•Soil moisture and nitrogen transport behavior in Andosol apple orchards is affected by snowmelt.•Snowmelt affects electrical conductivity and can be indicator of residual nitrogen in the new ...season.•The cumulative changes in total soil moisture (ΣΔTSM) tended to dry out it annually.•The variation in ΣΔTSM in Andosol was smaller than gravelly brown forest soil.•An innovative method to employ field monitoring system for apple orchards had been described.
Early spring corresponds to the snowmelt season in apple orchards of the northern hemisphere. This has a significant effect on the initial growth of shoots and flower buds of apple trees. Understanding the soil environment of the orchard during the non-growth period as monitored by farmers is important for managing year-round apple production. However, the details of mass transport, such as that of soil water and solute, during the non-growing season in the Andosols remain unclear. This study conducted soil environment monitoring in an Andosol apple orchard in Aomori Prefecture, Japan, during the non-growing season in winter to examine the year-round changes in the soil environment, using a field monitoring system that is necessary for understanding the soil environment. Volumetric water content, soil bulk electrical conductivity, and soil temperature were measured, and the cumulative changes in total soil moisture (ΣΔTSM) were calculated from the monitored volumetric water content. Results showed that although ΣΔTSM tended to increase (i.e., dry out) annually with periodicity, the variation was small compared to that of apple orchards with gravelly brown forest soil. These results could significantly influence fertilization management of apple orchard soil during the summer drought season and early spring when the roots of apple trees begin taking up nutrients. In particular, it was revealed that if sufficient nutrients remain in the soil pore water in early spring, the negative impact of excessive fertilization on the surrounding environment can be reduced. Therefore, this study constitutes an innovative step in the implementation of field monitoring system to understand the details of mass transport in the Andosol apple orchard soil.
Cholesterol is essential for the functioning of all human organs, but it is nevertheless the cause of coronary heart disease. Over the course of nearly a century of investigation, scientists have ...developed several lines of evidence that establish the causal connection between blood cholesterol, atherosclerosis, and coronary heart disease. Building on that knowledge, scientists and the pharmaceutical industry have successfully developed a remarkably effective class of drugs—the statins—that lower cholesterol levels in blood and reduce the frequency of heart attacks. (Communicated by Teruhiko BEPPU, M.J.A.)
Cholesterol in the body comes from what is absorbed from diet and from what is synthesized in the body, mainly by the liver. In the 1960s it was shown that, in humans, cholesterol produced in the ...liver exceeds what is absorbed from the diet. 3-Hydroxy-3- methylglutaryl (HMG)-CoA reductase, an enzyme that catalyzes the conversion of HMGCoA into mevalonate, proved to be the rate-controlling enzyme in cholesterol synthesis.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Chinese yam production is thriving in Aomori Prefecture, a cold and snowy region in Japan. Recently, there has been an increasing risk of nitrogen leaching in Chinese-yam fields, which consist of ...sandy soil, due to localized torrential rain. The relationships between the type of fertilizer used for Chinese-yam cultivation, the amount of nitrogen (N) leaching, and the timing of leaching remain unknown. Therefore, this study aimed to fill this knowledge gap by investigating the effects of different fertilizers (fast-acting and/or slow-release fertilizer) and irrigation practices (conventional and/or excessive irrigation) in order to mitigate the detrimental impact of nitrogen leaching on groundwater quality. An enhanced mathematical model and the spatiotemporal dynamics of inorganic nitrogen concentration in soil pore water were evaluated the negative impact of nitrogen leaching on the groundwater environment was evaluated. The results showed that the combined use of slow-release fertilizers could significantly reduce nitrate-nitrogen concentration in soil-water, especially during the harvest season. This study demonstrated that cultivating Chinese yam with a fertilizer application system that includes the use of slow-release fertilizer can diminish the negative impact of nitrogen leaching on the groundwater environment, contributing to our understanding of sustainable agricultural practices in regions facing similar environmental challenges. Therefore, our findings represent an important advancement providing new approaches to maintaining productivity while mitigating the adverse impacts on groundwater environments, as well as offering guidelines for agricultural practices in regions facing similar environmental challenges.
CRISPR/Cas9 systems are nowadays applied extensively to effect genome editing in various organisms including plants. CRISPR from Prevotella and Francisella 1 (Cpf1) is a newly characterized ...RNA-guided endonuclease that has two distinct features as compared to Cas9. First, Cpf1 utilizes a thymidine-rich protospacer adjacent motif (PAM) while Cas9 prefers a guanidine-rich PAM. Cpf1 could be used as a sequence-specific nuclease to target AT-rich regions of a genome that Cas9 had difficulty accessing. Second, Cpf1 generates DNA ends with a 5' overhang, whereas Cas9 creates blunt DNA ends after cleavage. "Sticky" DNA ends should increase the efficiency of insertion of a desired DNA fragment into the Cpf1-cleaved site using complementary DNA ends. Therefore, Cpf1 could be a potent tool for precise genome engineering. To evaluate whether Cpf1 can be applied to plant genome editing, we selected Cpf1 from Francisella novicida (FnCpf1), which recognizes a shorter PAM (TTN) within known Cpf1 proteins, and applied it to targeted mutagenesis in tobacco and rice. Our results show that targeted mutagenesis had occurred in transgenic plants expressing FnCpf1 with crRNA. Deletions of the targeted region were the most frequently observed mutations. Our results demonstrate that FnCpf1 can be applied successfully to genome engineering in plants.
The CRISPR/Cas9 system is an efficient and convenient tool for genome editing in plants. Cas9 nuclease derived from Streptococcus pyogenes (Sp) is commonly used in this system. Recently, ...Staphylococcus aureus Cas9 (SaCas9)-mediated genome editing was reported in human cells and Arabidopsis. Because SaCas9 (1053 a.a.) is smaller than SpCas9 (1368 a.a.), SaCas9 could have substantial advantages for delivering and expressing Cas9 protein, especially using virus vectors. Since the protospacer adjacent motif (PAM) sequence of SaCas9 (5'-NNGRRT-3') differs from that of SpCas9 (5'-NGG-3'), the use of this alternative Cas9 nuclease could expand the selectivity at potential cleavage target sites of the CRISPR/Cas9 system. Here we show that SaCas9 can mutagenize target sequences in tobacco and rice with efficiencies similar to those of SpCas9. We also analyzed the base preference for 'T' at the 6th position of the SaCas9 PAM. Targeted mutagenesis efficiencies in target sequences with non-canonical PAMs (5'-NNGRRV-3') were much lower than those with a canonical PAM (5'-NNGRRT-3'). The length of target sequence recognized by SaCas9 is one or two nucleotides longer than that recognized by SpCas9. Taken together, our results demonstrate that SaCas9 has higher sequence recognition capacity than SpCas9 and is useful for reducing off-target mutations in crop.
Nanofluidic energy harvesting systems have attracted interest in the field of battery application, particularly for miniaturized electrical devices, because they possess excellent energy conversion ...capability for their size. In this study, a mesoporous silica (MPS)-based nanofluidic energy harvesting system was fabricated and selective ion transport in mesopores as a function of the salt gradient was investigated. Aqueous solutions with three different kinds of monovalent electrolytes-KCl, NaCl, and LiCl-with different diffusion coefficients (D
) were considered. The highest power density was 3.90 W m
for KCl, followed by 2.39 W m
for NaCl and 1.29 W m
for LiCl. Furthermore, the dependency of power density on the type of cation employed indicates that the harvested energy increases as the cation mobility increases, particularly at high concentrations. This cation-specific dependency suggests that the maximum power density increases by increasing the diffusion coefficient ratio of cations to anions, making this ratio a critical parameter in enhancing the performance of nanofluidic energy harvesting systems with extremely small pores ranging from 2 to 3 nm.
A recurrent feature of infectious diseases is the observation that different individuals show different levels of secondary transmission. This inter-individual variation in transmission potential is ...often quantified by the dispersion parameter k. Low values of k indicate a high degree of variability and a greater probability of superspreading events. Understanding k for COVID-19 across contexts can assist policy makers prepare for future pandemics.
A literature search following a systematic approach was carried out in PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, medRxiv, bioRxiv and arXiv to identify publications containing epidemiological findings on superspreading in COVID-19. Study characteristics, epidemiological data, including estimates for k and R0, and public health recommendations were extracted from relevant records.
The literature search yielded 28 peer-reviewed studies. The mean k estimates ranged from 0.04 to 2.97. Among the 28 studies, 93% reported mean k estimates lower than one, which is considered as marked heterogeneity in inter-individual transmission potential. Recommended control measures were specifically aimed at preventing superspreading events. The combination of forward and backward contact tracing, timely confirmation of cases, rapid case isolation, vaccination and preventive measures were suggested as important components to suppress superspreading.
Superspreading events were a major feature in the pandemic of SARS-CoV-2. On the one hand, this made outbreaks potentially more explosive but on the other hand also more responsive to public health interventions. Going forward, understanding k is critical for tailoring public health measures to high-risk groups and settings where superspreading events occur.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The distribution of the generation time (the interval between individuals becoming infected and transmitting the virus) characterises changes in the transmission risk during SARS-CoV-2 infections. ...Inferring the generation time distribution is essential to plan and assess public health measures. We previously developed a mechanistic approach for estimating the generation time, which provided an improved fit to data from the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic (December 2019-March 2020) compared to existing models (Hart et al., 2021). However, few estimates of the generation time exist based on data from later in the pandemic. Here, using data from a household study conducted from March to November 2020 in the UK, we provide updated estimates of the generation time. We considered both a commonly used approach in which the transmission risk is assumed to be independent of when symptoms develop, and our mechanistic model in which transmission and symptoms are linked explicitly. Assuming independent transmission and symptoms, we estimated a mean generation time (4.2 days, 95% credible interval 3.3-5.3 days) similar to previous estimates from other countries, but with a higher standard deviation (4.9 days, 3.0-8.3 days). Using our mechanistic approach, we estimated a longer mean generation time (5.9 days, 5.2-7.0 days) and a similar standard deviation (4.8 days, 4.0-6.3 days). As well as estimating the generation time using data from the entire study period, we also considered whether the generation time varied temporally. Both models suggest a shorter mean generation time in September-November 2020 compared to earlier months. Since the SARS-CoV-2 generation time appears to be changing, further data collection and analysis is necessary to continue to monitor ongoing transmission and inform future public health policy decisions.
Thick mesoporous silica (MPS) films with sufficient mechanical strength and high porosity were prepared on aluminum plates by using electrophoretic deposition (EPD) with the addition of a small ...amount of polyvinylbutyral (PVB, 3.5–8.0 wt%) as binder. The porosity of the MPS films was approximately 50 vol%. The film thickness could be controlled by the deposition conditions, and a thickness of ca. 50 μm is reasonable for effectively using the whole MPS film. These MPS films exhibited good water vapor adsorption-desorption properties and sufficient stability for more than 150 adsorption-desorption cycles. When used in dehumidification applications, these MPS films had a dehumidification rate of 6.3 g-H2O/g-MPS per hour, with an adsorption-desorption cycle as short as 2 min even when a low temperature of 60 °C was used to regenerate the adsorbent.
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•Thick mesoporous silica films were prepared on Al plate by electrophoretic deposition.•These films contained 3.5–8 wt% of polyvinylbutyral.•The films exhibited sufficient stability for more than 150 adsorption-desorption cycles.•The MPS films had a dehumidification rate of 6.3 g-H2O/g-MPS h in 2 min cycle even at 60 °C regeneration.
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