A multidisciplinary literature review of low and zero carbon technologies into new housing

The UK Government is committed to all new homes being zero-carbon from 2016. The use of low and zero carbon (LZC) technologies is recognised by housing developers as being a key part of the solution to deliver against this zero-carbon target. The paper takes as its starting point that the selection of new technologies by firms is not a phenomenon which takes place within a rigid sphere of technical rationality (for example, Rip and Kemp, 1998). Rather, technology forms and diffusion trajectories are driven and shaped by myriad socio-technical structures, interests and logics. A literature review is offered to contribute to a more critical and systemic foundation for understanding the socio-technical features of the selection of LZC technologies in new housing. The problem is investigated through a multidisciplinary lens consisting of two perspectives: technological and institutional. The synthesis of the perspectives crystallises the need to understand that the selection of LZC technologies by housing developers is not solely dependent on technical or economic efficiency, but on the emergent ‘fit’ between the intrinsic properties of the technologies, institutional logics and the interests and beliefs of various actors in the housing development process.

Desert dust deposition on Mt. Elbrus, Caucasus Mountains, Russia in 2009-2012 as recorded in snow and shallow ice core: high-resolution "provenancing", transport patterns, physical properties and soluble ionic composition

A record of dust deposition events between 2009 and 2012 on Mt. Elbrus, Caucasus Mountains derived from a snow pit and a shallow ice core is presented for the first time for this region. A combination of isotopic analysis, SEVIRI red-green-blue composite imagery, MODIS atmospheric optical depth fields derived using the Deep Blue algorithm, air mass trajectories derived using the HYSPLIT model and analysis of meteorological data enabled identification of dust source regions with high temporal (hours) and spatial (cf. 20–100 km) resolution. Seventeen dust deposition events were detected; fourteen occurred in March–June, one in February and two in October. Four events originated in the Sahara, predominantly in north-eastern Libya and eastern Algeria. Thirteen events originated in the Middle East, in the Syrian Desert and northern Mesopotamia, from a mixture of natural and anthropogenic sources. Dust transportation from Sahara was associated with vigorous Saharan depressions, strong surface winds in the source region and mid-tropospheric south-westerly flow with daily winds speeds of 20–30 m s−1 at 700 hPa level and, although these events were less frequent, they resulted in higher dust concentrations in snow. Dust transportation from the Middle East was associated with weaker depressions forming over the source region, high pressure centered over or extending towards the Caspian Sea and a weaker southerly or south-easterly flow towards the Caucasus Mountains with daily wind speeds of 12–18 m s−1 at 700 hPa level. Higher concentrations of nitrates and ammonium characterise dust from the Middle East deposited on Mt. Elbrus in 2009 indicating contribution of anthropogenic sources. The modal values of particle size distributions ranged between 1.98 μm and 4.16 μm. Most samples were characterised by modal values of 2.0–2.8 μm with an average of 2.6 μm and there was no significant difference between dust from the Sahara and the Middle East.

When long-range zero-lag synchronization is feasible in cortical networks

Many studies have reported long-range synchronization of neuronal activity between brain areas, in particular in the beta and gamma bands with frequencies in the range of 14–30 and 40–80 Hz, respectively. Several studies have reported synchrony with zero phase lag, which is remarkable considering the synaptic and conduction delays inherent in the connections between distant brain areas. This result has led to many speculations about the possible functional role of zero-lag synchrony, such as for neuronal communication, attention, memory, and feature binding. However, recent studies using recordings of single-unit activity and local field potentials report that neuronal synchronization may occur with non-zero phase lags. This raises the questions whether zero-lag synchrony can occur in the brain and, if so, under which conditions. We used analytical methods and computer simulations to investigate which connectivity between neuronal populations allows or prohibits zero-lag synchrony. We did so for a model where two oscillators interact via a relay oscillator. Analytical results and computer simulations were obtained for both type I Mirollo–Strogatz neurons and type II Hodgkin–Huxley neurons. We have investigated the dynamics of the model for various types of synaptic coupling and importantly considered the potential impact of Spike-Timing Dependent Plasticity (STDP) and its learning window. We confirm previous results that zero-lag synchrony can be achieved in this configuration. This is much easier to achieve with Hodgkin–Huxley neurons, which have a biphasic phase response curve, than for type I neurons. STDP facilitates zero-lag synchrony as it adjusts the synaptic strengths such that zero-lag synchrony is feasible for a much larger range of parameters than without STDP.

High-resolution provenance of desert dust deposited on Mt. Elbrus, Caucasus in 2009–2012 using snow pit and firn core records

The first record of dust deposition events on Mt. Elbrus, Caucasus Mountains derived from a snow pit and a shallow firn core is presented for the 2009–2012 period. A combination of isotopic analysis, SEVIRI red-greenblue composite imagery, MODIS atmospheric optical depth fields derived using the Deep Blue algorithm, air mass trajectories derived using the HYSPLIT model and analyses of meteorological data enabled identification of dust source regions with high temporal (hours) and spatial (ca. 20–100 km) resolution. Seventeen dust deposition events were detected; fourteen occurred in March–June, one in February and two in October. Four events originated in the Sahara, predominantly in northeastern Libya and eastern Algeria. Thirteen events originated in the Middle East, in the Syrian Desert and northern Mesopotamia, from a mixture of natural and anthropogenic sources. Dust transportation from Sahara was associated with vigorous Saharan depressions, strong surface winds in the source region and mid-tropospheric southwesterly flow with daily winds speeds of 20–30 m s−1 at 700 hPa level. Although these events were less frequent than those originating in the Middle East, they resulted in higher dust concentrations in snow. Dust transportation from the Middle East was associated with weaker depressions forming over the source region, high pressure centred over or extending towards the Caspian Sea and a weaker southerly or southeasterly flow towards the Caucasus Mountains with daily wind speeds of 12–18 m s−1 at 700 hPa level. Higher concentrations of nitrates and ammonium characterised dust from the Middle East deposited on Mt. Elbrus in 2009 indicating contribution of anthropogenic sources. The modal values of particle size distributions ranged between 1.98 µm and 4.16 µm. Most samples were characterised by modal values of 2.0– 2.8 µm with an average of 2.6 µm and there was no signifi- cant difference between dust from the Sahara and the Middle East.

A genome-wide association meta-analysis identifies new childhood obesity loci

Multiple genetic variants have been associated with adult obesity and a few with severe obesity in childhood; however, less progress has been made in establishing genetic influences on common early-onset obesity. We performed a North American, Australian and European collaborative meta-analysis of 14 studies consisting of 5,530 cases (≥95th percentile of body mass index (BMI)) and 8,318 controls (<50th percentile of BMI) of European ancestry. Taking forward the eight newly discovered signals yielding association with P < 5 × 10(-6) in nine independent data sets (2,818 cases and 4,083 controls), we observed two loci that yielded genome-wide significant combined P values near OLFM4 at 13q14 (rs9568856; P = 1.82 × 10(-9); odds ratio (OR) = 1.22) and within HOXB5 at 17q21 (rs9299; P = 3.54 × 10(-9); OR = 1.14). Both loci continued to show association when two extreme childhood obesity cohorts were included (2,214 cases and 2,674 controls). These two loci also yielded directionally consistent associations in a previous meta-analysis of adult BMI(1).

Harnessing microbiome and probiotic research in sub-Saharan Africa: recommendations from an African workshop

To augment capacity-building for microbiome and probiotic research in Africa, a workshop was held in Nairobi, Kenya, at which researchers discussed human, animal, insect, and agricultural microbiome and probiotics/prebiotics topics. Five recommendations were made to promote future basic and translational research that benefits Africans.

Discovery of a mammalian splice variant of myostatin that stimulates myogenesis

Myostatin plays a fundamental role in regulating the size of skeletal muscles. To date, only a single myostatin gene and no splice variants have been identified in mammals. Here we describe the splicing of a cryptic intron that removes the coding sequence for the receptor binding moiety of sheep myostatin. The deduced polypeptide sequence of the myostatin splice variant (MSV) contains a 256 amino acid N-terminal domain, which is common to myostatin, and a unique C-terminus of 65 amino acids. Western immunoblotting demonstrated that MSV mRNA is translated into protein, which is present in skeletal muscles. To determine the biological role of MSV, we developed an MSV over-expressing C2C12 myoblast line and showed that it proliferated faster than that of the control line in association with an increased abundance of the CDK2/Cyclin E complex in the nucleus. Recombinant protein made for the novel C-terminus of MSV also stimulated myoblast proliferation and bound to myostatin with high affinity as determined by surface plasmon resonance assay. Therefore, we postulated that MSV functions as a binding protein and antagonist of myostatin. Consistent with our postulate, myostatin protein was co-immunoprecipitated from skeletal muscle extracts with an MSV-specific antibody. MSV over-expression in C2C12 myoblasts blocked myostatin-induced Smad2/3-dependent signaling, thereby confirming that MSV antagonizes the canonical myostatin pathway. Furthermore, MSV over expression increased the abundance of MyoD, Myogenin and MRF4 proteins (P,0.05), which indicates that MSV stimulates myogenesis through the induction of myogenic regulatory factors. To help elucidate a possible role in vivo, we observed that MSV protein was more abundant during early post-natal muscle development, while myostatin remained unchanged, which suggests that MSV may promote the growth of skeletal muscles. We conclude that MSV represents a unique example of intra-genic regulation in which a splice variant directly antagonizes the biological activity of the canonical gene product.

Vertical structure and physical processes of the Madden-Julian oscillation: exploring key model physics in climate simulations

Aimed at reducing deficiencies in representing the Madden-Julian oscillation (MJO) in general circulation models (GCMs), a global model evaluation project on vertical structure and physical processes of the MJO was coordinated. In this paper, results from the climate simulation component of this project are reported. It is shown that the MJO remains a great challenge in these latest generation GCMs. The systematic eastward propagation of the MJO is only well simulated in about one-fourth of the total participating models. The observed vertical westward tilt with altitude of the MJO is well simulated in good MJO models, but not in the poor ones. Damped Kelvin wave responses to the east of convection in the lower troposphere could be responsible for the missing MJO preconditioning process in these poor MJO models. Several process-oriented diagnostics were conducted to discriminate key processes for realistic MJO simulations. While large-scale rainfall partition and low-level mean zonal winds over the Indo-Pacific in a model are not found to be closely associated with its MJO skill, two metrics, including the low-level relative humidity difference between high and low rain events and seasonal mean gross moist stability, exhibit statistically significant correlations with the MJO performance. It is further indicated that increased cloud-radiative feedback tends to be associated with reduced amplitude of intraseasonal variability, which is incompatible with the radiative instability theory previously proposed for the MJO. Results in this study confirm that inclusion of air-sea interaction can lead to significant improvement in simulating the MJO.

Up-regulation of c-jun mRNA in cardiac myocytes requires the extracellular signal-regulated kinase cascade, but c-Jun N-terminal kinases are required for efficient up-regulation of c-Jun protein.

Cardiac hypertrophy, an important adaptational response, is associated with up-regulation of the immediate early gene, c- jun, which encodes the c-Jun transcription factor. c-Jun may feed back to up-regulate its own transcription and, since the c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK) family of mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) phosphorylate c-Jun(Ser-63/73) to increase its transactivating activity, JNKs are thought to be the principal factors involved in c- jun up-regulation. Hypertrophy in primary cultures of cardiac myocytes is induced by endothelin-1, phenylephrine or PMA, probably through activation of one or more of the MAPK family. These three agonists increased c- jun mRNA with the rank order of potency of PMA approximately endothelin-1>phenylephrine. Up-regulation of c- jun mRNA by endothelin-1 was attenuated by inhibitors of protein kinase C (GF109203X) and the extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) cascade (PD98059 or U0126), but not by inhibitors of the JNK (SP600125) or p38-MAPK (SB203580) cascades. Hyperosmotic shock (0.5 M sorbitol) powerfully activates JNKs, but did not increase c- jun mRNA. These data suggest that ERKs, rather than JNKs, are required for c- jun up-regulation. However, endothelin-1 and phenylephrine induced greater up-regulation of c-Jun protein than PMA and phosphorylation of c-Jun(Ser-63/73) correlated with the level of c-Jun protein. Up-regulation of c-Jun protein by endothelin-1 was attenuated by inhibitors of protein kinase C and the ERK cascade, probably correlating with a primary input of ERKs into transcription. In addition, SP600125 inhibited the phosphorylation of c-Jun(Ser-63/73), attenuated the increase in c-Jun protein induced by endothelin-1 and increased the rate of c-Jun degradation. Thus whereas ERKs are the principal MAPKs required for c- jun transcription, JNKs are necessary to stabilize c-Jun for efficient up-regulation of the protein.