Glycyrrhiza uralensis Nodules: Histological and Ultrastructural Organization and Tubulin Cytoskeleton Dynamics

Chinese liquorice (Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch. ex DC.) is widely used in the food industry and as a medicine. Like other legumes, G. uralensis forms symbiotic nodules. However, the structural organization of G. uralensis nodules is poorly understood. In this study, we analyzed the histological and ultrastructural organization and dynamics of the tubulin cytoskeleton in various cells from different histological zones of indeterminate nodules formed by two strains of Mesorhizobium sp. The unusual walls of infection threads and formation of multiple symbiosomes with several swollen bacteroids were observed. A large amount of poly-β-hydroxybutyrate accumulated in the bacteroids, while the vacuoles of meristematic and uninfected cells contained drop-shaped osmiophilic inclusions. Immunolocalization of the tubulin cytoskeleton and quantitative analysis of cytoskeletal elements revealed patterns of cortical microtubules in meristematic, infected and uninfected cells, and of endoplasmic microtubules associated with infection structures, typical of indeterminate nodules. The intermediate pattern of endoplasmic microtubules in infected cells was correlated with disordered arrangement of symbiosomes. Thus, analysis of the structural organization of G. uralensis nodules revealed some ancestral features more characteristic of determinate nodules, demonstrating the evolutionary closeness of G. uralensis nodulation to more ancient members of the legume family.

Precipitation Patterns and Rainfall Erosivity Return Period Under Savanna Conditions in Formosa, Goiás, Brazil

Losses of soil and nutrients affect a large part of agricultural areas in tropical regions, regardless of the level of technology adopted. This study evaluated the physical attributes and erosivity indices associated with rainfall patterns and return periods in the region of Formosa, State of Goiás, Brazil. Using series of pluviographic (2002-2008) and pluviometric (1975-1998) data from a station located at municipality of Formosa, the erosive potential (EI30 and KE>25), rainfall patterns (advanced, intermediate and delayed) and the erosivity associated with the rainfall return periods were determined. The average annual rainfall of the region was 1,391.6 mm with 87.4% of the rains concentrated in October to March. The average annual values of EI30 and KE>25 corresponded to 8,041.6 MJ mm ha-1 h-1 year-1 and 125.7 MJ ha-1 year-1, respectively. The months of the year did not differ based on rainfall pattern. The advanced hydrological pattern had the highest frequency of occurrence, followed by the delayed and intermediate patterns. The highest EI30 and KE>25 indices for individual rainfall seasons occurred under the intermediate and the advanced patterns in February and under the intermediate pattern in October for the index KE>25. The average annual erosivity index (R factor of USLE) (8041.6 MJ mm ha-1 h-1 year-1) is expected to occur at least once every 1.89 years, corresponding to a probability of occurrence of 52.84%. The average annual values of EI30 estimated for the return periods of 2, 5, 10, 25, 50 and 100 years were 8,230, 10,225, 10,889, 11,222, 11,421 and 11,488 MJ mm ha-1 h-1 year-1, respectively.

Do temporal information processing limitations share cognitive causes? A correlational study of different attentional forms and modalities

Selective attention can be directed according to behavioral goals or grabbed by salient stimuli. Whether controlled in a goal-directed or stimulus-driven fashion, attention has a dark side: Unattended items are frequently missed. Such failures have been explored through numerous experimental paradigms across sensory modalities, but their relationships have been incompletely characterized. In two experiments, we adopted an individual differences approach to better understand the common and dissociable cognitive components in temporal attention paradigms. In Experiment 1, participants (n=56) were tested twice on the attentional blink (goal-directed attention), surprise-induced blindness (stimulus-driven attention), and their auditory analogues. Despite strong effect reliability and significant within-modality correlations across effects, we found no significant correlations across modalities. In Experiment 2, participants (n=52) completed different versions of the visual tasks and a contingent capture task, whose deficit has been ascribed to both goal-directed and stimulus-driven components. Using exploratory factor analyses and partial correlations, we found that capture-related deficits accounted for the modest relationship between blink and surprise effects. Furthermore, surprise effects strongly habituated, blink effects remained, and capture-related deficits showed an intermediate pattern. We conclude that each attentional paradigm involves multiple cognitive components, some shared and others distinctly related to different attentional forms or sources of control.

The Roots of Bilingualism in Newborns

The first steps toward bilingual language acquisition have already begun at birth. When tested on their preference for English versus Tagalog, newborns whose mothers spoke only English during pregnancy showed a robust preference for English. In contrast, newborns whose mothers spoke both English and Tagalog regularly during pregnancy showed equal preference for both languages. A group of newborns whose mothers had spoken both Chinese and English showed an intermediate pattern of preference for Tagalog over English. Preference for two languages does not suggest confusion between them, however. Study 2 showed that both English monolingual newborns and Tagalog-English bilingual newborns could discriminate English from Tagalog. The same perceptual and learning mechanisms that support acquisition in a monolingual environment thus also naturally support bilingual acquisition.

Avaliação do padrão hidroclimático e da erosividade no Sertão de Pernambuco

A erosão hídrica é um dos grandes problemas que atingem regiões com potenciais agrícolas e áreas com propensão para deslizamento de terras. A chuva é considerada o fator climático que exerce maior influência no processo erosivo, especialmente nos trópicos por causa da sua distribuição temporal, espacial, características físicas e duração. Este trabalho teve como objetivo determinar o padrão hidrológico e o índice de erosividade no sertão Pernambucano, visando contribuir com informações estratégicas para gestão agrícola e ambiental na região. Foram utilizados dados pluviométricos horários de 2000 a 2017 localizados no município de Petrolina, disponibilizados pela (APAC). A partir dos dados da precipitação, utilizou-se o aplicativo Climap 3.0 para avaliar os eventos extremos de precipitação e o padrão hidrológico, bem como determinou-se por meio de equações o índice de erosividade para a região. No período analisado os maiores valores da precipitação ocorreram entre os meses de janeiro e abril e identificou-se 8 anos consecutivos de seca na região. Os resultados apontam que houve tendências significativas nas séries de dados, a erosividade foi considerada fraca a moderada em sua maioria, e o padrão hidrológico mais frequente foi o padrão intermediário, resultando uma alta suscetibilidade dos solos da região em sofrer erosão hídrica.Evaluation of hydroclimatic pattern and erosivity Sertão of Pernambuco A B S T R A C T Water erosion is one of major problems affecting regions with agricultural potential and landslide-prone areas. Rain is considered the climatic factor that exerts greatest influence on erosive process, especially in tropics because its temporal, spatial distribution, physical characteristics and duration. This work purpose to determine hydrological pattern and erosivity index in Pernambucano Sertão, to contribute with strategic information for agricultural and environmental management in region. Rainfall data from 2000 to 2017 located in city of Petrolina, provided by (APAC) were used. From the rainfall data, the Climap 3.0 was used to evaluate the extreme rainfall events and hydrological pattern, as well to determine through equations the erosivity index for region. During analyzed period the highest rainfall values occurred between January and April and 8 consecutive years of drought were identified in region. The results indicate that there were significant trends in data series, erosivity was considered weak to moderate mostly, and most frequent hydrological pattern was the intermediate pattern, resulting in high susceptibility of region's soils to water erosion.Keywords: climate variability, hydrological pattern, extreme indexes.

Gradient assimilation in French cross-word /n/+velar stop sequences

Articulatory studies have revealed cross-linguistic variation in the realization of cross-word nasal+stop sequences. Whereas languages such as Italian and Spanish show largely categorical regressive place assimilation (Kochetov & Colantoni 2011, Celata et al. 2013), English and German alveolar nasals are often characterized by gradient assimilation, modulated by the degree of overlap with the following gesture (Barry 1991, Ellis & Hardcastle 2002, Jaeger & Hoole 2011). The lack of comparable instrumental studies for French may be due to the common assumption that the language lacks nasal place assimilation in general. We investigate here the production of French /n/+/kɡ/ sequences via electropalatography. Four female speakers of European and Quebecois French wearing custom 62-electrode acrylic palates read the sentencesC'est une bonne casquette‘That's a good cap’ andC'est une bonne galette‘That's a good tart/cookie’ alongside comparable control sentences involving /n/+/t d/ sequences. For each sequence, assimilation type was determined both qualitatively via visual inspection of the linguopalatal profiles and quantitatively using two contact indices. None of the /n/-tokens exhibited either categorical assimilation (i.e. [ŋk]) or lack of assimilation (i.e. [n(ə)k]). Rather, an intermediate pattern was attested with the nasal involving overlapped coronal and velar gestures ([nn͡ŋ]) and continuous retraction of the constriction. The degree of overlap varied among speakers, extending up to half of the nasal interval. Overall, these French patterns are strikingly different from the categorical processes reported for other Romance languages, yet similar to the gradient assimilation attested in Germanic languages. We conclude by discussing possible sources of these differences.

Patterning of Quantum Dots by Dip-Pen and Polymer Pen Nanolithography

We present a direct way of patterning CdSe/ ZnS quantum dots by dip-pen nanolithography and polymer pen lithography. Mixtures of cholesterol and phospholipid 1,2-dioleoyl-sn-glycero-3 phosphocholine serve as biocompatible carrier inks to facilitate the transfer of quantum dots from the tips to the surface during lithography. While dip-pen nanolithography of quantum dots can be used to achieve higher resolution and smaller pattern features (approximately 1 μm), polymer pen lithography is able to address intermediate pattern scales in the low micrometre range. This allows us to combine the advantages of micro contact printing in large area and massive parallel patterning, with the added flexibility in pattern design inherent in the DPN technique.

Group Ability Composition on World Knowledge Problems

This chapter examines group ability composition and social combination processes on world knowledge tasks. On difficult world knowledge tasks, high-ability persons performed better in cooperative groups with other high-ability members than they did alone, and this difference increased with group size. In contrast, low-ability persons did not perform better in cooperative groups with other low-ability members than they did alone, and there was little improvement as group size increased. Low-ability members contributed very little unique information to one another and virtually none to high-ability members. Medium-ability members displayed an intermediate pattern that was more like low-ability than high-ability members. Consequently, the performance of groups of mixed high-ability, medium-ability, and low-ability members was basically proportional to the number of high-ability members: the greater the proportion of high-ability members, the better the group performance.