Dynamics of 5S rDNA in the tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) genome: repeat units, inverted sequences, pseudogenes and chromosome loci

In higher eukaryotes, the 5S ribosomal DNA (5S rDNA) is organized in tandem arrays with repeat units composed of a coding region and a non-transcribed spacer sequence (NTS). These tandem arrays can be found on either one or more chromosome pairs. 5S rDNA copies from the tilapia fish. Oreochromis niloticus, were cloned and the nucleotide sequences of the coding region and of the non-transcribed spacer were deter-mined. Moreover, the genomic organization of the 5S rDNA tandem repeats was investigated by fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) and Southern blot hybridization. Two 5S rDNA classes, one consisting of 1.4-kb repeats and another one with 0.5-kb repeats were identified and designated 5S rDNA type I and type II, respectively, An inverted 5S rRNA gene and a 5S rRNA putative pseudogene were also identified inside the tandem repeats of 5S rDNA type I. FISH permitted the visualization of the 5S rRNA genes at three chromosome loci, one of them consisting of arrays of the 5S rDNA type I, and the two others corresponding to arrays of the 5S rDNA type II. The two classes of the 5S rDNA. The presence of pseudogenes, and the inverted genes observed in the O. niloticus genome might be a consequence of the intense dynamics of the evolution of these tandem repeat elements. Copyright (C) 2002 S. Karger AG, Basel.

Is the LHC observing the pseudoscalar state of a two-Higgs-doublet model?

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Development of the inverted visceral yolk sac in three species of caviids (rodentia, caviomorpha, caviidae)

Guinea pig related rodents possess numerous derived placental characters. We attempt to identify diversity within the visceral yolk sac and its association with the chorioallantoic placenta in three species of caviids, two of them possessing a capsule formed by the decidua that covers the chorioallantoic placenta. The results verify that in early pregnancy all three species have in inverted yolk sac placenta. In advanced pregnancy the species differ: Galea spixii, as representative without a capsule, bear a yolk sac in apposition to the chorioallantoic placenta with signs of exchange activity until term. Galea is similar to other caviomorphs in this respect. In Dasyprocta leporina and Cuniculus paca, the representatives possessing a capsule, the yolk sac endoderm lacks signs of substance exchange. Evidently, the presence of a capsule prevents such ail interaction. The variations established here must be considered if animal models for human placentation are required which have restricted access to the chorioallantoic placenta from the outside. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Analysis of diametrical wear of grinding wheel and roundness errors in the machining of steel VC 131

Due to the high industrial competitiveness, the rigorous laws of environmental protection, the necessary reduction of costs, the mechanical industry sees itself forced to worry more and more with the refinement of your processes and products. In this context, can be mentioned the need to eliminate the roundness errors that appear after the grinding process. This work has the objective of verifying if optimized nozzles for the application of cutting fluid in the grinding process can minimize the formation of the roundness errors and the diametrical wear of grinding wheel in the machining of the steel VC 131 with 60 HRc, when compared to the conventional nozzles. These nozzles were analyzed using two types of grinding wheels and two different cutting fluids. Was verified that the nozzle of 3mm of diameter, integral oil and the CBN grinding wheel, were the best options to obtain smaller roundness errors and the lowest diametrical wears of grinding wheels.

Anelastic relaxation due to interstitial solutes diffusion in Nb and Nb-1 wt% Zr

Metals and alloys containing solute atoms dissolved interstitially often show anelastic behavior due to a process know as stress-induced ordering. The application of mechanical spectroscopy measurements to diffusion studies in body-centered cubic metals has been extensively used in the last decades. However the kind of preferential occupation of interstitial solutes in body-centered cubic metals is still controversial. The anelastic properties of the Nb and Nb-1 wt% Zr polycrystalline alloys were determined by internal friction and oscillation frequency measurements using a torsion pendulum inverted performed between 300K and 650K, operating in a frequency oscillation in the hertz bandwidth. The interstitial diffusion coefficients of oxygen and nitrogen in Nb and Nb-1 wt% Zr samples were determined at two distinct conditions: (a) for low concentration of oxygen and (b) for high concentration of oxygen.

Measurements of simulated periodontal bone defects in inverted digital image and film-based radiograph: An in vitro study

Purpose: This study was performed to compare the inverted digital images and film-based images of dry pig mandibles to measure the periodontal bone defect depth. Materials and Methods: Forty 2-wall bone defects were made in the proximal region of the premolar in the dry pig mandibles. The digital and conventional radiographs were taken using a Schick sensor and Kodak F-speed intraoral film. Image manipulation (inversion) was performed using Adobe Photoshop 7.0 software. Four trained examiners made all of the radiographic measurements in millimeters a total of three times from the cementoenamel junction to the most apical extension of the bone loss with both types of images: inverted digital and film. The measurements were also made in dry mandibles using a periodontal probe and digital caliper. The Student's t-test was used to compare the depth measurements obtained from the two types of images and direct visual measurement in the dry mandibles. A significance level of 0.05 for a 95% confidence interval was used for each comparison. Results: There was a significant difference between depth measurements in the inverted digital images and direct visual measurements (p>|t|=0.0039), with means of 6.29 mm (IC95%:6.04-6.54) and 6.79 mm (IC95%:6.45-7.11), respectively. There was a non-significant difference between the film-based radiographs and direct visual measurements (p>|t|=0.4950), with means of 6.64mm (IC95%:6.40-6.89) and 6.79mm(IC95%:6.45-7.11), respectively. Conclusion: The periodontal bone defect measurements in the inverted digital images were inferior to film-based radiographs, underestimating the amount of bone loss. copy; 2012 by Korean Academy of Oral and Maxillofacial Radiology.

The monetary pendulum in Mexico

Includes bibliography

Estudo de um modelo dinâmico para avaliação física do corpo humano

Pós-graduação em Engenharia Mecânica - FEG

Tarefas de triangulação com restrições perceptuais em pessoas com deficiência auditiva: um estudo por meio de gps

This study aimed to investigate how people with hearing disability perform tasks of distances estimation for locomotion and navigation when deprived of effective perceptual and proprioceptive information. For this, participants with hearing disability went three distances being the first and second 100 meters and the third 140 meters (triangulation) from a source point in an inverted L open field trajectory and then returned to the origin, and the first two were driven by a researcher guide with adapted GPS coordinates of the study, and the third being three free-form sessions, the first one without any perceptual and proprioceptive restriction, the second without visual perception, and the third on the wheel-chair, that is, without proprioception. The results showed that people with hearing disability without the knowledge of the path do not possess satisfactory accuracy but when they learn the way even with the restriction of visual perception and proprioception they can return to the starting point in a task of triangulation. The "t" students test with a significance level of 5% (2.131) indicates significant differences between the first task without any perceptual restriction and the third where they performed in the wheelchair. To achieve these results we used remote monitoring via GPS and the TrackMaker software.

Tool condition monitoring of aluminum oxide grinding wheel in dressing operation using acoustic emission and neural networks

The grinding operation gives workpieces their final finish, minimizing surface roughness through the interaction between the abrasive grains of a tool (grinding wheel) and the workpiece. However, excessive grinding wheel wear due to friction renders the tool unsuitable for further use, thus requiring the dressing operation to remove and/or sharpen the cutting edges of the worn grains to render them reusable. The purpose of this study was to monitor the dressing operation using the acoustic emission (AE) signal and statistics derived from this signal, classifying the grinding wheel as sharp or dull by means of artificial neural networks. An aluminum oxide wheel installed on a surface grinding machine, a signal acquisition system, and a single-point dresser were used in the experiments. Tests were performed varying overlap ratios and dressing depths. The root mean square values and two additional statistics were calculated based on the raw AE data. A multilayer perceptron neural network was used with the Levenberg-Marquardt learning algorithm, whose inputs were the aforementioned statistics. The results indicate that this method was successful in classifying the conditions of the grinding wheel in the dressing process, identifying the tool as "sharp''(with cutting capacity) or "dull''(with loss of cutting capacity), thus reducing the time and cost of the operation and minimizing excessive removal of abrasive material from the grinding wheel.

Inverted critical adsorption of polyelectrolytes in confinement

What are the fundamental laws for the adsorption of charged polymers onto oppositely charged surfaces, for convex, planar, and concave geometries? This question is at the heart of surface coating applications, various complex formation phenomena, as well as in the context of cellular and viral biophysics. It has been a long-standing challenge in theoretical polymer physics; for realistic systems the quantitative understanding is however often achievable only by computer simulations. In this study, we present the findings of such extensive Monte-Carlo in silico experiments for polymer-surface adsorption in confined domains. We study the inverted critical adsorption of finite-length polyelectrolytes in three fundamental geometries: planar slit, cylindrical pore, and spherical cavity. The scaling relations extracted from simulations for the critical surface charge density sigma(c)-defining the adsorption-desorption transition-are in excellent agreement with our analytical calculations based on the ground-state analysis of the Edwards equation. In particular, we confirm the magnitude and scaling of sigma(c) for the concave interfaces versus the Debye screening length 1/kappa and the extent of confinement a for these three interfaces for small kappa a values. For large kappa a the critical adsorption condition approaches the known planar limit. The transition between the two regimes takes place when the radius of surface curvature or half of the slit thickness a is of the order of 1/kappa. We also rationalize how sigma(c)(kappa) dependence gets modified for semi-flexible versus flexible chains under external confinement. We examine the implications of the chain length for critical adsorption-the effect often hard to tackle theoretically-putting an emphasis on polymers inside attractive spherical cavities. The applications of our findings to some biological systems are discussed, for instance the adsorption of nucleic acids onto the inner surfaces of cylindrical and spherical viral capsids.

Chaos control and sensitivity analysis of a double pendulum arm excited by an RLC circuit based nonlinear shaker

In this paper the dynamical interactions of a double pendulum arm and an electromechanical shaker is investigated. The double pendulum is a three degree of freedom system coupled to an RLC circuit based nonlinear shaker through a magnetic field, and the capacitor voltage is a nonlinear function of the instantaneous electric charge. Numerical simulations show the existence of chaotic behavior for some regions in the parameter space and this behaviour is characterized by power spectral density and Lyapunov exponents. The bifurcation diagram is constructed to explore the qualitative behaviour of the system. This kind of electromechanical system is frequently found in robotic systems, and in order to suppress the chaotic motion, the State-Dependent Riccati Equation (SDRE) control and the Nonlinear Saturation control (NSC) techniques are analyzed. The robustness of these two controllers is tested by a sensitivity analysis to parametric uncertainties.

Is the LHC observing the pseudoscalar state of a two-Higgs-doublet model?

The ATLAS and CMS collaborations have recently shown data suggesting the presence of a Higgs boson in the vicinity of 125 GeV. We show that a two-Higgs-doublet model spectrum, with the pseudoscalar state being the lightest, could be responsible for the diphoton signal events. In this model, the other scalars are considerably heavier and are not excluded by the current LHC data. If this assumption is correct, future LHC data should show a strengthening of the gamma gamma signal, while the signals in the ZZ(()*()) -> 4l and WW(*()) -> 2l2 nu channels should diminish and eventually disappear, due to the absence of diboson tree-level couplings of the CP-odd state. The heavier CP-even neutral scalars can now decay into channels involving the CP-odd light scalar which, together with their larger masses, allow them to avoid the existing bounds on Higgs searches. We suggest additional signals to confirm this scenario at the LHC, in the decay channels of the heavier scalars into AA and AZ. Finally, this inverted two-Higgs-doublet spectrum is characteristic in models where fermion condensation leads to electroweak symmetry breaking. We show that in these theories it is possible to obtain the observed diphoton signal at or somewhat above the prediction for the standard model Higgs for the typical values of the parameters predicted.

The interface between morphology and action planning: a comparison of two species of New World monkeys

Recent research with several species of nonhuman primates suggests sophisticated motor-planning abilities observed in human adults may be ubiquitous among primates. However, there is considerable variability in the extent to which these abilities are expressed across primate species. In the present experiment, we explore whether the variability in the expression of anticipatory motor-planning abilities may be attributed to cognitive differences (such as tool use abilities) or whether they may be due to the consequences of morphological differences (such as being able to deploy a precision grasp). We compared two species of New World monkeys that differ in their tool use abilities and manual dexterity: squirrel monkeys, Saimiri sciureus (less dexterous with little evidence for tool use) and tufted capuchins, Sapajus apella (more dexterous and known tool users). The monkeys were presented with baited cups in an untrained food extraction task. Consistent with the morphological constraint hypothesis, squirrel monkeys frequently showed second-order motor planning by inverting their grasp when picking up an inverted cup, while capuchins frequently deployed canonical upright grasping postures. Findings suggest that the lack of ability for precision grasping may elicit more consistent second-order motor planning, as the squirrel monkeys (and other species that have shown a high rate of second-order planning) have fewer means of compensating for inefficient initial postures. Thus, the interface between morphology and motor planning likely represents an important factor for understanding both the ontogenetic and phylogenetic origins of sophisticated motor-planning abilities.

The Interface Between Morphology and Action Planning: a Comparison of Two Species of New World Monkeys

Recent research with several species of nonhuman primates suggests sophisticated motor-planning abilities observed in human adults may be ubiquitous among primates. However, there is considerable variability in the extent to which these abilities are expressed across primate species. In the present experiment, we explore whether the variability in the expression of anticipatory motor-planning abilities may be attributed to cognitive differences (such as tool use abilities) or whether they may be due to the consequences of morphological differences (such as being able to deploy a precision grasp). We compared two species of New World monkeys that differ in their tool use abilities and manual dexterity: squirrel monkeys, Saimiri sciureus (less dexterous with little evidence for tool use) and tufted capuchins, Sapajus apella (more dexterous and known tool users). The monkeys were presented with baited cups in an untrained food extraction task. Consistent with the morphological constraint hypothesis, squirrel monkeys frequently showed second-order motor planning by inverting their grasp when picking up an inverted cup, while capuchins frequently deployed canonical upright grasping postures. Findings suggest that the lack of ability for precision grasping may elicit more consistent second-order motor planning, as the squirrel monkeys (and other species that have shown a high rate of second-order planning) have fewer means of compensating for inefficient initial postures. Thus, the interface between morphology and motor planning likely represents an important factor for understanding both the ontogenetic and phylogenetic origins of sophisticated motor-planning abilities. (C) 2013 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.