Environmental and occupational exposure to lead (Pb) remains to be a major public health issue. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to use non-invasive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy ((1)H MRS) techniques to investigate whether chronic exposure to Pb in an occupational setting altered brain structure and function of Pb-exposed workers. The ...

Transposon systems are widely used for generating mutations in various model organisms. PiggyBac (PB) has recently been shown to transpose efficiently in the mouse germ line and other mammalian cell lines. To facilitate PB's application in mammalian genetics, we characterized the properties of the PB transposon in mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells. We first measured the transposition efficiencies...

For a given pseudo-Brewster angle phi(pB) of minimum reflectance |r(p)| of p-polarized light at a dielectric-conductor interface, the second-Brewster angle phi(2B) of minimum reflectance ratio |rho|=|r(p)|/|r(s)| of the p and s polarizations is determined for all possible values of the complex relative dielectric function epsilon that lead to the same phi(pB). The difference phi(2B)-phi(pB) is ...

Doubly charged lead monohydrate, [Pb(H2O)]2+, was predicted to be unstable in the gas phase, but it has recently been observed to form in low yield via ligand change between [Pb(CH3CN)]2+ and H2O [Shi, T.; Orlova, G.; Guo, J.; Bohme, D. K.; Hopkinson, A. C.; Siu, K. W. M. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2004, 126, 7975-7980]. Here we report that abundant [Pb(H2O)]2+ is formed in the gas phase by ligand-excha...

Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) contains about 130 ATP-binding cassette (ABC) proteins, which are likely to contribute to the transport of diverse materials, including toxic substances. However, the substrates of ABC transporters remain unknown in most cases. We tested which ABC transporter is involved in detoxification of lead [Pb(II)]. Among the many tested, we found that the message level...

We present high spatial-resolution mapping of soil lead (Pb) concentrations in a small-urban residential setting. X-ray fluorescence was used to measure soil Pb at170 properties in the City Park neighborhood of Appleton, Wisconsin. Greater than two-thirds of soil samples collected from drip lines contained more than 400 μg g of Pb, and one third exceeded 1200 μg g. Soils adjacent to homes built...

Lead (Pb) is a dangerous heavy metal contaminant with high toxicity to plants. However, the regulatory mechanism of plant Pb tolerance is poorly understood. Here, we showed that the PSE1 gene confers Pb tolerance in Arabidopsis. A novel Pb-sensitive mutant pse1-1 (Pb-sensitive1) was isolated by screening T-DNA insertion mutants. PSE1 encodes an unknown protein with an NC domain and was localize...

Definition 1.6. Preemption-bound persistent sets. A set T ⊆ T of transitions enabled in a state s = final(S) is preemption-bound persistent in s iff for all nonempty sequences α of transitions from s in AG(Pb,c) such that ∀i ∈ dom(α), αi 6∈ T and for all t ∈ T , 1. Pb(S.t) ≤ Pb(S.α1) 2. if Pb(S.t) < Pb(S.α1), then t↔ last(α) and t↔ next(final(S.α), last(α).tid) 3. if Pb(S.t) = Pb(S.α1), then ex...

Acknowledgments First of all I would like to thank professor Gunther Roland for supervising my thesis and, most of all, the guidance and training during the two years in which I stayed in this group. I would also like to thank Yen-jie Lee, who gave me a lot of advice on the possible ways to progress on the study. Finally I would like to thank my advisor, professor Wit Busza, and everyone who he...

Abstract New results on the production of and hyperons in Pb+Pb interactions at 40 A GeV and at 30 A GeV are presented. Transverse mass spectra as well as rapidity spectra of these hyperons are shown and compared to previously measured data at different beam energies. The energy dependence of hyperon production (4π yields) is discussed. Additionally, the centrality dependence of − production at...