Finding new antimicrobial activities by functional metagenomics has been shown to depend on the heterologous host used to express the foreign DNA. Therefore, efforts are devoted to developing new tools for constructing metagenomic libraries in shuttle vectors replicatable in phylogenetically distinct hosts. Here we evaluated the use of the Escherichia coli-Bacillus subtilis shuttle vector pHT01...

The aim of this study was to determine if maximal effort, evidenced by peak HR was attained during the 20m shuttle-run test in a naturalistic setting. Shuttle-run test performance and peak HR were measured in 208 volunteers (11-16 years). Peak HR was 196 (95% confidence interval (C.I.) 194-198 bpm). The relationship between test performance and peak HR was assessed by regression. There was a we...

Dye-sensitized solar cells are a promising alternative to traditional inorganic semiconductor-based solar cells. Here we report an open-circuit voltage of over 1,000 mV in mesoscopic dye-sensitized solar cells incorporating a molecularly engineered cobalt complex as redox mediator. Cobalt complexes have negligible absorption in the visible region of the solar spectrum, and their redox propertie...

The recent development of an efficient transformation method and shuttle vectors for Haloferax volcanii has set the stage for rapid progress in archaebacterial molecular biology. We describe a shuttle-expression vector that can be selected for and maintained in either H. volcanii or Escherichia coli and permits the expression of cloned genes in H. volcanii. The vector, pWL204, was constructed b...

Here, the oxoglutarate carrier, already isolated from various sources and described in the literature, has been purified from rat brain and reconstituted in proteoliposomes for an accurate kinetic study. The rate of uptake of labelled oxoglutarate and malate has been measured in various conditions, essentially in double substrate experiments. The data so obtained fit the hypothesis that the car...

Vegetation maps are the starting point for the design of protected areas and regional conservation plans. Accurate vegetation maps are missing for much of Amazonia, preventing the development of effective and compelling conservation strategies. Here we used a network of 160 inventories across northwestern Amazonia to evaluate the use of Landsat and Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) data t...

This study evaluates the accuracy of digital elevation models (DEMs) produced from Cartosat-1 data. The Cartosat-1 satellite, launched by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) in May 2005, carries two panchromatic cameras capable of acquiring stereoscopic data along the orbital track. These data provide the potential to produce high-quality DEMs for virtually any location on the Earth’s...

........................................................................................................viii Chapter I: Introduction.........................................................................................1 Objectives.............................................................................................1 Chapter II: Literature Review...........................................