Principali patogeni e difesa

Olive as other woody perennial crops can be affected by several systemic pathogens, including bacteria, fungi and several vector-borne viruses. The most important olive diseases, caused by different pathogens, are described in this text. Pathogen biology, diagnostic technique and control strategies are reported for each disease. The main and widespread bacterial disease, caused by Pseudomonas savastanoi pv. savastanoi, is the olive knot. As concerns the most important and widespread fungal diseases, in this text are described the olive leaf spot, Verticillum wilt, cercosporiosis, anthracnose, fruit rot, parasitic brusca, root rot, sooty mold and wood rot. Infections caused by viruses are generally symptomless and do not result in diseased plants. Although, viruses do not cause detrimental disease on olive varieties, the infected olive trees represent a reservoir of virus inoculum for other crops, where these viruses are known to cause severe disease. Detection of these viruses represent an important critical step in the sanitary improvement of this crop. Recently, molecularbased assays have been effectively implemented to detect at least 8 of the 15 viruses known to infect this crop. Sanitation program using in vitro culture of shoot tip and thermotherapy have been recently described to recover virus-free plantlets.Realizzato nell'ambito del progetto "Ricerca ed Innovazione per l'Olivicoltura Meridionale", finanziato dal MiPAAFMiPAAF - Ministero delle politiche agricole alimentari e forestal

Coalescing binary systems of compact objects: Dynamics of angular momenta

The end state of a coalescing binary of compact objects depends strongly on the final total mass M and angular momentum J. Since gravitational radiation emission causes a slow evolution of the binary system through quasi-circular orbits down to the innermost stable one, in this paper we examine the corresponding behavior of the ratio J/M^2 which must be less than 1(G/c) or about 0.7(G/c) for the formation of a black hole or a neutron star respectively. The results show cases for which, at the end of the inspiral phase, the conditions for black hole or neutron star formation are not satisfied. The inclusion of spin effects leads us to a study of precession equations valid also for the calculation of gravitational waveforms.Comment: 22 pages, AASTeX and 13 figures in PostScrip

Electrochemical behavior of Cu-9%Al-5%Ni-2%Mn alloy in chloride media

The electrochemical behavior of Cu-9% Al-5% Ni-2% Mn alloy in different NaCl concentrantions and pHs was studied by means of open-circuit potential (E(OC)), cyclic voltammetry and polarization curves. The E(OC) curves showed a considerable influence of NaCl concentration and solution pH in the steady-state potential values. It was observed by the I/E profiles that the scan rate variation indicated the formation of a porous film of low conductivity which was the responsible by the linear increase of current due to the solution resistance contained in the film pores. In order to investigate the products formed during the potential scan, the potential was held at different values of applied potential of the cyclic voltammogram and analyzed by OM, SEM and EDS. In general, it was noticed the presence of CuCl precipitates in applied potentials equals to 0.20, 0.85 and 0.00 V (vs. Ag/AgCl/KCl((3 mol L-1))) and only Cu in -0.70, -1.00 and -1.35 V. In the latter cases, a Cu layer was observed on the alloy surface due to the cuprous chloride reduction. This film blocked the EDS peaks appearance related to the other metals present in the alloy. The polarization curves for Cu-9% Al-5% Ni-2% Mn showed that E(OC) varied according to the solution pH and NaCl concentration. As the NaCl concentrantion increased the E(OC) became more negative for the three pHs studied. The Tafel coefficients were calculated from the polarization curves and the values were 60 and 120 mV decade(-1), for anodic and cathodic region, respectively.Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP

Diagrammatic theory for Periodic Anderson Model: Stationary property of the thermodynamic potential

Diagrammatic theory for Periodic Anderson Model has been developed, supposing the Coulomb repulsion of $f-$ localized electrons as a main parameter of the theory. $f-$ electrons are strongly correlated and $c-$ conduction electrons are uncorrelated. Correlation function for $f-$ and mass operator for $c-$ electrons are determined. The Dyson equation for $c-$ and Dyson-type equation for $f-$ electrons are formulated for their propagators. The skeleton diagrams are defined for correlation function and thermodynamic functional. The stationary property of renormalized thermodynamic potential about the variation of the mass operator is established. The result is appropriate as for normal and as for superconducting state of the system.Comment: 12 pages, 10 figure

Atherosclerosis, dyslipidemia, and inflammation: the significant role of polyunsaturated fatty acids

Phospholipids play an essential role in cell membrane structure and function. The length and number of double bonds of fatty acids in membrane phospholipids are main determinants of fluidity, transport systems, activity of membrane-bound enzymes, and susceptibility to lipid peroxidation. The fatty acid profile of serum lipids, especially the phospholipids, reflects the fatty acid composition of cell membranes. Moreover, long-chain n-3 polyunsatured fatty acids decrease very-low-density lipoprotein assembly and secretion reducing triacylglycerol production. N-6 and n-3 polyunsatured fatty acids are the precursors of signalling molecules, termed “eicosanoids,” which play an important role in the regulation of inflammation. Eicosanoids derived from n-6 polyunsatured fatty acids have proinflammatory actions, while eicosanoids derived from n-3 polyunsatured fatty acids have antiinflammatory ones. Previous studies showed that inflammation contributes to both the onset and progression of atherosclerosis: actually, atherosclerosis is predominantly a chronic low-grade inflammatory disease of the vessel wall. Several studies suggested the relationship between long-chain n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and inflammation, showing that fatty acids may decrease endothelial activation and affect eicosanoid metabolis

Updates on the PeNCIL project

By comparing measured and expected polarization in the HI Lyα 121.6 nm coronal emission line it is possible to infer the magnetic field in the solar corona. PeNCIL is the ideal device to perform such a measurement. It is a light transmitting polarimeter optimized at 121.6 nm, completely free of mechanical moving parts, thought as part of an internally occulted coronagraph to be flown aboard a future small solar mission. Its optical components are in de Senarmont configuration: a fixed MgF2 quarter wave retarder, a nano-wire grid polarizer (nano-WGP) and a MgF2 variable retarder modulated through a calibrated piezo-clamp (PCVR). The nano-WGP and the PCVR represent a first-ever achievement in the history of technology development for VUV. The nano-WGP fabrication is at the edge of the current nanotechnology since the pitch between wires shall be 40 nm. The PCVR is based on a MgF 2 parallelepipedic sample refractive index variations as produced by a piezo-electric clamp. This work addresses the status of the project with particular emphasis on the design and manufacturing of the nano-WGP and the PCVR

Metrology on-board PROBA-3: The Shadow Position Sensor (SPS) subsystem

PROBA-3 is an ESA Mission whose aim is to demonstrate the in-orbit Formation Flying and attitude control capabilities of its two satellites by means of closed-loop, on-board metrology. The two small spacecraft will form a giant externally occulted coronagraph that will observe in visible polarized light the inner part of the solar corona. The SPS subsystem is composed of eight sensors that will measure, with the required sensitivity and dynamic range, the penumbra light intensity around the coronagraph instrument entrance pupil

The ARIEL Instrument Control Unit design for the M4 Mission Selection Review of the ESA's Cosmic Vision Program

The Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey mission (ARIEL) is one of the three present candidates for the ESA M4 (the fourth medium mission) launch opportunity. The proposed Payload will perform a large unbiased spectroscopic survey from space concerning the nature of exoplanets atmospheres and their interiors to determine the key factors affecting the formation and evolution of planetary systems. ARIEL will observe a large number (>500) of warm and hot transiting gas giants, Neptunes and super-Earths around a wide range of host star types, targeting planets hotter than 600 K to take advantage of their well-mixed atmospheres. It will exploit primary and secondary transits spectroscopy in the 1.2-8 um spectral range and broad-band photometry in the optical and Near IR (NIR). The main instrument of the ARIEL Payload is the IR Spectrometer (AIRS) providing low-resolution spectroscopy in two IR channels: Channel 0 (CH0) for the 1.95-3.90 um band and Channel 1 (CH1) for the 3.90-7.80 um range. It is located at the intermediate focal plane of the telescope and common optical system and it hosts two IR sensors and two cold front-end electronics (CFEE) for detectors readout, a well defined process calibrated for the selected target brightness and driven by the Payload's Instrument Control Unit (ICU).Comment: Experimental Astronomy, Special Issue on ARIEL, (2017

The role of autophagy in resistance to targeted therapies

Autophagy is a self-degradative cellular process, involved in stress response such as starvation, hypoxia, and oxidative stress. This mechanism balances macro-molecule recycling to regulate cell homeostasis. In cancer, autophagy play a role in the development and progression, while several studies describe it as one of the key processes in drug resistance. In the last years, in addition to standard anti-cancer treatments such as chemotherapies and irradiation, targeted therapy became one of the most adopted strategies in clinical practices, mainly due to high specificity and reduced side effects. However, similar to standard treatments, drug resistance is the main challenge in most patients. Here, we summarize recent studies that investigated the role of autophagy in drug resistance after targeted therapy in different types of cancers. We highlight positive results and limitations of pre-clinical and clinical studies in which autophagy inhibitors are used in combination with targeted therapies. Refereed/Peer-reviewe