Direct finite element simulation of turbulent flow for marine based renewable energy

In this article we present a computational framework for simulation of turbulent flow in marine based renewable energy applications. In particular, we focus on floating structures and rotating turbines. This work is an extension to multiphase turbulent flow, of our existing framework of residual based turbulence modeling for single phase turbulent incompressible flow. We illustrate the framework in four examples: a regular wave test where we compare against an exact solution, the standard MARIN wave impact benchmark with experimental validation data, a vertical axis turbine with complex geometry from an existing turbine, and finally a prototype simulation of decay test in a coupled moving boundary rigid-body and two-phase fluid simulation.IEA-OES Task 1

Comparing ischaemic stroke in six European countries. The EuroHOPE register study.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: The incidence of hospitalizations, treatment and case fatality of ischaemic stroke were assessed utilizing a comprehensive multinational database to attempt to compare the healthcare systems in six European countries, aiming also to identify the limitations and make suggestions for future improvements in the between-country comparisons. METHODS: National registers of hospital discharges for ischaemic stroke identified by International Classification of Diseases codes 433-434 (ICD-9) and code I63 (ICD-10), medication purchases and mortality were linked at the patient level in each of the participating countries and regions: Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Scotland and Sweden. Patients with an index admission in 2007 were followed for 1 year. RESULTS: In all, 64 170 patients with a disease code for ischaemic stroke were identified. The number of patients registered per 100 000 European standard population ranged from 77 in Scotland to 407 in Hungary. Large differences were observed in medication use. The age- and sex-adjusted all-cause case fatality amongst hospitalized patients at 1 year from stroke was highest in Hungary at 31.0% (95% confidence interval 30.5-31.5). Regional differences in age- and sex-adjusted 1-year case fatality within countries were largest in Hungary (range 23.6%-37.6%) and smallest in the Netherlands (20.5%-27.3%). CONCLUSIONS: It is feasible to link population-wide register data amongst European countries to describe incidence of hospitalizations, treatment patterns and case fatality of ischaemic stroke on a national level. However, the coverage and validity of administrative register data for ischaemic stroke should be developed further, and population-based and clinical stroke registers should be created to allow better control of case mix

Corrigendum:“Dating the funerary use of caves in Liguria (northwestern Italy) from the Neolithic to historic times. Results from a large-scale AMS campaign on human skeletal series” [Quat. Int. 536 (2020) 30–44] (Quaternary International (2020) 536 (30–44), (S1040618219308857), (10.1016/j.quaint.2019.11.034))

In Appendix 1, and Supplementary Information Tables S1 and S2, the age class of individual [AC6726.4 (Prob. AC EIV BB)/ACN 030] is indicated as “adolescent”; the correct age class is “adult”. In Appendix 1, and Supplementary Information Tables S1 and S2, the age class of individual [AC V BB/ACN 031] is indicated as “adult”; the correct age class is “adolescent”, as also discussed in the text. The mistake does not change the results in Table 4

Dating the funerary use of caves in Liguria (northwestern Italy) from the Neolithic to historic times:Results from a large-scale AMS campaign on human skeletal series

The multidisciplinary research team of this new project aimed at the chronological, anthropological and funerary behavior characterization of the skeletal remains unearthed from various caves in western Liguria (northwestern Italy) between the mid-1800s and the 1990s. Most of the burials and scattered bone assemblages were excavated prior to the development of modern stratigraphic methods, or come from disturbed contexts, often resulting in a vague chrono-cultural attribution. We present here the results of a systematic dating project that produced 130 new AMS dates on human bone samples (documented burials or individuals from scattered remains) from sixteen Ligurian caves, including most of the skeletal series from renowned sites such as Arene Candide Cave and Grotta Pollera. Results highlighted the funerary use of these caves from the last quarter of the sixth millennium BCE to the Common Era, with the majority of results clustering in the first half of the fifth millennium BCE. These dates allow for an initial assessment of patterns in Neolithic mortuary use of Ligurian caves, and aided in particular the characterization of funerary practices during the Square Mouthed Pottery culture

A survey of haptics in serious gaming

Serious gaming often requires high level of realism for training and learning purposes. Haptic technology has been proved to be useful in many applications with an additional perception modality complementary to the audio and the vision. It provides novel user experience to enhance the immersion of virtual reality with a physical control-layer. This survey focuses on the haptic technology and its applications in serious gaming. Several categories of related applications are listed and discussed in details, primarily on haptics acts as cognitive aux and main component in serious games design. We categorize haptic devices into tactile, force feedback and hybrid ones to suit different haptic interfaces, followed by description of common haptic gadgets in gaming. Haptic modeling methods, in particular, available SDKs or libraries either for commercial or academic usage, are summarized. We also analyze the existing research difficulties and technology bottleneck with haptics and foresee the future research directions

Dental calculus and isotopes provide direct evidence of fish and plant consumption in Mesolithic Mediterranean

In this contribution we dismantle the perceived role of marine resources and plant foods in the subsistence economy of Holocene foragers of the Central Mediterranean using a combination of dental calculus and stable isotope analyses. The discovery of fish scales and flesh fragments, starch granules and other plant and animal micro-debris in the dental calculus of a Mesolithic forager dated to the end of the 8th millenium BC and buried in the Vlakno Cave on Dugi Otok Island in the Croatian Archipelago demonstrates that marine resources were regularly consumed by the individual together with a variety of plant foods. Since previous stable isotope data in the Eastern Adriatic and the Mediterranean region emphasises that terrestrial-based resources contributed mainly to Mesolithic diets in the Mediterranean Basin, our results provide an alternative view of the dietary habits of Mesolithic foragers in the Mediterranean region based on a combination of novel methodologies and data

Diversity in Functional Organization of Class I and Class II Biotin Protein Ligase

The cell envelope of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.tuberculosis) is composed of a variety of lipids including mycolic acids, sulpholipids, lipoarabinomannans, etc., which impart rigidity crucial for its survival and pathogenesis. Acyl CoA carboxylase (ACC) provides malonyl-CoA and methylmalonyl-CoA, committed precursors for fatty acid and essential for mycolic acid synthesis respectively. Biotin Protein Ligase (BPL/BirA) activates apo-biotin carboxyl carrier protein (BCCP) by biotinylating it to an active holo-BCCP. A minimal peptide (Schatz), an efficient substrate for Escherichia coli BirA, failed to serve as substrate for M. tuberculosis Biotin Protein Ligase (MtBPL). MtBPL specifically biotinylates homologous BCCP domain, MtBCCP87, but not EcBCCP87. This is a unique feature of MtBPL as EcBirA lacks such a stringent substrate specificity. This feature is also reflected in the lack of self/promiscuous biotinylation by MtBPL. The N-terminus/HTH domain of EcBirA has the self-biotinable lysine residue that is inhibited in the presence of Schatz peptide, a peptide designed to act as a universal acceptor for EcBirA. This suggests that when biotin is limiting, EcBirA preferentially catalyzes, biotinylation of BCCP over self-biotinylation. R118G mutant of EcBirA showed enhanced self and promiscuous biotinylation but its homologue, R69A MtBPL did not exhibit these properties. The catalytic domain of MtBPL was characterized further by limited proteolysis. Holo-MtBPL is protected from proteolysis by biotinyl-5′ AMP, an intermediate of MtBPL catalyzed reaction. In contrast, apo-MtBPL is completely digested by trypsin within 20 min of co-incubation. Substrate selectivity and inability to promote self biotinylation are exquisite features of MtBPL and are a consequence of the unique molecular mechanism of an enzyme adapted for the high turnover of fatty acid biosynthesis

Mycobacterium tuberculosis Rv2419c, the missing glucosyl-3-phosphoglycerate phosphatase for the second step in methylglucose lipopolysaccharide biosynthesis

Mycobacteria synthesize intracellular methylglucose lipopolysaccharides (MGLP) proposed to regulate fatty acid synthesis. Although their structures have been elucidated, the identity of most biosynthetic genes remains unknown. The first step in MGLP biosynthesis is catalyzed by a glucosyl-3-phosphoglycerate synthase (GpgS, Rv1208 in Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37Rv). However, a typical glucosyl-3-phosphoglycerate phosphatase (GpgP, EC3.1.3.70) for dephosphorylation of glucosyl-3-phosphoglycerate to glucosylglycerate, was absent from mycobacterial genomes. We purified the native GpgP from Mycobacterium vanbaalenii and identified the corresponding gene deduced from amino acid sequences by mass spectrometry. The M. tuberculosis ortholog (Rv2419c), annotated as a putative phosphoglycerate mutase (PGM, EC5.4.2.1), was expressed and functionally characterized as a new GpgP. Regardless of the high specificity for glucosyl-3-phosphoglycerate, the mycobacterial GpgP is not a sequence homolog of known isofunctional GpgPs. The assignment of a new function in M. tuberculosis genome expands our understanding of this organism's genetic repertoire and of the early events in MGLP biosynthesis

The dUTPase Enzyme Is Essential in Mycobacterium smegmatis

Thymidine biosynthesis is essential in all cells. Inhibitors of the enzymes involved in this pathway (e.g. methotrexate) are thus frequently used as cytostatics. Due to its pivotal role in mycobacterial thymidylate synthesis dUTPase, which hydrolyzes dUTP into the dTTP precursor dUMP, has been suggested as a target for new antitubercular agents. All mycobacterial genomes encode dUTPase with a mycobacteria-specific surface loop absent in the human dUTPase. Using Mycobacterium smegmatis as a fast growing model for Mycobacterium tuberculosis, we demonstrate that dUTPase knock-out results in lethality that can be reverted by complementation with wild-type dUTPase. Interestingly, a mutant dUTPase gene lacking the genus-specific loop was unable to complement the knock-out phenotype. We also show that deletion of the mycobacteria-specific loop has no major effect on dUTPase enzymatic properties in vitro and thus a yet to be identified loop-specific function seems to be essential within the bacterial cell context. In addition, here we demonstrated that Mycobacterium tuberculosis dUTPase is fully functional in Mycobacterium smegmatis as it rescues the lethal knock-out phenotype. Our results indicate the potential of dUTPase as a target for antitubercular drugs and identify a genus-specific surface loop on the enzyme as a selective target