Quantifying surfactant interaction effects on soil moisture and turf quality

Soil water repellency occurs widely in horticultural and agricultural soils when very dry. The gradual accumulation and breakdown of surface organic matter over time produces wax-like organic acids, which coat soil particles preventing uniform entry of water into the soil. Water repellency is usually managed by regular surfactant applications. Surfactants, literally, are surface active agents (SURFace ACTive AgeNTS). Their mode of action is to reduce the surface tension of water, allowing it to penetrate and wet the soil more easily and completely. This practice improves water use efficiency (by requiring less water to wet the soil and by capturing rainfall and irrigation more effectively and rapidly). It also reduces nutrient losses through run-off erosion or leaching. These nutrients have the potential to pollute the surrounding environment and water courses. This project investigated potential improvements to standard practices (product combination and scheduling) for surfactant use to overcome localised dry spots on water repellent soils and thus improve turf quality and water use efficiency. Weather conditions for the duration of the trial prevented the identification of improved practices in terms of combination and scheduling. However, the findings support previous research that the use of soil surfactants decreased the time for water to infiltrate dry soil samples taken from a previously severely hydrophobic site. Data will be continually collected from this trial site on a private contractual basis, with the hope that improvements to standard practices will be observed during the drier winter months when moisture availability is a limiting factor for turfgrass growth and quality.

Resolution of racemic gossypol and interaction of individual enantiomers with serum albumins and model peptides

Racemic gossypol has been resolved by HPLC separation of diastereomeric (−) norepinephrine adducts on a reverse-phase column. The binding constants for the interaction of the three gossypol forms (+, − and −) with human and bovine serum albumins have been determined by fluoresence quenching studies. The KD values demonstrate that all three forms bind equally effectively to the two proteins, suggesting an absence of chiral discrimination in albumin-gossypol interactions. Circular dichroism studies of (+)-gossypol binding to the model dibasic peptides, Boc-Lys-Pro-Aib-Lys-NHMe and gramicidin S, suggesting that distortions of binaphthyl geometry may occur only for specific orientations of interacting residues at the receptor site.

Violence against the adolescents of Kolkata: A study in relation to the socio-economic background and mental health

This study attempts to understand the nature of violence suffered by the adolescents of Kolkata (erstwhile Calcutta) and to identify its relation with their socio-economic background and mental health variables such as anxiety, adjustment, and self-concept. It is a cross-sectional study covering a total of 370 adolescents (182 boys and 188 girls) from six higher secondary schools in Kolkata. The data was gathered by way of a semi-structured questionnaire and three standard psychological tests. Findings revealed that 52.4%, 25.1%, and 12.7% adolescents suffered psychological, physical, and sexual violence in the last year. Older adolescents (aged 17–18 years) suffered more psychological violence than the younger ones (15–16 years) (p < 0.05). Sixty nine (18.6%) adolescent students stood witness to violence between adult members in the family. More than three-fifth (61.9%) adolescents experienced at least one type of violence, while one-third (32.7%) experienced physical or sexual violence or both. Whatever its nature is, violence leaves a scar on the mental health of the victims. Those who have been through regular psychological violence reported high anxiety, emotional adjustment problem, and low self-concept. Sexual abuse left a damaging effect on self-concept (p < 0.05), while psychological violence or the witnessing of violence prompted high anxiety scores (p < 0.05), poor emotional adjustment (p < 0.05), and low self-concept (p < 0.05). This study stresses the need to provide individual counselling services to the maltreated adolescents of Kolkata so that their psychological traumas can heal and that they can move on in life with new hopes and dreams.

Interaction of rat testis protein, TP, with nucleic acids in vitro. Fluorescence quenching, UV absorption, and thermal denaturation studies

The nucleic acid binding properties of the testis protein, TP, were studied with the help of physical techniques, namely, fluorescence quenching, UV difference absorption spectroscopy, and thermal melting. Results of quenching of tyrosine fluorescence of TP upon its binding to double-stranded and denatured rat liver nucleosome core DNA and poly(rA) suggest that the tyrosine residues of TP interact/intercalate with the bases of these nucleic acids. From the fluorescence quenching data, obtained at 50 mM NaCl concentration, the apparent association constants for binding of TP to native and denatured DNA and poly(rA) were calculated to be 4.4 X 10(3) M-1, 2.86 X 10(4) M-1, and 8.5 X 10(4) M-1, respectively. UV difference absorption spectra upon TP binding to poly(rA) and rat liver core DNA showed a TP-induced hyperchromicity at 260 nm which is suggestive of local melting of poly(rA) and DNA. The results from thermal melting studies of binding of TP to calf thymus DNA at 1 mM NaCl as well as 50 mM NaCl showed that although at 1 mM NaCl TP brings about a slight stabilization of the DNA against thermal melting, a destabilization of the DNA was observed at 50 mM NaCl. From these results it is concluded that TP, having a higher affinity for single-stranded nucleic acids, destabilizes double- stranded DNA, thus behaving like a DNA-melting protein.

Viisi vuotta tiedonrakentamista yhteisö- ja teknologiaelementtien muovautumisen näkökulmasta

The object of this study was to examine the phenomena of a long-term Knowledge Building process. The subject was OECD/ENSI/FI-project's Knowledge Building in Knowledge Forum®3.4 environment from 8.9.2000 to 8.9.2005. Research was based on socio-cognitive and socio-cultural learning approaches and the theoretical background consisted of models of collaborative learning and knowledge processing. These theoretical applications were first structured using metaphors of language and then assembled into five main theoretical motifs. The main motifs were 1) context, 2) inter-subjective, shared area, 3) community's practices and participation, 4) developing expertise and 5) the sequential construction of processes. These themes were assembled in interpreting the results using the Mutual Shaping of Technological and Social Elements by Boczkowski (1999) as a conceptual tool. The social elements of the mutual shaping process were defined as 1) community structure, 2) discourse and 3) the meanings of activity. The technological elements were defined as 1) shared artefacts, 2) features of technology-use and 3) other technological conventions perceived in activity. The five main theoretical motifs were used as the basis for creating the research problems, which were divided into three themes: 1) shared artefacts, themes of Knowledge Building and participant formation, 2) patterns of participation and interaction and 3) the meanings of activity. As methods I used content analysis of the messages, the quantitative profiling of changes in the database, social network analysis, discourse analysis of selected message threads and theme interviews of eleven participants. Based on my study it's possible to say, that a long-term setting of this kind provides a different perspective on Knowledge Building from most of the previous research. The most valuable conclusions from the data are: 1) The centralisation of interaction in this type of setting is a feature that supports the improvement in the quality of action. 2) The participation in a long-term Knowledge Building process seems to support the concious effort on professional development and the expert-identity. 3) The quality of plasticity of the technology-in-use has implication for how the communal features of activity will develop. The agency is seen to initiate processes that in turn open up new possibilities for the quality of action on both the communal and individual levels.

Interaction Of Oxygen With Zn(0001) Surface

EELS and XPS studies show the presence of both adsorbed atomic and molecular oxygen at low temperatures. The nature of the oxide layer formed on the surface has been characterized by angular dependent and variable temperature EELS. A loss peak around 550 cm−1 is assigned to an electronic transition.

Hydroxylation of oxygen-covered Cu(110) and Zn(0001) surfaces by interaction with CH3OH, (CH3)2NH, H2S, HCl and other proton donor molecules

EELS studies provide definitive evidence for the hydroxylation of oxygen-covered Cu(110) and Zn(0001) surfaces on interaction with proton donor molecules such as H2O, CH3OH, HCOOH, NH3 and (CH3)2NH. The occurrence of surface hydroxylation is unambigouusly shown by a study of the interaction of H2S and HCl with an oxygen covered Cu(110) surface.

Preadolescents and Their Mothers as Oral Health-Promoting Actors : Non-biologic Determinants of Oral Health among Turkish and Finnish Preadolescents

Is oral health becoming a part of the global health culture? Oral health seems to turn out to be part of the global health culture, according to the findings of a thesis-research, Institute of Dentistry, University of Helsinki. The thesis is entitled as “Preadolescents and Their Mothers as Oral Health-Promoting Actors: Non-biologic Determinants of Oral Health among Turkish and Finnish Preadolescents.” The research was supervised by Prof.Murtomaa and led by Dr.A.Basak Cinar. It was conducted as a cross-sectional study of 611 Turkish and 223 Finnish school preadolescents in Istanbul and Helsinki, from the fourth, fifth, and sixth grades, aged 10 to 12, based on self-administered and pre-tested health behavior questionnaires for them and their mothers as well as the youth’s oral health records. Clinically assessed dental status (DMFT) and self-reported oral health of Turkish preadolescents was significantly poorer than the Finns`. A similar association occurred for well-being measures (height and weight, self-esteem), but not for school performance. Turkish preadolescents were more dentally anxious and reported lower mean values of toothbrushing self-efficacy and dietary self-efficacy than did Finns. The Turks less frequently reported recommended oral health behaviors (twice daily or more toothbrushing, sweet consumption on 2 days or less/week, decreased between-meal sweet consumption) than did the Finns. Turkish mothers reported less frequently dental health as being above average and recommended oral health behaviors as well as regular dental visits. Their mean values for dental anxiety was higher and self-efficacy on implementation of twice-daily toothbrushing were lower than those of the Finnish. Despite these differences between the Turks and Finns, the associations found in common for all preadolescents, regardless of cultural differences and different oral health care systems, assessed for the first time in a holistic framework, were as follows: There seems to be interrelation between oral health and general-well being (body height-weight measures, school performance, and self-esteem) among preadolescents: • The body height was an explanatory factor for dental health, underlining the possible common life-course factors for dental health and general well-being. • Better school performance, high levels of self-esteem and self-efficacy were interrelated and they contributed to good oral health. • Good school performance was a common predictor for twice-daily toothbrushing. Self-efficacy and maternal modelling have significant role for maintenance and improvement of both oral- and general health- related behaviors. In addition, there is need for integration of self-efficacy based approaches to promote better oral health. • All preadolescents with high levels of self-efficacy were more likely to report more frequent twice-daily toothbrushing and less frequent sweet consumption. • All preadolescents were likely to imitate toothbrushing and sweet consumption behaviors of their mothers. • High levels of self-efficacy contributed to low dental anxiety in various patterns in both groups. As a conclusion: • Many health-detrimental behaviors arise from the school age years and are unlikely to change later. Schools have powerful influences on children’s development and well-being. Therefore, oral health promotion in schools should be integrated into general health promotion, school curricula, and other activities. • Health promotion messages should be reinforced in schools, enabling children and their families to develop lifelong sustainable positive health-related skills (self-esteem, self-efficacy) and behaviors. • Placing more emphasis on behavioral sciences, preventive approaches, and community-based education during undergraduate studies should encourage social responsibility and health-promoting roles among dentists. Attempts to increase general well-being and to reduce oral health inequalities among preadolescents will remain unsuccessful if the individual factors, as well as maternal and societal influences, are not considered by psycho-social holistic approaches.

An NMR study of the interaction of cytosine arabinoside and lysozyme

Abstract is not available.

Singlet and triplet molecular interaction in excimers

A perturbative approach is developed to determine, term by term, the contributions of the various forces to the excimer potentials of the singlet and triplet excimers. The results show that the singlet excimer of naphthalene is more stable than the corresponding triplet excimer primarily due to large contributions of the exciton-resonance and the dispersion energy terms. The variation of the various terms with the conformations of the excimers suggests that the singlet and triplet excimers of naphthalene cannot have identical structure.

Loci affecting gamma-glutamyl transferase in adults and adolescents show age x SNP interaction and cardiometabolic disease associations

Serum gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT) activity is a marker of liver disease which is also prospectively associated with the risk of all-cause mortality, cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and cancers. We have discovered novel loci affecting GGT in a genome-wide association study (rs1497406 in an intergenic region of chromosome 1, P = 3.9 x 10(-8); rs944002 in C14orf73 on chromosome 14, P = 4.7 x 10(-13); rs340005 in RORA on chromosome 15, P = 2.4 x 10(-8)), and a highly significant heterogeneity between adult and adolescent results at the GGT1 locus on chromosome 22 (maximum P(HET) = 5.6 x 10(-12) at rs6519520). Pathway analysis of significant and suggestive single-nucleotide polymorphism associations showed significant overlap between genes affecting GGT and those affecting common metabolic and inflammatory diseases, and identified the hepatic nuclear factor (HNF) family as controllers of a network of genes affecting GGT. Our results reinforce the disease associations of GGT and demonstrate that control by the GGT1 locus varies with age.

Quantifying surfactant interaction effects on soil moisture

Quantifying surfactant interaction effects on soil moisture and turf quality.