Measuring ecological impact of water consumption by bioethanol using life cycle impact assessment

Purpose  

Though the development of biofuel has attracted numerous studies for quantifying potential water demand applying life cycle thinking, the impacts of biofuel water consumption still remain unknown. In this study, we aimed to quantify ecological impact associated with corn-based bioethanol water consumption in Minnesota in responding to different refinery expansion scenarios by applying a life cycle impact assessment method.     

Evolutionary rescue by beneficial mutations in environments that change in space and time

A factor that may limit the ability of many populations to adapt to changing conditions is the rate at which beneficial mutations can become established. We study the probability that mutations become established in changing environments by extending the classic theory for branching processes. When environments change in time, under quite general conditions, the establishment probability is approximately twice the ‘effective selection coefficient’, whose value is an average that gives most weight to a mutant''s fitness in the generations immediately after it appears. When fitness varies along a gradient in a continuous habitat, increased dispersal generally decreases the chance a mutation establishes because mutations move out of areas where they are most adapted. When there is a patch of favourable habitat that moves in time, there is a maximum speed of movement above which mutations cannot become established, regardless of when and where they first appear. This critical speed limit, which is proportional to the mutation''s maximum selective advantage, represents an absolute constraint on the potential of locally adapted mutations to contribute to evolutionary rescue.     

A new, transportable ergometer for the measurement of musculotendinous stiffness during wrist flexion.

We present here a new, dedicated mechanical device for monitoring quick-release movements of the wrist. The ergometer was designed to easily assess musculotendinous properties during wrist flexion. Maximal voluntary contractions (MVC) and quick-release (QR) movements during wrist flexion were performed on 14 subjects. A validation of the ergometer, using a test-retest methodology, was performed to assess its reliability and sensitivity. The device has been technically and biomechanically validated in a range of situations, including inertia measurement (mean inertia was found 0.0119+/-0.0012 N m s(2) rad(-1)) and appearance of the unloading reflex. Our results indicate that the device provides highly reliable, sensitive evaluation of wrist muscle stiffness (intraclass correlation coefficient for inertia, maximal voluntary contraction and stiffness index were 0.873, 0.994 and 0.930, respectively). Its portability facilitates measurement of the influence of repetitive, occupational activity on the musculotendinous complex of the wrist flexors.     

Coexistence of Probe Conformations in Lipid Phases—A Polarized Fluorescence Microspectroscopy Study

Several well-established fluorescence methods depend on environment-sensitive probes that report about molecular properties of their local environment. For reliable interpretation of experiments, careful characterization of probes’ behavior is required. In this study, bleaching-corrected polarized fluorescence microspectroscopy with nanometer spectral peak position resolution was applied to characterize conformations of two alkyl chain-labeled 7-nitro-2-1,3-benzoxadiazol-4-yl phospholipids in three model membranes, representing the three main lipid phases. The combination of polarized and spectral detection revealed two main probe conformations with their preferential fluorophore dipole orientations roughly parallel and perpendicular to membrane normal. Their peak positions were separated by 2–6 nm because of different local polarities and depended on lipid environment. The relative populations of conformations, estimated by a numerical model, indicated a specific sensitivity of the two probes to molecular packing with cholesterol. The coexistence of probe conformations could be further exploited to investigate membrane organization below microscopy spatial resolution, such as lipid rafts. With the addition of polarized excitation or detection to any environment-sensitive fluorescence imaging technique, the conformational analysis can be directly applied to explore local membrane complexity.     

Mayday - integrative analytics for expression data

Background  

DNA Microarrays have become the standard method for large scale analyses of gene expression and epigenomics. The increasing complexity and inherent noisiness of the generated data makes visual data exploration ever more important. Fast deployment of new methods as well as a combination of predefined, easy to apply methods with programmer's access to the data are important requirements for any analysis framework. Mayday is an open source platform with emphasis on visual data exploration and analysis. Many built-in methods for clustering, machine learning and classification are provided for dissecting complex datasets. Plugins can easily be written to extend Mayday's functionality in a large number of ways. As Java program, Mayday is platform-independent and can be used as Java WebStart application without any installation. Mayday can import data from several file formats, database connectivity is included for efficient data organization. Numerous interactive visualization tools, including box plots, profile plots, principal component plots and a heatmap are available, can be enhanced with metadata and exported as publication quality vector files.     

Electroencephalographic changes in the lateral septum complex following systemic administration of DES-TYR1 -α-endorphin,Des-Tyr1-γ-endorphin and haloperidol in rats

The influence of systemically administered Des-Tyr¹-α-endorphin (DTαE), Des-Tyr¹-γ-endorphin (DTγE) and haloperidol on electroencephalographic (EEG) activity of the lateral septum complex (LSC) and the frontal cortex was studied in male rats. DTαE (2 μg) significantly increased whereas DTγE (10 μg) significantly decreased the amounts of activity in the 5 Hz band. In addition, DTαE promoted production of 15 - 20 Hz activity, while DTγE decreased the amount of 20 - 30 Hz activity. EEG activity exhibited a marked variability which persisted throughout the recording session following administration of the peptides. Haloperidol markedly decreased the proportion of 10 - 15 Hz activity. The alterations in EEG of the frontal cortex were similar to those in LSC but less pronounced. The differences in the time course and frequency bands affected suggest that the effects of peptides and haloperidol on EEG activity of LSC are not mediated by the same mechanisms.     

Development of Four Populations of Meloidogyne hapla on Two Cultivars,of Cucumber at Different Temperatures

The infectivity and development of four populations of Meloidogyne hapla were compared, at three temperatures, on tomato and two varieties of cucumber. A population from Canada produced few root-galls on cucumber and, except at 24 C, no larvae developed into adult females and produced egg masses. In contrast, a population with 45 chromosomes from America produced many galls on cucumber and small proportions of larvae became females and produced egg masses at 20 and 24 C. At 18 C this population produced no egg masses on cucumber, but a population from Britain and one from America with 17 chromosomes produced more egg masses at this temperature than at 20 or 24 C. Dissection of the galls showed that on cucumber many larvae died or their growth and development was slowed.     

Genetic interaction between Non-MHC T- and B-cell alloantigens in response to rous sarcomas in chickens

Chickens of Regional Poultry Research Laboratory (RPRL) inbred line 6₃ regress sarcomas induced by Bryan high-titer Rous sarcoma virus to a greater extent than chickens of line RPRL 100, although these lines are identical for the major histocompatibility B complex. They differ, however, at three independent autosomal loci: Ly-4 and Th-1 determine the surface alloantigens of partly overlapping subsets of T lymphocytes, and Bu-1 determines a surface alloantigen of B lymphocytes. The association of genotypes at these loci with quantitative variation in their ability to regress Rous sarcomas was tested in segregating F₄ generation progeny derived from crosses of lines 100 and 6₃. The Ly-4 and Bu-1 genotypes showed association with Rous sarcoma regression, but the Th-1 genotype did not. Chickens of the Ly-4 ^a/Ly-4 ^a, Bu-1 ^b/Bu-1 ^b and Ly-4 ^b/Ly-4 ^b, Bu-1 ^a/Bu-1 ^a genotypes had a significantly higher regressor ability than the other two double homozygous genotypes. These results indicate that higher regression is associated with (1) interaction between the Ly-4 and Bu-1 loci, and (2) complementation between either the line 6 Ly-4 ^a allele and the line 100 Bu-1 ^b allele, or the line 100 Ly-4 ^b allele and the line 6 Bu-1 ^a allele.     

Selection on innate immunity and body condition in Florida scrub-jays throughout an epidemic

Opportunities to investigate selection in free-living species during a naturally occurring epidemic are rare; however, we assessed innate immunocompetence in Florida scrub-jays before the population suffered the greatest over-winter mortality in 20 years of study. Propitiously, three months prior to the epidemic, we had sampled a number of male breeders to evaluate a suite of physiological measures that are commonly used to estimate the overall health-state of an individual. There was a significant, positive selection gradient for both Escherichia coli bacterial killing capability and body condition, suggesting that directional selection had occurred upon each of these traits during the disease epidemic.