Close Proximity Research Articles

Non-target effects of the flowerbud weevil Anthonomus santacruzi released for the biological control of Solanum mauritianum in South Africa: field data align with pre-release risk predictions

ABSTRACT The flowerbud weevil Anthonomus santacruzi Hustache (Curculionidae) was released in South Africa in 2008 to reduce the spread of the widespread and highly invasive tree Solanum mauritianum Scop. (Solanaceae). The weevil is widely established in the country’s warmer regions, where conditions are better aligned with its native Argentinean range. During pre-release testing, A. santacruzi survived to adulthood on several non-target native Solanum species, but the risks to field populations were deemed sufficiently low to justify release. In this study, we assessed the host-plant utilisation of A. santacruzi in a rangeland where S. mauritianum persisted in sympatry with five non-target Solanum species that were tested in the pre-release trials. During the 12-month study, A. santacruzi larvae were recorded in the buds of two native and one exotic non-target species, but in significantly lower proportions relative to S. mauritianum. Although adults and larvae were consistently recorded on the native S. dasyphyllum Schumach. & Thonn., the most utilised non-target species, mean monthly numbers were significantly lower than on S. mauritianum, with floral exploitation (i.e. buds with larvae) and larval survival to adulthood significantly higher on S. mauritianum. Utilisation of the native S. campylacanthum Hochst. ex A. Rich. and exotic S. viarum Dun. was occasional and rare, respectively. Considering the close proximity (≤ 8 m) of the non-target plants to the S. mauritianum controls, these results align with predictions of ‘spillover damage’ and appear unlikely to threaten non-target populations. Additional studies are planned to confirm that isolated non-target Solanum populations are not supporting ‘full utilization’.

In the Vicinity of Marriage: Heteronormative Affect and Alternative Intimacies in Three Fin-de-Siècle Short Stories

ABSTRACT In the decades around the fin de siècle, literature offered women authors a space in which to experiment with new ways of living together. Previous research has prioritized alternatives that combine erotic desire and emotional intimacy as opposed to the marriage of convenience. In examining three Swedish short stories, this article takes the concept of intimacy as a starting point to include alternatives that have been overshadowed by the focus on eroticism. Anne Charlotte Leffler’s “Kvinnlighet och erotik” (1883), Elin Améen’s “En rabulist” (1898), and Frida Stéenhoff’s “Ett sällsamt öde” (1911) all feature female protagonists who have developed strong attachments leading to alternative intimacies, but who remain in close proximity to heteronormative marriage. The aim here is to elucidate the heteronormative script as an affective regulatory and productive force in constructing alternative intimacies, visible in both thematic and formal aspects of the stories’ composition, especially in spatial relations. The analysis is underpinned by Lauren Berlant’s and Michael Warner’s ideas of “national heterosexuality” and of intimacy as the “elsewhere of political public discourse”, which are combined with new censorship theory (553).

Single-cell RNA sequencing and spatial transcriptomics reveal the heterogeneity and intercellular communication of cancer-associated fibroblasts in gastric cancer

BackgroundGastric cancer is a highly aggressive malignancy characterized by a complex tumor microenvironment (TME). Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs), which are a key component of the TME, exhibit significant heterogeneity and play crucial roles in tumor progression. Therefore, a comprehensive understanding of CAFs is essential for developing novel therapeutic strategies for gastric cancer.MethodsThis study investigates the characteristics and functional information of CAF subtypes and explores the intercellular communication between CAFs and malignant epithelial cells (ECs) in gastric cancer by analyzing single-cell sequencing data from 24 gastric cancer samples. CellChat was employed to map intercellular communication, and Seurat was used to integrate single-cell sequencing data with spatial transcriptome data to reconstruct a comprehensive single-cell spatial map. The spatial relationship between apCAFs and cancer cells was analyzed using multicolor immunohistochemistry.ResultsCells were categorized into nine distinct categories, revealing a positive correlation between the proportions of epithelial cells (ECs) and fibroblasts. Furthermore, six fibroblast subpopulations were identified: inflammatory (iCAFs), pericytes, matrix (mCAFs), antigen-presenting (apCAFs), smooth muscle cells (SMCs), and proliferative CAFs (pCAFs). Each of these subpopulations was linked to various biological processes and immune responses. Malignant ECs exhibited heightened intercellular communication, particularly with CAF subpopulations, through specific ligand-receptor interactions. High-density regions of CAF subpopulations displayed spatial exclusivity, with pericytes serving as a source for iCAFs, mCAFs, and apCAFs. Notably, malignant ECs and apCAFs showed increased interactions, with certain ligand-receptor pairs potentially impacting the prognosis of gastric cancer. Multiplex immunohistochemistry (mIHC) confirmed the close spatial proximity of apCAFs to cancer cells in gastric cancer.ConclusionOur study provided a comprehensive characterization of CAF heterogeneity in gastric cancer and revealed the intricate intercellular networks within the TME. The identified CAF subpopulations and their interactions with malignant cells could serve as potential therapeutic targets.

Locomotion of paired spermatozoa during flagellar synchronisation

Microorganisms, such as spermatozoa, exhibit rich behaviours when in close proximity to each other. However, their locomotion is not fully understood when coupled mechanically and hydrodynamically. In this study, we develop hydrodynamic models to investigate the locomotion of paired spermatozoa, predicting the fine structure of their swimming. Experimentally, sperm pairs are observed to transition between different modes of flagellar synchronisation: in-phase, anti-phase and lagged synchronisation. Using our models, we assess their swimming performances in these synchronisation modes in terms of average swimming speed, average power consumption, and swimming efficiency. The swimming performances of paired spermatozoa are shown to depend on their flagellar phase lag, flagellar waveforms, and the mechanical coupling between their heads.

Key considerations of injectable minoxidil for alopecia.

Minoxidil has become an increasingly popular treatment option for hair loss disorders including androgenetic alopecia, cicatricial alopecia, and alopecia areata. There are various minoxidil formulations available including topical, oral, and injectable minoxidil. While injectable minoxidil may offer certain advantages, potential risks and costs should also be considered. First, we explore the enhanced bioavailability of injectable minoxidil in comparison to topical and oral formulations, as well as the variability in sulfotransferase enzyme levels and its role in the activation of minoxidil at hair follicles. Furthermore, we expand upon the potential adverse effects associated with injectable minoxidil given its widespread systemic distribution. We also highlight the importance of considering cost, access, and availability of injectable minoxidil given that injections are significantly more expensive than oral minoxidil tablets and involve the additional obstacle of frequent dermatology visits. Depending on geographic region and socioeconomic status, many patients may not live in sufficiently close proximity to a dermatologist for this level of care. Finally, we emphasize the need for ongoing research efforts to compare the efficacy, access, and tolerability of injectable minoxidil, alternative minoxidil formulations, and other alopecia medications.

Development and Validation of a Capillary Electrophoresis Coupled to Mass Spectrometry Pipeline for Comparable Assessment of the Plasma Peptidome.

Although capillary electrophoresis coupled to mass spectrometry (CE-MS) holds promise for urinary peptide profiling, only a limited number of studies have used CE-MS to study plasma peptides. Here we describe the establishment of a workflow, including sample preparation, CE-MS analysis, data processing and normalization optimized for the analysis of plasma peptides. Using 291 plasma samples from 136 patients with end stage kidney failure (including pre- and post-dialysis samples) and 20 patients with chronic kidney disease, we identified and quantified the abundance of 3920 unique plasma peptides. The repeatability and intermediate precision of the analysis were high (with a coefficient of variation of 5% on average for all peptides). Six hundred sixty-one out of 3920 peptides were sequenced by CE-MS/MS. These peptide fragments belonged to 135 parent proteins. Using the pipeline, we identified 169 sequenced plasma peptides with different plasma abundance pre- and post-dialysis. These peptides combined in a support vector machine (SVM) classifier successfully discriminated between pre- and post-dialysis samples in a blinded validation cohort of 45 dialysis patients. Enriched peptides post-dialyses were for the major part associated to inflammation and the coagulation contact systems that may serve as signatures for optimizing dialysis materials. In conclusion, this high-throughput strategy focuses on the plasma peptidome, an understudied component of the plasma, as a promising area for further exploration. Due to their close proximity to the vascular bed, plasma peptides hold significant potential to serve as reliable biomarkers for systemic complications associated with kidney disease.

Hordeum jubatum: An alternative host for fungal pathogens attacking cultivated barley.

Wild grasses can serve as hosts for plant pathogens that attack small grain cereal crops, thereby perpetuating the disease cycle and potentially initiating epidemics. Foxtail barley (Hordeum jubatum) is a perennial grass species that is common across North America and can often be found growing near cultivated barley fields. Despite the close proximity of the two plant species in agro-ecosystems, few studies have been advanced to characterize the compatibility of H. jubatum to barley pathogens and its possible role in disease epidemiology. The objective of this study was to assess whether H. jubatum can act as a host to seven fungal pathogens causing diseases of barley. A collection of H. jubatum accessions (N=100) collected from sites in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and North Dakota in the U.S. and Manitoba in Canada were inoculated at the seedling or adult plant stage in the greenhouse with isolates of Dreschlera teres f. teres (causal pathogen of net form net blotch), Bipolaris sorokiniana (spot blotch), Puccinia graminis f. sp. tritici (stem rust), Blumeria graminis f. sp. hordei (powdery mildew), Puccinia striiformis f. sp. hordei (stripe rust), Puccinia hordei (leaf rust) and P. coronati-hordei (crown rust). None of the accessions showed any visual signs of infection when challenged with B. graminis f. sp. hordei and P. hordei. In contrast, from 97% to 100% of evaluated accessions were infected by D. teres f. teres, B. sorokiniana, P. graminis f. sp. tritici, P. striiformis f. sp. hordei, and P. coronati-hordei. The relative degree of compatibility of H. jubatum to these latter five pathogens ranged from low (similar to resistant barley) to high (similar to susceptible barley). These results demonstrate that H. jubatum can be infected by isolates of important barley pathogens, but typically not with the same degree of compatibility as susceptible barleys. Nevertheless, when infected plants of H. jubatum are growing near barley fields, they could serve as reservoirs of inoculum to initiate some diseases.

Rare but specific: 5-bp composite motifs define SMAD binding in BMP signaling

BackgroundReceptor-activated SMADs trimerize with SMAD4 to regulate context-dependent target gene expression. However, the presence of a single SMAD1/5/8 binding motif in cis-regulatory elements alone does not trigger transcription in native contexts. We hypothesize that binding to composite motifs in which at least two SMAD binding sites are in close proximity would be enough to induce transcription as this scenario allows the simultaneous interaction of at least two SMAD proteins, thereby increasing specificity and affinity.ResultsUsing more than 65 distinct firefly luciferase constructs, we delineated the minimal requirements for BMP-induced gene activation. We propose a model in which two SMAD-MH1 domains bind a SMAD-composite motif in a back-to-back fashion with a 5-bp distance between the SMAD-motifs on opposing DNA strands. However screening of SMAD1-bound regions across a variety of cell types highlights that these composite motifs are extremely uncommon, explaining below 1% of SMAD1 binding events.ConclusionsDeviations from these minimal requirements prevent transcription and underline the need for co-transcription factors to achieve gene activation.

Step-by-Step Approach to Phrenic Nerve Displacement.

Phrenic nerve injury, though rare, can be a serious complication of catheter ablation leading to significant morbidity. The close proximity of the phrenic nerve to the site of origin of arrhythmias may also impact the success of catheter ablation. When the phrenic nerve is near the optimal site of ablation, several techniques have been proposed to create separation between the nerve and the epicardium, including the introduction of fluid, gas, and balloons. In this article, we present a step-by-step approach to phrenic nerve displacement to facilitate ablation, including a review of phrenic nerve anatomy, localization techniques, procedural strategies, and necessary equipment.

Peering into the heart of thunderstorm clouds: insights from cloud radar and spectral polarimetry

Abstract. Lightning is a natural phenomenon that can be dangerous to humans. It is therefore challenging to study thunderstorm clouds using direct observations since it can be dangerous to fly into them. In this study, a cloud radar at 35 GHz with 45° elevation is used to study the properties and dynamics of thunderstorm clouds. It is based on a thunderstorm case on 18 June 2021 from 16:10 to 17:45 UTC near Cabauw, the Netherlands. The observed thunderstorm was associated with severe weather conditions over The Netherlands, attributed to the remnants of storm “Bill”. The time and location of individual lightning strikes are determined using the BLIDS system, operated by Siemens, which is based on the time-of-arrival principle. Concurrently, spectral polarimetry in the millimetre band – an innovative technique not previously applied in thunderstorm cloud studies – is employed to elucidate the behaviour of various particle types within a radar resolution volume. Spectral polarimetric radar variables are also used to look for vertical alignment of ice crystals that is expected due to electric torque. Due to challenges posed by non-Rayleigh scattering, scattering simulations are carried out to aid the interpretation of spectral polarimetric variables. It is shown that the start of the Mie regime in the Doppler spectrum can be clearly identified by the use of the spectral differential phase. Furthermore, variations in the location of the first Mie minimum across different spectral polarimetric variables may be attributed to different sensitivities of these variables to particle shape and ice fraction. From the results, there is a high chance that supercooled liquid water and conical graupel are present in the investigated thunderstorm clouds. There is also a possibility of ice crystals arranged in chains at the cloud top. Ice crystals become vertically aligned a few seconds before lightning and return to their usual horizontal alignment afterwards. However, this phenomenon has been witnessed in only a few cases of cloud-to-cloud lightning, specifically when the lightning strike is in close proximity to the radar's line of sight or when the lightning is strong. Doppler analyses show that updrafts are found near the core of the thunderstorm cloud, while downdrafts are observed at the edges. Strong turbulence is also observed as shown by the large Doppler spectrum width.

Mechanism of Annealing of Complementary DNA Strands by the Single-Stranded DNA Binding Protein of Bacteriophage T7.

Gp2.5, an essential single-stranded DNA-binding protein encoded by bacteriophage T7, is integral to various steps of DNA metabolism. Unlike other single-stranded DNA binding proteins, it greatly facilitates the annealing of complementary DNA strands. Gp2.5 efficiently anneals DNA duplexes as short as 30 base pairs: efficient annealing occurs at a 100-fold lower concentration of complementary strands than that required in the absence of gp2.5. Additionally, gp2.5 selectively promotes DNA annealing with no observed effect on RNA or DNA hybrids. Kinetic studies show a substantial increase in the annealing rate, with gp2.5 accelerating the process by 30-fold compared with spontaneous annealing. Gp2.5 tolerates mismatches and unpaired loops within DNA, facilitating annealing in sequences with slight imperfections. FRET analysis demonstrates that gp2.5 brings strands of ssDNA into close proximity irrespective of their complementarity, likely through interactions between gp2.5 molecules. A unique long α helix A in gp2.5 is critical for its annealing activity: deletions of helix A impair DNA annealing without affecting DNA replication functions.

Terrain Factors Exploited for Petrol Stations Locations and Environmental Challenges in Maiduguri, Nigeria

Orderly planning and development of cities, towns or neighborhood are achieved through stipulation of adequate standards. However, in most Africa, developments are neither orderly nor sustainable due to locations of uncomplimentary structures side-by-side. This paper therefore, examined Terrain factors exploited by petroleum entrepreneurs for location of petrol stations and their environmental challenges in Maiduguri, Nigeria. Quantitative approach was used to source data along 3 out of 5 major routes using systematic sampling after affixing numerical figure to each. Thus, routes with odd numbers were picked as samples based on the study discretion, which are namely: Airport-Kano route, Bama route and Gamboru-Ngala route. A total of 77 petrol stations were identified through direct headcount along the 3 routes; as well as the Sites (coordinates) and Terrain Situation (elevations) captured using GPS 12X and 72X (Garmin) devices. Data obtained were imported into ArcMap environment of Query Module of ArcGIS10.1 for geo-reference maps depicting the urban major routes and petrol stations on sites. Digital Elevation Model revealed the urban Terrain Situation. From the results, ind.m station are the most located facilities along all the routes. Mj.m and nn.a trailed behind with fewer stations. However, most of these stations defaulted the DPR Regulatory Guideline that provides 400m distance between two close stations, based on their length coverage within the urban enclave. Given that, Kano-Airport road with 8600m has 32 instead of 21 stations; Bama with 6200m has the required 15 stations; whilst Gamboru-Ngala route has 29 as against 23 stations required by the standard. This non-adherence was facilitated by the urban convenient Sites and Terrain Situations that triggered stiff quest for high market turn-over within close proximity to customers. Hence, the unabated action has become serious environmental problem resulting to incidences of air and water pollution within the residential neighbourhood in Maiduguri. However, to remediate these trend of economic development challenges, it is recommended that genuine political-will through legislative instruments are highly needed to criminalize conversion or acquisition of land within the urban residential areas for petrol station location with enforceable penalties against defaulter.

Paralemmin-1 controls the nanoarchitecture of the neuronal submembrane cytoskeleton.

The submembrane cytoskeleton of neurons displays a highly ordered 190-nanometer periodic actin-spectrin lattice, the membrane-associated periodic skeleton (MPS). It is involved in mechanical resilience, signaling, and action potential transmission. Here, we identify paralemmin-1 (Palm1) as a component and regulator of the MPS. Palm1 binds to the amino-terminal region of βII-spectrin, and MINFLUX microscopy localizes it in close proximity (<20 nanometers) to the actin-capping protein and MPS component adducin. Combining overexpression, knockout, and rescue experiments, we observe that the expression level of Palm1 controls the degree of periodicity of the MPS and also affects the electrophysiological properties of neurons. A single amino acid mutation (W54A) in Palm1 abolishes the MPS binding and remodeling activities of Palm1. Our findings identify Palm1 as a protein specifically dedicated to organizing the MPS and will advance the understanding of the assembly and plasticity of the actin-spectrin submembrane skeleton in general.

Aggregating SNPs Improves Filtering for False Positive Associations Post-Imputation.

Imputation causes bias in P-values in downstream genome-wide association studies. Imputation quality measures such as IMPUTE info are used to discriminate between false and true associations. However, implementing a high threshold often discards true associations, while a low threshold preserves false associations. This poses a challenge, especially for studies genotyped with SNP arrays. In practice, association signals register as spikes of low P-values for SNPs in close proximity owing to linkage disequilibrium, but post-imputation filtering is conducted on SNPs independently. We simulated 1536 small case-control studies on the human chromosome 19 both to quantify the introduced bias and to evaluate post-imputation filtering. The established IMPUTE info thresholds 0.3 and 0.8 were compared on individual SNPs and aggregated spikes in the formats 'best guess genotype' and 'dosage'. Furthermore, we applied two recently published methods, Iam hiQ and MagicalRsq, to assess their effect on filtering. We found differences in false signals and imputation quality between the genotype formats, especially in the midrange between thresholds. In this midrange, 51% and 60% of associated SNPs for best guess and dosage format, respectively, are true associations. For aggregated SNPs, the majority of spikes in the midrange are true associations. We propose a new method, the Midrange Filter, which uses both thresholds and formats to classify spikes instead of SNPs. This method discards up to the same number of false signals as the upper threshold, while preserving all true associations in most simulation settings. The PsyCourse study is included as a real data application.

Proto-Att-FSL: enhanced prototypical network for cross-domain few-shot airline sentiment classification

In literature, the challenge of having limited labeled data is indeed significant, especially in fields of applying machine learning and deep learning algorithms. Several state-of-the-art methods, particularly deep learning techniques, are often data-hungry, as they require large labeled datasets to train effectively and to generalize well to new, unseen data. To address this issue, we have adopted metric learning, specifically focusing on few-shot learning methods, and leveraging transfer learning from pre-trained transformers. We have proposed a multi-attention-based prototypical network (Proto-Att-FSL), and our observations indicate that this proposed method offers superior class representation compared to approaches that do not utilize an attention-based prototypical network. For our experimental setup, we utilized an Airline sentiment analysis dataset. To maintain the data in close proximity, we divided the dataset into two distinct domains based on specific keywords. This approach allowed us to test both the proposed methods and their baseline counterparts within each domain as well as across different domains. We conducted experiments with configurations of 10, 30, and 50 shots, along with attention heads set to 1, 4, 6, and 8. Our observations revealed that the 50-shot, 4-head attention setup surpassed the baseline model’s performance and achieved 82.3% accuracy in the in-domain tests and the 30-shot. 1-head attention setup achieved 79.6% accuracy in the cross-domain evaluations. This result highlights the substantial impact of multi-attention mechanisms in prototypical networks for few-shot learning.

Exploring Bioinspired Ln3+ Complexes for Cu2+ Detection: Design and Efficacy as MRI Contrast Agents

Imaging extracellular Cu²⁺ in vivo is important due to its role in physiological and pathological processes. Magnetic resonance imaging is a promising modality for this purpose but developing contrast agents selective for Cu²⁺ over abundant Zn²⁺ ions remains a challenge. We synthesized and characterized two novel ligands, DO3A‐picG and DO3A‐picGH, containing a macrocycle and a pendant arm for Cu2+ complexation inspired from the ATCUN site of human serum albumin. The corresponding Ln³⁺ complexes were studied in the presence and in the absence of Cu2+ through UV‐visible, fluorescence and EPR spectroscopies, as well as relaxivity measurements. These studies show that Gd‐DO3A‐picG and Gd‐DO3A‐picGH are non‐hydrated complexes, in which the pyridine‐amide moiety remains coordinated to Ln3+ even in the presence of Cu2+. While Gd‐DO3A‐picG does not respond to Cu2+, a sizeable relaxivity increase is observed for Gd‐DO3A‐picGH. This increase is attributed to an increased second‐sphere contribution to the relaxivity, i.e. a higher number of H2O molecules retained in close proximity to Gd3+ through H‐bonding. Finally, we show that Gd‐DO3A‐picGH binds Cu2+ with a µM affinity, and is selective for Cu2+vs Zn2+.

RNA-targeted proteomics identifies YBX1 as critical for efficient HCMV mRNA translation

Viruses have evolved unique strategies to circumvent host control of protein synthesis and enable viral protein synthesis in the face of the host response. Defining the factors that regulate viral messenger RNA (mRNA) translation is thus critical to understand how viruses replicate and cause disease. To identify factors that might regulate viral mRNA translation, we developed a technique for identifying proteins associated with a native RNA expressed from its endogenous promoter and genomic locus. This approach uses a guide RNA to target dCas13b fused to a biotin ligase domain to a specific RNA, where it covalently labels proteins in close proximity. Using this approach, we identified multiple proteins associated with transcripts encoding the human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) IE1 and IE2 proteins and found that several associated proteins positively or negatively regulate HCMV replication. We confirmed that one such protein, the cellular Y-box binding protein 1 (YBX1), binds to HCMV immediate early mRNAs and is required for efficient viral protein expression and virus replication. Ablating YBX1 expression reduced the association of HCMV immediate early mRNAs with polysomes, demonstrating a role for YBX1 as a positive regulator of viral RNA translation. These results provide a powerful tool for unraveling RNA-protein interactions that can be used in a wide range of biological processes and reveal a role for YBX1 as a critical regulator of HCMV immediate early gene expression.

From Negative to No Cooperativity: Effects of Mutations on Intersubunit Communication within F420H2:NADP+ Oxidoreductase Using Steady-State and Pre-Steady-State Kinetic Methods.

F420H2:NADP+ oxidoreductase (Fno) catalyzes the reversible production of NADPH by transferring a hydride from the reduced F420 cofactor to NADP+. Previous kinetic studies suggest that wild-type Fno (wtFno) displays half-site reactivity and negative cooperativity, making Fno regulatory within methanogenic and sulfate-reducing archaea. These studies identified four amino acids; R186, T192, S190, and H133, as potential candidates involved in intersubunit communication due to their location either at or within close proximity to the interface of the dimer. Therefore, a library of Fno variants─R186K, R186Q, R186I, T192V, T192A, S190A, H133A, and H133N─was generated and characterized using binding, steady-state, and pre-steady-state kinetic experiments to understand their involvement in communication. The Hill coefficient for wtFno was previously reported as 0.61 ± 0.03, while the R186K, R186Q, R186I, and T192V Fno variant values were close or equal to 1, indicating a switch to no cooperativity behavior. The S190A variant displayed increased Hill coefficients of 0.8 ± 0.1 when compared to wtFno, showing that cooperativity was affected. The steady-state double reciprocal plots of the R186 variants, S190A, and T192V Fno variants were linear, which is indicative of no cooperativity, departing from the negative cooperativity shape displayed by wtFno. Unlike wtFno, the pre-steady-state kinetic experiments did not display half-site reactivity for the variants. Additionally, the hydride transfer step became rate-limiting in catalysis for the R186K Fno variant only. Our data suggest that negative cooperativity can be disrupted and that the amino acids R186, T192, and S190 are involved in intersubunit communication.

Plant Architecture, Tolerances to NaCl and Heavy Metals May Predispose Tragus racemosus to Growth Around Motorways.

Tragus racemosus often grows in close proximity to motorways. The aim of this work was to determine whether the seeds of the species can grow under salt (NaCl) stress, how the plants are able to accumulate heavy metals and what plant architecture prerequisites they have for spreading. It was found that the structure of the plant consists of a single rosette of the first order, from which shoots of the first order develop, on which rosettes of the second order grow, and this is repeated modularly. Higher-order rosettes can produce their own root systems. Research on this species revealed its small salt and heavy metal tolerances during germination and early development. The concentration of metals in the above-ground parts of plants was of the following rank: Fe >> Zn > Ni ≥ Pb > Cu; for soil, it was Fe >> Pb > Cu > Ni. The plant germinates successfully and grows in environments containing NaCl up to 0.50% (including solutions of 0.12% and 0.25%). However, higher salt contents of 0.99% and 1.96% proved lethal for seed germination. This tolerance to salt explains why T. racemosus commonly grows along motorways where winter road maintenance involves the application of salt. These adaptations give the species a competitive advantage in these human-modified environments. Furthermore, T. racemosus turned out to be a possible Ni hyperaccumulator.

Effect of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic on the Sexual Functions of Healthcare Providers

Abstract Introduction The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) impacted both sexes. The close physical proximity between sexual partners during intercourse might impact the spread of the virus between them. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the sexual functions of the healthcare providers working in the isolation units of the hospitals. Methods This cross-sectional survey was conducted from December 2022 to February 2023 on 200 healthcare providers working in the isolation units of the hospitals dealing with COVID-19 cases, with a mean age of 39.7 ± 6.895 years, the tool used was an online questionnaire written in English and translated into Arabic. Results Statistically substantial variation existed among the participants prior to and after COVID regarding masturbation frequency for males per week (P = 0.018). Regarding the International Index of Erectile Function (IIEF), a statistically substantial variation existed among the participants before and after COVID regarding the mean IIEF domain scores of the male participants. A statistically substantial variation existed among the participants before and after COVID regarding the Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI) domain scores of the female participants (P = 0.0183). Conclusions A significant decline in the frequencies of foreplay, sexual intercourse, and sexual pleasure among the Egyptian healthcare providers who are directly involved in the treatment of COVID-19 cases. Policy Implications People with a history of COVID-19 should be sexually treated to enhance foreplay, sexual intercourse, and sexual pleasure, as COVID-19 declines their frequency.