EFFECT OF BACILLUS MEGATERIUM ONU 500 ON THE GERMINATION AND GROWTH OF SUNFLOWER SEEDLINGS

The aim of the study was to evaluate the effect of Bacillus megaterium ONU 500 on the germination and growth of sunflower seedlings. Materials and methods. Sunflower seeds were sown in containers with soil inoculated with a suspension of bacteria B. megaterium ONU 500 in concentration of 106 CFU/ml. After 21 days growth characteristics of seedlings were compared: germination, average height, root length, leaf area, dry weight. Effect of these microorganisms on biofilm formation on roots was investigated with light microscopy. Results. Inoculation of soil with B. megaterium ONU 500 resulted in the positive effect on roots length (increase by 21%), leaf area (increase by 22%) and dry weight of seedlings (increase by 17.8%). No significant effect on germination and plant height was observed. On the roots of plants grown in soil treated with B. megaterium ONU 500 more developed biofilms with well formed matrix were observed, which indicates the stimulation of ability of plant and soil microbiota to form biofilms in presence of bacilli from the studied strain. Conclusion. The investigations demonstrated that bacteria of B. megaterium ONU 500 strain caused a positive effect on development of sunflower seedlings and formation of biofilms on their roots.

Investigation on the α/δ Crystal Transition of Poly(l-lactic Acid) with Different Molecular Weights

Poly(l-lactic acid) (PLLA) crystal possesses a complex polymorphism, and the formation mechanism of various crystal forms has been a hot research topic in the field of polymer condensate matter. In this research, five kinds of PLLA with different molecular weights were prepared by ring-opening polymerization with strict dehydration operations and multistep purification treatments. Then, thin film isothermal crystallization experiments were carried out to obtain crystallized samples. Previous research has proven that the PLLA α crystal form is usually formed at a temperature above 120 °C and the PLLA δ (or α’) crystal form is usually formed at a temperature below 120 °C. However, in this research, the characterization results indicated that the PLLA crystal changed from δ form to α form with the decrease of molecular weight at a temperature of 80 °C. Considering the molecular weight effect, the paper argued that the transitions of the α/δ crystal form are not only associated with temperature, but also related to entanglement state before crystallization. The small-angle X-ray scattering of the PLLA crystal and rheology analysis of the PLLA melt before crystallization further proved the significant role of entanglement. Finally, we tentatively proposed the entanglement effect mechanism on the transitions of the α/δ crystal form.

Understanding the Effect of a Soft Drinks Industry Levy on Consumer Well-Being in the UK: First Estimates

This paper is a first attempt to provide a quantitative evaluation of consumer well-being resulting from the UK Soft Drinks Industry Levy introduced in April 2018. Using a model setup that encompasses both a normal case and a Giffen case for sugary drinks consumption, a computational exercise is performed to quantify the welfare social loss for a variety of household incomes. The model demonstrates that the introduction of a soft drinks levy results in a non-trivial welfare loss, particularly in terms of monetary value and weight effect. We also find that the wealthiest individuals in society are affected positively by this levy, whilst the poorest segment of the population are adversely affected, especially in the presence of a binding nutritional constraint.

When lexical statistics and the grammar conflict: learning and repairing weight effects on stress

In weight-sensitive languages, stress is influenced by syllable weight. As a result, heavy syllables should attract, not repel, stress. The Portuguese lexicon, however, presents a case where weight seems to negatively impact stress: antepenultimate stress is more frequent in light antepenultimate syllables than in heavy ones. This pattern is phonologically unexpected, and appears to contradict the typology of weight and stress: it is a case where lexical statistics and the grammar conflict. Portuguese also contains gradient, not categorical, weight effects, which weaken as we move away from the right edge of the word. In this paper, I examine how native speakers’ grammars capture these subtle weight effects, and whether the negative antepenultimate weight effect is learned or repaired. I show that speakers learn the gradient weight effects in the language, but do not learn the unnatural negative effect. Instead, speakers repair this pattern, and generalize a positive weight effect to all syllables in the stress domain. This study thus provides empirical evidence that speakers may not only ignore unnatural patterns, but also learn the opposite pattern.

Dorsal expansion-related manual disability in verrucae vulgaris patients treated with cryotherapy: A longitudinal study via big data

Background: Common warts frequently occur over the hands and may overlie critical structures, including the extensor expansion of the digits, for which cryotherapy can lead to manual disability. Aims and Objectives: We aim to implement big data to infer knowledge on the interest of web users regarding the dorsal expansion-related manual disability in verrucae vulgaris patients managed with cryotherapy. Materials and Methods: We mapped the interest of users of the surface web in connection with five topics: cryosurgery, extensor digitorum muscle, human papillomavirus, manual disability, and verruca vulgaris. We retrieved longitudinal data [2004-2019] concerning the spatio-temporal variations of interest in these topics, using Google Trends. We are also reporting a case of interest while analyzing it using the Bradford Hill criteria. Results: Sixty-four nations contributed to the spatial (geographic) map, including ten countries from the Middle East and the north of Africa (15.63%). There was high temporal variability concerning cryosurgery 29.61 (+/- 0.94), extensor digitorum muscle 64.43 (+/- 0.86), human papillomavirus 0.01 (+/- 0.01), manual disability 2.89 (+/- 0.13), and verruca vulgaris 9.39 (+/- 0.20). Conjoint inference, via Post-Hoc testing and neural networks [machine learning], assigned the highest synaptic weight [effect size] to “cryosurgery” and “extensor digitorum muscle”, thus indicating that these topics are of prime interest for web users, including anatomists and dermatologists. Conclusions: We are conveying two messages: 1) Dermatologists are encouraged to collaborate with data scientists to realize the importance of big data for evidence-based dermatology. 2) Physicians should exercise extra caution in managing patients with verrucae vulgaris using cryotherapy.

Mind your weight: ‘Motionlessly’ sitting between the object and the verb in Japanese

The object in Japanese is often displaced from its canonical position next to the sentence-final verb, due to motivations such as information structure or animacy. Such flexibility allows for an adverb to be placed between the object and the verb. In the literature, there are suggestions for an almost equal preference to place Japanese manner adverbs before or after the object, inferred from both online and offline results. We will present a corpus study with a representative Japanese manner adverb zitto ‘motionlessly’ to show that either order may be preferred in different accounts of word order variation, but none can satisfy both requirements of distance minimization and accessibility, which are manifested in competing directions in Japanese, a verb-final language. In both accounts, weight has immense effect and should not be neglected. By using two heuristic methods to measure the weight effect, we propose that this case study with an object and an adverb sheds new light on the explanatory power of the distance minimization account, in particular by the Mimimize Domains principle (Hawkins 1994), which operates at both levels of (1) the constituency construction of the full VP, which favors the object-first order, and (2) the Phrasal Combination Domain between the head of object and the verb, which favors the adverb-first order. It is also proposed to implement a complement-and-adjunct distinction in the MiD principle, as a step toward a more effective study method of weight effect which I shall call efficiency profiling.