A Model for Granular Texture with Steric Exclusion

We propose a new method to characterize the geometrical texture of a granular packing at the particle scale including the steric hindrance effect. This method is based on the assumption of a maximum disorder (entropy) compatible both with strain-induced anisotropy of the contact network and steric exclusions. We show that the predicted statistics for the local configurations is in a fairly agreement with our numerical data.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figure

Electron Transport in Hybrid Ferromagnetic/Superconducting Nanostructures

We observe large amplitude changes in the resistance of ferromagnetic (F) wires at the onset of superconductivity of adjacent superconductors (S). New sharp peaks of large amplitude are found in the magnetoresistance of the F-wires. We discuss a new mechanism for the long-range superconducting proximity effect in F/S nanostructures based on the analysis of the topologies of actual Fermi-surfaces in ferromagnetic metals.Comment: 7 pages in LaTeX, 5 eps figures. Submitted to the Proceedings of MS200

Traveling Granular Segregation Patterns in a Long Drum Mixer

Mixtures of granular media often exhibit size segregation along the axis of a partially-filled, horizontal, rotating cylinder. Previous experiments have observed axial bands of segregation that grow from concentration fluctuations and merge in a manner analogous to spinodal decomposition. We have observed that a new dynamical state precedes this effect in certain mixtures: bi-directional traveling waves. By preparing initial conditions, we found that the wave speed decreased with wavelength. Such waves appear to be inconsistent with simple PDE models which are first order in time.Comment: 11 page

A mutation in the melon Vacuolar Protein Sorting 41prevents systemic infection of Cucumber mosaic virus

[EN] In the melon exotic accession PI 161375, the gene cmv1, confers recessive resistance to Cucumber mosaic virus (CMV) strains of subgroup II. cmv1 prevents the systemic infection by restricting the virus to the bundle sheath cells and impeding viral loading to the phloem. Here we report the fine mapping and cloning of cmv1. Screening of an F2 population reduced the cmv1 region to a 132 Kb interval that includes a Vacuolar Protein Sorting 41 gene. CmVPS41 is conserved among plants, animals and yeast and is required for post-Golgi vesicle trafficking towards the vacuole. We have validated CmVPS41 as the gene responsible for the resistance, both by generating CMV susceptible transgenic melon plants, expressing the susceptible allele in the resistant cultivar and by characterizing CmVPS41 TILLING mutants with reduced susceptibility to CMV. Finally, a core collection of 52 melon accessions allowed us to identify a single amino acid substitution (L348R) as the only polymorphism associated with the resistant phenotype. CmVPS41 is the first natural recessive resistance gene found to be involved in viral transport and its cellular function suggests that CMV might use CmVPS41 for its own transport towards the phloem.The TILLING platform is supported by the Program Saclay Plant Sciences (SPS, ANR-10-LABX-40) and the European Research Council (ERC-SEXYPARTH). This work was supported by grants AGL2009-12698-C02-01 and AGL2012-40130-C02-01 from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, the Spanish Ministry of Econom and Competitiveness, through the "Severo Ochoa Programme for Centres of Excellence in R&D" 2016-2019 (SEV-2015-0533)" and the CERCA Programme/Generalitat de Catalunya.Giner, A.; Pascual, L.; Bourgeois, M.; Gyetvai, G.; Rios, P.; Picó Sirvent, MB.; Troadec, C.... (2017). 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SNP genotyping in melons: genetic variation, population structure, and linkage disequilibrium. Theoretical and Applied Genetics 126, 1285–1303, doi: 10.1007/s00122-013-2053-5 (2013).Leida, C. et al. Variability of candidate genes, genetic structure and association with sugar accumulation and climacteric behavior in a broad germplasm collection of melon (Cucumis melo L.). BMC Genetics 16, 28, doi: 10.1186/s12863-015-0183-2 (2015).Balderhaar, H. Jk & Ungermann, C. CORVET and HOPS tethering complexes – coordinators of endosome and lysosome fusion. Journal of Cell Science 126, 1307–1316, doi: 10.1242/jcs.107805 (2013).Darsow, T., Katzmann, D. J., Cowles, C. R. & Emr, S. D. Vps41p Function in the Alkaline Phosphatase Pathway Requires Homo-oligomerization and Interaction with AP-3 through Two Distinct Domains. Molecular Biology of the Cell 12, 37–51 (2001).Ostrowicz, C. W. et al. Defined subunit arrangement and Rab interactions are required for functionality of the HOPS tethering complex. 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Microcraters in aluminum foils exposed by Stardust

We will present preliminary results on the nature and size frequency distribution of microcraters that formed in aluminum foils during the flyby of comet Wild 2 by the Stardust spacecraft

Three-dimensional random Voronoi tessellations: From cubic crystal lattices to Poisson point processes

We perturb the SC, BCC, and FCC crystal structures with a spatial Gaussian noise whose adimensional strength is controlled by the parameter a, and analyze the topological and metrical properties of the resulting Voronoi Tessellations (VT). The topological properties of the VT of the SC and FCC crystals are unstable with respect to the introduction of noise, because the corresponding polyhedra are geometrically degenerate, whereas the tessellation of the BCC crystal is topologically stable even against noise of small but finite intensity. For weak noise, the mean area of the perturbed BCC and FCC crystals VT increases quadratically with a. In the case of perturbed SCC crystals, there is an optimal amount of noise that minimizes the mean area of the cells. Already for a moderate noise (a>0.5), the properties of the three perturbed VT are indistinguishable, and for intense noise (a>2), results converge to the Poisson-VT limit. Notably, 2-parameter gamma distributions are an excellent model for the empirical of of all considered properties. The VT of the perturbed BCC and FCC structures are local maxima for the isoperimetric quotient, which measures the degre of sphericity of the cells, among space filling VT. In the BCC case, this suggests a weaker form of the recentluy disproved Kelvin conjecture. Due to the fluctuations of the shape of the cells, anomalous scalings with exponents >3/2 is observed between the area and the volumes of the cells, and, except for the FCC case, also for a->0. In the Poisson-VT limit, the exponent is about 1.67. As the number of faces is positively correlated with the sphericity of the cells, the anomalous scaling is heavily reduced when we perform powerlaw fits separately on cells with a specific number of faces

Towards a TILLING platform for functional genomics in Piel de Sapo melons

Background The availability of genetic and genomic resources for melon has increased significantly, but functional genomics resources are still limited for this crop. TILLING is a powerful reverse genetics approach that can be utilized to generate novel mutations in candidate genes. A TILLING resource is available for cantalupensis melons, but not for inodorus melons, the other main commercial group. Results A new ethyl methanesulfonate-mutagenized (EMS) melon population was generated for the first time in an andromonoecious non-climacteric inodorus Piel de Sapo genetic background. Diverse mutant phenotypes in seedlings, vines and fruits were observed, some of which were of possible commercial interest. The population was first screened for mutations in three target genes involved in disease resistance and fruit quality (Cm-PDS, Cm-eIF4E and Cm-eIFI(iso)4E). The same genes were also tilled in the available monoecious and climacteric cantalupensis EMS melon population. The overall mutation density in this first Piel de Sapo TILLING platform was estimated to be 1 mutation/1.5 Mb by screening four additional genes (Cm-ACO1, Cm-NOR, Cm-DET1 and Cm-DHS). Thirty-three point mutations were found for the seven gene targets, six of which were predicted to have an impact on the function of the protein. The genotype/phenotype correlation was demonstrated for a loss-of-function mutation in the Phytoene desaturase gene, which is involved in carotenoid biosynthesis. Conclusions The TILLING approach was successful at providing new mutations in the genetic background of Piel de Sapo in most of the analyzed genes, even in genes for which natural variation is extremely low. This new resource will facilitate reverse genetics studies in non-climacteric melons, contributing materially to future genomic and breeding studies.González, M.; Xu, M.; Esteras Gómez, C.; Roig Montaner, MC.; Monforte Gilabert, AJ.; Troadec, C.; Pujol, M.... (2011). 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Theor Appl Genet. 2008, 118: 139-150. 10.1007/s00122-008-0883-3.Deleu W, Esteras C, Roig C, González-To M, Fernández-Silva I, Blanca J, Aranda MA, Arús P, Nuez F, Monforte AJ, Picó MB, Garcia-Mas J: A set of EST-SNPs for map saturation and cultivar identification in melon. BMC Plant Biol. 2009, 9: 90-10.1186/1471-2229-9-90.Mascarell-Creus A, Cañizares J, Vilarrasa J, Mora-García S, Blanca J, González-Ibeas D, Saladié M, Roig C, Deleu W, Picó B, López-Bigas N, Aranda MA, Garcia-Mas J, Nuez F, Puigdomènech P, Caño-Delgado A: An oligo-based microarray offers novel transcriptomic approaches for the analysis of pathogen resistance and fruit quality traits in melon (Cucumis melo L.). BMC Genomics. 2009, 10: 467-10.1186/1471-2164-10-467.Blanca JM, Cañizares J, Ziarsolo P, Esteras C, Mir G, Nuez F, Garcia-Mas J, Pico B: Melon transcriptome characterization. SSRs and SNPs discovery for high throughput genotyping across the species. Plant Genome. 2011, 4 (2): 118-131. 10.3835/plantgenome2011.01.0003.González VM, Benjak A, Hénaff EM, Mir G, Casacuberta JM, Garcia-Mas J, Puigdomènech P: Sequencing of 6.7 Mb of the melon genome using a BAC pooling strategy. BMC Plant Biology. 2010, 10: 246-10.1186/1471-2229-10-246.Moreno E, Obando JM, Dos-Santos N, Fernández-Trujillo JP, Monforte AJ, Garcia-Mas J: Candidate genes and QTLs for fruit ripening and softening in melon. Theor Appl Genet. 2007, 116: 589-602.Essafi A, Díaz-Pendón JA, Moriones E, Monforte AJ, Garcia-Mas J, Martín-Hernández AM: Dissection of the oligogenic resistance to Cucumber mosaic virus in the melon accession PI 161375. Theor Appl Genet. 2009, 118: 275-284. 10.1007/s00122-008-0897-x.Comai L, Henikoff S: TILLING: practical single-nucleotide mutation discovery. Plant J. 2006, 45: 684-94. 10.1111/j.1365-313X.2006.02670.x.Cooper JL, Till BJ, Laport RG, Darlow MC, Kleffner JM, Jamai A, El-Mellouki T, Liu S, Ritchie R, Nielsen N, et al: TILLING to detect induced mutations in soybean. BMC Plant Biol. 2008, 8 (1): 9-10.1186/1471-2229-8-9.Dalmais M, Schmidt J, Le Signor C, Moussy F, Burstin J, Savois V, Aubert G, de Oliveira Y, Guichard C, Thompson R, Bendahmane A: UTILLdb, a Pisum sativum in silico forward and reverse genetics tool. Genome Biol. 2008, 9: R43-10.1186/gb-2008-9-2-r43.Dierking EC, Bilyeu KD: New sources of soybean meal and oil composition traits identified through TILLING. BMC Plant Biol. 2009, 9: 89-10.1186/1471-2229-9-89.Perry J, Brachmann A, Welham T, Binder A, Charpentier M, Groth M, Haage K, Markmann K, Wang TL, Parniske M: TILLING in Lotus japonicus identified large allelic series for symbiosis genes and revealed a bias in functionally defective ethyl methanesulfonate alleles toward glycine replacements. 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Engineering Melon Plants with Improved Fruit Shelf Life Using the TILLING Approach

Background: Fruit ripening and softening are key traits that have an effect on food supply, fruit nutritional value and consequently, human health. Since ethylene induces ripening of climacteric fruit, it is one of the main targets to control fruit over ripening that leads to fruit softening and deterioration. The characterization of the ethylene pathway in Arabidopsis and tomato identified key genes that control fruit ripening. [br/] Methodology/Principal Findings: To engineer melon fruit with improved shelf-life, we conducted a translational research experiment. We set up a TILLING platform in a monoecious and climacteric melon line, cloned genes that control ethylene production and screened for induced mutations that lead to fruits with enhanced shelf life. Two missense mutations, L124F and G194D, of the ethylene biosynthetic enzyme, ACC oxidase 1, were identified and the mutant plants were characterized with respect to fruit maturation. The L124F mutation is a conservative mutation occurring away from the enzyme active site and thus was predicted to not affect ethylene production and thus fruit ripening. In contrast, G194D modification occurs in a highly conserved amino acid position predicted, by crystallographic analysis, to affect the enzymatic activity. Phenotypic analysis of the G194D mutant fruit showed complete delayed ripening and yellowing with improved shelf life and, as predicted, the L124F mutation did not have an effect. [br/] Conclusions/Significance: We constructed a mutant collection of 4023 melon M2 families. Based on the TILLING of 11 genes, we calculated the overall mutation rate of one mutation every 573 kb and identified 8 alleles per tilled kilobase. We also identified a TILLING mutant with enhanced fruit shelf life. This work demonstrates the effectiveness of TILLING as a reverse genetics tool to improve crop species. As cucurbits are model species in different areas of plant biology, we anticipate that the developed tool will be widely exploited by the scientific community

Ectopic Pregnancy as a Model to Identify Endometrial Genes and Signaling Pathways Important in Decidualization and Regulated by Local Trophoblast

The endometrium in early pregnancy undergoes decidualization and functional changes induced by local trophoblast, which are not fully understood. We hypothesized that endometrium from tubal ectopic pregnancy (EP) could be interrogated to identify novel genes and pathways involved in these processes. Gestation-matched endometrium was collected from women with EP (n = 11) and intrauterine pregnancies (IUP) (n = 13). RNA was extracted from the tissue. In addition, tissues were prepared for histological analysis for degree of decidualization. We compared a) the samples from EP that were decidualized (n = 6) with non-decidualized samples (n = 5), and b) the decidualized EP (n = 6) with decidualization-matched IUP (n = 6) samples using an Affymetrix gene array platform, with Ingenuity Pathway Analysis, combined with quantitative RT-PCR. Expression of PRL and IGFBP1 was used to confirm the degree of decidualization in each group. There were no differences in PRL or IGFBP1 expression in the decidualization-matched samples but a marked reduction (P<0.001) in the non-decidualized samples. Decidualization was associated with increased expression of 428 genes including SCARA5 (181-fold), DKK1 (71-fold) and PROK1 (32-fold), and decreased expression of 230 genes including MMP-7 (35-fold) and SFRP4 (21-fold). The top canonical pathways associated with these differentially expressed genes were Natural Killer Cell and Wnt/b-Catenin signaling. Local trophoblast was associated with much less alteration of endometrial gene expression with an increase in 56 genes, including CSH1 (8-fold), and a reduction in 29 genes including CRISP3 (8-fold). The top associated canonical pathway was Antigen Presentation. The study of endometrium from tubal EP may promote novel insights into genes involved in decidualization and those influenced by factors from neighboring trophoblast. This has afforded unique information not highlighted by previous studies and adds to our understanding of the endometrium in early pregnancy

Reduction of Mitoferrin Results in Abnormal Development and Extended Lifespan in Caenorhabditis elegans

Iron is essential for organisms. It is mainly utilized in mitochondria for biosynthesis of iron-sulfur clusters, hemes and other cofactors. Mitoferrin 1 and mitoferrin 2, two homologues proteins belonging to the mitochondrial solute carrier family, are required for iron delivery into mitochondria. Mitoferrin 1 is highly expressed in developing erythrocytes which consume a large amount of iron during hemoglobinization. Mitoferrin 2 is ubiquitously expressed, whose functions are less known. Zebrafish with mitoferrin 1 mutation show profound hypochromic anaemia and erythroid maturation arrests, and yeast with defects in MRS3/4, the counterparts of mitoferrin 1/2, has low mitochondrial iron levels and grows poorly by iron depletion. Mitoferrin 1 expression is up-regulated in yeast and mouse models of Fiedreich's ataxia disease and in human cell culture models of Parkinson disease, suggesting its involvement in the pathogenesis of diseases with mitochondrial iron accumulation. In this study we found that reduced mitoferrin levels in C. elegans by RNAi treatment causes pleiotropic phenotypes such as small body size, reduced fecundity, slow movement and increased sensitivity to paraquat. Despite these abnormities, lifespan was increased by 50% to 80% in N2 wild type strain, and in further studies using the RNAi sensitive strain eri-1, more than doubled lifespan was observed. The pathways or mechanisms responsible for the lifespan extension and other phenotypes of mitoferrin RNAi worms are worth further study, which may contribute to our understanding of aging mechanisms and the pathogenesis of iron disorder related diseases