High pressure HC1 conversion of cellulose to glucose

The production of ethanol from glucose by means of fermentation represents a potential long-range alternative to oil for use as a transportation fuel. Today's rising oil prices and the dwindling world supply of oil have made other fuels, such as ethanol, attractive alternatives. It has been shown that automobiles can operate, with minor alterations, on a 10% ethanol-gasoline mixture popularly known as gasohol. Wood has long been known as a potential source of glucose. Glucose may be obtained from wood following acid hydrolysis. In this research, it was found that saturating wood particles with HCl gas under pressure was an effective pretreatment before subjecting the wood to dilute acid hydrolysis. The pretreatment is necessary because of the tight lattice structure of cellulose, which inhibits dilute acid hydrolysis. HCl gas makes the cellulose more susceptible to hydrolysis and the glucose yield is doubled when dilute acid hydrolysis is preceded by HCl saturation at high pressure. The saturation was most effectively performed in a fluidized bed reactor, with pure HCl gas fluidizing equal volumes of ground wood and inert particles. The fluidized bed effectively dissipated the large amount of heat released upon HCl absorption into the wood. Batch reaction times of one hour at 314.7 p.s.i.a. gave glucose yields of 80% and xylose yields of 95% after dilute acid hydrolysis. A non-catalytic gas-solid reaction model, with gas diffusing through the solid limiting the reaction rate, was found to describe the HCl-wood reaction in the fluidized bed. HCl was found to form a stable adduct with the lignin residue in the wood, in a ratio of 3.33 moles per mole of lignin monomer. This resulted in a loss of 0.1453 lb. of HCl per pound of wood. The adduct was broken upon the addition of water. A process design and economic evaluation for a plant to produce 214 tons per day of glucose from air-dried ground Populus tristi gave an estimated glucose cost of 15.14 cents per pound. This would correspond to $2.54 per gallon of ethanol if the glucose were fermented. Key factors contributing to the cost of glucose production were unrecovered HCl, which contributed 5.70 cents per pound of glucose, and the cost of wood, which at$25 per ton contribute 4.17 cents per pound

Viral factors in influenza pandemic risk assessment

The threat of an influenza A virus pandemic stems from continual virus spillovers from reservoir species, a tiny fraction of which spark sustained transmission in humans. To date, no pandemic emergence of a new influenza strain has been preceded by detection of a closely related precursor in an animal or human. Nonetheless, influenza surveillance efforts are expanding, prompting a need for tools to assess the pandemic risk posed by a detected virus. The goal would be to use genetic sequence and/or biological assays of viral traits to identify those non-human influenza viruses with the greatest risk of evolving into pandemic threats, and/or to understand drivers of such evolution, to prioritize pandemic prevention or response measures. We describe such efforts, identify progress and ongoing challenges, and discuss three specific traits of influenza viruses (hemagglutinin receptor binding specificity, hemagglutinin pH of activation, and polymerase complex efficiency) that contribute to pandemic risk

Detection of the Small Magellanic Cloud in gamma-rays with Fermi/LAT

The flux of gamma rays with energies >100MeV is dominated by diffuse emission from CRs illuminating the ISM of our Galaxy through the processes of Bremsstrahlung, pion production and decay, and inverse-Compton scattering. The study of this diffuse emission provides insight into the origin and transport of CRs. We searched for gamma-ray emission from the SMC in order to derive constraints on the CR population and transport in an external system with properties different from the Milky Way. We analysed the first 17 months of continuous all-sky observations by the Large Area Telescope of the Fermi mission to determine the spatial distribution, flux and spectrum of the gamma-ray emission from the SMC. We also used past radio synchrotron observations of the SMC to study the population of CR electrons specifically. We obtained the first detection of the SMC in high-energy gamma rays, with an integrated >100MeV flux of (3.7 +/-0.7) x10e-8 ph/cm2/s, with additional systematic uncertainty of <16%. The emission is steady and from an extended source ~3{\deg} in size. It is not clearly correlated with the distribution of massive stars or neutral gas, nor with known pulsars or SNRs, but a certain correlation with supergiant shells is observed. The observed flux implies an upper limit on the average CR nuclei density in the SMC of ~15% of the value measured locally in the Milky Way. The population of high-energy pulsars of the SMC may account for a substantial fraction of the gamma-ray flux, which would make the inferred CR nuclei density even lower. The average density of CR electrons derived from radio synchrotron observations is consistent with the same reduction factor but the uncertainties are large. From our current knowledge of the SMC, such a low CR density does not seem to be due to a lower rate of CR injection and rather indicates a smaller CR confinement volume characteristic size.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in A&

NfL and pNfH are increased in Friedreich's ataxia

Objective: To assess neurofilaments as neurodegenerative biomarkers in serum of patients with Friedreich’s ataxia. / Methods: Single molecule array measurements of neurofilament light (NfL) and heavy chain (pNfH) in 99 patients with genetically confirmed Friedreich’s ataxia. Correlation of NfL/pNfH serum levels with disease severity, disease duration, age, age at onset, and GAA repeat length. / Results: Median serum levels of NfL were 21.2 pg/ml (range 3.6–49.3) in controls and 26.1 pg/ml (0–78.1) in Friedreich’s ataxia (p = 0.002). pNfH levels were 23.5 pg/ml (13.3–43.3) in controls and 92 pg/ml (3.1–303) in Friedreich’s ataxia (p = 0.0004). NfL levels were significantly increased in younger patients (age 16–31 years, p < 0.001) and patients aged 32–47 years (p = 0.008), but not in patients of age 48 years and older (p = 0.41). In a longitudinal assessment, there was no difference in NfL levels in 14 patients with repeated sampling 2 years after baseline measurement. Levels of NfL correlated inversely with GAA1 repeat length (r = − 0.24, p = 0.02) but not with disease severity (r = − 0.13, p = 0.22), disease duration (r = − 0.06, p = 0.53), or age at onset (r = 0.05, p = 0.62). / Conclusion: Serum levels of NfL and pNfH are elevated in Friedreich’s ataxia, but differences to healthy controls decrease with increasing age. Long-term longitudinal data are required to explore whether this reflects a selection bias from early death of more severely affected individuals or a slowing down of the neurodegenerative process with age. In a pilot study over 2 years of follow-up—a period relevant for biomarkers indicating treatment effects—we found NfL levels to be stable

Deep drilling reveals massive shifts in evolutionary dynamics after formation of ancient ecosystem

The scarcity of high-resolution empirical data directly tracking diversity over time limits our understanding of speciation and extinction dynamics and the drivers of rate changes. Here, we analyze a continuous species-level fossil record of endemic diatoms from ancient Lake Ohrid, along with environmental and climate indicator time series since lake formation 1.36 million years (Ma) ago. We show that speciation and extinction rates nearly simultaneously decreased in the environmentally dynamic phase after ecosystem formation and stabilized after deep-water conditions established in Lake Ohrid. As the lake deepens, we also see a switch in the macroevolutionary trade-off, resulting in a transition from a volatile assemblage of short-lived endemic species to a stable community of long-lived species. Our results emphasize the importance of the interplay between environmental/climate change, ecosystem stability, and environmental limits to diversity for diversification processes. The study also provides a new understanding of evolutionary dynamics in long-lived ecosystems

The question concerning human rights and human rightlessness: disposability and struggle in the Bhopal gas disaster

In the midst of concerns about diminishing political support for human rights, individuals and groups across the globe continue to invoke them in their diverse struggles against oppression and injustice. Yet both those concerned with the future of human rights and those who champion rights activism as essential to resistance, assume that human rights – as law, discourse and practices of rights claiming – can ameliorate rightlessness. In questioning this assumption, this article seeks also to reconceptualise rightlessness by engaging with contemporary discussions of disposability and social abandonment in an attempt to be attentive to forms of rightlessness co-emergent with the operations of global capital. Developing a heuristic analytics of rightlessness, it evaluates the relatively recent attempts to mobilise human rights as a frame for analysis and action in the campaigns for justice following the 3 December 1984 gas leak from Union Carbide Corporation’s (UCC) pesticide manufacturing plant in Bhopal, India. Informed by the complex effects of human rights in the amelioration of rightlessness, the article calls for reconstituting human rights as an optics of rightlessness

Local selection in the presence of high levels of gene flow: Evidence of heterogeneous insecticide selection pressure across Ugandan Culex quinquefasciatus populations

Background: Culex quinquefasciatus collected in Uganda, where no vector control interventions directly targeting this species have been conducted, was used as a model to determine if it is possible to detect heterogeneities in selection pressure driven by insecticide application targeting other insect species. Methodology/Principal findings: Population genetic structure was assessed through microsatellite analysis, and the impact of insecticide pressure by genotyping two target-site mutations, Vgsc-1014F of the voltage-gated sodium channel target of pyrethroid and DDT insecticides, and Ace1-119S of the acetylcholinesterase gene, target of carbamate and organophosphate insecticides. No significant differences in genetic diversity were observed among populations by microsatellite markers with HE ranging from 0.597 to 0.612 and low, but significant, genetic differentiation among populations (FST = 0.019, P = 0.001). By contrast, the insecticide-resistance markers display heterogeneous allelic distributions with significant differences detected between Central Ugandan (urban) populations relative to Eastern and Southwestern (rural) populations. In the central region, a frequency of 62% for Vgsc-1014F, and 32% for the Ace1-119S resistant allele were observed. Conversely, in both Eastern and Southwestern regions the Vgsc-1014F alleles were close to fixation, whilst Ace1-119S allele frequency was 12% (although frequencies may be underestimated due to copy number variation at both loci). Conclusions/Significance: Taken together, the microsatellite and both insecticide resistance target-site markers provide evidence that in the face of intense gene flow among populations, disjunction in resistance frequencies arise due to intense local selection pressures despite an absence of insecticidal control interventions targeting Culex

Isolation and Characterisation of a Human-Like Antibody Fragment (scFv) That Inactivates VEEV In Vitro and In Vivo

Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus (VEEV) belongs to the Alphavirus genus and several species of this family are pathogenic to humans. The viruses are classified as potential agents of biological warfare and terrorism and sensitive detection as well as effective prophylaxis and antiviral therapies are required

Meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies of HDL cholesterol response to statins

BACKGROUND: In addition to lowering low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), statin therapy also raises high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) levels. Inter-individual variation in HDL-C response to statins may be partially explained by genetic variation.METHODS AND RESULTS: We performed a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies (GWAS) to identify variants with an effect on statin-induced high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) changes. The 123 most promising signals with p&lt;1×10(-4) from the 16 769 statin-treated participants in the first analysis stage were followed up in an independent group of 10 951 statin-treated individuals, providing a total sample size of 27 720 individuals. The only associations of genome-wide significance (p&lt;5×10(-8)) were between minor alleles at the CETP locus and greater HDL-C response to statin treatment.CONCLUSIONS: Based on results from this study that included a relatively large sample size, we suggest that CETP may be the only detectable locus with common genetic variants that influence HDL-C response to statins substantially in individuals of European descent. Although CETP is known to be associated with HDL-C, we provide evidence that this pharmacogenetic effect is independent of its association with baseline HDL-C levels.</p