Comunidade de formigas (Hymenoptera: formicidae) em cultivo de videiras no município de São Roque - São Paulo

The cultivation of grapes is one of the most traditional cultures and the world's oldest one. In Brazil, cultivars occupy an area of approximately 90 thousand hectares, covering the south, southeast and northeast, in latitudes ranging from 30 º 56 '15''S up to 5 º 11' 15''S. The culture of the vine may be the target of the attack of some diseases and pests, and currently the main concern for growers is the subterranean mealybug, Eurhizococcus brasiliensis (Hemiptera: Margarodidae), known as pearl-ground. This arthropod infests the roots causing a progressive languish of the vine, even causes its death. In southern Brazil it is known that some species of ants can disperse pearl-ground for short distances, however, there is no information about that in the State of Sao Paulo. Thus, it is extremely important to perform studies with this focus on wine regions in this State. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the species of underground ant community in different grape varieties found in vineyards in the town of São Roque – SP, Brazil. With that purpose, samples were collected within one year. We used underground pitfalls spread across twelve points. In each of the points were placed two traps, one containing honey and the other containing sardine as attractive. The results revealed the presence of three morphospecies of ants in Niágara Rosada and four in other grape varieties, there was no significant difference in the species richness among the cultivars (Kruskal-Wallis - 0.33, p = 0.5). In both trials, the most frequent species was Brachymyrmex sp.4, suggesting that there is no dominance of distinct species of Niágara Rosada and the other grape varieties. There was no dissimilarity in species richness of the ones visiting honey or sardines (Kruskal-Wallis - 0.08, p = 0.7) and the analysis of variance indicated a great similarity in species richness between the rainy and dry seasons (Kruskal-Wallis - 0.09, p = 0.7)

Identificação de Neutrophil Extracellular Traps em lesões tegumentares de pacientes com Paracoccidiodomicose e análise da formação de NETs in vitro por neutrófilos humanos desafiados com Paracoccidioides brasiliensis

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Neutrophil extracellular traps identification in tegumentary lesions of patients with paracoccidioidomycosis and different patterns of NETs generation in vitro

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Diastemas: reestablishment of an attractive smile

A healthy and attractive smile is very valued in today s society. Yet this requires better aesthetic and cosmetic solutions from dental surgeons.The present paper presents a case report of diastema closure using an association of tooth movement induced by orthodontic elastics,dental cosmetics and resin-bonded prosthesis. The female patient L.B.A.J., aged 19 years, visited the Integrated Clinic of Araçatuba DentalSchool UNESP mainly complaining of missing teeth and poor esthetics. After anamnesis, clinical and radiographic examination revealedhypodontia of the maxillary right and left first premolars, abnormal maxillary right lateral incisor shape and diastema between the maxillaryright lateral incisor and canine and between the maxillary left lateral incisor and canine. Planning was done which included indication ofdiastema closure with composite resin restoration and metal-free resin-bonded prosthesis, with a structure made of Vectris (Ivoclar VivadentInc., Amherst, NT, USA). The option for dental cosmetics associated with resin-bonded prosthesis after movement with orthodontic elasticsresulted in an excellent aesthetic outcome of low cost and short treatment duration.Indexing terms: composite resins; diastema; fixed resin bonded partial denture.

Mating Behavior of Diabrotica speciosa (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae)

Diabrotica speciosa (Germar) is an economically important pest of Neotropical cultures and represents a quarantine risk for Neartic and Paleartic Regions. Despite its agricultural importance, few studies have been done on mating behavior and chemical communication, which has delayed the development of behavioral techniques for population management, such as the use of pheromone traps. In this study, we determined 1) the age at first mating; 2) diel rhythm of matings; 3) number of matings over 7 d; 4) the sequence of D. speciosa activities during premating, mating, and postmating; 5) the duration of each activity; and 6) response to male and female conspecific volatiles in Y-tube olfactometer. The first mating occurred between the third and seventh day after adult emergence and the majority of pairs mated on the fourth day after emergence. Pairs of D. speciosa showed a daily rhythm of mating with greater sexual activity between the end of the photophase and the first half of the scotophase. During the 7 d of observation, most pairs mated only once, although 30% mated two, three, or four times. In a Y-tube olfactometer, males were attracted by virgin females as well as by the volatile compounds emitted by females. Neither males nor their volatiles were attractive to either sex. Our observation provide information about mating behavior of D. speciosa, which will be useful in future research in chemical communication, such as identification of the pheromone and development of management techniques for this species using pheromone traps.

Phase-disorder-induced firing activity in excitable neuronal networks with attractive and repulsive coupling

It has been revealed that the network of excitable neurons via attractive coupling can generate spikes under stimuli of subthreshold signals with disordered phases. In this paper, we explore the firing activity induced by phase disorder in excitable neuronal networks consisting of both attractive and repulsive coupling. By increasing the fraction of repulsive coupling, we find that, in the weak coupling strength case, the firing threshold of phase disorder is increased and the system response to subthreshold signals is decreased, indicating that the effect of inducing neuron firing by phase disorder is weakened with repulsive coupling. Interestingly, in the large coupling strength case, we see an opposite situation, where the coupled neurons show a rather large response to the subthreshold signals even with small phase disorder. The latter case implies that the effect of phase disorder is enhanced by repulsive coupling. A system of two-coupled excitable neurons is used to explain the role of repulsive coupling on phase-disorder-induced firing activity.

Species of Drosophila (Diptera: Drosophilidae) attracted to dung and carrion baited pitfall traps in the Uruguayan Eastern Serranías

This study investigates the species richness and abundance of Drosophila Fallén, 1823 attracted to dung and carrion baited pitfall traps in natural areas with heterogeneous habitats at the Sierra de Minas, Eastern Serranías, southeastern Uruguay. Collecting was carried out on a monthly basis (May 2002 through April 2003). Drosophilids accounted for 0.84% (n = 131) and 3.61% (n = 158) of the Diptera collected from dung (n = 15,630) and carrion (n = 4,382) pitfall traps, respectively. A total of 12 species were identified, 11 of which belong to the subgenus Drosophila (the richest) and one to the subgenus Sophophora Sturtevant, 1939. Over 90% of the Drosophila specimens collected belong to five species of the subgenus Drosophila, namely D. gaucha Jaeger & Salzano, 1953, D. immigrans Sturtevant, 1921, D. mediovittata Frota-Pessoa, 1954, D. aff. nappae Vilela, Valente & Basso-da-Silva, 2004, and D. ornatifrons Duda, 1927. Drosophila cardini Sturtevant, 1916 is recorded for the first time from Uruguay. Drosophila abundance and species richness in the four habitats sampled in the Uruguayan Eastern Serranías, namely woodlands sierra, riparian forest, pine plantation and grazing grassland, were considered to be a function of habitat conservation. Diversity indices were low in all habitats. Different habitats supported particular coprophilous and necrophilous Drosophila species. The woodland sierra represents the most preserved habitat, and contributed with the highest species richness observed. Drosophila ornatifrons was the dominant species, with a restricted habitat distribution. On the other hand, grazed grassland, an environment modified by livestock management, had the lowest species richness: only a few specimens of D. repleta Wollaston, 1858. Regarding species composition, significant differences were found in some pairwise comparisons of groups of Drosophila species that included D. ornatifrons. Fly attraction to dung can be exploited as an alternative and/or complementary collecting method in ecological studies of Drosophila assemblages in natural areas.

Molecular origin of charge traps in polyfluorene-based semiconductors

The comprehensive control of morphology and structure is of extreme importance in semiconducting polymers when used as active layers in optoelectronic devices. In the work reported here, a systematic investigation of the structural and dynamical properties of poly(9,9-di-n-octyl-fluorene-alt-benzothiadiazole), known as F8BT, and their correlation with electrical properties is presented when the material is used as an active layer in optoelectronic devices. By means of X-ray diffraction, one observes that in thick layer films (thickness of about 4 μm) grown by drop-cast deposition, a solvent induced crystalline phase exists which evolves to a stable phase as the temperature is raised. This was not observed in thin films (thickness of about 250 nm) prepared by spin-coating within the investigated temperature range. By modeling the current-voltages characteristics of both thick and thin film devices, important information on the influence of crystallization on the trapping states could be drawn. Furthermore, the temperature dependence of the charge carrier mobility was found to be closely related to that of the molecular relaxation processes. The understanding of the nature of such molecular relaxations, measured by solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance methods, allows one to understand the importance of molecular relaxations and microstructure changes on the trap states of the system.

Mode coupling for precise measurements of the electronic g-factor of hydrogen-like ions in Penning traps

The g-factor is a constant which connects the magnetic moment $vec{mu}$ of a charged particle, of charge q and mass m, with its angular momentum $vec{J}$. Thus, the magnetic moment can be writen $ vec{mu}_J=g_Jfrac{q}{2m}vec{J}$. The g-factor for a free particle of spin s=1/2 should take the value g=2. But due to quantum electro-dynamical effects it deviates from this value by a small amount, the so called g-factor anomaly $a_e$, which is of the order of $10^{-3}$ for the free electron. This deviation is even bigger if the electron is exposed to high electric fields. Therefore highly charged ions, where electric field strength gets values on the order of $10^{13}-10^{16}$V/cm at the position of the bound electron, are an interesting field of investigations to test QED-calculations. In previous experiments [H"aff00,Ver04] using a single hydrogen-like ion confined in a Penning trap an accuracy of few parts in $10^{-9}$ was obtained. In the present work a new method for precise measurement of magnetic the electronic g-factor of hydrogen-like ions is discussed. Due to the unavoidable magnetic field inhomogeneity in a Penning trap, a very important contribution to the systematic uncertainty in the previous measurements arose from the elevated energy of the ion required for the measurement of its motional frequencies. Then it was necessary to extrapolate the result to vanishing energies. In the new method the energy in the cyclotron degree of freedom is reduced to the minimum attainable energy. This method consist in measuring the reduced cyclotron frequency $nu_{+}$ indirectly by coupling the axial to the reduced cyclotron motion by irradiation of the radio frequency $nu_{coup}=nu_{+}-nu_{ax}+delta$ where $delta$ is, in principle, an unknown detuning that can be obtained from the knowledge of the coupling process. Then the only unknown parameter is the desired value of $nu_+$. As a test, a measurement with, for simplicity, artificially increased axial energy was performed yielding the result $g_{exp}=2.000~047~020~8(24)(44)$. This is in perfect agreement with both the theoretical result $g_{theo}=2.000~047~020~2(6)$ and the previous experimental result $g_{exp1}=2.000~047~025~4(15)(44).$ In the experimental results the second error-bar is due to the uncertainty in the accepted value for the electron's mass. Thus, with the new method a higher accuracy in the g-factor could lead by comparison to the theoretical value to an improved value of the electron's mass. [H"af00] H. H"affner et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 85 (2000) 5308 [Ver04] J. Verd'u et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 92 (2004) 093002-1

Microchannel heat exchangers: An attractive option for the regenerator of a mobile orc waste heat recovery system

The performance of microchannel heat exchangers was assessed in gas-to-liquid applications in the order of several tens of kWth . The technology is suitable for exhaust heat recovery systems based on organic Rankine cycle. In order to design a light and compact microchannel heat exchanger, an optimization process is developed. The model employed in the procedure is validated through computational fluid-dynamics analysis with commercial software. It is shown that conjugate effects have a significant impact on the heat transfer performance of the device.

Eosinophil and neutrophil extracellular DNA traps in human allergic asthmatic airways

Asthma is a heterogeneous inflammatory airway disorder that involves eosinophilic and noneosinophilic phenotypes. Unlike in healthy lungs, eosinophils are often present in atopic asthmatic airways, although a subpopulation of asthmatic subjects predominantly experience neutrophilic inflammation. Recently, it has been demonstrated that eosinophils and neutrophils generate bactericidal extracellular traps consisting of DNA and cytotoxic granule proteins.