University of Alberta

About: University of Alberta is a education organization based out in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Health care. The organization has 65403 authors who have published 154847 publications receiving 5358338 citations. The organization is also known as: Ualberta & UAlberta.

Control of leaf vascular patterning by polar auxin transport

Abstract: The formation of the leaf vascular pattern has fascinated biologists for centuries. In the early leaf primordium, complex networks of procambial cells emerge from homogeneous subepidermal tissue. The molecular nature of the underlying positional information is unknown, but various lines of evidence implicate gradually restricted transport routes of the plant hormone auxin in defining sites of procambium formation. Here we show that a crucial member of the AtPIN family of auxin-efflux-associated proteins, AtPIN1, is expressed prior to pre-procambial and procambial cell fate markers in domains that become restricted toward sites of procambium formation. Subcellular AtPIN1 polarity indicates that auxin is directed to distinct “convergence points” in the epidermis, from where it defines the positions of major veins. Integrated polarities in all emerging veins indicate auxin drainage toward pre-existing veins, but veins display divergent polarities as they become connected at both ends. Auxin application and transport inhibition reveal that convergence point positioning and AtPIN1 expression domain dynamics are self-organizing, auxin-transport-dependent processes. We derive a model for self-regulated, reiterative patterning of all vein orders and postulate at its onset a common epidermal auxin-focusing mechanism for major-vein positioning and phyllotactic patterning.

Perspectives on China's outward foreign direct investment

Abstract: Recent economic data reveal that, at the infant stage, China's outward foreign direct investment (FDI) is biased towards tax havens and Southeast Asian countries and are mostly conducted by state-controlled enterprises with government sanctioned monopoly status. Further examination of China's savings rate, corporate ownership structures, and bank-dominated capital allocation suggests that, although a surge in China's outward FDI might be economically sensible, the most active players have incentives to conduct excessive outward FDI while capital constraints limit players that most likely have value-creating FDI opportunities. We then discuss plausible firm-level justifications for China's outward FDI, its importance, and promising avenues for further research.

An overview on oxyfuel coal combustion—State of the art research and technology development

Abstract: Oxyfuel combustion is seen as one of the major options for CO2 capture for future clean coal technologies. The paper provides an overview on research activities and technology development through a fundamental research underpinning the Australia/Japan Oxyfuel Feasibility Project. Studies on oxyfuel combustion on a pilot-scale furnace and a laboratory scale drop tube furnace are presented and compared with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) predictions. The research has made several contributions to current knowledge, including; comprehensive assessment on oxyfuel combustion in a pilot-scale oxyfuel furnace, modifying the design criterion for an oxy retrofit by matching heat transfer, a new 4-grey gas model which accurately predicts emissivity of the gases in oxy-fired furnaces has been developed for furnace modelling, the first measurements of coal reactivity comparisons in air and oxyfuel at laboratory and pilot-scale; and predictions of observed delays in flame ignition in oxy-firing.