Development, implementation and evaluation of satellite-aided agricultural monitoring systems

Research activities in support of AgRISTARS Inventory Technology Development Project in the use of aerospace remote sensing for agricultural inventory described include: (1) corn and soybean crop spectral temporal signature characterization; (2) efficient area estimation techniques development; and (3) advanced satellite and sensor system definition. Studies include a statistical evaluation of the impact of cultural and environmental factors on crop spectral profiles, the development and evaluation of an automatic crop area estimation procedure, and the joint use of SEASAT-SAR and LANDSAT MSS for crop inventory

Understanding and utilization of Thematic Mapper and other remotely sensed data for vegetation monitoring

The TM Tasseled Cap transformation, which provides both a 50% reduction in data volume with little or no loss of important information and spectral features with direct physical association, is presented and discussed. Using both simulated and actual TM data, some important characteristics of vegetation and soils in this feature space are described, as are the effects of solar elevation angle and atmospheric haze. A preliminary spectral haze diagnostic feature, based on only simulated data, is also examined. The characteristics of the TM thermal band are discussed, as is a demonstration of the use of TM data in energy balance studies. Some characteristics of AVHRR data are described, as are the sensitivities to scene content of several LANDSAT-MSS preprocessing techniques

Comparison of Five Methods for the Determination of Rubella Immunity

Objective: The purpose of this study was to compare the accuracy of commonly used methods for the detection of rubella immunity, especially the fully automated IMx assay

Adaptive Gain Modulation in V1 Explains Contextual Modifications during Bisection Learning

The neuronal processing of visual stimuli in primary visual cortex (V1) can be modified by perceptual training. Training in bisection discrimination, for instance, changes the contextual interactions in V1 elicited by parallel lines. Before training, two parallel lines inhibit their individual V1-responses. After bisection training, inhibition turns into non-symmetric excitation while performing the bisection task. Yet, the receptive field of the V1 neurons evaluated by a single line does not change during task performance. We present a model of recurrent processing in V1 where the neuronal gain can be modulated by a global attentional signal. Perceptual learning mainly consists in strengthening this attentional signal, leading to a more effective gain modulation. The model reproduces both the psychophysical results on bisection learning and the modified contextual interactions observed in V1 during task performance. It makes several predictions, for instance that imagery training should improve the performance, or that a slight stimulus wiggling can strongly affect the representation in V1 while performing the task. We conclude that strengthening a top-down induced gain increase can explain perceptual learning, and that this top-down signal can modify lateral interactions within V1, without significantly changing the classical receptive field of V1 neurons

Nickel oxide thin films grown by chemical deposition techniques: Potential and challenges in next‐generation rigid and flexible device applications

Funder: Aziz FoundationFunder: Downing College, CambridgeFunder: Isaac Newton Trust; Id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100004815Abstract: Nickel oxide (NiO x ), a p‐type oxide semiconductor, has gained significant attention due to its versatile and tunable properties. It has become one of the critical materials in wide range of electronics applications, including resistive switching random access memory devices and highly sensitive and selective sensor applications. In addition, the wide band gap and high work function, coupled with the low electron affinity, have made NiO x widely used in emerging optoelectronics and p‐n heterojunctions. The properties of NiO x thin films depend strongly on the deposition method and conditions. Efficient implementation of NiO x in next‐generation devices will require controllable growth and processing methods that can tailor the morphological and electronic properties of the material, but which are also compatible with flexible substrates. In this review, we link together the fundamental properties of NiO x with the chemical processing methods that have been developed to grow the material as thin films, and with its application in electronic devices. We focus solely on thin films, rather than NiO x incorporated with one‐dimensional or two‐dimensional materials. This review starts by discussing how the p‐type nature of NiO x arises and how its stoichiometry affects its electronic and magnetic properties. We discuss the chemical deposition techniques for growing NiO x thin films, including chemical vapor deposition, atomic layer deposition, and a selection of solution processing approaches, and present examples of recent progress made in the implementation of NiO x thin films in devices, both on rigid and flexible substrates. Furthermore, we discuss the remaining challenges and limitations in the deposition of device‐quality NiO x thin films with chemical growth methods. imag

You Learn When You Teach: A Narrative Pedagogy for Faculty and Doctoral-Level Student Teaching Assistants

The purpose of this study was to understand the meaning of online co-teaching for PhD faculty and teaching assistants (TAs). Narrative pedagogy underpinned the inquiry, which was designed to advance the discourse on mentorship of PhD future faculty. A faculty member and TA authors kept concurrent weekly journals or after-the-fact written reflections. The authors analyzed data as a team using a five-phase interpretive phenomenological analysis process to interpret the meaning of co-teaching for faculty and TAs. Lines of inquiry, central concerns, exemplars, shared meanings, and paradigm cases supported the overall interpretation, “You Learn When You Teach.” Co-mentorship should be a requirement for nursing faculty preparation programs. Five strategies for ensuring success of PhD nursing students’ development as professional nurse scholars are recommended. Doctoral programs (e.g., PhD; DNP) would benefit from a unified approach to faculty preparation, guided by theories such as narrative pedagogy

Cholesterol Sulfotransferase SULT2B1b Modulates Sensitivity to Death Receptor Ligand TNFα in Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer

Cholesterol sulfotransferase, SULT2B1b, has been demonstrated to modulate both androgen receptor activity and cell growth properties. However, the mechanism(s) by which SULT2B1b alters these properties within prostate cancer cells has not been described. Furthermore, specific advantages of SULT2B1b expression in prostate cancer cells is not understood. In these studies, single-cell mRNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) was conducted to compare the transcriptomes of SULT2B1b knockdown (KD) versus Control KD LNCaP cells. Over 2,000 differentially expressed (DE) genes were identified along with alterations in numerous canonical pathways, including the death receptor signaling pathway. The studies herein demonstrate that SULT2B1b KD increases tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF) expression in prostate cancer cells and results in NF-κB activation in a TNF-dependent manner. More importantly, SULT2B1b KD significantly enhances TNF-mediated apoptosis in both TNF-sensitive LNCaP cells and TNF-resistant C4–2 cells. Overexpression of SULT2B1b in LNCaP cells also decreases sensitivity to TNF-mediated cell death, suggesting that SULT2B1b modulates pathways dictating the TNF sensitivity capacity of prostate cancer cells. Probing human prostate cancer patient datasets further support this work by providing evidence that SULT2B1b expression is inversely correlated with TNF-related genes, including TNF, CD40LG, FADD, and NFKB1. Together, these data provide evidence that SULT2B1b expression in prostate cancer cells enhances resistance to TNF and may provide a growth advantage. In addition, targeting SULT2B1b may induce an enhanced therapeutic response to TNF treatment in advanced prostate cancer

Polygenicity and Epistasis Underlie Fitness-Proximal Traits in the Caenorhabditis elegans Multiparental Experimental Evolution (CeMEE) Panel

The deposited article is a pre-print version and it has not been submitted to peer reviewing. This article version was provided by bioRxiv and is the preprint first posted online Mar. 26, 2017. This publication hasn't any creative commons license associated. The deposited article version contains attached the supplementary materials within the pdf.Understanding the genetic basis of complex traits remains a major challenge in biology. Polygenicity, phenotypic plasticity and epistasis contribute to phenotypic variance in ways that are rarely clear. This uncertainty can be problematic for estimating heritability, for predicting individual phenotypes from genomic data, and for parameterizing models of phenotypic evolution. Here we report an advanced recombinant inbred line (RIL) quantitative trait locus (QTL) mapping panel for the hermaphroditic nematode Caenorhabditis elegans, the C. elegans multiparental experimental evolution (CeMEE) panel. The CeMEE panel, comprising 507 RILs at present, was created by hybridization of 16 wild isolates, experimental evolution for 140-190 generations, and inbreeding by selfing for 13-16 generations. The panel contains 22% of single nucleotide polymorphisms known to segregate in natural populations, and complements existing C. elegans mapping resources by providing fine resolution and high nucleotide diversity across >95% of the genome. We apply it to study the genetic basis of two fitness components, fertility and hermaphrodite body size at time of reproduction, with high broad sense heritability in the CeMEE. While simulations show we should detect common alleles with additive effects as small as 5%, at gene-level resolution, the genetic architectures of these traits does not feature such alleles. We instead find that a significant fraction of trait variance, approaching 40% for fertility, can be explained by sign epistasis with main effects below the detection limit. In congruence, phenotype prediction from genomic similarity, while generally poor (r2 < 10%), requires modeling epistasis for optimal accuracy, with most variance attributed to the rapidly evolving chromosome arms.National Science Foundation grant: (PHY-1125915); National Institutes of Health grants: (R25-GM-067110, R01-GM-089972, R01-GM-121828); Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation grant: (2919.01); Human Frontiers Science Program (RGP0045/2010); European Research Council grant: (FP7/2007-2013/243285); Agence Nationale de la Recherche grant: (ANR-14-ACHN-0032-01).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Time resolved, 2-D hard X-ray imaging of relativistic electron-beam target interactions on ETA-II

Advanced radiographic applications require a constant source size less than 1 mm. To study the time history of a relativistic electron beam as it interacts with a bremsstrahlung converter, one of the diagnostics they use is a multi-frame time-resolved hard x-ray camera. They are performing experiments on the ETA-II accelerator at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to investigate details of the electron beam/converter interactions. The camera they are using contains 6 time-resolved images, each image is a 5 ns frame. By starting each successive frame 10 ns after the previous frame, they create a 6-frame movie from the hard x-rays produced from the interaction of the 50-ns electron beam pulse