Studies on the occurrence and distribution of heavy metals in sediments in Lagos Lagoon and their effects on benthic microbial population

An investigation was conducted to assess the concentration of heavy metals in sediments in three selected locations along Lagos lagoon comprising University of Lagos, Ebute Metta and Ijora zones and correlate the effect of metal concentrations on benthic microbial population vis a vis the open water bacterial population. Physiochemical analysis revealed a pH of 8.94, 11.98 and 7.82 of University of Lagos, Ebute Metta and Ijora zones respectively. The concentration of lead was more in Ebute Metta zone (Oko Oba) with a value of 22.75 mg/100 g, while the concentration of iron was more in Ijora zone with a value of 45.31 mg/100 g. The concentration of Cadmium was higher than other zones in Ebute Metta with a value of 14.63 mg/100 g. Mercury was more concentrated in University of Lagos zone with a value of 7.83 mg/100 g, while the value for chromium was more in Ebute Metta sediments with a value of 6.81 mg/100 g. Levene’s statistical analysis shows there is no significant difference in the variances for all metals across the three locations understudy. However, ANOVA analysis shows that mean measurements for all metals across the three locations are significantly different at 5% level of significance except for mercury where the mean measurements were not significantly different at 5% level of confidence. The benthic population (bacteria) was less than that of surface water (control).University of Lagos had the highest bacterial mean cfu/ml determined by log10 with a value 6.81 for control and 3.51 for sediments. The cfu value for fungi for control samples for University of Lagos zone, Ebute Metta and Ijora were 1.7, 1.54 and 1.6 respectively. The bacteria isolated and identified were Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus licheniformis, Arthrobacter sp and Achromobacter sp. Fungi isolated were Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Candida utilissima and Sporobolomyces sp. The values for heavy metals for all zones are of public health significance and pose a threat to the survival of both humans and aquatic life. An immediate attention from concerned authorities is required in order to protect the Lagos lagoon and its dependants from further pollution and diseases

Sialic Acid Glycobiology Unveils Trypanosoma cruzi Trypomastigote Membrane Physiology.

Trypanosoma cruzi, the flagellate protozoan agent of Chagas disease or American trypanosomiasis, is unable to synthesize sialic acids de novo. Mucins and trans-sialidase (TS) are substrate and enzyme, respectively, of the glycobiological system that scavenges sialic acid from the host in a crucial interplay for T. cruzi life cycle. The acquisition of the sialyl residue allows the parasite to avoid lysis by serum factors and to interact with the host cell. A major drawback to studying the sialylation kinetics and turnover of the trypomastigote glycoconjugates is the difficulty to identify and follow the recently acquired sialyl residues. To tackle this issue, we followed an unnatural sugar approach as bioorthogonal chemical reporters, where the use of azidosialyl residues allowed identifying the acquired sugar. Advanced microscopy techniques, together with biochemical methods, were used to study the trypomastigote membrane from its glycobiological perspective. Main sialyl acceptors were identified as mucins by biochemical procedures and protein markers. Together with determining their shedding and turnover rates, we also report that several membrane proteins, including TS and its substrates, both glycosylphosphatidylinositol-anchored proteins, are separately distributed on parasite surface and contained in different and highly stable membrane microdomains. Notably, labeling for α(1,3)Galactosyl residues only partially colocalize with sialylated mucins, indicating that two species of glycosylated mucins do exist, which are segregated at the parasite surface. Moreover, sialylated mucins were included in lipid-raft-domains, whereas TS molecules are not. The location of the surface-anchored TS resulted too far off as to be capable to sialylate mucins, a role played by the shed TS instead. Phosphatidylinositol-phospholipase-C activity is actually not present in trypomastigotes. Therefore, shedding of TS occurs via microvesicles instead of as a fully soluble form

Three-Dimensional In Vivo Imaging of the Murine Liver: A Micro-Computed Tomography-Based Anatomical Study

Various murine models are currently used to study acute and chronic pathological processes of the liver, and the efficacy of novel therapeutic regimens. The increasing availability of high-resolution small animal imaging modalities presents researchers with the opportunity to precisely identify and describe pathological processes of the liver. To meet the demands, the objective of this study was to provide a three-dimensional illustration of the macroscopic anatomical location of the murine liver lobes and hepatic vessels using small animal imaging modalities. We analysed micro-CT images of the murine liver by integrating additional information from the published literature to develop comprehensive illustrations of the macroscopic anatomical features of the murine liver and hepatic vasculature. As a result, we provide updated three-dimensional illustrations of the macroscopic anatomy of the murine liver and hepatic vessels using micro-CT. The information presented here provides researchers working in the field of experimental liver disease with a comprehensive, easily accessable overview of the macroscopic anatomy of the murine liver

A Long Baseline Neutrino Oscillation Experiment Using J-PARC Neutrino Beam and Hyper-Kamiokande

Document submitted to 18th J-PARC PAC meeting in May 2014. 50 pages, 41 figuresDocument submitted to 18th J-PARC PAC meeting in May 2014. 50 pages, 41 figuresDocument submitted to 18th J-PARC PAC meeting in May 2014. 50 pages, 41 figuresHyper-Kamiokande will be a next generation underground water Cherenkov detector with a total (fiducial) mass of 0.99 (0.56) million metric tons, approximately 20 (25) times larger than that of Super-Kamiokande. One of the main goals of Hyper-Kamiokande is the study of $CP$ asymmetry in the lepton sector using accelerator neutrino and anti-neutrino beams. In this document, the physics potential of a long baseline neutrino experiment using the Hyper-Kamiokande detector and a neutrino beam from the J-PARC proton synchrotron is presented. The analysis has been updated from the previous Letter of Intent [K. Abe et al., arXiv:1109.3262 [hep-ex]], based on the experience gained from the ongoing T2K experiment. With a total exposure of 7.5 MW $\times$ 10$^7$ sec integrated proton beam power (corresponding to $1.56\times10^{22}$ protons on target with a 30 GeV proton beam) to a $2.5$-degree off-axis neutrino beam produced by the J-PARC proton synchrotron, it is expected that the $CP$ phase $\delta_{CP}$ can be determined to better than 19 degrees for all possible values of $\delta_{CP}$, and $CP$ violation can be established with a statistical significance of more than $3\,\sigma$ ($5\,\sigma$) for $76$ ($58$) of the $\delta_{CP}$ parameter space

Measurements of neutrino oscillation in appearance and disappearance channels by the T2K experiment with 6.6 x 10(20) protons on target

111 pages, 45 figures, submitted to Physical Review D. Minor revisions to text following referee comments111 pages, 45 figures, submitted to Physical Review D. Minor revisions to text following referee comments111 pages, 45 figures, submitted to Physical Review D. Minor revisions to text following referee commentsWe thank the J-PARC staff for superb accelerator performance and the CERN NA61/SHINE Collaboration for providing valuable particle production data. We acknowledge the support of MEXT, Japan; NSERC, NRC, and CFI, Canada; CEA and CNRS/IN2P3, France; DFG, Germany; INFN, Italy; National Science Centre (NCN), Poland; RSF, RFBR and MES, Russia; MINECO and ERDF funds, Spain; SNSF and SER, Switzerland; STFC, UK; and the U. S. Deparment of Energy, USA. We also thank CERN for the UA1/NOMAD magnet, DESY for the HERA-B magnet mover system, NII for SINET4, the WestGrid and SciNet consortia in Compute Canada, GridPP, UK, and the Emerald High Performance Computing facility in the Centre for Innovation, UK. In addition, participation of individual researchers and institutions has been further supported by funds from ERC (FP7), EU; JSPS, Japan; Royal Society, UK; and DOE Early Career program, USA