Influence of fatty acid composition on chemical changes in blends of sunflower oils during thermoxidation and frying

The influence of fatty acid composition on formation of new compounds at frying temperatures has been studied in seven samples of sunflower oils widely differing in their fatty acid composition. Thermal oxidation assays as well as frying experiments were carried out and samples were evaluated by measuring the new compounds formed, i.e. polymers, polar compounds and their distribution by molecular weight, and polar fatty acids and their distribution by molecular weight. The levels of all the new compounds analysed strongly depended on the degree of oil unsaturation; the two least unsaturated oils with low content of linoleic acid and high content of palmitic acid behaved exceptionally well. When considering polar compounds or polar fatty acids, the polymers/oxidised monomers ratio increased significantly as the level of degradation increased. The new compounds formed are practically identical when analysed in the used frying oils or in the lipids extracted from the counterpart fried potatoes, independently of the level of degradation.     

Adaptive input shaping for single-link flexible manipulators using an algebraic identification

This work proposes an adaptive control scheme applied to single link-flexible manipulators, which combines a feedback controller of the joint angle with an adaptive input shaper updated by an algebraic non-asymptotic identification. The feedback controller is designed to guarantee trajectory tracking of the joint angle, simplifying thus the input shaper, which can be designed for the arm dynamics only. The input shaper is updated by an algebraic identification of the natural frequency corresponding to the first vibration mode of the arm. In addition, the influence of the assumptions adopted to derive the algebraic identification on the performance of the estimation is studied. Finally, the proposed adaptive control strategy is implemented in practice.     

Geographical Authentication of Tequila According to its Mineral Content by Means of Support Vector Machines

The elemental profile of tequila samples from the three main production areas of the State of Jalisco, namely Amatitlan, Guadalajara, and Tequila, was used to carry out their geographical characterization. With this aim, the concentration of Al, Ba, Ca, Cu, Fe, K, Mg, Mn, Na, S, Sr, and Zn was determined by inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy. Principal component analysis was addressed to visualize data trends. The number of input variables was reduced by means of backward stepwise linear discriminant analysis and support vector machines were used to construct an adequate classification model. The best classification performance was obtained by a linear support vector machine model with 100% of prediction ability.     

The effect of neighbourhood on rodent communities: an example from Pampean agroecosystems

Pampean region agroecosystems are devoted to agricultural and farming activities, but in the crop field matrix there are relicts of remnant natural habitats. Poultry farms mainly harbour commensal species as house mice and rats, which are rarely present in surrounding habitats. We assessed if neighbourhood to poultry farms affect the presence of Mus musculus in crop fields and their borders, and if rodent community in poultry farms is influenced by the species present in surrounding crop fields and borders. We found that habitat had a significant effect on the abundance of M. musculus. This species showed higher abundance in poultry farms than in crop field borders. Calomys laucha was the unique native species that was captured in farm sheds. We found higher abundance of native species in crop field borders than in crop fields independent of the proximity to the poultry farms. We conclude that rodent communities in poultry farms are little influenced by the surroundings, and show a dominance of M. musculus independently of the presence of native rodent species in neighbour habitats. On the other hand, farms do not export M. musculus to surrounding habitats, and borders only function as corridors for dispersal among farms, while crop fields are rarely used.     

Microstructural characterization of creep anisotropy at 673 K in the M5® alloy

Zirconium alloy tubing is used in pressurized water nuclear reactors in order to prevent fissile material from leaking into the coolant. It can be the first safety wall of nuclear fuel, and is submitted to complex thermomechanical loadings. In consequence, new Nb-modified alloys, such as the M5® alloy, and fine numerical models are being developed to guarantee a better and longer mechanical integrity of these tubes. To identify the physical mechanisms that could be considered in such models, an experimental approach, combining creep tests with electron backscattered diffraction and Transmission electron microscopy investigations, was carried out.Tubular specimens were submitted to multiaxial creep tests at a temperature of 673 K. Seven ratios between the axial and hoop applied stresses were investigated. It enabled a macroscopic evidence of the creep anisotropy. Besides, EBSD analyses on a mesoscopic-sized non deformed area led to the characterization of the variation of the average Schmid factor with the direction of loading. Finally, TEM observations were done on seven crept samples, corresponding to the seven directions of loading tested mechanically. The variations of the different parameters investigated (activated slip systems, dislocation densities, curvatures of the dislocations) can be seen as the effects of the creep anisotropy at a microscopic scale. The correlation between results is then discussed in a multiscale frame.     

Texture Prediction in Intact Green Asparagus by Near Infrared (NIR) Spectroscopy,Assaying Linear and Non-linear Regression Strategies

Texture-related parameters were assessed in intact green asparagus at harvest and during postharvest storage using near-infrared spectroscopy combined with MPLS and LOCAL algorithms. Three spectrophotometers were evaluated for this purpose: a monochromator (range, 400–2,500 nm), a diode-array Vis–NIR spectrophotometer (range, 400–1,700 nm), and a handheld micro-electro-mechanical system (MEMS) spectrophotometer (range, 1,600–2,400 nm). Three hundred green asparagus spears (cv. “Grande”) were used to obtain calibration models based on reference data and NIR data. Results for maximum shear force showed that LOCAL algorithm improved the predictive capacity of models constructed using all three NIRS instruments, increasing r ² by 24, 16, and 56 % and reducing the SEP(c) values by 11, 8, and 14 %, respectively. For cutting energy, the LOCAL also improved the predictive capacity of the models (r ² increased by 3 % for the monochromator and the diode-array instrument and by 6 % for the MEMS device; and the SEP(c) decreased by 3 % in the three instruments). It is worth noting that while the monochromator and diode-array instruments displayed similar predictive capacity for the parameters tested, the MEMS instrument achieved slightly poorer results but has clear advantages for the measurement of texture in intact asparagus, being economical, portable, and easy to use in situ.     

Crossing Paths in Human Renal Cell Carcinoma (hRCC)

Historically, cell-signaling pathways have been studied as the compilation of isolated elements into a unique cascade that transmits extracellular stimuli to the tumor cell nucleus. Today, growing evidence supports the fact that intracellular drivers of tumor progression do not flow in a single linear pathway, but disseminate into multiple intracellular pathways. An improved understanding of the complexity of cancer depends on the elucidation of the underlying regulatory networks at the cellular and intercellular levels and in their temporal dimension. The high complexity of the intracellular cascades causes the complete inhibition of the growth of one tumor cell to be very unlikely, except in cases in which the so-called “oncogene addiction” is known to be a clear trigger for tumor catastrophe, such as in the case of gastrointestinal stromal tumors or chronic myeloid leukemia. In other words, the separation and isolation of the driver from the passengers is required to improve accuracy in cancer treatment. This review will summarize the signaling pathway crossroads that govern renal cell carcinoma proliferation and the emerging understanding of how these pathways facilitate tumor escape. We outline the available evidence supporting the putative links between different signaling pathways and how they may influence tumor proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis, angiogenesis, metabolism and invasiveness. The conclusion is that tumor cells may generate their own crossroads/crosstalk among signaling pathways, thereby reducing their dependence on stimulation of their physiologic pathways.