Thunderstorm and Lightning Characteristics Associated With Sprites in Brazil

A study of the thunderstorm and cloud-ground lightning characteristics associated with sprite events observed in Brazil is presented. The study is based on ground and aircraft sprite observations with high sensitivity intensified CCD cameras of six different thunderstorms, GOES satellite infrared images, radar and lightning network data. A total of eighteen transient optical events were recorded at three different days in 2002 and 2003, sixteen of which exhibited vertical structures typically associated with sprites. Four thunderstorms were associated with two different cold fronts, one with a Mesoscale Convective System, and one was a local isolated thunderstorm. The sprites occurred during time periods when the percentage of positive flashes was higher than the average percentage for the storm lifetime. The lightning associated with the sprite events was all positive flashes with a mean peak current higher than the mean value for all flashes in the storms

Forty-Year Trends in Tooth Loss Among American Adults With and Without Diabetes Mellitus: An Age-Period-Cohort Analysis

Abstract Introduction This study aimed to assess the trends in tooth loss among adults with and without diabetes mellitus in the United States and racial/ethnic disparities in tooth loss patterns, and to evaluate trends in tooth loss by age, birth cohorts, and survey periods. Methods Data came from 9 waves of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) from 1971 through 2012. The trends in the estimated tooth loss in people with and without diabetes were assessed by age groups, survey periods, and birth cohorts. The analytical sample was 37,609 dentate (ie, with at least 1 permanent tooth) adults aged 25 years or older. We applied hierarchical age-period-cohort cross-classified random-effects models for the trend analysis. Results The estimated number of teeth lost among non-Hispanic blacks with diabetes increased more with age than that among non-Hispanic whites with diabetes (z = 4.05, P < .001) or Mexican Americans with diabetes (z = 4.38, P < .001). During 1971–2012, there was a significant decreasing trend in the number of teeth lost among non-Hispanic whites with diabetes (slope = −0.20, P < .001) and non-Hispanic blacks with diabetes (slope = −0.37, P < .001). However, adults with diabetes had about twice the tooth loss as did those without diabetes. Conclusion Substantial differences in tooth loss between adults with and without diabetes and across racial/ethnic groups persisted over time. Appropriate dental care and tooth retention need to be further promoted among adults with diabetes

Synthesis and bactericidal properties of porphyrins immobilized in a polyacrylamide support: influence of metal complexation on photoactivity

Spectroscopic and photodynamic properties of three novel polymeric hydrogels bearing porphyrins have been studied in vitro on the recombinant bioluminescent Gram-negative Escherichia coli DH5α to assess their ability to inactivate bacterial strains in solution. The three different hydrogels were formed by polymerization of 5-[4-2-(2-(2-acrylamidoethoxy)ethoxy)ethyl]carboxyphenyl-10,15,20-tris(4-N-methylpyridyl)porphyrin trichloride (5) and its complexes with Pd(II) (6) and Cu(II) (7) respectively, to form three optically transparent polyacrylamide hydrogels. All of the porphyrins are tricationic and they bear at the meso positions three N-methylpyridyl rings and one terminal acryloyl group connected through a flexible hydrophilic linker, particularly suitable for the later polymerization and incorporation into a hydrogel. The hydrogels were characterized by IR and scanning electron microscopy and incorporation of the dye was confirmed by UV-visible spectroscopy. All the hydrogels are characterized by a non-ordered microporous structure. The E. coli exhibited a decrease of 1.87 log after 25 min irradiation when the porphyrin hydrogel 9 was evaluated. When the Pd(II) and Cu(II)porphyrin hydrogels were tested (10, 11), they showed a 2.93 log decrease and 1.26 log decrease in the survival of the E. coli after 25 min irradiation, respectively. Similar results were obtained when the porphyrins were tested in solution. Of the three hydrogels, the Pd(II)porphyrin hydrogel (10) proved to be the one with the highest photokilling ability under illumination, and also exhibited the lowest toxicity in the absence of light. Hydrogels 9 and 10 were found to be active for five cycles, suggesting the possibility of reuse

The contribution of X-linked coding variation to severe developmental disorders

Over 130 X-linked genes have been robustly associated with developmental disorders, and X-linked causes have been hypothesised to underlie the higher developmental disorder rates in males. Here, we evaluate the burden of X-linked coding variation in 11,044 developmental disorder patients, and find a similar rate of X-linked causes in males and females (6.0% and 6.9%, respectively), indicating that such variants do not account for the 1.4-fold male bias. We develop an improved strategy to detect X-linked developmental disorders and identify 23 significant genes, all of which were previously known, consistent with our inference that the vast majority of the X-linked burden is in known developmental disorder-associated genes. Importantly, we estimate that, in male probands, only 13% of inherited rare missense variants in known developmental disorder-associated genes are likely to be pathogenic. Our results demonstrate that statistical analysis of large datasets can refine our understanding of modes of inheritance for individual X-linked disorders. Developmental disorders (DDs) are more prevalent in males, thought to be due to X-linked genetic variation. Here, the authors investigate the burden of X-linked coding variants in 11,044 DD patients, showing that this contributes to similar to 6% of both male and female cases and therefore does not solely explain male bias in DDs.Peer reviewe

Operational Research in Education

Operational Research (OR) techniques have been applied, from the early stages of the discipline, to a wide variety of issues in education. At the government level, these include questions of what resources should be allocated to education as a whole and how these should be divided amongst the individual sectors of education and the institutions within the sectors. Another pertinent issue concerns the efficient operation of institutions, how to measure it, and whether resource allocation can be used to incentivise efficiency savings. Local governments, as well as being concerned with issues of resource allocation, may also need to make decisions regarding, for example, the creation and location of new institutions or closure of existing ones, as well as the day-to-day logistics of getting pupils to schools. Issues of concern for managers within schools and colleges include allocating the budgets, scheduling lessons and the assignment of students to courses. This survey provides an overview of the diverse problems faced by government, managers and consumers of education, and the OR techniques which have typically been applied in an effort to improve operations and provide solutions

Calcineurin regulates innate antifungal immunity in neutrophils

Patients taking immunosuppressive drugs, like cyclosporine A (CsA), that inhibit calcineurin are highly susceptible to disseminated fungal infections, although it is unclear how these drugs suppress resistance to these opportunistic pathogens. We show that in a mouse model of disseminated Candida albicans infection, CsA-induced susceptibility to fungal infection maps to the innate immune system. To further define the cell types targeted by CsA, we generated mice with a conditional deletion of calcineurin B (CnB) in neutrophils. These mice displayed markedly decreased resistance to infection with C. albicans, and both CnB-deficient and CsA-treated neutrophils showed a defect in the ex vivo killing of C. albicans. In response to the fungal-derived pathogen-associated molecular pattern zymosan, neutrophils lacking CnB displayed impaired up-regulation of genes (IL-10, Cox2, Egr1, and Egr2) regulated by nuclear factor of activated T cells, the best characterized CnB substrate. This activity was Myd88 independent and was reproduced by stimulation with the β(1,3) glucan curdlan, indicating that dectin-1, rather than toll-like receptors, is the upstream activator of calcineurin. Our results suggest that disseminated fungal infections seen in CsA-treated patients are not just a general consequence of systemic suppression of adaptive immunity but are, rather, a result of the specific blockade of evolutionarily conserved innate pathways for fungal resistance

Relativistic Outflow Drives Gamma-Ray Emission in 3C345

Aims: 3C345 was recently identified as a gamma-ray emitter, based on the first 20 months of Fermi-LAT data and optical monitoring. In this paper, a connection between the gamma-ray and optical variability of 3C345 and properties of its parsec-scale radio emission is investigated. Methods: The Fermi-LAT data of 3C345, covering an energy range of 0.1-300 GeV, were combined with 32 Very Long Baseline Array observations of the object made at 43.2 GHz in the period of January 2008 - March 2010. Results: The VLBA data reveal morphology and kinematics of the flow on scales of up to ~5 milliarcseconds (mas; deprojected linear distances of 380 parsecs). The brightness temperature, T_b(r), measured along the jet first decreases with distance proportional to r^-(0.95 +/-0.69) and later exhibits a break at ~0.3 mas, with T_b(r) proportional to r^-(4.11 +/-0.85) at larger separations. Variations of the gamma-ray, optical and parsec-scale radio emission show a similar long-term trend persistent during the entire VLBA monitoring period. The gamma-ray and optical variations on shorter time scales are related to structural changes in the jet on scales of ~0.3 mas (~23 parsecs, deprojected), with the gamma-ray and optical flares possibly related to the evolution of four distinct superluminal components identified in the flow. Conclusions: The observations indicate that both the quiescent and flaring components of the gamma-ray emission are produced in a region of the jet of ~23 pc in extent. This region may mark the Compton-loss dominated zone of the flow and its large extent may favor the synchrotron self-Compton mechanism for gamma-ray production in the relativistic jet of the quasar 3C345.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures, 2 tables, accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysic

Use of genome sequencing to hunt for cryptic second-hit variants: analysis of 31 cases recruited to the 100 000 Genomes Project

Background: Current clinical testing methods used to uncover the genetic basis of rare disease have inherent limitations, which can lead to causative pathogenic variants being missed. Within the rare disease arm of the 100 000 Genomes Project (100kGP), families were recruited under the clinical indication ‘single autosomal recessive mutation in rare disease’. These participants presented with strong clinical suspicion for a specific autosomal recessive disorder, but only one suspected pathogenic variant had been identified through standard-of-care testing. Whole genome sequencing (WGS) aimed to identify cryptic ‘second-hit’ variants. Methods: To investigate the 31 families with available data that remained unsolved following formal review within the 100kGP, SVRare was used to aggregate structural variants present in <1% of 100kGP participants. Small variants were assessed using population allele frequency data and SpliceAI. Literature searches and publicly available online tools were used for further annotation of pathogenicity. Results: Using these strategies, 8/31 cases were solved, increasing the overall diagnostic yield of this cohort from 10/41 (24.4%) to 18/41 (43.9%). Exemplar cases include a patient with cystic fibrosis harbouring a novel exonic LINE1 insertion in CFTR and a patient with generalised arterial calcification of infancy with complex interlinked duplications involving exons 2–6 of ENPP1. Although ambiguous by short-read WGS, the ENPP1 variant structure was resolved using optical genome mapping and RNA analysis. Conclusion: Systematic examination of cryptic variants across a multi-disease cohort successfully identifies additional pathogenic variants. WGS data analysis in autosomal recessive rare disease should consider complex structural and small intronic variants as potentially pathogenic second hits

Intentional creation of carbon-rich dark earth soils in the Amazon

Fertile soil known as Amazonian dark earth is central to the debate over the size and ecological impact of ancient human populations in the Amazon. Dark earth is typically associated with human occupation, but it is uncertain whether it was created intentionally. Dark earth may also be a substantial carbon sink, but its spatial extent and carbon inventory are unknown. We demonstrate spatial and compositional similarities between ancient and modern dark earth and document modern Indigenous practices that enrich soil, which we use to propose a model for the formation of ancient dark earth. This comparison suggests that ancient Amazonians managed soil to improve fertility and increase crop productivity. These practices also sequestered and stored carbon in the soil for centuries, and we show that some ancient sites contain as much carbon as the above-ground rainforest biomass. Our results demonstrate the intentional creation of dark earth and highlight the value of Indigenous knowledge for sustainable rainforest management