This study aimed to identify the effects of basal thumb surgery on the range of dart thrower’s motion. Thirteen fresh-frozen cadaveric specimens were placed in a customized jig. Simulated ...scaphotrapeziotrapezoid joint fusion was carried out on all specimens. Half the specimens then underwent trapeziectomy and the rest had excision of the distal pole of the scaphoid. Simulated scaphotrapeziotrapezoid fusion reduced the range of dart thrower’s motion to 89% of the range in the intact wrists, from a mean of 117° to 104°. Although this reduction is not large, it was statistically significant. Simulated trapeziectomy caused a very small increase in dart thrower’s motion range compared with the range in the intact wrists. Simulated distal pole of scaphoid excision did not change the range of dart thrower’s motion. These results may inform preoperative decisions for surgical management of basal osteoarthritis of the thumb.
The fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (fAPAR) is a key parameter for estimating the gross primary production (GPP) of trees. For continuous, dense forest canopies, fAPAR, is ...often equated with the intercepted fraction, fIPAR. This assumption is not valid for individual trees in urban environments or parkland settings where the canopy is sparse and there are well-defined tree crown boundaries. Here, the distinction between fAPAR and fIPAR can be strongly influenced by the background and large illumination variations due to multi-scattering and shadows of buildings. This study investigates the radiative budget of PAR bands using a coupled leaf-canopy radiative transfer model (PROSPECT-DART), considering a suite of tropical tree species over a wide range of assumed leaf chlorophyll contents. The analyses simulate hyperspectral images (5 nm bandwidth) of individual tree crowns for the selected background (concrete vs. grass) and illumination conditions. We then use an artificial neural network-based method to partition sunlit vs. shaded leaves within each crown, as the latter have lower fAPAR and fIPAR values. Our results show fAPAR of sunlit leaves decreases with the ratio of diffuse to direct scene irradiance (SKYL), while SKYL has minimal influence for shaded leaves. Both fAPAR and fIPAR decrease at more oblique solar zenith angles (SZA). Higher values of fAPAR and fIPAR occur with concrete backgrounds and the influence of the background is larger at higher diffuse ratio and solar zenith angles. The results show that fIPAR is typically 6–9% higher than fAPAR, and up to 14% higher for sunlit leaves with a concrete background at SKYL = 0. The differences between the fIPAR and fAPAR also depend on the health condition of the leaves, such as chlorophyll content. This study can improve the understanding of urban individual trees fAPAR/fIPAR and facilitate the development of protocols for fAPAR field measurements.
Predicting tsunami impacts at remote coasts largely relies on tsunami en-route measurements in an open ocean. In this work, these measurements are used to generate instant tsunami predictions in deep ...water and near the coast. The predictions are generated as a response or a combination of responses to one or more tsunameters, with each response obtained as a convolution of real-time tsunameter measurements and a pre-computed pulse response function (PRF). Practical implementation of this method requires tables of PRFs in a 3D parameter space: earthquake location–tsunameter–forecasted site. Examples of hindcasting the 2010 Chilean and the 2011 Tohoku-Oki tsunamis along the US West Coast and beyond demonstrated high accuracy of the suggested technology in application to trans-Pacific seismically generated tsunamis.
The use of direct analysis m real-time（DART） mass spectrometry（MS） for direct detection of saponins andoligosaccharides is difficult mainly because of the strong polarity of these molecules, which ...results in challenges re-garding desorption and ionization of the compounds. Structure derivatization, such as methylation, is essential forimproving the volatility and the proton affinity of saponin and oligosaccharides. In this study, solid-phase methylationof saponins and oligosaccharides was accomplished in a stainless steel methylation column, and the methylatedproducts of astragaloside, salidroside, icariin, ginsenosides（Rbl, Rb2, Rb3, Rd, Re, Rf and Rgl）, maltose, isomaltose,sucrose and maltotriose were analyzed using DART-MS. Fragmentations occurred during ionization and tandem massspectrometry, and most fragments corresponded to the glycosidic bond, cross-ring cleavages, and the neutral loss ofCH3OH ions, but the aglycone cleavage fragment was not detected. Furthermore, the method was successfully used inthe rapid and simultaneous analysis of saponins and oligosaccharides in a ginseng extract; quantitative analysis ofginsenoside Rbl was also carried out, and consistent content results were obtained in DART-MS andhigh-performance liquid chromatography（HPLC）.
DART-MS is used for differentiating papers by their pulp constituents, including microgram samples of fibers tweezed from the paper surface.
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▶ DART-MS can differentiate printing and ...writing papers made from different types of pulps. ▶ Non-volatile polar organic compounds can be directly determined. ▶ Analysis is fast and reproducible. ▶ Microgram samples can be characterized.
A quick and direct method for identifying organic components of papers in library and archival collections with minimal destructive sampling is needed for preservation, forensic, and general purposes. Direct analysis in real time mass spectrometry (DART-MS) is used for characterizing 16 reference papers of known manufacture in terms of their pulp composition and pitch contaminants. Unique mass spectra are obtained from bleached kraft, chemithermomechanical, and stone groundwood pulp papers in real time without extractions, derivatizations, chromatographic separations, and other time- and chemical-consuming sample preparations. Phytosteroids are volatilized from bleached hardwood kraft but not from bleached softwood kraft papers, which differentiates the two of them. The kraft papers are in turn differentiated from chemithermomechanical pulp papers by lignin-derived thermolyis products: syringyl products arise from hardwood, but guaiacyl and coumaryl products arise from softwood, chemithermomechanical pulp papers. Stone groundwood papers contain a number of extractives that are volatilized, which serve to differentiate them from all the other papers. Papers that contain rosin vs. alkyl ketene dimer (AKD) sizings are immediately differentiated. The DART-MS methodology is fast and simple, and the spectra are repeatable. Microsamples as small as ∼10
μg tweezed from the paper surface may be analyzed. These benchmark spectra are the prelude to further applications of DART-MS in paper research and the beginning of the development of a searchable library of DART-MS spectra of printing and writing papers by the Library of Congress.
Antibodies occupy a central position when it comes to binding proteins with desired antigenic specificities. During the past decade, a plethora of recombinant or humanized versions of antibodies have ...entered clinical settings with outstanding accomplishments. Yet, they suffer from several drawbacks such as high molecular weight, limited tissue penetration, instability, high production cost, requirement for large doses and potential cytotoxicity. As a result, new generation of receptor proteins has been developed, that are derived from small and robust immunoglobulin (Ig) or non-immunoglobulin based “scaffolds”. Combinatorial protein engineering has tremendous scope in the development of these protein scaffolds with immunoglobulin like specificity and/or prescribed binding functions. The advancement made in this regard can boast of developing various validated Ig based and non-Ig protein scaffolds with desirable therapeutic potential. The newly emerging technology has profound scope in translational biology and offer matching replacement for existing immunotherapeutic agents. Only few data from early clinical studies are available yet, but many more are likely to come in the near future. Here, we provide a glimpse of recent clinical advances in the field of existing protein scaffolds.
Normal phase chiral LC (NPLC) has been proved to be powerful and efficient for chiral separation. However, the combination of NPLC with ESI or atmospheric pressure chemical ionization MS is ...restricted by the poor ionization efficiency and thermal fragmentations of analytes to some extent. Direct analysis in real time MS (DART‐MS) is an ambient ionization technique that shows high ionization efficiency of the analytes in the normal phase mobile phase. In this work, we coupled chiral NPLC to DART‐MS for the chiral qualitative and quantitative analysis of 4‐(methylnitrosamino)‐1‐(3‐pyridyl)‐1‐butanol and jasmonic acid enantiomers. Satisfactory results for the enantiomers of 4‐(methylnitrosamino)‐1‐(3‐pyridyl)‐1‐butanol operating in the positive mode were obtained in terms of linearity (2.5–250 μg/mL, R2, 0.999–1.000) and repeatability (25 μg/mL, RSDs, 4.7–5.6%). Moreover, chiral NPLC‐DART‐MS resulted in the simultaneous chiral separation and detection of jasmonic acid enantiomers, which are very difficult to be analyzed by NPLC‐ESI‐MS and NPLC‐APCI‐MS. Compared with the coupled techniques of NPLC‐ESI‐MS and NPLC‐APCI‐MS, NPLC‐DART‐MS showed advantages in increasing the ionization efficiency and reducing the in‐source thermal fragmentation of analytes.
We here report for the first time on the presence of three species of the conopid genus Stylogaster Macquart (Diptera, Conopidae) in Ethiopia, viz. S. nitens Brunetti, S. westwoodi Smith and ...Stylogaster sp.. We further screened 908 muscid flies (Diptera, Muscidae) for the presence of impaled eggs of Stylogaster and recorded eggs on 89 individuals (9.8%). Eggs were impaled on eight species, viz. Limnophora translucida Stein, Musca lusoria Wiedemann, Musca splendens Pont, Neomyia chrysopyga (Emden), Pseudohelina nigritarsis (Jaennicke), Stomoxys omega Newstead, Stomoxys taeniatus Bigot and Stomoxys varipes (Bezzi). The maximum number of eggs found on a single muscid was six. We illustrated the dissected eggs. L. translucida, M. lusoria, M. splendens, N. chrysopyga and S. varipes are reported as new muscid hosts species for Stylogaster.
Antimicrobial Hapalindole alkaloids have been identified in the order Stigonematales. Being exclusively present in a few members of this order, they can easily serve as a good chemical marker for ...their identification. In the present experiment, some locally isolated cyanobacterial strains were identified on the basis of these chemical compounds. Cyanobacterial strains were isolated from natural samples through standard techniques. Their antimicrobial activity was tested against various fungal and bacterial strains, which include: Psuedomonas syringe, Escherichia coli, Bacillus cereus, Pseudomonas putida, Salmonella sp., Fusarium oxysporum, Cercospora canescens and Colletotricum dematium. Of the several natural isolates, two strains showed strong antimicrobial activity against most of the tested microorganisms. Isolates showing antimicrobial activity were further subjected to DART-MS analysis to identify the chemical compounds. Mass spectra revealed the presence of a range of hapalindole alkaloids, which were confirmed through their exact mass measurement, elemental composition determination, and fragment ion generation in the DART source. Quantitative analysis was conducted by measuring relative abundance.
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