Comparative analysis of three next-generation sequencing techniques to measure nosZ gene abundance in Missouri claypan soils.

Quantitative next-generation sequencing techniques have been critical in gaining a better understanding of microbial ecosystems. In soils, denitrifying microorganisms are responsible for dinitrogen (N) production. The nosZ gene codes for nitrous oxide reductase, the enzyme facilitating the reduction of nitrous oxide (NO) to N.

Degradation kinetics of veterinary antibiotics and estrogenic hormones in a claypan soil.

Veterinary antibiotics and estrogens are excreted in livestock waste before being applied to agricultural lands as fertilizer, resulting in contamination of soil and adjacent waterways. The objectives of this study were to 1) investigate the degradation kinetics of the VAs sulfamethazine and lincomycin and the estrogens estrone and 17β-estradiol in soil mesocosms, and 2) assess the effect of the phytochemical DIBOA-Glu, secreted in eastern gamagrass (Tripsacum dactyloides) roots, on antibiotic degradation due to the ability of DIBOA-Glu to facilitate hydrolysis of atrazine in solution assays. Mesocosm soil was a silt loam representing a typical claypan soil in portions of Missouri and the Central United States.

Revision of Subtalar Joint Arthrodesis: Considerations for Bone Grafting, Fixation Constructs, and Three-Dimensional Printing.

Subtalar joint arthrodesis is a commonly used procedure for numerous pathologic conditions in the foot and ankle. Although rarely performed in isolation, this procedure can provide successful resolution of various lower-extremity complaints. There are traditional approaches to isolated subtalar joint arthrodesis; however, when these fail, the authors recommend alternatives to enhance the success of revisional surgery.

Vegetative buffer strips show limited effectiveness for reducing antibiotic transport in surface runoff.

Vegetative buffer strips (VBS) have been demonstrated to effectively reduce loads of sediment, nutrients, and herbicides in surface runoff, but their effectiveness for reducing veterinary antibiotic (VA) loads in runoff has not been well documented. The objective of this study was to determine the effectiveness of VBS vegetation and width on surface runoff loads of the VAs sulfamethazine (SMZ) and lincomycin (LIN). Experimental design of the plots (1.

Evaluating phytochemical and microbial contributions to atrazine degradation.

The inclusion of warm-season grasses, such as switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) and eastern gamagrass (EG) (Tripsacum dactyloides), in vegetated buffer strips has been shown to mitigate herbicide contamination in runoff and increase herbicide degradation in soil. The mode of action by which buffer strip rhizospheres enhance herbicide degradation remains unclear, but microorganisms and phytochemicals are believed to facilitate degradation processes. The objectives of this study were to: 1) screen root extracts from seven switchgrass cultivars for the ability to degrade the herbicide atrazine (ATZ) in solution; 2) determine sorption coefficients (K) of the ATZ-degrading phytochemical 2-β-D-glucopyranosyloxy-4-hydroxy-1,4-benzoxazin-3-one (DBG) to soil and Ca-montmorillonite, and investigate if DBG or ATZ sorption alters degradation processes; and 3) quantify ATZ degradation rates and soil microbial response to ATZ application in mesocosms containing soil and select warm-season grasses.

Conceptual knowledge shapes visual working memory for complex visual information.

Human visual working memory (VWM) is a memory store people use to maintain the visual features of objects and scenes. Although it is obvious that bottom-up information influences VWM, the extent to which top-down conceptual information influences VWM is largely unknown. We report an experiment in which groups of participants were trained in one of two different categories of geologic faults (left/right lateral, or normal/reverse faults), or received no category training.

Estimating simazine-treated area in watersheds based on annual stream loads.

Existing data in the United States are insufficient for estimating pesticide-treated crop areas at the watershed scale. The objective of this research was to evaluate an approach for estimating simazine usage on corn (Zea mays L.) based on its transport to streams of the Salt River Basin (SRB) of Missouri, USA.

An Artificial Intelligence Tool for Image Simulation in Rhinoplasty.

During rhinoplasty consultations, surgeons typically create a computer simulation of the expected result. An artificial intelligence model (AIM) can learn a surgeon's style and criteria and generate the simulation automatically. The objective of this study is to determine if an AIM is capable of imitating a surgeon's criteria to generate simulated images of an aesthetic rhinoplasty surgery.

Clothianidin decomposition in Missouri wetland soils.

Neonicotinoid pesticides can persist in soils for extended time periods; however, they also have a high potential to contaminate ground and surface waters. Studies have reported negative effects associated with neonicotinoids and nontarget taxa, including aquatic invertebrates, pollinating insect species, and insectivorous birds. This study evaluated factors associated with clothianidin (CTN) degradation and sorption in Missouri wetland soils to assess the potential for wetland soils to mitigate potential environmental risks associated with neonicotinoids.

Chloro-triazine transport to streams-evaluating methods for partitioning deisopropylatrazine sources.

Streams in the Salt River Basin (SRB) of northeastern Missouri, USA, have been chronically contaminated by atrazine and metabolites, with peak annual transport occurring from spring to early summer. Since 2005, increased fall-applied simazine has introduced a second chloro-triazine herbicide that degrades to deisopropylatrazine (DIA), creating the need for a method to partition DIA between its two parent sources - i.e.

Adaptive allocation of human visual working memory capacity during statistical and categorical learning.

Human brains are finite, and thus have bounded capacity. An efficient strategy for a capacity-limited agent is to continuously adapt by dynamically reallocating capacity in a task-dependent manner. Here we study this strategy in the context of visual working memory (VWM).

Atrazine Transport through a Soil-Epikarst System.

Row crop and livestock production contaminate soils and groundwater of the karst aquifers within south-central Kentucky's Pennyroyal Plateau. Transport of atrazine from field application to the epikarstic drainage system beneath a field with active row-crop farming was investigated. The Crumps Cave study site is a shallow autogenic drainage system with a recharge area of ∼1 ha that contains two epikarst drains (WF-1 and WF-2) which were monitored for atrazine, deethylatrazine (DEA), and deisopropylatrazine (DIA) concentrations from January 2011 to May 2012.

Updates to the : April 2015 to October 2016.

The (CIG) is a trusted, reader-friendly summary of information and advice on immunization that has been used by health care providers and policy makers for decades. It is continuously updated based on new recommendations from the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) and the Committee to Advise on Tropical Medicine and Travel (CATMAT), two external advisory bodies to the Public Health Agency of Canada. In September 2016, the CIG moved to a new web platform that has improved navigability and is more mobile friendly.

Immunization guidance products: Different levels of detail for different uses.

The National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) provides expert and evidence-based advice to the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) on the use of human vaccines in Canada. This advice is presented in a variety of publications for different uses. A recent survey identified some confusion regarding the various NACI publication products.

Mechanisms of Bond Cleavage during Manganese Oxide and UV Degradation of Glyphosate: Results from Phosphate Oxygen Isotopes and Molecular Simulations.

Degradation of glyphosate in the presence of manganese oxide and UV light was analyzed using phosphate oxygen isotope ratios and density function theory (DFT). The preference of C-P or C-N bond cleavage was found to vary with changing glyphosate/manganese oxide ratios, indicating the potential role of sorption-induced conformational changes on the composition of intermediate degradation products. Isotope data confirmed that one oxygen atom derived solely from water was incorporated into the released phosphate during glyphosate degradation, and this might suggest similar nucleophilic substitution at P centers and C-P bond cleavage both in manganese oxide- and UV light-mediated degradation.

Benzoxazinone-Mediated Triazine Degradation: A Proposed Reaction Mechanism.

The role of benzoxazinones (Bx, 2-hydroxy-2H-1,4-benzoxazin-3(4H)-one) in triazine resistance in plants has been studied for over half a century. In this research, fundamental parameters of the reaction between DIBOA-Glc (2-β-d-glucopyranosyloxy-4-hydroxy-1,4-benzoxazin-3-one) and atrazine (ATR, 6-chloro-N-ethyl-N'-(1-methylethyl)-1,3,5-triazine-2,4-diamine) were examined. Through a series of experiments employing a variety of chromatographic and spectroscopic techniques, the DIBOA-Glc/ATR reaction was characterized in terms of reactant and product kinetics, stoichiometry, identification of a reaction intermediate, and reaction products formed.

Veterinary Antibiotic Effects on Atrazine Degradation and Soil Microorganisms.

Veterinary antibiotics (VAs) in manure applied to agricultural lands may change agrichemical degradation by altering soil microbial community structure or function. The objectives of this study were to investigate the influence of two VAs, sulfamethazine (SMZ) and oxytetracycline (OTC), on atrazine (ATZ) degradation, soil microbial enzymatic activity, and phospholipid fatty acid (PLFA) markers. Sandy loam soil with and without 5% swine manure (w/w) was amended with 0 or 500 μg kgC radiolabeled ATZ and with 0, 100, or 1000 μg kg SMZ or OTC and incubated at 25°C in the dark for 96 d.

Impaired stimulation of glucose transport in cardiac myocytes exposed to very low-density lipoproteins.

We recently observed that free fatty acids impair the stimulation of glucose transport into cardiomyocytes in response to either insulin or metabolic stress. In vivo, fatty acids for the myocardium are mostly obtained from triglyceride-rich lipoproteins (chylomicrons and Very Low-Density Lipoproteins). We therefore determined whether exposure of cardiac myocytes to VLDL resulted in impaired basal and stimulated glucose transport.

Decision theory, motor planning, and visual memory: deciding where to reach when memory errors are costly.

Limitations in visual working memory (VWM) have been extensively studied in psychophysical tasks, but not well understood in terms of how these memory limits translate to performance in more natural domains. For example, in reaching to grasp an object based on a spatial memory representation, overshooting the intended target may be more costly than undershooting, such as when reaching for a cup of hot coffee. The current body of literature lacks a detailed account of how the costs or consequences of memory error influence what we encode in visual memory and how we act on the basis of remembered information.

Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization: Celebrating 50 years.

Vaccines have saved more lives than any other innovation in modern medicine. National immunization committees play a vital role in the development of evidence-based recommendations for the use of vaccines. The present article describes the evolution and work of the National Advisory Committee on Immunization in Canada as the group marks its 50th anniversary.

A simple method for isolation and purification of DIBOA-Glc from Tripsacum dactyloides.

Naturally occurring benzoxazinones (Bx) are a highly reactive class of compounds that have received particular attention in the past several decades. Recently, we identified 2-β-D-glucopyranosyloxy-4-hydroxy-1,4-benzoxazin-3-one (DIBOA-Glc) as the compound present in the roots of Eastern gamagrass {Tripsacum dactyloides (L.)} responsible for atrazine degradation.

An ultrasound tomography system with polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) moldings for coupling: in vivo results for 3-D pulse-echo imaging of the female breast.

Full-angle spatial compounding (FASC) is a concept for pulse-echo imaging using an ultrasound tomography (UST) system. With FASC, resolution is increased and speckles are suppressed by averaging pulse-echo data from 360°. In vivo investigations have already shown a great potential for 2-D FASC in the female breast as well as for finger-joint imaging.

Long-term agroecosystem research in the central Mississippi river basin: hyperspectral remote sensing of reservoir water quality.

In situ methods for estimating water quality parameters would facilitate efforts in spatial and temporal monitoring, and optical reflectance sensing has shown potential in this regard, particularly for chlorophyll, suspended sediment, and turbidity. The objective of this research was to develop and evaluate relationships between hyperspectral remote sensing and lake water quality parameters-chlorophyll, turbidity, and N and P species. Proximal hyperspectral water reflectance data were obtained on seven sampling dates for multiple arms of Mark Twain Lake, a large man-made reservoir in northeastern Missouri.

Long-term agroecosystem research in the central Mississippi river basin: hydrogeologic controls and crop management influence on nitrates in loess and fractured glacial till.

Nitrogen from agriculture is known to be a primary source of groundwater NO-N. Research was conducted in a northeastern Missouri watershed to assess the impact of cropping systems on NO-N for a loess and fractured glacial till aquifer underlying claypan soils. Three cropped fields with 10 yr of similar management were each instrumented with 20 to 25 monitoring wells, 3 to 15 m in depth, in 1991 to 1992.