Can NBPT urease inhibitor in combination with Azospirillum brasilense inoculation improve wheat development?

Nutrient Cycling in Agroecosystems - This research was developed to investigate the use of Azospirillum brasilense to enhance N use in wheat cropping systems and to assess the potential...     

The Reprimo-Like Gene Is an Epigenetic-Mediated Tumor Suppressor and a Candidate Biomarker for the Non-Invasive Detection of Gastric Cancer

Reprimo-like (RPRML) is an uncharacterized member of the Reprimo gene family. Here, we evaluated the role of RPRML and whether its regulation by DNA methylation is a potential non-invasive biomarker of gastric cancer. RPRML expression was evaluated by immunohistochemistry in 90 patients with gastric cancer and associated with clinicopathologic characteristics and outcomes. The role of RPRML in cancer biology was investigated in vitro, through RPRML ectopic overexpression. Functional experiments included colony formation, soft agar, MTS, and Ki67 immunofluorescence assays. DNA methylation-mediated silencing was evaluated by the 5-azacytidine assay and direct bisulfite sequencing. Non-invasive detection of circulating methylated RPRML DNA was assessed in 25 gastric cancer cases and 25 age- and sex-balanced cancer-free controls by the MethyLight assay. Downregulation of RPRML protein expression was associated with poor overall survival in advanced gastric cancer. RPRML overexpression significantly inhibited clonogenic capacity, anchorage-independent growth, and proliferation in vitro. Circulating methylated RPRML DNA distinguished patients with gastric cancer from controls with an area under the curve of 0.726. The in vitro overexpression results and the poor patient survival associated with lower RPRML levels suggest that RPRML plays a tumor-suppressive role in the stomach. Circulating methylated RPRML DNA may serve as a biomarker for the non-invasive detection of gastric cancer.     

Improving melt strength of polypropylene by minimal branching and blending

Branched polypropylenes (PPb) with markedly improved melt strength were produced without significantly affecting the processability of the original PP. A two-step process of functionalization with MA and crosslinking with m-XDA was used, both by batch mixing and by extrusion. Branching degrees of ~0.06 LCB/1000 monomer units or smaller were obtained. All PPbs display clear and significant strain hardening, being the PPb obtained by extrusion the one that shows the largest melt strength. This polymer has a zero-shear-rate viscosity slightly smaller than that of PP while its strain-hardening index is about 10 times higher. Moreover, the nonlinear behavior of PP at elongation begins at a time similar to its terminal relaxation time or larger, while the ratio of these times reduces significantly with branching. PP/PPb blends were prepared to extend the range of obtainable melt strength in PP. They display rheological behavior between those of the mixed polymers with slight positive deviation. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 137, 48845.     

Soybean yield and nutrition after tropical forage grasses

In previous studies, we assessed sulfur (S) uptake by crops from elemental S (ES) and sulfate-S (SO₄-S) in S-fortified monoammonium phosphate fertilizers over two years. The recovery by the crop ranged from 16 to 28% for ES and from 9 to 86% for SO₄-S. Here, we used a model which takes into account organic S cycling, SO₄-S leaching and ES oxidation to explain the observed recoveries. Higher recoveries of ES than SO₄-S in two of the four sites could be explained by partial leaching of SO₄-S and relatively fast oxidation of ES, due to a warm climate and high S-oxidizing soils. The same model was used for longer-term (5-year) predictions, and a sensitivity analysis was carried out. The size of the labile soil S pool and total S uptake strongly affected the recovery of both SO₄-S and ES. Predicted recoveries after 5 years were?over?threefold higher for a small than for a large labile organic S pool and for a high-uptake than for a low-uptake scenario. Leaching mainly affected SO₄-S, with predicted recoveries halved under a high-leaching scenario. Slow oxidation resulted in recoveries in the first year being fourfold lower for ES than for SO₄-S or even lower in case of a long lag-time. However, it is predicted that total recoveries of ES will eventually reach those of SO₄-S or exceed them if there is SO₄-S leaching. Our model demonstrates that long-term trials are needed to evaluate the true effectiveness of a slow-release fertilizer source such as ES.

     

About Shewhart control charts to monitor the Weibull mean

In this paper, a new reparametrization expressed in terms of the process mean for Weibull distribution is studied; thus, the monitoring of the process mean can be made directly. Additionally, we call attention that the asymptotic control limits for control chart by central limit theorem (CLT) may lead to a serious erroneous decision. Definitively, they can only be used to signal small/medium shifts in the process mean but with a very very large sample size. We present guidelines for practitioners about the minimum sample size needed to match out‐of‐control average run length (ARL₁) with the exact and asymptotic control limits in function of the shape parameter after an extensive simulation study. The proposed schemes are applied to monitoring the Weibull mean parameter of the strength distribution of a carbon fibber used in composite materials.     

Cooperative Space-Time Block Codes for Wireless Video Sensor Networks

Wireless video sensor networks (WVSNs) are gaining popularity due to numerous potential applications such as video surveillance, environmental and habitat monitoring, and so on. Considering large-scale WVSNs, in which the sink node is not within the range of all other nodes, a multi-hop operation is desired. This paper proposes a novel cooperative system that uses space time-block codes to enhance the performance of multi-hop wireless video sensor networks. The proposed scheme is designed to deal with large-scale WVSNs, by adapting the cluster size and extending the cooperation between the cluster-heads. The performance comparison between the proposed system and a non-cooperative scheme is presented based on network lifetime for varying propagation scenarios, number of camera nodes, and on the quality of transmitted videos in a WVSN. Simulation results show an improvement in performance for the proposed system.     

Effects of High Pressure Homogenization on Beer Quality Attributes

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the use of high pressure homogenization (HPH) as an alternative to thermal pasteurization for beer stabilization and to evaluate the effect of processing on colour, haze and redox potential immediately after the process and during the product shelf‐life (100 days). The results obtained showed good colour retention, changes in the redox potential and greater values for turbidity, presenting a higher value for the product treated by HPH than for the thermally treated samples reported in literature. The evaluation of the results indicated that the HPH process is a promising process for beer treatment in terms of guaranteeing better colour retention. However to make this product stable, it would be necessary to perform stabilization treatments to minimize the negative effects of processing on the haze of the final product.     

Design of volatile organic compounds profiles of roasted Coffea arabica extracts produced by supercritical and conventional solvents

This work addresses the potential of supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) to design volatile organic compounds (VOCs) profiles using roasted Coffea arabica. On the whole, 57 VOCs were identified by HS-SPME/GC–MS. A full factorial design was adopted to study the effect of pressure (180 and 300 bar), temperature (40 and 80 °C) and ethanol content (0 and 5 wt.%). The total extraction yield ranged from 1.4 wt.% to 9.8 wt.%. At 180 bar and 80 °C, two extracts exhibited VOCs amount up to 3.5 times higher than the dichloromethane extract. Temperature and pressure favoured VOCs amount and total yield in conflicting ways, and ethanol had a negligible effect on VOCs amount. At 180 bar and 80 °C, the VOCs profile revealed a reinforcement of pyrroles, phenols, cyclopentenes and pyrans, at the expense of pyridines, carboxylic acids and furans. Hence, this essay evidences the potential of SFE to engineer coffee VOCs profiles.     

An assessment of the impacts of large-scale urban projects on land values: The case of Belo Horizonte,Brazil

Large-scale urban projects (LSUPs) are capable of changing cities' structures and, consequently, have a potential deep impact on land values. However, to assume that the LSUP always uplift land values may dismiss too quickly some key aspects of these investments. This work uses a difference-in-differences model to assess the impacts of LSUPs on land values, implemented in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Results indicate that the impacts of LSUPs vary according to the kind of project (transit, iconic building and retail) and property (residential, commercial and vacant land). Macroeconomic cycles, negative externalities, and projects location within the local urban structure are key to understand the impacts' dynamics.