Unison

In music, unison is two or more musical parts sounding the same pitch or at an octave interval, usually at the same time.

Rhythmic patterns which are homorhythmic are also called unison.

Interval of the unison

Unison or perfect unison (also called a prime, or perfect prime) may refer to the (pseudo-)interval formed by a tone and its duplication (in German, Unisono, Einklang, or Prime), for example C–C, as differentiated from the second, C–D, etc. In the unison the two pitches have the ratio of 1:1 or 0 half steps and zero cents. Although two tones in unison are considered to be the same pitch, they are still perceivable as coming from separate sources, whether played on instruments of a different type:  play unison on C, piano and guitar ; or of the same type:  play unison on C, two pianos . This is because a pair of tones in unison come from different locations and/or can have different "colors" (timbres), i.e. come from different musical instruments or human voices. Voices with different colors have, as sound waves, different waveforms. These waveforms have the same fundamental frequency but differ in the amplitudes of their higher harmonics. The unison is considered the most consonant interval while the near unison is considered the most dissonant. The unison is also the easiest interval to tune. The unison is abbreviated as P1.

UNISON

UNISON is the second largest trade union in the United Kingdom with almost 1.3 million members.

The union was formed in 1993 when three public sector trade unions, the National and Local Government Officers Association (NALGO), the National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) and the Confederation of Health Service Employees (COHSE) merged.

UNISON's current general secretary is Dave Prentis. He was elected on 28 February 2000 and took up the post on 1 January 2001, succeeding Rodney Bickerstaffe who had held the post for five years.

Members and organisation

Members of UNISON are typically from industries within the public sector and generally cover both full-time and part-time support and administrative staff. The majority of people joining UNISON would be workers within areas such as local government, education, the National Health Service Registered Nurses, NHS Managers & Clinical Support Workers. The union also admits ancillary staff such as Health Care Assistants and Assistant Practitioners, including Allied Health Professionals. Probation services, police services, utilities (such as gas, electricity and water), and transport. These 'Service Groups' all have their own national and regional democratic structures within UNISON's constitution.

Unison (video)

Unison is Celine Dion's first home video, released on VHS on July 2, 1991. It includes the music videos from her English debut album Unison.

This collection features never before used version of "Calling You," previously unreleased version of Dion's breakthrough hit "Where Does My Heart Beat Now" (Canadian black-and-white version mixed with the U.S. performance version), plus exclusive interviews with Dion at her home.

Three videos: "Délivre-moi," "Have a Heart," and "Calling You" were filmed during the Unison Tour at the Winter Garden Theatre in Toronto, Canada, and later shown in the 1991 MusiMax TV special.

In the United States, the U.S. version of "(If There Was) Any Other Way" from 1991 was included; in Canada, the Canadian version from 1990. This VHS was made in both English and in French. The two contain similar interviews conducted in both languages.

Unison home video was certified Gold in Canada.

Track listing

Certifications

Release history

References

Sod

Sod or turf is grass and the part of the soil beneath it held together by the roots, or a piece of thin material.

In British English such material is more usually known as turf, and the word "sod" is limited mainly to agricultural senses (for example for turf when ploughed).

Uses

Sod is typically used for lawns, golf courses, and sports stadiums around the world. In residential construction, it is sold to landscapers, home builders or home owners who use it to establish a lawn quickly and avoid soil erosion. Sod can be used to repair a small area of lawn, golf course, or athletic field that has died. Sod is also effective in increasing cooling, improving air and water quality, and assisting in flood prevention by draining water.

Scandinavia has a long history of employing sod roofing and a traditional house type is the Icelandic turf house.

Following passage of the Homestead Act by the US Congress in 1862, settlers in the Great Plains used sod bricks to build entire sod houses. While it might be hard for some to imagine sod as a suitable primary building material, the prairie sod of the Great Plains was so dense and difficult to cut it earned the nickname Nebraska marble. Blacksmith John Deere made his fortune when he became the first to make a plow that could reliably cut the prairie sod.

SOD1

Superoxide dismutase [Cu-Zn] also known as superoxide dismutase 1 or SOD1 is an enzyme that in humans is encoded by the SOD1 gene, located on chromosome 21. SOD1 is one of three human superoxide dismutases. It is implicated in apoptosis and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Structure

SOD1 is a 32 kDa homodimer which forms a β-barrel and contains an intramolecular disulfide bond and a binuclear Cu/Zn site in each subunit. This Cu/Zn site holds the copper and a zinc ion and is responsible for catalyzing the disproportionation of superoxide to hydrogen peroxide and dioxygen. The maturation process of this protein is complex and not fully understood, involving the selective binding of copper and zinc ions, formation of the intra-subunit disulfide bond between Cys-57 and Cys-146, and dimerization of the two subunits. The copper chaperone for Sod1 (CCS) facilitates copper insertion and disulfide oxidation. Though SOD1 is synthesized in the cytosol can mature there, the fraction of expressed, and still immature, SOD1 targeted to the mitochondria must be inserted into the intermembrane space. There, it forms the disulfide bond, though not metallation, required for its maturation. The mature protein is highly stable, but unstable when in its metal-free and disulfide-reduced forms. This manifests in vitro, as the loss of metal ions results in increased SOD1 aggregation, and in disease models, where low metallation is observed for insoluble SOD1. Moreover, the surface-exposed reduced cysteines could participate in disulfide crosslinking and, thus, aggregation.

SOD2

Superoxide dismutase 2, mitochondrial (SOD2), also known as manganese-dependent superoxide dismutase (MnSOD), is an enzyme which in humans is encoded by the SOD2 gene on chromosome 6.

Structure

The SOD2 gene contains five exons interrupted by four introns, an uncharacteristic 5′-proximal promoter that possesses a GC-rich region in place of the TATA or CAAT, and an enhancer in the second intron. The proximal promoter region contains multiple binding sites for transcription factors, including specific-1 (Sp1), activator protein 2 (AP-2), and early growth response 1 (Egr-1). This gene is a the mitochondrial member of the iron/manganese superoxide dismutase family. It encodes a mitochondrial matrix protein that forms a homotetramer and binds one manganese ion per subunit. The manganese site forms a trigonal bipyramidal geometry with four ligands from the protein and a fifth solvent ligand. This solvent ligand is a hydroxide believed to serve as the electron acceptor of the enzyme. The active site cavity consists of a network of side chains of several residues associated by hydrogen bonding, extending from the aqueous ligand of the metal. Of note, the highly conserved residue Tyr34 plays a key role in the hydrogen-bonding network, as nitration of this residue inhibits the protein's catalytic ability. This protein also possesses an N-terminal mitochondrial leader sequence which targets it to the mitochondrial matrix, where it converts mitochondrial-generated reactive oxygen species from the respiratory chain to H2.Alternate transcriptional splice variants, encoding different isoforms, have been characterized.