ALBERT

Description: In this paper, the historical power load data from the National Electricity Market (Australia) is used to analyze the characteristics and regulations of electricity (the average value of every eight hours). Then, considering the inverse of Euclidean distance as the weight, this paper proposes a novel short-term load forecasting model based on the weighted k-nearest neighbor algorithm to receive higher satisfied accuracy. In addition, the forecasting errors are compared with the back-propagation neural network model and the autoregressive moving average model. The comparison results demonstrate that the proposed forecasting model could reflect variation trend and has good fitting ability in short-term load forecasting.

Description: Non-ferrous metal smelting enterprises produce hundreds of thousands of tons of arsenic sulfide sludge (ASS) each year in China. Most of the ASS are stored at the companies without enough preventive measures. During the storage and natural drying process, arsenic sulfide is easily oxidized, thereby causing secondary pollution and increasing environmental risks. In this paper, experiments of simulated storage were used to study the release characteristics of heavy metals. During the simulated storage, the release concentrations of As, Pb, and Cd increased rapidly at first and then slowly. Although the total amount of arsenic released was the largest, the release ratio was in the order of Cd 〉 Pb 〉 As. The effects of different atmospheres and conditions on the release of arsenic and heavy metals were explored. The more the H2SO4 in the sludge, the higher the release concentration, and the addition of an appropriate amount of Ca(OH)2 is beneficial for reducing the release of heavy metals. Finally, SEM, XRD and TG-DTG techniques were carried out to confirm that the release of heavy metals was caused by the oxidation process resulting from the residual H2SO4 in the ASS and the air.

Description: We demonstrate a single-photon compressed imaging system based on single photon counting technology and compressed sensing theory. In order to cut down the measurement times and shorten the imaging time, a fast and efficient adaptive sampling method, suited for single-photon compressed imaging, is proposed. First, the pre-measured rough images are transformed into sparse bases as a priori information. Then a smart threshold matrix is designed by using large sparse coefficients of the rough image in sparse bases. The adaptive measurement matrix is obtained by modifying the original Gaussian random matrix with the specially designed threshold matrix. Building the adaptive measurement matrix requires only one level of sparse representation, which means that adaptive imaging can be achieved quickly with very little computation. The experimental results show that the reconstruction effect of the image measured using the adaptive measurement matrix is obviously superior than that of the Gaussian random matrix under different measurement times and different reconstruction algorithms.

Description: Agronomy, Vol. 8, Pages 46: Molecular Cloning and Structure–Function Analysis of a Trypsin Inhibitor from Tartary Buckwheat and Its Application in Combating Phytopathogenic Fungi Agronomy doi: 10.3390/agronomy8040046 Authors: Jing-jun Ruan Shan-jun Tian Jun Yan Hui Chen Ru-hong Xu Jian-ping Cheng Host plant protease inhibitors offer resistance to proteases from invading pathogens. Trypsin inhibitors (TIs), in particular, serve as protective agents against insect and pathogen attacks. In this study, we designed a pair of degenerate primers based on highly conserved motifs at the N- and C-termini of the TI from tartary buckwheat (Fagopyrum tataricum; Ft) to clone the central portion. Genomic walking was performed to isolate the 5′ and 3′ flanking regions of FtTI. We demonstrated the successful PCR amplification of a 644 bp portion of FtTI. The full-length DNA of FtTI contains a complete open reading frame of 264 bp, encoding 87 amino acids with a mass of approximately 9.5 kDa. The FtTI protein sequence was 49% identical and 67% similar to potato protease inhibitors. Site-directed mutagenesis identified the residues, Asp67 and Arg68, as crucial for the inhibitory activity of the FtTI. Recombinant and mutant FtTI inhibited both the hyphal growth and spore germination of Alternaria solani. The calculated 50% inhibitory concentrations of FtTI ranged from 5–100 μg mL−1 for spore germination and 1–50 μg mL−1 for fungal growth. Thus, recombinant FtTI may function in host resistance against a variety of fungal plant pathogens.

Description: Due to increasing globalization and human disturbance, plant invasion has become a worldwide concern. Soil characteristics associated with the vegetation of recipient communities affect plant invasion success to a great extent. However, the relative importance of soil biotic and abiotic factors of different recipient communities in resisting plant invasion is not fully understood. We hypothesized that natural forest soils can better resist plant invasion than can plantation soils, that the allelopathic legacy of resident trees in soil plays a role in resisting invasive plants, and that late-successional soils have a strong effect. We examined the effects of soil and litter collected from four natural forests at successional stages and one Robinia pseudoacacia Linn. plantation in eastern China on the growth of Phytolacca americana L., which is a highly invasive species across China, and explored the individual effects of soil nutrients, allelochemicals, and soil microbes. We found that allelopathic activity of natural forest soils can effectively resist P. americana invasion, and that low level of nutrients, especially of phosphorus, in the soils might be potential limiting factors for the plant growth. The profound conditioning of soil resources by exotic R. pseudoacacia based on tree traits (including allelopathy) facilitated further P. americana invasion. Allelochemicals from forest litter inhibited the germination of P. americana seeds, but pH played a major role in P. americana growth when these substances entered the soil. However, we have no evidence that late-successional forest soils exhibit strong allelopathy toward P. americana. The present study will help to further our understanding of the mechanism of community resistance to invasion.