The non-appearance of female-specific proteins in male Spilostethus pandurus)

1. 1. Female-specific peptides can be detected by SDS-PAGE in the haemolymph when the female insects are 48 hr old. 2. 2. The age of the male insect at the moment of treatment with juvenile hormone I (JH I), JH III or ecdysone has no influence on the induction of the female-specific bands in male S. pandurus. 3. 3. Male insects exposed to the hormones for periods of time longer than 24 hr were also unable to show female-specific bands in their haemolymph. Consecutive treatments with JH were unable to induce these peptides in the males.

Determination of organic and inorganic anions in insect haemolymph and midgut contents by ion chromatography

A simple and rapid ion-exchange chromatographic method with conductimetric detection for the determination of carboxylic acids (succinic, malic and citric) and inorganic anions (chloride, phosphate and sulphate) in haemolymph and midgut content of Lepidoptera larvae is provided. The mobile phase is 0.975 mM phthalic acid at pH 4.1. The procedure of sample extractions was simple. Comparison of the results with whose reported in the bibliography showed that the values were similar. The ion-exchange chromatographic–conductimetric detection method permits the analysis of various organic and inorganic anions in small biological samples.

Radio environment map estimation based on communication cost modeling for heterogeneous networks

Los mapas del entorno radioeléctrico pueden ser una poderosa herramienta para lograr una asignación de recursos eficiente y consciente del contexto en las redes heterogéneas 5G. En este trabajo, consideramos una red heterogénea formada por una red celular tradicional y una red de sensores inalámbricos. El papel de la red de sensores inalámbricos es estimar el mapa del entorno radioeléctrico de la célula utilizando una técnica de interpolación geoestadística denominada Kriging. En un trabajo anterior se propuso un algoritmo de agrupación distribuida de sensores para reducir la complejidad de la estimación. En nuestra contribución, el proceso de formación de clústeres se modifica para incluir…

A Case Study on Agriture: Distributed HLA-Based Architecture for Agricultural Robotics

In agricultural robotics, as in other robotic systems, one of the most important parts is the control architecture. This paper describes the definition of a new control architecture specially designed for groups of robots in charge of doing maintenance tasks in agricultural environments. This architecture has been developed having in mind principles as scalability, code reuse, abstraction hardware and data distribution. Moreover, it is important that the control architecture can allow coordination and cooperation among the different elements in the system. The architecture presented in this paper implements all these concepts by means of the integration of different systems, such as Player,…

A New HLA-Based Distributed Control Architecture for Agricultural Teams of Robots in Hybrid Applications with Real and Simulated Devices or Environments

The control architecture is one of the most important part of agricultural robotics and other robotic systems. Furthermore its importance increases when the system involves a group of heterogeneous robots that should cooperate to achieve a global goal. A new control architecture is introduced in this paper for groups of robots in charge of doing maintenance tasks in agricultural environments. Some important features such as scalability, code reuse, hardware abstraction and data distribution have been considered in the design of the new architecture. Furthermore, coordination and cooperation among the different elements in the system is allowed in the proposed control system. By integrating …

Differences in the midgut proteolytic activity of twoHeliothis virescens strains, one susceptible and one resistant toBacillus thuringiensis toxins

The development of resistance to Bacillus thuringiensis toxic proteins is a growing concern because it could threaten both conventional and gene transfer use of this environmentally safe biological insecticide. The most common mechanism of resistance involves changes in binding affinity of toxin receptors in the insect midgut membrane. This has not been the case in Heliothis virescens. We have investigated changes in midgut proteolytic activity as a possibility to explain the resistance observed in this insect species. We have developed an improvement of known methods to demonstrate proteolytic activity in crude extracts. Using this method we have found differences in the proteolytic activi…

Interactive Terrain Simulation and Force Distribution Models in Sand Piles

This paper presents an application of Cellular Automata in the field of dry Granular Systems modelling While the study of granular systems is not a recent field, no efficient models exist, from a computational point of view, in classical methodologies Some previous works showed that the use of Cellular Automata is suitable for the development of models that can be used in real time applications This paper extends the existing Cellular Automata models in order to make them interactive A model for the reaction to external forces and a pressure distribution model are presented and analyzed, with numerical examples and simulations.

Sequiterpene-related compounds as endocrine disrupters in Oncopeltus fasciatus, and potential reduced glutathione synthesis modifiers

Sesquiterpene lactones have been found to exhibit effects on insect growth and development. In this study, the bioactivity of natural lactones extracted from Centaurea mariolensis and some structurally related synthetic derivatives has been investigated. Assays have also been carried out in order to determine the potential of these lactones as modifiers of reduced glutathione (GSH) synthesis.

Distributed radio map reconstruction for 5G automotive

Se espera que los mapas de entorno radio sean una herramienta esencial para la optimización y gestión de recursos del 5G en vehículos. En este trabajo, consideramos el problema de la reconstrucción del mapa de entorno radio utilizando una red de sensores inalámbricos formada por nodos sensores en vehículos, nodos de acceso de una infraestructura de ciudad inteligente, etc. Debido a las limitaciones de recursos en las redes de sensores, es crucial seleccionar un pequeño número de mediciones de los sensores para reconstruir el campo. En este contexto, presentamos un novedoso algoritmo distribuido basado en el método de regresión Kriging para la reconstrucción del mapa de entorno radio en térm…

Intravitreal dexamethasone as an enhancer for the anti-VEGF treatment in neovascular ARMD: recovering an old ally

A low complexity distributed cluster based algorithm for spatial prediction

Los mapas del entorno radioeléctrico (REM) pueden ser una herramienta esencial para numerosas aplicaciones en las futuras redes inalámbricas 5G. En este trabajo, empleamos un popular método geoestadístico llamado kriging ordinario para estimar el REM de un área cubierta por un eNodeB equipado con múltiples antenas. Los sensores inalámbricos se distribuyen por el área de interés y se organizan clústeres adaptativos de sensores para mejorar la calidad de la estimación del canal. En este trabajo, modificamos el algoritmo de clustering distribuido propuesto en un trabajo anterior para reducir la complejidad de la predicción de kriging. Se realizan simulaciones para detallar la técnica de formac…

Characterization of vitellogenins in Spilostethus pandurus (Hemiptera): Immunoelectrophoretic studies and short-term labelling experiments

Abstract The haemolymph of Spilostethus pandurus contains three female-specific proteins (I, II and III) as revealed by SDS-PAGE. Antibodies prepared against them recognize three fractions (4, 5 and 6) in ovarian extracts which have similar molecular weights suggesting that I, II and III are vitellogenins. Upon injection of a 14C amino acid mixture into vitellogenic females, labelled proteins first appear in the fat body, then in the haemolymph and next in the ovarian follicles.

Semantically-enhanced advertisement recommender systems in social networks

El suministro de recomendaciones en los sistemas sociales lleva ya algún tiempo en el punto de mira tanto de los académicos como de la industria. Los gigantes de las redes sociales como Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace, etc., están ansiosos por encontrar la bala de plata de la recomendación. Estas aplicaciones permiten a los clientes dar forma a unas determinadas redes sociales a través de sus comunicaciones sociales cooperativas cotidianas. Mientras tanto, la experiencia online actual depende progresivamente de la asociación social. Una de las principales preocupaciones en la red social es establecer un plan de negocio exitoso para obtener más beneficios de la red social. Hacer un negocio en ca…

Approximation of Continuous Media Models for Granular Systems Using Cellular Automata

In this paper a new cellular automata model suitable for granular systems simulation is presented. The proposed model is shown to be equivalent to a particularization of the well known BCRE model of granular systems and a correspondence between the parameters of the presented model and the BCRE model is also set, allowing to fit these parameters for a given system. The model has the advantage over other cellular automata models of being more realistic in the behavior of the surface of heaps and slopes. The dynamics of the CA is analyzed in order to confirm that it also has one of the most important features of these systems, 1/f noise.

Fault Injection into VHDL Models: Experimental Validation of a Fault-Tolerant Microcomputer System

This work presents a campaign of fault injection to validate the dependability of a fault tolerant microcomputer system. The system is duplex with cold stand-by sparing, parity detection and a watchdog timer. The faults have been injected on a chip-level VHDL model, using an injection tool designed with this purpose. We have carried out a set of injection experiments (with 3000 injections each), injecting transient and permanent faults of types stuck-at, open-line and indetermination on both the signals and variables of the system, running a workload. We have analysed the pathology of the propagated errors, measured their latency, and calculated both detection and recovery coverage. We have…

Resistance toBacillus thuringiensis Cry1Ac toxin in three strains ofHeliothis virescens: Proteolytic and SEM study of the larval midgut

In a previous study, we demonstrated that resistance to Bacillus thuringiensis toxins in Heliothis virescens might be related to differences in the composition of the proteolytic extracts from insect midgut. There, we found specific proteolytic bands present in the gut extracts of the resistant strain and absent from the susceptible one. Here we report related facts using a new resistant strain (KCB) and a cross between the two strains used in our previous study. As would be expected, no quantitative differences in total proteolytic activity were found between the strains, although qualitative differences related to the presence or absence of specific proteolytic activity bands using SDS-PA…

Effect of starvation on haemolymph vitellogenins and ovary uptake in Spilostethus pandurus

Abstract 1. 1. Starvation reduces haemolymph vitellogenins and their incorporation by developing oocytes in S. pandurus adult females. 2. 2. Access to food restores unspecifically the protein levels in both haemolymph and ovaries. 3. 3. Topical treatments with JH promote de novo specific synthesis of vitellogenins and incorporation by the ovaries. 4. 4. These results point to a strong role of the JH as the regulatory factor of both reproductive phenomena in S. pandurus .