR/36239.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) - grant ref. SFRH/BD/6654/2001

Paradoxical popups: Why are they hard to catch?

Even professional baseball players occasionally find it difficult to gracefully approach seemingly routine pop-ups. This paper describes a set of towering pop-ups with trajectories that exhibit cusps and loops near the apex. For a normal fly ball, the horizontal velocity is continuously decreasing due to drag caused by air resistance. But for pop-ups, the Magnus force (the force due to the ball spinning in a moving airflow) is larger than the drag force. In these cases the horizontal velocity decreases in the beginning, like a normal fly ball, but after the apex, the Magnus force accelerates the horizontal motion. We refer to this class of pop-ups as paradoxical because they appear to misinform the typically robust optical control strategies used by fielders and lead to systematic vacillation in running paths, especially when a trajectory terminates near the fielder. In short, some of the dancing around when infielders pursue pop-ups can be well explained as a combination of bizarre trajectories and misguidance by the normally reliable optical control strategy, rather than apparent fielder error. Former major league infielders confirm that our model agrees with their experiences.Comment: 28 pages, 10 figures, sumitted to American Journal of Physic

Development of tools for studying Olea europaea: Pseudomonas savastanoi interaction

Poster apresentado no 13th Congress of the Federation of European Societies of Plant Physiology, em 2002, Hersonissos, Creta, GréciaPortugal is one of the main world olive oil producers. Consequently, the culture of olive trees is of considerable importance for our country. In order to maintain and improve our varieties, responses to environmental stresses and pests, which can seriously affect productivity, must be studied, and clones more adapted to challenge stress conditions must be found. One problem that seriously affects Portuguese olive orchards' is olive knot, a disease caused by Pseudomonas savastanoi (Pseudomonas syringae pv savastanoi) which, causing tumours in the stems and leaves of the trees, drastically reduces the production of fruits. Some varieties, like Galega Vulgar, are know to be resistant to the disease, while others, like Cordovil de Serpa, variety are know to be susceptible. With the objective of developing an in vitro system of eliciation of Olea europaea with an avirulent strain of Pseudomonas savastanoi, we have initiated suspension cell cultures of from calli of the variety Galega Vulgar. Cells in middle exponential growth phase were incubated with a suspension of P. savastanoi.Hypersensitive response was studied using XTT (sodium,3’-(1-[phenylamino-carbonyl]-3,4-tetrazolium)-bis(4-methoxy-6-nitro) benzene-sulfonic acid) by the quantification of the perhydroxyl / superoxide (H2O./O2-) radical acid-base pair associated to the oxidative burst, during the time course of elicitation. The results showed the existence of two bursts (100 and 300 min after eliciation), which are characteristic of the HR that occurs in the incompatible interactions). By screening an elicited O. europaea cDNA library a clone encoding phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL) was obtained. The coding region was used as probe for evaluate Pal expression levels. The results will be discussed by comparing to variation of PAL activity, during the time course of elicitation.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) – grant ref. SFRH/BD/6654/2001, Programa Operacional “Ciência, Tecnologia, Inovação” (POCTI) - POCTI / AGR / 36239 / 99-00

Perspectivas da bubalinocultura no Baixo Madeira no estado de Rondonia.

Estudo preliminar visando suprir deficiencia de carne e leite dos moradores das margens do Rio Madeira. Envolve aspectos relativos a bubalinocultura, operacoes que formam o sistema, producao de leite, instalacoes, comercializacao e sugestoes para o fomento da bubalinocultura.bitstream/item/55121/1/Circ.tecn-03-0001.pd