Bats in Bulgaria: Patterns of Species Distribution, Richness, Rarity, and Vulnerability Derived from Distribution Models

Bats are affected by a variety of anthropogenic pressures, and effective conservation measures require a complex approach by not only covering the roosts themselves but also the surrounding habitats and migration corridors. The development of concrete localized conservation measures requires detailed quantitative data to assess habitat status regarding the most crucial factors for concrete species. This chapter aims, by modeling using a Maxent based on many georeferenced locations and the state of ecologically relevant ecogeographic variables, to reveal the spatial trends in the habitat suitability of 29 bat species; to obtain meaningful biogeographical species groups; and to provide a countrywide quantitative assessment of bat richness, rarity, and vulnerability. The modeling results showed that altitude, karstic areas (presence of caves), topographic wetness index, and presence of deciduous forests were the most influential factors. In this respect, three well-defined groups were delineated. The species’ richest areas were mostly located in semimountain karstic areas with a well-developed broadleaved forests, and the lowest in xerophilous, bare habitats, especially those of anthropogenic origin. Regarding rarity, more rare species were associated with caves and mountains. Vulnerability (in terms of IUCN criteria) was positively affected by the presence of caves showing the importance of protecting karstic areas

Study Of Oxidation Processes In Duck Meat With Application Of Rosemary And Grape Seed Extracts

The substantiation of the expedience of using antioxidants of a natural origin to decelerate oxidation processes in different meat products is an urgent direction of these studies. The prospective way of a solution of the problem of meat products oxidation spoilage is the use of vegetable extracts. The experimental studies of the effective use of the composition of rosemary and grape seed extracts in Peking duck forcemeat at the long storage were realized. Their influence on the dynamics of hydrolytic and peroxide oxidation of forcemeat lipids was studied. The analysis of oxidation secondary products accumulation was realized at the same time.The positive effect of the combined use of rosemary and grape seeds extracts on frozen Peking duck forcemeat was established, the optimal concentration of offered preparations was determined

Overlap of Viviparous1 (VP1) and Abscisic Acid Response Elements in the Em Promoter: G-Box Elements Are Sufficient but Not Necessary for VP1 Transactivation

The relationship between promoter sequences that mediate Viviparous1 (VP1) transactivation and regulation by abscisic acid (ABA) in the wheat Em promoter was investigated using deletion analysis and directed mutagenesis. The Em1a G-box is strongly coupled to VP1 transactivation as well as to ABA regulation; however, the Em promoter includes additional components that can support VP1 transactivation without ABA responsiveness or synergism. Oligonucleotide tetramers of several G-box sequences, including Em1a, Em1b, and the dyad G-box element from the UV light-regulated parsley chalcone synthase gene, were sufficient to confer VP1 transactivation and the synergistic interaction with ABA to the -45 cauliflower mosaic virus 35S core promoter. These data suggest that VP1 can activate transcription through at least two classes of cis-acting sequences, including the G-box elements and the Sph regulatory motif found in the C1 promoter. The contrasting roles of these motifs in the Em and C1 promoters suggest a basis for the differential regulation of the corresponding genes by VP1

Structural-acoustic properties of flexible rectangular boxes

Rectangular box-like structures are used widely in a large number of engineering applications, e.g. as elements of railway carriages, heavy goods vehicles, buildings, civil engineering constructions, etc. Although flexible rectangular boxes represent one of the geometrically simple types of engineering structures, their structural-acoustic properties cannot be described by closed-form analytical solutions. In the present study, a comprehensive numerical investigation of typical all-flexible rectangular box structures has been carried out to elucidate the physics of structural-acoustic interaction in them and to explore the possibilities of reduction of the associated structure-borne interior noise. Finite element method has been used to compute the resonant frequencies, the mode shapes and the structural-acoustic frequency response functions of different rectangular box models. The obtained results could assist in better understanding of structural-acoustic properties of flexible rectangular boxes as well as of numerous more complex structures using rectangular boxes as their building elements

New approach to investigation of resonant vibrations of noncircular shells based on the theory of coupled waveguides

In the present paper a new simple method of analytical description of resonant vibrations of finite noncircular cylindrical shells is developed. The method is based on the theory of coupled waveguides formed by quasiflat areas of the same noncircular shells having an infinite length (depth). The physical reason for guided wave propagation along quasiflat areas of such shells is the difference between flexural wave velocities in their quasiflat and curved areas, respectively. Using asymptotic expressions for flexural wave velocities in circular shells with different radii of curvature, approximate dispersion equations are derived for waves propagating in such waveguides and their corresponding coupling coefficients. After that, considering shells of finite length, the transition is made from the coupled guided modes to the coupled resonant vibrations of the shell. The obtained resonant frequencies and spatial distributions of the resulting vibration modes are in good agreement with the results of finite element calculations

Finite element study of the effect of structural modifications on structure-borne vehicle interior noise

This paper presents the results of the numerical investigation of structure-borne vehicle interior noise in a simplified model of vehicle compartment. The aim of the paper is to analyze the effects of different variations of certain geometrical and material parameters of vehicle structure on structural-acoustic frequency response functions. It has been found that geometrical modifications have little influence on the structural natural frequencies. However, they strongly affect the acoustic natural frequencies and normal modes as well as the resulting sound pressure responses. The increase in thickness of the bottom plate suppresses the sound pressure responses very efficiently. However, variations of material characteristics of wind- and back-screen do not have much influence on the interior noise

Determination of the Optimal Sterilization Regime of Canned Quail Meat with Hydrocoloids Application

The use of hydrocolloids in the modern meat industry is the one of prospective directions for improving functional and technological characteristics of meat and meat products, including poultry at long storage terms. A series of concrete requirements to functional-technological, physical-chemical and organoleptic parameters is offered for canned poultry in correspondence with minimal specifications for the quality of products of an animal origin.There is presented the study of the optimization of the process of meat products sterilization using meat of chicken-broilers, quails and hydrocolloids depending on physical-chemical and organoleptic properties. The parameters of quail meat use in recipes of canned poultry meat with hydrocolloids were considered. The influence of the sterilization process on characteristics of chicken-broiler and quail meat was established.There was revealed the essential difference in the influence on functional and technological parameters of canned quail meat using hydrocolloid mixtures comparing with canned chicken-broiler meat, manifested in changes of MKC (moisture keeping capacity), plasticity and salt content in jelly. At changing sterilization regimes, there takes place the change of physical and chemical characteristics of gels that correlates with organoleptic characteristics. For providing high quality parameters of canned poultry meat and industrial sterility, sterilization regimes for canned chicken-broiler meat must be realized for containers with the volume 500 with sterilization time no more than 90 minutes. For canned quail meat the sterilization process duration must be increased to 120 min at the temperature 115 ° С

What is the Computational Value of Finite Range Tunneling?

Quantum annealing (QA) has been proposed as a quantum enhanced optimization heuristic exploiting tunneling. Here, we demonstrate how finite range tunneling can provide considerable computational advantage. For a crafted problem designed to have tall and narrow energy barriers separating local minima, the D-Wave 2X quantum annealer achieves significant runtime advantages relative to Simulated Annealing (SA). For instances with 945 variables, this results in a time-to-99%-success-probability that is $\sim 10^8$ times faster than SA running on a single processor core. We also compared physical QA with Quantum Monte Carlo (QMC), an algorithm that emulates quantum tunneling on classical processors. We observe a substantial constant overhead against physical QA: D-Wave 2X again runs up to $\sim 10^8$ times faster than an optimized implementation of QMC on a single core. We note that there exist heuristic classical algorithms that can solve most instances of Chimera structured problems in a timescale comparable to the D-Wave 2X. However, we believe that such solvers will become ineffective for the next generation of annealers currently being designed. To investigate whether finite range tunneling will also confer an advantage for problems of practical interest, we conduct numerical studies on binary optimization problems that cannot yet be represented on quantum hardware. For random instances of the number partitioning problem, we find numerically that QMC, as well as other algorithms designed to simulate QA, scale better than SA. We discuss the implications of these findings for the design of next generation quantum annealers.Comment: 17 pages, 13 figures. Edited for clarity, in part in response to comments. Added link to benchmark instance