CP violating asymmetry in H±→W±h1H^\pm\to W^\pm h_1 decays

The CP violating asymmetry from the decay rates $H^\pm\to W^\pm h_1$ of charged Higgs bosons into the lightest neutral Higgs boson and a $W^\pm$ boson is calculated and discussed in the complex MSSM. The contributions from all complex phases are considered, especially from the top-squark trilinear coupling, which induces a large contribution to the CP asymmetry.Comment: 19 pages, 10 figures, version published in JHE

Occupational cow horn eye injuries in Ibadan, Nigeria

This case series aims to describe the clinical features, management, and outcome of occupational eye injuries caused by cow horns and to recommend possible preventive measures. A review of patients with cow horn inflicted eye injuries seen at the University College Hospital, Ibadan between January 2006, and December 2011 was conducted. Three patients were identified, and their charts were reviewed for demographic information, mechanism of injury, initial and final visual acuity, surgeries performed, as well as anatomic and visual outcome. The three patients were males and were aged 45, 22, and 49 years, respectively. They were all involved in cattle‑related jobs, and they all had unilateral open‑globe injuries with corneoscleral lacerations. Presenting visual acuity was nil light perception in the injured eyes. The contralateral eyes were all normal. Two of the patients required evisceration of the eye, while the third patient underwent repair of lacerations. Visual improvement was not achieved in any of the patients. Cow horn eye injuries may be quite severe and could result in loss of the eye with monocular blindness. Careful attention must be paid to prevent such injuries. Cattle rearers and dealers should wear safety goggles, and proper restraint of the animals is advocated.Keywords: Cow horn, Eye injury, Monocular blindness, Occupational injur

Effect of lead on zooplankton dynamics in Challawa River, Kano State, Nigeria

Lead concentration was determined with the aid of Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometer while zooplankton were collected with the aid of plankton net and analysed microscopically to assess their diversity and density in the Challawa River at four selected sites on fortnight basis between July 2006 and December 2007. The mean lead concentration was between 125 mg/L and 2.84 mg/L, far above maximum acceptable and allowable concentrations in drinking water of 0.05 mg/L and 0.10 mg/L respectively (WHO, 1996). The mean zooplankton density ranged between 3.09 Org/L and 10.26 Org/L. Only five protozoan, two insect, four copepod (plus one naplius I), one cladoceran and five rotifer species were identified during the study. The river quality decreased down stream, with least plankton recovery of 4 species at the industrial effluent inflow site and highest off-stream (site A) with 14 species. The site that experiences a direct inflow of industrial effluent was the most polluted (Odum’s Index = 0.22). Significant differences occurred in the lead concentration between the sites (

Oxaliplatin induces drug resistance more rapidly than cisplatin in H69 small cell lung cancer cells

Cisplatin produces good responses in solid tumours including small cell lung cancer (SCLC) but this is limited by the development of resistance. Oxaliplatin is reported to show activity against some cisplatin-resistant cancers but there is little known about oxaliplatin in SCLC and there are no reports of oxaliplatin resistant SCLC cell lines. Studies of drug resistance mainly focus on the cellular resistance mechanisms rather than how the cells develop resistance. This study examines the development of cisplatin and oxaliplatin resistance in H69 human SCLC cells in response to repeated treatment with clinically relevant doses of cisplatin or oxaliplatin for either 4 days or 2h. Treatments with 200ng/ml cisplatin or 400ng/ml oxaliplatin for 4 days produced sublines (H69CIS200 and H69OX400 respectively) that showed low level (approximately 2-fold) resistance after 8 treatments. Treatments with 1000ng/ml cisplatin or 2000ng/ml oxaliplatin for 2h also produced sublines, however these were not stably resistant suggesting shorter treatment pulses of drug may be more effective. Cells survived the first five treatments without any increase in resistance, by arresting their growth for a period and then regrowing. The period of growth arrest was reduced after the sixth treatment and the H69CIS200 and H69OX400 sublines showed a reduced growth arrest in response to cisplatin and oxaliplatin treatment suggesting that "regrowth resistance" initially protected against drug treatment and this was further upregulated and became part of the resistance phenotype of these sublines. Oxaliplatin dose escalation produced more surviving sublines than cisplatin dose escalation but neither set of sublines were associated with increased resistance as determined by 5-day cytotoxicity assays, also suggesting the involvement of regrowth resistance. The resistant sublines showed no change in platinum accumulation or glutathione levels even though the H69OX400 subline was more sensitive to buthionine sulfoximine treatment. The H69CIS200 cells were cross-resistant to oxaliplatin demonstrating that oxaliplatin does not have activity against low level cisplatin resistance. Relative to the H69 cells, the H69CIS200 and H69OX400 sublines were more sensitive to paclitaxel and taxotere suggests the taxanes may be useful in the treatment of platinum resistant SCLC. These novel cellular models of cisplatin and oxaliplatin resistant SCLC will be useful in developing strategies to treat platinum-resistant SCLC

Response of Onion (Allium cepa L.) to Irrigation Intervals and Plant Density in Zuru, Northern Guinea Savanna of Nigeria

Field experiments were conducted during the dry seasons of 2006/07 and 2007/08 at the Teaching and Research Farm of the College of Agriculture, Zuru, Kebbi State, Nigeria. The objective was to investigate the response of onion to irrigation interval and plant population density. The treatments consisted of factorial combination of four irrigation intervals (3, 6, 9 and 12 days) and five plant population densities (160,000, 200,000, 250,000, 350,000 and 500,000 plants/ha), corresponding to 25x25, 25x20, 20x20, 20x15 and 20x10 cm spacing respectively. The treatments were laid out in a split plot design with three replications. Irrigation interval was allocated to the main plots and population density to the sub plots. Results reveal that mean bulb diameter, mean cured bulb weight and onion yield in both trials and the combined analysis were significantly (p < 0.05) favoured by irrigation intervals at 3 and 6 days. Lower plant densities (160,000 and 200,000 plants/ha) increased both bulb diameter and cured bulb weight but decreased total yield. The result of the research concluded by recommending 6 days irrigation interval and plant population density of 500,000 plants/ha for maximum onion yield in the study area.Keywords: Onion, irrigation, population, Northern Guinea savanna, NigeriaNigerian Journal of Basic and Applied Science (2011), 19(2):241- 24

Corporate tax avoidance and firm value: The moderating role of environmental, social and governance (ESG) ratings

Data Availability Statement: Data available on request from the authors.In this study, we examine how managers in firms that have practiced tax avoidance strategically use sustainability activities together with their tax avoidance practices. More specifically, we investigate the moderating impact of ESG on the association between tax avoidance and firm value. Using a sample of French-listed companies during the years 2012–2021, we hypothesized and found that ESG rating negatively and significantly moderates the relationship between corporate tax avoidance and firm market valuation. Overall, our results suggest that investors reward firms for good ESG performance, perceiving such companies as more valuable. However, when these firms engage in higher tax liabilities, the positive effect of ESG on firm value is slightly reduced. This nuanced insight highlights the importance of considering how tax strategies interact with ESG initiatives in shaping overall firm value. This study, thus, provides theoretical and practical consequences that will encourage businesses and politicians to promote sustainable development. Our findings remain robust to an array of tests, including a number of different tax avoidance measures and potential endogeneity problems.The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article

Enhanced mitochondrial superoxide scavenging does not Improve muscle insulin action in the high fat-fed mouse

Improving mitochondrial oxidant scavenging may be a viable strategy for the treatment of insulin resistance and diabetes. Mice overexpressing the mitochondrial matrix isoform of superoxide dismutase (sod2(tg) mice) and/or transgenically expressing catalase within the mitochondrial matrix (mcat(tg) mice) have increased scavenging of O2(˙-) and H2O2, respectively. Furthermore, muscle insulin action is partially preserved in high fat (HF)-fed mcat(tg) mice. The goal of the current study was to test the hypothesis that increased O2(˙-) scavenging alone or in combination with increased H2O2 scavenging (mtAO mice) enhances in vivo muscle insulin action in the HF-fed mouse. Insulin action was examined in conscious, unrestrained and unstressed wild type (WT), sod2(tg), mcat(tg) and mtAO mice using hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamps (insulin clamps) combined with radioactive glucose tracers following sixteen weeks of normal chow or HF (60% calories from fat) feeding. Glucose infusion rates, whole body glucose disappearance, and muscle glucose uptake during the insulin clamp were similar in chow- and HF-fed WT and sod2(tg) mice. Consistent with our previous work, HF-fed mcat(tg) mice had improved muscle insulin action, however, an additive effect was not seen in mtAO mice. Insulin-stimulated Akt phosphorylation in muscle from clamped mice was consistent with glucose flux measurements. These results demonstrate that increased O2(˙-) scavenging does not improve muscle insulin action in the HF-fed mouse alone or when coupled to increased H2O2 scavenging

Large-scale collection and annotation of gene models for date palm (Phoenix dactylifera, L.)

The date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.), famed for its sugar-rich fruits (dates) and cultivated by humans since 4,000 B.C., is an economically important crop in the Middle East, Northern Africa, and increasingly other places where climates are suitable. Despite a long history of human cultivation, the understanding of P. dactylifera genetics and molecular biology are rather limited, hindered by lack of basic data in high quality from genomics and transcriptomics. Here we report a large-scale effort in generating gene models (assembled expressed sequence tags or ESTs and mapped to a genome assembly) for P. dactylifera, using the long-read pyrosequencing platform (Roche/454 GS FLX Titanium) in high coverage. We built fourteen cDNA libraries from different P. dactylifera tissues (cultivar Khalas) and acquired 15,778,993 raw sequencing reads—about one million sequencing reads per library—and the pooled sequences were assembled into 67,651 non-redundant contigs and 301,978 singletons. We annotated 52,725 contigs based on the plant databases and 45 contigs based on functional domains referencing to the Pfam database. From the annotated contigs, we assigned GO (Gene Ontology) terms to 36,086 contigs and KEGG pathways to 7,032 contigs. Our comparative analysis showed that 70.6 % (47,930), 69.4 % (47,089), 68.4 % (46,441), and 69.3 % (47,048) of the P. dactylifera gene models are shared with rice, sorghum, Arabidopsis, and grapevine, respectively. We also assigned our gene models into house-keeping and tissue-specific genes based on their tissue specificity. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s11103-012-9924-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

Effect of Variety, Seed Rate and Row Spacing on the Growth and Yield of Rice in Bauchi, Nigeria

Field experiments were conducted at Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Fadama Farm Bauchi, during the rainy seasons of 2006 and 2007 to study the effects of variety, seeding rate and row spacing on growth and yield of rice. Two varieties of rice; Ex – China (Indigenous and upland/lowland) and NERICA-1 (improved and upland), three seeding rates (32, 54 and 75 kg/ha) and four row spacings (15, 20, 25 and broadcast) were used during the study. The treatments were combined and laid in a split – split plot design with three replications. Variety was placed in the main plot, seeding rate in the sub plot while row spacing was placed in sub –sub plot. Data were collected on parameters such as plant height, number of tillers per plant, spikes per hill, spikelets per spike and number of seeds per spike, seed weight per hill, 1000 grain weight and yield kg ha-1 and analyzed using analysis of variance procedure for split – split plot and significant differences among the treatment means were separated using the Duncan multiple range test (DMRT). Variety Ex-China produced significantly (P<0.05) higher numbers of tillers per plant and spikes per hill. However, NERICA-1 produced significantly (P<0.05) higher numbers of spikelets per spike, seeds per spike, weight of seed per spike, weight of seed per hill, 1000 grain weight and yield in kg ha-1 than Ex-China. Row spacings of 15, 20 and 25cm also had significant effects on the number of tillers per plant, number of spikes per hill, number of spikelets per spike, number of seeds per spike, weight of seed per spike, weight of seed per hill, 1000 grain weight and yield kg ha-1 over the control. From the factors studied, seeding rate did not show any significant difference during the two years of investigation. Interactions were also observed among the factors studied. Therefore, row spacings irrespective of the method used, or hole planting of rice could be more appropriate for optimum grain yield.Key words: Seed rate, Row spacing, Spike