We determined the interactive effects of nutrient loading and salinity pulsing on Vallisneria americana Michx., the dominant submerged aquatic vegetation species in the lower St Johns River (LSJR), FL, USA, and its associated algal community. Five hundred and ninety 6-inch diameter intact plant plugs of Vallisneria were collected from the LSJR in March 2003 and transported to US Geological Surv...

A short-timescale sampling of phytoplankton abundance and diversity was carried out at Redang Island waters, South China Sea. Physico-chemical variables measured at four intervals over a day were relatively stable (temperature = 29 ± 0.6°C ; salinity = 27 ± 2 ppt, pH = 7.8 ± 0.1; total alkalinity = 2025 ± 33 μeq l–1) whereas inorganic nutrient concentrations (NH4 = 1.36 ± 0.51 μM; NO2 = 0.06 ± ...

Recently, two types of fatty acid synthases (FASs) have been discovered from apicomplexan parasites. Although significant progress has been made in characterizing these apicomplexan FASs, virtually nothing was previously known about the activation and regulation of these enzymes. In this study, we report the discovery and characterization of two distinct types of phosphopantetheinyl transferase...

Palmitoyl-protein thioesterase (PPT) deficiency was recently shown to be the primary defect in infantile neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis (INCL). The available enzyme assay is complicated and impractical for diagnostic use and is, in practice, unavailable. We have developed a new fluorimetric assay for PPT based on the sensitive fluorochrome 4-methylumbelliferone. This PPT assay is simple, sensit...

Communications via Microsoft PowerPoint (PPT for short) documents are commonplace, so it is crucial to take advantage of PPT documents for information security and digital forensics. In this paper, we propose a new method of text steganography, called MIMIC-PPT, which combines text mimicking technique with characteristics of PPT documents. Firstly, a dictionary and some sentence templates are a...

Positive psychotherapy (PPT) is an established psychological intervention initially validated with people experiencing symptoms of depression. PPT is a positive psychology intervention, an academic discipline that has developed somewhat separately from psychotherapy and focuses on amplifying well-being rather than ameliorating deficit. The processes targeted in PPT (e.g., strengths, forgiveness...

24 The guanylin family of peptides are effective regulators of intestinal physiology in marine 25 teleosts. In the distal intestinal segments, they inhibit or reverse fluid absorption by inhibiting the 26 absorptive short-circuit current (ISC). The present findings demonstrate that mRNA from 27 guanylin (GN) and uroguanylin (UGN), as well as at least one isoform of the guanylin peptide 28 recep...

Recently, elevated dioxin levels, over 5 parts per trillion (ppt) 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD), from Agent Orange was reported in 95% of 43 selected residents of Bien Hoa City, a city in southern Vietnam near a former air base used for Agent Orange-spraying missions. Agent Orange herbicide, contaminated with TCDD, was sprayed in Vietnam between 1962 and 1971 primarily for use as a...

Retroviral polypurine tracts (PPTs) serve as primers for plus-strand DNA synthesis during reverse transcription. The generation and removal of the PPT primer requires specific cleavages by the RNase H activity of reverse transcriptases; removal of the PPT primer defines the left end of the linear viral DNA. We replaced the endogenous PPT from RSVP(A)Z, a replication-competent shuttle vector bas...

COND In order to construct a motion model for the endoscope camera that moves freely in the 3D tracheo-bronchial tree, a second order auto-regressive (AR) model is used. For a Kthorder auto-regressive model, the following equation applies: Flexible fiber-optic bronchoscopy is performed on patients who are fully awake or with light conscious sedation. The procedure can entail considerable discom...