689 research outputs found
Agricultural biodiversity is essential for a sustainable improvement in food and nutrition security
Agricultural biodiversity has hitherto been valued almost exclusively as a source of traits that can be used in scientific breeding programs to improve the productivity of crop varieties and livestock breeds. We argue that it can make a far greater contribution to increased productivity. In particular, a wider deployment of agricultural biodiversity is an essential component in the sustainable delivery of a more secure food supply. Diversity of kingdoms, species and genepools can increase the productivity of farming systems in a range of growing conditions, and more diverse farming systems are also generally more resilient in the face of perturbations, thus enhancing food security. Diversity can maintain and increase soil fertility and mitigate the impact of pests and diseases. Diversity of diet, founded on diverse farming systems, delivers better nutrition and greater health, with additional benefits for human productivity and livelihoods. Agricultural biodiversity will also be absolutely essential to cope with the predicted impacts of climate change, not simply as a source of traits but as the underpinnings of more resilient farm ecosystems. Many of the benefits of agricultural biodiversity are manifested at different ecological and human scales, and cut across political divisions, requiring a cross-sectoral approach to reassess the role of agricultural biodiversity in sustainable and secure food production
The pion-pion Interaction in the rho Channel in Finite Volume
The aim of this paper is to investigate an efficient strategy that allows to
obtain pi-pi phase shifts and rho meson properties from QCD lattice data with
high precision. For this purpose we evaluate the levels of the pi-pi system in
the rho channel in finite volume using chiral unitary theory. We investigate
the dependence on the pi mass and compare with other approaches which use QCD
lattice calculations and effective theories. We also illustrate the errors
induced by using the conventional Luscher approach instead of a more accurate
one recently developed that takes into account exactly the relativistic two
meson propagators. Finally we make use of this latter approach to solve the
inverse problem, getting pi-pi phase shifts from "synthetic" lattice data,
providing an optimal strategy and showing which accuracy is needed in these
data to obtain the properties with a desired accuracy.Comment: 16 pages, 13 figures, 1 table, substantially modified with practical
examples of use to lattice researchers, new comments and references adde
Extracting Scattering Phase-Shifts in Higher Partial-Waves from Lattice QCD Calculations
L\"uscher's method is routinely used to determine meson-meson, meson-baryon
and baryon-baryon s-wave scattering amplitudes below inelastic thresholds from
Lattice QCD calculations - presently at unphysical light-quark masses. In this
work we review the formalism and develop the requisite expressions to extract
phase-shifts describing meson-meson scattering in partial-waves with
angular-momentum l<=6 and l=9. The implications of the underlying cubic
symmetry, and strategies for extracting the phase-shifts from Lattice QCD
calculations, are presented, along with a discussion of the signal-to-noise
problem that afflicts the higher partial-waves.Comment: 79 pages, 41 figure
A role for TSPO in mitochondrial Ca2+ homeostasis and redox stress signaling
The 18 kDa translocator protein TSPO localizes on the outer mitochondrial membrane (OMM). Systematically overexpressed at sites of neuroinflammation it is adopted as a biomarker of brain conditions. TSPO inhibits the autophagic removal of mitochondria by limiting PARK2-mediated mitochondrial ubiquitination via a peri-organelle accumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS). Here we describe that TSPO deregulates mitochondrial Ca2+ signaling leading to a parallel increase in the cytosolic Ca2+ pools that activate the Ca2+-dependent NADPH oxidase (NOX) thereby increasing ROS. The inhibition of mitochondrial Ca2+ uptake by TSPO is a consequence of the phosphorylation of the voltage-dependent anion channel (VDAC1) by the protein kinase A (PKA), which is recruited to the mitochondria, in complex with the Acyl-CoA binding domain containing 3 (ACBD3). Notably, the neurotransmitter glutamate, which contributes neuronal toxicity in age-dependent conditions, triggers this TSPO-dependent mechanism of cell signaling leading to cellular demise. TSPO is therefore proposed as a novel OMM-based pathway to control intracellular Ca2+ dynamics and redox transients in neuronal cytotoxicity
Electromagnetic corrections to light hadron masses
At the precision reached in current lattice QCD calculations, electromagnetic
effects are becoming numerically relevant. We will present preliminary results
for electromagnetic corrections to light hadron masses, based on simulations in
which a degree of freedom is superimposed on QCD
configurations from the BMW collaboration.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figures, The XXVIII International Symposium on Lattice
Field Theory, June 14-19,2010, Villasimius, Sardinia Ital
Standard-model prediction for direct CP violation in decay
We report the first lattice QCD calculation of the complex kaon decay
amplitude with physical kinematics, using a lattice
volume and a single lattice spacing , with GeV. We find
Re GeV and Im GeV, where the first error is statistical
and the second systematic. The first value is in approximate agreement with the
experimental result: Re GeV while the second
can be used to compute the direct CP violating ratio
Re, which is
below the experimental value . The real
part of is CP conserving and serves as a test of our method while the
result for Re provides a new test of the
standard-model theory of CP violation, one which can be made more accurate with
increasing computer capability.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures. Updated to match published versio
Participatory decision-making: The core of multi-stakeholder collaboration
The purpose of this brief is to provide insights and guiding principles that can inspire readers to conduct multistakeholder collaboration more effectively. The objectives are to demystify the process of collaboration, to make its assumptions more accessible, and especially to encourage readers to adapt participatory values and practices to their own settings. The brief describes several time-tested tools and procedures that can be implemented in a straightforward manner
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