The impacts of cattle access points on deposited sediment levels in headwater streams in Ireland

Cattle access to streams has been linked globally with degradation of stream water quality, driven largely by bank erosion and resultant instream, fine sediment deposition. The majority of evidence on such effects is however based in arid and semiarid regions of the United States and Australia, with few studies relating to cool temperate climates such as Northwest Europe. In this study, “Quorer” resuspendable sediment samples were taken from riffle geomorphic units upstream (control) and at two points downstream (pressure and recovery) of cattle access points in headwater streams in agricultural catchments in Ireland to assess levels of deposited stream sediment. Samples were taken in April/May (2016) prior to the grazing season and in October (2016) at the end of the grazing season. Sites in good‐high ecological status catchments and less than good ecological status catchments were included in the study. Higher levels of sediment were found downstream of cattle access points in both good‐high status and less than good status catchments; however, the impacts of access points were spatially confined to, in most cases, the area immediately downstream of the point of access. There was a strong correlation between deposited sediment mass and organic matter (OM) mass, with levels of OM increasing linearly with deposited sediment mass. Levels of measured sediment were negatively correlated with riparian habitat health (measured using a qualitative habitat assessment). The results of this study highlight the need for measures to prevent cattle access to headwater streams where access points can be many in order to manage local habitat quality and downstream water quality issues.     

Scarring trachoma is associated with polymorphism in the tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha) gene promoter and with elevated TNF-alpha levels in tear fluid

Tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha) may play a central role in the disease pathogenesis which occurs as a consequence of chlamydial infection. To investigate the importance of TNF-alpha gene promoter polymorphisms and TNF-alpha levels in tear fluid in scarring trachoma, a large matched-pair case-control study was performed in The Gambia. The -308A allele was present in a higher proportion of patients (28.4%) than controls (18.4%), with an increasing association for homozygotes (chi2 for trend, P = 0.032; allele frequency, 0.163 in patients and 0.099 in controls; chi2, P = 0.025). For the -238A allele, the association was similar but not significant. The disease association was highly significant when the number of either -308A or -238A sites in an individual was considered (P = 0.003). TNF-alpha promoter alleles are tightly linked to some HLA class I and II alleles, but multivariate analysis confirmed that the disease associations were independent of HLA, although a class I allele, A*6802, is also associated with disease. TNF-alpha was more frequently detected in tear samples from patients (27.6%) than from controls (15.9%), increasingly so for higher levels of detectable TNF-alpha (P = 0.015). Among patients, detectable TNF-alpha in tears was highly associated with the presence of ocular chlamydial infection (P < 0.001). The results indicate that TNF-alpha plays a major role in the tissue damage and scarring which occurs as a consequence of Chlamydia trachomatis infection.     

Moral Judgment and Crime Drama: An Integrated Theory of Enjoyment

The article proposes a theoretical framework in which moral reasoning about mediated crime and punishment is defined and combined with existing, affect-driven entertainment theory to yield an integrated theory of enjoyment. The authors analyze how crime dramas serve as statements about justice and then address how moral deliberation about the propriety of those statements impacts enjoyment. The authors report research findings to support the analysis of cognitive processing during crime dramas distinct from affective processing. The article also suggests future means by which the integrated theory of enjoyment can be examined.     

Artefactual cleavage of E coli H-NS by OmpT

In the bacterium Escherichia coli, H-NS-(H1, H1a) is a heat-stable protein with a molecular mass of 15.5 kDa involved in nucleoid organisation and gene regulation linked to certain signal transduction pathways. We have shown that, following addition of preparations of everted inner membrane vesicles, heat-stable cleavage products of approximately 10 kDa of H-NS are formed in vitro from newly synthesised, radio-labelled H-NS and from purified H-NS. The 15.5 kDa protein and its cleavage products were also recovered from a minicell system. These results raised the possibility that cleavage of H-NS is physiologically significant. However, the cleavage of H-NS observed appears to occur during cell breakage and to depend on the method of protein extraction and the presence of the outer membrane protease, OmpT. Nevertheless, the results indicate that H-NS may contain at least two separate domains with cleavage occurring between these domains at a preferred OmpT site. Failure to take account of H-NS cleavage in sample preparation and analysis can lead to serious underestimation of H-NS levels.     

Na/K pump current in guinea pig cardiac myocytes and the effect of Na leak

INTRODUCTION: Steady-state Na/K pump current (Ip) in adult guinea pig ventricular myocytes was studied to determine the effect on the Na/K pump of transmembrane Na leak, membrane potential, and pipette Na concentration. METHODS AND RESULTS: Using conventional whole cell, patch clamp techniques, Ip was identified as either Ko-sensitive or ouabain-sensitive current when most other membrane currents were inhibited. Control experiments showed that there were no Ko-sensitive currents other than Ip under the conditions of our experiments. Ip was found to be similar to that reported by others being voltage dependent between -130 and 0 mV and having a half maximal activation by Nai of 28 mM. Ouabain sensitivity was also measured, and it was found that there were two binding sites with the high affinity site comprising 5% to 10% of the total and having an apparent affinity 1000-fold higher than the low affinity site. Apparent affinity of both sites was shifted about 10-fold (higher affinity) by increasing Nai from 10 to 85 mM. When internally perfused with 0 Na solution, Na leak through the membrane was found to be linearly related to Na/K pump activity. In contrast to prior suggestions, Ip was not correlated with series resistance when there was a large transmembrane Na gradient. CONCLUSION: These data suggest that, under conditions of high transmembrane Na gradient, Na leak through the membrane plays a significant role in determining Na/K pump activity.     

Gastric ECL-cell hyperplasia produces enhanced basal and stimulated gastric acid output but not gastric erosion formation in the rat

Cervical involvement is one of the major prognostic factors in carcinoma of the endometrium confined to the uterus. The purpose of this study was to determine whether intrauterine ultrasound with a high-frequency miniature probe can depict the degree of cervical involvement of the disease. Thirty-two women with endometrial carcinoma underwent preoperative transvaginal and intrauterine sonography. By both scans, the degree of cervical involvement was prospectively evaluated. Sonograms were compared with the findings from histologic examination. Intrauterine sonography was completed in 30 of the 32 patients. In these 30 patients, the degree of cervical involvement (none, endocervical gland, or cervical stroma) based on transvaginal scan was correct in 23 cases (77%), and that based on intrauterine scan was correct in 26 cases (87%). Three tumors with endocervical glandular involvement were correctly diagnosed by intrauterine sonography, whereas they were incorrectly diagnosed by transvaginal scan. The specificity and positive predictive value of intrauterine sonography for the assessment of the presence of cervical stromal invasion are 100% (26/26 and 3/3, respectively). Although this study is preliminary, our experience with intrauterine sonography shows that it has potential for assessing cervical stromal invasion in endometrial carcinoma.     

Mechanomyography and oxygen consumption during incremental cycle ergometry

Brucella abortus strain RB51 was recently approved as an official brucellosis calfhood vaccine for cattle by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service branch of the United States Department of Agriculture. Currently available serologic surveillance tests for B. abortus do not detect seroconversion following SRB51 vaccination. The purpose of this study was to evaluate a dot-blot assay using gamma-irradiated strain RB51 bacteria for its specificity and sensitivity to detect antibody responses of cattle vaccinated with strain RB51. Dot-blot titers of sera at a recommended dosage (10(10) colony-forming units) were similar to those of sera from cattle vaccinated with similar numbers of B. abortus strain 19 and greater (P < 0.05) than titers of nonvaccinated cattle. In the first 12 weeks after vaccination with 10(10) colony-forming units of strain RB51, the RB51 dot-blot assay had 100% specificity for titers of 80 or less and a 53% sensitivity for titers of 160 or greater. Sensitivity of the RB51 dot-blot assay peaked at 4 weeks after vaccination with 10(10) colony-forming units of strain RB51. Dot-blot responses of sera from cattle vaccinated with a reduced dosage of strain RB51 (10(9) colony-forming units) did not differ (P > 0.05) from titers of sera from nonvaccinated cattle. Following intraconjunctival challenge with B. abortus strain 2308, titers on the RB51 dot-blot assay did not differ (P > 0.05) between nonvaccinated cattle and cattle vaccinated at calfhood with strain 19 or strain RB51.     

Disulfide bond assignment in human interleukin-7 by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectroscopy and site-directed cysteine to serine mutational analysis

Interleukin-7 (IL-7) is a proteinaceous biological response modifier that has a bioactive tertiary structure dependent on disulfide bond formation. Disulfide bond assignments in human (h)IL-7 are based upon the results of matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI) mass spectroscopy and Cys to Ser mutational analyses. A gene encoding the hIL-7 was synthesized incorporating Escherichia coli codon usage bias and was used to express biologically active protein as determined by stimulation of precursor B-cell proliferation. MALDI mass spectroscopic analysis of trypsin-digested hIL-7 was performed and compared with the anticipated results of a simulated tryptic digestion. Many of the anticipated hIL-7 tryptic fragments were detected including one with a molecular mass equivalent to the sum of two polypeptides linked through a disulfide bond formed from Cys residues (Cys3 and Cys142). Subsequently, Cys to Ser substitution mutational analyses were performed. A hIL-7 variant with all six Cys substituted with Ser was found to be biologically inactive (EC50 > 1 x 10(-7) M). In contrast, a family of single disulfide bond-forming variants of hIL-7 were constructed by reintroducing Cys pairs (Cys3-Cys142, Cys35-Cys130, and Cys48-Cys93), and each could stimulate cell proliferation with an EC50 of 4 x 10(-9), 2 x 10(-8), and 2 x 10(-9) M, respectively. In single disulfide bond-forming mutants of hIL-7, the ability to stimulate cell proliferation was abolished in the presence of 2 mM dithiothreitol. The results presented strongly suggest that only a single disulfide bond is required for hIL-7 to form a tertiary structure capable of stimulating precursor B-cell proliferation.