Summary
Rhinoviruses were isolated in 14 of 87 respiratory episodes that occurred in 24 of 44 patients with chronic bronchitis studied for periods up to 2½ yr. Thirteen of these infections were associated with exacerbations of bronchitis. The virus in seven rhinovirus-positive sputum specimens was assayed, and detailed studies of the neutralising antibody responses of the bronchitics to their rhinovirus infections were made. The results suggest that rhinoviruses multiply in the lower respiratory tract and probably stimulate a greater antibody response than that found in non-bronchitic adults. There was no evidence that the rhinoviruses found in the bronchitics were different from those circulating in the normal population. Three of the rhinoviruses belonged to known serotypes and ten of the remaining 11 belonged to eight other types. Representative strains of these eight types have been characterised and submitted as possibly new rhinovirus serotypes.


Higgs boson production in association with heavy quarks is one of the most important discovery channels for Higgs particles in the Standard Model and its super-symmetric extension at the LHC pp collider. We review the status of the Higgs boson studies, with particular emphasis on the case bbh and tth production. We present results for the total cross section at Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in both single and double parton scattering mechanism.


CONTROL ID: TITLE: Role of IL-1 and the gut-lung axis in sterile inflammation following lung ischemia reperfusion injury AUTHORS (FIRST NAME, LAST NAME): Arun Prakash 1 , Xiaoli Tian 1 , and Judith Hellman 1 ABSTRACT BODY: Background: Ischemia reperfusion (IR) injury is a source of sterile inflammation that can complicate the clinical course of severely injured trauma patients in shock, organ transplantation, and thrombotic/embolic events. The lungs are a portal to the external environment and a barrier organ. As such, they are vulnerable to infectious and sterile insults that can be life threatening if their ability to deliver oxygen and eliminate CO2 are compromised. We previously demonstrated a role for the gut microbiome in modulating this inflammatory process in vivo and in priming alveolar macrophages. Methods: We used an in vivo model of left pulmonary artery occlusion to examine the inflammation generated in mice either genetically deficient or pharmacologically inhibited in IL-1 release or signaling pathways. We also challenged alveolar macrophages and endothelial cells in vitro with colonic lumen filtrates from antibiotic treated and control mice to determine whether shed LPS and metabolites are among the priming factor(s) for alveolar macrophages. Results/Conclusions: Using knockout mice and inhibitor studies, we have determined that the inflammasome regulates lung IR-induced sterile inflammation. Specifically, the NLRP3 inflammasome, IL-1 release, and downstream IL-1 signaling are important factors in the generation of lung IR inflammation. Finally, we believe that the exponentially higher level of shed LPS in mice with a full complement of gut microbiota, as well as levels of short chain fatty acids, such as butyrate, may intriguingly explain the priming of alveolar macrophages that results in IL- 1 production. Together this may constitute a gut-lung axis of communication that modulates the lung IR sterile inflammatory process.


Prior research on intelligent Internet agents has failed to address the needs of long-lived data-collecting agents, focusing instead on short-lived transaction agents. Transaction agents typically run for a few seconds and retrieve information for a single transaction. With the staggering growth of electronic commerce, researchers and practitioners will want to design long-lived data-collecting agents that intelligently search for, retrieve, interpret, categorize, and store vast amounts of related information each time that they run. Such agents can run over the course of days rather than seconds and can be used by practitioners for decision support applications or by researchers as part of an empirical research methodology. This paper proposes a framework for agent sophistication, and emphasizes a number of design concepts for long-lived Internet agents, including intelligence, validation, concurrency, recovery, monitoring, and interactivity. These concepts are used in the development of an illustrative tool called Electronic Data Retrieval LexicaL Agent (eDRILL), an object-oriented data-collecting agent. eDRILL is designed using the Unified Modeling Language (UML) and is written in Java. It gathers research data from an online auction.


The surgical indications for
dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) remain controversial, not including cardiac transplantation
and mechanical circulatory support. We describe a case of idiopathic DCM that
underwent successful surgical treatment using a modified left
ventriculectomy, modification of the Batista procedure. The patient was a
63-year-old man who suffered from heart failure, New York Heart Association (NYHA) Class IV. Heart failure was derived
from idiopathic DCM with a severely compromised left ventricular
function complicated by left ventricular thrombosis. He underwent successful
surgical treatment, specifically partial left ventriculectomy combined with the
papillary muscle approximation, and the postoperative course was uneventful. He
has been well with NYHA Class I for 3 years
after the operation without heart failure.


Recently with the development of more affordable 3D acquisition systems and the availability of 3D face databases, 3D face recognition has been attracting interest to tackle the limitations in performance of most existing 2D systems. In this research, we introduce a robust automated 3D Face recognition system that implements 3D data of faces with different facial expressions, hair, shoulders, clothing, etc., extracts features for discrimination and uses machine learning techniques to make the final decision. A novel system for automatic processing for 3D facial data has been implemented using multi stage architecture; in a pre-processing and registration stage the data was standardized, spikes were removed, holes were filled and the face area was extracted. Then the nose region, which is relatively more rigid than other facial regions in an anatomical sense, was automatically located and analysed by computing the precise location of the symmetry plane. Then useful facial features and a set of effective 3D curves were extracted. Finally, the recognition and matching stage was implemented by using CCNN and SVM for classification, and the KNN algorithms for matching.


Candida species have been implicated as significant contributors to morbidity in the neonatal period and are associated with 25-50% of mortality in invasive neonatal candidiasis. Peritoneal candidiasis, being paucisymptomatic, cannot often be correctly identified in a preterm neonate. The correct approach to diagnosis of neonatal peritoneal candidiasis is taking into account the epidemiology along with a strong clinical suspicion and appropriate timely diagnostic interventions. We report a case of fatal neonatal peritoneal candidiasis which was misdiagnosed as mucormycosis.


Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is a novel aerospace concept involving drones and Personal Air Vehicles (PAVs) operating in a densely populated urban environment. Most of such vehicles will be electric-powered and rotor-based, creating a distinct sound in the proposed setting of a city. Public
 acceptability, partially due to noise impact, is a valid concern for the introduction of UAM. To evaluate human perception and noise annoyance of these vehicles, a study is set up that comprises audio-only and combined audio-visual stimuli of hovering and fly-over events using a Virtual Reality
 experiment. For both types of stimuli, two ambient environments, recorded with synchronized spherical video and ambisonics audio, are provided as background: a louder urban street environment, and a quieter urban street environment. In addition to the drone sounds, more familiar sounds are
 also evaluated, namely a helicopter and a lawnmower sound, with and without a visualisation. Test subjects are asked about their noise sensitivity according to a shortened Weinstein scale, and their attitude towards drones using a separate questionnaire at the end of the experiment. [Note
 from authors: The laboratory study is ongoing and the first results are being analysed. The final results are expected well before the paper deadline. This abstract will be complemented with the main results and conclusions.]


Objective To evaluate the clinical value of noninvasive positive-pressure ventilation (NPPV) treatment in acute respiratory distress syndrome caused by acute pancreatitis. Methods A retrospective study of 27 cases, with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) caused by acute paucreatitis,who were admitted to our department from Jan 2007 to May 2010 and treated with NPPV, was performed. The changes of heart rate, respiratory rate, PaO2, oxygenation index (OI) and PaCO2 before and after treatment were compared. Results The heart rate, respiratory rate of 25(92.6% ) patients decreased from (118.4 ±13.4)/min, (32.1 ± 1.7)/min to ( 81.9 + 8.5 )/min, ( 19.9 ± 2.1 )/min; PaO2, OI and PaCO2 increased from (74.1 ±5.0)mmHg, (148.2 +10.0)mmHg, (28.7 ±1.6)mmHg to (110.4 ±20.8)mmHg, (204.5±71.1)mmHg, (38.4 +3.6)mmHg 48 h after NPPV, respectively, and they recovered and were transited to oxygen supply by Venturi mask. 2 (7.4%) patients deteriorated and were transited to invasive positive-pressure ventilation support. Conclusions NPPV could effectively improve oxygenation of patients with ARDS caused by acute pancreatitis. The procedure of NPPV is relatively easy to use and to learn with few complications, and worth of clinical application.

Key words:
Pancreatitis;  Respiratory distress syndrome, adult;  Retrospective studies; Noninvasive positive-pressure ventilation


Autistic children need special attention, one of the most self-sufficient everyday activities of self-reliance, the training toilet. The self-reliance toilet training in autistic children is very low because of developments that affect their brain function. But it can be enhanced by the proper learning methods it can afford. The study was to improve training toilet skills by training methods for elementary school children in SDIT Luqman Padang. The method used in the study is experimental methods through the design of the single subject research (SSR) approach A-B-A. The data collection technique used was by observation, by direct observation of the development of the child training toilet. Research shows that practice methods can improve toilet training skills on autic children shown with changes in the ability increased from the baseline (A1), the intervention (B) and the baseline (A2) phase. The increased ability of the autic toilet training children can be seen from the percentage of achievement obtained ata child's initial ability (A1) children get 16%, the intervention results (B) go up to 72% and the baseline (A2) result gets 88%.


OBJECTIVE
To analyze the frequency of chromosomal anomalies or 22q11 microdeletion in patients with congenital heart defects and other congenital anomalies; to describe the clinical phenotype of children with the 22q11 microdeletion and with chromosomal anomalies; to evaluate patients' clinical evolution; and to provide genetic counseling for families.

METHODS
The study included 46 patients with congenital heart defects and other anomalies and patients with a phenotype consistent with 22q11 microdeletion observed between 1999 and 2001. Confirmation of the heart defect was accomplished through echocardiography, magnetic resonance angiography or cardiac catheterization. Karyotyping with high resolution banding and detection of 22q11 microdeletion with FISH techniques were performed. We excluded patients with trisomy 21, 13 and 18, 45,X and deletion of 7q11.23. Patients with 22q11 microdeletion underwent immunology studies and evaluation of parathyroid function. Clinical evolution was evaluated. Chromosome and FISH studies were performed on parents of affected children (25 couples).

RESULTS
Forty-six children were included, of whom twelve (26.1%) had chromosomal anomalies (group A), fourteen (30.4%) had 22q11 microdeletion (group B) and the remaining twenty (43.5%) had normal karyotype and negative FISH studies (group C). In group A septal heart defects predominated. This group had significant morbidity, with surgical correction in three patients, early development of pulmonary hypertension, failure to thrive and serious neurological problems. Two patients died. In group B conotruncal heart defects (7/14) and ventricular septal defects (5/14, two associated with cervical aortic arch) predominated. The most significant morbidity was related to cardiac pathology, with surgical correction in seven cases (50%). Immune function defects and parathyroid function problems were mild, requiring no therapeutic measures. One patient died.

CONCLUSION
In the presence of heart defects associated with other congenital anomalies, karyotyping is mandatory and if clinical features are compatible, 22q11 microdeletion should be specifically sought with FISH techniques. Detection of chromosomal anomalies has a significant impact on prognosis and follow-up of patients, as well as on genetic counseling of families.


The material bone consists of a biopolymer matrix (collagen) reinforced with mineral nanoparticles (carbonated hydroxylapatite), forming a natural composite which builds up a dense shell on the exterior and a network of struts with a mean diameter of 200µm in the core of many bones. The architecture of the foamy inner part of bones (spongiosa) is determined by loading conditions. The architecture strongly influences the mechanical properties of cellular solids together with the apparent density and the material it consists of. In addition, the ingrowth of bone cells into porous implants depends on pore size, size distribution and interconnectivity. From this it is clear that the possibility to design the architecture of a bone replacement material is beneficial from a biological as well as a mechanical point of view. Our approach uses rapid prototyping methods, ceramic gelcasting and sintering to produce cellular structures with designed architecture from hydroxylapatite and other bioceramics. The influence of sintering temperature and atmosphere on the physical properties of these scaffolds was investigated with x-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy. Furthermore, the cell ingrowth behaviour was determined in cell culture experiments, using the praeosteoblastic cell line MC3T3-E1, derived from mouse calvariae. The cell ingrowth behaviour was evaluated during a culture period of two and three weeks, by light microscopy and afterwards by histology after embedding and Giemsa-staining. The phase composition of the material was found to change with increasing sintering temperature and its surface characteristics was influenced by the sintering atmosphere. These changes also affected the cell ingrowth behaviour. In some experiments, the osteoblasts-like cells were found to cover the whole external and internal surface of the scaffold. The cells produced extracellular matrix consisting of collagen, which eventually filled nearly all the pores. In particular, the cells had the tendency to fill any crack or opening in the scaffolds, and to generally smooth the surfaces. In conclusion, rapid prototyping and ceramic gelcasting allows the freeform fabrication of porous bioceramics with controlled architecture. Such structures made of hydroxylapatit were found to support the growth of mouse osteoblasts.


Identification of genes contributing to mouse seizure susceptibility can reveal novel genes or pathways that provide insight into human epilepsy. Using mouse chromosome substitution strains and interval‐specific congenic strains (ISCS), we previously identified an interval conferring pilocarpine‐induced limbic seizure susceptibility on distal mouse chromosome 10 (Ch10). We narrowed the region by generating subcongenics with smaller A/J Ch10 segments on a C57BL/6J (B6) background and tested them with pilocarpine. We also tested pilocarpine‐susceptible congenics for 6‐Hz ECT (electroconvulsive threshold), another model of limbic seizure susceptibility, to determine whether the susceptibility locus might have a broad effect on neuronal hyperexcitability across more than one mode of limbic seizure induction. The ISCS Line 1, which contained the distal 2.7 Mb segment from A/J (starting at rs29382217), was more susceptible to both pilocarpine and ECT. Line 2, which was a subcongenic of Line 1 (starting at rs13480828), was not susceptible, thus defining a 1.0 Mb critical region that was unique to Line 1. Bioinformatic approaches identified 45 human orthologs within the unique Line 1 susceptibility region, the majority syntenic to human Ch12. Applying an epilepsy network analysis of known and suspected excitability genes and examination of interstrain genomic and brain expression differences revealed novel candidates within the region. These include Stat2, which plays a role in hippocampal GABA receptor expression after status epilepticus, and novel candidates Pan2, Cdk2, Gls2 and Cs, which are involved in neural cell differentiation, cellular remodeling and embryonic development. Our strategy may facilitate discovery of novel human epilepsy genes.


The design of tilted, decentered, and non-rotationally symmetric or freeform optical systems has become an important part of optical design. We explore desensitization of traditional and freeform optical designs and compare them.


Abstract We present an efficient method for answering one-dimensional range and closest-point queries in a verifiable and privacy-preserving manner. We consider a model where a data owner outsources a dataset of key-value pairs to a server, who answers range and closest-point queries issued by a client and provides proofs of the answers. The client verifies the correctness of the answers while learning nothing about the dataset besides the answers to the current and previous queries. Our work yields for the first time a zero-knowledge privacy assurance to authenticated range and closest-point queries. Previous work leaked the size of the dataset and used an inefficient proof protocol. Our construction is based on hierarchical identity-based encryption. We prove its security and analyze its efficiency both theoretically and with experiments on synthetic and real data (Enron email and Boston taxi datasets).


Introduction The present rapid rate of increase in the size and mobility of the American population concerns art education as imperatively as it concerns all education. High birth rates among the low-income groups, the rapidly increasing shift of population from rural to urban areas, and the rise in economic status of peoples still denied social equality occur while mass media urge the achievement of status and "happiness" through acquisition of material things. These factors, together with others, contribute to the situation in which those who face social rejection and economic privation find themselves. The rejection of economically and socially deprived children, by the same society that makes them go to school .to prepare for a life they are not encouraged to enter, increases their hostility to society and tends to lead to withdrawal from it. Appropriate education can help these children improve the quality of their experience, and art education has a particularly import~nt role to play in their education.


ABSTRACT Future increases in need of old-age care warrant research on receipt of informal care among older people in different policy and cultural contexts. Separating informal care into help provided by spouse and by children may shed more light on dynamics of informal help, important in alleviating the demands on the formal sector. Using nationally representative data from England and Finland, we performed logistic regression analyses to study receipt of help from spouse and children among community-dwelling persons aged 70+ years with functional limitations. In both countries, women and those with more functional limitations had higher odds of receiving spousal and filial help. In England – but not in Finland – those receiving formal public help had lower odds of receiving spousal help than those with no formal help. Those with low education received more filial help in England, but no association was found between formal and filial help. In Finland, the effect of education was not significant but those receiving formal help had higher odds of also receiving filial help. The results suggest that in a liberal market-led state, the role of children may be to help their parents living alone and with low financial resources. In the context of a generous welfare state, children may function more as active agents bridging the gap between their parents and formal services.


Background Annually about 280,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer. Treatment options depend on age, comorbidities, tumor stage, grade, size, and other factors. Often, patients must decide between two surgical treatment options: mastectomy or lumpectomy-with-radiation herein simply called a lumpectomy. Since both offer similar survival outcomes, the choice ultimately is the patient's. However, most rely on inputs from doctors, family, friends, personal research, and other actions. We believe decision-making processes for future patients will be aided if experiences of prior breast cancer survivors are known. This study's aim is to provide such information. Methods Feedback from prior breast cancer survivors was obtained using a 19-question survey distributed online to multiple breast cancer support groups. It focused on issues relevant to choosing between the two surgical options including, post-surgical complications, breast reconstruction, chronic pain, cosmetics, and surgery-choice satisfaction. Results Respondents (N=1606) had a median age of 49 years (range 26 to 88 years) and had a median body mass index (BMI) of 26.6 Kg/m2. There were 978 mastectomy patients (60.9%) and 628 lumpectomy patients (39.1%). With regard to post-surgical reconstruction, 64.2% of mastectomy respondents and 13.5% of lumpectomy respondents decided to undergo breast cancer reconstruction following breast cancer surgery. Almost all (99.8%) of lumpectomy respondents had radiation side-effects; with skin irritation and thickening and chest wall tenderness being the most common. Among mastectomy patients, 94.3% had one or more complications; loss-or-changes in nipple or breast sensation, uneven breasts, chest wall tenderness, and breast swelling were the most common complications. Post-surgical pain lasting six months or more was experienced by a smaller percentage of mastectomy vs. lumpectomy patients (64.1% vs. 78%, p <0.00001). Mastectomy patients were also less likely to have pain that was persistent and present up to the time of the survey (35.4% vs. 46.0%, p=0.0002). With respect to cosmetic outcomes, mastectomy patients vs. lumpectomy patients were less likely to be either satisfied or very satisfied (52.2% vs. 62.7%, p=0.00004). Overall satisfaction of surgical treatment was 70.9% for mastectomy patients and 68.6% for lumpectomy patients. Conclusion Based on the experiences of these breast cancer survivors, mastectomy is associated with less chronic pain frequency and lower incidence of post-surgical side effects compared to lumpectomy. However, mastectomy is associated with lower cosmetic satisfaction. Breast cancer survivors that underwent a lumpectomy, reported being more satisfied with cosmetic outcomes but almost all reported radiation side-effects with skin thickening listed as the most common. Lumpectomy was also associated with higher chronic pain frequency compared to mastectomy. The overall surgical treatment satisfaction reported by mastectomy and lumpectomy respondents was similar. The composite findings will provide information that will aid future breast cancer patients in making a decision between having a mastectomy or a lumpectomy.


The purpose of this study was to investigate the prevalence of the fundamental attribution error among leisure education programs that were treated as independent variables as part of research during the past 10 years (1999-2009). The fundamental attribution error is the tendency to overestimate dispositional or internal attributions of a person when explaining or modifying behavior, and to underestimate the influence of the actual situation or other environmental factors (Ross, 1977). Drawing on a past study that examined the fundamental attribution error in leisure education from 1978 – 1998 (Dieser, Fox, & Walker, 2002), this study examined how leisure education learning components (n = 38) described in studies of leisure education interventions were conceptualized from 1999-2009. Results suggest that, with respect to research-oriented leisure education programs, that leisure education research is still committing the fundamental attribution error. Recommendations regarding future leisure education practice and research are provided.


Parkinson's disease is a nosological entity of unknown origin for which, in some cases, a possible pathogenetic role for mitochondrial dysfunction has been postulated. Two young onset parkinsonian patients with mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) deletions in skeletal muscle are reported on. Patient 1 also presented with increased blood creatine kinase and lactate concentrations and a family history which included a wide range of phenotypes affecting multiple systems. Patient 2 presented with multiple symmetric lipomatosis. Histopathological investigation showed ragged red fibres and COX negative fibres in muscle biopsies from both patients. The data support the hypothesis that mitochondrial DNA mutations may occur in some cases of parkinsonism, suggesting that a diagnosis of a mitochondrial disorder should be considered in the presence of consistent family history and clinical symptoms.


The study of migration too often ignores the ways that labour migrants' emotional entanglements and complicated personal relationships factor into their experiences of being people on the move. In examining post-Soviet migrant women's relationships with Turkish men and the ways these are regulated in Turkey, in this article I consider how intimate practices of marriage and performances of 'love' have emerged as key aspects of transnational mobility. These intimate practices both enable long-term transnational circuits between post-Soviet homelands and Turkey, and attest to the way global capitalism is redefining personal lives.


BACKGROUNDS AND AIMS
Paraoxonase 1 (PON1) is a novel marker that has been shown to exert protective functions on atherosclerosis by preventing oxidative modification of serum lipoproteins. In this study, we investigated the effects of PON1 on CA-IMT in renal transplant patients.

METHODS
A total of 98 adult renal transplant recipients was enrolled in the study. CA-IMT was determined by B-mode Doppler ultrasonography. PON-1 activity was assessed by the rate of enzymatic hydrolysis of paraoxon to p-nitrophenol.

RESULTS
Mean age was 39.4 ± 9.6 years and 10% of the patients were diabetic. Time after transplant was 76 ± 59 months. Mean PON1 level was 62.1 ± 43.3 U/l. PON1 levels were negatively correlated with CA-IMT and positively with HDL cholesterol. Mean CA-IMT was 0.62 ± 0.10 mm (0.40 - 0.98). CA-IMT was positively correlated with age, male gender and negatively with proteinuria and PON1 levels. In linear regression analysis, PON1 levels were associated with CA-IMT.

CONCLUSION
Reduced PON1 activity is significantly associated with increased carotid atherosclerosis in renal transplant patients.


Large-scale environmental gradients have been invaluable for unraveling the processes shaping the evolution and maintenance of biodiversity. Environmental gradients provide a natural setting to test theories about species diversity and distributions within a landscape with changing biotic and abiotic interactions. Elevational gradients are particularly useful because they often encompass a large climatic range within a small geographical extent. Here, we analyzed tree communities in plots located throughout Arunachal Pradesh, a province in northeast India located on the southern face of the Eastern Himalayas, representing one of the largest elevational gradients in the world. Using indices of species and phylogenetic diversity, we described shifts in community structure across the landscape and explored the putative biotic and abiotic forces influencing species assembly. As expected, species richness and phylogenetic diversity decreased with increasing elevation; however, contrary to predictions of environmental filtering, species relatedness did not show any clear trend. Nonetheless, patterns of beta diversity (both taxonomic and phylogenetic) strongly suggest lineage filtering along the elevational gradient. Our results may be explained if filtering is driving the assembly of species from distinct evolutionary lineages. New metrics exploring community contributions to regional taxonomic and phylogenetic beta diversity provided additional evidence for the persistence of unique communities at high elevations. We suggest that these patterns may be consistent with filtering on glacial relicts, part of once more diverse clades with convergent traits suited to climates at the last glacial maximum, resulting in random or over-dispersed community assemblages at high elevations. We propose that these high-elevation sites with evolutionarily distinct species represent possible regions for conservation priority that may provide refugia for species threatened by current warming trends.


Household members of 46 patients with confirmed acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) and 43 human T-cell lymphotropic virus type III/lymphadenopathy-associated virus (HTLV-III/LAV)-seronegative controls from Kinshasa, Zaire, were identified and sought for serologic testing for evidence of HTLV-III/LAV infection. Twenty (9.8%) of 204 case-household members and three (1.9%) of 155 control-household members were HTLV-III/LAV seropositive (relative risk = 5.1; 95% confidence interval, 1.7 to 15.2). Eleven (61.1%) of 18 spouses of patients with AIDS were HTLV-III/LAV seropositive, compared with one (3.7%) of 27 control spouses (relative risk = 16.5; 95% confidence interval, 3.7 to 75.0). Except for spouses, the rate of HTLV-III/LAV seropositivity did not differ significantly between case and control households. Furthermore, for adults in case households who were not spouses, the number seropositive for HTLV-III/LAV was identical to that predicted from sex- and age-specific HTLV-III/LAV seroprevalence rates. These data from Zaire confirm the results of US and European studies of household contacts of infected hemophiliacs and pediatric patients with AIDS.


Purpose: The purpose of this study were to 1) degree of the aging anxiety 2) to identify predictors influencing aging anxiety of the elderly. Method: Data were collected from 179 elders & utilizing questionnaires developed by Watkins, Coates, and Ferroni(1998). Data were analyzed using SPSS/Win 10.0 program and descriptive statistics t-test ANOVA were adopted as necessary. Result: Degree of the aging anxiety were 33-60scores, mean 49.96 scores. There were significant differeence in aging anxiety scores according to relegion, and disease. conclusion : The result of this study show the aging anxiety in a improtant factor in explaining psychological health, and development of adequate intervention for the elderly population to decrease the aging anxiety.


For the first time, we studied the applicability of a conditioning-based model to a heterogeneous data set composed of expression values for microRNA, total mRNA and polysomal mRNA resulting from experiments about two dietary contexts. The results suggest that some of the microRNAs are likely to be involved in the regulation of a large set of genes and not just their putative targets. Furthermore, the regulatory activities of intestinal microRNA appear to be dependent on the sub-cellular location of mRNA within the cell.


Background. Understanding the causes of accidents plays a major role in learning from accidents and developing accident prevention and control strategies. Objective. This study aimed at application and modification of the Tripod Beta method for analyzing accident causes in the oil and gas industries. Materials and methods. A total of 68 accidents occurring in the oil and gas industries during 2005–2016 were analyzed. For this purpose, we used the Tripod Beta method and modified it using Reason's Swiss cheese model and analysis accident results. Results. The main causes that have been ignored in the Tripod Beta method were supervision factors involved in 66% of the accidents (underlying causes) and unsafe conditions that contributed to 55% of accidents (immediate causes). The former was incorporated as a sublayer of the underlying cause and the latter as a sublayer of immediate cause to the modified Tripod Beta method. Conclusions. The results of the present study added to the knowledge on the causes of accidents. These results can help increase the capabilities of the Tripod Beta method for analyzing accident causes, such as supervision factors and unsafe conditions, which have been ignored in analyses performed using the Tripod Beta method.


Massarigenin A (1) and papyracillic acids A (2) and B (3) were isolated from the endophytic fungus Microsphaeropsis sp. Their structures were elucidated by multidimensional nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy; the structure of massarigenin A (1) was also confirmed by X-ray crystallography. The absolute configuration of massarigenin A (1) was established by means of circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy and time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT) calculations. The impact of intermolecular hydrogen bonds detected in the crystal packing of 1 on CD spectra measured in the solid state was also investigated.


EcologyBotanists and biologists have long grounded their understanding of the natural world on long-term projects such as the Madidi Project, which measures tree growth in a Bolivian forest that is one of the largest, most diverse protected areas on the planet. Recurrent surveys of the same communities generate data that help researchers figure out how species interact in the face of environmental change or nearby human activity. As climate change descends upon us, it's becoming critical to identify factors influencing tree survival. Trees can shift their range when threatened in their current habitat, say by long-term drought or a more competitive species. Through seed dispersal and other regeneration mechanisms, trees can move to a better area. Otherwise, to survive, they must adapt, evolving traits better suited to the new conditions. The choices will determine the biodiversity of future forests.


Background This paper describes methods developed to assess occupational exposure to pesticide active ingredients and chemical groups, harmonised across cohort studies included in the first AGRICOH pooling project, focused on the risk of lymph-haematological malignancies. Methods Three prospective agricultural cohort studies were included: US Agricultural Health Study (AHS), French Agriculture and Cancer Study (AGRICAN) and Cancer in the Norwegian Agricultural Population (CNAP). Self-reported pesticide use was collected in AHS. Crop-exposure matrices (CEMs) were developed for AGRICAN and CNAP. We explored the potential impact of these differences in exposure assessment by comparing a CEM approach estimating exposure in AHS with self-reported pesticide use. Results In AHS, 99% of participants were considered exposed to pesticides, 68% in AGRICAN and 63% in CNAP. For all cohorts combined (n=316 270), prevalence of exposure ranged from 19% to 59% for 14 chemical groups examined, and from 13% to 46% for 33 active ingredients. Exposures were highly correlated within AGRICAN and CNAP where CEMs were applied; they were less correlated in AHS. Poor agreement was found between self-reported pesticide use and assigned exposure in AHS using a CEM approach resembling the assessment for AGRICAN (κ −0.00 to 0.33) and CNAP (κ −0.01 to 0.14). Conclusions We developed country-specific CEMs to assign occupational exposure to pesticides in cohorts lacking self-reported data on the use of specific pesticides. The different exposure assessment methods applied may overestimate or underestimate actual exposure prevalence, and additional work is needed to better estimate how far the exposure estimates deviate from reality.


Structured overlay networks are widely used as platforms for distributed systems. However, in a high churn situation, it is highly costly to maintain the structure and service availability of an overlay network because there is a limitation in churn handling. Several cooperation mechanisms among overlay networks are proposed to improve service availability of overlay networks in a high-churn situation. Several cooperation mechanisms are proposed among overlay networks. The cooperation mechanisms can group structured overlay networks to simplify routing functions. However, the existing mechanisms do not consider managing churn information among overlay networks. In this paper, we propose a new framework that can share states of the nodes and spread churn information to neighbor nodes among different overlay networks. Using our framework, we are able to maintain each overlay network effectively and improve the reachability of messages under churn. We evaluate our framework with Chord, Kademlia, and Pastry. Our framework improves the detection time of churn by about 30% and decreases the stabilization messages by about 30-40%. We discuss combinatorial effects of the sharing state of the nodes among different overlay networks.


This paper addresses the potential speedup achieved by using decimal floating-point hardware, instead of software routines, on a high-performance superscalar architecture. Software routines were written to perform decimal addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Cycle counts were then measured for each instruction using the Simplescalar simulator. After this, new hardware algorithms were developed, existing hardware algorithms were analyzed, and cycle counts were estimated for the same set of instructions using specialized decimal floating-point hardware. This data was then used to show the potential speedup obtained for programs with different instruction mixes and a previously developed benchmark.


In the semiconductor industry, the testing section has always played an important role. The testing section often requires engineers to judge the defect, which wastes a lot of time and cost. The accurate classification can provide useful information for engineers through neural networks. In this paper, we present a method for wafer map data augmentation and defect classification. Data augmentation is based on CNN encoder-decoder and the classification is based on depthwise separable convolutions. There are two datasets used, one is open dataset WM-811K and the other is built with a Taiwan company. We train two models with mobilenetV1 and V2 for the different datasets. The light-weight deep convolution can reduce model parameters and calculations, which is very efficient for the testing house with large production volumes. On two different data sets, our proposed method can reduce the number of parameters by 30% and 95%, and reduce the amount of calculation by 75% and 25%, respectively. The test accuracy of the first dataset is 93.95%. The second dataset test accuracy is 87.04%. After the data augmentation, accuracy is increased to 97.01% and 95.09%, respectively.


Recent work in the field of medical simulation have led to real advances in the mechanical simulation of organs. However, it is important to notice that, despite the major role they may have in the interaction between organs, the connective tissues are often left out of these simulations. In this paper, we propose a model which can rely on either a mesh based or a meshless methods. To provide a realistic simulation of these tissues, our work is based on the weak form of continuum mechanics equations for hyperelastic soft materials. Furthermore, the stability of deformable objects simulation is ensured by an implicit temporal integration scheme. Our method allows to model these tissues without prior assumption on the dimension of their of their geometry (curve, surface or volume), and enables mechanical coupling between organs. To obtain an interactive frame rate, we develop a parallel version suitable for to GPU computation. Finally we demonstrate the proper convergence of our finite element scheme.


The interaction between combustion and flowfield in a rectangular scramjet combustor is investigated experimentally and numerically. The combustion mode is categorized into two modes ; one is intensive combustion (IC) mode and the other is weak combustion (WC) mode. In IC mode, large separation region is generated by the precombustion shock wave, and fuel is rolled up and transported toward the core of the main airflow. The combustion is controlled by the rate of mixing, and both the mixing efficiency and the combustion efficiency are high. On the other hand, in WC mode, the fuel reacts gradually in the shear layer at the downstream of the step and the rate of heat release is low. The combustion is controlled by the rate of chemical reaction of the mixture generated in the shear layer, and the mixing efficiency and the combustion efficiency remain low.


This paper deals with the characterization of the operation modes of the 2-RUU parallel ma-nipulator with an algebraic approach, namely the Study kinematic mapping of the Euclidean group SE(3). The manipulator is described by a set of eight constraint equations and the primary decomposition reveals that the mechanism has three 4-dof operation modes. The singularity conditions are obtained by deriving the determinant of the Jacobian matrix of the constraint equations with respect to the Study parameters. It is shown that there exist singular configurations in which the 2-RUU parallel manipulator may switch from one operation mode to another operation mode, which is known as constraint singularity. All the singular configurations are mapped onto the joint space and are physically interpreted. Eventually, the 2-RUU parallel manipulator may switch from the 1st Schonflies mode to the 2nd Schonflies mode, or vice versa, through the additional 4-dof mode that contains self-motion.


3-Aryl-2-methyl-quinazolin-4-ones 1 were treated with nitrofurfural diacetate 2 in presence of piperidine and drops of concentrated sulphuric acid to obtain 3-aryl-2-[(5-nitro-2- furfuryl)vinyl]quinazolin-4-ones 3 in fairly good yields. The structures of these compounds were confirmed on the basis of elemental analyses, IR, NMR and mass spectral data. These compounds were also tested for their antifungal activities.


The 5-HT1B receptors have been identified by radioligand binding techniques predominantly in the basal ganglia of the rat and mouse brain. A number of 5-HT receptor agonists have been shown to display high affinity but limited selectivity for the 5-HT1B recognition site. These include 5-CT, 5-HT, RU 24969, TFMPP, MCPP, and CGS 12066B. Antagonists at the 5-HT1B site include the drugs metitepin, metergoline, cyanopindolol, isamoltane, and propranolol but none of these drugs are selective for this receptor. Functional correlates of 5-HT1B receptor activation have been most closely defined in vitro. These include inhibition of transmitter release, inhibition of forskolin-stimulated adenylate cyclase and actions on the mouse urinary bladder strip and the rat vena cava. Many functional correlates of 5-HT1B receptor activation in vivo have been proposed, but convincing evidence from antagonist studies is generally lacking. The development of selective 5-HT1B receptor agonists and antagonists will be a key step in defining the physiological role of this receptor site in the brain and periphery of the mouse and rat although it must be realized that these compounds, if they are developed, are unlikely to have functional effects in man since the 5-HT1B recognition site is absent in the human CNS. Nevertheless many of these studies on the 5-HT1B receptor may aid the development of drugs acting at the 5-HT1D site since this receptor has been identified as being the equivalent of the 5-HT1B site in species other than the rat and mouse.


Novel alternating current electroluminescent devices with an asymmetric structure are successfully fabricated by using a hole-type polymer, poly(2,5-bis (dodecyloxy)-phenylenevinylene) (PDDOPV), and an electron-type polymer, poly(phenyl quinoxaline) (PPQ). The performance of the polymer devices with heterojunctions under ac operation is insensitive to the thickness of the two polymer layers, compared to that under dc operation. This new advantage means easy and cheap production facility on a large scale in the near future. Different emission spectra are obtained when our ac devices are operated in an ac mode, forward or reverse bias. The emission spectrum at reverse bias includes two parts: one from PDDOPV and the other from PPQ.


This paper presents an ethnographically sensitive account of a family of modal constructions in Sakapultek, a Mayan language spoken in highland Guatemala. The constructions in question share many characteristics with those that have been analyzed as ironic in English and are dubbed "moral irony," due both to their similarities to irony in other languages and to their primary interactional function. The morphosyntactic composition and semiotic processes involved in moral irony are described and the proposed account of these semiotic properties makes use of Goffman's distinction between author, animator and principal as dimensions of the speaker role. The indexical properties of moral irony are demonstrated and it is argued that they play a greater role in determining ironic meaning than speaker intentions. Using extended examples from naturally-occurring talk, the paper also demonstrates how irony functions in evaluative stance-taking in Sakapultek. Such examples illustrate both the relatively presupposing and entailing aspects of moral irony's indexical meaning. Moral irony is argued to be modal in that it projects hypothetical or unreal possible worlds and ironic in that it indirectly and negatively evaluates the stances of an imagined principal. Finally, on the ethnographic level, moral irony is examined in light of what it reveals about Sakapultek notions of moral personhood.


Results of a questionnaire study of the long-term effects of divorce in young adults of divorced parents indicate that depression is related to the young adult's perception of the parents, rather than to the divorce itself. Specifically, when the non-custodial parent is perceived as "lost," the young adult is more depressed. When a divorce occurs, the perception of the non-custodial father has been shown to change in a negative direction, while the perception of the mother (whether custodial or non-custodial) remains relatively stable. These results have implications for intervention.


A 59-year-old-woman complained of weight loss and abdominal pain. A CT scan revealed a 20 cm large retroperitoneal mass, and she was diagnosed with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma via biopsy of the mass. After 75% CHP therapy, she developed an acute abdomen and CT revealed generalized peritonitis. Amylase in the ascites fluid was elevated, and infiltration into the pancreas was suspected on CT before treatment, suggesting a pancreatic fistula caused by tumor shrinkage. Enterobacteria were found in ascites fluid culture, suggesting a gastrointestinal perforation complication. The patient was refractory to treatment, and death was confirmed due to progression of the primary disease. The pathological autopsy revealed diffuse pancreatic infiltration, suggesting that the pancreatic fistula was caused by pancreatic injury. Pancreatic fistula is a known complication of surgical procedures but is rarely caused by tumor shrinkage due to chemotherapy. Since there is no preventive method for pancreatic injury caused by tumor shrinkage, early diagnosis and early treatment of pancreatic fistula are critical, and ascites fluid analysis, including amylase, was thought to be useful for the diagnosis.


Postrhinal cortex (POR) and neighboring lateral visual association areas are necessary for identifying objects and interpreting them in specific contexts, but how POR neurons encode the same object across contexts remains unclear. Here, we imaged excitatory neurons in mouse POR across tens of days throughout initial cue-reward learning and reversal learning. As such, neurons were tracked across sessions/trials where the same cue was rewarded or unrewarded, during both locomotor and stationary contexts. Surprisingly, a large class of POR neurons were minimally cue-driven prior to learning. After learning, distinct clusters within this class responded selectively to a given cue when presented in a specific conjunction of reward and locomotion contexts. In addition, another class involved clusters of neurons whose cue responses were more transient, insensitive to reward learning, and adapted over thousands of presentations. These two classes of POR neurons may support context-dependent interpretation and context-independent identification of sensory cues.


We study monetary policy-making in an economy with many sector-specific monopoly unions. It is assumed that the senior union members are in the majority and – due to the practice of lay-offs by inverse seniority – face a lower unemployment risk than the junior members. Consequently, the unions' median voters are senior and set nominal wages that imply involuntary unemployment on part of the juniors. Thus, equilibrium unemployment is too high from a social welfare point of view. Nevertheless, an independent central bank is found not to produce an inflation bias because it is accountable to the majority of the population, which is not involuntarily unemployed. In contrast, government-dependence leads to an inflation bias and a higher variability of inflation, but has an ambiguous effect on employment variability. The reason is that democratic elections are about more than one policy issue, which is shown to give rise to political uncertainty about the monetary policy preferences of the elected government.


From the Platonistic standpoint, mathematical edifices form an immaterial, unchanging, and eternal world that exists independently of human thought. By extension, "scientific Platonism" says that directly mathematizable physical phenomena – in other terms, the research field of physics – are governed by entities belonging to this objectively existing mathematical world.
Platonism is a metaphysical theory. But since metaphysical theories, by definition, are neither provable nor refutable, anti-Platonistic approaches cannot be less metaphysical than Platonism itself. In other words, anti-Platonism is not "more scientific" than Platonism. All we can do is to compare Platonism and its negations under epistemological criteria such as simplicity, economy of hypotheses, or consistency with regard to their respective consequences.
In this paper I intend to show that anti-Platonism claiming in a first approximation (i) that mathematical edifices consist of meaningless signs assembled according to arbitrary rules, and (ii) that the adequacy of mathematical entities and phenomena covered by physics results from idealization of these phenomena, is based as much as Platonism on metaphysical presuppositions. Thereafter, without directly taking position, I try to launch a debate focusing on the following questions:
(i) To maintain its coherence, is anti-Platonism not constrained to adopt extremely complex assumptions, difficult to defend, and not always consistent with current realities or practices of scientific knowledge?
(ii) Instead of supporting anti-Platonism whatever the cost, in particular by the formulation of implausible hypotheses, would it not be more adequate to accept the idea of a mathematical world existing objectively and governing certain aspects of the material world, just as we note the existence of the material world which could also not exist?


An FMS is a highly integrated manufacturing system. The inter-relationships between its components are not well understood. Consequently, it has not been possible to develop closed form analytic models of FMSs. Computer simulation has been extensively applied to study their performance. The optimal design of FMSs is an important problem. In this research a computer simulation model of an FMS is interfaced with the Hooke-Jeeves algorithm to search an optimum design without full factory experimentation. Some modifications of the HJ algorithm are needed to accommodate the stochastic nature of computer simulation.


In order to make the best choice, two types of a force field have been studied to access a possibility of application of one of them to simulation of adsorption and transport processes in the silicalite (synthetic zeolite)-methane system. To accomplish this, the molecular dynamic technique implemented in the LAMMPS package was used. Priority criteria of the choice were retention of the structure completeness during long simulation runs, the system's stability, the possibility of simulation of a separate good-sized zeolite cluster without using periodic boundary conditions for multiplying zeolite's lattice in space. For the force-field, which met these requirements, some structural, thermodynamic and transport characteristics of the system were calculated. Radial and angular distribution functions for different atom pairs and triplets were obtained for both the pure zeolite and the silicalite-methane system. A good agreement of all obtained characteristics with literature data of numerical and natural experiments was achieved.


Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) was used to determine the thermodynamic functions of the undercooled liquid and the amorphous phase with respect to the crystalline state of the ~41.2Ti13.8CU125Nilo.OBe22.5 bulk mltallic glass forming alloy. The specific heat capacities of this alloy. in the undercooled liquid, the amorphous state and the crystal were determined. The differences in enthalpy, AH, entropy, AS, and Gibbs free energy, AG, between crystal and the undercooled liquid were calculated using the measured specific heat capacity data as well as the heat of fusion. The results indicate that the Gibbs free energy difference between metastable undercooled liquid and crystalline solid, AG, stays small compared to conventional metallic glass forming alloys even for large undercoolings. Furthermore, the Kauzmann temperature, TK, where the entropy of the undercooled liquid equals to that of the crystal, was determined to be 560 K. The Kauzmann temperature is compared with the experimentally observed rate-dependent glass transition temperature, TR. Both onset and end temperatures of the glass transition depend linearly on the logarithm of the heating rate based on the DSC experiments. Those characteristic temperatures for the kinetically observed glass transition become equal close to the Kauzmann temperature in this alloy, which suggests an underlying thermodynamic glass transition as a lower bound for the kinetically observed freezing process.


In this study, the Disturbance Storm Time (Dst) profile of long-lasting storms are investigated. Dst variations for the entire duration of storms are approximated using both gamma and lognormal distributions. Profiles of fifty storms were evaluated so far and preliminary analysis showed that the Gamma distribution function may be a better fit overall than the lognormal distribution. Although both distributions tend to approximate the main phase of storms reasonably well, the gamma distribution function tend to approximate the recovery phase much better. Further analysis also shows that the gamma distribution function is also a much better fit than the lognormal distribution for storms caused by ICMEs as opposed to CIR storms. This may due CIR storms long duration recovery phases that can sometimes last days to weeks. This also applies to other storms such as High-Intensity, Long-Duration, Continuous AE Activity (HILDCAA) events with highly fluctuating magnetic fields. Of interest, energy dissipation is also modeled as a diffusion-like process where a 1-D diffusion profile would be equivalent to a Gamma distribution of k = 0.5. Profiles of evaluated storms show this diffusion-like profile suggesting the existence of a diffusion-like process in the energy dissipation in the ring current. More storms are being added to this study to further support our analysis and conclusion. Methods used and results will be discussed


Consideration is given to the exact computation of the equilibrium state probabilities of a class of non-product-form queueing networks that is of interest for communication systems. It is shown that a specific structure in the state transition lattice leads to a sequential method of solution. The method is sequential either in terms of individual states or in terms of subsets of states. In the former case, algebraic recursions for the state probabilities can be developed. In both cases, substantial computational savings are possible. >


In the Agricultural Research and Development Station of Suceava in the last period was achieved many researches concerning the crop behavior of some cultivars belonged differentiated both biological point of view and utilization mode of them: bakery (wheat, rye) and non bakery (triticale, barley and oat). In this paper we present the differences between 19 genotypes (4 spring wheat cultivars, one rye cultivar, five Triticale cultivars, eight spring barley cultivars and one oat cultivar) and the spring barley cultivar Speranta used like standard. During experimentation period from yield capacity point of view were remarked the spring barley cultivars Maria and Narcisa, which surpassed during 5 years the middle yield of the standard cultivar with 11% that mean 329 k/ha and respectively 334 kg/ha. Also, the middle yield of standard cultivar was surpassed by the spring barley cultivars Suceava 3, Daciana, Stindard and Aura, with insignificant increases, comprises between 3% and 7%. For spring wheat only the polish cultivar Henika surpassed the middle yield on 2932 kg/ha of the standard cultivar Speranta with an increase on 3% that mean 87 kg/ha. The rest of experimented cultivars gave more less yields face to middle yields of the standard cultivar, such as the oat cultivar Mures which achieved 68% from its yield capacity, resulting a minus significant yield on 947 kg/ha. The ecological crop conditions from the North West of Moldavia offer the favorable possibilities but very differentiated for different spring cereals species. Between them, the spring barley emphasizes an efficient ecological response, quantified through high middle yields comprise between 3036 and 3266 kg/ha.


Abstract Nowadays, international and national events clearly point out the need for cooperation between different defense organizations in crisis and emergency situations (disaster events, migration issues, and other emergencies) for successful tasks. The fundamental basis of this cooperation is always the command and control activity supported by modern technical equipment that ensures the coordinated implementation of tasks. The key, human element of info-communication support is the preparation and training of the successful professionals. In this paper, the authors intend to present the importance of vocational training.


A single Rydberg atom impurity excited in a BEC is a system that can be utilized to measure the quantum mechanical properties of electron - neutral scattering andthe electron probability density of a Rydberg atom. The Rydberg electron – neutral atom scattering process, is a fundamental scattering process, which can be described via Fermi's pseudopotential as V{vec{r},vec{R} )=2pi textit{a}[k(R)]delta^{(3)}(vec{r}-vec{R}). The scattering length is dependent on the momentum of the Rydberg electron, and therefore is dependent on the separation of the Rydberg electron from the ion core. At the classical outermost turning point of the electron, it has the slowest momentum leading to s-wave dominated scattering potentials 10's of MHz in depth for n<40 (Greene et al. PRL 85 2458 (2000), Bendkowsky et al. PRL 105 163201 (2010)). In alkali atoms there is a shape resonance for p-wave scattering, which becomes relevant at ion-neutral separations of ~75nm (I.I. Fabrikant J.Phys B 19, 1527 (1985)). This shape resonance potential is several GHz deep, spanning the energy level spacing between n and n-1 principal quantum numbers. At high BEC densities of 5x10^14cm-3 the nearest neighbor spacing is less than 70nm. A Rydberg atom excited within a BEC, is an excitation of the Rydberg atom and all N neutral atoms located within the Rydberg orbit, described as nS+N x 5S. The nS+N x 5S state is density shifted from the Rydberg resonance. Not only does the distribution of atoms within the Rydberg orbit lead to a density shift, but, at these high densities, atoms excited in the nS+N x 5S state near the shape resonance potential cause large perturbations to the density shift, leading to a line broadening. Therefore the spectroscopic line shape of a Rydberg atom in a BEC allows us to probe the theoretically calculated p-wave shape resonance potential. Furthermore, we can observe and measure the dynamics of neutrals excited in the nS+N x 5S state. In the ultracold regime of a BEC, the background neutral atoms within the Rydberg orbit have kinetic energies of a few kHz, and experience large forces due to the GHz-deep shape resonance potentials. An atom dragged into this deep potential leads to an exothermic state-changing collision. We measure the timescale of this state-changing collision and compare to semi-classical calculations of the neutral atoms evolving in the potential of the two-particle nS+ 5S system. We also measure the change in energy from the original nS state to the product state, (n-4)L (L<3). On time scales shorter than the state-changing collisions, which for n<100 is on the order of 10 microseconds, the neutral atoms will evolve and collect in the shallower electron-neutral potentials, which mimic the electron probability density of the Rydberg atom.With n<100, the Rydberg atom has a diameter greater than 2 micrometers. With an imaging system with <1 micrometer resolution, we expect to observe a macroscopic change in the density profile of the BEC indicating an nS versus nD Rydberg state. The BEC would serve as a contrast agent for observing textbook atomic wavefunctions (Karpiuk et al. New Journal of Physics 17, 053046 (2015)).


Efficiency of gas turbine monitoring systems primarily depends on the accuracy of employed algorithms, in particular, pattern recognition techniques to diagnose gas path faults. In investigations many techniques were applied to recognize gas path faults, but recommendations on selecting the best technique for real monitoring systems are still insufficient and often contradictory.In our previous works, three recognition techniques were compared under different conditions of gas turbine diagnosis. The comparative analysis has shown that all these techniques yield practically the same accuracy for each comparison case.The present contribution considers a new recognition technique, Probabilistic Neural Network (PNN), comparing it with the techniques previously examined. The results for all comparison cases show that the PNN is not practically inferior to the other techniques. With this inference, the recommendation is to choose the PNN for real monitoring systems because it has an important advantage of providing confidence estimation for every diagnostic decision made.Copyright © 2013 by ASME


BACKGROUND
Adequacy of body fluid volume improves short- and long-term outcomes inpatients with heart and kidney disorders. Bioelectrical impedance vector analysis (BIVA) has the potential to be used as a routine method at the bedside for assessment and management of body fluids.

METHODS
Impedance (Z vector) is a combination of resistance, R (function of intra- and extracellular fluid volume) and reactance, Xc (function of the dielectric material of tissue cells), with the best signal to noise ratio at 50 kHz. BIVA allows a direct assessment of body fluid volume through patterns of vector distribution on the R-Xc plane without the knowledge of the body weight. Reference tolerance ellipses (50, 75 and 95%) for the individual vector were previously calculated in the healthy population.

RESULTS
We determined the optimal vector distribution in patients undergoing hemodialysis without hypotension or intradialytic symptoms. Most vectors lay within the reference 75% tolerance ellipse of the healthy population indicating full electrical restoration of tissues. We also determined the optimal vector distribution of patients undergoing continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis without edema and with a residual urine output. The vector distribution was close to the distribution of both healthy subjects and pre-session distribution of hemodialysis patients. We established the relationship between central venous pressure and BIVA in critically ill patients. Shorter vectors (overhydration) were associated with increasing venous pressure, whereas longer vectors were associated with decreasing venous pressure. The association between BIVA and NT-proBNP has been evaluated in patients with acute cardiac-related dyspnea. In the 'gray zone' of NT-proBNP values between 'ruling out' and 'ruling in' acute heart failure, BIVA detected latent peripheral congestion.

CONCLUSION
Simple patterns of BIVA allow detection, monitoring, and control of hydration status using vector displacement for the feedback on treatment.


With image capturing technology growing ubiquitous in consumer products and scientific studies, there is a corresponding growth in the applications that utilize scene structure for deriving information. This trend has also been reflected in the plethora of recent studies on reconstruction using robust structure from motion, bundle adjustment, and related techniques. Most of these studies, however, have concentrated on unstructured collections of images. In this paper, we propose a feature tracking and reconstruction framework for structured image collections using heterogenous features. This is motivated by the observation that images contain a small number of features that are fast/easy to track and a large number of features that are difficult/slow to track. By tracking these separately, we show that we can not only improve the tracking speed, but also improve the tracking accuracy by using a camera geometry based descriptor. We demonstrate this on a new challenging dataset which contains images of Arctic sea ice. The reconstruction pipeline constructed using the proposed method provides near real time reconstruction of the scene, enabling the user to parse vast amounts of data rapidly. Quantitative comparisons with baseline SFM techniques show that reconstruction accuracy does not suffer.


This paper proposes an interpretive framework to examine China's internationalised education development. Utilising a range of theoretical perspectives, encompassing the realms of politics, economics, legacy, driving forces and trends, this paper posits that the advancement of internationalised education within China is influenced by a multifaceted interplay of cultural, economic, and political factors. By examining the historical context of China's connection with the world and the role of the Chinese state in promoting internationalisation, the paper sheds light on the dynamics of this process. It highlights the struggles and tension, resulting in updated local policies, between the need to compete on the open global stage and the desire to maintain national sovereignty and cultural identity. Through a critical analysis of key policy documents in China, the paper identifies several challenges and opportunities for the future development of internationalised education in China. Ultimately, it contributes to a deeper understanding of the complex and multifaceted nature of the globalisation of education and its implications for China's future development.


"Continuing his career-long exploration of modern democracy, Dahl addresses a question that has long vexed students of political theory: the place of independent organizations, associations, or special interest groups within the democratic state."-The Wilson Quarterly "There is probably no greater expert today on the subject of democratic theory than Dahl...His proposal for an ultimate adoption here of a 'decentralized socialist economy,' a system primarily of worker ownership and control of economic production, is daring but rational, reflecting his view that economic inequality seems destined to become the major issue here it historically has been in Europe."-Library Journal "Dahl reaffirms his commitment to pluralist democracy while attempting to come to terms with some of its defects."-Laura Greyson, Worldview "Anyone who is interested in these issues and who makes the effort the book requires will come away the better for it. And more. He will receive an explanation for our current difficulties that differs considerably from the explanation for our current difficulties that differs considerably from the explanation offered by the Reagan administration, and a prescription for the future which differs fundamentally from the nostrums emanating from the White House."-Dennis Carrigan, The (Louisville, Kentucky) Courier-Journal


Australian communities are taking action in many ways to reduce levels of violence in Australian society. The projects described in this volume are drawn from the projects included in the Australian Violence Prevention Award Program between 1992 and 1995. Each entry describes one project, including details of the violence prevention strategy that it has adopted, the effectiveness of the project, its current status, its funding and staffing resources, and a contact point for further information.


We have previously shown that GSH depletion alters global metabolism of cells. In the present study, we applied a metabolomic approach for studying the early changes in metabolism in hydrogen peroxide- (H2O2-) treated hepatoma cells which were destined to die. Levels of fructose 1,6-bisphosphate and an unusual metabolite, sedoheptulose 1,7-bisphosphate (S-1,7-BP), were elevated in hepatoma Hep G2 cells. Deficiency in G6PD activity significantly reduced S-1,7-BP formation, suggesting that S-1,7-BP is formed in the pentose phosphate pathway as a response to oxidative stress. Additionally, H2O2 treatment significantly increased the level of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADP+) and reduced the levels of ATP and NAD+. Severe depletion of ATP and NAD+ in H2O2-treated Hep G2 cells was associated with cell death. Inhibition of PARP-mediated NAD+ depletion partially protected cells from death. Comparison of metabolite profiles of G6PD-deficient cells and their normal counterparts revealed that changes in GSH and GSSG per se do not cause cell death. These findings suggest that the failure of hepatoma cells to maintain energy metabolism in the midst of oxidative stress may cause cell death.


Key Points mIL-2/CD25 induces Treg expansion and upregulates CD25 expression in mice. mIL-2/CD25 shows efficacy in inhibiting lupus nephritis in NZB × NZW and MRL/lpr mice. Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is associated with an IL-2–deficient state, with regulatory T cells (Tregs) showing diminished immune regulatory capacity. A low dose of IL-2 has shown encouraging clinical benefits in SLE patients; however, its clinical utility is limited because of the requirement of daily injections and the observation of increase in proinflammatory cytokines and in non-Tregs. We recently showed that a fusion protein of mouse IL-2 and mouse IL-2Rα (CD25), joined by a noncleavable linker, was effective in treating diabetes in NOD mice by selectively inducing Treg expansion. In this report, we show that mouse IL-2 (mIL-2)/CD25 at doses up to 0.5 mg/kg twice a week induced a robust Treg expansion without showing signs of increase in the numbers of NK, CD4+Foxp3−, or CD8+ T cells or significant increase in proinflammatory cytokines. In both NZB × NZW and MRL/lpr mice, mIL-2/CD25 at 0.2–0.4 mg/kg twice a week demonstrated efficacy in inducing Treg expansion, CD25 upregulation, and inhibiting lupus nephritis based on the levels of proteinuria, autoantibody titers, and kidney histology scores. mIL-2/CD25 was effective even when treatment was initiated at the time when NZB × NZW mice already showed signs of advanced disease. Furthermore, we show coadministration of prednisolone, which SLE patients commonly take, did not interfere with the ability of mIL-2/CD25 to expand Tregs. The prednisolone and mIL-2/CD25 combination treatment results in improvements in most of the efficacy readouts relative to either monotherapy alone. Taken together, our results support further evaluation of IL-2/CD25 in the clinic for treating immune-mediated diseases such as SLE.


Careful graphing of the anthropometric measurements of children with chronic disease and short stature should be done to determine height and weight growth velocities. In addition, a detailed history can provide information helpful in determining the expected growth curve. If the chronic disease can be effectively treated (eg, malnutrition, emotional deprivation, celiac disease, asthma, rheumatoid arthritis), a period of rapid "catch-up" growth can be anticipated. The prognosis with regard to adult stature depends on the timing, duration, and severity of the growth-inhibiting influence.


"Good fortune offered this nation an unusual chance at ideal nation-forming and... some honorable leaders seized that chance, " writes William Lee Miller in The Business of May Next, and none among the founders made more of the opportunity than did James Madison, subject of this engaging work. Madison is depicted during the critical years between 1784 and 1791, when he was so active in articulating the governmental aims of the fledgling nation that he sometimes found himself in official dialogue with himself. More than simply a historical and biographical account, the book traces Madison's political and theoretical development as a means of illuminating its larger theme, the moral and intellectual underpinnings of the American nation. With a sound grasp of his material and a refreshing style Miller reveals how Madison's research into republics and his influence on the writing of the Constitution are central to the values for which the nation stands. From an examination of Madison's notes, Miller traces Madison's early research into other republics and their weaknesses. He reveals how Madison's thinking shaped the Virginia Plan, which, in turn, shaped the United States Constitution and the nation's institutions. The author writes that Madison sought the strands of Republicanism in history and gave republican ideals new and lasting institutional expression. He shows how the making of republican institutions became a collaboration, and how the newly created institutions contained within themselves provision for their own continuing alteration and for the involvement and influence of collective humanity down through the years. Miller follows Madison through the Constitutional Convention("the business of May next") to the great national argument on behalf of the Constitution, notably through the Federalist papers. Of particular interest are his discussions of the constitutional deliberations over religious freedom and the institution of slavery.


The inflammatory and infectious circumstances involving the orbit are known as 'orbitopathies' Considering the progress of immunology and imagistical investigations, it has been proposed a new classification of these entities. This classification divides the orbithopathies in specific and nonspecific. This paper brings up the case of a 65 year old female patient, showing unilateral proptosis with progressive evolution for about one year. The local examination and paraclinical investigations (computerised tomography and thyroid gland scintigram) sustained the diagnosis of Basedow disease. The ophthalmopathy in Basedow disease is a specific orbital involvement. Considering it's high rate of occurrence among the exophthalmic eyes (10%) it rests a severe disease, with a not yet fully understood physiopathology and a controversial treatment. The basedowian ophthalmopathy is, as well, an autoimmune disease, which requires the presence of T lymphocytes at the level of the orbital tissue. The computerised tomography gives us a direct visualisation of the enlarged muscles in hyperthyroidism (the muscles can increase 8 times their normal size), that is why we have to recommend it every time we are facing a patient with proptosis, especially unilateral.


The author considers eponymous names of CNS diseases related to physicians who had actively cooperated with Nazis during the Second World War. The data on the activity of some specialists in the field of neurosciences whose activity did not correspond to ethical values of the physician and the scientist are presented. The author suggests excluding a number of eponymous terms associated with the names of physicians, former Nazis or those who actively cooperated with Nazis.


Grid computing is a collaborative e-infrastructure to solve large multidisciplinary problems having interrelated demands of data, compute, scientific instruments and increased importance of collaboration. Grid is a distributed system which enables sharing, selection, and aggregation of heterogeneous geographically distributed autonomous resources dynamically depending on their availability, capability, performance, and users QoS requirements. Validating such a vast system has additional complexities of heterogeneity, multiple administrative policies, and issues of multi-layer software interactions. GARUDA is the Indian National Grid Computing Initiative connecting over 65 partnering institutes across 30 cities of India and aggregating over 70TF-15TB Compute-Storage power. The authors present the software engineering challenges and validation methodologies for GARUDA, to make it a production level grid. Integrated validation of GARUDA through Application testing, Health Monitoring, Middleware-Software testing, Performance benchmarking and Stress testing are described.


Research on evolutionary games in a noisy environment is still a non-solved problem. By using Markov process, we build a dynamic model for two-player and two-strategy symmetric game in noisy environment. Some illustrative examples are presented and the results are determined by simulation experiments.


A functional thymus is crucial to produce mature, self-tolerant T cells. Crosstalk between the residing thymic stromal cells, especially the predominant population of thymic epithelial cells (TECs), and the developing thymocytes is essential for thymopoiesis. The survival and proliferation of TECs depend on a unique 3 dimensional (3-D) configuration of the thymus microenvironment. Disorganization of TECs results in a loss of gene expressions essential for TEC growth and survival, as well as inability to produce functional T cells. Recapitulating the property of thymus has been proven to be challenging.
 In our study, we have incorporated EAK16-II, a low molecular weight peptide that self-assembles into beta-sheet fibrils, and its histidinylated analogue, to induce 3-D aggregation of TECs. When the adaptor complex comprised of anti-EpCAM IgG, anti-His and recombinant protein A/G molecules were mixed with TECs in the hydrogel, TECs were captured into small clusters. TECs cultured in this condition maintained their molecular properties and were viable up to 2 weeks. Furthermore, when the TEC clusters in the hydrogel were transplanted into athymic nude mice, T cell development was observed, and these newly generated T cells proliferated upon stimulation with allogenic cells. These results demonstrate that self-assembling EAK16-II/EAKIIH6 system with addition of tri-component adaptor complex may be a useful tool to organize TECs in a 3-D-like structure to support T cell development, suggesting a possibility to generate injectable mini thymus-like units to restore adaptive immune system.


The present Investigation was carried out to elucidate the storability of drip fertigation resultant seeds of pigeonpea (cv.VBN 3).The laboratory studies were conducted at Agricultural College and Research Institute, Madurai, during 2011. The study on resultant seed storability revealed that, among the 13 treatments, T4, T5, T6, T7, T8, T9, T10, T11 and T12 were good storers, while T1, T2, T3 and T13 were medium storers. Whereas seeds stored in polyethylene bag maintained a germination of 93.0 per cent after nine months of storage and the seed quality characters in terms of physiological and biochemical parameters decreased with ageing irrespective of treatment and containers.


Directed evolution methods based on high-throughput growth selection enable efficient discovery of enzymes with improved function in vivo. High-throughput selection is particularly useful when engineering oxygenases, which are sensitive to structural perturbations and prone to uncoupled activity. In this work, we combine the principle that reactive oxygen species (ROS) produced by uncoupled oxygenase activity is detrimental to cell fitness with a redox balance-based growth selection method for oxygenase engineering that enables concurrent advancement in catalytic activity and coupling efficiency. As a proof-of-concept, we engineered P450-BM3 for degradation of acenaphthene (ACN), a recalcitrant environmental pollutant. Selection of the site-saturation mutagenesis library in E. coli strain MX203 identified P450-BM3 variants GVQ-AL and GVQ-D222N, which have both improved coupling efficiency and catalytic activity compared to the starting variant. Computational modeling indicates that the discovered mutations cooperatively optimize binding pocket shape complementarity to ACN, and shift the protein's conformational dynamics to favor the lid-closed, catalytically competent state. We further demonstrated that the selective pressure on coupling efficiency can be tuned by modulating cellular ROS defense mechanisms.


Voltage-dependent conductance of ion channels is key for the generation of action potentials. Ion channels are opening and closing stochastically due to thermal noise and introduce internal noise into the membrane potential of the cell. The noise power depends on the size of the ion channel cluster that generates the action potential (the hillock). We show that the encoding of small sinusoidal signals in terms of spikes can be enhanced by channel noise if the cluster size is in a certain range.


Report on the Third IAEA Technical Committee Meeting on Alpha Particle Physics in Thermonuclear Reactors held at Trieste, Italy 10-14 May 1993.


A ttributes and Limitations: The essence of Georg von Bekesy' s elucidation of Helmholtz's theory of hearing was based on his observation of the vibration patterns of the tympanic membrane and the response of ossicular movement to the stimulus of sound — an undulating traveling wave. In the decades since his claim to the Nobel Prize in 1962, there has been an explosion of knowledge about morphology and function that has produced what seems to be an endless series of surprising and intriguing results. Incidentally, von Bekesy's discoveries stand fast; only minute details of his findings are being investigated. As this book shows, the sensory transduction in the cochlea has attracted more research effort than any other part of the auditory system. Such is the reason that this book is heavily weighted toward chapters on cochlear physiology. The anatomy and physiology of the ear and auditory nervous system are clearly presented and, for the most part, can be understood with minimal knowledge of the physics of sound. Chapter 19 has some of the best and some of the worst; that is, it provides an excellent understanding of how the auditory system works, but for the clinician, it provides too much information on physics.


Coronal X-ray sources (CXSs) are phenomenon very often occurring in solar flares regardless of a flare size, duration or power. The nature of the sources was difficult to uncover for many years. It seems that at last, combining data from RHESSI and SDO/AIA, there is a unprecedented possibility to 'look inside' CXSs and to answer the questions about their formation, evolution and structure. We present a study of a CXS of the SOL2011-10-22T11:10 long-duration flare observed simultaneously with RHESSI and SDO/AIA. We focus our attention on the following questions: What was responsible for the CXS presence and long duration? Was there any fine structure in the CXS? Available data enables us to study a relation between the CXS and structures observed in EUV during the decay phase of the flare. X-ray emission recorded by RHESSI during the decay phase of the flare came from about 10 MK hot CXS. The source was observable for 5 hours. This long presence of the source could be supported by magnetic reconnection ongoing during the decay phase. Supra-arcade downflows, which are considered to be a manifestation of magnetic reconnection, were observed at the same time as the CXS. The source was co-spatial with the part of the hot supra-arcade region that had the highest emission measure and simultaneously the temperature within the range of RHESSI thermal-response. However, while the supra-arcade region was a dynamic region consisting of small-scale structures, the CXS seemed to be smooth, structureless. We run simulations using real and synthetic RHESSI data, but we did not find any strong evidence that the CXS had any small-scale structure.


Rhenium disulphide (ReS2) is a recently discovered new member of the transition metal dichalcogenides. Most impressively, it exhibits a direct bandgap from bulk to monolayer. However, the growth of ReS2 nanosheets (NSs) still remains a challenge and in turn their applications are unexplored. In this study, we successfully synthesized high-quality ReS2 NSs via chemical vapor deposition. A high-performance field effect transistor of ReS2 NSs with an on/off ratio of ∼10(5) was demonstrated. Through both electrical transport measurements at varying temperatures (80 K-360 K) and first-principles calculations, we find sulfur vacancies, which exist intrinsically in ReS2 NSs and significantly affect the performance of the ReS2 FET device. Furthermore, we demonstrated that sulfur vacancies can efficiently adsorb and recognize oxidizing (O2) and reducing (NH3) gases, which electronically interact with ReS2 only at defect sites. Our findings provide experimental groundwork for the synthesis of new transition metal dichalocogenides, supply guidelines for understanding the physical nature of ReS2 FETs, and offer a new route toward tailoring their electrical properties by defect engineering in the future.


Background. Laparoscopic gastric sleeve (LGS) has been recently introduced as a stand-alone, restrictive bariatric surgery. Theoretically, LGS attenuates micronutrients deficiencies and associated complications that were typically observed following malabsorptive procedures. The aim of this study was to assess some micronutrients and mineral deficiencies in patients undergoing LGS. Methods. In the period between July 2008 and April 2010, 138 obese patients (110 females and 28 males) with mean BMI 44.4 kg/m2 ± 6.5, mean age 43.9 ± 10.9 years were enrolled and underwent LGS. Patients were followed up with routine laboratory tests and anthropometric measurements and assessed for nutritional status, as regards vitamin B12, folic acid, iron, hemoglobin, calcium, and vitamin D, every three months throughout 12 months. Results. 12 months after sleeve, patients did not show iron deficiency and/or anemia; plasma calcium levels were in the normal range without supplementation from the sixth month after the operation. Vitamin B12 and folic acid were adequately supplemented for all the follow-up period. Vitamin D was in suboptimal levels, despite daily multivitamin supplementation. Conclusion. In this study, we showed that LGS is an effective surgery for the management of morbid obesity. An adequate supplementation is important to avoid micronutrients deficiencies and greater weight loss does not require higher dosage of multivitamins.


A self-synthesized HQ-8 resin was prepared using a O/W suspension polymerization technique and employed as a potential adsorbent for the removal of acid soluble lignin (ASL) from rice straw hydrolysate (RSH). The structure and morphology of the HQ-8 resin before and after the adsorption of ASL were characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and nitrogen adsorption–desorption isotherms. A series of adsorption conditions such as pH value, adsorbent dose, initial concentration, and temperature were systematically investigated to obtain the optimum process parameters. Within the studied range of ASL concentrations, the adsorption equilibrium was found to follow the Freundlich isotherm model well, with R2 > 0.988. The rate of ASL adsorption onto the HQ-8 resin was very quick, and equilibrium was reached within 50 min of contact. Furthermore, the maximum adsorption capacity of ASL on the HQ-8 resin was 64.61 mg g−1 at 298 K at an initial solution pH of 1. The regression results revealed that the ASL adsorption kinetics was represented accurately by a pseudo-second-order model. The efficiency of the HQ-8 resin for the spontaneous and exothermic adsorption of ASL is attributed to the hydrophobic interaction between the cross-linked benzene ring of the HQ-8 resin and the aromatic ring of ASL. In addition, the activation energy of ASL adsorption onto the HQ-8 resin was 35.99 kJ mol−1. In summary, the present adsorption studies of ASL from RSH revealed the potential of a self-synthesized HQ-8 resin to be applied as an alternative adsorbent for lignocellulose hydrolysate detoxification.


This article reviews the topic of self-help, from the origin of this concept to its connection with everyday themes, as well as the branches of academia responsible for the construction of this phenomenon. The starting point in this process is intellectual thinking meant to show how self-help is present in the world of work and the capitalist system, appropriating methods of legitimation. Ways of addressing the topic of self-help are sought out, beyond its critiques as superfluous literature.


This essay analyzes key aspects of Heidegger's critique of the picture (Bild) based on an objection to world-pictures as well as a negative understanding of two other related concepts: Gestell and Vorstellen (representation). The restrictive frames of world-pictures, Heidegger claims, must be opposed by instances of thinking and language use associated with poiesis. For him, the revelation of the world in poiesis results in a subject-less experience of things and words, akin to the experience of art and literature, and presumably outside the representational hold of pictures. I argue against Heidegger's repudiation of the picture by underscoring the inescapability of Vorstellen. Heidegger's world may be seen as a world-picture as well as a particular system of representation that we associate with affective uses of language, i.e., a literary system similar to the one discussed by Wolgang Iser.


The antioxidant phenotype caused by resveratrol has been recognized as a key piece in the health benefits exerted by this phytochemical in diseases related to aging. It has recently been proposed that a mitochondrial pro‐oxidant mechanism could be the cause of resveratrol antioxidant properties. In this regard, the hypothesis that resveratrol impedes electron transport to complex III of the electron transport chain as its main target suggests that resveratrol could increase reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation through reverse electron transport or by the semiquinones formation. This idea also explains that cells respond to resveratrol oxidative damage, inducing their antioxidant systems. Moreover, resveratrol pro‐oxidant properties could accelerate the aging process, according to the free radical theory of aging, which postulates that organism's age due to the accumulation of the harmful effects of ROS in cells. Nonetheless, there is no evidence linking the chronological lifespan (CLS) shorten occasioned by resveratrol with a pro‐oxidant mechanism. Hence, this study aimed to evaluate whether resveratrol shortens the CLS of Saccharomyces cerevisiae due to a pro‐oxidant activity. Herein, we provide evidence that supplementation with 100 μM of resveratrol at 5% glucose: (1) shortened the CLS of ctt1Δ and yap1Δ strains; (2) decreased ROS levels and increased the catalase activity in WT strain; (3) maintained unaffected the ROS levels and did not change the catalase activity in ctt1Δ strain; and (4) lessened the exponential growth of ctt1Δ strain, which was restored with the adding of reduced glutathione. These results indicate that resveratrol decreases CLS by a pro‐oxidant mechanism.


The current study aimed to evaluate the in vitro and in vivo anticancer potential of the silver nanoparticles fabricated with butanol fraction of Pinus roxburghii needles (PNb-AgNPs). In vitro results revealed significant cytotoxicity of PNb-AgNPs towards Ehrlich Ascites Carcinoma (EAC) cells with an IC50 of 47.02 ± 1.11 μg/ml. Further, morphological changes, Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) generation, mitochondrial depolarization, and DNA fragmentation elucidated EAC cell death by PNb-AgNPs exposure. The cell cycle analysis displayed an increase in the Sub-G1 population (52%), further confirmed by nuclear fragmentation in EAC cells after PNb-AgNPs treatment. The hemolytic investigation revealed the biocompatible nature of PNb-AgNPs. In vivo experiments were performed using the liquid Ehrlich Ascites Carcinoma tumor model, which clearly showed a reduction in tumor growth and body weight following PNb-AgNPs treatment in EAC-bearing mice as compared to untreated controls. Moreover, elevated hematological and biochemical parameters were found to restore to normal range in EAC-bearing mice treated with PNb-AgNPs. Overall, PNb-AgNPs effectively induced apoptotic cell death in EAC cells and exhibited remarkable in vivo antitumor potential.


Proceedings: AACR 103rd Annual Meeting 2012‐‐ Mar 31‐Apr 4, 2012; Chicago, IL

Tumor suppressor genes (TSGs) play critical roles in preventing tumorigenesis and they are frequently inactivated in tumours. Recently developed high-density microarrays can detect subchromosomal deletions, recurrence of which usually indicates the location of TSGs within the deleted region. We analyzed testicular germ cell tumour (TGCT) clinical samples using SNP arrays and found a frequent small deletion on the region 6q25.3 containing only one known gene, ZDHHC14. While its cellular function is unknown, ZDHHC14 belongs to the recently discovered DHHC family, which are predicted to be involved in protein palmitoylation, a reversible lipid modification that regulates membrane tethering for key proteins in cell signaling, cancer, neuronal transmission, and membrane trafficking. Consistently, we found a dramatic under-expression of ZDHHC14 mRNA and protein in TGCTs, and this associated with chemoresistance. Oncomine database mining showed that ZDHHC14 is also under-expressed in lymphoma, liposarcoma, brain, kidney, lung and colorectal cancers. Thus, it appears that ZDHHC14 downregulation may be involved in other cancers. We studied ZDHHC14 expression in prostate cancer (PCa), detecting a decrease at mRNA and protein level. We also detected that ZDHHC14 mRNA was downregulated in a pilot study on breast cancer samples. As genomic loss of the ZDHHC14 region was only detected in a small number of PCa samples, we checked whether promoter hypermethylation was the cause for ZDHHC14 downregulation. However, no changes in methylation status were found. We then sequenced the whole genomic region surrounding ZDHHC14 by next generation sequencing in TGCTs and PCa and found several mutations in the promoter, the coding region, as well as in intronic regions. Finally, we tested the function of ZDHHC14 in cell-based studies. We generated a 293 T-REx tetracycline inducible ZDHHC14 overexpressing stable cell line, which showed that ZDHHC14 overexpression decreased cell viability. The induction of apoptosis by ZDHHC14 overexpression was detected both by FACS and caspase 7 and PARP cleavage analyses. This was confirmed by transient ZDHHC14 overexpression in the PCa cell line 22RV1. In vivo we xenografted mice using both tetracycline inducible ZDHHC14 overexpressing 293 T-REx cells and control cells transfected with the empty vector. ZDHHC14 expression was induced by tetracycline at the beginning of inoculation and we detected that ZDHHC14 overexpression blocked tumour initiation completely. In conclusion, these results implicate ZDHHC14 as a tumour suppressor gene commonly inactivated in human cancers, indicating that it might exert its tumor suppressor role through the induction of programmed cell death. This is the first study showing the involvement of ZDHHC14 in a specific pathway, the classic caspase-dependent apoptosis.

Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 103rd Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2012 Mar 31-Apr 4; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2012;72(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 4858. doi:1538-7445.AM2012-4858