Plant delta(15)N associated with arbuscular mycorrhization, drought and nitrogen deficiency

It has long been evident that plant (15)N chiefly reflects the processes which fractionate (15)N/(14)N rather than the (15)N of plant N source(s). It has emerged recently that one of the most important fractionating processes contributing to the whole plant (15)N is the presence/absence, type or species of mycorrhiza, especially when interacting with nutrient deficiency. Ecto- and ericoid mycorrhizas are frequently associated with (15)N-depleted foliar (15)N, commonly as low as -12 per thousand. As shown by the present study, plants having no mycorrhiza, or those infected with various species of arbuscular mycorrhiza (AM)-forming fungi, interact with varying concentrations of soil nitrogen [N] and moisture to enrich plant (15)N by as much as 3.5 per thousand. Hence the lack of a mycorrhiza, or variation in the species of AM-forming fungal associations, can account for about 25% of the usually reported variations of foliar (15)N found in field situations and do so by (15)N enrichment rather than depletion. Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Error growth in the numerical integration of periodic orbits by multistep methods, with application to reversible systems

We study the growth with time of (the coefficients of the asymptoticexpansion of) the error in the numerical integration with linearmultistep methods of periodic solutions of systems of ordinarydifferential equations. Particular attention is devoted to reversiblesystems. It turns out that symmetric linear multistep methodscannot be recommended in spite of the fact that they mimic thereversibility of the true flow. For reversible second-ordersystems, linear multistep methods without parasitic double rootsare useful.     

Measuring the top quark mass in the eµ channel: A study

We describe a simple method to measure the top quark mass in the channel that may be useful in Run II of D? detector. The method is validated by applying it to the Run Ib eμ data.     

Level structures of 95,97Mo — A comparative study

High-spin states of ^95,97Mo (Z=42, N=53,55) nuclei have been investigated through ⁸²Se(¹⁸O, xn) reaction at Eb=60 MeV. The level scheme in ⁹⁵Mo has been observed upto ≏ 10 MeV in the present experiment. The level structure shows mainly single particle character. In ⁹⁷Mo, the ground state level sequence has been extended to ≏ 4.5 MeV while the previous information had been up to 2.4 MeV. A negative parity band built on 1437 keV (11/2⁻) excited state has been extended to 5.5 MeV. The structure seems to show a coexistence of single particle and collective modes of excitation. Properties of both the nuclei have been compared with shell model calculations using OXBASH.     

Development of a universal measure of quadrupedal forelimb-hindlimb coordination using digital motion capture and computerised analysis

Background  

Clinical spinal cord injury in domestic dogs provides a model population in which to test the efficacy of putative therapeutic interventions for human spinal cord injury. To achieve this potential a robust method of functional analysis is required so that statistical comparison of numerical data derived from treated and control animals can be achieved.     

Major increases of the reactivity and selectivity in aminoglycoside O-alkylation due to the presence of fluoride ions

Major increases of the selectivity and/or reactivity in aminosugar and sugar O-alkylation were observed in the presence of tetrabutylammonium fluoride (TBAF) in comparison to TBAI under phase-transfer conditions or in solution. The presence of TBAF allowed the selective and rapid alkylation of the 6-hydroxyl function of neamine and efficient preparation of protected intermediates useful in synthesis and potent or potential antimicrobial O-alkylated derivatives of neamine and paromamine. In regard to the observed strong effects of TBAF, the alkylation and acylation of carbohydrates merit to be studied in the presence of TBAF under phase-transfer conditions.     

Reversal of the enantiomeric elution order of some aromatic amino acids using reversed-phase chromatographic supports coated with the teicoplanin chiral selector

In this paper, two chiral stationary phases were prepared by coating the surface of both C8 and C18 high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) supports with the teicoplanin chiral selector. The hydrophobic C11 acyl side chain, attached to the d-glucosamine group of teicoplanin, served as anchor moiety for the immobilization of the chiral selector on the apolar support material. The retention and enantioselectivity of these coated stationary phases were studied using some aromatic amino acids as probe solutes and an aqueous solution as mobile phase. It was found that the enantiomer elution order on the modified C8 and C18 stationary phases was reversed (l > d) relatively to that classically observed with a teicoplanin covalently immobilized on a silica support (d > l). Such a dynamic coating on the reversed-phase supports was found to be of interest since the apparent enantioselectivity was not significantly changed by the use during an extended period of time or following a long-term storage of the columns.     

X-ray in-line phase tomography of multimaterial objects

We present a method for phase retrieval from x-ray Fresnel diffraction patterns for multimaterial objects. Previously, homogeneous object assumptions have been used and have been introduced in the Radon domain. Here, we apply prior knowledge in the object domain, which permits the introduction of multiple materials. This is achieved first by a tomographic reconstruction of an attenuation scan and then introduction of the prior followed by a forward projection step to yield the a priori phase maps. The method is applied to the reconstruction of an object of known composition consisting of both soft and hard materials and is shown to perform better than previously proposed algorithms.