Map of the Shvedsʻka- Poli︠a︡na colony

Digital image

Branch-branch connections in trees analogous to hyphal fusions in fungal colonies

the leopard tree Caesalpinia ferrea (Leguminosae) a native of eastern Brazil-some of the leader branches connect to and fuse with neighbouring branches of the same tree. The bridge initials project out as pegs or protuberances and apparently extend in a coordinated manner, connecting branches up to 4 ft apart. The fusion of two branches of the same tree implies intra-plant communication involving signaling factor(s). The bridges resemble fusions between hyphae in a fungal colony. Whereas hyphal fusions are common and the process is apparently completed in <1 h, branch fusions in C. ferrea tree are limited and a slow process, apparently requiring several months to years to complete. Branch fusions in C. ferrea are in accord with Claus Mattheck's analysis that tree branches actually seek contact rather than avoid contacts.

Reforming technology company incentive programs for achieving knowledge-based economic development:a Brazil-Australia comparative study

This doctoral thesis aims to demonstrate the importance of incentives to technology-based firms as a strategy to promote knowledge-based economic development (KBED). To remain competitive, technology-based firms must innovate and seek new markets; therefore, this study aims to propose an incentive model to technology-based firms as a strategy to promote knowledge-based urban development, according to framework described by Yigitcanlar (2011). This is an exploratory and descriptive research with a qualitative approach. Surveys were carried out with national trade associations that represented technology-based firms both in Brazil and Australia. After analysing the surveys, structured interviews were conducted with government representatives, trade associations and businessmen who had used financial support by the federal government. When comparing both countries, the study found the importance of direct incentives through tax incentives, for it is a less bureaucratic, quicker and more direct process for firms. We suggest to include the terms incentives in the framework of knowledge-based urban development, as one of the pillars that contribute to knowledge-based economic development.

Scheduling parallel batch processors with incompatible job families using ant colony optimization

The present work concerns with the static scheduling of jobs to parallel identical batch processors with incompatible job families for minimizing the total weighted tardiness. This scheduling problem is applicable in burn-in operations and wafer fabrication in semiconductor manufacturing. We decompose the problem into two stages: batch formation and batch scheduling, as in the literature. The Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) based algorithm called ATC-BACO algorithm is developed in which ACO is used to solve the batch scheduling problems. Our computational experimentation shows that the proposed ATC-BACO algorithm performs better than the available best traditional dispatching rule called ATC-BATC rule.

Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) for multi-objective design optimization of composite structures

In this paper, we present a generic method/model for multi-objective design optimization of laminated composite components, based on Vector Evaluated Artificial Bee Colony (VEABC) algorithm. VEABC is a parallel vector evaluated type, swarm intelligence multi-objective variant of the Artificial Bee Colony algorithm (ABC). In the current work a modified version of VEABC algorithm for discrete variables has been developed and implemented successfully for the multi-objective design optimization of composites. The problem is formulated with multiple objectives of minimizing weight and the total cost of the composite component to achieve a specified strength. The primary optimization variables are the number of layers, its stacking sequence (the orientation of the layers) and thickness of each layer. The classical lamination theory is utilized to determine the stresses in the component and the design is evaluated based on three failure criteria: failure mechanism based failure criteria, maximum stress failure criteria and the tsai-wu failure criteria. The optimization method is validated for a number of different loading configurations-uniaxial, biaxial and bending loads. The design optimization has been carried for both variable stacking sequences, as well fixed standard stacking schemes and a comparative study of the different design configurations evolved has been presented. Finally the performance is evaluated in comparison with other nature inspired techniques which includes Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), Artificial Immune System (AIS) and Genetic Algorithm (GA). The performance of ABC is at par with that of PSO, AIS and GA for all the loading configurations. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

From ‘Afflicted’ to Activists: Structural Violence and Climate Change Discourse in the States of Pernambuco and Paraíba in Northeast Brazil

This study approaches the problem of poverty in the hinterlands of Northeast Brazil through the concept of structural violence, linking the environmental threats posed by climate change, especially those related to droughts, to the broader social struggles in the region. When discussions about potentials and rights are incorporated into the problematic of poverty, a deeper insight is obtained regarding the various factors behind the phenomenon. It is generally believed that climate change is affecting the already marginalized and poor more than those of higher social standing, and will increasingly do so in the future. The data for this study was collected during a three month field work in the states of Pernambuco and Paraíba in Northeast Brazil. The main methods used were semi-structured interviews and participant observation, including attending seminars concerning climate change on the field. The focus of the work is to compare both layman and expert perceptions on what climate change is about, and question the assumptions about its effects in the future, mainly that of increased numbers of ‘climate refugees’ or people forced to migrate due to changes in climate. The focus on droughts, as opposed to other manifestations of climate change, arises from the fact that droughts are not only phenomena that develop over a longer time span than floods or hurricanes, but is also due to the historical persistence of droughts in the region, and both the institutional and cultural linkages that have evolved around it. The instances of structural violence that are highlighted in this study; the drought industry, land use, and the social and power relations present in the region, including those between the civil society, the state and the private agribusiness sector, all work against a backdrop of symbolic and moral realms of value production, where relations between the different actors are being negotiated anew with the rise of the climate change discourse. The main theoretical framework of the study consists of Johan Galtung’s and Paul Farmer’s theory of structural violence, Ulrich Beck’s theory of the risk society, and James Scott’s theory of everyday peasant resistance.

Chemical communication in Ropalidia marginata: Dufour's gland contains queen signal that is perceived across colonies and does not contain colony signal

Queens of the primitively eusocial wasp Ropalidia marginata appear to maintain reproductive monopoly through pheromone rather than through physical aggression. Upon queen removal, one of the workers (potential queen, PQ) becomes extremely aggressive but drops her aggression immediately upon returning the queen. If the queen is not returned, the PQ gradually drops her aggression and becomes the next queen of the colony. In a previous study, the Dufour's gland was found to be at least one source of the queen pheromone. Queen-worker classification could be done with 100% accuracy in a discriminant analysis, using the compositions of their respective Dufour's glands. In a bioassay, the PQ dropped her aggression in response to the queen's Dufour's gland macerate, suggesting that the queen's Dufour's gland contents mimicked the queen herself. In the present study, we found that the PQ also dropped her aggression in response to the macerate of a foreign queen's Dufour's gland. This suggests that the queen signal is perceived across colonies. This also suggests that the Dufour's gland in R. marginata does not contain information about nestmateship, because queens are attacked when introduced into foreign colonies, and hence PQ is not expected to reduce her aggression in response to a foreign queen's signal. The latter conclusion is especially significant because the Dufour's gland chemicals are adequate to classify individuals correctly not only on the basis of fertility status (queen versus worker) but also according to their colony membership, using discriminant analysis. This leads to the additional conclusion (and precaution) that the ability to statistically discriminate organisms using their chemical profiles does not necessarily imply that the organisms themselves can make such discrimination. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Geochemistry of water and ground water in the Nhecolandia, Pantanal of Mato Grosso, Brazil: Variability and associated processes

A distinctive feature of the Nhecolandia, a sub-region of the Pantanal wetland in Brazil, is the presence of both saline and freshwater lakes. Saline lakes used to be attributed to a past and phase during the Pleistocene. However, recent studies have shown that saline and fresh water lakes are linked by a continuous water table, indicating that saline water could come from a contemporary concentration process. This concentration process could also be responsible for the large chemical variability of the waters observed in the area. A regional water sampling has been conducted in surface and sub-surface water and the water table, and the results of the geochemical and statistical analysis are presented. Based on sodium contents, the concentration shows a 1: 4443 ratio. All the samples belong to the same chemical family and evolve in a sodic alkaline manner. Calcite or magnesian calcite precipitates very early in the process of concentration, probably followed by the precipitation of magnesian silicates. The most concentrated solutions remain under-saturated with respect to the sodium carbonate salt, even if this equilibrium is likely reached around the saline lakes. Apparently, significant amounts of sulfate and chloride are lost simultaneously from the solutions, and this cannot be explained solely by evaporative concentration. This could be attributed to the sorption on reduced minerals in a green sub-surface horizon in the "cordilhieira" areas. In the saline lakes, low potassium, phosphate, magnesium, and sulfate are attributed to algal blooms. Under the influence of evaporation, the concentration of solutions and associated chemical precipitations are identified as the main factors responsible for the geochemical variability in this environment (about 92 % of the variance). Therefore, the saline lakes of Nhecolandia have to be managed as landscape units in equilibrium with the present water flows and not inherited from a past and phase. In order to elaborate hydrochemical tracers for a quantitative estimation of water flows, three points have to be investigated more precisely: (1) the quantification of magnesium involved in the Mg-calcite precipitation; (2) the identification of the precise stoichiometry of the Mg-silicate; and (3) the verification of the loss of chloride and sulfate by sorption onto labile iron minerals.

Worker piping triggers hissing for coordinated colony defence in the dwarf honeybee Apis florea

Defending a large social insect colony containing several thousands of workers requires the simultaneous action of many individuals. Ideally this action involves communication between the workers, enabling coordinated action and a fast response. The Asian dwarf honeybee, Apis florea, is a small honeybee with an open nesting habit and a comparatively small colony size, features that leave them particularly exposed to predators. We describe here a novel defence response of these bees in which the emission of an initial warning signal from one individual (“piping”) is followed 0.3 to 0.7 seconds later by a general response from a large number of bees (“hissing”). Piping is audible to the human ear, with a fundamental frequency of 384 ± 31Hz and lasting for 0.82 ± 0.35 seconds. Hissing is a broad band, noisy signal, clearly audible to the human observer and produced by slight but visible movements of the bees' wings. Hissing begins in individuals close to the piping bee, spreads rapidly to neighbours and results in an impressive coordinated crescendo occasionally involving the entire colony. Piping and hissing are accompanied by a marked decrease, or even cessation, of worker activities such as forager dancing and departures from the colony. We show that whereas hissing of the colony can be elicited without piping, the sequential and correlated piping and hissing response is specific to the presence of potential predators close to the colony. We suggest that the combined audio-visual effect of the hissing might deter small predators, while the cessation of flight activity could decrease the risk of predation by birds and insects which prey selectively on flying bees.

Social insect colony as a biological regulatory system: modelling information flow in dominance networks

Social insects provide an excellent platform to investigate flow of information in regulatory systems since their successful social organization is essentially achieved by effective information transfer through complex connectivity patterns among the colony members. Network representation of such behavioural interactions offers a powerful tool for structural as well as dynamical analysis of the underlying regulatory systems. In this paper, we focus on the dominance interaction networks in the tropical social wasp Ropalidia marginata-a species where behavioural observations indicate that such interactions are principally responsible for the transfer of information between individuals about their colony needs, resulting in a regulation of their own activities. Our research reveals that the dominance networks of R. marginata are structurally similar to a class of naturally evolved information processing networks, a fact confirmed also by the predominance of a specific substructure-the `feed-forward loop'-a key functional component in many other information transfer networks. The dynamical analysis through Boolean modelling confirms that the networks are sufficiently stable under small fluctuations and yet capable of more efficient information transfer compared to their randomized counterparts. Our results suggest the involvement of a common structural design principle in different biological regulatory systems and a possible similarity with respect to the effect of selection on the organization levels of such systems. The findings are also consistent with the hypothesis that dominance behaviour has been shaped by natural selection to co-opt the information transfer process in such social insect species, in addition to its primal function of mediation of reproductive competition in the colony.

The Evolution of Animal Welfare and the 3Rs in Brazil, China, and India

Increasingly, scientific collaborations and contracts cross country borders. The need for assurance that the quality of animal welfare and the caliber of animal research conducted are equivalent among research partners around the globe is of concern to the scientific and laboratory animal medicine communities, the general public, and other key stakeholders. Therefore, global harmonization of animal care and use standards and practices, with the welfare of the animals as a cornerstone, is essential. In the evolving global landscape of enhanced attention to animal welfare, a widely accepted path to achieving this goal is the successful integration of the 3Rs in animal care and use programs. Currently, awareness of the 3Rs, their implementation, and the resulting animal care and use standards and practices vary across countries. This variability has direct effects on the animals used in research and potentially the data generated and may also have secondary effects on the country's ability to be viewed as a global research partner. Here we review the status of implementation of the 3Rs worldwide and focus on 3 countries-Brazil, China and India-with increasing economic influence and an increasing footprint in the biomedical research enterprise.

Glioblastoma-derived Macrophage Colony-stimulating Factor (MCSF) Induces Microglial Release of Insulin-like Growth Factor-binding Protein 1 (IGFBP1) to Promote Angiogenesis

Glioblastoma (grade IV glioma/GBM) is the most common primary adult malignant brain tumor with poor prognosis. To characterize molecular determinants of tumor-stroma interaction in GBM, we profiled 48 serum cytokines and identified macrophage colony-stimulating factor (MCSF) as one of the elevated cytokines in sera from GBM patients. Both MCSF transcript and protein were up-regulated in GBM tissue samples through a spleen tyrosine kinase (SYK)-dependent activation of the PI3K-NF kappa B pathway. Ectopic overexpression and silencing experiments revealed that glioma-secreted MCSF has no role in autocrine functions and M2 polarization of macrophages. In contrast, silencing expression of MCSF in glioma cells prevented tube formation of human umbilical vein endothelial cells elicited by the supernatant from monocytes/microglial cells treated with conditioned medium from glioma cells. Quantitative proteomics based on stable isotope labeling by amino acids in cell culture showed that glioma-derived MCSF induces changes in microglial secretome and identified insulin-like growth factor-binding protein 1 (IGFBP1) as one of the MCSF-regulated proteins secreted by microglia. Silencing IGFBP1 expression in microglial cells or its neutralization by an antibody reduced the ability of supernatants derived from microglial cells treated with glioma cell-conditioned medium to induce angiogenesis. In conclusion, this study shows up-regulation of MCSF in GBM via a SYK-PI3K-NF kappa B-dependent mechanism and identifies IGFBP1 released by microglial cells as a novel mediator of MCSF-induced angiogenesis, of potential interest for developing targeted therapy to prevent GBM progression.

Alvará, porque Vossa Alteza Real he servido revogar toda a prohibição, que havia, de fabricas, e manufacturas no Estado do Brazil, e dominios ultramarinos, na forma acima exposta : para Vossa Alteza Real João Alvares de Miranda Varejão o fez

Apresenta o alvará de 12 de abril de 1808, do Príncipe Regente D. João, que revoga o Alvará de 5 de janeiro de 1785, de Maria I, que extinguia a manufatura de tecidos no Brasil.

A Amazonia : as provincias do Pará e Amazonas e o governo central do Brazil

O Barão de Marajó relata a situação da Amazônia (Pará e Amazonas) em relação ao governo central.