The Molecular Nature of Tumorigenesis

This paper is an exploration of the molecular aspects behind the tumor development process. Robert Weinberg provides an in-depth analysis of the subject matter over a series of publications entitled The Hallmarks of Cancer, The Hallmarks of Cancer: the next generation, and The Biology of Cancer. Current therapy development in the context of the hallmarks of cancer are discussed. The paper espouses some theories about the main differences between pediatric and adult cancers, specifically dealing with the mortality rates. The molecular aspects of tumorigenesis are discussed with particular attention to the tumor suppressor protein p53. This flows into the current treatment of cancer and how the future of cancer therapy development lies in novel concepts such as p53-induced apoptosis. Finally, some major methods of cancer prevention are presented because a reduction in the incidence of cancer, rather than improvements in current therapeutic techniques provide the best prospects for a reduction in cancer-associated mortality. Prevention is the cure.B.S

Lake-level Variability and Water Availability in the Great Lakes

Key components of water availability in a hydrologic system4 are the amount of water in storage and the variability of that amount. In the Great Lakes Basin, a vast amount of water is stored in the lakes themselves. Because of the lakes’ size, small changes in water levels cause huge changes in the amount of water in storage. Approximately 5,439 mi3 of water, measured at chart datum, is stored in the Great Lakes. A change of 1 ft in water level over the total Great Lakes surface area of 94,250 mi2 means a change of 18 mi3 of water in storage. Changes in lake level over time also play an important role in human activities and in coastal processes and nearshore ecosystems, including development and maintenance of beaches, dunes, and wetlands. The purpose of this report is to present recorded and reconstructed (pre-historical) changes in water levels in the Great Lakes, relate them to climate changes of the past, and highlight major water-availability implications for storage, coastal ecosystems, and human activities. Reconstructed water-level changes have not been completed for all Great Lakes; consequently, this report presents these changes primarily for Lakes Michigan and Huron, with some reference to Lake Superior also

Reduced Translocation of Glyphosate and Dicamba in Combination Contributes to Poor Control of Kochia scoparia: Evidence of Herbicide Antagonism

Citation: Ou, Junjun, Curtis R. Thompson, Phillip W. Stahlman, Nicholas Bloedow, and Mithila Jugulam. “Reduced Translocation of Glyphosate and Dicamba in Combination Contributes to Poor Control of Kochia Scoparia : Evidence of Herbicide Antagonism.” Scientific Reports 8, no. 1 (March 28, 2018): 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-23742-3.Kochia scoparia is a troublesome weed across the Great Plains of North America. Glyphosate and dicamba have been used for decades to control K. scoparia. Due to extensive selection, glyphosate- and dicamba-resistant (GDR) K. scoparia have evolved in the USA. Herbicide mixtures are routinely used to improve weed control. Herbicide interactions if result in an antagonistic effect can significantly affect the management of weeds, such as K. scoparia. To uncover the interaction of glyphosate and dicamba when applied in combination in K. scoparia management the efficacies of different doses of glyphosate plus dicamba were evaluated under greenhouse and field conditions using GDR and a known glyphosate- and dicamba-susceptible (GDS) K. scoparia. The results of greenhouse and field studies suggest that the combination of glyphosate and dicamba application controlled GDS, but glyphosate alone provided a better control of GDR K. scoparia compared to glyphosate plus dicamba combinations. Furthermore, investigation of the basis of this response suggested glyphosate and dicamba interact antagonistically and consequently, the translocation of both herbicides was significantly reduced resulting in poor control of K. scoparia. Therefore, a combination of glyphosate plus dicamba may not be a viable option to control GDR K. scoparia

Meniscal transplantation and its effect on osteoarthritis risk : an abridged protocol for the MeTEOR study : a comprehensive cohortstudy incorporating a pilot randomised controlled trial

Objectives: Subtotal or total meniscectomy in the medial or lateral compartment of the knee results in a high risk of future osteoarthritis. Meniscal allograft transplantation has been performed for over thirty years with the scientifically plausible hypothesis that it functions in a similar way to a native meniscus. It is thought that a meniscal allograft transplant has a chondroprotective effect, reducing symptoms and the long-term risk of osteoarthritis. However, this hypothesis has never been tested in a high-quality study on human participants. This study aims to address this shortfall by performing a pilot randomised controlled trial within the context of a comprehensive cohort study design. Methods: Patients will be randomised to receive either meniscal transplant or a non-operative, personalised knee therapy program. MRIs will be performed every four months for one year. The primary endpoint is the mean change in cartilage volume in the weight-bearing area of the knee at one year post intervention. Secondary outcome measures include the mean change in cartilage thickness, T2 maps, patient-reported outcome measures, health economics assessment and complications. Results: This study is expected to report its findings in 2016

Northern Bobwhite Demographics and Resource Selection Are Explained by Prescribed Fire with Grazing and Woody Cover in Southwest Missouri

Understanding the effects of landscape management on northern bobwhite (Colinus virginianus; hereafter, bobwhite) population growth requires information about seasonal- and stage-specific demographic parameters linked across the annual cycle. We review results to date from 3 years (2016–2018) of an intensive field study evaluating drivers of bobwhite population dynamics and resource selection during the breeding and non-breeding season in southwest Missouri, USA using data from adult and juvenile bobwhite fitted with radio-transmitters. Land cover of our study sites ranged from large blocks of native grasslands maintained with prescribed fire and grazing to more traditional management resulting in small patches of grasslands interspersed with food plots, disked idle areas, and woody cover. During the breeding season, relative probability of selection by broods increased in relation to proportion of native grass managed by grazing and burning and proportion of cropland. Brood survival was also greatest on native grasslands burned and grazed within the past 2 growing seasons. During the fall and winter, relative probability of selection by adults increased as woody edge density increased. Fall and winter survival increased as distance from trees increased and decreased as distance to shrubs increased. Our integrated population model indicated that the number of young hatched per female and adult breeding season survival were greatest on sites with the most native grassland managed by prescribed fire with grazing. However, non-breeding season survival was greater on sites with more agriculture or food plots and woody cover. Abundance declined across all sites from 2016 to 2019. Our work suggests that native grasslands managed by prescribed fire with grazing can provide quail habitat superior to traditional management that strived for a mixture of agriculture, woody cover, and grassland. The combination of conservation grazing and fire in native grasslands interspersed with shrubs may provide the greatest chance for bobwhite populations to persist in southwest Missouri and similar landscapes

Geotechnical Observations of the November 3, 2002 M7.9 Denali Fault Earthquake

The M 7.9 earthquake of November 3, 2002 event ruptured more than 340 kilometers on three fault, causing widespread liquefaction in the fluvial deposits of steep alpine valleys of the Alaska Range and eastern lowlands of the Tanana River. The event occurred in a remote and largely undeveloped portion of the rugged Alaskan central range, with few seismometer recordings. The areas affected by liquefaction are largely confined to native Holocene river deposits, areas bounded by stiffer ground moraine, Pleistocene uplands, and bedrock. Liquefaction affected areas of alluvial river valleys draining mountainous and glacier-proximal rivers. The most noteworthy observations are that liquefaction damage was focused towards the eastern end of the rupture area. In the western portion of the rupture zone, localized liquefaction developed in recent deposits of the Susitna and Delta rivers in the immediate vicinity of the surface rupture of the fault. More abundant and severe liquefaction occurred on the eastern Robertson, Slana, Tok, Chisana and, especially, Nabesna Rivers. In the Tanana lowland, liquefaction features were sparse on the western bars of the Tanana River in the vicinity of Fairbanks to west of Delta, but became pervasive throughout the eastern region from Delta to Northway. Though liquefaction observations were abundant, there was a dearth of instrumental recordings useful to relate damage effects to measured intensity. To characterize soil properties and stiffness of liquefaction evaluation sites, we used a portable spectral analysis of surface waves (SASW) apparatus to profile the shear wave velocity of the ground. On the Nabesna and Delta rivers that cross the fault, we only observe liquefaction features in soil deposits where normalized shear wave velocities fall below 230 m/s. Severity of sand boils, fissuring and lateral displacement of liquefied ground dramatically increase in soils of lower shear wave velocity, especially below 170 m/s. Some of the most pronounced ground failures are far from the fault zone (60-100 km) in extremely loose, low velocity (~120 m/s) fine sands of the bars of the Tanana River. Strong motion instrumentation was sparse within 150 kilometers of the fault rupture and the seismometers of Alyeska pump stations PS9 (PGA=0.09), PS10 (PGA=0.36g), and PS11 (PGA=0.09) serve as the principal strong motion recordings. Insufficient strong motion instrumentation is available to identify areas of amplified ground motio

Robo-AO M-dwarf Multiplicity Survey: Catalog

We analyze observations from Robo-AO's field M dwarf survey taken on the 2.1 m Kitt Peak telescope and perform a multiplicity comparison with Gaia DR2. Through its laser-guided, automated system, the Robo-AO instrument has yielded the largest adaptive optics M dwarf multiplicity survey to date. After developing an interface to visually identify and locate stellar companions, we selected 11 low-significance Robo-AO detections for follow-up on the Keck II telescope using NIRC2. In the Robo-AO survey we find 553 candidate companions within 4'' around 534 stars out of 5566 unique targets, most of which are new discoveries. Using a position cross-match with DR2 on all targets, we assess the binary recoverability of Gaia DR2 and compare the properties of multiples resolved by both Robo-AO and Gaia. The catalog of nearby M dwarf systems and their basic properties presented here can assist other surveys which observe these stars, such as the NASA TESS mission

Directional Charge Separation in Isolated Organic Semiconductor Crystalline Nanowires

One of the fundamental design paradigms in organic photovoltaic device engineering is based on the idea that charge separation is an extrinsically driven process requiring an interface for exciton fission. This idea has driven an enormous materials science engineering effort focused on construction of domain sizes commensurate with a nominal exciton diffusion length of order 10 nm. Here, we show that polarized optical excitation of isolated pristine crystalline nanowires of a small molecule n-type organic semiconductor, 7,8,15,16-tetraazaterrylene, generates a significant population of charge-separated polaron pairs along the π-stacking direction. Charge separation was signalled by pronounced power-law photoluminescence decay polarized along the same axis. In the transverse direction, we observed exponential decay associated with excitons localized on individual monomers. We propose that this effect derives from an intrinsic directional charge-transfer interaction that can ultimately be programmed by molecular packing geometry

Conceptual Basis for an Index of Forest Integrity for Upland Coastal Plain Ecosystems

Following the recent trend to manage natural resources for sustainability, ecologists, resource managers and policymakers are beginning to think of the management of forest ecosystems in terms of ecosystem health or ecosystem integrity. Biologists are increasingly recognizing that use of chemical assays in assessing the condition of an ecosystem has limited value, and that biological factors, e.g., species diversity and composition, can be useful characters in the analysis of biotic integrity. An index of biotic integrity (IBI) has been developed for riverine ecosystems in the Midwest U.S., using fish species diversity, indicator population analysis, trophic structure assessment, and physiological abnormalities in fish as measurable surrogates for biotic integrity . This paper explores the development of an analogous index of forest integrity (IFI) to be applied to the upland coastal plain forests of southern Arkansas and northern Louisiana. The IFI developed here includes sampling and analysis of population trends of dominant plant taxa, plant species diversity, and horizontal and vertical vegetative structure at midstory, shrub and detritus levels