Ammonium excess leads to Ca restrictions, morphological changes, and nutritional imbalances in tomato plants, which can be monitored by the N/Ca ratio.

Both nitrogen and calcium fertilization management are vital for crops, where an imbalance of these elements can cause both physiological and yield problems. It has been proposed that nitrogen absorption, particularly ammonium, is in part dependent on calcium supply. Moreover, the balance between these two nutrients could be a key indicator of plant growth in some species. Tomato, one of the most cultivated crops worldwide, can also be widely affected by nutritional imbalance. Using large amounts of N fertilizers could lead to an imbalance with other nutrients and, thus, detrimental effects in terms of plant development and yield. Here we show that ammonium excess has a negative impact on plant development and results in calcium deficiency. Moreover, a deficit in calcium nutrition not only affects calcium concentration but also leads to a restriction in N uptake and reduced N concentration in the plant. These effects were evident at the seedling stage and also during flowering/fruit set. Using PCA analysis, we integrated both phenotypic and nutritional imbalances in seedlings and grown plants. Interestingly, the Ca/N ratio appears to be a key indicator to monitor appropriate N and calcium nutrition and more importantly the balance between both. Maintaining this balance could be an essential element for tomato crop production

Plasmatic Soluble Receptor for Advanced Glycation End Products as a New Oxidative Stress Biomarker in Patients with Prosthetic-Joint-Associated Infections?

Prosthetic joint infection (PJI) is the most common cause of failure of total joint arthroplasty, but a gold standard for PJI diagnosis is still lacking. Advanced glycation end products (AGEs) are proinflammatory molecules inducing intracellular oxidative stress (OS) after binding to their cell membrane receptors (RAGE). The aim of this study was to evaluate plasmatic soluble receptor for advanced glycation end products (sRAGE), as a new OS and infection marker correlating sRAGE to the level of OS and antioxidant defenses, in PJI, in order to explore the possible application of this new biomarker in the early diagnosis of PJI. Plasmatic sRAGE levels (by ELISA assay), plasma antioxidant total defenses (by lag time method), plasma reactive oxygen species (ROS), and thiobarbituric acid reactive substance (TBARS) levels (by colorimetric assay) were evaluated in 11 PJI patients and in 30 matched controls. ROS and TBARS were significantly higher (p < 0 001) while plasma total antioxidant capacity and sRAGE were significantly lower (p < 0 01) in patients with PJI compared to controls. Our results confirm the OS in PJI and show a strong negative correlation between the level of sRAGE and oxidative status, suggesting the plasmatic sRAGE as a potential marker for improving PJI early diagnosis

Reference gene validation for quantitative RT-PCR during biotic and abiotic stresses in Vitis vinifera

Grapevine is one of the most cultivated fruit crop worldwide with Vitis vinifera being the species with the highest economical importance. Being highly susceptible to fungal pathogens and increasingly affected by environmental factors, it has become an important agricultural research area, where gene expression analysis plays a fundamental role. Quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) is currently amongst the most powerful techniques to perform gene expression studies. Nevertheless, accurate gene expression quantification strongly relies on appropriate reference gene selection for sample normalization. Concerning V. vinifera, limited information still exists as for which genes are the most suitable to be used as reference under particular experimental conditions. In this work, seven candidate genes were investigated for their stability in grapevine samples referring to four distinct stresses (Erysiphe necator, wounding and UV-C irradiation in leaves and Phaeomoniella chlamydospora colonization in wood). The expression stability was evaluated using geNorm, NormFinder and BestKeeper. In all cases, full agreement was not observed for the three methods. To provide comprehensive rankings integrating the three different programs, for each treatment, a consensus ranking was created using a non-weighted unsupervised rank aggregation method. According to the last, the three most suitable reference genes to be used in grapevine leaves, regardless of the stress, are UBC, VAG and PEP. For the P. chlamydospora treatment, EF1, CYP and UBC were the best scoring genes. Acquaintance of the most suitable reference genes to be used in grapevine samples can contribute for accurate gene expression quantification in forthcoming studiesinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The Glycan Shield of HIV Is Predominantly Oligomannose Independently of Production System or Viral Clade

The N-linked oligomannose glycans of HIV gp120 are a target for both microbicide and vaccine design. The extent of cross-clade conservation of HIV oligomannose glycans is therefore a critical consideration for the development of HIV prophylaxes. We measured the oligomannose content of virion-associated gp120 from primary virus from PBMCs for a range of viral isolates and showed cross-clade elevation (62–79%) of these glycans relative to recombinant, monomeric gp120 (∼30%). We also confirmed that pseudoviral production systems can give rise to notably elevated gp120 oligomannose levels (∼98%), compared to gp120 derived from a single-plasmid viral system using the HIVLAI backbone (56%). This study highlights differences in glycosylation between virion-associated and recombinant gp120

Azimuthal correlations of high transverse momentum jets at next-to-leading order in the parton branching method

AbstractThe azimuthal correlation, $$\Delta \phi _{12}$$ Δ ϕ 12 , of high transverse momentum jets in pp collisions at $$\sqrt{s}=13$$ s = 13  TeV is studied by applying PB-TMD distributions to NLO calculations via MCatNLO together with the PB-TMD parton shower. A very good description of the cross section as a function of $$\Delta \phi _{12}$$ Δ ϕ 12 is observed. In the back-to-back region of $${\Delta \phi _{12}}\rightarrow \pi$$ Δ ϕ 12 → π , a very good agreement is observed with the PB-TMD Set 2 distributions while significant deviations are obtained with the PB-TMD Set 1 distributions. Set 1 uses the evolution scale while Set 2 uses transverse momentum as an argument in $$\alpha _\mathrm {s}$$ α s , and the above observation therefore confirms the importance of an appropriate soft-gluon coupling in angular ordered parton evolution. The total uncertainties of the predictions are dominated by the scale uncertainties of the matrix element, while the uncertainties coming from the PB-TMDs and the corresponding PB-TMD shower are very small. The $$\Delta \phi _{12}$$ Δ ϕ 12 measurements are also compared with predictions using MCatNLO together Pythia8, illustrating the importance of details of the parton shower evolution.</jats:p

Azimuthal correlations of high transverse momentum jets at next-to-leading order in the parton branching method

AbstractThe azimuthal correlation, $$\Delta \phi _{12}$$ Δ ϕ 12 , of high transverse momentum jets in pp collisions at $$\sqrt{s}=13$$ s = 13  TeV is studied by applying PB-TMD distributions to NLO calculations via MCatNLO together with the PB-TMD parton shower. A very good description of the cross section as a function of $$\Delta \phi _{12}$$ Δ ϕ 12 is observed. In the back-to-back region of $${\Delta \phi _{12}}\rightarrow \pi$$ Δ ϕ 12 → π , a very good agreement is observed with the PB-TMD Set 2 distributions while significant deviations are obtained with the PB-TMD Set 1 distributions. Set 1 uses the evolution scale while Set 2 uses transverse momentum as an argument in $$\alpha _\mathrm {s}$$ α s , and the above observation therefore confirms the importance of an appropriate soft-gluon coupling in angular ordered parton evolution. The total uncertainties of the predictions are dominated by the scale uncertainties of the matrix element, while the uncertainties coming from the PB-TMDs and the corresponding PB-TMD shower are very small. The $$\Delta \phi _{12}$$ Δ ϕ 12 measurements are also compared with predictions using MCatNLO together Pythia8, illustrating the importance of details of the parton shower evolution.</jats:p

Test beam performance of a CBC3-based mini-module for the Phase-2 CMS Outer Tracker before and after neutron irradiation

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN will undergo major upgrades to increase the instantaneous luminosity up to 5–7.5×10$^{34}$ cm$^{-2}$s$^{-1}$. This High Luminosity upgrade of the LHC (HL-LHC) will deliver a total of 3000–4000 fb-1 of proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13–14 TeV. To cope with these challenging environmental conditions, the strip tracker of the CMS experiment will be upgraded using modules with two closely-spaced silicon sensors to provide information to include tracking in the Level-1 trigger selection. This paper describes the performance, in a test beam experiment, of the first prototype module based on the final version of the CMS Binary Chip front-end ASIC before and after the module was irradiated with neutrons. Results demonstrate that the prototype module satisfies the requirements, providing efficient tracking information, after being irradiated with a total fluence comparable to the one expected through the lifetime of the experiment

Heteroptera on flowering spontaneous herbs in differently managed orchards

Heteroptera in two different plant mixtures are considered. The first plot is a mixture of species with different flowering periods, the second one presents mainly Gramineae. As foreseen, the first plot presents a higher number of species of Heteroptera, and in the second one the species are mainly phytophagous rather than predaceous

Respiratory muscle function and exercise capacity in multiple sclerosis.

Patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) show a poor exercise tolerance. A reduction in respiratory muscle strength has also been reported. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether reduction in exercise tolerance was related to respiratory muscle dysfunction. Twenty four multiple sclerosis patients (mean +/- SD age: 48 +/- 9 yrs, duration of illness 12.2 +/- 6 yrs, severity of illness as assessed by Expanded Disability Scale Score (EDSS) 5.3 +/- 2), underwent detailed evaluation of lung function tests, arterial blood gas analysis, respiratory muscle strength and endurance, and exercise test on an arm ergometer. Sixteen of the 24 patients were able to perform the exercise test (Group I), whilst the other eight were not (group II). Arterial blood gases and lung function tests were normal for both groups. Respiratory muscle strength as assessed both by maximal inspiratory pressure (MIP) and maximal expiratory pressure (MEP) was significantly reduced (MIP 18-76 cmH2O; MEP 16-82 cmH2O) compared to predicted values. Inspiratory muscle endurance time was significantly reduced in Group II in comparison to Group I (247 +/- 148 vs 397 +/- 154 s, respectively). Both MIP and MEP were significantly related to inspiratory muscle endurance time. Endurance time, MIP and MEP were inversely significantly related to duration of illness, whilst only endurance time was significantly related to Expanded Disability Scale Score