Plant-growth-regulating N-(phosphonoacetyl)amines

A series of N-(phosphonacetyl)amine derivatives were synthesized and screened for plant-growth regulating activity on Lepidium sativum L. and Cucumis sativus L. Aromatic N-(phosphonoacetyl)amines. which may be considered as possible analogues of N-acylaniline herbicides obtained by replacement of their acyl group by the phosphonacetyl moiety, exhibited significant or moderate herbicidal activity. In contrast, N-(phosphonoacetyl)amino acids and N-(phosphonoacetyl)aminophosphonic acids promoted the growth of L. sativum and C. sativus roots.     

Detection of cows with insemination problems using selected classification models

In the present study, the detection of cows with artificial insemination (AI) difficulties using selected statistical and machine learning methods is presented. Cows were divided into two classes: those that conceived after one or two services (“GOOD”) and those that required more than two services per conception (“POOR”). The best performance was exhibited by one of the artificial neural networks (ANN) and the multivariate adaptive regression spline (MARS) method (AIC, BIC, RMS and accuracy); whereas logistic regression (LR) and classification functions (CF) were of somewhat lower quality. The detection of cows with AI difficulties, performed on the basis of the test set comprising new instances, showed that the ANN and MARS were more precise in comparison with the statistical methods. Sensitivity and specificity were over 85% for the perceptron with two hidden layers (MLP2) and MARS and approximately 80% or lower for LR and CF. From among variables determining the AI category, the average calving interval and cow body condition index were the most important. Other significant variables were lactation number, pregnancy length, sex of calf from previous calving and cow age. The prognoses obtained using ANN and MARS can be used for the appropriate preparation of cows for AI.     

Biochemical and spectroscopic characterization of almond and cashew nut seed 11S legumins, amandin and anacardein

Native, undenatured amandin and anacardein secondary structures were estimated to be, respectively, 56.4 and 49% β-sheet, 14 and 23.7% α-helix, and 29.6 and 27.4% random coil. Circular dichroic (CD) and fluorescence spectroscopy were used to assess structural changes in amandin and anacardein subjected to denaturing treatments that included heat (100 °C, 5 min), guanidium HCl (GuHCl), urea, sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS), and reducing agent, 2% v/v β-mercaptoethanol (βME) + heat. Mouse monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) 4C10 and 4F10 directed against amandin and 1F5 and 4C3 directed against anacardein were used to assess the influence of denaturing treatments on the immunoreactivity of amandin and anacardein. Among the denaturing treatments investigated, SDS and β-ME caused a significant reduction in the immunoreactivity of amandin and anacardein when probed with mAb 4C10 and 4C3, respectively.     

Tetrodotoxin- and resiniferatoxin-induced changes in paracervical ganglion ChAT- and nNOS-IR neurons supplying the urinary bladder in female pigs

The aim of the present study was to establish the effect of intravesical administration of resiniferatoxin (RTX) and tetrodotoxin (TTX) on the chemical coding of paracervical ganglion (PCG) neurons supplying the urinary bladder in the pig. In order to identify the PCG neurons innervating the bladder, retrograde tracer Fast Blue was injected into the bladder wall prior to intravesical RTX or TTX administration. Consequent application of immunocytochemical methods revealed that in the control group 76.82% of Fast Blue positive PCG neurons contain nitric oxide synthetase (nNOS), and 66.92% contain acetylcholine transferase (ChAT). Intravesical infusion of RTX resulted in a reduction of the nNOS-IR neurons to 57.74% and ChAT-IR to 57.05%. Alternative administration of TTX induced an increase of nNOS-IR neurons up to 79.29% and a reduction of the ChAT-IR population down to 3.73% of the Fast Blue positive PCG cells. Our data show that both neurotoxins affect the chemical coding of PCG cells supplying the porcine urinary bladder, but the effects of their action are different. Moreover, these results shed light on the possible involvement of NO-ergic and cholinergic neurons in the mechanisms of therapeutic action exerted by RTX and TTX in curing the overactive bladder disorder.     

Predicting the Concentration of Total Mercury in Mineral Horizons of Forest Soils Varying in Organic Matter and Mineral Fine Fraction Content

In this study, an artificial neural networks (ANN) model was developed to predict the removal of a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH), namely, naphthalene from marine oily wastewater by using UV irradiation. The removal rate was used as model output and simulated as a function of five independent input variables, including fluence rate, salinity, temperature, initial concentration and reaction time. The configuration of the ANN model was optimized as a three-layer feed-forward Levenberg–Marquardt backpropagation network with log-sigmoid and linear transfer functions at the hidden (12 hidden neurons) and output layers, respectively. By considering goodness-of-fit and cross validated predictability, the ANN model was trained to provide good overall agreement with experimental results with a slope of 0.97 and a correlation of determination (R ²) of 0.943. Sensitivity analysis revealed that fluence rate and temperature were the most influential variables, followed by reaction time, salinity and initial concentration. The findings of this study showed that neural network modeling could effectively predict the behavior of the photo-induced PAH degradation process.     

Application of image analysis for the varietal classification of barley:: Morphological features

This paper presents an exploratory investigation of the application of morphological features in image analysis for varietal classification of Polish spring barley. The objective of this study was to determine the utility of morphological features for classifying individual kernels of five varieties of barley. Furthermore, this study was performed to find the best method to classify kernels of barley with the lowest error of classification. Image processing consisted of several steps: image acquisition, segmentation, external and internal image feature extraction, classification and interpretation. Each barley kernel was described using 74 morphological features. The selection was carried out using three methods based on: Fisher's coefficient, probability of error and average correlation coefficient and mutual information. Principle component analysis (PCA), linear discriminant analysis (LDA), and non-linear discriminant analysis (NDA) were used throughout this paper as the classification methods. The results confirmed that the method using morphological features may be successfully employed in image analysis for preliminary varietal identification of barley kernels. Furthermore, LDA was found to be the method which best separated different varieties of objects.     

Evidence of Anti-Proliferative Activities in Blue Mussel (Mytilus edulis) By-Products

Shellfish waste components contain significant levels of high quality protein and are therefore a potential source for biofunctional high-value peptides. The feasibility of applying a pilot scale enzymatic hydrolysis process to whole Mytilus edulis and, by fractionation, recover hydrolysates presenting a biological activity of interest, was evaluated. Fractions were tested on four immortalized cancerous cell lines: A549, BT549, HCT15 and PC3. The 50 kDa fraction, enriched in peptides, presented anti-proliferative activity with all cell lines and results suggest a bioactive molecule synergy within the fraction. At a protein concentration of 44 µg/mL, the 50 kDa fraction induced a mortality of 90% for PC3, 89% for A549, 85% for HCT15 and of 81% for BT549 cell lines. At the low protein concentration of only 11 µg/mL the 50 kDa fraction still entails a cell mortality of 76% for A549 and 87% for PC3 cell lines. The 50 kDa fraction contains 56% of proteins, 3% of lipids and 6% of minerals on a dry weight basis and the lowest levels detected of taurine and methionine and highest levels of threonine, proline and glycine amino acids. The enzymatic hydrolysis process suggests that Mytilus edulis by-products should be viewed as high-valued products with strong potential as anti-proliferative agent and promising active ingredients in functional foods.     

Digital radiography (DR) and imaging analysis for evaluating the penetration and distribution of organic substances used in wood conservation

Consolidation treatments are commonly employed in museum conservation studios for treating biologically deteriorated wooden cultural heritage objects. Impregnation using either a solvent/resin or a polymerizing system is an example of such an intervention, which is often difficult to describe in terms of its behavior within the object’s structure. A new simple method has been devised to evaluate the effectiveness of these impregnation treatments in terms of spatial distribution of consolidant solution. A combination of digital radiography and imaging analysis has permitted to evaluate the degree of penetration of a consolidant and to determine its location within the artifact by studying the X-ray images taken before, during, and after treatment. The adequacy of polymer solutions or their effectiveness as wood consolidants is properties which are often difficult to investigate due to limited visual access to the interior of the object. The proposed method provides an alternative way of studying these parameters through analysis of X-ray attenuation recorded on two images: taken before and after the conservation treatment. The resulting image is then converted into a two-dimensional map of consolidation agent within the object using a straightforward calibration procedure.