Plant substrate as a vehicle for trituration: a pilot study

Motivation: Lactose and hydroalcoholic solutions are not the proper substances to study the High Dilution (HD) effects using plant models. Plant substrate can not be considered an inert vehicle, but it is not harmful to plants. Aim: In this pilot study we verify the possibility to use plant substrate as a trituration vehicle to prepare substances to be used in plants. Methods: We used a partially dried commercial plant substrate (12% humidity) as the vehicle to prepare a set of trituration, having NaCl as the initial active substance. Triturations were performed using a ball mill, with a mass dilution rate of 1:18 (set A) and 1:100 (set B), up to the 7th trituration, that is, each set contained 8 groups: A0 to A7 and B0 to B7. For each group, the triturated substrate was mixed with a fresh one in a mass ratio of 1:1. After homogenization, 18 seeds of radish (Raphanus sativus) were sown in plastic trays (31 ml cell), for each group and kept in a green house exposed to natural thermal and light variations. After 4 weeks we determine the germination rate and number of mature cotyledon. Then 5 plants from each group were selected at random to determine the following parameters: averaged leaf area, length, fresh and dry mass and pigments amount (chlorophyll a and b, carotenes). Results: Groups A0 and B0 (higher saline concentration) showed those typical effects of saline stress: lower germination ratio, immature cotyledons, smaller and shorter leaves, higher water content and less pigments. All the others groups showed similar results, for all parameters, except pigments amount. The chlorophyll to carotene ratio (CCr) showed an unexpected but interesting behavior (figure 1).Both sets showed an initial CCr growing (as expected due the saline ratio decrease), but followed by an unexpected decrement. Set B (the higher mass dilution rate, 1:100) showed a slower change, compared to set A. When we sort the results in order of saline amount we observe two peaks (figure 2), indicating that this behavior can not be explained by the saline stress.Conclusions: Trituration using plant substrate as vehicle can be suitable to assess HD effects in plant models. In this pilot study we observed unusual results regarding to the expected saline stress due the saline concentration.

Anomalous behavior induced by water insertion in Molybdenum disulfide nanoflowers

The coexistence of negative photoconductivity and metallic-like behavior in conventional semiconductors is very uncommon. In this work, we report the existence of such unconventional physical properties in Molybdenum disulfide nanoflowers (MoS2-NF). This is achieved by making the surface of MoS2 hygroscopic by alcohol treatment and creating a transport channel that favors protonic over electronic conduction. On cooling the MoS2-NF in a heat sink, the excess water that condenses on the surface forms a proton (H3O+) wire which exhibits pinched hysteresis characteristics. The conductivity of MoS2 increased by two orders of magnitude in the proton-dominated conduction regime with an exceptionally high positive temperature coefficient of 1.3×104 Ω/K. Interestingly, MoS2-NF also exhibits strong negative photoresponse (NPC) at room temperature when illuminated with UV and infra-red radiation. This interesting behavior observed in MoS2 NF can be useful for energy harvesting applications and the realization of fast thermal memories and optical switches.

Relativistic motion on Gaussian quantum steering for two-mode localized Gaussian states

Realistic quantum systems always exhibit gravitational and relativistic features. In this paper, we investigate the properties of Gaussian steering and its asymmetry by the localized two-mode Gaussian quantum states, instead of the traditional single-mode approximation method in the relativistic setting. We find that the one-side Gaussian quantum steering will monotonically decrease with increasing observers of acceleration. Meanwhile, our results also reveal the interesting behavior of the Gaussian steering asymmetry, which increases for a specific range of accelerated parameter and then gradually approaches to a finite value. Such findings is well consistent and explained by the well-known Unruh effect, which could significantly destroy the one-side Gaussian quantum steering. Finally, our results could also be applied to the dynamical studies of Gaussian steering between the Earth and satellites, since the effects of acceleration is equal to the effects of gravity according to the equivalence principle.

Inter-chromosomal k-mer distances

Background Inversion Symmetry is a generalization of the second Chargaff rule, stating that the count of a string of k nucleotides on a single chromosomal strand equals the count of its inverse (reverse-complement) k-mer. It holds for many species, both eukaryotes and prokaryotes, for ranges of k which may vary from 7 to 10 as chromosomal lengths vary from 2Mbp to 200 Mbp. Building on this formalism we introduce the concept of k-mer distances between chromosomes. We formulate two k-mer distance measures, D1 and D2, which depend on k. D1 takes into account all k-mers (for a single k) appearing on single strands of the two compared chromosomes, whereas D2 takes into account both strands of each chromosome. Both measures reflect dissimilarities in global chromosomal structures. Results After defining the various distance measures and summarizing their properties, we also define proximities that rely on the existence of synteny blocks between chromosomes of different bacterial strains. Comparing pairs of strains of bacteria, we find negative correlations between synteny proximities and k-mer distances, thus establishing the meaning of the latter as measures of evolutionary distances among bacterial strains. The synteny measures we use are appropriate for closely related bacterial strains, where considerable sections of chromosomes demonstrate high direct or reversed equality. These measures are not appropriate for comparing different bacteria or eukaryotes. K-mer structural distances can be defined for all species. Because of the arbitrariness of strand choices, we employ only the D2 measure when comparing chromosomes of different species. The results for comparisons of various eukaryotes display interesting behavior which is partially consistent with conventional understanding of evolutionary genomics. In particular, we define ratios of minimal k-mer distances (KDR) between unmasked and masked chromosomes of two species, which correlate with both short and long evolutionary scales. Conclusions k-mer distances reflect dissimilarities among global chromosomal structures. They carry information which aggregates all mutations. As such they can complement traditional evolution studies , which mainly concentrate on coding regions.

Marriage Harmony: The Role Of Empathy And Forgiveness

The phenomenon of forgiveness is an interesting behavior to discuss, especially in marital relationships. This article aims to examine the factors that influence forgiveness behavior in a marital relationship as well as to find out whether empathy is related to forgiveness behavior. The method used in this study is a mixed method with a population of 30 families or 60 subjects. The instruments used in addition to interviews were the scale of empathy and the scale of forgiveness. The analysis technique used is the Pearson correlation. The results showed that there was a significant relationship between empathy and forgiveness behavior. Meanwhile, the factors that influence forgiveness behavior are empathy, social and religious norms, interdependence between partners, and commitment.

Torsions-Driven Root Helical Growth, Waving And Skewing In Arabidopsis

Helical growth broadly exists in immobile plants to support their limited movement, and Arabidopsis seedling root exhibiting natural left-handedness helical growth is considered as a simplified model for investigating this interesting behavior. Efforts have been made for understanding the mechanism of root helical growth and consequent root waving and skewing on tilted and impenetrable surface, and several models have been established. Here, previous reports are reviewed and a straightforward torsions-driven mechanism has been emphasized, and additional experiments have been performed to fill up the gaps of this theory in our study.This study implies that, torsions originating from handedness of both cortical microtubules and cellulose microfibrils play central role in root handed helical growth. Different from torsions directly provided by handed assembled cortical microtubules, torsions originating from right-handed assembled cellulose microfibrils are relaxed by their cross-linking with pectin within cell wall, but only exhibited when their cross-linking is interrupted due to damaged cell wall integrity. To topologically relax these torsions, supercoils of cortical microtubules and/or cellulose microfibrils exhibiting as oblique alignments are formed in root cells, which alter the orientation of root cell files and generate handed helical roots. Working together with gravitropic response, relaxation of torsions originating from helical roots drives roots to elongate with handedness, which therefore produces waved and skewed roots on tilted and impenetrable surface.

Influence of Inductive Effect in Organic Residuals Content in IZO Thin Films and the Performance on the Behavior of MIS Capacitors on Plastic

In this work, zinc oxide and indium-doped zinc oxide thin films at different concentrations were deposited by solution techniques at 200 °C. The thin films were characterized by XRD, Raman, FTIR and the four-point probe technique. Through FTIR spectroscopy, interesting behavior was observed when the IZO film at 6 wt.% doping showed a lower number of organic residues. Due to an inductive effect, an unusual displacement of bonds was observed. The reduction of organic residuals corroborated with the behavior of flexible metal–insulator–semiconductor (MIS) capacitors.

On the Correlation between Energy Spectra and Element Abundances in Solar Energetic Particles

In solar energetic particle (SEP) events, the physical processes of both shock acceleration and scattering during transport can cause energy-spectral indices to be correlated with enhancement or suppression of element abundances versus mass-to-charge ratios $A/Q$ A / Q . We observe correlations for those “gradual” SEP events where shock waves accelerate ions from the ambient coronal plasma, but there are no such correlations for “impulsive” SEP events produced by magnetic reconnection in solar jets, where abundance enhancement in different events vary from $(A/Q)^{+2}$ ( A / Q ) + 2 to $(A/Q)^{+8}$ ( A / Q ) + 8 , nor are there correlations when shock waves reaccelerate these residual impulsive ions. In the latter events the abundances are determined separately, prior to the accelerated spectra. Events with correlated spectra and abundances show a wide variety of interesting behavior that has not been described previously. Small and moderate gradual SEP events, with relative abundances typically depending approximately upon $(A/Q)^{-1}$ ( A / Q ) − 1 and the spectra upon energy $E^{-2.5}$ E − 2.5 , vary little with time. Large SEP events show huge temporal variations skirting the correlation line; in one case O spectra vary with time from $E^{-1}$ E − 1 to $E^{-5}$ E − 5 while abundances vary from $(A/Q)^{+1}$ ( A / Q ) + 1 to $(A/Q)^{-2}$ ( A / Q ) − 2 during the event. In very large events, streaming-limited transport through proton-generated resonant Alfvén waves flattens the spectra and enhances heavy ion abundances prior to local shock passage, then steepens the spectra and reduces enhancements afterward, recapturing the typical correlation. Systematic correlation of spectra and element abundances provide a new perspective on the “injection problem” of ion selection by shocks and on the physics of SEP acceleration and transport.

Roots and Powers in Regular Languages: Recognizing Nonregular Properties by Finite Automata

It is well known that the set of powers of any given order, for example squares, in a regular language need not be regular. Nevertheless, finite automata can identify them via their roots. More precisely, we recall that, given a regular language L, the set of square roots of L is regular. The same holds true for the nth roots for any n and for the set of all nontrivial roots; we give a concrete construction for all of them. Using the above result, we obtain decision algorithms for many natural problems on powers. For example, it is decidable, given two regular languages, whether they contain the same number of squares at each length. Finally, we give an exponential lower bound on the size of automata identifying powers in regular languages. Moreover, we highlight interesting behavior differences between taking fractional powers of regular languages and taking prefixes of a fractional length. Indeed, fractional roots in a regular language can typically not be identified by finite automata.

Lorentz Violation at the Level of Undergraduate Classical Mechanics

In this paper, we use the classical limit of the Standard-Model Extension to explore some generic features of Lorentz violation. This classical limit is formulated at the level of undergraduate physics. We first discuss the general equations of motion and then concentrate on three specific systems. First, we consider the theoretical aspects of pendulum motion in the presence of Lorentz violation, followed by some sample experimental results. The experimental bounds we achieve, in the range of 10−3, are not competitive with the current bounds from atomic clocks; rather, our experiment illustrates some common ideas and methods that appear in Lorentz-violation studies. We then discuss how Newton’s 2nd Law must be treated with caution in our model. Finally, we introduce a computational simulation of a binary star system that is perturbed by Lorentz-violating effects. This simulation shows some interesting behavior that could be the subject of future analytical studies.