NESTOR - A NEUTRINO PARTICLE ASTROPHYSICS UNDERWATER LABORATORY FOR THE MEDITERRANEAN

An underwater neutrino astrophysics laboratory, to be located in the international waters off the Southwest of Greece, near the town of Pylos is now under construction. In the last two years a group of physicists from Greece and Russia have carried out two demonstration experiments in 4km deep water, counting muons and verifying the adequacy of the deep sea site. Plans are presented for a 100,000 m2 high energy neutrino detector composed of a hexagon of hexagonal towers, with 1176 optical detector units. A progress report is given and the physics potential of a single tower with 168 phototubes (currently under construction) is described

NESTOR: a status report

NESTOR is an underwater neutrino astrophysics laboratory to be located in the international waters of the southwest of Greece. The first phase of this experiment is the construction and deployment of one hexagonal tower consisting of 168 optical modules, with effective area of 20000m(2) for E greater than or equal to TeV neutrinos. Over the past few years detailed studies of the site have been carried out while many tests have been performed. The current status of the preparation of the experiment and the future plans will be presented

Reconstruction of fish allergenicity from the content and structural traits of the component β-parvalbumin isoforms

12 pages, 7 figures.-- This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International LicenseMost fish-allergic patients have anti-β-parvalbumin (β-PV) immunoglobulin E (IgE), which cross-reacts among fish species with variable clinical effects. Although the β-PV load is considered a determinant for allergenicity, fish species express distinct β-PV isoforms with unknown pathogenic contributions. To identify the role various parameters play in allergenicity, we have taken Gadus morhua and Scomber japonicus models, determined their β-PV isoform composition and analyzed the interaction of the IgE from fish-allergic patient sera with these different conformations. We found that each fish species contains a major and a minor isoform, with the total PV content four times higher in Gadus morhua than in Scomber japonicus. The isoforms showing the best IgE recognition displayed protease-sensitive globular folds, and if forming amyloids, they were not immunoreactive. Of the isoforms displaying stable globular folds, one was not recognized by IgE under any of the conditions, and the other formed highly immunoreactive amyloids. The results showed that Gadus morhua muscles are equipped with an isoform combination and content that ensures the IgE recognition of all PV folds, whereas the allergenic load of Scomber japonicus is under the control of proteolysis. We conclude that the consideration of isoform properties and content may improve the explanation of fish species allergenicity differencesThis work was supported by grants from the Spanish AEI/EU-FEDER SAF2014-52661-C3 (MG) and BFU2015- 72271-EXP (MG), Angulas Aguinaga (MG, RRP) contract and the Ramón Areces Foundation (MC). MC is a Ramón y Cajal fellowPeer reviewe