A total of 1,040 growing pigs (initially, 22.9 ± 4.3 kg) were used in a 115-d study to evaluate the effects of 2 mycotoxin mitigation strategies, a preservative blend (PB) and a yeast product (YP), on the growth performance of swine fed diets containing corn dried distillers grains with solubles naturally contaminated with deoxynivalenol (DON). The PB consists of preservatives, antioxidants, AA...

Lake sediments provide a record of atmospheric Pb deposition and changes in Pb isotope composition. To our knowledge, such an approach has not previously been performed in The Netherlands or linked to national air monitoring data. Results are presented for Pb content and isotope composition of (137)Cs dated lake sediments from 2 Dutch urban lakes. Between 1942 and 2002A.D. anthropogenic atmosph...

The activity of the Damavand volcano (Central Alborz, northern Iran) began 1.8 Ma ago and continued up to 7 ka BP. Although the volcanic suite is clearly of shoshonitic affinity, only two petrographic types can be distinguished in the studied lavas: (1) weakly differentiated absarokites (49 < %SiO2 < 51), scattered around the volcano but with a regional extension, (2) highly differentiated bana...

Low-level lead (Pb) exposure is associated with behavioral and cognitive dysfunction, but it is not clear how Pb produces these behavioral changes. Pb has been shown to alter auditory temporal processing in both humans and animals. Auditory temporal processing occurs in the superior olivary complex (SOC) in the brainstem, where it is an important component in sound detection in noisy environmen...

We have analyzed characteristics of sharable resources and developed techniques for intelligently sharing resources--specifically, communication channels-among agents in multiagent systems. Our techniques allow agents to nearly optimize their communication behavior in a distributed fashion, involving the use of a microeconomic pricing system based on economic laws of supply and demand and tradi...

The atomic structure of Pb(Sc1/2Ta1/2)O3 (PST), and related Pb(A,B)O3 type mixed perovskites was studied by diffraction using synchrotron X-rays and pulsed neutrons. The Rietveld refinement was carried out to determine the average, long-range crystallographic structure, while the pair-density function (PDF) analysis was used in studying the local atomic structure. The compounds examined, relaxo...

The application of Pb inhibited the development of mycelia of the saprobe fungi Fusarium concolor and Trichoderma koningii and the hyphal length of the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AM) Glomus mosseae and G. deserticola in vitro. The application to soil of 1500mg kg−1 of Pb decreases the dry weight, total N, P, Mg and Fe concentration and chlorophyll content of the shoot of E. globulus no inocu...

BACKGROUND This study was conducted to investigate the fertilization and embryo development of human oocytes injected at different time intervals after extrusion of the first polar body (PB) following in vitro maturation (IVM) in IVM cycles. Also, we evaluated whether spindle imaging could serve as a tool to determine the optimal ICSI time. METHODS Oocytes were collected from 43 women with po...

The residues from the extraction of lead/zinc (Pb/Zn) ores of most Pb/Zn mines are permanently stored in tailings ponds, which require revegetation to reduce their environmental impact. This can only be done if the main constraints on plant establishment are evaluated. This can readily be done by field and greenhouse studies. To test this, the properties of different tailings from Lechang Pb/Zn...

The common practice of remediating metal contaminated mine soils with compost can reduce metal mobility and promote revegetation, but the effect of introduced or colonising earthworms on metal solubility is largely unknown. We amended soils from an As/Cu (1150 mg As kg(-1) and 362 mg Cu kg(-1)) and Pb/Zn mine (4550 mg Pb kg(-1) and 908 mg Zn kg(-1)) with 0, 5, 10, 15 and 20% compost and then in...