Barefoot Hall (frenchswan1)

We demonstrated that Armillaria isolates can be cured of viruses by thermal treatment, which enables the examination of virus effects on host growth and phenotype using isogenic virus-infected and virus-free strains.The concept of "sugar addiction" is gaining increasing attention in both the lay media and scientific literature. However, the concept of sugar addiction is controversial and only a few studies to date have attempted to determine the "addictive" properties of sugar using rigorous scientific criteria. Here we set out to systematically test the addictive properties of sugar in male and female mice using established paradigms and models from the drug addiction field. Male and female C57BL/6N (8-10 weeks old) were evaluated in 4 experimental procedures to study the addictive properties of sugar (i) a drinking in the dark (DID) procedure to model sugar binging; (ii) a long-term free choice home cage drinking procedure measuring the sugar deprivation effect (SDE) following an abstinence phase; (iii) a long-term operant sugar self-administration with persistence, motivation and compulsivity measures and (iv) intracranial self-stimulation (ICSS). Female mice were more vulnerable to the addictive properties of sugar than male mice, showing higher binge and long-term, excessive drinking, a more pronounced relapse-like drinking following deprivation, and higher persistence and motivation for sugar. No sex differences were seen in a compulsivity test or reward sensitivity measured using ICSS following extended sugar consumption. This study demonstrates the occurrence of an addictive-like phenotype for sugar in male and female mice, similar to drugs of abuse, and suggests sex-dependent differences in the development of sugar addiction.The discovery of the GFP-type dye DFHBI that becomes fluorescent upon binding to an RNA aptamer, termed Spinach, led to the development of a variety of fluorogenic RNA systems that enable genetic encoding of living cells. In view of increasing interest in small RNA aptamers and the scarcity of their photophysical characterisation, this paper is a model study on Baby Spinach, a truncated Spinach aptamer with half its sequence. Fluorescence and fluorescence excitation spectra of DFHBI complexes of Spinach and Baby Spinach are known to be similar. Surprisingly, a significant divergence between absorption and fluorescence excitation spectra of the DFHBI/RNA complex was observed on conditions of saturation at large excess of RNA over DFHBI. Since absorption spectra were not reported for any Spinach-type aptamer, this effect is new. Quantitative modelling of the absorption spectrum based on competing dark and fluorescent binding sites could explain it. However, following reasoning of fluorescence lifetimes of bound DFHBI, femtosecond-fluorescence lifetime profiles would be more supportive of the notion that the abnormal absorption spectrum is largely caused by trans-isomers formed within the cis-bound DFHBI/RNA complex. Independent of the origin, the unexpected discrepancy between absorption and fluorescence excitation spectra allows for easily accessed screening and insight into the efficiency of a fluorogenic dye/RNA system.Nanowires, atomic point contacts, and chains of atoms are one-dimensional nanostructures, which display size-dependent quantum effects in electrical and thermal conductivity. Chaetocin manufacturer In this work a Cu nanofilament of a defined resistance and formed between a Cu and Pt electrode is heated remotely in a controlled way. Depending on the robustness of the conductive filament and the amount of heat transferred several resistance-changing effects are observed. In case of sufficiently fragile nanofilament exhibiting electrical quantum conductance effects and moderate heating applied to it, a dramatic increase of resistance is observed just after the completion of the heating cycle. However, when the filament is allowed to cool off, a spontaneous restoration of the origi