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Adenosine-5'-triphosphate (ATP) is the primary energy carrier in all living organisms, and its detection in living cells represents a well-established approach. ATP-driven bioluminescence (BL) relying on the D-luciferin-luciferase reaction is a bioanalytical tool widely employed for monitoring hygiene and microbial contamination of foods.Here, we report a straightforward method for ATP BL detection using an ATP sensing paper fabricated with an alternative freeze-dry procedure. The assay can be easily implemented in laboratories equipped with (i) freeze-drying, wax printing, and 3D printing technologies and (ii) instrumentation for BL detection such as benchtop luminometers and portable light detectors including a smartphone camera without the need for additional equipment., Elisa Michelini acknowledges support by MIUR and Prima (Partnership for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean Area) with FEDKITO project. ICN2 is funded by CERCA programme, Generalitat de Catalunya. Grant SEV-2017-0706 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033.

This method originated due to the need to quickly and sensitively detect Avocado sunblotch viroid (ASBVd) in nursery and field trees in California. Optimum sampling protocols were developed for leaf collection from different sized trees based on size and branching as well as for fruit. An ethanol containing buffered extract from 1 g of ground leaf tissue was used as the source of RNA. The extract was absorbed onto small pieces (disks) of Whatman No. 1 filter paper which were then washed and dried. RNA was eluted from the filter paper using sterile water and used as a template in a standard single-tube RT-PCR reaction. The RNA adsorbed on the filter paper disks was quite stable, and the disks could be stored for over 1 year and shipped worldwide at ambient temperature with no noticeable decline in the quality or quantity of the resulting RT-PCR products. The filter paper capture method was expanded to the detection of other viroids including Potato spindle tuber viroid, Peach latent mosaic viroid, and Chrysanthemum stunt viroid and was tested with some viruses as well with minor modifications of the standard protocol.

Previous studies from our lab have created a simple procedure for single-cell count of bacteria on a paper chip platform using optical detection from a smartphone. The procedure and steps employed are outlined along with the lessons learned and details of certain steps and how the design was optimized. Smartphone optical detection is easy to use, low cost, and potentially field deployable, which can be useful for early and rapid detection of pathogens. Smartphone imaging of a paper microfluidic chip preloaded with antibody-conjugated particles provides an adaptable platform for detection of different bacterial targets. The paper microfluidic chip was fabricated with a multichannel design. Each channel was preloaded with either a negative control of bovine serum albumin (BSA) conjugated particles, anti-Salmonella Typhimurium-conjugated particles with varying amounts (to cover different ranges of assay), or anti-Escherichia coli-conjugated particles. Samples were introduced to the paper microfluidic chip using pipetting. Antigens of Salmonella Typhimurium traveled through the channel by capillary action confined within the paper fibers surrounded by the hydrophobic barrier. The paper channel was observed to act as a filter for unwanted particles and contaminants found in field samples. Serial dilutions of known concentrations of bacterial targets were also tested using this procedure to construct a standard curve prior to the assays. The antibody-conjugated particles were able to immunoagglutinate which was quantified through evaluation of Mie scatter intensity. This Mie scattering was quantified in images taken with a smartphone at an optimized angle and distance. Mie scatter simulation provided a method of optimizing the experimental setup and could translate easily to other types of target sample matrices. A smartphone application was developed to help the user position the smartphone optimally in relation to the paper microfluidic chip. The application integrated both image capturing capability and a simple image processing algorithm that calculated bacteria concentrations. The detection limit was at a single-cell level with a total assay time ranging from 90 to less than 60 s depending on the target.

An early example of the working relationship between the electrical transmission of images and silver halide photography or phototelegraphy was the Kopiertelegraph (from the German Kopagraphegrafen for copying telegraphy), the invention of engineer Gustav Grzanna, born in Breslau. In 1901 Grzanna presented his fernschreiber (teleprinter) that used a scanning stylet at the transmitter to send an electrical signal via telegraph lines. At the receiver the image was written by a mirror galvanometer, a small mirror on a magnet held within the field produced by two electromagnetics, one for X and the other for Y translation. Light projected onto the mirror was reflected to scan and expose photographic paper (Huurdeman 2003). The Grzanna Kopiertelegraph Company of Dresden went out of business in 1905, unable to compete with the Telautograph of German physicist Arthur Korn that was introduced in 1902, as noted in Chap. 75 (Suplee et al. 1906, p. 1105). Korn’s rotating scanning drum was a precursor of the photographic facsimile machines used by organizations like newspapers and police departments for many years.

DNA methylation serves to mark DNA as either a directed epigenetic signaling modification or in response to DNA lesions. Methods for detecting DNA methylation have become increasingly more specific and sensitive over time. Conventional methods for detecting DNA methylation, ranging from paper chromatography to differential restriction enzyme digestion preference to dot blots, have more recently been supplemented by ultrahigh performance liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS) to accurately quantify specific DNA methylation. Methylated DNA can also be sequenced by either methylated DNA immunoprecipitation followed by sequencing (MeDIP-seq) or single-molecule real-time sequencing (SMRTseq) for identifying genomic locations of DNA methylation. Here we describe a protocol for the detection and quantification of epigenetic signaling DNA methylation modifications including, N6-methyladenine (6mA), N4-methylcytosine (4mC) and C5-methylcytosine (5mC) in genomic DNA by triple quadrupole liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry (QQQ-LC-MS/MS). The high sensitivity of the UHPLC-MS/MS methodology and the use of calibration standards of pure nucleosides allow for the accurate quantification of DNA methylation.

The concept of the Josephson energy emerges directly from the original predictions of Brian Josephson. Although it can be used to explain the behaviour of Josephson devices, the Josephson energy has no present applications. In this paper, we show that in the context of magnetic Josephson junctions, the Josephson energy offers a potential mechanism for controlling magnetic memory devices.

As the consequences of climate change become apparent, metabolic engineers and synthetic biologists are exploring sustainable sources for transportation fuels. The design and engineering of microorganisms to produce bio-gasoline and other biofuels from renewable feedstocks can significantly reduce dependence on fossil fuels as well as lower the emissions of greenhouse gases. A significant amount of research over the past two decades has led to the development of microbial strains for the production of advanced fuel compounds. Crucial to these efforts are robust methods to quantify the amount of the biofuel compound being produced as well as the other metabolites that might be present during fermentation. Here, we provide a protocol for the quantification of branched-chain alcohols, specifically isobutanol and isopropanol, using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC).

Bioreactors are manufactured apparatuses that allow the generation of a specific environment for the highly controlled cultivation of living cells. Originally used for microbial production systems, they have found widespread applications in fields as diverse as vaccine production, plant cell cultivation, and the growth of human brain organoids and exist in equally diverse designs (Chu and Robinson, Curr Opin Biotechnol 12(2):180-187, 2001; Qian et al., Nat Protoc 13:565-580, 2018). Manufacturing of biologics is currently mostly performed using a stirred tank bioreactor and CHO host cells and represents the most "classical" bioreactor production process. In this chapter, we will therefore use the cultivation of suspension Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells for recombinant protein production in a stirred tank bioreactor as an example. However, general guidelines provided in this chapter are transferable to different bioreactor types and host cells (Li et al., MAbs 2(5):466-479, 2010).The preparation and operation of a bioreactor (also referred to as upstream process in a biotechnological/industrial setting) is comprised of three main steps: expansion (generation of biomass), production (batch, fed-batch, or continuous process), and harvest. The expansion of cells can last from few days to weeks depending on the number of cells at the start, the cellular doubling time, and the required biomass to inoculate the production bioreactor. The production phase lasts a few weeks and is a highly sensitive phase as the concentration of different chemicals and physical parameters need to be tightly controlled. Finally, the harvest will allow the separation of the product of interest from large particles and then the desired material (cell culture supernatant or cells) is transferred to the downstream process.The raw materials used during the upstream phase (all three steps) need to be aligned with the final purpose of the manufactured product, as the presence of residual impurities may have an impact on suitability of the final product for a desired purpose.

There are three essential steps involved in bioethanol production from lignocellulosic biomass feedstocks. They are pretreatment, hydrolysis, and fermentation process. Among them, biomass pretreatment is an expensive and energy-intensive process used to remove the lignin and make the feedstock amenable for bioethanol production. The hydrodynamic cavitation can also be used for biomass pretreatment process. In order to improve the effectiveness of biomass pretreatment, a combination of any two methods of physical, chemical, and biological pretreatment can be used. A combination of the hydrodynamic cavitation pretreatment of biomass with the chemical or biochemical catalyst can be performed better than the individual pretreatment method. In this chapter, a protocol is describes the biomass pretreatment via a combined hydrodynamic cavitation with biocatalyst process.

Worldwide demand for ethanol alternative fuel has been emerging day by day owing to the rapid population growth and industrialization. Culturing microalgae as an alternative feedstock is anticipated to be a potentially significant approach for sustainable bioethanol biofuel production. Microalgae are abundant in nature, which grow at faster rates with a capability of storing high lipid and starch/cellulose contents inside their cells. This process offers several environmental advantages, including the effective utilization of land, good CO2 sequestration without entering into "food against fuel" dispute. This chapter focuses on the methods and processes used for the production of bioethanol biofuels from algae. Thus, it also covers significant achievements in the research and developments on algae bioethanol production, mainly including pretreatment, hydrolysis, and fermentation of algae biomass. The processes of producing biodiesel, biogas, and hydrogen have also been discussed.

Biofuels offer a solution to combat climate change and secure energy surplus. Among the various sources for biodiesel production, the seed of oilseed crops is primary raw material. The biodiesel industry demands a supply of good quality oil so that it can reduce processing costs and price of biodiesel. In general, the oils with low free fatty acid contents are considered as good quality oil and for which the quality of the oil should be analyzed in seed lot for biodiesel production. Currently, oil quality testing is done to the oil extracted from seed lot using sophisticated instruments. However, the analysis of oil seed lot is not tested, which forms the basic materials for oil extraction. Therefore, analysis of the quality of raw materials (seed lot in this case) is mandatory for assessing oil quality.Till now, there is no standard method available for screening the quality of the oilseed before biodiesel production. The free fatty acid (FFA) content of the oil is the critical factor for biodiesel production. In seeds, the FFA content of oil is directly associated with seed viability. In this chapter, an easy-to-perform protocol is presented for determining the seed viability potential, which is having a significant positive association with FFA content of the seed.

Yarrowia lipolytica produces a range of valuable biotechnological products from natural metabolites and enzymes to heterologous proteins. The production of these products is affected by medium composition and various environmental factors. Here we describe bioprocess development for a recombinant laccase production by Y. lipolytica. At first, response surface methodology (RSM), as a statistical technique for design of experiment (DOE), is used for the optimization of medium composition in flask level. Then, results of RSM are applied to increase laccase production in controlled conditions of the bioreactor.

Funder: University of Cambridge, One in eight children aged 5–19 years in the UK suffer from a psychiatric disorder, while fewer than 35% are identified and only 25% of children access mental health services. Whilst government policy states that primary schools are well-placed to spot the early warning signs of mental health issues in children, the implementation of early identification methods in schools remains under-researched. This study aims to increase understanding of the acceptability and feasibility of different early identification methods in this setting. Four primary schools in the East of England in the UK participated in a qualitative exploration of views about different methods that might enhance the early identification of mental health difficulties (MHDs). Twenty-seven staff and 20 parents took part in semi-structured interviews to explore current and future strategies for identifying pupils at risk of experiencing MHDs. We presented participants with four examples of identification methods selected from a systematic review of the literature: a curriculum-based approach delivered to pupils, staff training, universal screening, and selective screening. We used NVivo to thematically code and analyse the data, examining which models were perceived as acceptable and feasible as well as participants’ explanations for their beliefs. Three main themes were identified; benefits and facilitators; barriers and harms, and the need for a tailored approach to implementation. Parents and staff perceived staff training as the most acceptable and feasible approach to systematic identification, followed by a curriculum-based approach. Universal and selective screening garnered mixed responses. Findings suggest that a systematic and tailored approach to early identification would be most acceptable and feasible, taking into consideration school context. Teacher training should be a core component in all schools.

Quark is a traditional German unripened cheese, produced by acid coagulation or a combined acid/rennet coagulation. It developed from naturally occurring acidification during storage of milk in the nineteenth century. Commercial production started in the twentieth century as a batch process using linen sacks for whey drainage after protein aggregation. Nowadays, in continuous processing using quark separators and membrane filtration more than 840.000 t of fresh cheese and quark are produced in Germany. The chapter provides an overview on this development of the process technology for quark production.

Salting and drying of cod has been dated back to the fifteenth century. Dried and/or salted cod has a long shelf life (from months to years) without any special packaging needs but it requires storage with controlled relative humidity and temperature. For the countries where this product is most appreciated, the objective of salting and drying fresh cod is no longer aimed at producing a shelf-stable product but to promote essential sensory characteristics that remain throughout desalting and cooking. This chapter describes the raw material characteristics and processing steps until its use by the consumer.

Nuts are recommended constituents of the daily diet, although their real intake differs remarkably. Emerging proofs indicate that nuts may be a source of health promoting compounds that elicit cardioprotective effects. Nut fruits contain high levels of oil (50 – 70 %) and they are consumed fresh, toasted or salted, alone or in other edible products. Among the by-products of nuts industry, in general, the oil has not yet obtained popularity, although it has been demonstrated that its consumption has a lot of nutritional benefits. Their major constituents are triglycerides, in which unsaturated fatty acids are present in high amounts. The presence of other bioactive minor components, such as tocopherols and phytosterols, has been also documented.A major goal in nuts oils production is to find an appropriate method to recover oil from the seeds. To get high quality virgin oils, the process includes the selection of the fruits, the conditions of their transport and storage, the choice of the steps of the mechanical processing and finally the control of the storage and packaging conditions of the virgin oils. In recent years, there has been a resurgence of interest in the use of continuous, mechanical screw-presses to recover oil from oilseeds. Although screw pressing will not extensively replace solvent extraction in commodity oilseeds – because it recovers a lower proportion of oil; in the case of new specialty edible oils, screw pressing provides a simple and reliable method of processing small batches of seed. Moreover, mechanical pressing oil extraction is technically less extensive and less labor-intensive than the extraction solvent method. The safety and simplicity of the whole process is advantageous over the more efficient solvent extraction equipment. Furthermore, materials pressed out generally have better preserved native properties, end products are free of chemicals and it is a safer process.

Nuts have high lipid content, with mono- and polyunsaturated fats, which makes them very prone to lipid oxidation and rancidity, and quality properties very sensitive to water vapor adsorption. So, their commercialization requires high oxygen and water vapor barrier packaging materials to preserve their quality and enlarge shelf life. Edible films and coatings could be used to this end, thus reducing the environmental problems and recyclability needs of conventional plastic bags, while limiting moisture, aroma, and lipid migration between components of nut blends. Nut coatings must fulfill different requirements, such as good adhesion to the nut surface to ensure its widespread coating; good sensory attributes (organoleptic compatibility with the product, transparency, and gloss); high moisture and oxygen barrier properties and mechanical resistance; chemical, physical, and microbial stability; and health safety. In this sense, coatings can be used as carriers of natural and safe antimicrobial and antioxidant agents to prevent nut deterioration and fungal toxin production as well as oxidation of the native lipids. Adequate formulation design of coatings using hydrocolloids, and safe components to improve their adhesion and active properties are necessary and in recent years, research in the field attracted significant attention within the scientific community. This chapter reviews these materials and their effect on processed nut quality and their applicability as eco-friendly alternatives to conventional packaging systems.

Karachay Ayran is a product of mixed fermentation that contains low levels of alcohol and carbon dioxide. Karachay Ayran has been reported to have antimicrobial, anticancer, and other health promoting properties.

The photographic process that prevailed until relatively recently is based on the invention of William Henry Fox Talbot (1800–1877), who was born in Dorset in South West England. He was a brilliant man who studied the classics at Cambridge and contributed papers on mathematics and optics to the Royal Society and other organizations. In his early 30s, he became frustrated by his attempts to use the camera obscura as a drawing aid, which motivated him to figure out how to capture its image, a process he would call “photogenic drawings.” The medium for his effort was paper rather than Daguerre’s silver halide coated on a copperplate. In Talbot’s process of 1834, which he did not disclose at the time, the first step was to moisten paper in a dilute bath of silver chloride and then to wash it in a solution of silver nitrate. These experiments did not use a camera obscura but rather involved placing flat objects, such as leaves and lace, on the treated paper to produce reverse silhouettes that required many hours of exposure to sunlight. These photograms produced an image using a process called printing-out, which did not require chemical development but would fade with time and exposure to light. By February 1835, he realized that he could make positives from his negatives by contact printing the original on sensitized paper thus giving the world the negative-positive photographic process. He used a salt solution in an attempt to fix his images, a process that merely slowed the fading. He also found that repeated washes of salt and silver solutions increased the sensitivity of the paper, which he exposed in his camera obscura when still wet. During the summer of 1835, he was taking photos of buildings and had reduced the exposure time from hours to 10 minutes. Upon learning of Daguerre’s work in 1839, Talbot announced his own method (Newhall 2012, p. 20).

Reduction of fossil fuels at an alarming rate has attracted increasing attention to blending biofuels worldwide. India's energy demand is expected to grow at an annual rate of 4-5 times over the next couple of decades. With self-sufficiency levels in crude oil becoming a distant dream, there is growing interest to look out for alternative fuels and the biofuels are an important option for policy makers in India. In this context, this paper reviews the experiences in India in the last two decades with respect to biofuel cultivation and its impact on land use, environment, and the livelihoods of rural communities. The objective of this paper is to assess the economics of biofuel production using Sorghum and Pearl millet feedstocks in India using a Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) approach. Baseline study was conducted during the year 2013 in the Madhya Pradesh state of India covering five districts and 333 sample farmers to understand the farmers perception about the various issues related to the production of biofuels using Indian staple food crops Sorghum and Pearl millet. Empirical data from the multi-locational trials conducted during the years 2014-2015 and 2015-2016 in farmers' fields was used to conduct the LCA analysis. Sorghum and Pearl millet feedstocks which are rain-fed crops are considered for bioethanol production with different pretreatment methods. Net Energy Ratio (NER), Net Energy Balance (NEB), Net Carbon Balance (NCB), and % Carbon reduction were some of the key parameters used for analysis and the results are evaluated based on the environmental impacts through the Life Cycle Assessment at 5% blending. Findings reveal that, dilute alkali pretreatment process is most energy intensive due to consumption of alkali consumption. Whereas dilute acid pretreatment has higher conversion efficiency than the other pretreatment processes which is due to higher glucan and xylan conversion efficiencies.The study concludes that Sorghum feedstock is more energy intensive than Pearl millet feedstock due to higher water requirement and yield. Biofuels, either conventional or advanced, should not been couraged without a comprehensive outlook on the overall impact that will ultimately have on the society, environment, or on the countries' energy security. Efforts should be made toward encouragement of research and development in the field as well as in formulating a comprehensive and effective biofuel policy for India.

In August 1889, the Eastman Dry Plate Company made its first thin and flexible cellulose nitrate base on which to coat a light-sensitive emulsion for photographic film for its consumer snapshot cameras. Vicious nitrate dope was poured onto glass plates and when dry was peeled off as thin sheets, after which they were coated with photographic gelatin emulsion. Eastman intended that this flexible transparent film would replace the paper substrate stripping film used in his Kodak No. 1 camera of 1888. Stripping film, after removal from the customer’s camera at Rochester, was developed, and its image-bearing gelatin emulsion was stripped from the paper backing and laid onto a glass sheet for making contact prints. Modern photography was inaugurated with the new Eastman Transparent Film that made it far easier to make prints (Belton 1992). This product was exactly what Thomas Edison’s hands-on lab assistant William Kennedy Laurie Dickson needed for Kineto Project experiments. As recounted earlier in these pages, in a letter dated March 18, 1925, George Eastman wrote: “I received a call from a representative of Mr. Edison’s (probably Dickson) who told me of Mr. Edison’s experiments in motion pictures and how necessary it was for him to have some of this film.” (Richardson 1925) Dickson sent a $2.50 purchase order for a 1 in. wide strip of 50 feet of film, which Eastman received on September 2, 1899 (Bowen 1955). The film would be driven through experimental Kinetograph, and Kinetoscope machines after perforations were added in Dickson’s darkroom using a machine of his devising. Dickson had to make a decision about the direction of the film’s travel, horizontal or vertical; at first the film was horizontal-traveling, but Edison and Dickson settled on vertical-traveling 35 mm film cutdown from 70 mm stock.

Lipid rafts are membrane areas characterized by the clustering of selected membrane lipids, as the result of their phase separation forming a liquid-ordered phase floating in the lipid-disordered bulk membrane. van Meer and Simons hypothesized the existence of lipid rafts to explain the differential composition of the apical and basolateral domains of polarized epithelial cells and proposed that association of given proteins with lipid rafts along the traffic route might represent an important mechanism for protein sorting. However, great attention was paid to the lipid raft theory after Simons and Ikonen highlighted the enrichment of several proteins involved in signal transduction in "detergent-insoluble, glycolipid-enriched complexes," and postulated that lipid rafts might serve as hubs in regulating intracellular signaling. Most notably, the feature of detergent-insolubility was incorporated in the definition of lipid rafts used in 1997 by these authors. "Lipid rafts" and "detergent-resistant membranes" became almost synonymous after the publication, in 1992, of the seminal paper by Brown and Rose, describing the separation of a low-density, Triton X-100-insoluble fraction from epithelial cells, enriched in GSL and apical GPI-anchored proteins and depleted of basolateral membrane marker proteins. This paper provided a working definition of lipid rafts and a putative biochemical method for their separation. More than 2000 papers have been published using "the Triton method." Evidences obtained by the use of alternative biochemical methods for the isolation of lipid rafts and of methods enabling to analyze the dynamics of lipid rafts in intact cells highlighted the several limitations of the Triton X-100 method. On the other hand, the main findings obtained by this method have not been confuted, and the method is still widely used.In this chapter, we will discuss the most relevant methodological aspects related to the preparation of detergent-resistant membrane fractions, with a special focus on neural cells and tissues.

Can we reconstruct how prehistoric people perceived things (their “ways of seeing” or visual culture)? This challenge is made more difficult by the traditional disciplinary assumptions built into prehistoric art studies, for instance focusing narrowly upon a single body of art in isolation. This paper proposes an alternative approach, using comparative study to reveal broad regional changes in visual culture. Although prehistoric art specialists rarely work comparatively, art historians are familiar with describing continent-wide general developments in visual culture and placing them in social context (for instance, the traditional broad-brush history from Classical to medieval to Renaissance systems of representation). This paper does the same for Neolithic (6000–2500 BC) vs. Bronze Age (2500–800 BC) and Iron Age (800 BC–Classical) rock and cave art from sites across Europe, uncovering broad patterns of change. The principal pattern is a shift from a Neolithic iconic art which uses heavily encoded imagery, often schematic geometric motifs, to a Bronze/Iron Age narrative art, which increasingly involves imagery of identifiable people, animals and objects. Moreover, there is also an increasing tendency for motifs to be associated in scenes rather than purely accumulative, and with contextual changes in how art is used—a movement from hidden places to more open or accessible places. Underlying all these changes is a shift in how rock and cave art was used, from citations reproducing ritual knowledge to composed arrays telling narratives of personhood.

Funder: University of Cambridge, In this paper we study a class of fast geometric image inpainting methods based on the idea of filling the inpainting domain in successive shells from its boundary inwards. Image pixels are filled by assigning them a color equal to a weighted average of their already filled neighbors. However, there is flexibility in terms of the order in which pixels are filled, the weights used for averaging, and the neighborhood that is averaged over. Varying these degrees of freedom leads to different algorithms, and indeed the literature contains several methods falling into this general class. All of them are very fast, but at the same time all of them leave undesirable artifacts such as “kinking” (bending) or blurring of extrapolated isophotes. Our objective in this paper is to build a theoretical model in order to understand why these artifacts occur and what, if anything, can be done about them. Our model is based on two distinct limits: a continuum limit in which the pixel width h→0 and an asymptotic limit in which h>0 but h≪1. The former will allow us to explain “kinking” artifacts (and what to do about them) while the latter will allow us to understand blur. Both limits are derived based on a connection between the class of algorithms under consideration and stopped random walks. At the same time, we consider a semi-implicit extension in which pixels in a given shell are solved for simultaneously by solving a linear system. We prove (within the continuum limit) that this extension is able to completely eliminate kinking artifacts, which we also prove must always be present in the direct method. Finally, we show that although our results are derived in the context of inpainting, they are in fact abstract results that apply more generally. As an example, we show how our theory can also be applied to a problem in numerical linear algebra.

The paper investigates the status of gravitational energy in Newtonian Gravity (NG), developing upon recent work by Dewar and Weatherall. The latter suggest that gravitational energy is a gauge quantity. This is potentially misleading: its gauge status crucially depends on the spacetime setting one adopts. In line with Møller-Nielsen’s plea for a motivational approach to symmetries, we supplement Dewar and Weatherall’s work by discussing gravitational energy–stress in Newtonian spacetime, Galilean spacetime, Maxwell-Huygens spacetime, and Newton–Cartan Theory (NCT). Although we ultimately concur with Dewar and Weatherall that the notion of gravitational energy is problematic in NCT, our analysis goes beyond their work. The absence of an explicit definition of gravitational energy–stress in NCT somewhat detracts from the force of Dewar and Weatherall’s argument. We fill this gap by examining the supposed gauge status of prima facie plausible candidates—NCT analogues of gravitational energy–stress pseudotensors, the Komar mass, and the Bel-Robinson tensor. Our paper further strengthens Dewar and Weatherall’s results. In addition, it sheds more light upon the subtle link between sufficiently rich inertial structure and the definability of gravitational energy in NG.

Starting from the last years of the past century, the number of papers and books using, within the most different scientific domains, the networks as the main conceptual tool undergo a fast growth. This circumstance allowed the introduction of the generic name of network science (see, for instance, Barabasi & Posfai, 2016; Lewis, 2009a) to denote a number of contributions having in common the fact of using the mathematical machinery of graph theory as well as of its consequences. The interest in the network science was justified by the fact that its methods allowed to obtain new and interesting results regarding collective systems.As well known, this expression denotes systems made by a large number of reciprocally interacting basic units, whose study is often very difficult by resorting to traditional mathematical tools. Despite that, the tools of network science allowed, since the first papers, not only to characterize the possible dynamical evolution of some kinds of collective systems but also to forecast in advance their survival ability in the presence of damages and their usefulness as supporters of information transmission.

This paper provides new Farkas-type results characterizing the inclusion of a given set, called contained set, into a second given set, called container set, both of them are subsets of some locally convex space, called decision space. The contained and the container sets are described here by means of vector functions from the decision space to other two locally convex spaces which are equipped with the partial ordering associated with given convex cones. These new Farkas lemmas are obtained via the complete characterization of the conic epigraphs of certain conjugate mappings which constitute the core of our approach. In contrast with a previous paper of three of the authors (Dinh et al. in J Optim Theory Appl 173:357–390, 2017), the aimed characterizations of the containment are expressed here in terms of the data. This research was supported by the National Foundation for Science & Technology Development (NAFOSTED) of Vietnam, Project 101.01-2015.27, Generalizations of Farkas lemma with applications to optimization, by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) of the European Commission, Project MTM2014-59179-C2-1-P, and by the Australian Research Council, Project DP160100854.

Considerable effort in constraint programming has focused on the development of efficient propagators for individual constraints. In this paper, we consider the combined power of such propagators when applied to collections of more than one constraint. In particular we identify classes of constraint problems where such propagators can decide the existence of a solution on their own, without the need for any additional search. Sporadic examples of such classes have previously been identified, including classes based on restricting the structure of the problem, restricting the constraint types, and some hybrid examples. However, there has previously been no unifying approach which characterises all of these classes: structural, language-based and hybrid. In this paper we develop such a unifying approach and embed all the known classes into a common framework. We then use this framework to identify a further class of problems that can be solved by propagation alone.

Spectral flow cytometry is a new technology that enables measurements of fluorescent spectra and light scattering properties in diverse cellular populations with high precision. Modern instruments allow simultaneous determination of up to 40+ fluorescent dyes with heavily overlapping emission spectra, discrimination of autofluorescent signals in the stained specimens, and detailed analysis of diverse autofluorescence of different cells—from mammalian to chlorophyll-containing cells like cyanobacteria. In this paper, we review the history, compare modern conventional and spectral flow cytometers, and discuss several applications of spectral flow cytometry.

In the face of a highly competitive environment, it has long been considered important for a hotel to formulate a business competition strategy, strengthen corporate operations and upgrade quality of service. This paper is to discuss the management strategies formulation of the international tourist hotel industry in Taiwan based on the efficiency evaluation. First, data envelopment analysis (DEA), developed by Charnes et al. (Eur J Oper Res 2(6):429–444, 1978), is used to measure the relative managerial efficiency of the international tourist hotels in Taiwan. Through the Kruskal-Wallis, Taiwan’s international tourist hotels are divided into different strategic group. Secondly, by way of factor analyses of industry strategies, a clear picture of the industry strategies and features are identified. Consequently, the appropriate management strategies for different market segments are discussed. The research shows that the efficiency of international tourist hotels is different due to their managerial styles. International tourist hotels can be categorized into three groups: international cooperation; domestic franchise; and independent. “Target market”, “product differentiation”, “the degree of vertical integration”, “economics of scale”, “location” and “competitive edges” is concluded as the key factors to the formation of the managerial strategies. These six variables are used to discuss the managerial strategies of each market segment. The result of this paper will provide useful information for future business management needs of managers. Also, they may serve as valuable reference to the relevant authority of tourism.

As noted early on by Y.C. Fung, one of the greatest needs in biomechanics is formulation of constitutive relations for tissues that experience multiaxial loading. Although most investigators today seek to glean ideas on constitutive formulations from the latest papers, there is often much to learn from the earliest papers wherein truly original ideas can be found. In this Chapter, I provide a brief historical reflection on the formulation of constitutive relations for cardiovascular tissues, with particular focus on contributions by Y. Lanir. In this way, we can recall seminal works upon which much of our field has been built as well as see how past work continues to influence constitutive formulations, even in frontier areas such as soft tissue growth and remodeling.

Different from elastic materials, some materials, such as steels or aluminum alloys, show permanent deformation when a force larger than a certain limit (elastic limit) is applied and removed. A simple example is bending a paper clip. If a small force is applied and removed, the paper clip comes back to its initial geometry, but when the force is larger than the elastic limit (irreversible), it does not. In contrast to elasticity, this behavior of materials is called plasticity. Since these materials are initially elastic and then become plastic, this behavior of materials is called elastoplasticity, which is the main topic of this chapter.

The efficiency of genomic selection strongly depends on the prediction accuracy of the genetic merit of candidates. Numerous papers have shown that the composition of the calibration set is a key contributor to prediction accuracy. A poorly defined calibration set can result in low accuracies, whereas an optimized one can considerably increase accuracy compared to random sampling, for a same size. Alternatively, optimizing the calibration set can be a way of decreasing the costs of phenotyping by enabling similar levels of accuracy compared to random sampling but with fewer phenotypic units. We present here the different factors that have to be considered when designing a calibration set, and review the different criteria proposed in the literature. We classified these criteria into two groups: model-free criteria based on relatedness, and criteria derived from the linear mixed model. We introduce criteria targeting specific prediction objectives including the prediction of highly diverse panels, biparental families, or hybrids. We also review different ways of updating the calibration set, and different procedures for optimizing phenotyping experimental designs.

During budding yeast mitosis, duplicated chromosomes are aligned at the center of the metaphase mitotic spindle, and the centromeres are stretched by forces generated within the mitotic spindle. In response to these stretching forces, mechanical tension builds up in the centromeric chromatin. The magnitude of this tension is detected by the cell to signal the attachment configuration of the sister chromosomes: a high tension signal would indicate that sister chromosomes are properly attached to opposite spindle poles, while a low tension signal could indicate the lack of a bipolar attachment. A low tension signal drives the cell to correct improper attachments in metaphase, thus preventing potential errors in anaphase chromosome segregation. In this paper, we describe a microscopy-based method to directly measure the magnitude of centromere tension in budding yeast metaphase spindles. The advantage of this method is that quantitative tension estimates are obtained without perturbing spindle and/or chromosome structure, and as cells progress normally through mitosis.

International audience; Colloidal gels are formed through the aggregation of attractive particles, whose size ranges from 10 nm to a few micrometers, suspended in a liquid. Such gels are ubiquitous in everyday life applications, from food products to paints or construction materials, in particular thanks to their ability to easily “yield”, i.e., to turn from a solid to a liquid under the application of a weak external load. Understanding and controlling the mechanical response of colloidal gels is therefore of prime importance. Depending on the details of the system, however, the resulting gel networks present different microstructural organizations that may lead to widely different mechanical responses. This raises important challenges in fully characterizing yielding and in uncovering the mechanisms of nonlinear response in colloidal gels. In this paper, we distinguish between two classes of colloidal gels showing respectively reversible yielding, where the gel network reforms upon load release, and irreversible yielding, where the network is fully destroyed through fractures and phase separation. This broad, empirical distinction is achieved through rheology and local experiments at a mesoscopic scale, intermediate between the network characteristic size and the sample size. We further discuss how the observables derived from creep and fatigue experiments may be modeled to predict yielding and highlight open questions and future research directions in the domain.

Microarrays are broadly used in the omic investigation and have several areas of applications in biology and medicine, providing a significant amount of data for a single experiment. Different kinds of microarrays are available, identifiable by characteristics such as the type of probes, the surface used as support, and the method used for the target detection. To better deal with microarray datasets, the development of microarray data analysis protocols simple to use as well as able to produce accurate reports, and comprehensible results arise. The object of this paper is to provide a general protocol showing how to choose the best software tool to analyze microarray data, allowing to efficiently figure out genomic/pharmacogenomic biomarkers.

In this paper, we describe the application of electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) to characterize process of formation and properties of solid-supported tethered bilayer membranes on solid conducting substrates. Along with the description of experimental procedures to prepare substrates and self-assembly of phospholipid bilayers onto gold-coated glass slides, we describe the detailed protocols of EIS measurements. We demonstrate the utility of EIS in the evaluation of the properties of both molecular anchor layers used to immobilize tBLMs as well as characterization of tBLMs. We show that the EIS methodology extends the applicability of this technique well beyond the mere evaluation of electric parameters. Specifically, we demonstrate how by using EIS one may evaluate both density and size of water-filled defects (ion-channels) in tBLMs, to determine the structural mode (homogeneous, heterogeneous, or clustered) of distribution of defects in tBLMs. Our methodology can be applied in both basic protein membrane interaction studies, as well as in the development of precision biosensoric systems with tBLMs as a sensing element.

A wireless wearable sensor on a paper substrate was used to continuously monitor respiratory behavior that can extract and deliver clinically relevant respiratory parameters to a smartphone. Intended to be placed horizontally at the midpoint of the costal margin and the xiphoid process as determined through anatomical analysis and experimental test, the wearable sensor is compact at only 40 × 35 × 6 mm3 in size and 6.5 g weight including a 2.7 g lithium battery. The wearable sensor, consisting of an ultrasound emitter, an ultrasound receiver, wireless transmission system, and associated data acquisition, measures the linear change in circumference at the attachment location by recording and analyzing the changes in ultrasound pressure as the distance between the emitter and the receiver changes. Changes in ultrasound pressure corresponding to linear strain are converted to temporal lung volume data and are wirelessly transmitted to an associated custom-designed smartphone app. Processing the received data, the mobile app is able to display the temporal volume trace and the flow rate vs. volume loop graphs, which are standard plots used to analyze respiration. From the plots, the app is able to extract and display clinically relevant respiration parameters, including forced expiratory volume delivered in the first second of expiration (FEV1) and forced vital capacity (FVC). The sensor was evaluated with eight volunteers, showing a mean difference of the FEV1/FVC ratio as bounded by 0.00-4.25% when compared to the industry-standard spirometer results. By enabling continuous tracking of respiratory behavioral parameters, the wireless wearable sensor helps monitor the progression of chronic respiratory illnesses, including providing warnings to asthma patients and caregivers to pursue necessary medical assistance.

A powerful method for examining genetic fitness and function on a large scale is to couple saturating transposon mutagenesis with high-throughput sequencing (TnSeq). By mapping where transposon insertions can be tolerated in a genome, it is possible to analyze the fitness of every gene in a genome simultaneously under a given growth condition. While this technique can describe genes as essential or nonessential under those growth conditions, sufficient mutagenesis and sequencing depth can provide more subtle differences in fitness. In this paper, TnSeq was used to analyze gene fitness of two Alphaproteobacteria from different environments: the freshwater oligotroph Brevundimonas subvibrioides (Caulobacterales) and the soil plant pathogen Agrobacterium tumefaciens (Rhizobiales) for the purpose of comparing conservation of gene function.

A paper by Karmarkar in 1984 [1] and substantial progress made since that time have led to the field of modern interior-point methods for linear programming (LP). Unlike the family of simplex methods considered in Chap. 11, which approach the solution through a sequence of iterates that move from vertex to vertex along the edges on the boundary of the feasible polyhedron, the iterates generated by interior-point algorithms approach the solution from the interior of a polyhedron. Although the claims about the efficiency of the algorithm in [1] have not been substantiated in general, extensive computational testing has shown that a number of interior-point algorithms are much more efficient than simplex methods for large-scale LP problems [2] .