Sediment production from unpaved roads in a sub-tropical dry setting — Southwestern Puerto Rico

The threat imposed by increased sediment loading rates ranks among the most important stressors affecting coral reef ecosystems worldwide. This study represents an effort to quantify the effects of unpaved roads on erosion rates in a dry sub-tropical area of Puerto Rico and is intended to aid in developing scientifically-based erosion mitigation strategies. Hence, the specific objectives of this study were to: (1) measure sediment production rates from unpaved roads; (2) evaluate the effect of precipitation, rainfall erosivity, slope, plot length, and vegetation cover on sediment production rates; and (3) compare measured sediment production rates to published surface erosion data from roaded and natural sites in the Eastern Caribbean. Sediment production from nine abandoned road segments with varying slopes and plot lengths were measured with sediment traps in southwestern Puerto Rico from August 2003 to September 2005.     

Electrochemical Degradation of a Real Pharmaceutical Effluent

In this work, the electrochemical treatment of an effluent from the pharmaceutical industry with boron-doped diamond electrodes was investigated. The electrolyses were carried out in a discontinuous operation mode under galvanostatic conditions, using a bench-scale plant equipped with a single-compartment electrochemical flow cell. The effect of operating conditions, such as current density (from 25.7 to 179.4?mA?cm²) and flow rate (from 104.8 to 564.7?cm³?min^?1), at residence times between 0 and 570?min, was studied. Design of experiments was used for optimizing the process. The global contribution of operative parameters and evolution of the residence time in TOC removal was studied, and a time of 77?min was obtained in order to evaluate the highest influence of the operative parameters. For this time, ANOVA test reported significance for four of the five involved variables. The current density was found to have a considerable positive effect on TOC removal, whereas the flow rate was found to have a moderate negative effect on target variable.     

Lipid composition of lees from Sherry wine

In this paper, we describe the study and characterization of the lipids from lees of Sherry wine, one of the main byproducts from the wine-making industry in the Jerez/Xeres/Sherry denomination of the origin zone in Jerez de la Frontera, Spain. The lipid content, extractability, classification, fatty acid composition, and its main chemical characteristics have been determined in order to evaluate their potential use as a food or food additive.     

Distribution of the Mallorcan midwife toad (Alytes muletensis) in relation to landscape topography and introduced predators

The endemic midwife toad of Mallorca (Alytes muletensis) is restricted to a small number of breeding populations in the mountainous northwest of the island. The decline of the species has been attributed to the impacts of introduced species such as the viperine snake (Natrix maura) and green frog (Rana perezi), and toads may be surviving only in areas that are suboptimal for these predators. The influence of landscape features (elevation, aspect and maximum slope) on the distribution of toads and associated predators was therefore investigated using GIS. The presence of toads was positively associated with steep slopes. At sites where they occurred with toads, the distribution of predators was negatively associated with elevation. Reproductive success within toad populations was strongly associated with the number of pools at each site, while reproductive success within individual pools was positively associated with elevation. These findings may be used to optimise the design and location of future reintroduction sites.     

Simultaneous determination of eight water-soluble vitamins in supplemented foods by liquid chromatography

A fast, simple, and reliable method for the isolation and determination of the vitamins thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, pyridoxine, folic acid, cyanocobalamin, and ascorbic acid in food samples is proposed. The most relevant advantages of the proposed method are the simultaneous determination of the eight more common vitamins in enriched food products and a reduction of the time required for quantitative extraction, because the method consists merely of the addition of a precipitation solution and centrifugation of the sample. Furthermore, this method saves a substantial amount of reagents as compared with official methods, and minimal sample manipulation is achieved due to the few steps required. The chromatographic separation is carried out on a reverse phase C18 column, and the vitamins are detected at different wavelengths by either fluorescence or UV-visible detection. The proposed method was applied to the determination of water-soluble vitamins in supplemented milk, infant nutrition products, and milk powder certified reference material (CRM 421, BCR) with recoveries ranging from 90 to 100%.     

Agronomic characterization of diploid hybrid families derived from crosses between haploids of the common potato and three wild Argentinian tuber-bearing species

Five diploid hybrid families derived from crosses between haploids of three Argentinian cultivars and three diploid wild species,Solanum gourlayi, S. chacoense andS. spegazzinii, were evaluated in a field experiment in Balcarce. All plants were androsterile and, thus, could not be screened for 2n pollen production. Data on agronomic tuber traits were statistically analyzed. Differences among families were non-significant for tuber number/plant, but were significant for tuber weight/plant and dry matter content (with values above 21.0% in two of them). The relative frequencies of tubers in the categories established for size, skin texture, and eye depth were family dependent, but they were familiy independent in the categories established for tuber shape and skin color. Great morphological variability was detected for all the traits studied, and plants with high yield and high dry matter content were identified. These families can be used as sources of germplasm in breeding and to explore heterotic responses in 2x × 4x crosses, given the capacity of some plants to produce 2n eggs, as found in a related investigation.     

Glutathione Depletion and Insecticide Synergism in Triatoma infestans produced by the Butyl Ester of Buthionine Sulfoximine

The butyl ester of buthionine sulfoximine (BBSO) applied topically to the nymph V stage of Triatoma infestans (Klug) caused glutathione depletion which was maintained for four days after treatment. Topical pre-treatment of nymph V with BBSO significantly synergised the toxicity of DDT and fenitrothion to T. infestans.