Dose uniformity of loteprednol etabonate ophthalmic gel (0.5%) compared with branded and generic prednisolone acetate ophthalmic suspension (1%).

PubMed

Marlowe, Zora T; Davio, Stephen R

2014-01-01

Loteprednol etabonate (LE) ophthalmic gel 0.5% (Lotemax®) is a new polycarbophil-based, nonsettling topical ophthalmic formulation. The formulation is a semisolid gel at rest and a shear thinning fluid when expressed through a dropper tip. The present study was undertaken to determine how the nonsettling character of LE ophthalmic gel affects dose uniformity. Prednisolone acetate ophthalmic suspension 1% (Pred Forte®) and a generic prednisolone acetate suspension 1% were used as comparators. Drug concentrations of LE ophthalmic gel, Pred Forte, and a generic prednisolone acetate suspension were determined following simulated dosing - consisting of 2 drops, expressed four times daily for 2 weeks, with bottles that were shaken or not shaken immediately prior to expressing the drops. Drug concentrations were determined using a reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method and reported as a percentage of the declared (labeled) concentration. Comparative kinetics of drug particle sedimentation were also determined for each formulation, using dispersion analysis under gravity. Mean drug concentrations in drops of all three formulations were within a few percentage points of the declared concentration when the bottles were shaken for 5 seconds prior to dispensing. Only LE ophthalmic gel showed consistent and on-target concentrations when the bottles were unshaken prior to dispensing, with a mean (standard deviation [SD]) percent declared concentration of 102% (1.92%) over the 2-week dosing regimen. Drug concentrations for the branded and generic prednisolone acetate suspensions following expression from unshaken bottles were highly variable (overall relative SDs of 16.8% and 20.3%, respectively), with mean concentrations for both falling significantly below the declared concentration for drops expressed at the beginning of the 2-week dosing regimen and significantly above the declared concentration for drops expressed near the end of the dosing regimen. Dispersion analysis at 120× g showed no drug particle sedimentation for LE ophthalmic gel over the 24-hour testing period, whereas the prednisolone acetate suspensions settled in less than 6 hours. LE ophthalmic gel 0.5% provided consistent dose uniformity at the declared concentration whether or not the bottle was shaken prior to dispensing, whereas Pred Forte® and the generic prednisolone acetate required shaking to provide consistent drug concentrations. LE ophthalmic gel may be beneficial to patients because it eliminates the potential impact on the clinical response of both under- and overdosing.

Improving RNA-Seq expression estimation by modeling isoform- and exon-specific read sequencing rate.

PubMed

Liu, Xuejun; Shi, Xinxin; Chen, Chunlin; Zhang, Li

2015-10-16

The high-throughput sequencing technology, RNA-Seq, has been widely used to quantify gene and isoform expression in the study of transcriptome in recent years. Accurate expression measurement from the millions or billions of short generated reads is obstructed by difficulties. One is ambiguous mapping of reads to reference transcriptome caused by alternative splicing. This increases the uncertainty in estimating isoform expression. The other is non-uniformity of read distribution along the reference transcriptome due to positional, sequencing, mappability and other undiscovered sources of biases. This violates the uniform assumption of read distribution for many expression calculation approaches, such as the direct RPKM calculation and Poisson-based models. Many methods have been proposed to address these difficulties. Some approaches employ latent variable models to discover the underlying pattern of read sequencing. However, most of these methods make bias correction based on surrounding sequence contents and share the bias models by all genes. They therefore cannot estimate gene- and isoform-specific biases as revealed by recent studies. We propose a latent variable model, NLDMseq, to estimate gene and isoform expression. Our method adopts latent variables to model the unknown isoforms, from which reads originate, and the underlying percentage of multiple spliced variants. The isoform- and exon-specific read sequencing biases are modeled to account for the non-uniformity of read distribution, and are identified by utilizing the replicate information of multiple lanes of a single library run. We employ simulation and real data to verify the performance of our method in terms of accuracy in the calculation of gene and isoform expression. Results show that NLDMseq obtains competitive gene and isoform expression compared to popular alternatives. Finally, the proposed method is applied to the detection of differential expression (DE) to show its usefulness in the downstream analysis. The proposed NLDMseq method provides an approach to accurately estimate gene and isoform expression from RNA-Seq data by modeling the isoform- and exon-specific read sequencing biases. It makes use of a latent variable model to discover the hidden pattern of read sequencing. We have shown that it works well in both simulations and real datasets, and has competitive performance compared to popular methods. The method has been implemented as a freely available software which can be found at https://github.com/PUGEA/NLDMseq.

The gravitational potential due to uniform disks and rings

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lass, H.; Blitzer, L.

1983-07-01

The gravitational potential of bodies possessing axial symmetry can be expressed as a power series in distance, with the Legendre polynomials as coefficients. Such series, however, converge so slowly in the neighborhood of thin, uniform disks and rings that too many series terms must be summed in order to obtain an accurate field measure. A gravitational potential expression is presently obtained in closed form, in terms of complete elliptic integrals.

Plain faces are more expressive: comparative study of facial colour, mobility and musculature in primates

PubMed Central

Santana, Sharlene E.; Dobson, Seth D.; Diogo, Rui

2014-01-01

Facial colour patterns and facial expressions are among the most important phenotypic traits that primates use during social interactions. While colour patterns provide information about the sender's identity, expressions can communicate its behavioural intentions. Extrinsic factors, including social group size, have shaped the evolution of facial coloration and mobility, but intrinsic relationships and trade-offs likely operate in their evolution as well. We hypothesize that complex facial colour patterning could reduce how salient facial expressions appear to a receiver, and thus species with highly expressive faces would have evolved uniformly coloured faces. We test this hypothesis through a phylogenetic comparative study, and explore the underlying morphological factors of facial mobility. Supporting our hypothesis, we find that species with highly expressive faces have plain facial colour patterns. The number of facial muscles does not predict facial mobility; instead, species that are larger and have a larger facial nucleus have more expressive faces. This highlights a potential trade-off between facial mobility and colour patterning in primates and reveals complex relationships between facial features during primate evolution. PMID:24850898

Alteration of human umbilical vein endothelial cell gene expression in different biomechanical environments.

PubMed

Shoajei, Shahrokh; Tafazzoli-Shahdpour, Mohammad; Shokrgozar, Mohammad Ali; Haghighipour, Nooshin

2014-05-01

Biomechanical environments affect the function of cells. In this study we analysed the effects of five mechanical stimuli on the gene expression of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) in mRNA level using real-time PCR. The following loading regimes were applied on HUVECs for 48 h: intermittent (0-5 dyn/cm(2) , 1 Hz) and uniform (5 dyn/cm(2) ) shear stresses concomitant by 10% intermittent equiaxial stretch (1 Hz), uniform shear stress alone (5 dyn/cm(2) ), and intermittent uniaxial and equiaxial stretches (10%, 1 Hz). A new bioreactor was made to apply uniform/cyclic shear and tensile loadings. Three endothelial suggestive specific genes (vascular endothelial growth factor receptor-2 (VEGFR-2, also known as FLK-1), von Willebrand Factor (vWF) and vascular endothelial-cadherin (VE-cadherin)), and two smooth muscle genes (α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) and smooth muscle myosin heavy chain (SMMHC)) were chosen for assessment of alteration in gene expression of endothelial cells and transdifferentiation toward smooth cells following load applications. Shear stress alone enhanced the endothelial gene expression significantly, while stretching alone was identified as a transdifferentiating factor. Cyclic equiaxial stretch contributed less to elevation of smooth muscle genes compared to uniaxial stretch. Cyclic shear stress in comparison to uniform shear stress concurrent with cyclic stretch was more influential on promotion of endothelial genes expression. Influence of different mechanical stimuli on gene expression may open a wider horizon to regulate functions of cell for tissue engineering purposes. © 2013 International Federation for Cell Biology.

Expression patterns of tight junction components induced by CD24 in an oral epithelial cell-culture model correlated to affected periodontal tissues.

PubMed

Ye, P; Yu, H; Simonian, M; Hunter, N

2014-04-01

Previously we demonstrated uniformly strong expression of CD24 in the epithelial attachment to the tooth and in the migrating epithelium of the periodontitis lesion. Titers of serum antibodies autoreactive with CD24 peptide correlated with reduced severity of periodontal disease. Ligation of CD24 expressed by oral epithelial cells induced formation of tight junctions that limited paracellular diffusion. In this study, we aimed to reveal that the lack of uniform expression of tight junction components in the pocket epithelium of periodontitis lesions is likely to contribute to increased paracellular permeability to bacterial products. This is proposed as a potential driver of the immunopathology of periodontitis. An epithelial culture model with close correspondence for expression patterns for tight junction components in periodontal epithelia was used. Immunohistochemical staining and confocal laser scanning microscopy were used to analyse patterns of expression of gingival epithelial tight junction components. The minimally inflamed gingival attachment was characterized by uniformly strong staining at cell contacts for the tight junction components zona occludens-1, zona occludens-2, occludin, junction adhesion molecule-A, claudin-4 and claudin-15. In contrast, the pocket epithelium of the periodontal lesion showed scattered, uneven staining for these components. This pattern correlated closely with that of unstimulated oral epithelial cells in culture. Following ligation of CD24 expressed by these cells, the pattern of tight junction component expression of the minimally inflamed gingival attachment developed rapidly. There was evidence for non-uniform and focal expression only of tight junction components in the pocket epithelium. In the cell-culture model, ligation of CD24 induced a tight junction expression profile equivalent to that observed for the minimally inflamed gingival attachment. Ligation of CD24 expressed by gingival epithelial cells by lectin-like receptors of commensal oral streptococci could mediate the phenotype of health, whereas pathogenic organisms associated with periodontal disease might not signal effectively through CD24. © 2013 John Wiley & Sons A/S. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Analytic theory of orbit contraction

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vinh, N. X.; Longuski, J. M.; Busemann, A.; Culp, R. D.

1977-01-01

The motion of a satellite in orbit, subject to atmospheric force and the motion of a reentry vehicle are governed by gravitational and aerodynamic forces. This suggests the derivation of a uniform set of equations applicable to both cases. For the case of satellite motion, by a proper transformation and by the method of averaging, a technique appropriate for long duration flight, the classical nonlinear differential equation describing the contraction of the major axis is derived. A rigorous analytic solution is used to integrate this equation with a high degree of accuracy, using Poincare's method of small parameters and Lagrange's expansion to explicitly express the major axis as a function of the eccentricity. The solution is uniformly valid for moderate and small eccentricities. For highly eccentric orbits, the asymptotic equation is derived directly from the general equation. Numerical solutions were generated to display the accuracy of the analytic theory.

Comparison of two leading uniform theories of edge diffraction with the exact uniform asymptotic solution

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Boersma, J.; Rahmat-Samii, Y.

1980-01-01

The diffraction of an arbitrary cylindrical wave by a half-plane has been treated by Rahmat-Samii and Mittra who used a spectral domain approach. In this paper, their exact solution for the total field is expressed in terms of a new integral representation. For large wave number k, two rigorous procedures are described for the exact uniform asymptotic expansion of the total field solution. The uniform expansions obtained are valid in the entire space, including transition regions around the shadow boundaries. The final results are compared with the formulations of two leading uniform theories of edge diffraction, namely, the uniform asymptotic theory and the uniform theory of diffraction. Some unique observations and conclusions are made in relating the two theories.

School Uniforms: Guidelines for Principals.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Essex, Nathan L.

2001-01-01

Principals desiring to develop a school-uniform policy should involve parents, teachers, community leaders, and student representatives; beware restrictions on religious and political expression; provide flexibility and assistance for low-income families; implement a pilot program; align the policy with school-safety issues; and consider legal…

Highly buoyant bent-over plumes in a boundary layer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tohidi, Ali; Kaye, Nigel B.

2016-04-01

Highly buoyant plumes, such as wildfire plumes, in low to moderate wind speeds have initial trajectories that are steeper than many industrial waste plumes. They will rise further into the atmosphere before bending significantly. In such cases the plume's trajectory will be influenced by the vertical variation in horizontal velocity of the atmospheric boundary layer. This paper examined the behavior of a plume in an unstratified environment with a power-law ambient velocity profile. Examination of previously published experimental measurements of plume trajectory show that inclusion of the boundary layer velocity profile in the plume model often provides better predictions of the plume trajectory compared to algebraic expressions developed for uniform flow plumes. However, there are many cases in which uniform velocity profile algebraic expressions are as good as boundary layer models. It is shown that it is only important to model the role of the atmospheric boundary layer velocity profile in cases where either the momentum length (square root of source momentum flux divided by the reference wind speed) or buoyancy length (buoyancy flux divided by the reference wind speed cubed) is significantly greater than the plume release height within the boundary layer. This criteria is rarely met with industrial waste plumes, but it is important in modeling wildfire plumes.

Novel R2R3-MYB transcription factors from Prunus americana regulate differential patterns of anthocyanin accumulation in tobacco and citrus

PubMed Central

Dasgupta, Kasturi; Stover, Ed; Oliveira, Maria Luiza; Thomson, James

2017-01-01

ABSTRACT The level of anthocyanins in plants vary widely among cultivars, developmental stages and environmental stimuli. Previous studies have reported that the expression of various MYBs regulate anthocyanin pigmentation during growth and development. Here we examine the activity of 3 novel R2R3-MYB transcription factor (TF) genes, PamMybA.1, PamMybA.3 and PamMybA.5 from Prunus americana. The anthocyanin accumulation patterns mediated by CaMV double35S promoter (db35Sp) controlled expression of the TFs in transgenic tobacco were compared with citrus-MoroMybA, Arabidopsis-AtMybA1 and grapevine-VvMybA1 transgenics during their entire growth cycles. The db35Sp-PamMybA.1 and db35Sp-PamMybA.5 constructs induced high levels of anthocyanin accumulation in both transformed tobacco calli and the regenerated plants. The red/purple color pigmentation induced in the PamMybA.1 and PamMybA.5 lines was not uniformly distributed, but appeared as patches in the leaves, whereas the flowers showed intense uniform pigmentation similar to the VvMybA1 expressing lines. MoroMybA and AtMybA1 showed more uniform pink coloration in both vegetative and reproductive tissues. Plant morphology, anthocyanin content, seed viability, and transgene inheritance were examined for the PamMybA.5 transgenic plants and compared with the controls. We conclude that these TFs alone are sufficient for activating anthocyanin production in plants and may be used as visible reporter genes for plant transformation. Evaluating these TFs in a heterologous crop species such as citrus further validated that these genes can be useful for the metabolic engineering of anthocyanin production and cultivar enhancement. PMID:28051907

Base composition and expression level of human genes.

PubMed

Arhondakis, Stilianos; Auletta, Fabio; Torelli, Giuseppe; D'Onofrio, Giuseppe

2004-01-21

It is well known that the gene distribution is non-uniform in the human genome, reaching the highest concentration in the GC-rich isochores. Also the amino acid frequencies, and the hydrophobicity, of the corresponding encoded proteins are affected by the high GC level of the genes localized in the GC-rich isochores. It was hypothesized that the gene expression level as well is higher in GC-rich compared to GC-poor isochores [Mol. Biol. Evol. 10 (1993) 186]. Several features of human genes and proteins, namely expression level, coding and non-coding lengths, and hydrophobicity were investigated in the present paper. The results support the hypothesis reported above, since all the parameters so far studied converge to the same conclusion, that the average expression level of the GC-rich genes is significantly higher than that of the GC-poor genes.

Analytical solutions of the Schroedinger equation for a two-dimensional exciton in magnetic field of arbitrary strength

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hoang-Do, Ngoc-Tram; Hoang, Van-Hung; Le, Van-Hoang

2013-05-15

The Feranchuk-Komarov operator method is developed by combining with the Levi-Civita transformation in order to construct analytical solutions of the Schroedinger equation for a two-dimensional exciton in a uniform magnetic field of arbitrary strength. As a result, analytical expressions for the energy of the ground and excited states are obtained with a very high precision of up to four decimal places. Especially, the precision is uniformly stable for the whole range of the magnetic field. This advantage appears due to the consideration of the asymptotic behaviour of the wave-functions in strong magnetic field. The results could be used for variousmore » physical analyses and the method used here could also be applied to other atomic systems.« less

Quantitative gene expression analysis in Caenorhabditis elegans using single molecule RNA FISH.

PubMed

Bolková, Jitka; Lanctôt, Christian

2016-04-01

Advances in fluorescent probe design and synthesis have allowed the uniform in situ labeling of individual RNA molecules. In a technique referred to as single molecule RNA FISH (smRNA FISH), the labeled RNA molecules can be imaged as diffraction-limited spots and counted using image analysis algorithms. Single RNA counting has provided valuable insights into the process of gene regulation. This microscopy-based method has often revealed a high cell-to-cell variability in expression levels, which has in turn led to a growing interest in investigating the biological significance of gene expression noise. Here we describe the application of the smRNA FISH technique to samples of Caenorhabditis elegans, a well-characterized model organism. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Acoustic power of a moving point source in a moving medium

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cole, J. E., III; Sarris, I. I.

1976-01-01

The acoustic power output of a moving point-mass source in an acoustic medium which is in uniform motion and infinite in extent is examined. The acoustic medium is considered to be a homogeneous fluid having both zero viscosity and zero thermal conductivity. Two expressions for the acoustic power output are obtained based on a different definition cited in the literature for the average energy-flux vector in an acoustic medium in uniform motion. The acoustic power output of the source is found by integrating the component of acoustic intensity vector in the radial direction over the surface of an infinitely long cylinder which is within the medium and encloses the line of motion of the source. One of the power expressions is found to give unreasonable results even though the flow is uniform.

Exploitation of the Apoptosis-Primed State of MYCN-Amplified Neuroblastoma to Develop a Potent and Specific Targeted Therapy Combination

PubMed Central

Ham, Jungoh; Costa, Carlotta; Sano, Renata; Lochmann, Timothy L.; Sennott, Erin M.; Patel, Neha U.; Dastur, Anahita; Gomez-Caraballo, Maria; Krytska, Kateryna; Hata, Aaron N.; Floros, Konstantinos V.; Hughes, Mark T.; Jakubik, Charles T.; Heisey, Daniel A.R.; Ferrell, Justin T.; Bristol, Molly L.; March, Ryan J.; Yates, Craig; Hicks, Mark A.; Nakajima, Wataru; Gowda, Madhu; Windle, Brad E.; Dozmorov, Mikhail G.; Garnett, Mathew J.; McDermott, Ultan; Harada, Hisashi; Taylor, Shirley M.; Morgan, Iain M.; Benes, Cyril H.; Engelman, Jeffrey A.; Mossé, Yael P.; Faber, Anthony C.

2016-01-01

Summary Fewer than half of children with high-risk neuroblastoma survive. Many of these tumors harbor high-level amplification of MYCN, which correlates with poor disease outcome. Using data from our large drug screen we predicted, and subsequently demonstrated, that MYCN-amplified neuroblastomas are sensitive to the BCL-2 inhibitor ABT-199. This sensitivity occurs in part through low anti-apoptotic BCL-xL expression, high pro-apoptotic NOXA expression, and paradoxical, MYCN-driven upregulation of NOXA. Screening for enhancers of ABT-199 sensitivity in MYCN-amplified neuroblastomas, we demonstrate that the Aurora Kinase A inhibitor MLN8237 combines with ABT-199 to induce widespread apoptosis. In diverse models of MYCN-amplified neuroblastoma, including a patient-derived xenograft model, this combination uniformly induced tumor shrinkage, and in multiple instances led to complete tumor regression. PMID:26859456

Silver/hydroxyapatite composite coatings on porous titanium surfaces by sol-gel method.

PubMed

Qu, Jie; Lu, Xiong; Li, Dan; Ding, Yonghui; Leng, Yang; Weng, Jie; Qu, Shuxin; Feng, Bo; Watari, Fumio

2011-04-01

Hydroxyapatite (HA) coatings loaded with nanosilver particles is an attractive method to impart the HA coating with antibacterial properties. Producing Ag/HA coatings on porous Ti substrates have been an arduous job since commonly used line-of-sight techniques are not able to deposit uniform coatings on the inner pore surfaces of the porous Ti. In this study, porous Ti scaffolds with high porosity and interconnected structures were prepared by polymer impregnating method. A sol-gel process was used to produce uniform Ag/HA composite coatings on the surfaces of porous Ti substrates. Ca(NO(3) )(2) ·4H(2) O and P(2) O(5) in an ethyl alcohol based system was selected to prepare the sol, which ensured the homogeneous distribution of Ag in the sol. The characterization revealed that silver particles uniformly distributed in the coatings without agglomeration. High antibacterial ratio (>95%), against E. coli and S. albus was expressed by the silver-containing coatings (Ag/HA 0.8 and 1.6 wt %). The biocompatibility of the Ag/HA 0.8 surfaces was as good as that of pure HA surface, as revealed by culturing osteoblasts on them. The results indicated that Ag/HA 0.8 had the good balance between the biocompatibility and antibacterial properties of the coatings. Copyright © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

E-cadherin and beta-catenin are down-regulated in prostatic bone metastases.

PubMed

Bryden, A A G; Hoyland, J A; Freemont, A J; Clarke, N W; Schembri Wismayer, D; George, N J R

2002-03-01

To determine the E-cadherin and beta-catenin expression phenotype in untreated primary prostate cancer and corresponding bone metastases. Paired bone metastasis and primary prostate specimens were obtained from 14 men with untreated metastatic prostate carcinoma. The tumours were histologically graded by an independent pathologist. Expression of mRNA for E-cadherin and beta-catenin was detected within the tumour cells using in-situ hybridization with a 35S-labelled cDNA probe. The expression of E-cadherin and beta-catenin were graded as uniform, heterogeneous or negative. The mRNA for E-cadherin was expressed in 13 of 14 primary carcinomas and 11 bone metastases; beta-catenin was expressed by 13 and nine, respectively. Of the primary tumours, nine expressed E-cadherin and beta-catenin uniformly; in contrast, all metastases had down-regulated E-cadherin and/or beta-catenin. The down-regulation of E-cadherin and beta-catenin are a feature of the metastatic phenotype, which may be a significant factor in the genesis of bone metastases. However, this does not appear to be reflected in the expression of these molecules in the primary tumours.

A Biodosimeter for Multiparametric Determination of Radiation Dose, Radiation Quality, and Radiation Risk

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Richmond, Robert; Cruz, Angela; Jansen, Heather; Bors, Karen

2003-01-01

Predicting risk of human cancer following exposure of an individual or a population to ionizing radiation is challenging. To an approximation, this is because uncertainties of uniform absorption of dose and the uniform processing of dose-related damage at the cellular level within a complex set of biological variables degrade the confidence of predicting the delayed expression of cancer as a relatively rare event. Cellular biodosimeters that simultaneously report: 1) the quantity of absorbed dose after exposure to ionizing radiation, 2) the quality of radiation delivering that dose, and 3) the risk of developing cancer by the cells absorbing that dose would therefore be useful. An approach to such a multiparametric biodosimeter will be reported. This is the demonstration of a dose responsive field effect of enhanced expression of keratin 18 (K18) in cultures of human mammary epithelial cells irradiated with cesium-1 37 gamma-rays. Dose response of enhanced K18 expression was experimentally extended over a range of 30 to 90 cGy for cells evaluated at mid-log phase. K18 has been reported to be a marker for tumor staging and for apoptosis, and thereby serves as an example of a potential marker for cancer risk, where the reality of such predictive value would require additional experimental development. Since observed radiogenic increase in expression of K18 is a field effect, ie., chronically present in all cells of the irradiated population, it may be hypothesized that K18 expression in specific cells absorbing particulate irradiation, such as the high-LET-producing atomic nuclei of space radiation, will report on both the single-cell distributions of those particles amongst cells within the exposed population, and that the relatively high dose per cell delivered by densely ionizing tracks of those intersecting particles will lead to cell-specific high-expression levels of K18, thereby providing analytical end points that may be used to resolve both the quantity and the quality of the radiation dose absorbed by individual cells. The principal value of this reported potential multiparametric cellular biodosimeter is suggested to be that it justifies a search for similar but more robust radiogenic assays. That is, K18 is only one radiation dose-sensitive expressed protein, whereas analytical techniques of genomics and proteomics can be used to simultaneously analyze multiple gene and protein expressions resulting from radiation-dose absorption. The potential usefulness of multiparametric cellular biodosimeters will be best realized from quantitatively profiling these multiple markers using these modern techniques.

Eshelby's problem of non-elliptical inclusions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zou, Wennan; He, Qichang; Huang, Mojia; Zheng, Quanshui

2010-03-01

The Eshelby problem consists in determining the strain field of an infinite linearly elastic homogeneous medium due to a uniform eigenstrain prescribed over a subdomain, called inclusion, of the medium. The salient feature of Eshelby's solution for an ellipsoidal inclusion is that the strain tensor field inside the latter is uniform. This uniformity has the important consequence that the solution to the fundamental problem of determination of the strain field in an infinite linearly elastic homogeneous medium containing an embedded ellipsoidal inhomogeneity and subjected to remote uniform loading can be readily deduced from Eshelby's solution for an ellipsoidal inclusion upon imposing appropriate uniform eigenstrains. Based on this result, most of the existing micromechanics schemes dedicated to estimating the effective properties of inhomogeneous materials have been nevertheless applied to a number of materials of practical interest where inhomogeneities are in reality non-ellipsoidal. Aiming to examine the validity of the ellipsoidal approximation of inhomogeneities underlying various micromechanics schemes, we first derive a new boundary integral expression for calculating Eshelby's tensor field (ETF) in the context of two-dimensional isotropic elasticity. The simple and compact structure of the new boundary integral expression leads us to obtain the explicit expressions of ETF and its average for a wide variety of non-elliptical inclusions including arbitrary polygonal ones and those characterized by the finite Laurent series. In light of these new analytical results, we show that: (i) the elliptical approximation to the average of ETF is valid for a convex non-elliptical inclusion but becomes inacceptable for a non-convex non-elliptical inclusion; (ii) in general, the Eshelby tensor field inside a non-elliptical inclusion is quite non-uniform and cannot be replaced by its average; (iii) the substitution of the generalized Eshelby tensor involved in various micromechanics schemes by the average Eshelby tensor for non-elliptical inhomogeneities is in general inadmissible.

A structured sparse regression method for estimating isoform expression level from multi-sample RNA-seq data.

PubMed

Zhang, L; Liu, X J

2016-06-03

With the rapid development of next-generation high-throughput sequencing technology, RNA-seq has become a standard and important technique for transcriptome analysis. For multi-sample RNA-seq data, the existing expression estimation methods usually deal with each single-RNA-seq sample, and ignore that the read distributions are consistent across multiple samples. In the current study, we propose a structured sparse regression method, SSRSeq, to estimate isoform expression using multi-sample RNA-seq data. SSRSeq uses a non-parameter model to capture the general tendency of non-uniformity read distribution for all genes across multiple samples. Additionally, our method adds a structured sparse regularization, which not only incorporates the sparse specificity between a gene and its corresponding isoform expression levels, but also reduces the effects of noisy reads, especially for lowly expressed genes and isoforms. Four real datasets were used to evaluate our method on isoform expression estimation. Compared with other popular methods, SSRSeq reduced the variance between multiple samples, and produced more accurate isoform expression estimations, and thus more meaningful biological interpretations.

Expression and phylogenetic analyses reveal paralogous lineages of putatively classical and non-classical MHC-I genes in three sparrow species (Passer).

PubMed

Drews, Anna; Strandh, Maria; Råberg, Lars; Westerdahl, Helena

2017-06-26

The Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) plays a central role in immunity and has been given considerable attention by evolutionary ecologists due to its associations with fitness-related traits. Songbirds have unusually high numbers of MHC class I (MHC-I) genes, but it is not known whether all are expressed and equally important for immune function. Classical MHC-I genes are highly expressed, polymorphic and present peptides to T-cells whereas non-classical MHC-I genes have lower expression, are more monomorphic and do not present peptides to T-cells. To get a better understanding of the highly duplicated MHC genes in songbirds, we studied gene expression in a phylogenetic framework in three species of sparrows (house sparrow, tree sparrow and Spanish sparrow), using high-throughput sequencing. We hypothesize that sparrows could have classical and non-classical genes, as previously indicated though never tested using gene expression. The phylogenetic analyses reveal two distinct types of MHC-I alleles among the three sparrow species, one with high and one with low level of polymorphism, thus resembling classical and non-classical genes, respectively. All individuals had both types of alleles, but there was copy number variation both within and among the sparrow species. However, the number of highly polymorphic alleles that were expressed did not vary between species, suggesting that the structural genomic variation is counterbalanced by conserved gene expression. Overall, 50% of the MHC-I alleles were expressed in sparrows. Expression of the highly polymorphic alleles was very variable, whereas the alleles with low polymorphism had uniformly low expression. Interestingly, within an individual only one or two alleles from the polymorphic genes were highly expressed, indicating that only a single copy of these is highly expressed. Taken together, the phylogenetic reconstruction and the analyses of expression suggest that sparrows have both classical and non-classical MHC-I genes, and that the evolutionary origin of these genes predate the split of the three investigated sparrow species 7 million years ago. Because only the classical MHC-I genes are involved in antigen presentation, the function of different MHC-I genes should be considered in future ecological and evolutionary studies of MHC-I in sparrows and other songbirds.

Novelty and fear conditioning induced gene expression in high and low states of anxiety.

PubMed

Donley, Melanie P; Rosen, Jeffrey B

2017-09-01

Emotional states influence how stimuli are interpreted. High anxiety states in humans lead to more negative, threatening interpretations of novel information, typically accompanied by activation of the amygdala. We developed a handling protocol that induces long-lasting high and low anxiety-like states in rats to explore the role of state anxiety on brain activation during exposure to a novel environment and fear conditioning. In situ hybridization of the inducible transcription factor Egr-1 found increased gene expression in the lateral nucleus of the amygdala (LA) following exposure to a novel environment and contextual fear conditioning in high anxiety-like rats. In contrast, low state anxiety-like rats did not generate Egr-1 increases in LA when placed in a novel chamber. Egr-1 expression was also examined in the dorsal hippocampus and prefrontal cortex. In CA1 of the hippocampus and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), Egr-1 expression increased in response to novel context exposure and fear conditioning, independent of state anxiety level. Furthermore, in mPFC, Egr-1 in low anxiety-like rats was increased more with fear conditioning than novel exposure. The current series of experiments show that brain areas involved in fear and anxiety-like states do not respond uniformly to novelty during high and low states of anxiety. © 2017 Donley and Rosen; Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.

Mandatory School Uniforms and Freedom of Expression

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Vopat, Mark C.

2010-01-01

On 10 December 2007 the Akron City School Board--following the precedent set by many school systems across the United States and the world--instituted a policy of mandatory school uniforms for all students in grades K-8. The measure was met with mixed reviews. While many parents supported the measure, a small group of parents from a selective,…

Algal autolysate medium to label proteins for NMR in mammalian cells.

PubMed

Fuccio, Carmelo; Luchinat, Enrico; Barbieri, Letizia; Neri, Sara; Fragai, Marco

2016-04-01

In-cell NMR provides structural and functional information on proteins directly inside living cells. At present, the high costs of the labeled media for mammalian cells represent a limiting factor for the development of this methodology. Here we report a protocol to prepare a homemade growth medium from Spirulina platensis autolysate, suitable to express uniformly labeled proteins inside mammalian cells at a reduced cost-per-sample. The human proteins SOD1 and Mia40 were overexpressed in human cells grown in (15)N-enriched S. platensis algal-derived medium, and high quality in-cell NMR spectra were obtained.

Semiclassical evaluation of quantum fidelity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vanicek, Jiri

2004-03-01

We present a numerically feasible semiclassical method to evaluate quantum fidelity (Loschmidt echo) in a classically chaotic system. It was thought that such evaluation would be intractable, but instead we show that a uniform semiclassical expression not only is tractable but it gives remarkably accurate numerical results for the standard map in both the Fermi-golden-rule and Lyapunov regimes. Because it allows a Monte-Carlo evaluation, this uniform expression is accurate at times where there are 10^70 semiclassical contributions. Remarkably, the method also explicitly contains the ``building blocks'' of analytical theories of recent literature, and thus permits a direct test of approximations made by other authors in these regimes, rather than an a posteriori comparison with numerical results. We explain in more detail the extended validity of the classical perturbation approximation and thus provide a ``defense" of the linear response theory from the famous Van Kampen objection. We point out the potential use of our uniform expression in other areas because it gives a most direct link between the quantum Feynman propagator based on the path integral and the semiclassical Van Vleck propagator based on the sum over classical trajectories. Finally, we test the applicability of our method in integrable and mixed systems.

p63 expression defines a lethal subset of muscle-invasive bladder cancers.

PubMed

Choi, Woonyoung; Shah, Jay B; Tran, Mai; Svatek, Robert; Marquis, Lauren; Lee, I-Ling; Yu, Dasom; Adam, Liana; Wen, Sijin; Shen, Yu; Dinney, Colin; McConkey, David J; Siefker-Radtke, Arlene

2012-01-01

p63 is a member of the p53 family that has been implicated in maintenance of epithelial stem cell compartments. Previous studies demonstrated that p63 is downregulated in muscle-invasive bladder cancers, but the relationship between p63 expression and survival is not clear. We used real-time PCR to characterize p63 expression and several genes implicated in epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in human bladder cancer cell lines (n = 15) and primary tumors (n = 101). We correlated tumor marker expression with stage, disease-specific (DSS), and overall survival (OS). Expression of E-cadherin and p63 correlated directly with one another and inversely with expression of the mesenchymal markers Zeb-1, Zeb-2, and vimentin. Non-muscle-invasive (Ta and T1) bladder cancers uniformly expressed high levels of E-cadherin and p63 and low levels of the mesenchymal markers. Interestingly, a subset of muscle-invasive (T2-T4) tumors maintained high levels of E-cadherin and p63 expression. As expected, there was a strongly significant correlation between EMT marker expression and muscle invasion (p<0.0001). However, OS was shorter in patients with muscle-invasive tumors that retained p63 (p = 0.007). Our data confirm that molecular markers of EMT are elevated in muscle-invasive bladder cancers, but interestingly, retention of the "epithelial" marker p63 in muscle-invasive tumors is associated with a worse outcome.

BnDGAT1s Function Similarly in Oil Deposition and Are Expressed with Uniform Patterns in Tissues of Brassica napus.

PubMed

Zhao, Cuizhu; Li, Huan; Zhang, Wenxue; Wang, Hailan; Xu, Aixia; Tian, Jianhua; Zou, Jitao; Taylor, David C; Zhang, Meng

2017-01-01

As an allotetraploid oilcrop, Brassica napus contains four duplicated Acyl-CoA:diacylglycerol acyltransferase 1 ( DGAT1 ) genes, which catalyze one of the rate-limiting steps in triacylglycerol (TAG) biosynthesis in plants. While all four BnDGAT1 s have been expressed functionally in yeast, their expression patterns in different germplasms and tissues and also consequent contribution to seed oil accumulation in planta remain to be elucidated. In this study, the coding regions of the four BnDGAT1s were expressed in an Arabidopsis dgat1 mutant. All four BnDGAT1s showed similar effects on oil content and fatty acid composition, a result which is different from that observed in previous studies of their expression in yeast. Expression patterns of BnDGAT1s were analyzed in developing seeds of 34 B. napus inbred lines and in different tissues of 14 lines. Different expression patterns were observed for the four BnDGAT1 s, which suggests that they express independently or randomly in different germplasm sources. Higher expression of BnDGAT1s was correlated with higher seed oil content lines. Tissue-specific analyses showed that the BnDGAT1 s were expressed in a uniform pattern in different tissues. Our results suggest that it is important to maintain expression of the four BnDGAT1s for maximum return on oil content.

Human dopamine receptor nanovesicles for gate-potential modulators in high-performance field-effect transistor biosensors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Park, Seon Joo; Song, Hyun Seok; Kwon, Oh Seok; Chung, Ji Hyun; Lee, Seung Hwan; An, Ji Hyun; Ahn, Sae Ryun; Lee, Ji Eun; Yoon, Hyeonseok; Park, Tai Hyun; Jang, Jyongsik

2014-03-01

The development of molecular detection that allows rapid responses with high sensitivity and selectivity remains challenging. Herein, we demonstrate the strategy of novel bio-nanotechnology to successfully fabricate high-performance dopamine (DA) biosensor using DA Receptor-containing uniform-particle-shaped Nanovesicles-immobilized Carboxylated poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (CPEDOT) NTs (DRNCNs). DA molecules are commonly associated with serious diseases, such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases. For the first time, nanovesicles containing a human DA receptor D1 (hDRD1) were successfully constructed from HEK-293 cells, stably expressing hDRD1. The nanovesicles containing hDRD1 as gate-potential modulator on the conducting polymer (CP) nanomaterial transistors provided high-performance responses to DA molecule owing to their uniform, monodispersive morphologies and outstanding discrimination ability. Specifically, the DRNCNs were integrated into a liquid-ion gated field-effect transistor (FET) system via immobilization and attachment processes, leading to high sensitivity and excellent selectivity toward DA in liquid state. Unprecedentedly, the minimum detectable level (MDL) from the field-induced DA responses was as low as 10 pM in real- time, which is 10 times more sensitive than that of previously reported CP based-DA biosensors. Moreover, the FET-type DRNCN biosensor had a rapid response time (<1 s) and showed excellent selectivity in human serum.

A Fourier Method for Sidelobe Reduction in Equally Spaced Linear Arrays

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Safaai-Jazi, Ahmad; Stutzman, Warren L.

2018-04-01

Uniformly excited, equally spaced linear arrays have a sidelobe level larger than -13.3 dB, which is too high for many applications. This limitation can be remedied by nonuniform excitation of array elements. We present an efficient method for sidelobe reduction in equally spaced linear arrays with low penalty on the directivity. The method involves the following steps: construction of a periodic function containing only the sidelobes of the uniformly excited array, calculation of the Fourier series of this periodic function, subtracting the series from the array factor of the original uniformly excited array after it is truncated, and finally mitigating the truncation effects which yields significant increase in sidelobe level reduction. A sidelobe reduction factor is incorporated into element currents that makes much larger sidelobe reductions possible and also allows varying the sidelobe level incrementally. It is shown that such newly formed arrays can provide sidelobe levels that are at least 22.7 dB below those of the uniformly excited arrays with the same size and number of elements. Analytical expressions for element currents are presented. Radiation characteristics of the sidelobe-reduced arrays introduced here are examined, and numerical results for directivity, sidelobe level, and half-power beam width are presented for example cases. Performance improvements over popular conventional array synthesis methods, such as Chebyshev and linear current tapered arrays, are obtained with the new method.

Family characteristics of anxious ADHD children: preliminary results.

PubMed

Kepley, Hayden O; Ostrander, Rick

2007-02-01

To investigate the family environments of children in a community sample with ADHD and co-occurring anxiety. Family Environment Scale, Behavioral Assessment System for Children, and Structured Clinical Interview are administered to parents of children with ADHD with and without anxiety. ADHD families are uniformly less cohesive and expressive and possess more conflict than families representing the community sample. In contrast to community or nonanxious ADHD families, anxious ADHD families do not encourage independence and tend to be distinctly less assertive, self-sufficient, and autonomous. Although anxious and nonanxious ADHD children tend to have a uniformly high incidence of maternal ADHD, mothers of anxious ADHD children tend to display a much higher incidence of substance/alcohol abuse than either nonanxious or community participants. Findings are consistent with the notion that an insular, dependent, and somewhat controlling family environment characterizes families of children with ADHD and comorbid childhood anxiety.

Identifying Stable Reference Genes for qRT-PCR Normalisation in Gene Expression Studies of Narrow-Leafed Lupin (Lupinus angustifolius L.).

PubMed

Taylor, Candy M; Jost, Ricarda; Erskine, William; Nelson, Matthew N

2016-01-01

Quantitative Reverse Transcription PCR (qRT-PCR) is currently one of the most popular, high-throughput and sensitive technologies available for quantifying gene expression. Its accurate application depends heavily upon normalisation of gene-of-interest data with reference genes that are uniformly expressed under experimental conditions. The aim of this study was to provide the first validation of reference genes for Lupinus angustifolius (narrow-leafed lupin, a significant grain legume crop) using a selection of seven genes previously trialed as reference genes for the model legume, Medicago truncatula. In a preliminary evaluation, the seven candidate reference genes were assessed on the basis of primer specificity for their respective targeted region, PCR amplification efficiency, and ability to discriminate between cDNA and gDNA. Following this assessment, expression of the three most promising candidates [Ubiquitin C (UBC), Helicase (HEL), and Polypyrimidine tract-binding protein (PTB)] was evaluated using the NormFinder and RefFinder statistical algorithms in two narrow-leafed lupin lines, both with and without vernalisation treatment, and across seven organ types (cotyledons, stem, leaves, shoot apical meristem, flowers, pods and roots) encompassing three developmental stages. UBC was consistently identified as the most stable candidate and has sufficiently uniform expression that it may be used as a sole reference gene under the experimental conditions tested here. However, as organ type and developmental stage were associated with greater variability in relative expression, it is recommended using UBC and HEL as a pair to achieve optimal normalisation. These results highlight the importance of rigorously assessing candidate reference genes for each species across a diverse range of organs and developmental stages. With emerging technologies, such as RNAseq, and the completion of valuable transcriptome data sets, it is possible that other potentially more suitable reference genes will be identified for this species in future.

Identifying Stable Reference Genes for qRT-PCR Normalisation in Gene Expression Studies of Narrow-Leafed Lupin (Lupinus angustifolius L.)

PubMed Central

Erskine, William; Nelson, Matthew N.

2016-01-01

Quantitative Reverse Transcription PCR (qRT-PCR) is currently one of the most popular, high-throughput and sensitive technologies available for quantifying gene expression. Its accurate application depends heavily upon normalisation of gene-of-interest data with reference genes that are uniformly expressed under experimental conditions. The aim of this study was to provide the first validation of reference genes for Lupinus angustifolius (narrow-leafed lupin, a significant grain legume crop) using a selection of seven genes previously trialed as reference genes for the model legume, Medicago truncatula. In a preliminary evaluation, the seven candidate reference genes were assessed on the basis of primer specificity for their respective targeted region, PCR amplification efficiency, and ability to discriminate between cDNA and gDNA. Following this assessment, expression of the three most promising candidates [Ubiquitin C (UBC), Helicase (HEL), and Polypyrimidine tract-binding protein (PTB)] was evaluated using the NormFinder and RefFinder statistical algorithms in two narrow-leafed lupin lines, both with and without vernalisation treatment, and across seven organ types (cotyledons, stem, leaves, shoot apical meristem, flowers, pods and roots) encompassing three developmental stages. UBC was consistently identified as the most stable candidate and has sufficiently uniform expression that it may be used as a sole reference gene under the experimental conditions tested here. However, as organ type and developmental stage were associated with greater variability in relative expression, it is recommended using UBC and HEL as a pair to achieve optimal normalisation. These results highlight the importance of rigorously assessing candidate reference genes for each species across a diverse range of organs and developmental stages. With emerging technologies, such as RNAseq, and the completion of valuable transcriptome data sets, it is possible that other potentially more suitable reference genes will be identified for this species in future. PMID:26872362

Identification of a monofunctional aspartate kinase gene of Arabidopsis thaliana with spatially and temporally regulated expression.

PubMed

Yoshioka, Y; Kurei, S; Machida, Y

2001-06-01

We screened a gene trap library of Arabidopsis thaliana and isolated a line in which a gene encoding a homologue of monofunctional aspartate kinase was trapped by the reporter gene. Aspartate kinase (AK) is a key enzyme in the biosynthsis of aspartate family amino acids such as lysine, threonine, isoleucine, and methionine. In plants, two types of AK are known: one is AK which is sensitive to feedback inhibition by threonine and carries both AK and homoserine dehydrogenase (HSD) activities. The other one is monofunctional, sensitive to lysine and synergistically S-adenosylmethionine, and has only AK activity. We concluded that the trapped gene encoded a monofunctional aspartate kinase and designated as AK-lys3, because it lacked the HSD domain and had an amino acid sequence highly similar to those of the monofunctional aspartate kinases ofA. thaliana. AK-lys3 was highly expressed in xylem of leaves and hypocotyls and stele of roots. Significant expression of this gene was also observed in trichomes after bolting. Slight expression of AK-lys3 was detected in vascular bundles and mesophyll cells of cauline leaves, inflorescence stems, sepals, petals, and stigmas. These results indicated that this aspartate kinase gene was not expressed uniformly but in a spatially specific manner.

The pINDUCER lentiviral toolkit for inducible RNA interference in vitro and in vivo

PubMed Central

Meerbrey, Kristen L.; Hu, Guang; Kessler, Jessica D.; Roarty, Kevin; Fang, Justin E.; Herschkowitz, Jason I.; Burrows, Anna E.; Ciccia, Alberto; Sun, Tingting; Schmitt, Earlene M.; Bernardi, Ronald J.; Fu, Xiaoyong; Bland, Christopher S.; Cooper, Thomas A.; Schiff, Rachel; Rosen, Jeffrey M.; Westbrook, Thomas F.; Elledge, Stephen J.

2011-01-01

The discovery of RNAi has revolutionized loss-of-function genetic studies in mammalian systems. However, significant challenges still remain to fully exploit RNAi for mammalian genetics. For instance, genetic screens and in vivo studies could be broadly improved by methods that allow inducible and uniform gene expression control. To achieve this, we built the lentiviral pINDUCER series of expression vehicles for inducible RNAi in vivo. Using a multicistronic design, pINDUCER vehicles enable tracking of viral transduction and shRNA or cDNA induction in a broad spectrum of mammalian cell types in vivo. They achieve this uniform temporal, dose-dependent, and reversible control of gene expression across heterogenous cell populations via fluorescence-based quantification of reverse tet-transactivator expression. This feature allows isolation of cell populations that exhibit a potent, inducible target knockdown in vitro and in vivo that can be used in human xenotransplantation models to examine cancer drug targets. PMID:21307310

Cellular and laminar expression of Dab-1 during the postnatal critical period in cat visual cortex and the effects of dark rearing.

PubMed

Kiser, Paul J; Liu, Zijing; Wilt, Steven D; Mower, George D

2011-04-06

This study describes postnatal critical period changes in cellular and laminar expression of Dab-1, a gene shown to play a role in controlling neuronal positioning during embryonic brain development, in cat visual cortex and the effects of dark rearing (DR). At 1week, there is dense cellular staining which is uniform across cortical layers and very light neuropil staining. At the peak of the critical period (5weeks), dense cell staining is largely restricted to large pyramidal cells of deep layer III and layer V, there is faint cell body staining throughout all cortical layers, neuropil staining is markedly increased and uniform in layers III to VI. This dramatic change in laminar and cellular labeling is independent of visual input, since immunostaining is similar in 5-week DR cats. By 10weeks, the mature laminar and cellular staining pattern is established and the major subsequent change is a further reduction in the density of cellular staining in all cortical layers. Neuropil staining is pronounced and uniform across cortical layers. These developmental changes are altered by DR. Quantification by cell counts indicated that age and DR interact such that differences in cellular expression are opposite in direction between 5- and 20-week-old cats. This bidirectional regulation of cellular expression is the same in all cortical laminae. The bidirectional regulation of cellular expression matches the effects of age and DR on physiological plasticity during the critical period as assessed by ocular dominance shifts in response to monocular deprivation. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Luminosity function and jet structure of Gamma-Ray Burst

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pescalli, A.; Ghirlanda, G.; Salafia, O. S.; Ghisellini, G.; Nappo, F.; Salvaterra, R.

2015-02-01

The structure of gamma-ray burst (GRB) jets impacts on their prompt and afterglow emission properties. The jet of GRBs could be uniform, with constant energy per unit solid angle within the jet aperture, or it could be structured, namely with energy and velocity that depend on the angular distance from the axis of the jet. We try to get some insight about the still unknown structure of GRBs by studying their luminosity function. We show that low (1046-48 erg s-1) and high (i.e. with L ≥ 1050 erg s-1) luminosity GRBs can be described by a unique luminosity function, which is also consistent with current lower limits in the intermediate luminosity range (1048-50 erg s-1). We derive analytical expressions for the luminosity function of GRBs in uniform and structured jet models and compare them with the data. Uniform jets can reproduce the entire luminosity function with reasonable values of the free parameters. A structured jet can also fit adequately the current data, provided that the energy within the jet is relatively strongly structured, i.e. E ∝ θ-k with k ≥ 4. The classical E ∝ θ-2 structured jet model is excluded by the current data.

Probabilistic pathway construction.

PubMed

Yousofshahi, Mona; Lee, Kyongbum; Hassoun, Soha

2011-07-01

Expression of novel synthesis pathways in host organisms amenable to genetic manipulations has emerged as an attractive metabolic engineering strategy to overproduce natural products, biofuels, biopolymers and other commercially useful metabolites. We present a pathway construction algorithm for identifying viable synthesis pathways compatible with balanced cell growth. Rather than exhaustive exploration, we investigate probabilistic selection of reactions to construct the pathways. Three different selection schemes are investigated for the selection of reactions: high metabolite connectivity, low connectivity and uniformly random. For all case studies, which involved a diverse set of target metabolites, the uniformly random selection scheme resulted in the highest average maximum yield. When compared to an exhaustive search enumerating all possible reaction routes, our probabilistic algorithm returned nearly identical distributions of yields, while requiring far less computing time (minutes vs. years). The pathways identified by our algorithm have previously been confirmed in the literature as viable, high-yield synthesis routes. Prospectively, our algorithm could facilitate the design of novel, non-native synthesis routes by efficiently exploring the diversity of biochemical transformations in nature. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Spectral characterization of differential group delay in uniform fiber Bragg gratings.

PubMed

Bette, S; Caucheteur, C; Wuilpart, M; Mégret, P; Garcia-Olcina, R; Sales, S; Capmany, J

2005-12-12

In this paper, we completely study the wavelength dependency of differential group delay (DGD) in uniform fiber Bragg gratings (FBG) exhibiting birefringence. An analytical expression of DGD is established. We analyze the impact of grating parameters (physical length, index modulation and apodization profile) on the wavelength dependency of DGD. Experimental results complete the paper. A very good agreement between theory and experience is reported.

Physical Interpretation of the Schott Energy of An Accelerating Point Charge and the Question of Whether a Uniformly Accelerating Charge Radiates

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rowland, David R.

2010-01-01

A core topic in graduate courses in electrodynamics is the description of radiation from an accelerated charge and the associated radiation reaction. However, contemporary papers still express a diversity of views on the question of whether or not a uniformly accelerating charge radiates suggesting that a complete "physical" understanding of the…

A free-electron laser in a uniform magnetic field

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ride, S. K.; Colson, W. B.

1979-01-01

The study shows that a free-electron laser can operate in a uniform, longitudinal magnetic field. The fully relativistic Lorentz force equations are examined and solved order by order in a radiation field strength to obtain analytic expressions for the electron trajectory and energy as functions of initial electron position within a wavelength of light. Analytic expressions for the longitudinal and transverse bunching and for laser gain are found. The bunching of this laser process is compared to the bunching processes involved in (1) a Stanford free-electron laser and (2) a cyclotron maser. The results received can be useful in exploring light amplification in astrophysical magnetic fields, the magnetosphere, and in laboratory devices.

The low noise limit in gene expression

DOE PAGES

Dar, Roy D.; Weinberger, Leor S.; Cox, Chris D.; ...

2015-10-21

Protein noise measurements are increasingly used to elucidate biophysical parameters. Unfortunately noise analyses are often at odds with directly measured parameters. Here we show that these inconsistencies arise from two problematic analytical choices: (i) the assumption that protein translation rate is invariant for different proteins of different abundances, which has inadvertently led to (ii) the assumption that a large constitutive extrinsic noise sets the low noise limit in gene expression. While growing evidence suggests that transcriptional bursting may set the low noise limit, variability in translational bursting has been largely ignored. We show that genome-wide systematic variation in translational efficiencymore » can-and in the case of E. coli does-control the low noise limit in gene expression. Therefore constitutive extrinsic noise is small and only plays a role in the absence of a systematic variation in translational efficiency. Lastly, these results show the existence of two distinct expression noise patterns: (1) a global noise floor uniformly imposed on all genes by expression bursting; and (2) high noise distributed to only a select group of genes.« less

The visual discrimination of negative facial expressions by younger and older adults.

PubMed

Mienaltowski, Andrew; Johnson, Ellen R; Wittman, Rebecca; Wilson, Anne-Taylor; Sturycz, Cassandra; Norman, J Farley

2013-04-05

Previous research has demonstrated that older adults are not as accurate as younger adults at perceiving negative emotions in facial expressions. These studies rely on emotion recognition tasks that involve choosing between many alternatives, creating the possibility that age differences emerge for cognitive rather than perceptual reasons. In the present study, an emotion discrimination task was used to investigate younger and older adults' ability to visually discriminate between negative emotional facial expressions (anger, sadness, fear, and disgust) at low (40%) and high (80%) expressive intensity. Participants completed trials blocked by pairs of emotions. Discrimination ability was quantified from the participants' responses using signal detection measures. In general, the results indicated that older adults had more difficulty discriminating between low intensity expressions of negative emotions than did younger adults. However, younger and older adults did not differ when discriminating between anger and sadness. These findings demonstrate that age differences in visual emotion discrimination emerge when signal detection measures are used but that these differences are not uniform and occur only in specific contexts.

BFDCA: A Comprehensive Tool of Using Bayes Factor for Differential Co-Expression Analysis.

PubMed

Wang, Duolin; Wang, Juexin; Jiang, Yuexu; Liang, Yanchun; Xu, Dong

2017-02-03

Comparing the gene-expression profiles between biological conditions is useful for understanding gene regulation underlying complex phenotypes. Along this line, analysis of differential co-expression (DC) has gained attention in the recent years, where genes under one condition have different co-expression patterns compared with another. We developed an R package Bayes Factor approach for Differential Co-expression Analysis (BFDCA) for DC analysis. BFDCA is unique in integrating various aspects of DC patterns (including Shift, Cross, and Re-wiring) into one uniform Bayes factor. We tested BFDCA using simulation data and experimental data. Simulation results indicate that BFDCA outperforms existing methods in accuracy and robustness of detecting DC pairs and DC modules. Results of using experimental data suggest that BFDCA can cluster disease-related genes into functional DC subunits and estimate the regulatory impact of disease-related genes well. BFDCA also achieves high accuracy in predicting case-control phenotypes by using significant DC gene pairs as markers. BFDCA is publicly available at http://dx.doi.org/10.17632/jdz4vtvnm3.1. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

BnDGAT1s Function Similarly in Oil Deposition and Are Expressed with Uniform Patterns in Tissues of Brassica napus

PubMed Central

Zhao, Cuizhu; Li, Huan; Zhang, Wenxue; Wang, Hailan; Xu, Aixia; Tian, Jianhua; Zou, Jitao; Taylor, David C.; Zhang, Meng

2017-01-01

As an allotetraploid oilcrop, Brassica napus contains four duplicated Acyl-CoA:diacylglycerol acyltransferase 1 (DGAT1) genes, which catalyze one of the rate-limiting steps in triacylglycerol (TAG) biosynthesis in plants. While all four BnDGAT1s have been expressed functionally in yeast, their expression patterns in different germplasms and tissues and also consequent contribution to seed oil accumulation in planta remain to be elucidated. In this study, the coding regions of the four BnDGAT1s were expressed in an Arabidopsis dgat1 mutant. All four BnDGAT1s showed similar effects on oil content and fatty acid composition, a result which is different from that observed in previous studies of their expression in yeast. Expression patterns of BnDGAT1s were analyzed in developing seeds of 34 B. napus inbred lines and in different tissues of 14 lines. Different expression patterns were observed for the four BnDGAT1s, which suggests that they express independently or randomly in different germplasm sources. Higher expression of BnDGAT1s was correlated with higher seed oil content lines. Tissue-specific analyses showed that the BnDGAT1s were expressed in a uniform pattern in different tissues. Our results suggest that it is important to maintain expression of the four BnDGAT1s for maximum return on oil content. PMID:29312429

Use of uninformative priors to initialize state estimation for dynamical systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Worthy, Johnny L.; Holzinger, Marcus J.

2017-10-01

The admissible region must be expressed probabilistically in order to be used in Bayesian estimation schemes. When treated as a probability density function (PDF), a uniform admissible region can be shown to have non-uniform probability density after a transformation. An alternative approach can be used to express the admissible region probabilistically according to the Principle of Transformation Groups. This paper uses a fundamental multivariate probability transformation theorem to show that regardless of which state space an admissible region is expressed in, the probability density must remain the same under the Principle of Transformation Groups. The admissible region can be shown to be analogous to an uninformative prior with a probability density that remains constant under reparameterization. This paper introduces requirements on how these uninformative priors may be transformed and used for state estimation and the difference in results when initializing an estimation scheme via a traditional transformation versus the alternative approach.

Time-dependent electrophoresis of a dielectric spherical particle embedded in Brinkman medium

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Saad, E. I.; Faltas, M. S.

2018-04-01

An expression for electrophoretic apparent velocity slip in the time-dependent flow of an electrolyte solution saturated in a charged porous medium within an electric double layer adjacent to a dielectric plate under the influence of a tangential uniform electric field is derived. The velocity slip is used as a boundary condition to solve the electrophoretic motion of an impermeable dielectric spherical particle embedded in an electrolyte solution saturated in porous medium under the unsteady Darcy-Brinkman model. Throughout the system, a uniform electric field is applied and maintains with constant strength. Two cases are considered, when the electric double layer enclosing the particle is thin, but finite and when of a particle with a thick double layer. Expressions for the electrophoretic mobility of the particle as functions of the relevant parameters are found. Our results indicate that the time scale for the growth of mobility is significant and small for high permeability. Generally, the effect of the relaxation time for starting electrophoresis is negligible, irrespective of the thickness of the double layer and permeability of the medium. The effects of the elapsed time, permeability, mass density and Debye length parameters on the fluid velocity, the electrophoretic mobility and the acceleration are shown graphically.

Distributional and regularized radiation fields of non-uniformly moving straight dislocations, and elastodynamic Tamm problem

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lazar, Markus; Pellegrini, Yves-Patrick

2016-11-01

This work introduces original explicit solutions for the elastic fields radiated by non-uniformly moving, straight, screw or edge dislocations in an isotropic medium, in the form of time-integral representations in which acceleration-dependent contributions are explicitly separated out. These solutions are obtained by applying an isotropic regularization procedure to distributional expressions of the elastodynamic fields built on the Green tensor of the Navier equation. The obtained regularized field expressions are singularity-free, and depend on the dislocation density rather than on the plastic eigenstrain. They cover non-uniform motion at arbitrary speeds, including faster-than-wave ones. A numerical method of computation is discussed, that rests on discretizing motion along an arbitrary path in the plane transverse to the dislocation, into a succession of time intervals of constant velocity vector over which time-integrated contributions can be obtained in closed form. As a simple illustration, it is applied to the elastodynamic equivalent of the Tamm problem, where fields induced by a dislocation accelerated from rest beyond the longitudinal wave speed, and thereafter put to rest again, are computed. As expected, the proposed expressions produce Mach cones, the dynamic build-up and decay of which is illustrated by means of full-field calculations.

Coulomb explosion of uniformly charged spheroids

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grech, M.; Nuter, R.; Mikaberidze, A.; di Cintio, P.; Gremillet, L.; Lefebvre, E.; Saalmann, U.; Rost, J. M.; Skupin, S.

2011-11-01

A simple, semianalytical model is proposed for nonrelativistic Coulomb explosion of a uniformly charged spheroid. This model allows us to derive the time-dependent particle energy distributions. Simple expressions are also given for the characteristic explosion time and maximum particle energies in the limits of extreme prolate and oblate spheroids as well as for the sphere. Results of particle simulations are found to be in remarkably good agreement with the model.

Phenotypically heterogeneous deletion of the ABH antigen from the transformed bladder urothelium. A scanning electron microscope study.

PubMed

De Harven, E; He, S; Hanna, W; Bootsma, G; Connolly, J G

1987-10-01

The deletion of ABH blood group antigens from the luminal surface of the bladder mucosa in cases of well differentiated transitional cell carcinomata, and the formation of pleomorphic microvilli have both been associated with aggressive biological behaviour and invasiveness of the tumors. We have studied cold cup biopsies from 8 normal mucosae and 17 papillary transitional cell carcinomata of the urinary bladder. The aim of our study was to correlate the formation of uniform or pleomorphic microvilli with the extent of deletion of the ABH blood group antigens on the surface of normal and transformed bladder urothelium. Immunogold scanning electron microscopy (SEM) in the backscattered electron (BE) imaging mode was used for this purpose. In the normal urothelium, uniform labeling of the luminal cells was demonstrated. In well differentiated tumors, the superficial cells exhibited uniform microvilli and a heterogeneous expression of the ABH antigens, giving characteristic 'mosaic' patterns of the antigenic labeling across the mucosal surface. These patterns were sharply delimitated at cell junctions when viewed by SEM; these observations were confirmed by transmission electron microscopy. In higher grade tumors, decreased ABH antigen expression, pleomorphic microvilli and/or featureless luminal cells were observed. In the transformed urothelium, the formation of uniform microvilli appeared to precede the loss of ABH antigen in most cases.

Isolation, characterization, and expression of Le-msx, a maternally expressed member of the msx gene family from the glossiphoniid leech, Helobdella.

PubMed

Master, V A; Kourakis, M J; Martindale, M Q

1996-12-01

The msx gene family is one of the most highly conserved of the nonclustered homeobox-containing genes. We have isolated an msx homolog (Le-msx) from the glossiphoniid leech, Helobdella robusta, and characterized its pattern of expression by whole mount in situ hybridization. In situ expression and reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) data results show that Le-msx is a maternal transcript initially uniformly distributed in the cortex of immature oocytes that becomes asymmetrically localized to the polar regions of the uncleaved zygote. This is the earliest reported expression for the msx gene family and the first maternally expressed homeodomain-containing transcription factor reported in annelids. During embryonic development, Le-msx is expressed in all 10 embryonic stem cells and their segmental founder cell descendants. At midembryonic stages, Le-msx is expressed in the expanding germinal plate. Le-msx is confined to the central nervous system and nephridia at late (stage 9) stages and subsequently disappears from nephridia. In addition, we present a phylogenetic hypothesis for the evolution of the msx gene family, including the identification of a putative C. elegans msx homolog and the realignment of the sponge msx homolog to the NK class of homeodomain genes.

Oligonucleotide Microarray Analysis of Dietary-Induced Hyperlipidemia Gene Expression Profiles in Miniature Pigs

PubMed Central

Takahashi, Junko; Waki, Shiori; Matsumoto, Rena; Odake, Junji; Miyaji, Takayuki; Tottori, Junichi; Iwanaga, Takehiro; Iwahashi, Hitoshi

2012-01-01

Background Hyperlipidemia animal models have been established, but complete gene expression profiles of the transition from normal lipid levels have not been obtained. Miniature pigs are useful model animals for gene expression studies on dietary-induced hyperlipidemia because they have a similar anatomy and digestive physiology to humans, and blood samples can be obtained from them repeatedly. Methodology Two typical dietary treatments were used for dietary-induced hyperlipidemia models, by using specific pathogen-free (SPF) Clawn miniature pigs. One was a high-fat and high-cholesterol diet (HFCD) and the other was a high-fat, high-cholesterol, and high-sucrose diet (HFCSD). Microarray analyses were conducted from whole blood samples during the dietary period and from white blood cells at the end of the dietary period to evaluate the transition of expression profiles of the two dietary models. Principal Findings Variations in whole blood gene expression intensity within the HFCD or the HFCSD group were in the same range as the controls provide with normal diet at all periods. This indicates uniformity of dietary-induced hyperlipidemia for our dietary protocols. Gene ontology- (GO) based functional analyses revealed that characteristics of the common changes between HFCD and HFCSD were involved in inflammatory responses and reproduction. The correlation coefficient between whole blood and white blood cell expression profiles at 27 weeks with the HFCSD diet was significantly lower than that of the control and HFCD diet groups. This may be due to the effects of RNA originating from the tissues and/or organs. Conclusions No statistically significant differences in fasting plasma lipids and glucose levels between the HFCD and HFCSD groups were observed. However, blood RNA analyses revealed different characteristics corresponding to the dietary protocols. In this study, whole blood RNA analyses proved to be a useful tool to evaluate transitions in dietary-induced hyperlipidemia gene expression profiles in miniature pigs. PMID:22662175

Bacterial Expression and Purification of the Amyloidogenic Peptide PAPf39 for Multidimensional NMR Spectroscopy

PubMed Central

Shanmuganathan, Aranganathan; Bishop, Anthony C.; French, Kinsley C.; McCallum, Scott A.; Makhatadze, George I.

2013-01-01

PAPf39 is a 39 residue peptide fragment from human prostatic acidic phosphatase that forms amyloid fibrils in semen. These fibrils have been implicated in facilitating HIV transmission. To enable structural studies of PAPf39 by NMR spectroscopy, efficient methods allowing the production of milligram quantities of isotopically labeled peptide are essential. Here, we report the high-yield expression, as a fusion to ubiquitin at the N-terminus and an intein at the C-terminus, and purification of uniformly labeled 13C- and 15N-labeled PAPf39 peptide. This allows the study of the PAPf39 monomer conformational ensemble by NMR spectroscopy. To this end, we performed the NMR chemical shift assignment of the PAPf39 peptide in the monomeric state at low pH. PMID:23314347

Chromosome rearrangements induce both variegated and reduced, uniform expression of heterochromatic genes in a development-specific manner.

PubMed Central

Weiler, K S; Wakimoto, B T

1998-01-01

In Drosophila melanogaster, chromosome rearrangements that juxtapose euchromatin and heterochromatin can result in position effect variegation (PEV), the variable expression of heterochromatic and euchromatic genes in the vicinity of the novel breakpoint. We examined PEV of the heterochromatic light (lt) and concertina (cta) genes in order to investigate potential tissue or developmental differences in chromosome structure that might be informative for comparing the mechanisms of PEV of heterochromatic and euchromatic genes. We employed tissue pigmentation and in situ hybridization to RNA to assess expression of lt in individual cells of multiple tissues during development. Variegation of lt was induced in the adult eye, larval salivary glands and larval Malpighian tubules for each of three different chromosome rearrangements. The relative severity of the effect in these tissues was not tissue-specific but rather was characteristic of each rearrangement. Surprisingly, larval imaginal discs did not exhibit variegated lt expression. Instead, a uniform reduction of the lt transcript was observed, which correlated in magnitude with the degree of variegation. The same results were obtained for cta expression. These two distinct effects of rearrangements on heterochromatic gene expression correlated with the developmental stage of the tissue. These results have implications for models of heterochromatin formation and the nuclear organization of chromosomes during development and differentiation. PMID:9649533

Optical design and fabrication of palm/fingerprint uniform illumination system with a high-power near-infrared light-emitting diode.

PubMed

Jing, Lei; Wang, Yao; Zhao, Huifu; Ke, Hongliang; Wang, Xiaoxun; Gao, Qun

2017-06-10

In order to meet the requirements of uniform illumination for optical palm/fingerprint instruments and overcome the shortcomings of the poor uniform illumination on the working plane of the optical palm/fingerprint prism, a novel secondary optical lens with a free-form surface, compact structure, and high uniformity is presented in this paper. The design of the secondary optical lens is based on emission properties of the near-infrared light-emitting diode (LED) and basic principles of non-imaging optics, especially considering the impact of the thickness of the prism in the design. Through the numerical solution of Snell's law in geometric optics, we obtain the profile of the free-form surface of the lens. Using the optical software TracePro, we trace and simulate the illumination system. The results show that the uniformity is 89.8% on the working plane of the prism, and the test results show that the actual uniformity reaches 85.7% in the experiment, which provides an effective way for realizing a highly uniform illumination system with high-power near-infrared LED.

The distribution of the therapeutic monoclonal antibodies cetuximab and trastuzumab within solid tumors.

PubMed

Lee, Carol M; Tannock, Ian F

2010-06-03

Poor distribution of some anticancer drugs in solid tumors may limit their anti-tumor activity. Here we used immunohistochemistry to quantify the distribution of the therapeutic monoclonal antibodies cetuximab and trastuzumab in relation to blood vessels and to regions of hypoxia in human tumor xenografts. The antibodies were injected into mice implanted with human epidermoid carcinoma A431 or human breast carcinoma MDA-MB-231 transfected with ERBB2 (231-H2N) that express high levels of ErbB1 and ErbB2 respectively, or wild-type MDA-MB-231, which expresses intermediate levels of ErbB1 and low levels of ErbB2. The distribution of cetuximab in A431 xenografts and trastuzumab in 231-H2N xenografts was time and dose dependent. At early intervals after injection of 1 mg cetuximab into A431 xenografts, the concentration of cetuximab decreased with increasing distance from blood vessels, but became more uniformly distributed at later times; there remained however limited distribution and binding in hypoxic regions of tumors. Injection of lower doses of cetuximab led to heterogeneous distributions. Similar results were observed with trastuzumab in 231-H2N xenografts. In MDA-MB-231 xenografts, which express lower levels of ErbB1, homogeneity of distribution of cetuximab was achieved more rapidly. Cetuximab and trastuzumab distribute slowly, but at higher doses achieve a relatively uniform distribution after about 24 hours, most likely due to their long half-lives in the circulation. There remains poor distribution within hypoxic regions of tumors.

Maternally expressed PGK-Cre transgene as a tool for early and uniform activation of the Cre site-specific recombinase.

PubMed

Lallemand, Y; Luria, V; Haffner-Krausz, R; Lonai, P

1998-03-01

A transgenic mouse strain with early and uniform expression of the Cre site-specific recombinase is described. In this strain, PGK-Crem, Cre is driven by the early acting PGK-1 promoter, but, probably due to cis effects at the integration site, the recombinase is under dominant maternal control. When Cre is transmitted by PGK-Crem females mated to males that carry a reporter transgene flanked by loxP sites, even offspring that do not inherit PGK-Cre delete the target gene. It follows that in the PGK-Crem female Cre activity commences in the diploid phase of oogenesis. In PGK-Crem crosses complete recombination was observed in all organs, including testis and ovary. We prepared a mouse stock that is homozygous for PGK-Crem and at the albino (c) locus. This strain will be useful for the early and uniform induction of ectopic and dominant negative mutations, for the in vivo removal of selective elements from targeted mutations and in connection with the manipulation of targeted loci in 'knock in' and related technologies.

IKZF1 expression is a prognostic marker in newly diagnosed standard-risk multiple myeloma treated with lenalidomide and intensive chemotherapy: a study of the German Myeloma Study Group (DSMM).

PubMed

Krönke, J; Kuchenbauer, F; Kull, M; Teleanu, V; Bullinger, L; Bunjes, D; Greiner, A; Kolmus, S; Köpff, S; Schreder, M; Mügge, L-O; Straka, C; Engelhardt, M; Döhner, H; Einsele, H; Bassermann, F; Bargou, R; Knop, S; Langer, C

2017-06-01

Lenalidomide is an immunomodulatory compound with high clinical activity in multiple myeloma. Lenalidomide binding to the Cereblon (CRBN) E3 ubiquitin ligase results in targeted ubiquitination and degradation of the lymphoid transcription factors Ikaros (IKZF1) and Aiolos (IKZF3) leading to growth inhibition of multiple myeloma cells. Recently, Basigin (BSG) was identified as another protein regulated by CRBN that is involved in the activity of lenalidomide. Here, we analyzed the prognostic value of IKZF1, IKZF3, CRBN and BSG mRNA expression levels in pretreatment plasma cells from 60 patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma uniformly treated with lenalidomide in combination with intensive chemotherapy within a clinical trial. We found that IKZF1 mRNA expression levels are significantly associated with progression-free survival (PFS). Patients in the lowest quartile (Q1) of IKZF1 expression had a superior PFS compared with patients in the remaining quartiles (Q2-Q4; 3-year PFS of 86 vs 51%, P=0.01). This translated into a significant better overall survival (100 vs 74%, P=0.03). Subgroup analysis revealed a significant impact of IKZF1, IKZF3 and BSG expression levels on PFS in cytogenetically defined standard-risk but not high-risk patients. Our data suggest a prognostic role of IKZF1, IKZF3 and BSG expression levels in lenalidomide-treated multiple myeloma.

High intensity ultrasound transducer used in gene transfection

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Morrison, Kyle P.; Keilman, George W.; Noble, Misty L.; Brayman, Andrew A.; Miao, Carol H.

2012-11-01

This paper describes a novel therapeutic high intensity non-focused ultrasound (HIU) transducer designed with uniform pressure distribution to aid in accelerated gene transfer in large animal liver tissues in vivo. The underlying HIU transducer was used to initiate homogeneous cavitation throughout the tissue while delivering up to 2.7 MPa at 1.1 MHz across its radiating surface. The HIU transducer was built into a 6 cm diameter x 1.3 cm tall housing ergonomically designed to avoid collateral damage to the surrounding anatomy during dynamic motion. The ultrasound (US) radiation was applied in a 'paintbrush-like' manner to the surface of the liver. The layers and geometry of the transducer were carefully selected to maximize the active diameter (5.74 cm), maximize the electrical to acoustic conversion efficiency (85%) to achieve 2.7 MPa of peak negative pressure, maximize the frequency operating band at the fundamental resonance to within a power transfer delta of 1 dB, and reduce the pressure delta to within 2 dB across the radiating surface. For maximum peak voltage into the transducer, a high performance piezoceramic was chosen and a DC bias circuit was built integral to the system. An apodized two element annular pattern was made from a single piezoceramic element, resulting in significant pressure uniformity enhancement. In addition to using apodization for pressure uniformity, a proprietary multi-layered structure was used to improve efficiency while sustaining an operating band from 900 kHz to 1.3 MHz. The resultant operating band allowed for dithering techniques using frequency modulation. The underlying HIU transducer for use in large animals enhances gene expression up to 6300-fold.

Structural study of the membrane protein MscL using cell-free expression and solid-state NMR

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Abdine, Alaa; Verhoeven, Michiel A.; Park, Kyu-Ho; Ghazi, Alexandre; Guittet, Eric; Berrier, Catherine; Van Heijenoort, Carine; Warschawski, Dror E.

2010-05-01

High-resolution structures of membrane proteins have so far been obtained mostly by X-ray crystallography, on samples where the protein is surrounded by detergent. Recent developments of solid-state NMR have opened the way to a new approach for the study of integral membrane proteins inside a membrane. At the same time, the extension of cell-free expression to the production of membrane proteins allows for the production of proteins tailor made for NMR. We present here an in situ solid-state NMR study of a membrane protein selectively labeled through the use of cell-free expression. The sample consists of MscL (mechano-sensitive channel of large conductance), a 75 kDa pentameric α-helical ion channel from Escherichia coli, reconstituted in a hydrated lipid bilayer. Compared to a uniformly labeled protein sample, the spectral crowding is greatly reduced in the cell-free expressed protein sample. This approach may be a decisive step required for spectral assignment and structure determination of membrane proteins by solid-state NMR.

Stability evaluation of reference genes for gene expression analysis by RT-qPCR in soybean under different conditions.

PubMed

Wan, Qiao; Chen, Shuilian; Shan, Zhihui; Yang, Zhonglu; Chen, Limiao; Zhang, Chanjuan; Yuan, Songli; Hao, Qinnan; Zhang, Xiaojuan; Qiu, Dezhen; Chen, Haifeng; Zhou, Xinan

2017-01-01

Real-time quantitative reverse transcription PCR is a sensitive and widely used technique to quantify gene expression. To achieve a reliable result, appropriate reference genes are highly required for normalization of transcripts in different samples. In this study, 9 previously published reference genes (60S, Fbox, ELF1A, ELF1B, ACT11, TUA5, UBC4, G6PD, CYP2) of soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] were selected. The expression stability of the 9 genes was evaluated under conditions of biotic stress caused by infection with soybean mosaic virus, nitrogen stress, across different cultivars and developmental stages. ΔCt and geNorm algorithms were used to evaluate and rank the expression stability of the 9 reference genes. Results obtained from two algorithms showed high consistency. Moreover, results of pairwise variation showed that two reference genes were sufficient to normalize the expression levels of target genes under each experimental setting. For virus infection, ELF1A and ELF1B were the most stable reference genes for accurate normalization. For different developmental stages, Fbox and G6PD had the highest expression stability between two soybean cultivars (Tanlong No. 1 and Tanlong No. 2). ELF1B and ACT11 were identified as the most stably expressed reference genes both under nitrogen stress and among different cultivars. The results showed that none of the candidate reference genes were uniformly expressed at different conditions, and selecting appropriate reference genes was pivotal for gene expression studies with particular condition and tissue. The most stable combination of genes identified in this study will help to achieve more accurate and reliable results in a wide variety of samples in soybean.

Testimonial Privileged Communication and the School Counselor

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Litwack, Lawrence; and others

1969-01-01

Briefly reviews literature and state laws regarding counselor legal status and client confidentiality. Expresses need for professional associations to assume leadership role in push for uniform legislation. (CJ)

Modeling of Hurricane Impacts

DTIC Science & Technology

2007-12-21

2.4 Implementation of non-uniform gridsize The numerical method has been extended to allow non-uniform gridsizes in x and y direction, though the...and the vertical excursion of the swash motion A is expressed as 0.125 / 0 inaA sT g h π = . Figure 3 and 4 compare the XBeach results with the...A. Van Gent, A. J. H. M. Reniers, and D. J. R. Walstra (2008), Analysis of dune erosion processes in large scale flume experiments, submitted to

7 CFR 29.6081 - Elements of quality and degrees of each element.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... use of words or terms designated as degrees. These degrees are arranged to show their relative value, but the actual value of each degree varies with type and group. Elements Degrees Body Heavy Medium...) Uniformity (2) (2) (2) Injury tolerance (2) (2) (2) 1 Expressed in inches. 2 Expressed in percentages. Rules ...

Efficient and stable transformation of Lactuca sativa L. cv. Cisco (lettuce) plastids.

PubMed

Kanamoto, Hirosuke; Yamashita, Atsushi; Asao, Hiroshi; Okumura, Satoru; Takase, Hisabumi; Hattori, Masahira; Yokota, Akiho; Tomizawa, Ken-Ichi

2006-04-01

Transgenic plastids offer unique advantages in plant biotechnology, including high-level foreign protein expression. However, broad application of plastid genome engineering in biotechnology has been largely hampered by the lack of plastid transformation systems for major crops. Here we describe the development of a plastid transformation system for lettuce, Lactuca sativa L. cv. Cisco. The transforming DNA carries a spectinomycin-resistance gene (aadA) under the control of lettuce chloroplast regulatory expression elements, flanked by two adjacent lettuce plastid genome sequences allowing its targeted insertion between the rbcL and accD genes. On average, we obtained 1 transplastomic lettuce plant per bombardment. We show that lettuce leaf chloroplasts can express transgene-encoded GFP to approximately 36% of the total soluble protein. All transplastomic T0 plants were fertile and the T1 progeny uniformly showed stability of the transgene in the chloroplast genome. This system will open up new possibilities for the efficient production of edible vaccines, pharmaceuticals, and antibodies in plants.

Thermal response of large area high temperature superconducting YBaCuO infrared bolometers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Khalil, Ali E.

1991-01-01

Thermal analysis of large area high temperature superconducting infrared detector operating in the equilibrium mode (bolometer) was performed. An expression for the temperature coefficient beta = 1/R(dR/dT) in terms of the thermal conductance and the thermal time constant of the detector were derived. A superconducting transition edge bolometer is a thermistor consisting of a thin film superconducting YBaCuO evaporated into a suitable thermally isolated substrate. The operating temperature of the bolometer is maintained close to the midpoint of the superconducting transition region where the resistance R has a maximum dynamic range. A detector with a strip configuration was analyzed and an expression for the temperature rise (delta T) above the ambient due to a uniform illumination with a source of power density was calculated. An expression for the thermal responsibility depends upon the spatial modulation frequency and the angular frequency of the incoming radiation. The problem of the thermal cross talk between different detector elements was addressed. In the case of monolithic HTS detector array with a row of square elements of dimensions 2a and CCD or CID readout electronics the thermal spread function was derived for different spacing between elements.

Perturbations of a close-earth satellite due to sunlight diffusely reflected from the earth. I - Uniform albedo

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lautman, D. A.

1977-01-01

A semianalytic method has been developed to calculate the radiation-pressure perturbations of a close-earth satellite due to sunlight reflected from the earth. The assumptions made are that the satellite is spherically symmetric and that the solar radiation is reflected from the earth according to Lambert's Law with uniform albedo. By using expressions for the components of the radiation-pressure force due to Lochry, the expressions for the perturbations of the elements were developed into series in the true anomaly. The perturbations within a given revolution can be obtained analytically by integrating with respect to v while holding all slowly varying quantities constant. The long-range perturbations are then obtained by accumulating the net perturbations at the end of each revolution.

Design of highly uniform spool and bar horns for ultrasonic bonding.

PubMed

Kim, Sun-Rak; Lee, Jae Hak; Yoo, Choong D; Song, Jun-Yeob; Lee, Seung S

2011-10-01

Although the groove and slot have been widely utilized for horn design to achieve high uniformity, their effects on uniformity have not been analyzed thoroughly. In this work, spool and bar horns for ultrasonic bonding are designed in a systematic way using the design of experiments (DOE) to achieve high amplitude uniformity of the horn. Three-dimensional modal analysis is conducted to predict the natural frequency, amplitude, and stress of the horns, and the DOE is employed to analyze the effects of the groove and slot on the amplitude uniformity. The design equations are formulated to determine the optimum dimensions of the groove and slot, and the uniformity is found to be influenced most significantly by the groove depth and slot width. Displacements of the spool and bar horns were measured using a laser Doppler vibrometer (LDV), and the predicted results are in good agreement with the experimental data.

Arctic storms simulated in atmospheric general circulation models under uniform high, uniform low, and variable resolutions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Roesler, E. L.; Bosler, P. A.; Taylor, M.

2016-12-01

The impact of strong extratropical storms on coastal communities is large, and the extent to which storms will change with a warming Arctic is unknown. Understanding storms in reanalysis and in climate models is important for future predictions. We know that the number of detected Arctic storms in reanalysis is sensitive to grid resolution. To understand Arctic storm sensitivity to resolution in climate models, we describe simulations designed to identify and compare Arctic storms at uniform low resolution (1 degree), at uniform high resolution (1/8 degree), and at variable resolution (1 degree to 1/8 degree). High-resolution simulations resolve more fine-scale structure and extremes, such as storms, in the atmosphere than a uniform low-resolution simulation. However, the computational cost of running a globally uniform high-resolution simulation is often prohibitive. The variable resolution tool in atmospheric general circulation models permits regional high-resolution solutions at a fraction of the computational cost. The storms are identified using the open-source search algorithm, Stride Search. The uniform high-resolution simulation has over 50% more storms than the uniform low-resolution and over 25% more storms than the variable resolution simulations. Storm statistics from each of the simulations is presented and compared with reanalysis. We propose variable resolution as a cost-effective means of investigating physics/dynamics coupling in the Arctic environment. Future work will include comparisons with observed storms to investigate tuning parameters for high resolution models. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory managed and operated by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation, for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration under contract DE-AC04-94AL85000. SAND2016-7402 A

Theory and application of high temperature superconducting eddy current probes for nondestructive evaluation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Claycomb, James Ronald

1998-10-01

Several High-T c Superconducting (HTS) eddy current probes have been developed for applications in electromagnetic nondestructive evaluation (NDE) of conducting materials. The probes utilize high-T c SUperconducting Quantum Interference Device (SQUID) magnetometers to detect the fields produced by the perturbation of induced eddy currents resulting from subsurface flaws. Localized HTS shields are incorporated to selectively screen out environmental electromagnetic interference and enable movement of the instrument in the Earth's magnetic field. High permeability magnetic shields are employed to focus flux into, and thereby increase the eddy current density in the metallic test samples. NDE test results are presented, in which machined flaws in aluminum alloy are detected by probes of different design. A novel current injection technique performing NDE of wires using SQUIDs is also discussed. The HTS and high permeability shields are designed based on analytical and numerical finite element method (FEM) calculations presented here. Superconducting and high permeability magnetic shields are modeled in uniform noise fields and in the presence of dipole fields characteristic of flaw signals. Several shield designs are characterized in terms of (1) their ability to screen out uniform background noise fields; (2) the resultant improvement in signal-to-noise ratio and (3) the extent to which dipole source fields are distorted. An analysis of eddy current induction is then presented for low frequency SQUID NDE. Analytical expressions are developed for the induced eddy currents and resulting magnetic fields produced by excitation sources above conducting plates of varying thickness. The expressions derived here are used to model the SQUID's response to material thinning. An analytical defect model is also developed, taking into account the attenuation of the defect field through the conducting material, as well as the current flow around the edges of the flaw. Time harmonic FEM calculations are then used to model the electromagnetic response of eight probe designs, consisting of an eddy current drive coil coupled to a SQUID surrounded by superconducting and/or high permeability magnetic shielding. Simulations are carried out with the eddy current probes located a finite distance above a conducting surface. Results are quantified in terms of shielding and focus factors for each probe design.

Quantum-dot-tagged microbeads for multiplexed optical coding of biomolecules.

PubMed

Han, M; Gao, X; Su, J Z; Nie, S

2001-07-01

Multicolor optical coding for biological assays has been achieved by embedding different-sized quantum dots (zinc sulfide-capped cadmium selenide nanocrystals) into polymeric microbeads at precisely controlled ratios. Their novel optical properties (e.g., size-tunable emission and simultaneous excitation) render these highly luminescent quantum dots (QDs) ideal fluorophores for wavelength-and-intensity multiplexing. The use of 10 intensity levels and 6 colors could theoretically code one million nucleic acid or protein sequences. Imaging and spectroscopic measurements indicate that the QD-tagged beads are highly uniform and reproducible, yielding bead identification accuracies as high as 99.99% under favorable conditions. DNA hybridization studies demonstrate that the coding and target signals can be simultaneously read at the single-bead level. This spectral coding technology is expected to open new opportunities in gene expression studies, high-throughput screening, and medical diagnostics.

Developmental constraints shape the evolution of the nematode mid-developmental transition.

PubMed

Zalts, Harel; Yanai, Itai

2017-03-27

Evolutionary theory assumes that genetic variation is uniform and gradual in nature, yet morphological and gene expression studies have revealed that different life-stages exhibit distinct levels of cross-species conservation. In particular, a stage in mid-embryogenesis is highly conserved across species of the same phylum, suggesting that this stage is subject to developmental constraints, either by increased purifying selection or by a strong mutational bias. An alternative explanation, however, holds that the same 'hourglass' pattern of variation may result from increased positive selection at the earlier and later stages of development. To distinguish between these scenarios, we examined gene expression variation in a population of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans using an experimental design that eliminated the influence of positive selection. By measuring gene expression for all genes throughout development in 20 strains, we found that variations were highly uneven throughout development, with a significant depletion during mid-embryogenesis. In particular, the family of homeodomain transcription factors, whose expression generally coincides with mid-embryogenesis, evolved under high constraint. Our data further show that genes responsible for the integration of germ layers during morphogenesis are the most constrained class of genes. Together, these results provide strong evidence for developmental constraints as the mechanism underlying the hourglass model of animal evolution. Understanding the pattern and mechanism of developmental constraints provides a framework to understand how evolutionary processes have interacted with embryogenesis and led to the diversity of animal life on Earth.

Electromagnetic Fields of a Uniform Sphere in a Uniform Conducting Medium with Application to Dipole Sources

DTIC Science & Technology

1991-09-01

12b. DISTRIBUTION CODE Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited. 13. ABSTRACT (Maximum 200 words) Vector spherical harmonic expansions are...electric and magnetic field vectors from E rand B - r alone. Genural expressions are given relating the scattered field expansion coefficients to the source...Prescnbed by ANSI Std. Z39-18 29W-102 NCSC TR 426-90 CONTENTS Pag o INTRODUCTION 1 BACKGROUND 1 ANGULAR MOMENTUM OPERATOR AND VECTOR SPHERICAL

Highly uniform parallel microfabrication using a large numerical aperture system

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Zhang, Zi-Yu; Su, Ya-Hui, E-mail: ustcsyh@ahu.edu.cn, E-mail: dongwu@ustc.edu.cn; Zhang, Chen-Chu

In this letter, we report an improved algorithm to produce accurate phase patterns for generating highly uniform diffraction-limited multifocal arrays in a large numerical aperture objective system. It is shown that based on the original diffraction integral, the uniformity of the diffraction-limited focal arrays can be improved from ∼75% to >97%, owing to the critical consideration of the aperture function and apodization effect associated with a large numerical aperture objective. The experimental results, e.g., 3 × 3 arrays of square and triangle, seven microlens arrays with high uniformity, further verify the advantage of the improved algorithm. This algorithm enables the laser parallelmore » processing technology to realize uniform microstructures and functional devices in the microfabrication system with a large numerical aperture objective.« less

UniVIO: A Multiple Omics Database with Hormonome and Transcriptome Data from Rice

PubMed Central

Sakurai, Tetsuya; Sakakibara, Hitoshi

2013-01-01

Plant hormones play important roles as signaling molecules in the regulation of growth and development by controlling the expression of downstream genes. Since the hormone signaling system represents a complex network involving functional cross-talk through the mutual regulation of signaling and metabolism, a comprehensive and integrative analysis of plant hormone concentrations and gene expression is important for a deeper understanding of hormone actions. We have developed a database named Uniformed Viewer for Integrated Omics (UniVIO: http://univio.psc.riken.jp/), which displays hormone-metabolome (hormonome) and transcriptome data in a single formatted (uniformed) heat map. At the present time, hormonome and transcriptome data obtained from 14 organ parts of rice plants at the reproductive stage and seedling shoots of three gibberellin signaling mutants are included in the database. The hormone concentration and gene expression data can be searched by substance name, probe ID, gene locus ID or gene description. A correlation search function has been implemented to enable users to obtain information of correlated substance accumulation and gene expression. In the correlation search, calculation method, range of correlation coefficient and plant samples can be selected freely. PMID:23314752

Quantum transport in d-dimensional lattices

DOE PAGES

Manzano, Daniel; Chuang, Chern; Cao, Jianshu

2016-04-28

We show that both fermionic and bosonic uniform d-dimensional lattices can be reduced to a set of independent one-dimensional chains. This reduction leads to the expression for ballistic energy fluxes in uniform fermionic and bosonic lattices. By the use of the Jordan–Wigner transformation we can extend our analysis to spin lattices, proving the coexistence of both ballistic and non-ballistic subspaces in any dimension and for any system size. Lastly, we then relate the nature of transport to the number of excitations in the homogeneous spin lattice, indicating that a single excitation always propagates ballistically and that the non-ballistic behaviour ofmore » uniform spin lattices is a consequence of the interaction between different excitations.« less

Normalization matters: tracking the best strategy for sperm miRNA quantification.

PubMed

Corral-Vazquez, Celia; Blanco, Joan; Salas-Huetos, Albert; Vidal, Francesca; Anton, Ester

2017-01-01

What is the most reliable normalization strategy for sperm microRNA (miRNA) quantitative Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reactions (qRT-PCR) using singleplex assays? The use of the average expression of hsa-miR-100-5p and hsa-miR-30a-5p as sperm miRNA qRT-PCR data normalizer is suggested as an optimal strategy. Mean-centering methods are the most reliable normalization strategies for miRNA high-throughput expression analyses. Nevertheless, specific trustworthy reference controls must be established in singleplex sperm miRNA qRT-PCRs. Cycle threshold (Ct) values from previously published sperm miRNA expression profiles were normalized using four approaches: (i) Mean-Centering Restricted (MCR) method (taken as the reference strategy); (ii) expression of the small nuclear RNA RNU6B; (iii) expression of four miRNAs selected by the Concordance Correlation Restricted (CCR) algorithm: hsa-miR-100-5p, hsa-miR-146b-5p, hsa-miR-92a-3p and hsa-miR-30a-5p; (iv) the combination of two of these miRNAs that achieved the highest proximity to MCR. Expression profile data from 736 sperm miRNAs were taken from previously published studies performed in fertile donors (n = 10) and infertile patients (n = 38). For each tested normalizer molecule, expression ubiquity and uniformity across the different samples and populations were assessed as indispensable requirements for being considered as valid candidates. The reliability of the different normalizing strategies was compared to MCR based on the set of differentially expressed miRNAs (DE-miRNAs) detected between populations, the corresponding predicted targets and the associated enriched biological processes. All tested normalizers were found to be ubiquitous and non-differentially expressed between populations. RNU6B was the least uniformly expressed candidate across samples. Data normalization through RNU6B led to dramatically misguided results when compared to MCR outputs, with a null prediction of target genes and enriched biological processes. Hsa-miR-146b-5p and hsa-miR-92a-3p were more uniformly expressed than RNU6B, but their results still showed scant proximity to the reference method. The highest resemblance to MCR was achieved by hsa-miR-100-5p and hsa-miR-30a-5p. Normalization against the combination of both miRNAs reached the best proximity rank regarding the detected DE-miRNAs (Area Under the Curve = 0.8). This combination also exhibited the best performance in terms of the target genes predicted (72.3% of True Positives) and their corresponding enriched biological processes (70.4% of True Positives). Not applicable. This study is focused on sperm miRNA qRT-PCR analysis. The use of the selected normalizers in other cell types or tissues would still require confirmation. The search for new fertility biomarkers based on sperm miRNA expression using high-throughput assays is one of the upcoming challenges in the field of reproductive genetics. In this context, validation of the results using singleplex assays would be mandatory. The normalizer strategy suggested in this study would provide a universal option in this area, allowing for normalization of the validated data without causing meaningful variations of the results. Instead, qRT-PCR data normalization by RNU6B should be discarded in sperm-miRNA expression studies. This work was supported by the 2014/SGR00524 project (Agència de Gestió d'Ajuts Universitaris i de Recerca, Generalitat de Catalunya, Spain) and UAB CF-180034 grant (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona). Celia Corral-Vazquez is a recipient of a Personal Investigador en Formació grant UAB/PIF2015 (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona). The authors report no conflict of interest. © The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Comparison of Turbulent Heat-Transfer Results for Uniform Wall Heat Flux and Uniform Wall Temperature

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Siegel, R.; Sparrow, E. M.

1960-01-01

The purpose of this note is to examine in a more precise way how the Nusselt numbers for turbulent heat transfer in both the fully developed and thermal entrance regions of a circular tube are affected by two different wall boundary conditions. The comparisons are made for: (a) Uniform wall temperature (UWT); and (b) uniform wall heat flux (UHF). Several papers which have been concerned with the turbulent thermal entrance region problem are given. 1 Although these analyses have all utilized an eigenvalue formulation for the thermal entrance region there were differences in the choices of eddy diffusivity expressions, velocity distributions, and methods for carrying out the numerical solutions. These differences were also found in the fully developed analyses. Hence when making a comparison of the analytical results for uniform wall temperature and uniform wall heat flux, it was not known if differences in the Nusselt numbers could be wholly attributed to the difference in wall boundary conditions, since all the analytical results were not obtained in a consistent way. To have results which could be directly compared, computations were carried out for the uniform wall temperature case, using the same eddy diffusivity, velocity distribution, and digital computer program employed for uniform wall heat flux. In addition, the previous work was extended to a lower Reynolds number range so that comparisons could be made over a wide range of both Reynolds and Prandtl numbers.

Comparison between the Amount of Environmental Change and the Amount of Transcriptome Change

PubMed Central

Ogata, Norichika; Kozaki, Toshinori; Yokoyama, Takeshi; Hata, Tamako; Iwabuchi, Kikuo

2015-01-01

Cells must coordinate adjustments in genome expression to accommodate changes in their environment. We hypothesized that the amount of transcriptome change is proportional to the amount of environmental change. To capture the effects of environmental changes on the transcriptome, we compared transcriptome diversities (defined as the Shannon entropy of frequency distribution) of silkworm fat-body tissues cultured with several concentrations of phenobarbital. Although there was no proportional relationship, we did identify a drug concentration “tipping point” between 0.25 and 1.0 mM. Cells cultured in media containing lower drug concentrations than the tipping point showed uniformly high transcriptome diversities, while those cultured at higher drug concentrations than the tipping point showed uniformly low transcriptome diversities. The plasticity of transcriptome diversity was corroborated by cultivations of fat bodies in MGM-450 insect medium without phenobarbital and in 0.25 mM phenobarbital-supplemented MGM-450 insect medium after previous cultivation (cultivation for 80 hours in MGM-450 insect medium without phenobarbital, followed by cultivation for 10 hours in 1.0 mM phenobarbital-supplemented MGM-450 insect medium). Interestingly, the transcriptome diversities of cells cultured in media containing 0.25 mM phenobarbital after previous cultivation (cultivation for 80 hours in MGM-450 insect medium without phenobarbital, followed by cultivation for 10 hours in 1.0 mM phenobarbital-supplemented MGM-450 insect medium) were different from cells cultured in media containing 0.25 mM phenobarbital after previous cultivation (cultivation for 80 hours in MGM-450 insect medium without phenobarbital). This hysteretic phenomenon of transcriptome diversities indicates multi-stability of the genome expression system. Cellular memories were recorded in genome expression networks as in DNA/histone modifications. PMID:26657512

DWARF TILLER1, a WUSCHEL-Related Homeobox Transcription Factor, Is Required for Tiller Growth in Rice

PubMed Central

Wang, Wenfei; Li, Gang; Zhao, Jun; Chu, Huangwei; Lin, Wenhui; Zhang, Dabing; Wang, Zhiyong; Liang, Wanqi

2014-01-01

Unlike many wild grasses, domesticated rice cultivars have uniform culm height and panicle size among tillers and the main shoot, which is an important trait for grain yield. However, the genetic basis of this trait remains unknown. Here, we report that DWARF TILLER1 (DWT1) controls the developmental uniformity of the main shoot and tillers in rice (Oryza sativa). Most dwt1 mutant plants develop main shoots with normal height and larger panicles, but dwarf tillers bearing smaller panicles compared with those of the wild type. In addition, dwt1 tillers have shorter internodes with fewer and un-elongated cells compared with the wild type, indicating that DWT1 affects cell division and cell elongation. Map-based cloning revealed that DWT1 encodes a WUSCHEL-related homeobox (WOX) transcription factor homologous to the Arabidopsis WOX8 and WOX9. The DWT1 gene is highly expressed in young panicles, but undetectable in the internodes, suggesting that DWT1 expression is spatially or temporally separated from its effect on the internode growth. Transcriptomic analysis revealed altered expression of genes involved in cell division and cell elongation, cytokinin/gibberellin homeostasis and signaling in dwt1 shorter internodes. Moreover, the non-elongating internodes of dwt1 are insensitive to exogenous gibberellin (GA) treatment, and some of the slender rice1 (slr1) dwt1 double mutant exhibits defective internodes similar to the dwt1 single mutant, suggesting that the DWT1 activity in the internode elongation is directly or indirectly associated with GA signaling. This study reveals a genetic pathway synchronizing the development of tillers and the main shoot, and a new function of WOX genes in balancing branch growth in rice. PMID:24625559

BATS: a Bayesian user-friendly software for analyzing time series microarray experiments.

PubMed

Angelini, Claudia; Cutillo, Luisa; De Canditiis, Daniela; Mutarelli, Margherita; Pensky, Marianna

2008-10-06

Gene expression levels in a given cell can be influenced by different factors, namely pharmacological or medical treatments. The response to a given stimulus is usually different for different genes and may depend on time. One of the goals of modern molecular biology is the high-throughput identification of genes associated with a particular treatment or a biological process of interest. From methodological and computational point of view, analyzing high-dimensional time course microarray data requires very specific set of tools which are usually not included in standard software packages. Recently, the authors of this paper developed a fully Bayesian approach which allows one to identify differentially expressed genes in a 'one-sample' time-course microarray experiment, to rank them and to estimate their expression profiles. The method is based on explicit expressions for calculations and, hence, very computationally efficient. The software package BATS (Bayesian Analysis of Time Series) presented here implements the methodology described above. It allows an user to automatically identify and rank differentially expressed genes and to estimate their expression profiles when at least 5-6 time points are available. The package has a user-friendly interface. BATS successfully manages various technical difficulties which arise in time-course microarray experiments, such as a small number of observations, non-uniform sampling intervals and replicated or missing data. BATS is a free user-friendly software for the analysis of both simulated and real microarray time course experiments. The software, the user manual and a brief illustrative example are freely available online at the BATS website: http://www.na.iac.cnr.it/bats.

Three-dimensional bioprinting of embryonic stem cells directs highly uniform embryoid body formation.

PubMed

Ouyang, Liliang; Yao, Rui; Mao, Shuangshuang; Chen, Xi; Na, Jie; Sun, Wei

2015-11-04

With the ability to manipulate cells temporarily and spatially into three-dimensional (3D) tissue-like construct, 3D bioprinting technology was used in many studies to facilitate the recreation of complex cell niche and/or to better understand the regulation of stem cell proliferation and differentiation by cellular microenvironment factors. Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) have the capacity to differentiate into any specialized cell type of the animal body, generally via the formation of embryoid body (EB), which mimics the early stages of embryogenesis. In this study, extrusion-based 3D bioprinting technology was utilized for biofabricating ESCs into 3D cell-laden construct. The influence of 3D printing parameters on ESC viability, proliferation, maintenance of pluripotency and the rule of EB formation was systematically studied in this work. Results demonstrated that ESCs were successfully printed with hydrogel into 3D macroporous construct. Upon process optimization, about 90% ESCs remained alive after the process of bioprinting and cell-laden construct formation. ESCs continued proliferating into spheroid EBs in the hydrogel construct, while retaining the protein expression and gene expression of pluripotent markers, like octamer binding transcription factor 4, stage specific embryonic antigen 1 and Nanog. In this novel technology, EBs were formed through cell proliferation instead of aggregation, and the quantity of EBs was tuned by the initial cell density in the 3D bioprinting process. This study introduces the 3D bioprinting of ESCs into a 3D cell-laden hydrogel construct for the first time and showed the production of uniform, pluripotent, high-throughput and size-controllable EBs, which indicated strong potential in ESC large scale expansion, stem cell regulation and fabrication of tissue-like structure and drug screening studies.

Expression of a gymnosperm PIN homologous gene correlates with auxin immunolocalization pattern at cotyledon formation and in demarcation of the procambium during Picea abies somatic embryo development and in seedling tissues.

PubMed

Palovaara, Joakim; Hallberg, Henrik; Stasolla, Claudio; Luit, Bert; Hakman, Inger

2010-04-01

In seed plants, the body organization is established during embryogenesis and is uniform across gymnosperms and angiosperms, despite differences during early embryogeny. Evidence from angiosperms implicates the plant hormone auxin and its polar transport, mainly established by the PIN family of auxin efflux transporters, in the patterning of embryos. Here, PaPIN1 from Norway spruce (Picea abies [L.] Karst.), a gene widely expressed in conifer tissues and organs, was characterized and its expression and localization patterns were determined with reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction and in situ hybridization during somatic embryo development and in seedlings. PaPIN1 shares the predicted structure of other PIN proteins, but its central hydrophilic loop is longer than most PINs. In phylogenetic analyses, PaPIN1 clusters with Arabidopsis thaliana (L.) Heynh. PIN3, PIN4 and PIN7, but its expression pattern also suggests similarity to PIN1. The PaPIN1 expression signal was high in the protoderm of pre-cotyledonary embryos, but not if embryos were pre-treated with the auxin transport inhibitor N-1-naphthylphthalamic acid (NPA). This, together with a high auxin immunolocalization signal in this cell layer, suggests a role of PaPIN1 during cotyledon formation. At later stages, high PaPIN1 expression was observed in differentiating procambium, running from the tip of incipient cotyledons down through the embryo axis and to the root apical meristem (RAM), although the mode of RAM specification in conifer embryos differs from that of most angiosperms. Also, the PaPIN1 in situ signal was high in seedling root tips including root cap columella cells. The results thus suggest that PaPIN1 provides an ancient function associated with auxin transport and embryo pattern formation prior to the separation of angiosperms and gymnosperms, in spite of some morphological differences.

I Think We're Alone Now: Solitary Social Behaviors in Adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

PubMed

Zane, Emily; Neumeyer, Kayla; Mertens, Julia; Chugg, Amanda; Grossman, Ruth B

2017-10-10

Research into emotional responsiveness in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has yielded mixed findings. Some studies report uniform, flat and emotionless expressions in ASD; others describe highly variable expressions that are as or even more intense than those of typically developing (TD) individuals. Variability in findings is likely due to differences in study design: some studies have examined posed (i.e., not spontaneous expressions) and others have examined spontaneous expressions in social contexts, during which individuals with ASD-by nature of the disorder-are likely to behave differently than their TD peers. To determine whether (and how) spontaneous facial expressions and other emotional responses are different from TD individuals, we video-recorded the spontaneous responses of children and adolescents with and without ASD (between the ages of 10 and 17 years) as they watched emotionally evocative videos in a non-social context. Researchers coded facial expressions for intensity, and noted the presence of laughter and other responsive vocalizations. Adolescents with ASD displayed more intense, frequent and varied spontaneous facial expressions than their TD peers. They also produced significantly more emotional vocalizations, including laughter. Individuals with ASD may display their emotions more frequently and more intensely than TD individuals when they are unencumbered by social pressure. Differences in the interpretation of the social setting and/or understanding of emotional display rules may also contribute to differences in emotional behaviors between groups.

Temporal high-pass non-uniformity correction algorithm based on grayscale mapping and hardware implementation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jin, Minglei; Jin, Weiqi; Li, Yiyang; Li, Shuo

2015-08-01

In this paper, we propose a novel scene-based non-uniformity correction algorithm for infrared image processing-temporal high-pass non-uniformity correction algorithm based on grayscale mapping (THP and GM). The main sources of non-uniformity are: (1) detector fabrication inaccuracies; (2) non-linearity and variations in the read-out electronics and (3) optical path effects. The non-uniformity will be reduced by non-uniformity correction (NUC) algorithms. The NUC algorithms are often divided into calibration-based non-uniformity correction (CBNUC) algorithms and scene-based non-uniformity correction (SBNUC) algorithms. As non-uniformity drifts temporally, CBNUC algorithms must be repeated by inserting a uniform radiation source which SBNUC algorithms do not need into the view, so the SBNUC algorithm becomes an essential part of infrared imaging system. The SBNUC algorithms' poor robustness often leads two defects: artifacts and over-correction, meanwhile due to complicated calculation process and large storage consumption, hardware implementation of the SBNUC algorithms is difficult, especially in Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) platform. The THP and GM algorithm proposed in this paper can eliminate the non-uniformity without causing defects. The hardware implementation of the algorithm only based on FPGA has two advantages: (1) low resources consumption, and (2) small hardware delay: less than 20 lines, it can be transplanted to a variety of infrared detectors equipped with FPGA image processing module, it can reduce the stripe non-uniformity and the ripple non-uniformity.

Cell–specific Variation in E-selectin Ligand Expression Among Human Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells: Implications for Immunosurveillance and Pathobiology

PubMed Central

Silva, Mariana; Fung, Ronald Kam Fai; Donnelly, Conor Brian; Videira, Paula Alexandra; Sackstein, Robert

2017-01-01

Both host defense and immunopathology are shaped by the ordered recruitment of circulating leukocytes to affected sites, a process initiated by binding of blood-borne cells to E-selectin displayed at target endothelial beds. Accordingly, knowledge of the expression and function of leukocyte E-selectin ligands is key to understanding the tempo and specificity of immunoreactivity. Here, we performed E-selectin adherence assays under hemodynamic flow conditions coupled with flow cytometry and western blot analysis to elucidate the function and structural biology of glycoprotein E-selectin ligands expressed on human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs). Circulating monocytes uniformly express high levels of the canonical E-selectin binding determinant sLeX and display markedly greater adhesive interactions with E-selectin than do circulating lymphocytes, which exhibit variable E-selectin binding among CD4+ and CD8+ T-cells but no binding by B-cells. Monocytes prominently present sLeX decorations on an array of protein scaffolds including PSGL-1, CD43, and CD44 (rendering the E-selectin ligands CLA, CD43E, and HCELL, respectively), and B-cells altogether lack E-selectin ligands. Quantitative PCR gene expression studies of glycosyltransferases that regulate display of sLeX reveal high transcript levels among circulating monocytes and low levels among circulating B-cells, and, commensurately, cell surface α(1,3)-fucosylation reveals that acceptor sialyllactosaminyl glycans convertible into sLeX are abundantly expressed on human monocytes yet are relatively deficient on B-cells. Collectively, these findings unveil distinct cell-specific patterns of E-selectin ligand expression among human PBMCs, indicating that circulating monocytes are specialized to engage E-selectin and providing key insights into the molecular effectors mediating recruitment of these cells at inflammatory sites. PMID:28330896

Frequency graded 1D metamaterials: A study on the attenuation bands

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Banerjee, Arnab; Das, Raj; Calius, Emilio P.

2017-08-01

Depending on the frequency, waves can either propagate (transmission band) or be attenuated (attenuation band) while travelling through a one-dimensional spring-mass chain with internal resonators. The literature on wave propagation through a 1D mass-in-mass chain is vast and continues to proliferate because of its versatile applicability in condensed matter physics, optics, chemistry, acoustics, and mechanics. However, in all these areas, a uniformly periodic arrangement of identical linear resonating units is normally used which limits the attenuation band to a narrow frequency range. To counter this limitation of linear uniformly periodic metamaterials, the attenuation bandwidth in a one-dimensional finite chain with frequency graded linear internal resonators are investigated in this paper. The result shows that a properly tuned frequency graded arrangement of resonating units can extend the upper part of the attenuation band of 1D metamaterial theoretically up to infinity and also increases the lower part of the attenuation bandwidth by around 40% of an equivalent uniformly periodic metamaterial without increasing the mass. Therefore, the frequency graded metamaterials can be a potential solution towards low frequency and wideband acoustic or vibration insulation. In addition, this paper provides analytical expressions for the attenuation and transmission frequency limits for a periodic mass-in-mass metamaterial and demonstrates the attenuation band is generated by the high absolute value of the effective mass not only due to the negative effective mass.

Static micromixer-coaxial electrospray synthesis of theranostic lipoplexes.

PubMed

Wu, Yun; Li, Lei; Mao, Yicheng; Lee, Ly James

2012-03-27

Theranostic lipoplexes are an integrated nanotherapeutic system with diagnostic imaging capability and therapeutic functions. They hold great promise to improve current cancer treatments; however, producing uniform theranostic lipoplexes with multiple components in a reproducible manner is a highly challenging task. Conventional methods, such as bulk mixing, are not able to achieve this goal because of their macroscale and random nature. Here we report a novel technique, called the static micromixer-coaxial electrospray (MCE), to synthesize theranostic lipoplexes in a single step with high reproducibility. In this work, quantum dots (QD605) and Cy5-labeled antisense oligodeoxynucleotides (Cy5-G3139) were chosen as the model imaging reagent and therapeutic drug, respectively. Compared with bulk mixing, QD605/Cy5-G3139-loaded lipoplexes produced by MCE were highly uniform with polydispersity of 0.024 ± 0.006 and mean diameter by volume of 194 ± 15 nm. MCE also showed higher encapsulation efficiency of QD605 and Cy5-G3139. QD605 and Cy5 also formed the Förster resonance energy transfer pair, and thus the cellular uptake and intracellular fate of theranostic lipoplexes could be visualized by flow cytometry and confocal microscopy. The lipoplexes were efficiently delivered to A549 cells (non-small cell lung cancer cell line) and down-regulated the Bcl-2 gene expression by 48 ± 6%. © 2012 American Chemical Society

A novel perfused rotary bioreactor for cardiomyogenesis of embryonic stem cells.

PubMed

Teo, Ailing; Mantalaris, Athanasios; Song, Kedong; Lim, Mayasari

2014-05-01

Developments in bioprocessing technology play an important role for overcoming challenges in cardiac tissue engineering. To this end, our laboratory has developed a novel rotary perfused bioreactor for supporting three-dimensional cardiac tissue engineering. The dynamic culture environments provided by our novel perfused rotary bioreactor and/or the high-aspect rotating vessel produced constructs with higher viability and significantly higher cell numbers (up to 4 × 10(5) cells/bead) than static tissue culture flasks. Furthermore, cells in the perfused rotary bioreactor showed earlier gene expressions of cardiac troponin-T, α- and β-myosin heavy chains with higher percentages of cardiac troponin-I-positive cells and better uniformity of sacromeric α-actinin expression. A dynamic and perfused environment, as provided by this bioreactor, provides a superior culture performance in cardiac differentiation for embryonic stem cells particularly for larger 3D constructs.

Transcription termination factor Rho and microbial phenotypic heterogeneity.

PubMed

Bidnenko, Elena; Bidnenko, Vladimir

2018-06-01

Populations of genetically identical microorganisms exhibit high degree of cell-to-cell phenotypic diversity even when grown in uniform environmental conditions. Heterogeneity is a genetically determined trait, which ensures bacterial adaptation and survival in the ever changing environmental conditions. Fluctuations in gene expression (noise) at the level of transcription initiation largely contribute to cell-to-cell variability within population. Not surprisingly, the analyses of the mechanisms driving phenotypic heterogeneity are mainly focused on the activity of promoters and transcriptional factors. Less attention is currently given to a role of intrinsic and factor-dependent transcription terminators. Here, we discuss recent advances in understanding the regulatory role of the multi-functional transcription termination factor Rho, the major inhibitor of pervasive transcription in bacteria and the emerging global regulator of gene expression. We propose that termination activity of Rho might be among the mechanisms by which cells manage the intensity of transcriptional noise, thus affecting population heterogeneity.

Asymptotic co- and post-seismic displacements in a homogeneous Maxwell sphere

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tang, He; Sun, Wenke

2018-07-01

The deformations of the Earth caused by internal and external forces are usually expressed through Green's functions or the superposition of normal modes, that is, via numerical methods, which are applicable for computing both co- and post-seismic deformations. It is difficult to express these deformations in an analytical form, even for a uniform viscoelastic sphere. In this study, we present a set of asymptotic solutions for computing co- and post-seismic displacements; these solutions can be further applied to solving co- and post-seismic geoid, gravity and strain changes. Expressions are derived for a uniform Maxwell Earth by combining the reciprocity theorem, which links earthquake, tidal, shear and loading deformations, with the asymptotic solutions of these three external forces (tidal, shear and loading) and analytical inverse Laplace transformation formulae. Since the asymptotic solutions are given in a purely analytical form without series summations or extra convergence skills, they can be practically applied in an efficient way, especially when computing post-seismic deformations and glacial isotactic adjustments of the Earth over long timescales.

Asymptotic Co- and Post-seismic displacements in a homogeneous Maxwell sphere

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tang, He; Sun, Wenke

2018-05-01

The deformations of the Earth caused by internal and external forces are usually expressed through Green's functions or the superposition of normal modes, i.e. via numerical methods, which are applicable for computing both co- and post-seismic deformations. It is difficult to express these deformations in an analytical form, even for a uniform viscoelastic sphere. In this study, we present a set of asymptotic solutions for computing co- and post-seismic displacements; these solutions can be further applied to solving co- and post-seismic geoid, gravity, and strain changes. Expressions are derived for a uniform Maxwell Earth by combining the reciprocity theorem, which links earthquake, tidal, shear and loading deformations, with the asymptotic solutions of these three external forces (tidal, shear and loading) and analytical inverse Laplace transformation formulae. Since the asymptotic solutions are given in a purely analytical form without series summations or extra convergence skills, they can be practically applied in an efficient way, especially when computing post-seismic deformations and glacial isotactic adjustments of the Earth over long timescales.

36 CFR 910.31 - High architectural quality.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 36 Parks, Forests, and Public Property 3 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false High architectural quality... PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE DEVELOPMENT AREA Standards Uniformly Applicable to the Development Area § 910.31 High architectural quality. Development must maintain a uniformly high standard of architecture, representative of...

36 CFR 910.31 - High architectural quality.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... 36 Parks, Forests, and Public Property 3 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false High architectural quality... PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE DEVELOPMENT AREA Standards Uniformly Applicable to the Development Area § 910.31 High architectural quality. Development must maintain a uniformly high standard of architecture, representative of...

The Relationship of School Uniforms to Student Attendance, Achievement, and Discipline

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sowell, Russell Edward

2012-01-01

This causal-comparative study examined the relationship of school uniforms to attendance, academic achievement, and discipline referral rates, using data collected from two high schools in rural southwest Georgia county school systems, one with a uniforms program and one without a uniforms program. After accounting for race and students with…

Preparation and flow cytometry of uniform silica-fluorescent dye microspheres.

PubMed

Bele, Marjan; Siiman, Olavi; Matijević, Egon

2002-10-15

Uniform fluorescent silica-dye microspheres have been prepared by coating preformed monodispersed silica particles with silica layers containing rhodamine 6G or acridine orange. The resulting dispersions exhibit intense fluorescent emission between 500 and 600 nm, over a broad excitation wavelength range of 460 to 550 nm, even with exceedingly small amounts of dyes incorporated into the silica particles (10-30 ppm, expressed as weight of dye relative to weight of dry particles). The fluorescent particles can be prepared in micrometer diameters suitable for analyses using flow cytometry with 488-nm laser excitation.

Advection and Taylor-Aris dispersion in rivulet flow

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Al Mukahal, F. H. H.; Duffy, B. R.; Wilson, S. K.

2017-11-01

Motivated by the need for a better understanding of the transport of solutes in microfluidic flows with free surfaces, the advection and dispersion of a passive solute in steady unidirectional flow of a thin uniform rivulet on an inclined planar substrate driven by gravity and/or a uniform longitudinal surface shear stress are analysed. Firstly, we describe the short-time advection of both an initially semi-infinite and an initially finite slug of solute of uniform concentration. Secondly, we describe the long-time Taylor-Aris dispersion of an initially finite slug of solute. In particular, we obtain the general expression for the effective diffusivity for Taylor-Aris dispersion in such a rivulet, and discuss in detail its different interpretations in the special case of a rivulet on a vertical substrate.

Diffuse-Illumination Systems for Growing Plants

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

May, George; Ryan, Robert

2010-01-01

Agriculture in both terrestrial and space-controlled environments relies heavily on artificial illumination for efficient photosynthesis. Plant-growth illumination systems require high photon flux in the spectral range corresponding with plant photosynthetic active radiation (PAR) (400 700 nm), high spatial uniformity to promote uniform growth, and high energy efficiency to minimize electricity usage. The proposed plant-growth system takes advantage of the highly diffuse reflective surfaces on the interior of a sphere, hemisphere, or other nearly enclosed structure that is coated with highly reflective materials. This type of surface and structure uniformly mixes discrete light sources to produce highly uniform illumination. Multiple reflections from within the domelike structures are exploited to obtain diffuse illumination, which promotes the efficient reuse of photons that have not yet been absorbed by plants. The highly reflective surfaces encourage only the plant tissue (placed inside the sphere or enclosure) to absorb the light. Discrete light sources, such as light emitting diodes (LEDs), are typically used because of their high efficiency, wavelength selection, and electronically dimmable properties. The light sources are arranged to minimize shadowing and to improve uniformity. Different wavelengths of LEDs (typically blue, green, and red) are used for photosynthesis. Wavelengths outside the PAR range can be added for plant diagnostics or for growth regulation

A Structurally Specialized Uniform Wall Layer is Essential for Constructing Wall Ingrowth Papillae in Transfer Cells

PubMed Central

Xia, Xue; Zhang, Hui-Ming; Offler, Christina E.; Patrick, John W.

2017-01-01

Transfer cells are characterized by wall labyrinths with either a flange or reticulate architecture. A literature survey established that reticulate wall ingrowth papillae ubiquitously arise from a modified component of their wall labyrinth, termed the uniform wall layer; a structure absent from flange transfer cells. This finding sparked an investigation of the deposition characteristics and role of the uniform wall layer using a Vicia faba cotyledon culture system. On transfer of cotyledons to culture, their adaxial epidermal cells spontaneously trans-differentiate to a reticulate architecture comparable to their abaxial epidermal transfer cell counterparts formed in planta. Uniform wall layer construction commenced once adaxial epidermal cell expansion had ceased to overlay the original outer periclinal wall on its inner surface. In contrast to the dense ring-like lattice of cellulose microfibrils in the original primary wall, the uniform wall layer was characterized by a sparsely dispersed array of linear cellulose microfibrils. A re-modeled cortical microtubule array exerted no influence on uniform wall layer formation or on its cellulose microfibril organization. Surprisingly, formation of the uniform wall layer was not dependent upon depositing a cellulose scaffold. In contrast, uniform wall cellulose microfibrils were essential precursors for constructing wall ingrowth papillae. On converging to form wall ingrowth papillae, the cellulose microfibril diameters increased 3-fold. This event correlated with up-regulated differential, and transfer-cell specific, expression of VfCesA3B while transcript levels of other cellulose biosynthetic-related genes linked with primary wall construction were substantially down-regulated. PMID:29259611

A Structurally Specialized Uniform Wall Layer is Essential for Constructing Wall Ingrowth Papillae in Transfer Cells.

PubMed

Xia, Xue; Zhang, Hui-Ming; Offler, Christina E; Patrick, John W

2017-01-01

Transfer cells are characterized by wall labyrinths with either a flange or reticulate architecture. A literature survey established that reticulate wall ingrowth papillae ubiquitously arise from a modified component of their wall labyrinth, termed the uniform wall layer; a structure absent from flange transfer cells. This finding sparked an investigation of the deposition characteristics and role of the uniform wall layer using a Vicia faba cotyledon culture system. On transfer of cotyledons to culture, their adaxial epidermal cells spontaneously trans -differentiate to a reticulate architecture comparable to their abaxial epidermal transfer cell counterparts formed in planta . Uniform wall layer construction commenced once adaxial epidermal cell expansion had ceased to overlay the original outer periclinal wall on its inner surface. In contrast to the dense ring-like lattice of cellulose microfibrils in the original primary wall, the uniform wall layer was characterized by a sparsely dispersed array of linear cellulose microfibrils. A re-modeled cortical microtubule array exerted no influence on uniform wall layer formation or on its cellulose microfibril organization. Surprisingly, formation of the uniform wall layer was not dependent upon depositing a cellulose scaffold. In contrast, uniform wall cellulose microfibrils were essential precursors for constructing wall ingrowth papillae. On converging to form wall ingrowth papillae, the cellulose microfibril diameters increased 3-fold. This event correlated with up-regulated differential, and transfer-cell specific, expression of VfCesA3B while transcript levels of other cellulose biosynthetic-related genes linked with primary wall construction were substantially down-regulated.

36 CFR § 910.31 - High architectural quality.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 36 Parks, Forests, and Public Property 3 2013-07-01 2012-07-01 true High architectural quality. Â... PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE DEVELOPMENT AREA Standards Uniformly Applicable to the Development Area § 910.31 High architectural quality. Development must maintain a uniformly high standard of architecture, representative of...

Evaluating the relationship between leaf chlorophyll concentration and SPAD-502 chlorophyll meter readings.

PubMed

Uddling, J; Gelang-Alfredsson, J; Piikki, K; Pleijel, H

2007-01-01

Relationships between chlorophyll concentration ([chl]) and SPAD values were determined for birch, wheat, and potato. For all three species, the relationships were non-linear with an increasing slope with increasing SPAD. The relationships for birch and wheat were strong (r (2) approximately 0.9), while the potato relationship was comparatively weak (r (2) approximately 0.5). Birch and wheat had very similar relationships when the chlorophyll concentration was expressed per unit leaf area, but diverged when it was expressed per unit fresh weight. Furthermore, wheat showed similar SPAD-[chl] relationships for two different cultivars and during two different growing seasons. The curvilinear shape of the SPAD-[chl] relationships agreed well with the simulated effects of non-uniform chlorophyll distribution across the leaf surface and multiple scattering, causing deviations from linearity in the high and low SPAD range, respectively. The effect of non-uniformly distributed chlorophyll is likely to be more important in explaining the non-linearity in the empirical relationships, since the effect of scattering was predicted to be comparatively weak. The simulations were based on the algorithm for the calculation of SPAD-502 output values. We suggest that SPAD calibration curves should generally be parameterised as non-linear equations, and we hope that the relationships between [chl] and SPAD and the simulations of the present study can facilitate the interpretation of chlorophyll meter calibrations in relation to optical properties of leaves in future studies.

A High Frequency Model of Cascade Noise

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Envia, Edmane

1998-01-01

Closed form asymptotic expressions for computing high frequency noise generated by an annular cascade in an infinite duct containing a uniform flow are presented. There are two new elements in this work. First, the annular duct mode representation does not rely on the often-used Bessel function expansion resulting in simpler expressions for both the radial eigenvalues and eigenfunctions of the duct. In particular, the new representation provides an explicit approximate formula for the radial eigenvalues obviating the need for solutions of the transcendental annular duct eigenvalue equation. Also, the radial eigenfunctions are represented in terms of exponentials eliminating the numerical problems associated with generating the Bessel functions on a computer. The second new element is the construction of an unsteady response model for an annular cascade. The new construction satisfies the boundary conditions on both the cascade and duct walls simultaneously adding a new level of realism to the noise calculations. Preliminary results which demonstrate the effectiveness of the new elements are presented. A discussion of the utility of the asymptotic formulas for calculating cascade discrete tone as well as broadband noise is also included.

Semiclassical evaluation of quantum fidelity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vaníček, Jiří; Heller, Eric J.

2003-11-01

We present a numerically feasible semiclassical (SC) method to evaluate quantum fidelity decay (Loschmidt echo) in a classically chaotic system. It was thought that such evaluation would be intractable, but instead we show that a uniform SC expression not only is tractable but it also gives remarkably accurate numerical results for the standard map in both the Fermi-golden-rule and Lyapunov regimes. Because it allows Monte Carlo evaluation, the uniform expression is accurate at times when there are 1070 semiclassical contributions. Remarkably, it also explicitly contains the “building blocks” of analytical theories of recent literature, and thus permits a direct test of the approximations made by other authors in these regimes, rather than an a posteriori comparison with numerical results. We explain in more detail the extended validity of the classical perturbation approximation and show that within this approximation, the so-called “diagonal approximation” is automatic and does not require ensemble averaging.

Plasmon mass scale in two-dimensional classical nonequilibrium gauge theory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lappi, T.; Peuron, J.

2018-02-01

We study the plasmon mass scale in classical gluodynamics in a two-dimensional configuration that mimics the boost-invariant initial color fields in a heavy-ion collision. We numerically measure the plasmon mass scale using three different methods: a hard thermal loop (HTL) expression involving the quasiparticle spectrum constructed from Coulomb gauge field correlators, an effective dispersion relation, and the measurement of oscillations between electric and magnetic energies after introducing a spatially uniform perturbation to the electric field. We find that the HTL expression and the uniform electric field measurement are in rough agreement. The effective dispersion relation agrees with other methods within a factor of 2. We also study the dependence on time and occupation number, observing similar trends as in three spatial dimensions, where a power-law dependence sets in after an occupation-number-dependent transient time. We observe a decrease of the plasmon mass squared as t-1 / 3 at late times.

A Pearson Random Walk with Steps of Uniform Orientation and Dirichlet Distributed Lengths

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Le Caër, Gérard

2010-08-01

A constrained diffusive random walk of n steps in ℝ d and a random flight in ℝ d , which are equivalent, were investigated independently in recent papers (J. Stat. Phys. 127:813, 2007; J. Theor. Probab. 20:769, 2007, and J. Stat. Phys. 131:1039, 2008). The n steps of the walk are independent and identically distributed random vectors of exponential length and uniform orientation. Conditioned on the sum of their lengths being equal to a given value l, closed-form expressions for the distribution of the endpoint of the walk were obtained altogether for any n for d=1,2,4. Uniform distributions of the endpoint inside a ball of radius l were evidenced for a walk of three steps in 2D and of two steps in 4D. The previous walk is generalized by considering step lengths which have independent and identical gamma distributions with a shape parameter q>0. Given the total walk length being equal to 1, the step lengths have a Dirichlet distribution whose parameters are all equal to q. The walk and the flight above correspond to q=1. Simple analytical expressions are obtained for any d≥2 and n≥2 for the endpoint distributions of two families of walks whose q are integers or half-integers which depend solely on d. These endpoint distributions have a simple geometrical interpretation. Expressed for a two-step planar walk whose q=1, it means that the distribution of the endpoint on a disc of radius 1 is identical to the distribution of the projection on the disc of a point M uniformly distributed over the surface of the 3D unit sphere. Five additional walks, with a uniform distribution of the endpoint in the inside of a ball, are found from known finite integrals of products of powers and Bessel functions of the first kind. They include four different walks in ℝ3, two of two steps and two of three steps, and one walk of two steps in ℝ4. Pearson-Liouville random walks, obtained by distributing the total lengths of the previous Pearson-Dirichlet walks according to some specified probability law are finally discussed. Examples of unconstrained random walks, whose step lengths are gamma distributed, are more particularly considered.

Variance-reduction normalization technique for a compton camera system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, S. M.; Lee, J. S.; Kim, J. H.; Seo, H.; Kim, C. H.; Lee, C. S.; Lee, S. J.; Lee, M. C.; Lee, D. S.

2011-01-01

For an artifact-free dataset, pre-processing (known as normalization) is needed to correct inherent non-uniformity of detection property in the Compton camera which consists of scattering and absorbing detectors. The detection efficiency depends on the non-uniform detection efficiency of the scattering and absorbing detectors, different incidence angles onto the detector surfaces, and the geometry of the two detectors. The correction factor for each detected position pair which is referred to as the normalization coefficient, is expressed as a product of factors representing the various variations. The variance-reduction technique (VRT) for a Compton camera (a normalization method) was studied. For the VRT, the Compton list-mode data of a planar uniform source of 140 keV was generated from a GATE simulation tool. The projection data of a cylindrical software phantom were normalized with normalization coefficients determined from the non-uniformity map, and then reconstructed by an ordered subset expectation maximization algorithm. The coefficient of variations and percent errors of the 3-D reconstructed images showed that the VRT applied to the Compton camera provides an enhanced image quality and the increased recovery rate of uniformity in the reconstructed image.

School Violence and Its Effect on the Constitutionality of Public School Uniform Policies.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Starr, Jennifer

2000-01-01

The Arizona Court of Appeals, in the first court decision regarding public school uniform policies, held that mandatory school uniforms do not violate students' First Amendment rights. Discusses the Arizona decision and its effect on the structuring of school uniform policies and their potential successful institution at the high school level. (31…

A modular toolset for recombination transgenesis and neurogenetic analysis of Drosophila.

PubMed

Wang, Ji-Wu; Beck, Erin S; McCabe, Brian D

2012-01-01

Transgenic Drosophila have contributed extensively to our understanding of nervous system development, physiology and behavior in addition to being valuable models of human neurological disease. Here, we have generated a novel series of modular transgenic vectors designed to optimize and accelerate the production and analysis of transgenes in Drosophila. We constructed a novel vector backbone, pBID, that allows both phiC31 targeted transgene integration and incorporates insulator sequences to ensure specific and uniform transgene expression. Upon this framework, we have built a series of constructs that are either backwards compatible with existing restriction enzyme based vectors or utilize Gateway recombination technology for high-throughput cloning. These vectors allow for endogenous promoter or Gal4 targeted expression of transgenic proteins with or without fluorescent protein or epitope tags. In addition, we have generated constructs that facilitate transgenic splice isoform specific RNA inhibition of gene expression. We demonstrate the utility of these constructs to analyze proteins involved in nervous system development, physiology and neurodegenerative disease. We expect that these reagents will facilitate the proficiency and sophistication of Drosophila genetic analysis in both the nervous system and other tissues.

Uniform and nonuniform V-shaped planar arrays for 2-D direction-of-arrival estimation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Filik, T.; Tuncer, T. E.

2009-10-01

In this paper, isotropic and directional uniform and nonuniform V-shaped arrays are considered for azimuth and elevation direction-of-arrival (DOA) angle estimation simultaneously. It is shown that the uniform isotropic V-shaped arrays (UI V arrays) have no angle coupling between the azimuth and elevation DOA. The design of the UI V arrays is investigated, and closed form expressions are presented for the parameters of the UI V arrays and nonuniform V arrays. These expressions allow one to find the isotropic V angle for different array types. The DOA performance of the UI V array is compared with the uniform circular array (UCA) for correlated signals and in case of mutual coupling between array elements. The modeling error for the sensor positions is also investigated. It is shown that V array and circular array have similar robustness for the position errors while the performance of UI V array is better than the UCA for correlated source signals and when there is mutual coupling. Nonuniform V-shaped isotropic arrays are investigated which allow good DOA performance with limited number of sensors. Furthermore, a new design method for the directional V-shaped arrays is proposed. This method is based on the Cramer-Rao Bound for joint estimation where the angle coupling effect between the azimuth and elevation DOA angles is taken into account. The design method finds an optimum angle between the linear subarrays of the V array. The proposed method can be used to obtain directional arrays with significantly better DOA performance.

Reliable solution processed planar perovskite hybrid solar cells with large-area uniformity by chloroform soaking and spin rinsing induced surface precipitation

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Chern, Yann-Cherng; Wu, Hung-Ruei; Chen, Yen-Chu

2015-08-15

A solvent soaking and rinsing method, in which the solvent was allowed to soak all over the surface followed by a spinning for solvent draining, was found to produce perovskite layers with high uniformity on a centimeter scale and with much improved reliability. Besides the enhanced crystallinity and surface morphology due to the rinsing induced surface precipitation that constrains the grain growth underneath in the precursor films, large-area uniformity with film thickness determined exclusively by the rotational speed of rinsing spinning for solvent draining was observed. With chloroform as rinsing solvent, highly uniform and mirror-like perovskite layers of area asmore » large as 8 cm × 8 cm were produced and highly uniform planar perovskite solar cells with power conversion efficiency of 10.6 ± 0.2% as well as much prolonged lifetime were obtained. The high uniformity and reliability observed with this solvent soaking and rinsing method were ascribed to the low viscosity of chloroform as well as its feasibility of mixing with the solvent used in the precursor solution. Moreover, since the surface precipitation forms before the solvent draining, this solvent soaking and rinsing method may be adapted to spinless process and be compatible with large-area and continuous production. With the large-area uniformity and reliability for the resultant perovskite layers, this chloroform soaking and rinsing approach may thus be promising for the mass production and commercialization of large-area perovskite solar cells.« less

Including scattering within the room acoustics diffusion model: An analytical approach.

PubMed

Foy, Cédric; Picaut, Judicaël; Valeau, Vincent

2016-10-01

Over the last 20 years, a statistical acoustic model has been developed to predict the reverberant sound field in buildings. This model is based on the assumption that the propagation of the reverberant sound field follows a transport process and, as an approximation, a diffusion process that can be easily solved numerically. This model, initially designed and validated for rooms with purely diffuse reflections, is extended in the present study to mixed reflections, with a proportion of specular and diffuse reflections defined by a scattering coefficient. The proposed mathematical developments lead to an analytical expression of the diffusion constant that is a function of the scattering coefficient, but also on the absorption coefficient of the walls. The results obtained with this extended diffusion model are then compared with the classical diffusion model, as well as with a sound particles tracing approach considering mixed wall reflections. The comparison shows a good agreement for long rooms with uniform low absorption (α = 0.01) and uniform scattering. For a larger absorption (α = 0.1), the agreement is moderate, due to the fact that the proposed expression of the diffusion coefficient does not vary spatially. In addition, the proposed model is for now limited to uniform diffusion and should be extended in the future to more general cases.

Pure versus combined Merkel cell carcinomas: immunohistochemical evaluation of cellular proteins (p53, Bcl-2, and c-kit) reveals significant overexpression of p53 in combined tumors.

PubMed

Lai, Jonathan H; Fleming, Kirsten E; Ly, Thai Yen; Pasternak, Sylvia; Godlewski, Marek; Doucette, Steve; Walsh, Noreen M

2015-09-01

Merkel cell polyomavirus is of oncogenic significance in approximately 80% of Merkel cell carcinomas. Morphological subcategories of the tumor differ in regard to viral status, the rare combined type being uniformly virus negative and the predominant pure type being mainly virus positive. Indications that different biological subsets of the tumor exist led us to explore this diversity. In an Eastern Canadian cohort of cases (75 patients; mean age, 76 years [range, 43-91]; male/female ratio, 43:32; 51 [68%] pure and 24 [34%] combined tumors), we semiquantitatively compared the immunohistochemical expression of 3 cellular proteins (p53, Bcl-2, and c-kit) in pure versus combined groups. Viral status was known in a subset of cases. The significant overexpression of p53 in the combined group (mean [SD], 153.8 [117.8] versus 121.6 [77.9]; P = .01) and the increased epidermal expression of this protein (p53 patches) in the same group lend credence to a primary etiologic role for sun damage in these cases. Expression of Bcl-2 and c-kit did not differ significantly between the 2 morphological groups. A relative increase in c-kit expression was significantly associated with a virus-negative status (median [interquartile range], 100 [60-115] versus 70 [0-100]; P = .03). Emerging data reveal divergent biological pathways in Merkel cell carcinoma, each with a characteristic immunohistochemical profile. Virus-positive tumors (all pure) exhibit high retinoblastoma protein and low p53 expression, whereas virus-negative cases (few pure and all combined) show high p53 and relatively high c-kit expression. The potential biological implications of this dichotomy call for consistent stratification of these tumors in future studies. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Improved sensitivity via layered-double-hydroxide-uniformity-dependent chemiluminescence.

PubMed

Li, Zenghe; Wang, Dan; Yuan, Zhiqin; Lu, Chao

2016-12-01

In the last two decades nanoparticles have been widely applied to enhance chemiluminescence (CL). The morphology of nanoparticles has an important influence on nanoparticle-amplified CL. However, studies of nanoparticle-amplified CL focus mainly on the size and shape effects, and no attempt has been made to explore the influence of uniformity in nanoparticle-amplified CL processes. In this study we have investigated nanoparticle uniformity in the luminol-H 2 O 2 CL system using layered double hydroxides (LDHs) as a model material. The results demonstrated that the uniformity of LDHs played a key role in CL amplification. A possible mechanism is that LDHs with high uniformity possess abundant catalytic active sites, which results in high CL intensity. Meanwhile, the sensitivity for H 2 O 2 detection was increased by one order of magnitude (1.0 nM). Moreover, the uniform-LDH-amplified luminol CL could be applied to selective detection of glucose in human plasma samples. Furthermore, such a uniformity-dependent CL enhancement effect could adapted to other redox CL systems-for example, the peroxynitrous acid (ONOOH) CL system.

High-temperature ratchets with sawtooth potentials

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rozenbaum, Viktor M.; Shapochkina, Irina V.; Sheu, Sheh-Yi; Yang, Dah-Yen; Lin, Sheng Hsien

2016-11-01

The concept of the effective potential is suggested as an efficient instrument to get a uniform analytical description of stochastic high-temperature on-off flashing and rocking ratchets. The analytical representation for the average particle velocity, obtained within this technique, allows description of ratchets with sharp potentials (and potentials with jumps in particular). For sawtooth potentials, the explicit analytical expressions for the average velocity of on-off flashing and rocking ratchets valid for arbitrary frequencies of potential energy fluctuations are derived; the difference in their high-frequency asymptotics is explored for the smooth and cusped profiles, and profiles with jumps. The origin of the difference as well as the appearance of the jump behavior in ratchet characteristics are interpreted in terms of self-similar universal solutions which give the continuous description of the effect. It is shown how the jump behavior in motor characteristics arises from the competition between the characteristic times of the system.

Improved high power/high frequency inductor

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mclyman, W. T. (Inventor)

1990-01-01

A toroidal core is mounted on an alignment disc having uniformly distributed circumferential notches or holes therein. Wire is then wound about the toroidal core in a uniform pattern defined by the notches or holes. Prior to winding, the wire may be placed within shrink tubing. The shrink tubing is then wound about the alignment disc and core and then heat-shrunk to positively retain the wire in the uniform position on the toroidal core.

Development-related expression patterns of protein-coding and miRNA genes involved in porcine muscle growth.

PubMed

Wang, F J; Jin, L; Guo, Y Q; Liu, R; He, M N; Li, M Z; Li, X W

2014-11-27

Muscle growth and development is associated with remarkable changes in protein-coding and microRNA (miRNA) gene expression. To determine the expression patterns of genes and miRNAs related to muscle growth and development, we measured the expression levels of 25 protein-coding and 16 miRNA genes in skeletal and cardiac muscles throughout 5 developmental stages by quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction. The Short Time-Series Expression Miner (STEM) software clustering results showed that growth-related genes were downregulated at all developmental stages in both the psoas major and longissimus dorsi muscles, indicating their involvement in early developmental stages. Furthermore, genes related to muscle atrophy, such as forkhead box 1 and muscle ring finger, showed unregulated expression with increasing age, suggesting a decrease in protein synthesis during the later stages of skeletal muscle development. We found that development of the cardiac muscle was a complex process in which growth-related genes were highly expressed during embryonic development, but they did not show uniform postnatal expression patterns. Moreover, the expression level of miR-499, which enhances the expression of the β-myosin heavy chain, was significantly different in the psoas major and longissimus dorsi muscles, suggesting the involvement of miR-499 in the determination of skeletal muscle fiber types. We also performed correlation analyses of messenger RNA and miRNA expression. We found negative relationships between miR-486 and forkhead box 1, and miR-133a and serum response factor at all developmental stages, suggesting that forkhead box 1 and serum response factor are potential targets of miR-486 and miR-133a, respectively.

Successful pod infections by Moniliophthora roreri result in differential Theobroma cacao gene expression depending on the clone's level of tolerance.

PubMed

Ali, Shahin S; Melnick, Rachel L; Crozier, Jayne; Phillips-Mora, Wilberth; Strem, Mary D; Shao, Jonathan; Zhang, Dapeng; Sicher, Richard; Meinhardt, Lyndel; Bailey, Bryan A

2014-09-01

An understanding of the tolerance mechanisms of Theobroma cacao used against Moniliophthora roreri, the causal agent of frosty pod rot, is important for the generation of stable disease-tolerant clones. A comparative view was obtained of transcript populations of infected pods from two susceptible and two tolerant clones using RNA sequence (RNA-Seq) analysis. A total of 3009 transcripts showed differential expression among clones. KEGG (Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes) pathway analysis of differentially expressed genes indicated shifts in 152 different metabolic pathways between the tolerant and susceptible clones. Real-time quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (real-time qRT-PCR) analyses of 36 genes verified the differential expression. Regression analysis validated a uniform progression in gene expression in association with infection levels and fungal loads in the susceptible clones. Expression patterns observed in the susceptible clones diverged in tolerant clones, with many genes showing higher expression at a low level of infection and fungal load. Principal coordinate analyses of real-time qRT-PCR data separated the gene expression patterns between susceptible and tolerant clones for pods showing malformation. Although some genes were constitutively differentially expressed between clones, most results suggested that defence responses were induced at low fungal load in the tolerant clones. Several elicitor-responsive genes were highly expressed in tolerant clones, suggesting rapid recognition of the pathogen and induction of defence genes. Expression patterns suggested that the jasmonic acid-ethylene- and/or salicylic acid-mediated defence pathways were activated in the tolerant clones, being enhanced by reduced brassinosteroid (BR) biosynthesis and catabolic inactivation of both BR and abscisic acids. Finally, several genes associated with hypersensitive response-like cell death were also induced in tolerant clones. © 2014 BSPP AND JOHN WILEY & SONS LTD.

Seamless growth of a supramolecular carpet

PubMed Central

Kim, Ju-Hyung; Ribierre, Jean-Charles; Yang, Yu Seok; Adachi, Chihaya; Kawai, Maki; Jung, Jaehoon; Fukushima, Takanori; Kim, Yousoo

2016-01-01

Organic/metal interfaces play crucial roles in the formation of intermolecular networks on metal surfaces and the performance of organic devices. Although their purity and uniformity have profound effects on the operation of organic devices, the formation of organic thin films with high interfacial uniformity on metal surfaces has suffered from the intrinsic limitation of molecular ordering imposed by irregular surface structures. Here we demonstrate a supramolecular carpet with widely uniform interfacial structure and high adaptability on a metal surface via a one-step process. The high uniformity is achieved with well-balanced interfacial interactions and site-specific molecular rearrangements, even on a pre-annealed amorphous gold surface. Co-existing electronic structures show selective availability corresponding to the energy region and the local position of the system. These findings provide not only a deeper insight into organic thin films with high structural integrity, but also a new way to tailor interfacial geometric and electronic structures. PMID:26839053

40 CFR 51.301 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... impairment. A deciview is a haze index derived from calculated light extinction, such that uniform changes in... (for the purposes of calculating deciview, the atmospheric light extinction coefficient must be... light extinction coefficient, expressed in inverse megameters (Mm−1). Existing stationary facility means...

40 CFR 51.301 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... impairment. A deciview is a haze index derived from calculated light extinction, such that uniform changes in... (for the purposes of calculating deciview, the atmospheric light extinction coefficient must be... light extinction coefficient, expressed in inverse megameters (Mm−1). Existing stationary facility means...

40 CFR 51.301 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... impairment. A deciview is a haze index derived from calculated light extinction, such that uniform changes in... (for the purposes of calculating deciview, the atmospheric light extinction coefficient must be... light extinction coefficient, expressed in inverse megameters (Mm−1). Existing stationary facility means...

40 CFR 51.301 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... impairment. A deciview is a haze index derived from calculated light extinction, such that uniform changes in... (for the purposes of calculating deciview, the atmospheric light extinction coefficient must be... light extinction coefficient, expressed in inverse megameters (Mm−1). Existing stationary facility means...

Over 95% of large-scale length uniformity in template-assisted electrodeposited nanowires by subzero-temperature electrodeposition.

PubMed

Shin, Sangwoo; Kong, Bo Hyun; Kim, Beom Seok; Kim, Kyung Min; Cho, Hyung Koun; Cho, Hyung Hee

2011-07-23

In this work, we report highly uniform growth of template-assisted electrodeposited copper nanowires on a large area by lowering the deposition temperature down to subzero centigrade. Even with highly disordered commercial porous anodic aluminum oxide template and conventional potentiostatic electrodeposition, length uniformity over 95% can be achieved when the deposition temperature is lowered down to -2.4°C. Decreased diffusion coefficient and ion concentration gradient due to the lowered deposition temperature effectively reduces ion diffusion rate, thereby favors uniform nanowire growth. Moreover, by varying the deposition temperature, we show that also the pore nucleation and the crystallinity can be controlled.

Magnetic field effects on peristaltic flow of blood in a non-uniform channel

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Latha, R.; Rushi Kumar, B.

2017-11-01

The objective of this paper is to carry out the effect of the MHD on the peristaltic transport of blood in a non-uniform channel have been explored under long wavelength approximation with low (zero) Reynolds number. Blood is made of an incompressible, viscous and electrically conducting. Explicit expressions for the axial velocity, axial pressure gradient are derived using long wavelength assumptions with slip and regularity conditions. It is determined that the pressure gradient diminishes as the couple stress parameter increments and it decreases as the magnetic parameter increments. We additionally concentrate the embedded parameters through graphs.

Uniform Recovery Bounds for Structured Random Matrices in Corrupted Compressed Sensing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Peng; Gan, Lu; Ling, Cong; Sun, Sumei

2018-04-01

We study the problem of recovering an $s$-sparse signal $\\mathbf{x}^{\\star}\\in\\mathbb{C}^n$ from corrupted measurements $\\mathbf{y} = \\mathbf{A}\\mathbf{x}^{\\star}+\\mathbf{z}^{\\star}+\\mathbf{w}$, where $\\mathbf{z}^{\\star}\\in\\mathbb{C}^m$ is a $k$-sparse corruption vector whose nonzero entries may be arbitrarily large and $\\mathbf{w}\\in\\mathbb{C}^m$ is a dense noise with bounded energy. The aim is to exactly and stably recover the sparse signal with tractable optimization programs. In this paper, we prove the uniform recovery guarantee of this problem for two classes of structured sensing matrices. The first class can be expressed as the product of a unit-norm tight frame (UTF), a random diagonal matrix and a bounded columnwise orthonormal matrix (e.g., partial random circulant matrix). When the UTF is bounded (i.e. $\\mu(\\mathbf{U})\\sim1/\\sqrt{m}$), we prove that with high probability, one can recover an $s$-sparse signal exactly and stably by $l_1$ minimization programs even if the measurements are corrupted by a sparse vector, provided $m = \\mathcal{O}(s \\log^2 s \\log^2 n)$ and the sparsity level $k$ of the corruption is a constant fraction of the total number of measurements. The second class considers randomly sub-sampled orthogonal matrix (e.g., random Fourier matrix). We prove the uniform recovery guarantee provided that the corruption is sparse on certain sparsifying domain. Numerous simulation results are also presented to verify and complement the theoretical results.

The influence of jet-grid turbulence on heat transfer from the stagnation region of a cylinder in crossflow

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Obrien, J. E.; Vanfossen, G. J., Jr.

1985-01-01

The effect of high-intensity turbulence on heat transfer from the stagnation region of a circular cylinder in crossflow was studied. The work was motivated by the desire to be able to more fully understand and predict the heat transfer to the leading edge of a turbine airfoil. In order to achieve high levels of turbulence with a reasonable degree of isotropy and homogeneity, a jet-injection turbulence grid was used. The jet grid provided turbulence intensities of 10 to 12 percent, measured at the test cylinder location, for downstream blowing with the blowing rate adjusted to an optimal value for flow uniformity. Heat transfer augmentation above the zeroturbulence case ranged from 37 to 53 percent for the test cylinder behind the jet grid for a cylinder Reynolds number range of 48,000 to 180,000, respectively. The level of heat transfer augmentation was found to be fairly uniform with respect to circumferential distance from the stagnation line. Stagnation point heat transfer results (expressed in terms of the Frossling number) were found to be somewhat low with respect to previous studies, when compared on the basis of equal values of the parameter Tu Re(1/2), indicating an additional Reynolds number effect as observed by previous investigators. Consequently, for a specified value of Tu Re(1/2), data obtained with a relatively high turbulence intensity will have a lower value of the Frossling number.

Biomimetic microbeads containing a chondroitin sulfate/chitosan polyelectrolyte complex for cell-based cartilage therapy.

PubMed

Daley, Ethan Lh; Coleman, Rhima M; Stegemann, Jan P

2015-10-28

Articular cartilage has a limited healing capacity that complicates the treatment of joint injuries and osteoarthritis. Newer repair strategies have focused on the use of cells and biomaterials to promote cartilage regeneration. In the present study, we developed and characterized bioinspired materials designed to mimic the composition of the cartilage extracellular matrix. Chondroitin sulfate (CS) and chitosan (CH) were used to form physically cross-linked macromolecular polyelectrolyte complexes (PEC) without the use of additional crosslinkers. A single-step water-in-oil emulsification process was used to either directly embed mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) in PEC particles created with a various concentrations of CS and CH, or to co-embed MSC with PEC in agarose-based microbeads. Direct embedding of MSC in PEC resulted in high cell viability but irregular and large particles. Co-embedding of PEC particles with MSC in agarose (Ag) resulted in uniform microbeads 80-90 μm in diameter that maintained high cell viability over three weeks in culture. Increased serum content resulted in more uniform PEC distribution within the microbead matrix, and both high and low CS:CH ratios resulted in more homogeneous microbeads than 1:1 formulations. Under chondrogenic conditions, expression of sulfated GAG and collagen type II was increased in 10:1 CS:CH PEC-Ag microbeads compared to pure Ag beads, indicating a chondrogenic influence of the PEC component. Such PEC-Ag microbeads may have utility in the directed differentiation and delivery of progenitor cell populations for cartilage repair.

Detecting Uniform Areas for Vicarious Calibration using Landsat TM Imagery: A Study using the Arabian and Saharan Deserts

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hilbert, Kent; Pagnutti, Mary; Ryan, Robert; Zanoni, Vicki

2002-01-01

This paper discusses a method for detecting spatially uniform sites need for radiometric characterization of remote sensing satellites. Such information is critical for scientific research applications of imagery having moderate to high resolutions (<30-m ground sampling distance (GSD)). Previously published literature indicated that areas with the African Saharan and Arabian deserts contained extremely uniform sites with respect to spatial characteristics. We developed an algorithm for detecting site uniformity and applied it to orthorectified Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) imagery over eight uniform regions of interest. The algorithm's results were assessed using both medium-resolution (30-m GSD) Landsat 7 ETM+ and fine-resolution (<5-m GSD) IKONOS multispectral data collected over sites in Libya and Mali. Fine-resolution imagery over a Libyan site exhibited less than 1 percent nonuniformity. The research shows that Landsat TM products appear highly useful for detecting potential calibration sites for system characterization. In particular, the approach detected spatially uniform regions that frequently occur at multiple scales of observation.

Optimal Scaling of Digital Transcriptomes

PubMed Central

Glusman, Gustavo; Caballero, Juan; Robinson, Max; Kutlu, Burak; Hood, Leroy

2013-01-01

Deep sequencing of transcriptomes has become an indispensable tool for biology, enabling expression levels for thousands of genes to be compared across multiple samples. Since transcript counts scale with sequencing depth, counts from different samples must be normalized to a common scale prior to comparison. We analyzed fifteen existing and novel algorithms for normalizing transcript counts, and evaluated the effectiveness of the resulting normalizations. For this purpose we defined two novel and mutually independent metrics: (1) the number of “uniform” genes (genes whose normalized expression levels have a sufficiently low coefficient of variation), and (2) low Spearman correlation between normalized expression profiles of gene pairs. We also define four novel algorithms, one of which explicitly maximizes the number of uniform genes, and compared the performance of all fifteen algorithms. The two most commonly used methods (scaling to a fixed total value, or equalizing the expression of certain ‘housekeeping’ genes) yielded particularly poor results, surpassed even by normalization based on randomly selected gene sets. Conversely, seven of the algorithms approached what appears to be optimal normalization. Three of these algorithms rely on the identification of “ubiquitous” genes: genes expressed in all the samples studied, but never at very high or very low levels. We demonstrate that these include a “core” of genes expressed in many tissues in a mutually consistent pattern, which is suitable for use as an internal normalization guide. The new methods yield robustly normalized expression values, which is a prerequisite for the identification of differentially expressed and tissue-specific genes as potential biomarkers. PMID:24223126

Nonlinear periodic wavetrains in thin liquid films falling on a uniformly heated horizontal plate

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Issokolo, Remi J. Noumana; Dikandé, Alain M.

2018-05-01

A thin liquid film falling on a uniformly heated horizontal plate spreads into fingering ripples that can display a complex dynamics ranging from continuous waves, nonlinear spatially localized periodic wave patterns (i.e., rivulet structures) to modulated nonlinear wavetrain structures. Some of these structures have been observed experimentally; however, conditions under which they form are still not well understood. In this work, we examine profiles of nonlinear wave patterns formed by a thin liquid film falling on a uniformly heated horizontal plate. For this purpose, the Benney model is considered assuming a uniform temperature distribution along the film propagation on the horizontal surface. It is shown that for strong surface tension but a relatively small Biot number, spatially localized periodic-wave structures can be analytically obtained by solving the governing equation under appropriate conditions. In the regime of weak nonlinearity, a multiple-scale expansion combined with the reductive perturbation method leads to a complex Ginzburg-Landau equation: the solutions of which are modulated periodic pulse trains which amplitude and width and period are expressed in terms of characteristic parameters of the model.

7 CFR 29.3101 - Elements of quality and degrees of each element.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... value, but the actual value of each degree varies with type, group, and grade. In each case the first...) 9 Uniformity (2) (2) (2) (2) (2) 10 Injury tolerance (2) (2) (2) (2) (2) 1 Expressed in inches. 2...

40 CFR 51.301 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... impairment. A deciview is a haze index derived from calculated light extinction, such that uniform changes in... (for the purposes of calculating deciview, the atmospheric light extinction coefficient must be... extinction coefficient, expressed in inverse megameters (Mm−1). Existing stationary facility means any of the...

EXPRESSING SUPPLY LIMITATION IN SAND SALTATION

EPA Science Inventory

Saltation-driven sandblasting is the most effective producer of windblown dust. Modeling of wind-blown dust emissions requires an efficient parameterization of sand flux in the saltating mode. According to the theory of P. R. Owen the horizontal mass flux of saltating uniform p...

Using high-speed texture measurements to improve the uniformity of hot-mix asphalt.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2003-01-01

This study introduces Virginia's efforts to apply high-speed texture measurement as a tool to improve the uniformity of hot-mix asphalt (HMA) pavements. Three approaches for detecting and quantifying HMA segregation through measuring pavement surface...

IDP-ASE: haplotyping and quantifying allele-specific expression at the gene and gene isoform level by hybrid sequencing

PubMed Central

Deonovic, Benjamin; Wang, Yunhao; Weirather, Jason; Wang, Xiu-Jie; Au, Kin Fai

2017-01-01

Abstract Allele-specific expression (ASE) is a fundamental problem in studying gene regulation and diploid transcriptome profiles, with two key challenges: (i) haplotyping and (ii) estimation of ASE at the gene isoform level. Existing ASE analysis methods are limited by a dependence on haplotyping from laborious experiments or extra genome/family trio data. In addition, there is a lack of methods for gene isoform level ASE analysis. We developed a tool, IDP-ASE, for full ASE analysis. By innovative integration of Third Generation Sequencing (TGS) long reads with Second Generation Sequencing (SGS) short reads, the accuracy of haplotyping and ASE quantification at the gene and gene isoform level was greatly improved as demonstrated by the gold standard data GM12878 data and semi-simulation data. In addition to methodology development, applications of IDP-ASE to human embryonic stem cells and breast cancer cells indicate that the imbalance of ASE and non-uniformity of gene isoform ASE is widespread, including tumorigenesis relevant genes and pluripotency markers. These results show that gene isoform expression and allele-specific expression cooperate to provide high diversity and complexity of gene regulation and expression, highlighting the importance of studying ASE at the gene isoform level. Our study provides a robust bioinformatics solution to understand ASE using RNA sequencing data only. PMID:27899656

Maize histone H2B-mCherry: a new fluorescent chromatin marker for somatic and meiotic chromosome research.

PubMed

Howe, Elizabeth S; Clemente, Thomas E; Bass, Hank W

2012-06-01

Cytological studies of fluorescent proteins are rapidly yielding insights into chromatin structure and dynamics. Here we describe the production and cytological characterization of new transgenic maize lines expressing a fluorescent histone fusion protein, H2B-mCherry. The transgene is expressed under the control of the maize ubiquitin1 promoter, including its first exon and intron. Polymerase chain reaction-based genotyping and root-tip microscopy showed that most of the lines carrying the transgene also expressed it, producing bright uniform staining of nuclei. Further, plants showing expression in root tips at the seedling stage also showed expression during meiosis, late in the life cycle. Detailed high-resolution three-dimensional imaging of cells and nuclei from various somatic and meiotic cell types showed that H2B-mCherry produced remarkably clear images of chromatin and chromosome fiber morphology, as seen in somatic, male meiotic prophase, and early microgametophyte cells. H2B-mCherry also yielded distinct nucleolus staining and was shown to be compatible with fluorescence in situ hybridization. We found several instances where H2B-mCherry was superior to DAPI as a generalized chromatin stain. Our study establishes these histone H2B-mCherry lines as new biological reagents for visualizing chromatin structure, chromosome morphology, and nuclear dynamics in fixed and living cells in a model plant genetic system.

Dual-Electrode CMUT With Non-Uniform Membranes for High Electromechanical Coupling Coefficient and High Bandwidth Operation

PubMed Central

Guldiken, Rasim O.; Zahorian, Jaime; Yamaner, F. Y.; Degertekin, F. L.

2010-01-01

In this paper, we report measurement results on dual-electrode CMUT demonstrating electromechanical coupling coefficient (k2) of 0.82 at 90% of collapse voltage as well as 136% 3 dB one-way fractional bandwidth at the transducer surface around the design frequency of 8 MHz. These results are within 5% of the predictions of the finite element simulations. The large bandwidth is achieved mainly by utilizing a non-uniform membrane, introducing center mass to the design, whereas the dual-electrode structure provides high coupling coefficient in a large dc bias range without collapsing the membrane. In addition, the non-uniform membrane structure improves the transmit sensitivity of the dual-electrode CMUT by about 2dB as compared with a dual electrode CMUT with uniform membrane. PMID:19574135

Premyelinated central axons express neurotoxic NMDA receptors: relevance to early developing white-matter injury

PubMed Central

Huria, Tahani; Beeraka, Narasimha Murthy; Al-Ghamdi, Badrah; Fern, Robert

2015-01-01

Ischemic-type injury to developing white matter is associated with the significant clinical condition cerebral palsy and with the cognitive deficits associated with premature birth. Premyelinated axons are the major cellular component of fetal white matter and loss of axon function underlies the disability, but the cellular mechanisms producing ischemic injury to premyelinated axons have not previously been described. Injury was found to require longer periods of modelled ischemia than at latter developmental points. Ischemia produced initial hyperexcitability in axons followed by loss of function after Na+ and Ca2+ influx. N-methyl-D-aspartate- (NMDA) type glutamate receptor (GluR) agonists potentiated axon injury while antagonists were protective. The NMDA GluR obligatory Nr1 subunit colocalized with markers of small premyelinated axons and expression was found at focal regions of axon injury. Ischemic injury of glial cells present in early developing white matter was NMDA GluR independent. Axons in human postconception week 18 to 23 white matter had a uniform prediameter expansion phenotype and postembedded immuno-gold labelling showed Nr1 subunit expression on the membrane of these axons, demonstrating a shared key neuropathologic feature with the rodent model. Premyelinated central axons therefore express high levels of functional NMDA GluRs that confer sensitivity to ischemic injury. PMID:25515212

In vitro evaluation of three-dimensional single-walled carbon nanotube composites for bone tissue engineering.

PubMed

Gupta, Ashim; Main, Benjamin J; Taylor, Brittany L; Gupta, Manu; Whitworth, Craig A; Cady, Craig; Freeman, Joseph W; El-Amin, Saadiq F

2014-11-01

The purpose of this study was to develop three-dimensional single-walled carbon nanotube composites (SWCNT/PLAGA) using 10-mg single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) for bone regeneration and to determine the mechanical strength of the composites, and to evaluate the interaction of MC3T3-E1 cells via cell adhesion, growth, survival, proliferation, and gene expression. PLAGA (polylactic-co-glycolic acid) and SWCNT/PLAGA microspheres and composites were fabricated, characterized, and mechanical testing was performed. MC3T3-E1 cells were seeded and cell adhesion/morphology, growth/survival, proliferation, and gene expression analysis were performed to evaluate biocompatibility. Imaging studies demonstrated microspheres with uniform shape and smooth surfaces, and uniform incorporation of SWCNT into PLAGA matrix. The microspheres bonded in a random packing manner while maintaining spacing, thus resembling trabeculae of cancellous bone. Addition of SWCNT led to greater compressive modulus and ultimate compressive strength. Imaging studies revealed that MC3T3-E1 cells adhered, grew/survived, and exhibited normal, nonstressed morphology on the composites. SWCNT/PLAGA composites exhibited higher cell proliferation rate and gene expression compared with PLAGA. These results demonstrate the potential of SWCNT/PLAGA composites for musculoskeletal regeneration, for bone tissue engineering, and are promising for orthopedic applications as they possess the combined effect of increased mechanical strength, cell proliferation, and gene expression. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Over 95% of large-scale length uniformity in template-assisted electrodeposited nanowires by subzero-temperature electrodeposition

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

In this work, we report highly uniform growth of template-assisted electrodeposited copper nanowires on a large area by lowering the deposition temperature down to subzero centigrade. Even with highly disordered commercial porous anodic aluminum oxide template and conventional potentiostatic electrodeposition, length uniformity over 95% can be achieved when the deposition temperature is lowered down to -2.4°C. Decreased diffusion coefficient and ion concentration gradient due to the lowered deposition temperature effectively reduces ion diffusion rate, thereby favors uniform nanowire growth. Moreover, by varying the deposition temperature, we show that also the pore nucleation and the crystallinity can be controlled. PMID:21781335

High sensitivity charge amplifier for ion beam uniformity monitor

DOEpatents

Johnson, Gary W.

2001-01-01

An ion beam uniformity monitor for very low beam currents using a high-sensitivity charge amplifier with bias compensation. The ion beam monitor is used to assess the uniformity of a raster-scanned ion beam, such as used in an ion implanter, and utilizes four Faraday cups placed in the geometric corners of the target area. Current from each cup is integrated with respect to time, thus measuring accumulated dose, or charge, in Coulombs. By comparing the dose at each corner, a qualitative assessment of ion beam uniformity is made possible. With knowledge of the relative area of the Faraday cups, the ion flux and areal dose can also be obtained.

High power cladding light stripper using segmented corrosion method: theoretical and experimental studies.

PubMed

Yin, Lu; Yan, Mingjian; Han, Zhigang; Wang, Hailin; Shen, Hua; Zhu, Rihong

2017-04-17

We present the segmented corrosion method that uses hydrofluoric acid to etch the fiber of a fiber laser for removing high-power cladding light to improve stripping uniformity and power handling capability. For theoretical guidelines, we propose a simulation model of etched-fiber stripping to evaluate the relationship between the etched-fiber parameters and cladding light attenuation and to analyze the stripping uniformity achieved with segmented corrosion. A two-segment etched fiber is fabricated with cladding light attenuation of 19.8 dB and power handling capability up to 670 W. We find that the cladding light is stripped uniformly and the temperature distribution is uniform without the formation of hot spots.

Numerical studies of the use of thin high-Z layers for reducing laser imprint in direct-drive inertial-fusion targets

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bates, Jason; Schmitt, Andrew; Karasik, Max; Obenschain, Steve

2012-10-01

Using the FAST code, we present numerical studies of the effect of thin metallic layers with high atomic number (high-Z) on the hydrodynamics of directly-driven inertial-confinement-fusion (ICF) targets. Previous experimental work on the NIKE Laser Facility at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory demonstrated that the use of high-Z layers may be efficacious in reducing laser non-uniformities imprinted on the target during the start-up phase of the implosion. Such a reduction is highly desirable in a direct-drive ICF scenario because laser non-uniformities seed hydrodynamic instabilities that can amplify during the implosion process, prevent uniform compression and spoil high gain. One of the main objectives of the present work is to assess the utility of high-Z layers for achieving greater laser uniformity in polar-drive target designs planned for the National Ignition Facility. To address this problem, new numerical routines have recently been incorporated in the FAST code, including an improved radiation-transfer package and a three-dimensional ray-tracing algorithm. We will discuss these topics, and present initial simulation results for high-Z planar-target experiments planned on the NIKE Laser Facility later this year.

A kinetic theory treatment of heat transfer in plane Poiseuille flow with uniform pressure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bahrami, Parviz A.

1992-01-01

Plane compressible Poiseuille flow with uniform pressure (Couette flow with stationary boundaries) is revisited where the Lees two-steam method with the Enskog equation of change is applied. Single particle velocity distribution functions are chosen, which preserve the essential physical features of this flow with arbitrary but uniform plate temperatures and gas pressure. Lower moments are shown to lead to expressions for the parameter functions, molecular number densities, and temperatures which are entirely in agreement with those obtained in the analysis of Lees for compressible plane Couette flow in the limit of low Mach number and vanishing mean gas velocity. Important simplifications result, which are helpful in gaining insight into the power of kinetic theory in fluid mechanics. The temperature distribution, heat flux, as well as density, are completely determined for the whole range of Knudson numbers from free molecular flow to the continuum regime, when the pressure level is specified.

Global Transcriptional Profiling of Diapause and Climatic Adaptation in Drosophila melanogaster

PubMed Central

Zhao, Xiaqing; Bergland, Alan O.; Behrman, Emily L.; Gregory, Brian D.; Petrov, Dmitri A.; Schmidt, Paul S.

2016-01-01

Wild populations of the model organism Drosophila melanogaster experience highly heterogeneous environments over broad geographical ranges as well as over seasonal and annual timescales. Diapause is a primary adaptation to environmental heterogeneity, and in D. melanogaster the propensity to enter diapause varies predictably with latitude and season. Here we performed global transcriptomic profiling of naturally occurring variation in diapause expression elicited by short day photoperiod and moderately low temperature in two tissue types associated with neuroendocrine and endocrine signaling, heads, and ovaries. We show that diapause in D. melanogaster is an actively regulated phenotype at the transcriptional level, suggesting that diapause is not a simple physiological or reproductive quiescence. Differentially expressed genes and pathways are highly distinct in heads and ovaries, demonstrating that the diapause response is not uniform throughout the soma and suggesting that it may be comprised of functional modules associated with specific tissues. Genes downregulated in heads of diapausing flies are significantly enriched for clinally varying single nucleotide polymorphism (SNPs) and seasonally oscillating SNPs, consistent with the hypothesis that diapause is a driving phenotype of climatic adaptation. We also show that chromosome location-based coregulation of gene expression is present in the transcriptional regulation of diapause. Taken together, these results demonstrate that diapause is a complex phenotype actively regulated in multiple tissues, and support the hypothesis that natural variation in diapause propensity underlies adaptation to spatially and temporally varying selective pressures. PMID:26568616

Spatial distributions of Kv4 channels and KChip2 isoforms in the murine heart based on laser capture microdissection.

PubMed

Teutsch, Christine; Kondo, Richard P; Dederko, Dorothy A; Chrast, Jacqueline; Chien, Kenneth R; Giles, Wayne R

2007-03-01

Regional differences in repolarizing K(+) current densities and expression levels of their molecular components are important for coordinating the pattern of electrical excitation and repolarization of the heart. The small size of hearts from mice may obscure these interventricular and/or transmural expression differences of K(+) channels. We have examined this possibility in adult mouse ventricle using a technology that provides very high spatial resolution of tissue collection. Conventional manual dissection and laser capture microdissection (LCM) were utilized to dissect tissue from distinct ventricular regions. RNA was isolated from epicardial, mid-myocardial and endocardial layers of both the right and left ventricles. Real-time RT-PCR was used to quantify the transcript expression in these different regions. LCM revealed significant interventricular and transmural gradients for both Kv4.2 and the alpha-subunit of KChIP2. The expression profile of a second K(+) channel transcript, Kir2.1, which is responsible for the inwardly rectifying K(+) current I(k1), showed no interventricular or transmural gradients and therefore served as a negative control. Our findings are in contrast to previous reports of a relatively uniform left ventricular transmural pattern of expression of Kv4.2, Kv4.3 and KChIP2 in adult mouse heart, which appear to be different than that in larger mammals. Specifically, our results demonstrate significant epi- to endocardial differences in the patterns of expression of both Kv4.2 and KChIP2.

The caste- and sex-specific DNA methylome of the termite Zootermopsis nevadensis

PubMed Central

Glastad, Karl M.; Gokhale, Kaustubh; Liebig, Jürgen; Goodisman, Michael A. D.

2016-01-01

Epigenetic inheritance plays an important role in mediating alternative phenotype in highly social species. In order to gain a greater understanding of epigenetic effects in societies, we investigated DNA methylation in the termite Zootermopsis nevadensis. Termites are the most ancient social insects, and developmentally distinct from highly-studied, hymenopteran social insects. We used replicated bisulfite-sequencing to investigate patterns of DNA methylation in both sexes and among castes of Z. nevadensis. We discovered that Z. nevadensis displayed some of the highest levels of DNA methylation found in insects. We also found strong differences in methylation between castes. Methylated genes tended to be uniformly and highly expressed demonstrating the antiquity of associations between intragenic methylation and gene expression. Differentially methylated genes were more likely to be alternatively spliced than not differentially methylated genes, and possessed considerable enrichment for development-associated functions. We further observed strong overrepresentation of multiple transcription factor binding sites and miRNA profiles associated with differential methylation, providing new insights into the possible function of DNA methylation. Overall, our results show that DNA methylation is widespread and associated with caste differences in termites. More generally, this study provides insights into the function of DNA methylation and the success of insect societies. PMID:27848993

Study on characteristics of the aperture-averaging factor of atmospheric scintillation in terrestrial optical wireless communication

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shen, Hong; Liu, Wen-xing; Zhou, Xue-yun; Zhou, Li-ling; Yu, Long-Kun

2018-02-01

In order to thoroughly understand the characteristics of the aperture-averaging effect of atmospheric scintillation in terrestrial optical wireless communication and provide references for engineering design and performance evaluation of the optics system employed in the atmosphere, we have theoretically deduced the generally analytic expression of the aperture-averaging factor of atmospheric scintillation, and numerically investigated characteristics of the apertureaveraging factor under different propagation conditions. The limitations of the current commonly used approximate calculation formula of aperture-averaging factor have been discussed, and the results showed that the current calculation formula is not applicable for the small receiving aperture under non-uniform turbulence link. Numerical calculation has showed that aperture-averaging factor of atmospheric scintillation presented an exponential decline model for the small receiving aperture under non-uniform turbulent link, and the general expression of the model was given. This model has certain guiding significance for evaluating the aperture-averaging effect in the terrestrial optical wireless communication.

Trapped one-dimensional ideal Fermi gas with a single impurity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Astrakharchik, G. E.; Brouzos, I.

2013-08-01

Ground-state properties of a single impurity in a one-dimensional Fermi gas are investigated in uniform and trapped geometries. The energy of a trapped system is obtained (i) by generalizing the McGuire expression from a uniform to trapped system (ii) within the local density approximation (iii) using the perturbative approach in the case of a weakly interacting impurity and (iv) diffusion Monte Carlo method. We demonstrate that there is a closed formula based on the exact solution of the homogeneous case which provides a precise estimation for the energy of a trapped system even for a small number of fermions and arbitrary coupling constant of the impurity. Using this expression, we analyze energy contributions from kinetic, interaction, and potential components, as well as spatial properties such as the system size and the pair-correlation function. Finally, we calculate the frequency of the breathing mode. Our analysis is directly connected and applicable to the recent experiments in microtraps.

Quasielastic small-angle neutron scattering from heavy water solutions of cyclodextrins

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kusmin, André; Lechner, Ruep E.; Saenger, Wolfram

2011-01-01

We present a model for quasielastic neutron scattering (QENS) by an aqueous solution of compact and inflexible molecules. This model accounts for time-dependent spatial pair correlations between the atoms of the same as well as of distinct molecules and includes all coherent and incoherent neutron scattering contributions. The extension of the static theory of the excluded volume effect [A. K. Soper, J. Phys.: Condens. Matter 9, 2399 (1997)] to the time-dependent (dynamic) case allows us to obtain simplified model expressions for QENS spectra in the low Q region in the uniform fluid approximation. The resulting expressions describe the quasielastic small-angle neutron scattering (QESANS) spectra of D _2O solutions of native and methylated cyclodextrins well, yielding in particular translational and rotational diffusion coefficients of these compounds in aqueous solution. Finally, we discuss the full potential of the QESANS analysis (that is, beyond the uniform fluid approximation), in particular, the information on solute-solvent interactions (e.g., hydration shell properties) that such an analysis can provide, in principle.

Patterns of Alcohol Policy Enforcement Activities among Local Law Enforcement Agencies: A Latent Class Analysis

PubMed Central

Erickson, Darin J.; Rutledge, Patricia C.; Lenk, Kathleen M.; Nelson, Toben F.; Jones-Webb, Rhonda; Toomey, Traci L.

2015-01-01

Aims We assessed levels and patterns of alcohol policy enforcement activities among U.S. local law enforcement agencies. Design/Setting/Participants We conducted a cross-sectional survey of a representative sample of 1,631 local law enforcement agencies across the 50 states. Measures/Methods We assessed 29 alcohol policy enforcement activities within each of five enforcement domains—underage alcohol possession/consumption, underage alcohol provision, underage alcohol sales, impaired driving, and overservice of alcohol—and conducted a series of latent class analyses to identify unique classes or patterns of enforcement activity for each domain. Findings We identified three to four unique enforcement activity classes for each of the enforcement domains. In four of the domains, we identified a Uniformly Low class (i.e., little or no enforcement) and a Uniformly High enforcement activity class (i.e., relatively high levels of enforcement), with one or two middle classes where some but not all activities were conducted. The underage provision domain had a Uniformly Low class but not a Uniformly High class. The Uniformly Low class was the most prevalent class in three domains: underage provision (58%), underage sales (61%), and overservice (79%). In contrast, less than a quarter of agencies were in Uniformly High classes. Conclusions We identified qualitatively distinct patterns of enforcement activity, with a large proportion of agencies in classes characterized by little or no enforcement and fewer agencies in high enforcement classes. An important next step is to determine if these patterns are associated with rates of alcohol use and alcohol-related injury and mortality. PMID:26877822

Glioblastoma and acute myeloid leukemia: malignancies with striking similarities.

PubMed

Goethe, Eric; Carter, Bing Z; Rao, Ganesh; Pemmaraju, Naveen

2018-01-01

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and glioblastoma (GB) are two malignancies associated with high incidence of treatment refractoriness and generally, uniformly poor survival outcomes. While the former is a hematologic (i.e. a "liquid") malignancy and the latter a solid tumor, the two diseases share both clinical and biochemical characteristics. Both diseases exist predominantly in primary (de novo) forms, with only a small subset of each progressing from precursor disease states like the myelodysplastic syndromes or diffuse glioma. More importantly, the primary and secondary forms of each disease are characterized by common sets of mutations and gene expression abnormalities. The primary versions of AML and GB are characterized by aberrant RAS pathway, matrix metalloproteinase 9, and Bcl-2 expression, and their secondary counterparts share abnormalities in TP53, isocitrate dehydrogenase, ATRX, inhibitor of apoptosis proteins, and survivin that both influence the course of the diseases themselves and their progression from precursor disease. An understanding of these shared features is important, as it can be used to guide both the research about and treatment of each.

Evaluation of bed load transport subject to high shear stress fluctuations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cheng, Nian-Sheng; Tang, Hongwu; Zhu, Lijun

2004-05-01

Many formulas available in the literature for computing sediment transport rates are often expressed in terms of time mean variables such as time mean bed shear stress or flow velocity, while effects of turbulence intensity, e.g., bed shear stress fluctuation, on sediment transport were seldom considered. This may be due to the fact that turbulence fluctuation is relatively limited in laboratory open-channel flows, which are often used for conducting sediment transport experiments. However, turbulence intensity could be markedly enhanced in practice. This note presents an analytical method to compute bed load transport by including effects of fluctuations in the bed shear stress. The analytical results obtained show that the transport rate enhanced by turbulence can be expressed as a simple function of the relative fluctuation of the bed shear stress. The results are also verified using data that were collected recently from specifically designed laboratory experiments. The present analysis is applicable largely for the condition of a flat bed that is comprised of uniform sand particles subject to unidirectional flows.

A chromosomally encoded T7 RNA polymerase-dependent gene expression system for Corynebacterium glutamicum: construction and comparative evaluation at the single-cell level

PubMed Central

Kortmann, Maike; Kuhl, Vanessa; Klaffl, Simon; Bott, Michael

2015-01-01

Corynebacterium glutamicum has become a favourite model organism in white biotechnology. Nevertheless, only few systems for the regulatable (over)expression of homologous and heterologous genes are currently available, all of which are based on the endogenous RNA polymerase. In this study, we developed an isopropyl-β-d-1-thiogalactopyranosid (IPTG)-inducible T7 expression system in the prophage-free strain C. glutamicum MB001. For this purpose, part of the DE3 region of Escherichia coli BL21(DE3) including the T7 RNA polymerase gene 1 under control of the lacUV5 promoter was integrated into the chromosome, resulting in strain MB001(DE3). Furthermore, the expression vector pMKEx2 was constructed allowing cloning of target genes under the control of the T7lac promoter. The properties of the system were evaluated using eyfp as heterologous target gene. Without induction, the system was tightly repressed, resulting in a very low specific eYFP fluorescence (= fluorescence per cell density). After maximal induction with IPTG, the specific fluorescence increased 450-fold compared with the uninduced state and was about 3.5 times higher than in control strains expressing eyfp under control of the IPTG-induced tac promoter with the endogenous RNA polymerase. Flow cytometry revealed that T7-based eyfp expression resulted in a highly uniform population, with 99% of all cells showing high fluorescence. Besides eyfp, the functionality of the corynebacterial T7 expression system was also successfully demonstrated by overexpression of the C. glutamicum pyk gene for pyruvate kinase, which led to an increase of the specific activity from 2.6 to 135 U mg−1. It thus presents an efficient new tool for protein overproduction, metabolic engineering and synthetic biology approaches with C. glutamicum. PMID:25488698

Cloning of transgenic tobacco BY-2 cells; an efficient method to analyse and reduce high natural heterogeneity of transgene expression.

PubMed

Nocarova, Eva; Fischer, Lukas

2009-04-22

Phenotypic characterization of transgenic cell lines, frequently used in plant biology studies, is complicated because transgene expression in individual cells is often heterogeneous and unstable. To identify the sources and to reduce this heterogeneity, we transformed tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L.) BY-2 cells with a gene encoding green fluorescent protein (GFP) using Agrobacterium tumefaciens, and then introduced a simple cloning procedure to generate cell lines derived from the individual transformed cells. Expression of the transgene was monitored by analysing GFP fluorescence in the cloned lines and also in lines obtained directly after transformation. The majority ( approximately 90%) of suspension culture lines derived from calli that were obtained directly from transformation consisted of cells with various levels of GFP fluorescence. In contrast, nearly 50% of lines generated by cloning cells from the primary heterogeneous suspensions consisted of cells with homogenous GFP fluorescence. The rest of the lines exhibited "permanent heterogeneity" that could not be resolved by cloning. The extent of fluorescence heterogeneity often varied, even among genetically identical clones derived from the primary transformed lines. In contrast, the offspring of subsequent cloning of the cloned lines was uniform, showing GFP fluorescence intensity and heterogeneity that corresponded to the original clone. The results demonstrate that, besides genetic heterogeneity detected in some lines, the primary lines often contained a mixture of epigenetically different cells that could be separated by cloning. This indicates that a single integration event frequently results in various heritable expression patterns, which are probably accidental and become stabilized in the offspring of the primary transformed cells early after the integration event. Because heterogeneity in transgene expression has proven to be a serious problem, it is highly advisable to use transgenes tagged with a visual marker for BY-2 transformation. The cloning procedure can be used not only for efficient reduction of expression heterogeneity of such transgenes, but also as a useful tool for studies of transgene expression and other purposes.

Quasilinear diffusion operator for wave-particle interactions in inhomogeneous magnetic fields

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Catto, P. J.; Lee, J.; Ram, A. K.

2017-10-01

The Kennel-Engelmann quasilinear diffusion operator for wave-particle interactions is for plasmas in a uniform magnetic field. The operator is not suitable for fusion devices with inhomogeneous magnetic fields. Using drift kinetic and high frequency gyrokinetic equations for the particle distribution function, we have derived a quasilinear operator which includes magnetic drifts. The operator applies to RF waves in any frequency range and is particularly relevant for minority ion heating. In order to obtain a physically meaningful operator, the first order correction to the particle's magnetic moment has to be retained. Consequently, the gyrokinetic change of variables has to be retained to a higher order than usual. We then determine the perturbed distribution function from the gyrokinetic equation using a novel technique that solves the kinetic equation explicitly for certain parts of the function. The final form of the diffusion operator is compact and completely expressed in terms of the drift kinetic variables. It is not transit averaged and retains the full poloidal angle variation without any Fourier decomposition. The quasilinear diffusion operator reduces to the Kennel-Engelmann operator for uniform magnetic fields. Supported by DoE Grant DE-FG02-91ER-54109.

Hotspot Identification for Shanghai Expressways Using the Quantitative Risk Assessment Method

PubMed Central

Chen, Can; Li, Tienan; Sun, Jian; Chen, Feng

2016-01-01

Hotspot identification (HSID) is the first and key step of the expressway safety management process. This study presents a new HSID method using the quantitative risk assessment (QRA) technique. Crashes that are likely to happen for a specific site are treated as the risk. The aggregation of the crash occurrence probability for all exposure vehicles is estimated based on the empirical Bayesian method. As for the consequences of crashes, crashes may not only cause direct losses (e.g., occupant injuries and property damages) but also result in indirect losses. The indirect losses are expressed by the extra delays calculated using the deterministic queuing diagram method. The direct losses and indirect losses are uniformly monetized to be considered as the consequences of this risk. The potential costs of crashes, as a criterion to rank high-risk sites, can be explicitly expressed as the sum of the crash probability for all passing vehicles and the corresponding consequences of crashes. A case study on the urban expressways of Shanghai is presented. The results show that the new QRA method for HSID enables the identification of a set of high-risk sites that truly reveal the potential crash costs to society. PMID:28036009

Restoration of MRI data for intensity non-uniformities using local high order intensity statistics

PubMed Central

Hadjidemetriou, Stathis; Studholme, Colin; Mueller, Susanne; Weiner, Michael; Schuff, Norbert

2008-01-01

MRI at high magnetic fields (>3.0 T) is complicated by strong inhomogeneous radio-frequency fields, sometimes termed the “bias field”. These lead to non-biological intensity non-uniformities across the image. They can complicate further image analysis such as registration and tissue segmentation. Existing methods for intensity uniformity restoration have been optimized for 1.5 T, but they are less effective for 3.0 T MRI, and not at all satisfactory for higher fields. Also, many of the existing restoration algorithms require a brain template or use a prior atlas, which can restrict their practicalities. In this study an effective intensity uniformity restoration algorithm has been developed based on non-parametric statistics of high order local intensity co-occurrences. These statistics are restored with a non-stationary Wiener filter. The algorithm also assumes a smooth non-uniformity and is stable. It does not require a prior atlas and is robust to variations in anatomy. In geriatric brain imaging it is robust to variations such as enlarged ventricles and low contrast to noise ratio. The co-occurrence statistics improve robustness to whole head images with pronounced non-uniformities present in high field acquisitions. Its significantly improved performance and lower time requirements have been demonstrated by comparing it to the very commonly used N3 algorithm on BrainWeb MR simulator images as well as on real 4 T human head images. PMID:18621568

Potential and field produced by a uniform or non-uniform elliptical beam inside a confocal elliptic vacuum chamber

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Regenstreif, E.

The potential produced by an isolated beam of elliptic cross-section seems to have been considered first by L.C. Teng. Image effects of line charges in elliptic vacuum chambers were introduced into accelerator theory by L. J. Laslett. Various approximate solutions for elliptic beams of finite cross-section coasting inside an elliptic vacuum chamber were subsequently proposed by P. Lapostolle and C. Bovet. A rigorous expression is derived for the potential produced by an elliptic beam inside an elliptic vacuum chamber, provided the beam envelope and the vacuum chamber can be assimilated to confocal ellipses.

Magnetron cathodes in plasma electrode Pockels cells

DOEpatents

Rhodes, M.A.

1995-04-25

Magnetron cathodes, which produce high current discharges, form greatly improved plasma electrodes on each side of an electro-optic crystal. The plasma electrode has a low pressure gas region on both sides of the crystal. When the gas is ionized, e.g., by a glow discharge in the low pressure gas, the plasma formed is a good conductor. The gas electrode acts as a highly uniform conducting electrode. Since the plasma is transparent to a high energy laser beam passing through the crystal, the plasma is transparent. A crystal exposed from two sides to such a plasma can be charged up uniformly to any desired voltage. A typical configuration utilizes helium at 50 millitorr operating pressure and 2 kA discharge current. The magnetron cathode produces a more uniform plasma and allows a reduced operating pressure which leads to lower plasma resistivity and a more uniform charge on the crystal. 5 figs.

Magnetron cathodes in plasma electrode pockels cells

DOEpatents

Rhodes, Mark A.

1995-01-01

Magnetron cathodes, which produce high current discharges, form greatly improved plasma electrodes on each side of an electro-optic crystal. The plasma electrode has a low pressure gas region on both sides of the crystal. When the gas is ionized, e.g., by a glow discharge in the low pressure gas, the plasma formed is a good conductor. The gas electrode acts as a highly uniform conducting electrode. Since the plasma is transparent to a high energy laser beam passing through the crystal, the plasma is transparent. A crystal exposed from two sides to such a plasma can be charged up uniformly to any desired voltage. A typical configuration utilizes helium at 50 millitorr operating. pressure and 2 kA discharge current. The magnetron cathode produces a more uniform plasma and allows a reduced operating pressure which leads to lower plasma resistivity and a more uniform charge on the crystal.

Uniform high order spectral methods for one and two dimensional Euler equations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cai, Wei; Shu, Chi-Wang

1991-01-01

Uniform high order spectral methods to solve multi-dimensional Euler equations for gas dynamics are discussed. Uniform high order spectral approximations with spectral accuracy in smooth regions of solutions are constructed by introducing the idea of the Essentially Non-Oscillatory (ENO) polynomial interpolations into the spectral methods. The authors present numerical results for the inviscid Burgers' equation, and for the one dimensional Euler equations including the interactions between a shock wave and density disturbance, Sod's and Lax's shock tube problems, and the blast wave problem. The interaction between a Mach 3 two dimensional shock wave and a rotating vortex is simulated.

A Modular Toolset for Recombination Transgenesis and Neurogenetic Analysis of Drosophila

PubMed Central

Wang, Ji-Wu; Beck, Erin S.; McCabe, Brian D.

2012-01-01

Transgenic Drosophila have contributed extensively to our understanding of nervous system development, physiology and behavior in addition to being valuable models of human neurological disease. Here, we have generated a novel series of modular transgenic vectors designed to optimize and accelerate the production and analysis of transgenes in Drosophila. We constructed a novel vector backbone, pBID, that allows both phiC31 targeted transgene integration and incorporates insulator sequences to ensure specific and uniform transgene expression. Upon this framework, we have built a series of constructs that are either backwards compatible with existing restriction enzyme based vectors or utilize Gateway recombination technology for high-throughput cloning. These vectors allow for endogenous promoter or Gal4 targeted expression of transgenic proteins with or without fluorescent protein or epitope tags. In addition, we have generated constructs that facilitate transgenic splice isoform specific RNA inhibition of gene expression. We demonstrate the utility of these constructs to analyze proteins involved in nervous system development, physiology and neurodegenerative disease. We expect that these reagents will facilitate the proficiency and sophistication of Drosophila genetic analysis in both the nervous system and other tissues. PMID:22848718

Scaling functions and scaling exponents in turbulence

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stolovitzky, G.; Sreenivasan, K. R.; Juneja, A.

1993-11-01

We extend the recent work of Sirovich, Smith, and Yakhot (unpublished) and obtain for structure functions of arbitrary order an expression that is uniformly valid for the dissipation as well as the inertial range of scales. We compare the expression with experimental data obtained in a moderate-Reynolds-number turbulent boundary layer and find good agreement. This enables a more definitive determination of the scaling exponents and intermittency corrections than has been possible in the past. The results are substantiated by several consistency checks.

Reflecting on Hell in Anticipation of Armageddon: The Impact of Reflection and Adaptation on the Education of the US Army Officer Corps

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-05-10

Daniel W. Johnson, “Focused vs Broad in World War I: A Historical Comparison of General Staff Officer Education at Pre-war Leavenworth and Langres...expressions of the same culture that produces the values. They included objects ( logos , uniforms, memorabilia), verbal expressions (speeches, legends...TRADOC, stressed the impact of these numbers within comparison to the US Army in a presentation titled “Implications of the Middle East War on US Army

DISCHARGE AND DEPTH BEHIND A PARTIALLY BREACHED DAM.

USGS Publications Warehouse

Chen, Cheng-lung

1987-01-01

The role that the velocity-distribution correction factor plays in the determination of the flood discharge and corresponding flow depth behind a partially breached dam is investigated. Assumption of a uniformly progressive flow for an established dam-break flood in a rectangular channel of infinite extent leads to the formulation of a theoretical relation between the depth and velocity of flow expressed in differential form. Integrating this ordinary differential equation, one can express the velocity in terms of the depth.

38 CFR 49.25 - Revision of budget and program plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... (CONTINUED) UNIFORM ADMINISTRATIVE REQUIREMENTS FOR GRANTS AND AGREEMENTS WITH INSTITUTIONS OF HIGHER EDUCATION, HOSPITALS, AND OTHER NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATIONS Post-Award Requirements Financial and Program Management § 49.25 Revision of budget and program plans. (a) The budget plan is the financial expression of...

Public School Accountability. Background Paper 95-14.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sturm, H. Pepper

This paper describes the background of various accountability systems, discusses policy issues related to the use of educational accountability information, and offers a history of the school-accountability law in Nevada. The paper concludes that because policymakers continue to express concerns about uniform measurements and comparability, it is…

10 CFR Appendix F to Subpart B of... - Uniform Test Method for Measuring the Energy Consumption of Room Air Conditioners

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... Engineers (ASHRAE) Standard 16-69, “Method of Testing for Rating Room Air Conditioners.” 2. Test conditions...-1972 and in accordance with ASHRAE Standard 16-69. 4.2Determine the electrical power input (expressed...

10 CFR Appendix F to Subpart B of... - Uniform Test Method for Measuring the Energy Consumption of Room Air Conditioners

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... Engineers (ASHRAE) Standard 16-69, “Method of Testing for Rating Room Air Conditioners.” 2. Test conditions...-1972 and in accordance with ASHRAE Standard 16-69. 4.2Determine the electrical power input (expressed...

FOXM1 in sarcoma: role in cell cycle, pluripotency genes and stem cell pathways.

PubMed

Kelleher, Fergal C; O'Sullivan, Hazel

2016-07-05

FOXM1 is a pro-proliferative transcription factor that promotes cell cycle progression at the G1-S, and G2-M transitions. It is activated by phosphorylation usually mediated by successive cyclin - cyclin dependent kinase complexes, and is highly expressed in sarcoma. p53 down regulates FOXM1 and FOXM1 inhibition is also partly dependent on Rb and p21. Abnormalities of p53 or Rb are frequent in sporadic sarcomas with bone or soft tissue sarcoma, accounting for 36% of index cancers in the high penetrance TP53 germline disorder, Li-Fraumeni syndrome.FOXM1 stimulates transcription of pluripotency related genes including SOX2, KLF4, OCT4, and NANOG many of which are important in sarcoma, a disorder of mesenchymal stem cell/ partially committed progenitor cells. In a selected specific, SOX2 is uniformly expressed in synovial sarcoma. Embryonic pathways preferentially used in stem cell such as Hippo, Hedgehog, and Wnt dominate in FOXM1 stoichiometry to alter rates of FOXM1 production or degradation. In undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcoma, liposarcoma, and fibrosarcoma, dysregulation of the Hippo pathway increases expression of the effector co-transcriptional activator Yes-Associated Protein (YAP). A complex involving YAP and the transcription factor TEAD elevates FOXM1 in these sarcoma subtypes. In another scenario 80% of desmoid tumors have nuclear localization of β-catenin, the Wnt pathway effector molecule. Thiazole antibiotics inhibit FOXM1 and because they have an auto-regulator loop FOXM1 expression is also inhibited. Current systemic treatment of sarcoma is of limited efficacy and inhibiting FOXM1 represents a potential new strategy.

Silver Nanowire Transparent Conductive Films with High Uniformity Fabricated via a Dynamic Heating Method.

PubMed

Jia, Yonggao; Chen, Chao; Jia, Dan; Li, Shuxin; Ji, Shulin; Ye, Changhui

2016-04-20

The uniformity of the sheet resistance of transparent conductive films is one of the most important quality factors for touch panel applications. However, the uniformity of silver nanowire transparent conductive films is far inferior to that of indium-doped tin oxide (ITO). Herein, we report a dynamic heating method using infrared light to achieve silver nanowire transparent conductive films with high uniformity. This method can overcome the coffee ring effect during the drying process and suppress the aggregation of silver nanowires in the film. A nonuniformity factor of the sheet resistance of the as-prepared silver nanowire transparent conductive films could be as low as 6.7% at an average sheet resistance of 35 Ω/sq and a light transmittance of 95% (at 550 nm), comparable to that of high-quality ITO film in the market. In addition, a mechanical study shows that the sheet resistance of the films has little change after 5000 bending cycles, and the film could be used in touch panels for human-machine interactive input. The highly uniform and mechanically stable silver nanowire transparent conductive films meet the requirement for many significant applications and could play a key role in the display market in a near future.

Methods for making deposited films with improved microstructures

DOEpatents

Patten, James W.; Moss, Ronald W.; McClanahan, Edwin D.

1982-01-01

Methods for improving microstructures of line-of-sight deposited films are described. Columnar growth defects ordinarily produced by geometrical shadowing during deposition of such films are eliminated without resorting to post-deposition thermal or mechanical treatments. The native, as-deposited coating qualities, including homogeneity, fine grain size, and high coating-to-substrate adherence, can thus be retained. The preferred method includes the steps of emitting material from a source toward a substrate to deposit a coating non-uniformly on the substrate surface, removing a portion of the coating uniformly over the surface, again depositing material onto the surface, but from a different direction, and repeating the foregoing steps. The quality of line-of-sight deposited films such as those produced by sputtering, progressively deteriorates as the angle of incidence between the flux and the surface becomes increasingly acute. Depositing non-uniformly, so that the coating becomes progressively thinner as quality deteriorates, followed by uniformly removing some of the coating, such as by resputtering, eliminates the poor quality portions, leaving only high quality portions of the coating. Subsequently sputtering from a different direction applies a high quality coating to other regions of the surface. Such steps can be performed either simultaneously or sequentially to apply coatings of a uniformly high quality, closed microstructure to three-dimensional or larger planar surfaces.

Deposited films with improved microstructures

DOEpatents

Patten, James W.; Moss, Ronald W.; McClanahan, Edwin D.

1984-01-01

Methods for improving microstructures of line-of-sight deposited films are described. Columnar growth defects ordinarily produced by geometrical shadowing during deposition of such films are eliminated without resorting to post-deposition thermal or mechanical treatments. The native, as-deposited coating qualities, including homogeneity, fine grain size, and high coating-to-substrate adherence, can thus be retained. The preferred method includes the steps of emitting material from a source toward a substrate to deposit a coating non-uniformly on the substrate surface, removing a portion of the coating uniformly over the surface, again depositing material onto the surface, but from a different direction, and repeating the foregoing steps. The quality of line-of-sight deposited films such as those produced by sputtering, progressively deteriorates as the angle of incidence between the flux and the surface becomes increasingly acute. Depositing non-uniformly, so that the coating becomes progressively thinner as quality deteriorates, followed by uniformly removing some of the coating, such as by resputtering, eliminates the poor quality portions, leaving only high quality portions of the coating. Subsequently sputtering from a different direction applies a high quality coating to other regions of the surface. Such steps can be performed either simultaneously or sequentially to apply coatings of a uniformly high quality, closed microstructure to three-dimensional or large planar surfaces.

Erwinia amylovora Expresses Fast and Simultaneously hrp/dsp Virulence Genes during Flower Infection on Apple Trees

PubMed Central

Pester, Doris; Milčevičová, Renáta; Schaffer, Johann; Wilhelm, Eva; Blümel, Sylvia

2012-01-01

Background Pathogen entry through host blossoms is the predominant infection pathway of the Gram-negative bacterium Erwinia amylovora leading to manifestation of the disease fire blight. Like in other economically important plant pathogens, E. amylovora pathogenicity depends on a type III secretion system encoded by hrp genes. However, timing and transcriptional order of hrp gene expression during flower infections are unknown. Methodology/Principal Findings Using quantitative real-time PCR analyses, we addressed the questions of how fast, strong and uniform key hrp virulence genes and the effector dspA/E are expressed when bacteria enter flowers provided with the full defense mechanism of the apple plant. In non-invasive bacterial inoculations of apple flowers still attached to the tree, E. amylovora activated expression of key type III secretion genes in a narrow time window, mounting in a single expression peak of all investigated hrp/dspA/E genes around 24–48 h post inoculation (hpi). This single expression peak coincided with a single depression in the plant PR-1 expression at 24 hpi indicating transient manipulation of the salicylic acid pathway as one target of E. amylovora type III effectors. Expression of hrp/dspA/E genes was highly correlated to expression of the regulator hrpL and relative transcript abundances followed the ratio: hrpA>hrpN>hrpL>dspA/E. Acidic conditions (pH 4) in flower infections led to reduced virulence/effector gene expression without the typical expression peak observed under natural conditions (pH 7). Conclusion/Significance The simultaneous expression of hrpL, hrpA, hrpN, and the effector dspA/E during early floral infection indicates that speed and immediate effector transmission is important for successful plant invasion. When this delicate balance is disturbed, e.g., by acidic pH during infection, virulence gene expression is reduced, thus partly explaining the efficacy of acidification in fire blight control on a molecular level. PMID:22412891

School Uniforms in Urban Public High Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Draa, Virginia Ann Bendel

2005-01-01

The purpose of this study was to determine whether or not the implementation of a mandatory uniform policy in urban public high schools improved school performance measures at the building level for rates of attendance, graduation, academic proficiency, and student conduct as measured by rates of suspensions and expulsions. Sixty-four secondary…

Reference genes for gene expression studies in wheat flag leaves grown under different farming conditions

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background Internal control genes with highly uniform expression throughout the experimental conditions are required for accurate gene expression analysis as no universal reference genes exists. In this study, the expression stability of 24 candidate genes from Triticum aestivum cv. Cubus flag leaves grown under organic and conventional farming systems was evaluated in two locations in order to select suitable genes that can be used for normalization of real-time quantitative reverse-transcription PCR (RT-qPCR) reactions. The genes were selected among the most common used reference genes as well as genes encoding proteins involved in several metabolic pathways. Findings Individual genes displayed different expression rates across all samples assayed. Applying geNorm, a set of three potential reference genes were suitable for normalization of RT-qPCR reactions in winter wheat flag leaves cv. Cubus: TaFNRII (ferredoxin-NADP(H) oxidoreductase; AJ457980.1), ACT2 (actin 2; TC234027), and rrn26 (a putative homologue to RNA 26S gene; AL827977.1). In addition of these three genes that were also top-ranked by NormFinder, two extra genes: CYP18-2 (Cyclophilin A, AY456122.1) and TaWIN1 (14-3-3 like protein, AB042193) were most consistently stably expressed. Furthermore, we showed that TaFNRII, ACT2, and CYP18-2 are suitable for gene expression normalization in other two winter wheat varieties (Tommi and Centenaire) grown under three treatments (organic, conventional and no nitrogen) and a different environment than the one tested with cv. Cubus. Conclusions This study provides a new set of reference genes which should improve the accuracy of gene expression analyses when using wheat flag leaves as those related to the improvement of nitrogen use efficiency for cereal production. PMID:21951810

Coded aperture imaging with uniformly redundant arrays

DOEpatents

Fenimore, Edward E.; Cannon, Thomas M.

1980-01-01

A system utilizing uniformly redundant arrays to image non-focusable radiation. The uniformly redundant array is used in conjunction with a balanced correlation technique to provide a system with no artifacts such that virtually limitless signal-to-noise ratio is obtained with high transmission characteristics. Additionally, the array is mosaicked to reduce required detector size over conventional array detectors.

Coded aperture imaging with uniformly redundant arrays

DOEpatents

Fenimore, Edward E.; Cannon, Thomas M.

1982-01-01

A system utilizing uniformly redundant arrays to image non-focusable radiation. The uniformly redundant array is used in conjunction with a balanced correlation technique to provide a system with no artifacts such that virtually limitless signal-to-noise ratio is obtained with high transmission characteristics. Additionally, the array is mosaicked to reduce required detector size over conventional array detectors.

Adipose-Derived Stem Cell Delivery into Collagen Gels Using Chitosan Microspheres

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-02-17

Porous CSM of uniform size and composition were prepared and used as a stem cell carrier. ASC were allowed to attach to the microspheres and infiltrate...and viable, could be retrieved from the spheres, and maintained expression of stem - cell -specific markers. Electron microscopic evaluation of the cell

7 CFR 29.2351 - Elements of quality and degrees of each element.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... degrees. These degrees are arranged to show their relative value and are used in determining the quality of tobacco. The actual value of each degree varies with group. Elements Degrees Body Thin Medium... Moderate Deep. Width Narrow Normal Spready Broad. Uniformity. Expressed in percentages. Injury tolerance...

7 CFR 29.2601 - Elements of quality and degrees of each element.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... degrees. These degrees are arranged to show their relative value and are used in determining the quality of tobacco. The actual value of each degree varies with group. Elements Degrees Body Thin Medium... Moderate Deep. Width Narrow Normal Spready. Uniformity......Expressed in percentages. Injury tolerance...

Approximate analytical solution to diurnal atmospheric boundary-layer growth under well-watered conditions

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

The system of governing equations of a simplified slab model of the uniformly-mixed, purely convective, diurnal atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) is shown to allow immediate solutions for the potential temperature and specific humidity as functions of the ABL height and net radiation when expressed i...

A Review of Conflict of Interest, Competing Interest, and Bias for Toxicologists

EPA Science Inventory

One of the issues often associated with scientific misconduct is conflict of interest (CoI). Although there is a lack of uniformity in the definition of CoI, many express concerns that competing interests may bias research methods and the interpretation of data and conclusions. ...

The Center of Mass of a Soft Spring

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Serna, Juan D.; Joshi, Amitabh

2011-01-01

This article uses calculus to find the center of mass of a soft, vertically suspended, cylindrical helical spring, which necessarily is stretched non-uniformly by the action of gravity. A general expression for the vertical position of the center of mass is obtained and compared with other results in the literature.

Adenoviral receptor expression of normal bladder and transitional cell carcinoma of the bladder.

PubMed

Buscarini, Maurizio; Quek, Marcus L; Gilliam-Hegarich, Susan; Kasahara, Nori; Bochner, Bernard

2007-01-01

The insertion of absent or underexpressed genes into cancer cells to alter their malignant phenotype is an important potential application of available gene therapy technology. One of the more common viral vector systems that has been extensively studied for this purpose are the replication-deficient adenoviruses (Ad). Adenoviral infection of cells is mediated through a complex pathway, initiated following viral-cell attachment. Adenoviral-cell attachment occurs following interactions with a 46-kDa transmembrane protein with high affinity for both the Coxsackie and adenovirus, designated the CAR (Coxsackie and adenoviral receptor). Additional important cell-viral interactions that occur involve the alpha(v)-based integrins, specifically alpha(v)beta3 and alpha(v)beta5. The purpose of the present study was to determine the extent of expression and localization of the known Ad receptor proteins (CAR, alpha(v)beta3, and alpha(v)beta5) in normal and cancerous human bladders. Frozen tissue samples of normal bladder and invasive transitional cell cancers of the bladder were evaluated. Tissue blocks containing muscle-invasive transitional cell carcinoma (TCC) were obtained following radical cystectomy, which were performed at our institution. Thirty-two invasive transitional cell bladder tumors were evaluated, each with a matched sample of histologically normal-appearing bladder used as a control. Four additional samples of normal bladder were obtained from patients with no evidence of disease of the bladder and served as further controls. Three additional cases of invasive bladder cancer with no matching normal tissue were also evaluated. Identification of the CAR receptor was performed using the anti-CAR mouse monoclonal antibody designated RmBC. The integrins alpha(v)beta3 and alpha(v)beta5 were identified using the mouse monoclonal antibodies designated LM609 and P1F6 respectively. All slides were evaluated by two of the authors (M.B., B.B.) without knowledge of the clinical and pathological data. Normal bladder: Normal bladder mucosa demonstrated a marked positivity for CAR in 29/35 (82.8%) cases. In contrast, normal transitional epithelial cells were uniformly negative when tested for the integrins alpha(v)beta3 and alpha(v)beta5. Subepithelial tissues, specifically the connective tissue components of the lamina propria and deep muscle wall of the bladder, were positive for alpha(v)beta3 and for alpha(v)beta5 in 61 and 75% of samples, respectively. Endothelial cells associated with the various layers throughout the bladder uniformly expressed both integrins and served as a consistent internal control for both antibodies. An almost identical staining pattern of the endothelium was observed using LM609 and P1F6 in all samples tested. Bladder transitional cell carcinoma: CAR immunoreactivity against TCC cells was uniformly decreased compared to normal transitional cells. Nine tumors exhibited a weak positivity for CAR while the remaining samples were negative. In some cases, the absence of CAR positivity was associated with histological evidence of carcinoma in situ. In 6 cases, it led to the identification of small regions of carcinoma in situ that were not noted on primary pathological evaluation. Peritumoral connective tissue expressed both integrins in the majority of cases, similar to the pattern described above for normal bladder. Transitional cell cancers demonstrated a similar pattern of expression of alpha(v)beta5, in which all tumor cells exhibited minimal or no staining. The success of all viral-mediated gene therapy strategies relies on the ability of the vector to efficiently deliver its genetic material to a target cell population. In the current study, we demonstrate that the bladder epithelial layer consistently expresses high levels of CAR. Deeper layers of the epithelium also express CAR, including the basal layer cells. A decrease in the expression of CAR appears as an early event in bladder carcinogenesis. We observed that both alpha(v)beta3 and alpha(v)beta5 are strongly expressed in muscle cells surrounding the neoplastic cells, as well as within the peritumoral connective tissue. In cases of invasive bladder cancer that have lost CAR expression, an adenoviral vector may still be utilized through the less efficient interactions with the integrins. Bladder tumor tissue may be less susceptible to an adenoviral-mediated gene therapy approach in which a significant percentage of tumor cells require transduction. Adenoviral uptake by tumor or peritumoral cells with subsequent gene transfer could be predicted by the level of CAR and alpha(v)-based integrin expression. This would enhance our ability to identify those patients whose tumors would be more susceptible to Ad-mediated gene delivery as part of an antitumor treatment. 2007 S. Karger AG, Basel

Uniform irradiation of irregularly shaped cavities for photodynamic therapy.

PubMed

Rem, A I; van Gemert, M J; van der Meulen, F W; Gijsbers, G H; Beek, J F

1997-03-01

It is difficult to achieve a uniform light distribution in irregularly shaped cavities. We have conducted a study on the use of hollow 'integrating' moulds for more uniform light delivery of photodynamic therapy in irregularly shaped cavities such as the oral cavity. Simple geometries such as a cubical box, a sphere, a cylinder and a 'bottle-neck' geometry have been investigated experimentally and the results have been compared with computed light distributions obtained using the 'radiosity method'. A high reflection coefficient of the mould and the best uniform direct irradiance possible on the inside of the mould were found to be important determinants for achieving a uniform light distribution.

Polarization operator of a photon in a magnetic field

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Katkov, V. M., E-mail: V.M.Katkov@inp.nsk.su

2016-08-15

The polarization operator of a photon in a static uniform magnetic field has been studied at photon energies both above and below the threshold of electron–positron pair production by a photon. In the first order of the fine-structure constant α, expressions for the refractive index of a photon with a certain polarization in both low and high fields as compared to the critical field H{sub 0} = 4.41 × 10{sup 13} G have been obtained. Both the purely quantum range of photon energies, where the particles of a pair are produced at the lowest Landau levels, and the region ofmore » applicability of the semiclassical approximation in the case of the population of high energy levels have been considered. A general spectral integral formula has been obtained with divergent threshold terms separated in an explicit form.« less

Use of Bayesian Methods to Analyze and Visualize Content Uniformity Capability Versus United States Pharmacopeia and ASTM Standards.

PubMed

Hofer, Jeffrey D; Rauk, Adam P

2017-02-01

The purpose of this work was to develop a straightforward and robust approach to analyze and summarize the ability of content uniformity data to meet different criteria. A robust Bayesian statistical analysis methodology is presented which provides a concise and easily interpretable visual summary of the content uniformity analysis results. The visualization displays individual batch analysis results and shows whether there is high confidence that different content uniformity criteria could be met a high percentage of the time in the future. The 3 tests assessed are as follows: (a) United States Pharmacopeia Uniformity of Dosage Units <905>, (b) a specific ASTM E2810 Sampling Plan 1 criterion to potentially be used for routine release testing, and (c) another specific ASTM E2810 Sampling Plan 2 criterion to potentially be used for process validation. The approach shown here could readily be used to create similar result summaries for other potential criteria. Copyright © 2017 American Pharmacists Association®. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Thermally dried ink-jet process for 6,13-bis(triisopropylsilylethynyl)-pentacene for high mobility and high uniformity on a large area substrate

USGS Publications Warehouse

Ryu, Gi Seong; Lee, Myung Won; Jeong, Seung Hyeon; Song, Chung Kun

2012-01-01

In this study we developed a simple ink-jet process for 6,13-bis(triisopropylsilylethynyl)-pentacene (TIPS-pentacene), which is known as a high-mobility soluble organic semiconductor, to achieve relatively high-mobility and high-uniformity performance for large-area applications. We analyzed the behavior of fluorescent particles in droplets and applied the results to determining a method of controlling the behavior of TIPS-pentacene molecules. The grain morphology of TIPS-pentacene varied depending on the temperature applied to the droplets during drying. We were able to obtain large and uniform grains at 46 degrees C without any "coffee stain". The process was applied to a large-size organic thin-film transistor (OTFT) backplane for an electrophoretic display panel containing 192 x 150 pixels on a 6-in.-sized substrate. The average of mobilities of 36 OTFTs, which were taken from different locations of the backplane, was 0.44 +/- 0.08 cm2.V-1.s-1, with a small deviation of 20%, over a 6-in.-size area comprising 28,800 OTFTs. This process providing high mobility and high uniformity can be achieved by simply maintaining the whole area of the substrate at a specific temperature (46 degrees C in this case) during drying of the droplets.

Differential expression of catalase genes in Nicotiana plumbaginifolia (L.).

PubMed Central

Willekens, H; Langebartels, C; Tiré, C; Van Montagu, M; Inzé, D; Van Camp, W

1994-01-01

We have analyzed the expression of three catalase (Cat; EC 1.11.1.6) genes from Nicotiana plumbaginifolia by means of RNA blot and in situ hybridizations. Our data demonstrate that the expression of each catalase is associated with a particular H2O2-producing process. Cat1 appears to be specifically involved in the scavenging of photorespiratory H2O2 and is under control of a circadian rhythm, Cat2 is uniformly expressed in different organs with a cellular preference for vascular tissues, and the expression profile of Cat3 points to a role in glyoxysomal processes. Differential expression of these catalases is also manifested in response to temperature changes. DNA sequence comparison with other dicotyledonous catalases led to the identification of at least three distinct classes, which indicates that the functional organization of catalases is generally conserved in dicotyledonous plants. Images PMID:7937973

Differential expression of catalase genes in Nicotiana plumbaginifolia (L.).

PubMed

Willekens, H; Langebartels, C; Tiré, C; Van Montagu, M; Inzé, D; Van Camp, W

1994-10-25

We have analyzed the expression of three catalase (Cat; EC 1.11.1.6) genes from Nicotiana plumbaginifolia by means of RNA blot and in situ hybridizations. Our data demonstrate that the expression of each catalase is associated with a particular H2O2-producing process. Cat1 appears to be specifically involved in the scavenging of photorespiratory H2O2 and is under control of a circadian rhythm, Cat2 is uniformly expressed in different organs with a cellular preference for vascular tissues, and the expression profile of Cat3 points to a role in glyoxysomal processes. Differential expression of these catalases is also manifested in response to temperature changes. DNA sequence comparison with other dicotyledonous catalases led to the identification of at least three distinct classes, which indicates that the functional organization of catalases is generally conserved in dicotyledonous plants.

Fine mapping of canine parvovirus B cell epitopes.

PubMed

López de Turiso, J A; Cortés, E; Ranz, A; García, J; Sanz, A; Vela, C; Casal, J I

1991-10-01

In this report we describe the topological mapping of neutralizing domains of canine parvovirus (CPV). We obtained 11 CPV-specific monoclonal antibodies (MAbs), six of which are neutralizing. The reactivities were as determined by ELISA and Western blot (immunoblot) analysis. VP2, the most abundant protein of the CPV capsid, seemed to contain all the neutralization sites. Also, an almost full-length genomic clone of CPV was constructed in the bacterial plasmid pUC18 to enable expression of CPV proteins. All the neutralizing MAbs recognized recombinant VP2 when it was expressed as a free protein in Escherichia coli but not when expressed as a fusion protein with glutathione-S-transferase. When two large fragments containing about 85% and 67% of the C terminus of VP2 were expressed, no neutralization sites were detected. When fusion proteins containing the N terminus were expressed, two linear determinants were mapped, one between residues 1 to 10 of VP2, and the other between amino acids 11 and 23. The peptide 11 GQPAVRNERATGS 23, recognized by MAb 3C9, was synthesized chemically and checked for immunogenicity, not being able to induce neutralizing activity. Although the antibody response in rabbits to all the fusion proteins was uniformly high, the anti-CPV response was very variable. Protein from pCPVEx11, which contains a T cell epitope (peptide PKIFINLAKKKKAG) present in the VP1-specific region as well as the B cell epitopes, seemed to be the most effective in inducing virus neutralization.

Impeller tandem blade study with grid embedding for local grid refinement

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bache, George

1992-01-01

Flow non-uniformity at the discharge of high power density impellers can result in significant unsteady interactions between impeller blades and downstream diffuser vanes. These interactions result in degradation of both performance and pump reliability. The MSFC Pump Technology Team has recognized the importance of resolving this problem and has thus initiated the development and testing of a high head coefficient impeller. One of the primary goals of this program is to improve impeller performance and discharge flow uniformity. The objective of the present work is complimentary. Flow uniformity and performance gains were sought through the application of a tandem blade arrangement. The approach adopted was to numerically establish flow characteristics at the impeller discharge for the baseline MSFC impeller and then parametrically evaluate tandem blade configurations. A tandem design was sought that improves both impeller performance and discharge uniformity. The Navier-Stokes solver AEROVISC was used to conduct the study. Grid embedding is used to resolve local gradients while attempting to minimize model size. Initial results indicate that significant gains in flow uniformity can be achieved through the tandem blade concept and that blade clocking rather than slot location is the primary driver for flow uniformity.

A Transition Zone Showing Highly Discontinuous or Alternating Levels of Stem Cell and Proliferation Markers Characterizes the Development of PTEN-Haploinsufficient Colorectal Cancer.

PubMed

Arvai, Kevin J; Hsu, Ya-Hsuan; Lee, Lobin A; Jones, Dan

2015-01-01

Stepwise acquisition of oncogene mutations and deletion/inactivation of tumor suppressor genes characterize the development of colorectal cancer (CRC). These genetic events interact with discrete morphologic transitions from hyperplastic mucosa to adenomatous areas, followed by in situ malignant transformation and finally invasive carcinoma. The goal of this study was to identify tissue markers of the adenoma-carcinoma morphogenetic transitions in CRC. We analyzed the patterns of expression of growth regulatory and stem cell markers across these distinct morphologic transition zones in 735 primary CRC tumors. In 202 cases with preserved adenoma-adenocarcinoma transition, we identified, in 37.1% of cases, a zone of adenomatous epithelium, located immediately adjacent to the invasive component, that showed rapidly alternating intraglandular stretches of PTEN+ and PTEN- epithelium. This zone exactly overlapped with similar alternating expression of Ki-67 and inversely with the transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β) growth regulator SMAD4. These zones also show parallel alternating levels and/or subcellular localization of multiple cancer stem/progenitor cell (CSC) markers, including β-catenin/CTNNB1, ALDH1, and CD44. PTEN was always re-expressed in the invasive tumor in these cases, unlike those with complete loss of PTEN expression. Genomic microarray analysis of CRC with prominent CSC-like expansions demonstrated a high frequency of PTEN genomic deletion/haploinsufficiency in tumors with CSC-like transition zones (62.5%) but not in tumors with downregulated but non-alternating PTEN expression (14.3%). There were no significant differences in the levels of KRAS mutation or CTNNB1 mutation in CSC-like tumors as compared to unselected CRC cases. In conclusion, we have identified a distinctive CSC-like pre-invasive transition zone in PTEN-haploinsufficient CRC that shows convergent on-off regulation of the PTEN/AKT, TGF-β/SMAD and Wnt/β-catenin pathways. This bottleneck-like zone is usually followed by the emergence of invasive tumors with intact PTEN expression but dysregulated TP53 and uniformly high proliferation rates.

Highly Enhanced Electromechanical Stability of Large-Area Graphene with Increased Interfacial Adhesion Energy by Electrothermal-Direct Transfer for Transparent Electrodes.

PubMed

Kim, Jangheon; Kim, Gi Gyu; Kim, Soohyun; Jung, Wonsuk

2016-09-07

Graphene, a two-dimensional sheet of carbon atoms in a hexagonal lattice structure, has been extensively investigated for research and industrial applications as a promising material with outstanding electrical, mechanical, and chemical properties. To fabricate graphene-based devices, graphene transfer to the target substrate with a clean and minimally defective surface is the first step. However, graphene transfer technologies require improvement in terms of uniform transfer with a clean, nonfolded and nontorn area, amount of defects, and electromechanical reliability of the transferred graphene. More specifically, uniform transfer of a large area is a key challenge when graphene is repetitively transferred onto pretransferred layers because the adhesion energy between graphene layers is too low to ensure uniform transfer, although uniform multilayers of graphene have exhibited enhanced electrical and optical properties. In this work, we developed a newly suggested electrothermal-direct (ETD) transfer method for large-area high quality monolayer graphene with less defects and an absence of folding or tearing of the area at the surface. This method delivers uniform multilayer transfer of graphene by repetitive monolayer transfer steps based on high adhesion energy between graphene layers and the target substrate. To investigate the highly enhanced electromechanical stability, we conducted mechanical elastic bending experiments and reliability tests in a highly humid environment. This ETD-transferred graphene is expected to replace commercial transparent electrodes with ETD graphene-based transparent electrodes and devices such as a touch panels with outstanding electromechanical stability.

Saving the Baltic Sea, the inland waters of its drainage basin, or both? spatial perspectives on reducing P-loads in eastern Sweden.

PubMed

Andersson, Ingela; Jarsjö, Jerker; Petersson, Mona

2014-11-01

Nutrient loads from inland sources to the Baltic Sea and adjacent inland waters need to be reduced in order to prevent eutrophication and meet requirements of the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) and the Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP). We here investigate the spatial implications of using different possible criteria for reducing water-borne phosphorous (P) loads in the Northern Baltic Sea River Basin District (NBS-RBD) in Sweden. Results show that most catchments that have a high degree of internal eutrophication do not express high export of P from their outlets. Furthermore, due to lake retention, lake catchments with high P-loads per agricultural area (which is potentially of concern for the WFD) did not considerably contribute to the P-loading of the Baltic Sea. Spatially uniform water quality goals may, therefore, not be effective in NBS-RBD, emphasizing more generally the need for regional adaptation of WFD and BSAP-related goals.

Acoustic energy in ducts - Further observations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eversman, W.

1979-01-01

The transmission of acoustic energy in uniform ducts carrying uniform flow is investigated with the purpose of clarifying two points of interest. The two commonly used definitions of acoustic 'energy' flux are shown to be related by a Legendre transformation of the Lagrangian density exactly as in deriving the Hamiltonian density in mechanics. In the acoustic case the total energy density and the Hamiltonian density are not the same which accounts for two different 'energy' fluxes. When the duct has acoustically absorptive walls neither of the two flux expressions gives correct results. A reevaluation of the basis of derivation of the energy density and energy flux provides forms which yield consistent results for soft walled ducts.

The electric field of a uniformly charged cubic shell

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McCreery, Kaitlin; Greenside, Henry

2018-01-01

As an integrative and insightful example for undergraduates learning about electrostatics, we discuss how to use symmetry, Coulomb's law, superposition, Gauss's law, and visualization to understand the electric field E (x ,y ,z ) produced by a uniformly charged cubic shell. We first discuss how to deduce qualitatively, using freshman-level physics, the perhaps surprising fact that the interior electric field is nonzero and has a complex structure, pointing inwards from the middle of each face of the shell and pointing outwards towards each edge and corner. We then discuss how to understand the quantitative features of the electric field by plotting an analytical expression for E along symmetry lines and on symmetry surfaces of the shell.

A vaccine targeting mutant IDH1 induces antitumour immunity.

PubMed

Schumacher, Theresa; Bunse, Lukas; Pusch, Stefan; Sahm, Felix; Wiestler, Benedikt; Quandt, Jasmin; Menn, Oliver; Osswald, Matthias; Oezen, Iris; Ott, Martina; Keil, Melanie; Balß, Jörg; Rauschenbach, Katharina; Grabowska, Agnieszka K; Vogler, Isabel; Diekmann, Jan; Trautwein, Nico; Eichmüller, Stefan B; Okun, Jürgen; Stevanović, Stefan; Riemer, Angelika B; Sahin, Ugur; Friese, Manuel A; Beckhove, Philipp; von Deimling, Andreas; Wick, Wolfgang; Platten, Michael

2014-08-21

Monoallelic point mutations of isocitrate dehydrogenase type 1 (IDH1) are an early and defining event in the development of a subgroup of gliomas and other types of tumour. They almost uniformly occur in the critical arginine residue (Arg 132) in the catalytic pocket, resulting in a neomorphic enzymatic function, production of the oncometabolite 2-hydroxyglutarate (2-HG), genomic hypermethylation, genetic instability and malignant transformation. More than 70% of diffuse grade II and grade III gliomas carry the most frequent mutation, IDH1(R132H) (ref. 3). From an immunological perspective, IDH1(R132H) represents a potential target for immunotherapy as it is a tumour-specific potential neoantigen with high uniformity and penetrance expressed in all tumour cells. Here we demonstrate that IDH1(R132H) contains an immunogenic epitope suitable for mutation-specific vaccination. Peptides encompassing the mutated region are presented on major histocompatibility complexes (MHC) class II and induce mutation-specific CD4(+) T-helper-1 (TH1) responses. CD4(+) TH1 cells and antibodies spontaneously occurring in patients with IDH1(R132H)-mutated gliomas specifically recognize IDH1(R132H). Peptide vaccination of mice devoid of mouse MHC and transgenic for human MHC class I and II with IDH1(R132H) p123-142 results in an effective MHC class II-restricted mutation-specific antitumour immune response and control of pre-established syngeneic IDH1(R132H)-expressing tumours in a CD4(+) T-cell-dependent manner. As IDH1(R132H) is present in all tumour cells of these slow-growing gliomas, a mutation-specific anti-IDH1(R132H) vaccine may represent a viable novel therapeutic strategy for IDH1(R132H)-mutated tumours.

High-aspect-ratio microstructures with versatile slanting angles on silicon by uniform metal-assisted chemical etching

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Li, Liyi; Zhang, Cheng; Tuan, Chia-Chi; Chen, Yun; Wong, C.-P.

2018-05-01

High-aspect-ratio (HAR) microstructures on silicon (Si) play key roles in photonics and electromechanical devices. However, it has been challenging to fabricate HAR microstructures with slanting profiles. Here we report successful fabrication of uniform HAR microstructures with controllable slanting angles on (1 0 0)-Si by slanted uniform metal-assisted chemical etching (SUMaCE). The trenches have width of 2 µm, aspect ratio greater than 20:1 and high geometric uniformity. The slanting angles can be adjusted between 2-70° with respect to the Si surface normal. The results support a fundamental hypothesis that under the UMaCE condition, the preferred etching direction is along the normal of the thin film catalysts, regardless of the relative orientation of the catalyst to Si substrates or the crystalline orientation of the substrates. The SUMaCE method paves the way to HAR 3D microfabrication with arbitrary slanting profiles inside Si.

A New Method to Measure Temperature and Burner Pattern Factor Sensing for Active Engine Control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ng, Daniel

1999-01-01

The determination of the temperatures of extended surfaces which exhibit non-uniform temperature variation is very important for a number of applications including the "Burner Pattern Factor" (BPF) of turbine engines. Exploratory work has shown that use of BPF to control engine functions can result in many benefits, among them reduction in engine weight, reduction in operating cost, increase in engine life, while attaining maximum engine efficiency. Advanced engines are expected to operate at very high temperature to achieve high efficiency. Brief exposure of engine components to higher than design temperatures due to non-uniformity in engine burner pattern can reduce engine life. The engine BPF is a measure of engine temperature uniformity. Attainment of maximum temperature uniformity and high temperatures is key to maximum efficiency and long life. A new approach to determine through the measurement of just one radiation spectrum by a multiwavelength pyrometer is possible. This paper discusses a new temperature sensing approach and its application to determine the BPF.

A new formula for normal tissue complication probability (NTCP) as a function of equivalent uniform dose (EUD).

PubMed

Luxton, Gary; Keall, Paul J; King, Christopher R

2008-01-07

To facilitate the use of biological outcome modeling for treatment planning, an exponential function is introduced as a simpler equivalent to the Lyman formula for calculating normal tissue complication probability (NTCP). The single parameter of the exponential function is chosen to reproduce the Lyman calculation to within approximately 0.3%, and thus enable easy conversion of data contained in empirical fits of Lyman parameters for organs at risk (OARs). Organ parameters for the new formula are given in terms of Lyman model m and TD(50), and conversely m and TD(50) are expressed in terms of the parameters of the new equation. The role of the Lyman volume-effect parameter n is unchanged from its role in the Lyman model. For a non-homogeneously irradiated OAR, an equation relates d(ref), n, v(eff) and the Niemierko equivalent uniform dose (EUD), where d(ref) and v(eff) are the reference dose and effective fractional volume of the Kutcher-Burman reduction algorithm (i.e. the LKB model). It follows in the LKB model that uniform EUD irradiation of an OAR results in the same NTCP as the original non-homogeneous distribution. The NTCP equation is therefore represented as a function of EUD. The inverse equation expresses EUD as a function of NTCP and is used to generate a table of EUD versus normal tissue complication probability for the Emami-Burman parameter fits as well as for OAR parameter sets from more recent data.

Analytical solutions and particle simulations of cross-field plasma sheaths

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gerver, M.J.; Parker, S.E.; Theilhaber, K.

1989-08-30

Particles simulations have been made of an infinite plasma slab, bounded by absorbing conducting walls, with a magnetic field parallel to the walls. The simulations have been either 1-D, or 2-D, with the magnetic field normal to the simulation plane. Initially, the plasma has a uniform density between the walls, and there is a uniform source of ions and electrons to replace particles lost to the walls. In the 1-D case, there is no diffusion of the particle guiding centers, and the plasma remains uniform in density and potential over most of the slab, with sheaths about a Debye lengthmore » wide where the potential rises to the wall potential. In the 2-D case, the density profile becomes parabolic, going almost to zero at the walls, and there is a quasineutral presheath in the bulk of the plasma, in addition to sheaths near the walls. Analytic expressions are found for the density and potential profiles in both cases, including, in the 2-D case, the magnetic presheath due to finite ion Larmor radius, and the effects of the guiding center diffusion rate being either much less than or much grater than the energy diffusion rate. These analytic expressions are shown to agree with the simulations. A 1-D simulation with Monte Carlo guiding center diffusion included gives results that are good agreement with the much more expensive 2-D simulation. 17 refs., 10 figs.« less

PPARGC1A is upregulated and facilitates lung cancer metastasis.

PubMed

Li, Jin-Dong; Feng, Qing-Chuan; Qi, Yu; Cui, Guanghui; Zhao, Song

2017-10-15

Lung cancer remains a leading cause of cancer-related mortality, with metastatic progression remaining the single largest cause of lung cancer mortality. Hence it is imperative to determine reliable biomarkers for lung cancer prognosis. We performed quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis to explore epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) inducers that regulate EMT process in three patients with advanced lung cancer disease. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPARGC1A) was uniformly the topmost overexpressed gene in all three human non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patient samples. Further evaluation in human normal lung and metastatic lung cancer cell lines revealed that the expression of PPARGC1A was upregulated in metastatic lung cancer cell lines. Metagenomic analysis revealed direct correlation among PPARGC1A, zinc-finger transcription factor snail homolog 1 (SNAI1), and metastatic lung disease. Upregulation of PPARGC1A transcript expression was independent of a differential upregulation of the upstream AMP-dependent protein kinase (AMPK) activation or steady state expression of the silent mating type information regulation 2 homolog 1 (SIRT1). Xenograft tail vein colonization assays proved that the high expression of PPARGC1A was a prerequisite for metastatic progression of lung cancer to brain. Our results indicate that PPARGC1A might be a potential biomarker for lung cancer prognosis. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Inc.

Levels of potential bioactive compounds including carotenoids, vitamin C and phenolic compounds, and expression of their cognate biosynthetic genes vary significantly in different varieties of potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) grown under uniform cultural conditions.

PubMed

Valcarcel, Jesus; Reilly, Kim; Gaffney, Michael; O'Brien, Nora M

2016-02-01

In addition to their high carbohydrate content, potatoes are also an important dietary source of vitamin C and bioactive secondary metabolites, including phenolic compounds and carotenoids, which have been suggested to play a role in human health. The expression of genes encoding key enzymes involved in the synthesis of these compounds was assessed by reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction and compared to the accumulation of the corresponding product in seven potato varieties showing contrasting levels of metabolite accumulation. Strong positive correlations were found between phenolic content in the flesh of tubers and transcript levels of phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL) and chalcone synthase (CHS) genes. The expression of PAL and CHS was also related to that of AN1, a transcription factor involved in the synthesis of anthocyanins, suggesting that these genes are regulated in a coordinated manner. No clear relationship was found between transcript levels of phytoene synthase (PSY) or L-galactono-1,4-lactone dehydrogenase (GLDH) genes and total carotenoid or vitamin C accumulation, respectively. Data indicate that levels of total phenolic and flavonoid compounds in potato are controlled primarily by PAL and CHS gene expression. Transcript levels of PSY and GLDH did not control accumulation of carotenoids or vitamin C. © 2015 Society of Chemical Industry.

PHOTOPERIOD RESPONSE 1 (PHOR1)-like genes regulate shoot/root growth, starch accumulation, and wood formation in Populus.

PubMed

Zawaski, Christine; Ma, Cathleen; Strauss, Steven H; French, Darla; Meilan, Richard; Busov, Victor B

2012-09-01

This study describes functional characterization of two putative poplar PHOTOPERIOD RESPONSE 1 (PHOR1) orthologues. The expression and sequence analyses indicate that the two poplar genes diverged, at least partially, in function. PtPHOR1_1 is most highly expressed in roots and induced by short days, while PtPHOR1_2 is more uniformly expressed throughout plant tissues and is not responsive to short days. The two PHOR1 genes also had distinct effects on shoot and root growth when their expression was up- and downregulated transgenically. PtPHOR1_1 effects were restricted to roots while PtPHOR1_2 had similar effects on aerial and below-ground development. Nevertheless, both genes seemed to be upregulated in transgenic poplars that are gibberellin-deficient and gibberellin-insensitive, suggesting interplay with gibberellin signalling. PHOR1 suppression led to increased starch accumulation in both roots and stems. The effect of PHOR1 suppression on starch accumulation was coupled with growth-inhibiting effects in both roots and shoots, suggesting that PHOR1 is part of a mechanism that regulates the allocation of carbohydrate to growth or storage in poplar. PHOR1 downregulation led to significant reduction of xylem formation caused by smaller fibres and vessels suggesting that PHOR1 likely plays a role in the growth of xylem cells.

PHOTOPERIOD RESPONSE 1 (PHOR1)-like Genes Regulate Shoot/root Growth, Starch Accumulation, and Wood Formation in Populus

PubMed Central

Busov, Victor B.

2012-01-01

This study describes functional characterization of two putative poplar PHOTOPERIOD RESPONSE 1 (PHOR1) orthologues. The expression and sequence analyses indicate that the two poplar genes diverged, at least partially, in function. PtPHOR1_1 is most highly expressed in roots and induced by short days, while PtPHOR1_2 is more uniformly expressed throughout plant tissues and is not responsive to short days. The two PHOR1 genes also had distinct effects on shoot and root growth when their expression was up- and downregulated transgenically. PtPHOR1_1 effects were restricted to roots while PtPHOR1_2 had similar effects on aerial and below-ground development. Nevertheless, both genes seemed to be upregulated in transgenic poplars that are gibberellin-deficient and gibberellin-insensitive, suggesting interplay with gibberellin signalling. PHOR1 suppression led to increased starch accumulation in both roots and stems. The effect of PHOR1 suppression on starch accumulation was coupled with growth-inhibiting effects in both roots and shoots, suggesting that PHOR1 is part of a mechanism that regulates the allocation of carbohydrate to growth or storage in poplar. PHOR1 downregulation led to significant reduction of xylem formation caused by smaller fibres and vessels suggesting that PHOR1 likely plays a role in the growth of xylem cells. PMID:22915748

Effects of broiler breeder management on pullet body weight and carcass uniformity.

PubMed

Zuidhof, M J; Holm, D E; Renema, R A; Jalal, M A; Robinson, F E

2015-06-01

An experiment was conducted to study the effect of broiler breeder feeding management practices on pullet performance, BW uniformity, and carcass traits during rearing (to 22 wk of age). At 3 wk of age, 1,200 Ross 308 breeder pullets were assigned to one of 5 treatments: 1) control: standard mash diet, fed daily; 2) high fiber: mash diet containing 25% lower nutrient density, fed daily; 3) scatter: standard diet in pellet form scattered on litter, fed daily; 4) skip-a-day: standard mash diet, fed on alternate days; or 5) grading: standard mash diet, fed daily (birds sorted into low, average, and high BW groups every 4 wk). Birds on the high fiber treatment consumed more feed (P<0.0001) and had the highest feed conversion ratio (FCR; P<0.004) but the lowest ME to gain and CP to gain ratios (P≤0.002). Skip-a-day treatment pullets consumed more ME and CP than birds in any other treatment (P<0.001). Grading yielded the highest BW uniformity at 22 wk of age (CV=6.2%), while control and high fiber treatment groups were least uniform (CV>15%; P<0.0001). Skip-a-day feed restriction produced birds with the significantly lowest breast muscle and highest liver weight compared to all other treatments (P<0.05). Variation in shank length, chest width, and breast muscle was lowest in the grading treatment, whereas the CV for fat pad and liver was lowest in the skip-a-day treatment. In this trial, broiler breeder target BW profiles were achieved using combinations of quantitative and qualitative feed restriction, or preemptive management practices. Qualitative diet dilution and skip-a-day management did little to increase flock uniformity relative to the control during the most intense period of feed restriction (7 to 19 wk). Scatter feeding increased flock uniformity to a small degree, whereas grading yielded the highest increase in BW and carcass trait uniformity. © 2015 Poultry Science Association Inc.

Elastic field of a spherical inclusion with non-uniform eigenfields in second strain gradient elasticity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Delfani, M. R.; Latifi Shahandashti, M.

2017-09-01

In this paper, within the complete form of Mindlin's second strain gradient theory, the elastic field of an isolated spherical inclusion embedded in an infinitely extended homogeneous isotropic medium due to a non-uniform distribution of eigenfields is determined. These eigenfields, in addition to eigenstrain, comprise eigen double and eigen triple strains. After the derivation of a closed-form expression for Green's function associated with the problem, two different cases of non-uniform distribution of the eigenfields are considered as follows: (i) radial distribution, i.e. the distributions of the eigenfields are functions of only the radial distance of points from the centre of inclusion, and (ii) polynomial distribution, i.e. the distributions of the eigenfields are polynomial functions in the Cartesian coordinates of points. While the obtained solution for the elastic field of the latter case takes the form of an infinite series, the solution to the former case is represented in a closed form. Moreover, Eshelby's tensors associated with the two mentioned cases are obtained.

Express quality control of chicken eggs by machine vision

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gorbunova, Elena V.; Chertov, Aleksandr N.; Peretyagin, Vladimir S.; Korotaev, Valery V.; Arbuzova, Evgeniia A.

2017-06-01

The urgency of the task of analyzing the foodstuffs quality is determined by the strategy for the formation of a healthy lifestyle and the rational nutrition of the world population. This applies to products, such as chicken eggs. In particular, it is necessary to control the chicken eggs quality at the farm production prior to incubation in order to eliminate the possible hereditary diseases, as well as high embryonic mortality and a sharp decrease in the quality of the bred young. Up to this day, in the market there are no objective instruments of contactless express quality control as analytical equipment that allow the high-precision quality examination of the chicken eggs, which is determined by the color parameters of the eggshell (color uniformity) and yolk of eggs, and by the presence in the eggshell of various defects (cracks, growths, wrinkles, dirty). All mentioned features are usually evaluated only visually (subjectively) with the help of normalized color standards and ovoscopes. Therefore, this work is devoted to the investigation of the application opportunities of contactless express control method with the help of technical vision to implement the chicken eggs' quality analysis. As a result of the studies, a prototype with the appropriate software was proposed. Experimental studies of this equipment on a representative sample of eggs from chickens of different breeds have been carried out (the total number of analyzed samples exceeds 300 pieces). The correctness of the color analysis was verified by spectrophotometric studies of the surface of the eggshell.

Albumin-based nanoparticles as methylprednisolone carriers for targeted delivery towards the neonatal Fc receptor in glomerular podocytes

PubMed Central

Wu, Lin; Chen, Mingyu; Mao, Huijuan; Wang, Ningning; Zhang, Bo; Zhao, Xiufen; Qian, Jun; Xing, Changying

2017-01-01

Glucocorticoids (GCs) are commonly used in the treatment of nephrotic syndrome. However, high doses and long periods of GC therapy can result in severe side effects. The present study aimed to selectively deliver albumin-methylprednisolone (MP) nanoparticles towards glomerular podocytes, which highly express the specific neonatal Fc receptor (FcRn) of albumin. Bovine serum albumin (BSA) was labeled with a fluorescent dye and linked with modified MP via an amide bond. The outcome nanoparticle named BSA633-MP showed a uniform size with a diameter of approximately 10 nm and contained 12 drug molecules on average. The nanoconjugates were found to be stable at pH 7.4 and acid-sensitive at pH 4.0, with approximately 72% release of the MP drug after 48 h of incubation. The nanoparticle demonstrated a 36-fold uptake in receptor-specific cellular delivery in the FcRn-expressing human podocytes compared to the uptake in the non-FcRn-expressing control cells. Co-localization further confirmed that uptake of the nanoconjugates involved receptor-mediated endocytosis followed by lysosome associated transportation. In vitro cellular experiments indicated that the BSA633-MP ameliorated puromycin aminonucleoside-induced podocyte apoptosis. Moreover, in vivo fluorescence molecular imaging showed that BSA633-MP was mainly accumulated in the liver and kidney after intravenous dosing for 24 h. Collectively, this study may provide an approach for the effective and safe therapy of nephrotic syndrome. PMID:28259932

Hematopoietic progenitors express neural genes

PubMed Central

Goolsby, James; Marty, Marie C.; Heletz, Dafna; Chiappelli, Joshua; Tashko, Gerti; Yarnell, Deborah; Fishman, Paul S.; Dhib-Jalbut, Suhayl; Bever, Christopher T.; Pessac, Bernard; Trisler, David

2003-01-01

Bone marrow, or cells selected from bone marrow, were reported recently to give rise to cells with a neural phenotype after in vitro treatment with neural-inducing factors or after delivery into the brain. However, we showed previously that untreated bone marrow cells express products of the neural myelin basic protein gene, and we demonstrate here that a subset of ex vivo bone marrow cells expresses the neurogenic transcription factor Pax-6 as well as neuronal genes encoding neurofilament H, NeuN (neuronal nuclear protein), HuC/HuD (Hu-antigen C/Hu-antigen D), and GAD65 (glutamic acid decarboxylase 65), as well as the oligodendroglial gene encoding CNPase (2′,3′ cyclic nucleotide 3′-phosphohydrolase). In contrast, astroglial glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) was not detected. These cells also were CD34+, a marker of hematopoietic stem cells. Cultures of these highly proliferative CD34+ cells, derived from adult mouse bone marrow, uniformly displayed a phenotype comparable with that of hematopoietic progenitor cells (CD45+, CD34+, Sca-1+, AA4.1+, cKit+, GATA-2+, and LMO-2+). The neuronal and oligodendroglial genes expressed in ex vivo bone marrow also were expressed in all cultured CD34+ cells, and GFAP was not observed. After CD34+ cell transplantation into adult brain, neuronal or oligodendroglial markers segregated into distinct nonoverlapping cell populations, whereas astroglial GFAP appeared, in the absence of other neural markers, in a separate set of implanted cells. Thus, neuronal and oligodendroglial gene products are present in a subset of bone marrow cells, and the expression of these genes can be regulated in brain. The fact that these CD34+ cells also express transcription factors (Rex-1 and Oct-4) that are found in early development elicits the hypothesis that they may be pluripotent embryonic-like stem cells. PMID:14634211

Quantification of multiple gene expression in individual cells.

PubMed

Peixoto, António; Monteiro, Marta; Rocha, Benedita; Veiga-Fernandes, Henrique

2004-10-01

Quantitative gene expression analysis aims to define the gene expression patterns determining cell behavior. So far, these assessments can only be performed at the population level. Therefore, they determine the average gene expression within a population, overlooking possible cell-to-cell heterogeneity that could lead to different cell behaviors/cell fates. Understanding individual cell behavior requires multiple gene expression analyses of single cells, and may be fundamental for the understanding of all types of biological events and/or differentiation processes. We here describe a new reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) approach allowing the simultaneous quantification of the expression of 20 genes in the same single cell. This method has broad application, in different species and any type of gene combination. RT efficiency is evaluated. Uniform and maximized amplification conditions for all genes are provided. Abundance relationships are maintained, allowing the precise quantification of the absolute number of mRNA molecules per cell, ranging from 2 to 1.28 x 10(9) for each individual gene. We evaluated the impact of this approach on functional genetic read-outs by studying an apparently homogeneous population (monoclonal T cells recovered 4 d after antigen stimulation), using either this method or conventional real-time RT-PCR. Single-cell studies revealed considerable cell-to-cell variation: All T cells did not express all individual genes. Gene coexpression patterns were very heterogeneous. mRNA copy numbers varied between different transcripts and in different cells. As a consequence, this single-cell assay introduces new and fundamental information regarding functional genomic read-outs. By comparison, we also show that conventional quantitative assays determining population averages supply insufficient information, and may even be highly misleading.

Properties of a recombinant bovine tissue factor expressed by Silkworm pupae and its performance as an Owren-type prothrombin time reagent for warfarin monitoring.

PubMed

Okuda, Masahiro; Taniguchi, Tomokuni; Takamiya, Osamu

2012-09-01

Tissue factor (TF), or thromboplastin, is a glycoprotein that triggers the extrinsic coagulation pathway. In blood coagulation testing, TF has been used as a natural source for determining Quick prothrombin time (PT) or the Owren PT (OBT). Currently, natural sources are being replaced with recombinant proteins because of their uniform characteristics and the possibility of stable mass production of PT reagents. Because bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE)-infected cows are widespread in Japan, we prepared a recombinant bovine TF (rbTF) with a baculovirus expression system using silkworms. To overcome the limitations of natural TF, especially in bovine brain, we expressed a full-length rbTF protein in Silkworm pupae with a baculovirus expression system. Baculovirus inactivation and the presence of DNA fragments in the rbTF fraction were confirmed using Reed-Muench and polymerase chain reaction methods after inactivation with a detergent. The rbTF fraction prepared by an immobilized anti-Silkworm pupae fluid protein Sepharose 4B column was identified as a visible band on western blots with a polyclonal antibody against human TF with cross-reactivity with TFs. The inhibition of the polyclonal antibody against human TF by the clotting assay for PT was identified, and amidolytic biological activity through activated factor VII on S-2288 substrate was observed. In conclusion, the rbTF expressed by the baculovirus system using Silkworm pupae was uniformly specific for bovine TF. The OBT reagent incorporated by this rbTF was similar to those of commercial reagents. It also showed a suitable International Sensitivity Index and reproducibility precision, thereby allowing for diagnostic use. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Determination of Duty Cycle for Energy Storage Systems in a Renewables (Solar) Firming Application

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Schoenwald, David A.; Ellison, James

2016-04-01

This report supplements the document, “Protocol for Uniformly Measuring and Expressing the Performance of Energy Storage Systems,” issued in a revised version in April 2016, which will include the renewables (solar) firming application for an energy storage system (ESS). This report provides the background and documentation associated with the determination of a duty cycle for an ESS operated in a renewables (solar) firming application for the purpose of measuring and expressing ESS performance in accordance with the ESS performance protocol.

The Right Stuff: Fashioning an Identity through Clothing in a Junior School.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Swain, Jon

2002-01-01

Explored the role of clothing in expressing individual and collective identity among preadolescent English students. Results found that a relaxed enforcement of school uniforms created space for students to use clothing to gain recognition, generate common bonds, and share interests within peer groups. Clothing and footwear were used as an…

Infant formula feeding increases hepatic cholesterol 7 alpha hydroxylase (CYP7A1) expression and fecal bile acid loss in neonatal piglets

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

During the postnatal feeding period, formula-fed infants have higher cholesterol synthesis rates, and lower circulating cholesterol concentrations as compared to their breastfed counterparts. Although this disparity has been attributed to the uniformly low dietary cholesterol content of typical inf...

Dress Codes Blues: An Exploration of Urban Students' Reactions to a Public High School Uniform Policy

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

DaCosta, Kneia

2006-01-01

This qualitative investigation explores the responses of 22 U.S. urban public high school students when confronted with their newly imposed school uniform policy. Specifically, the study assessed students' appraisals of the policy along with compliance and academic performance. Guided by ecological human development perspectives and grounded in…

Unifying cancer and normal RNA sequencing data from different sources

PubMed Central

Wang, Qingguo; Armenia, Joshua; Zhang, Chao; Penson, Alexander V.; Reznik, Ed; Zhang, Liguo; Minet, Thais; Ochoa, Angelica; Gross, Benjamin E.; Iacobuzio-Donahue, Christine A.; Betel, Doron; Taylor, Barry S.; Gao, Jianjiong; Schultz, Nikolaus

2018-01-01

Driven by the recent advances of next generation sequencing (NGS) technologies and an urgent need to decode complex human diseases, a multitude of large-scale studies were conducted recently that have resulted in an unprecedented volume of whole transcriptome sequencing (RNA-seq) data, such as the Genotype Tissue Expression project (GTEx) and The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). While these data offer new opportunities to identify the mechanisms underlying disease, the comparison of data from different sources remains challenging, due to differences in sample and data processing. Here, we developed a pipeline that processes and unifies RNA-seq data from different studies, which includes uniform realignment, gene expression quantification, and batch effect removal. We find that uniform alignment and quantification is not sufficient when combining RNA-seq data from different sources and that the removal of other batch effects is essential to facilitate data comparison. We have processed data from GTEx and TCGA and successfully corrected for study-specific biases, enabling comparative analysis between TCGA and GTEx. The normalized datasets are available for download on figshare. PMID:29664468

Students Wearing Police Uniforms Exhibit Biased Attention toward Individuals Wearing Hoodies.

PubMed

Civile, Ciro; Obhi, Sukhvinder S

2017-01-01

Police provide an essential public service and they often operate in difficult circumstances, requiring high-speed cognition. Recent incidents involving apparent profiling and aggressive behavior have led to accusations that the police are sometimes biased. Given that previous research has shown a link between clothing and cognition, we investigated the question of whether the police uniform itself might induce a bias in social attention. To address this question, and using a Canadian university student sample, we assessed whether wearing a police uniform biases attention toward black faces compared to white faces, and low-status individuals compared to high-status individuals. In Experiment 1 ( n = 28), participants wore either a police-style uniform or mechanic overalls, and performed a shape categorization task in the presence of a distractor that could be either: a black face, a white face, a person wearing a hoodie (whom we propose will be associated with low SES), or a person wearing a suit (whom we propose will be associated with high SES). Participants wearing the police-style uniform exhibited biased attention, indexed by slower reaction times (RTs), in the presence of low-SES images. In Experiment 2 ( n = 28), we confirmed this bias using a modified Dot-Probe task - an alternate measure of attentional bias in which we observed faster RTs to a dot probe that was spatially aligned with a low SES image. Experiment 3 ( n = 56) demonstrated that attentional bias toward low-SES targets appears only when participants wear the police-style uniform, and not when they are simply exposed to it - by having it placed on the desk in front of them. Our results demonstrate that wearing a police-style uniform biases attention toward low-SES targets. Thus, wearing a police-style uniform may induce a kind of "status-profiling" in which individuals from low-status groups become salient and capture attention. We note that our results are limited to university students and that it will be important to extend them to members of the community and law-enforcement officers. We discuss how uniforms might exert their effects on cognition by virtue of the power and cultural associations they evoke in the wearer.

Gold-film coating assisted femtosecond laser fabrication of large-area, uniform periodic surface structures.

PubMed

Feng, Pin; Jiang, Lan; Li, Xin; Rong, Wenlong; Zhang, Kaihu; Cao, Qiang

2015-02-20

A simple, repeatable approach is proposed to fabricate large-area, uniform periodic surface structures by a femtosecond laser. 20 nm gold films are coated on semiconductor surfaces on which large-area, uniform structures are fabricated. In the case study of silicon, cross-links and broken structures of laser induced periodic surface structures (LIPSSs) are significantly reduced on Au-coated silicon. The good consistency between the scanning lines facilitates the formation of large-area, uniform LIPSSs. The diffusion of hot electrons in the Au films increases the interfacial carrier densities, which significantly enhances interfacial electron-phonon coupling. High and uniform electron density suppresses the influence of defects on the silicon and further makes the coupling field more uniform and thus reduces the impact of laser energy fluctuations, which homogenizes and stabilizes large-area LIPSSs.

Physical optics-based diffraction coefficient for a wedge with different face impedances.

PubMed

Umul, Yusuf Ziya

2018-03-20

A new diffraction field expression is introduced with the aid of the modified theory of physical optics for a wedge with different face impedances. First, the scattered geometrical optics fields are determined when both faces of the wedge are illuminated by the incident wave. The geometrical optics waves are then expressed in terms of the sum of two different fields that occur for different impedance wedges. The diffracted fields are determined for the two cases separately, and the total diffracted field is obtained as a sum of these waves. Lastly, the uniform field expressions are obtained, and the resultant fields are numerically compared with the solution of Maliuzhinets.

Response to non-uniform salinity in the root zone of the halophyte Atriplex nummularia: growth, photosynthesis, water relations and tissue ion concentrations.

PubMed

Bazihizina, Nadia; Colmer, Timothy D; Barrett-Lennard, Edward G

2009-09-01

Soil salinity is often heterogeneous, yet the physiology of halophytes has typically been studied with uniform salinity treatments. An evaluation was made of the growth, net photosynthesis, water use, water relations and tissue ions in the halophytic shrub Atriplex nummularia in response to non-uniform NaCl concentrations in a split-root system. Atriplex nummularia was grown in a split-root system for 21 d, with either the same or two different NaCl concentrations (ranging from 10 to 670 mm), in aerated nutrient solution bathing each root half. Non-uniform salinity, with high NaCl in one root half (up to 670 mm) and 10 mm in the other half, had no effect on shoot ethanol-insoluble dry mass, net photosynthesis or shoot pre-dawn water potential. In contrast, a modest effect occurred for leaf osmotic potential (up to 30 % more solutes compared with uniform 10 mm NaCl treatment). With non-uniform NaCl concentrations (10/670 mm), 90 % of water was absorbed from the low salinity side, and the reduction in water use from the high salinity side caused whole-plant water use to decrease by about 30 %; there was no compensatory water uptake from the low salinity side. Leaf Na(+) and Cl(-) concentrations were 1.9- to 2.3-fold higher in the uniform 670 mm treatment than in the 10/670 mm treatment, whereas leaf K(+) concentrations were 1.2- to 2.0-fold higher in the non-uniform treatment. Atriplex nummularia with one root half in 10 mm NaCl maintained net photosynthesis, shoot growth and shoot water potential even when the other root half was exposed to 670 mm NaCl, a concentration that inhibits growth by 65 % when uniform in the root zone. Given the likelihood of non-uniform salinity in many field situations, this situation would presumably benefit halophyte growth and physiology in saline environments.

Virulence, immunopathology and transmissibility of selected strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in a murine model

PubMed Central

Marquina-Castillo, Brenda; García-García, Lourdes; Ponce-de-León, Alfredo; Jimenez-Corona, Maria-Eugenia; Bobadilla-del Valle, Miriam; Cano-Arellano, Bulmaro; Canizales-Quintero, Sergio; Martinez-Gamboa, Areli; Kato-Maeda, Midori; Robertson, Brian; Young, Douglas; Small, Peter; Schoolnik, Gary; Sifuentes-Osornio, Jose; Hernandez-Pando, Rogelio

2009-01-01

After encounter with Mycobacterium tuberculosis, a series of non-uniform immune responses are triggered that define the course of the infection. Eight M. tuberculosis strains were selected from a prospective population-based study of pulmonary tuberculosis patients (1995–2003) based on relevant clinical/epidemiological patterns and tested in a well-characterized BALB/c mouse model of progressive pulmonary tuberculosis. In addition, a new mouse model of transmissibility consisting of prolonged cohousing (up to 60 days) of infected and naïve animals was tested. Four phenotypes were defined based on strain virulence (mouse survival, lung bacillary load and tissue damage), immunology response (cytokine expression determined by real-time polymerase chain reaction) and transmissibility (lung bacillary loads and cutaneous delayed-type hypersensitivity in naïve animals).We identified four clearly defined strain phenotypes: (1) hypervirulent strain with non-protective immune response and highly transmissible; (2) virulent strain, associated with high expression of proinflammatory cytokines (tumour necrosis factor and interferon) and very low anti-inflammatory cytokine expression (interleukins 4 and 10), which induced accelerated death by immunopathology; (3) strain inducing efficient protective immunity with lower virulence, and (4) strain demonstrating strong and early macrophage activation (innate immunity) with delayed participation of acquired immunity (interferon expression). We were able to correlate virulent and transmissible phenotypes in the mouse model and markers of community transmission such as tuberculin reactivity among contacts, rapid progression to disease and cluster status. However, we were not able to find correlation with the other two phenotypes. Our new transmission model supported the hypothesis that among these strains increased virulence was linked to increased transmission. PMID:19191912

FOXM1 in sarcoma: role in cell cycle, pluripotency genes and stem cell pathways

PubMed Central

Kelleher, Fergal C.; O'sullivan, Hazel

2016-01-01

FOXM1 is a pro-proliferative transcription factor that promotes cell cycle progression at the G1-S, and G2-M transitions. It is activated by phosphorylation usually mediated by successive cyclin – cyclin dependent kinase complexes, and is highly expressed in sarcoma. p53 down regulates FOXM1 and FOXM1 inhibition is also partly dependent on Rb and p21. Abnormalities of p53 or Rb are frequent in sporadic sarcomas with bone or soft tissue sarcoma, accounting for 36% of index cancers in the high penetrance TP53 germline disorder, Li-Fraumeni syndrome. FOXM1 stimulates transcription of pluripotency related genes including SOX2, KLF4, OCT4, and NANOG many of which are important in sarcoma, a disorder of mesenchymal stem cell/ partially committed progenitor cells. In a selected specific, SOX2 is uniformly expressed in synovial sarcoma. Embryonic pathways preferentially used in stem cell such as Hippo, Hedgehog, and Wnt dominate in FOXM1 stoichiometry to alter rates of FOXM1 production or degradation. In undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcoma, liposarcoma, and fibrosarcoma, dysregulation of the Hippo pathway increases expression of the effector co-transcriptional activator Yes-Associated Protein (YAP). A complex involving YAP and the transcription factor TEAD elevates FOXM1 in these sarcoma subtypes. In another scenario 80% of desmoid tumors have nuclear localization of β-catenin, the Wnt pathway effector molecule. Thiazole antibiotics inhibit FOXM1 and because they have an auto-regulator loop FOXM1 expression is also inhibited. Current systemic treatment of sarcoma is of limited efficacy and inhibiting FOXM1 represents a potential new strategy. PMID:27074562

Eradication of Large Solid Tumors by Gene Therapy with a T-Cell Receptor Targeting a Single Cancer-Specific Point Mutation.

PubMed

Leisegang, Matthias; Engels, Boris; Schreiber, Karin; Yew, Poh Yin; Kiyotani, Kazuma; Idel, Christian; Arina, Ainhoa; Duraiswamy, Jaikumar; Weichselbaum, Ralph R; Uckert, Wolfgang; Nakamura, Yusuke; Schreiber, Hans

2016-06-01

Cancers usually contain multiple unique tumor-specific antigens produced by single amino acid substitutions (AAS) and encoded by somatic nonsynonymous single nucleotide substitutions. We determined whether adoptively transferred T cells can reject large, well-established solid tumors when engineered to express a single type of T-cell receptor (TCR) that is specific for a single AAS. By exome and RNA sequencing of an UV-induced tumor, we identified an AAS in p68 (mp68), a co-activator of p53. This AAS seemed to be an ideal tumor-specific neoepitope because it is encoded by a trunk mutation in the primary autochthonous cancer and binds with highest affinity to the MHC. A high-avidity mp68-specific TCR was used to genetically engineer T cells as well as to generate TCR-transgenic mice for adoptive therapy. When the neoepitope was expressed at high levels and by all cancer cells, their direct recognition sufficed to destroy intratumor vessels and eradicate large, long-established solid tumors. When the neoepitope was targeted as autochthonous antigen, T cells caused cancer regression followed by escape of antigen-negative variants. Escape could be thwarted by expressing the antigen at increased levels in all cancer cells or by combining T-cell therapy with local irradiation. Therapeutic efficacies of TCR-transduced and TCR-transgenic T cells were similar. Gene therapy with a single TCR targeting a single AAS can eradicate large established cancer, but a uniform expression and/or sufficient levels of the targeted neoepitope or additional therapy are required to overcome tumor escape. Clin Cancer Res; 22(11); 2734-43. ©2015 AACRSee related commentary by Liu, p. 2602. ©2015 American Association for Cancer Research.

Thermally Dried Ink-Jet Process for 6,13-Bis(triisopropylsilylethynyl)-Pentacene for High Mobility and High Uniformity on a Large Area Substrate

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ryu, Gi Seong; Lee, Myung Won; Jeong, Seung Hyeon; Song, Chung Kun

2012-05-01

In this study we developed a simple ink-jet process for 6,13-bis(triisopropylsilylethynyl)-pentacene (TIPS-pentacene), which is known as a high-mobility soluble organic semiconductor, to achieve relatively high-mobility and high-uniformity performance for large-area applications. We analyzed the behavior of fluorescent particles in droplets and applied the results to determining a method of controlling the behavior of TIPS-pentacene molecules. The grain morphology of TIPS-pentacene varied depending on the temperature applied to the droplets during drying. We were able to obtain large and uniform grains at 46 °C without any “coffee stain”. The process was applied to a large-size organic thin-film transistor (OTFT) backplane for an electrophoretic display panel containing 192×150 pixels on a 6-in.-sized substrate. The average of mobilities of 36 OTFTs, which were taken from different locations of the backplane, was 0.44±0.08 cm2·V-1·s-1, with a small deviation of 20%, over a 6-in.-size area comprising 28,800 OTFTs. This process providing high mobility and high uniformity can be achieved by simply maintaining the whole area of the substrate at a specific temperature (46 °C in this case) during drying of the droplets.

Determination of mean camber surfaces for wings having uniform chordwise loading and arbitrary spanwise loading in subsonic flow

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Katzoff, S; Faison, M Frances; Dubose, Hugh C

1954-01-01

The field of a uniformly loaded wing in subsonic flow is discussed in terms of the acceleration potential. It is shown that, for the design of such wings, the slope of the mean camber surface at any point can be determined by a line integration around the wing boundary. By an additional line integration around the wing boundary, this method is extended to include the case where the local section lift coefficient varies with spanwise location (the chordwise loading at every section still remaining uniform). For the uniformly loaded wing of polygonal plan form, the integrations necessary to determine the local slope of the surface and the further integration of the slopes to determine the ordinate can be done analytically. An outline of these integrations and the resulting formulas are included. Calculated results are given for a sweptback wing with uniform chordwise loading and a highly tapered spanwise loading, a uniformly loaded delta wing, a uniformly loaded sweptback wing, and the same sweptback wing with uniform chordwise loading but elliptical span load distribution.

Hydroetching of high surface area ceramics using moist supercritical fluids

DOEpatents

Fryxell, Glen; Zemanian, Thomas S.

2004-11-02

Aerogels having a high density of hydroxyl groups and a more uniform pore size with fewer bottlenecks are described. The aerogel is exposed to a mixture of a supercritical fluid and water, whereupon the aerogel forms a high density of hydroxyl groups. The process also relaxes the aerogel into a more open uniform internal structure, in a process referred to as hydroetching. The hydroetching process removes bottlenecks from the aerogels, and forms the hydrogels into more standard pore sizes while preserving their high surface area.

C. elegans Demonstrates Distinct Behaviors within a Fixed and Uniform Electric Field

PubMed Central

Chrisman, Steven D.; Waite, Christopher B.; Scoville, Alison G.; Carnell, Lucinda

2016-01-01

C. elegans will orient and travel in a straight uninterrupted path directly towards the negative pole of a DC electric field. We have sought to understand the strategy worms use to navigate to the negative pole in a uniform electric field that is fixed in both direction and magnitude. We examined this behavior by quantifying three aspects of electrotaxis behavior in response to different applied field strengths: the mean approach trajectory angles of the animals’ tracks, turning behavior (pirouettes) and average population speeds. We determined that C. elegans align directly to the negative pole of an electric field at sub-preferred field strength and alter approach trajectories at higher field strengths to maintain taxis within a preferred range we have calculated to be ~ 5V/cm. We sought to identify the sensory neurons responsible for the animals’ tracking to a preferred field strength. eat-4 mutant animals defective in glutamatergic signaling of the amphid sensory neurons are severely electrotaxis defective and ceh-36 mutant animals, which are defective in the terminal differentiation of two types of sensory neurons, AWC and ASE, are partially defective in electrotaxis. To further elucidate the role of the AWC neurons, we examined the role of each of the pair of AWC neurons (AWCOFF and AWCON), which are functionally asymmetric and express different genes. nsy-5/inx-19 mutant animals, which express both neurons as AWCOFF, are severely impaired in electrotaxis behavior while nsy-1 mutants, which express both neurons as AWCON, are able to differentiate field strengths required for navigation to a specific field strength within an electric field. We also tested a strain with targeted genetic ablation of AWC neurons and found that these animals showed only slight disruption of directionality and turning behavior. These results suggest a role for AWC neurons in which complete loss of function is less disruptive than loss of functional asymmetry in electrotaxis behavior within a uniform fixed field. PMID:26998749

The energy density distribution of an ideal gas and Bernoulli’s equations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Santos, Leonardo S. F.

2018-05-01

This work discusses the energy density distribution in an ideal gas and the consequences of Bernoulli’s equation and the corresponding relation for compressible fluids. The aim of this work is to study how Bernoulli’s equation determines the energy flow in a fluid, although Bernoulli’s equation does not describe the energy density itself. The model from molecular dynamic considerations that describes an ideal gas at rest with uniform density is modified to explore the gas in motion with non-uniform density and gravitational effects. The difference between the component of the speed of a particle that is parallel to the gas speed and the gas speed itself is called ‘parallel random speed’. The pressure from the ‘parallel random speed’ is denominated as parallel pressure. The modified model predicts that the energy density is the sum of kinetic and potential gravitational energy densities plus two terms with static and parallel pressures. The application of Bernoulli’s equation and the corresponding relation for compressible fluids in the energy density expression has resulted in two new formulations. For incompressible and compressible gas, the energy density expressions are written as a function of stagnation, static and parallel pressures, without any dependence on kinetic or gravitational potential energy densities. These expressions of the energy density are the main contributions of this work. When the parallel pressure was uniform, the energy density distribution for incompressible approximation and compressible gas did not converge to zero for the limit of null static pressure. This result is rather unusual because the temperature tends to zero for null pressure. When the gas was considered incompressible and the parallel pressure was equal to static pressure, the energy density maintained this unusual behaviour with small pressures. If the parallel pressure was equal to static pressure, the energy density converged to zero for the limit of the null pressure only if the gas was compressible. Only the last situation describes an intuitive behaviour for an ideal gas.

Particle separation by phase modulated surface acoustic waves.

PubMed

Simon, Gergely; Andrade, Marco A B; Reboud, Julien; Marques-Hueso, Jose; Desmulliez, Marc P Y; Cooper, Jonathan M; Riehle, Mathis O; Bernassau, Anne L

2017-09-01

High efficiency isolation of cells or particles from a heterogeneous mixture is a critical processing step in lab-on-a-chip devices. Acoustic techniques offer contactless and label-free manipulation, preserve viability of biological cells, and provide versatility as the applied electrical signal can be adapted to various scenarios. Conventional acoustic separation methods use time-of-flight and achieve separation up to distances of quarter wavelength with limited separation power due to slow gradients in the force. The method proposed here allows separation by half of the wavelength and can be extended by repeating the modulation pattern and can ensure maximum force acting on the particles. In this work, we propose an optimised phase modulation scheme for particle separation in a surface acoustic wave microfluidic device. An expression for the acoustic radiation force arising from the interaction between acoustic waves in the fluid was derived. We demonstrated, for the first time, that the expression of the acoustic radiation force differs in surface acoustic wave and bulk devices, due to the presence of a geometric scaling factor. Two phase modulation schemes are investigated theoretically and experimentally. Theoretical findings were experimentally validated for different mixtures of polystyrene particles confirming that the method offers high selectivity. A Monte-Carlo simulation enabled us to assess performance in real situations, including the effects of particle size variation and non-uniform acoustic field on sorting efficiency and purity, validating the ability to separate particles with high purity and high resolution.

Uniform electron gases. I. Electrons on a ring.

PubMed

Loos, Pierre-François; Gill, Peter M W

2013-04-28

We introduce a new paradigm for one-dimensional uniform electron gases (UEGs). In this model, n electrons are confined to a ring and interact via a bare Coulomb operator. We use Rayleigh-Schrödinger perturbation theory to show that, in the high-density regime, the ground-state reduced (i.e., per electron) energy can be expanded as ε(r(s),n)=ε0(n)r(s)(-2)+ε1(n)r(s)(-1)+ε2(n)+ε3(n)r(s+)⋯ , where r(s) is the Seitz radius. We use strong-coupling perturbation theory and show that, in the low-density regime, the reduced energy can be expanded as ε(r(s),n)=η0(n)r(s)(-1)+η1(n)r(s)(-3/2)+η2(n)r(s)(-2)+⋯ . We report explicit expressions for ε0(n), ε1(n), ε2(n), ε3(n), η0(n), and η1(n) and derive the thermodynamic (large-n) limits of each of these. Finally, we perform numerical studies of UEGs with n = 2, 3, [ellipsis (horizontal)], 10, using Hylleraas-type and quantum Monte Carlo methods, and combine these with the perturbative results to obtain a picture of the behavior of the new model over the full range of n and r(s) values.

Eigensensitivity analysis of rotating clamped uniform beams with the asymptotic numerical method

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bekhoucha, F.; Rechak, S.; Cadou, J. M.

2016-12-01

In this paper, free vibrations of a rotating clamped Euler-Bernoulli beams with uniform cross section are studied using continuation method, namely asymptotic numerical method. The governing equations of motion are derived using Lagrange's method. The kinetic and strain energy expression are derived from Rayleigh-Ritz method using a set of hybrid variables and based on a linear deflection assumption. The derived equations are transformed in two eigenvalue problems, where the first is a linear gyroscopic eigenvalue problem and presents the coupled lagging and stretch motions through gyroscopic terms. While the second is standard eigenvalue problem and corresponds to the flapping motion. Those two eigenvalue problems are transformed into two functionals treated by continuation method, the Asymptotic Numerical Method. New method proposed for the solution of the linear gyroscopic system based on an augmented system, which transforms the original problem to a standard form with real symmetric matrices. By using some techniques to resolve these singular problems by the continuation method, evolution curves of the natural frequencies against dimensionless angular velocity are determined. At high angular velocity, some singular points, due to the linear elastic assumption, are computed. Numerical tests of convergence are conducted and the obtained results are compared to the exact values. Results obtained by continuation are compared to those computed with discrete eigenvalue problem.

MS-HRM assay identifies high levels of epigenetic heterogeneity in human immortalized cell lines.

PubMed

Putnik, Milica; Wojdacz, Tomasz K; Pournara, Angeliki; Vahter, Marie; Wallberg, Annika E

2015-04-15

Immortalized cell lines are widely used in genetic and epigenetic studies, from exploration of basic molecular pathways to evaluation of disease-specific cellular properties. They are also used in biotechnology, e.g., in drug toxicity tests and vaccine production. Cellular and genetic uniformity is the main feature of immortalized cell lines and it has been particularly advantageous in functional genomic research, which has in recent years been expanded to include epigenetic mechanisms of gene expression regulation. Using the MS-HRM technique, we demonstrated heterogeneity in locus-specific methylation patterns in different cell cultures of four human cell lines: HEK293, HEK293T, LCL and DU145. Our results show that some human immortalized cell lines consist of cells that differ in the methylation status of specific loci, i.e., that they are epigenetically heterogeneous. We show that even two cultures of the same cell line obtained from different laboratories can differ in the methylation status of the specific loci. The results indicated that epigenetic uniformity of the cell lines cannot be assumed in experiments which utilize cell cultures and that the methylation status of the specific loci in the immortalized cell lines should be re-characterized and carefully profiled before epigenetic studies are performed. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Nanobubble-Affibody: Novel ultrasound contrast agents for targeted molecular ultrasound imaging of tumor.

PubMed

Yang, Hengli; Cai, Wenbin; Xu, Lei; Lv, Xiuhua; Qiao, Youbei; Li, Pan; Wu, Hong; Yang, Yilin; Zhang, Li; Duan, Yunyou

2015-01-01

Nanobubbles (NBs), as novel ultrasound contrast agents (UCAs), have attracted increasing attention in the field of molecular ultrasound imaging for tumors. However, the preparation of uniform-sized NBs is considered to be controversial, and poor tumor selectivity in in vivo imaging has been reported. In this study, we fabricated uniform nano-sized NBs (478.2 ± 29.7 nm with polydispersity index of 0.164 ± 0.044, n = 3) using a thin-film hydration method by controlling the thickness of phospholipid films; we then conjugated the NBs with Affibody molecules to produce nano-sized UCAs referred to as NB-Affibody with specific affinity to human epidermal growth factor receptor type 2 (HER2)-overexpressing tumors. NB-Affibody presented good ultrasound enhancement, demonstrating a peak intensity of 104.5 ± 2.1 dB under ultrasound contrast scanning. Ex vivo experiments further confirmed that the NB-Affibody conjugates were capable of targeting HER2-expressing tumor cells in vivo with high affinity. The newly prepared nano-sized NB-Affibody conjugates were observed to be novel targeted UCAs for efficient and safe specific molecular imaging and may have potential applications in early cancer quantitative diagnosis and targeted therapy in the future. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Flow rate of transport network controls uniform metabolite supply to tissue

PubMed Central

Meigel, Felix J.

2018-01-01

Life and functioning of higher organisms depends on the continuous supply of metabolites to tissues and organs. What are the requirements on the transport network pervading a tissue to provide a uniform supply of nutrients, minerals or hormones? To theoretically answer this question, we present an analytical scaling argument and numerical simulations on how flow dynamics and network architecture control active spread and uniform supply of metabolites by studying the example of xylem vessels in plants. We identify the fluid inflow rate as the key factor for uniform supply. While at low inflow rates metabolites are already exhausted close to flow inlets, too high inflow flushes metabolites through the network and deprives tissue close to inlets of supply. In between these two regimes, there exists an optimal inflow rate that yields a uniform supply of metabolites. We determine this optimal inflow analytically in quantitative agreement with numerical results. Optimizing network architecture by reducing the supply variance over all network tubes, we identify patterns of tube dilation or contraction that compensate sub-optimal supply for the case of too low or too high inflow rate. PMID:29720455

High-voltage electrode optimization towards uniform surface treatment by a pulsed volume discharge

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ponomarev, A. V.; Pedos, M. S.; Scherbinin, S. V.; Mamontov, Y. I.; Ponomarev, S. V.

2015-11-01

In this study, the shape and material of the high-voltage electrode of an atmospheric pressure plasma generation system were optimised. The research was performed with the goal of achieving maximum uniformity of plasma treatment of the surface of the low-voltage electrode with a diameter of 100 mm. In order to generate low-temperature plasma with the volume of roughly 1 cubic decimetre, a pulsed volume discharge was used initiated with a corona discharge. The uniformity of the plasma in the region of the low-voltage electrode was assessed using a system for measuring the distribution of discharge current density. The system's low-voltage electrode - collector - was a disc of 100 mm in diameter, the conducting surface of which was divided into 64 radially located segments of equal surface area. The current at each segment was registered by a high-speed measuring system controlled by an ARM™-based 32-bit microcontroller. To facilitate the interpretation of results obtained, a computer program was developed to visualise the results. The program provides a 3D image of the current density distribution on the surface of the low-voltage electrode. Based on the results obtained an optimum shape for a high-voltage electrode was determined. Uniformity of the distribution of discharge current density in relation to distance between electrodes was studied. It was proven that the level of non-uniformity of current density distribution depends on the size of the gap between electrodes. Experiments indicated that it is advantageous to use graphite felt VGN-6 (Russian abbreviation) as the material of the high-voltage electrode's emitting surface.

Streamlined platform for short hairpin RNA interference and transgenesis in cultured mammalian cells.

PubMed

Khandelia, Piyush; Yap, Karen; Makeyev, Eugene V

2011-08-02

Sequence-specific gene silencing by short hairpin (sh) RNAs has recently emerged as an indispensable tool for understanding gene function and a promising avenue for drug discovery. However, a wider biomedical use of this approach is hindered by the lack of straightforward methods for achieving uniform expression of shRNAs in mammalian cell cultures. Here we report a high-efficiency and low-background (HILO) recombination-mediated cassette exchange (RMCE) technology that yields virtually homogeneous cell pools containing doxycycline-inducible shRNA elements in a matter of days and with minimal efforts. To ensure immediate utility of this approach for a wider research community, we modified 11 commonly used human (A549, HT1080, HEK293T, HeLa, HeLa-S3, and U2OS) and mouse (CAD, L929, N2a, NIH 3T3, and P19) cell lines to be compatible with the HILO-RMCE process. Because of its technical simplicity and cost efficiency, the technology will be advantageous for both low- and high-throughput shRNA experiments. We also provide evidence that HILO-RMCE will facilitate a wider range of molecular and cell biology applications by allowing one to rapidly engineer cell populations expressing essentially any transgene of interest.

Streamlined platform for short hairpin RNA interference and transgenesis in cultured mammalian cells

PubMed Central

Khandelia, Piyush; Yap, Karen; Makeyev, Eugene V.

2011-01-01

Sequence-specific gene silencing by short hairpin (sh) RNAs has recently emerged as an indispensable tool for understanding gene function and a promising avenue for drug discovery. However, a wider biomedical use of this approach is hindered by the lack of straightforward methods for achieving uniform expression of shRNAs in mammalian cell cultures. Here we report a high-efficiency and low-background (HILO) recombination-mediated cassette exchange (RMCE) technology that yields virtually homogeneous cell pools containing doxycycline-inducible shRNA elements in a matter of days and with minimal efforts. To ensure immediate utility of this approach for a wider research community, we modified 11 commonly used human (A549, HT1080, HEK293T, HeLa, HeLa-S3, and U2OS) and mouse (CAD, L929, N2a, NIH 3T3, and P19) cell lines to be compatible with the HILO-RMCE process. Because of its technical simplicity and cost efficiency, the technology will be advantageous for both low- and high-throughput shRNA experiments. We also provide evidence that HILO-RMCE will facilitate a wider range of molecular and cell biology applications by allowing one to rapidly engineer cell populations expressing essentially any transgene of interest. PMID:21768390

The natural emergence of asymmetric tree-shaped pathways for cooling of a non-uniformly heated domain

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cetkin, Erdal; Oliani, Alessandro

2015-07-01

Here, we show that the peak temperature on a non-uniformly heated domain can be decreased by embedding a high-conductivity insert in it. The trunk of the high-conductivity insert is in contact with a heat sink. The heat is generated non-uniformly throughout the domain or concentrated in a square spot of length scale 0.1 L0, where L0 is the length scale of the non-uniformly heated domain. Peak and average temperatures are affected by the volume fraction of the high-conductivity material and by the shape of the high-conductivity pathways. This paper uncovers how varying the shape of the symmetric and asymmetric high-conductivity trees affects the overall thermal conductance of the heat generating domain. The tree-shaped high-conductivity inserts tend to grow toward where the heat generation is concentrated in order to minimize the peak temperature, i.e., in order to minimize the resistances to the heat flow. This behaviour of high-conductivity trees is alike with the root growth of the plants and trees. They also tend to grow towards sunlight, and their roots tend to grow towards water and nutrients. This paper uncovers the similarity between biological trees and high-conductivity trees, which is that trees should grow asymmetrically when the boundary conditions are non-uniform. We show here even though all the trees have the same objectives (minimum flow resistance), their shape should not be the same because of the variation in boundary conditions. To sum up, this paper shows that there is a high-conductivity tree design corresponding to minimum peak temperature with fixed constraints and conditions. This result is in accord with the constructal law which states that there should be an optimal design for a given set of conditions and constraints, and this design should be morphed in order to ensure minimum flow resistances as conditions and constraints change.

High density, uniformly distributed W/UO2 for use in Nuclear Thermal Propulsion

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tucker, Dennis S.; Barnes, Marvin W.; Hone, Lance; Cook, Steven

2017-04-01

An inexpensive, quick method has been developed to obtain uniform distributions of UO2 particles in a tungsten matrix utilizing 0.5 wt percent low density polyethylene. Powders were sintered in a Spark Plasma Sintering (SPS) furnace at 1600 °C, 1700 °C, 1750 °C, 1800 °C and 1850 °C using a modified sintering profile. This resulted in a uniform distribution of UO2 particles in a tungsten matrix with high densities, reaching 99.46% of theoretical for the sample sintered at 1850 °C. The powder process is described and the results of this study are given below.

The prior statistics of object colors.

PubMed

Koenderink, Jan J

2010-02-01

The prior statistics of object colors is of much interest because extensive statistical investigations of reflectance spectra reveal highly non-uniform structure in color space common to several very different databases. This common structure is due to the visual system rather than to the statistics of environmental structure. Analysis involves an investigation of the proper sample space of spectral reflectance factors and of the statistical consequences of the projection of spectral reflectances on the color solid. Even in the case of reflectance statistics that are translationally invariant with respect to the wavelength dimension, the statistics of object colors is highly non-uniform. The qualitative nature of this non-uniformity is due to trichromacy.

Regulation of the Deposition Morphology of Inkjet-Printed Crystalline Materials via Polydopamine Functional Coatings for Highly Uniform and Electrically Conductive Patterns.

PubMed

Liu, Liang; Ma, Siyuan; Pei, Yunheng; Xiong, Xiao; Sivakumar, Preeth; Singler, Timothy J

2016-08-24

We report a method to achieve highly uniform inkjet-printed silver nitrate (AgNO3) and a reactive silver precursor patterns on rigid and flexible substrates functionalized with polydopamine (PDA) coatings. The printed AgNO3 patterns on PDA-coated substrates (glass and polyethylene terephthalate (PET)) exhibit a narrow thickness distribution ranging between 0.9 and 1 μm in the line transverse direction and uniform deposition profiles in the line axial direction. The deposited reactive silver precursor patterns on PDA-functionalized substrates also show "dome-shaped" morphology without "edge-thickened" structure due to "coffee-stain" effect. We posit that the highly uniform functional ink deposits formed on PDA-coated substrates are attributable to the strong binding interaction between the abundant catecholamine moieties at the PDA surface and the metallic silver cations (Ag(+) or Ag(NH3)(2+)) in the solutal inks. During printing of the ink rivulet and solvent evaporation, the substrate-liquid ink (S-L) interface is enriched with the silver-based cations and a solidification at the S/L interface is induced. The preferential solidification initiated at the S-L interface is further verified by the in situ visualization of the dynamic solidification process during solvent evaporation, and results suggest an enhanced crystal nucleation and growth localized at the S-L interface on PDA functionalized substrates. This interfacial interaction mediates solute transport in the liquid phase, resulting in the controlled enrichment of solute at the S-L interface and mitigated solute precipitation in both the contact line region and the liquid ink-vapor (L-V) interface due to evaporation. This mediated transport contributes to the final uniform solid deposition for both types of ink systems. This technique provides a complementary strategy for achieving highly uniform inkjet-printed crystalline structures, and can serve as an innovative foundation for high-precision additive delivery of functional materials.

Catalytic wet air oxidation of coke-plant wastewater on ruthenium-based eggshell catalysts in a bubbling bed reactor.

PubMed

Yang, M; Sun, Y; Xu, A H; Lu, X Y; Du, H Z; Sun, C L; Li, C

2007-07-01

Catalytic wet air of coke-plant wastewater was studied in a bubbling bed reactor. Two types of supported Ru-based catalysts, eggshell and uniform catalysts, were employed. Compared with the results in the wet air oxidation of coke-plant wastewater, supported Ru uniform catalysts showed high activity for chemical oxygen demand (COD) and ammonia/ammonium compounds (NH3-N) removal at temperature of 250 degrees C and pressure of 4.8 MPa, and it has been demonstrated that the catalytic activity of uniform catalyst depended strongly on the distribution of active sites of Ru on catalyst. Compared to the corresponding uniform catalysts with the same Ru loading (0.25 wt.% and 0.1 wt.%, respectively), the eggshell catalysts showed higher activities for CODcr removal and much higher activities for NH3-N degradation. The high activity of eggshell catalyst for treatment of coke-plant wastewater can be attributed to the higher density of active Ru sites in the shell layer than that of the corresponding uniform catalyst with the same Ru loading. It has been also evidenced that the active Ru sites in the internal core of uniform catalyst have very little or no contribution to CODcr and NH3-N removal in the total oxidation of coke-plant wastewater.

Cross-flow shearing effects on the trajectory of highly buoyant bent-over plumes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tohidi, Ali; Kaye, Nigel Berkeley; Gollner, Michael J.

2017-11-01

The dynamics of highly buoyant plumes in cross-flow is ubiquitous throughout both industrial and environmental phenomena. The rise of smoke from a chimney, wastewater discharge into river currents, and dispersion of wildfire plumes are only a few instances. There have been many previous studies investigating the behavior of jets and highly buoyant plumes in cross-flow. So far, however, very little attention has been paid to the role of shearing effects in the boundary layer on the plume trajectory, particularly on the rise height. Numerical simulations and dimensional analysis are conducted to characterize the near- and far-field behavior of a highly buoyant plume in a boundary layer cross-flow. The results show that shear in the cross-flow leads to large differences in the rise height of the plume in relation to a uniform cross-flow, especially at far-field. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No.1200560. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in the material are of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of NSF.

Explosive laser light initiation of propellants

DOEpatents

Piltch, Martin S.

1993-01-01

A improved initiator for artillery shell using an explosively generated laser light to uniformly initiate the propellent. A small quantity of a high explosive, when detonated, creates a high pressure and temperature, causing the surrounding noble gas to fluoresce. This fluorescence is directed into a lasing material, which lases, and directs laser light into a cavity in the propellant, uniformly initiating the propellant.

Explosive laser light initiation of propellants

DOEpatents

Piltch, M.S.

1993-05-18

A improved initiator for artillery shell using an explosively generated laser light to uniformly initiate the propellent. A small quantity of a high explosive, when detonated, creates a high pressure and temperature, causing the surrounding noble gas to fluoresce. This fluorescence is directed into a lasing material, which lases, and directs laser light into a cavity in the propellant, uniformly initiating the propellant.

Highland Russet: A Full Season, Processing Variety with High Yields of Uniform U.S. No. 1 Tubers

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Highland Russet is a late-season potato variety with light russet skin notable for its high yield of uniform U.S. No. 1 tubers, and good processing and culinary qualities. It resulted from a 1990 cross between Ranger Russet and Russet Legend and has been evaluated for over 15 years in public and ind...

Nonuniform grid implicit spatial finite difference method for acoustic wave modeling in tilted transversely isotropic media

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chu, Chunlei; Stoffa, Paul L.

2012-01-01

Discrete earth models are commonly represented by uniform structured grids. In order to ensure accurate numerical description of all wave components propagating through these uniform grids, the grid size must be determined by the slowest velocity of the entire model. Consequently, high velocity areas are always oversampled, which inevitably increases the computational cost. A practical solution to this problem is to use nonuniform grids. We propose a nonuniform grid implicit spatial finite difference method which utilizes nonuniform grids to obtain high efficiency and relies on implicit operators to achieve high accuracy. We present a simple way of deriving implicit finite difference operators of arbitrary stencil widths on general nonuniform grids for the first and second derivatives and, as a demonstration example, apply these operators to the pseudo-acoustic wave equation in tilted transversely isotropic (TTI) media. We propose an efficient gridding algorithm that can be used to convert uniformly sampled models onto vertically nonuniform grids. We use a 2D TTI salt model to demonstrate its effectiveness and show that the nonuniform grid implicit spatial finite difference method can produce highly accurate seismic modeling results with enhanced efficiency, compared to uniform grid explicit finite difference implementations.

Mining TCGA Data Using Boolean Implications

PubMed Central

Sinha, Subarna; Tsang, Emily K.; Zeng, Haoyang; Meister, Michela; Dill, David L.

2014-01-01

Boolean implications (if-then rules) provide a conceptually simple, uniform and highly scalable way to find associations between pairs of random variables. In this paper, we propose to use Boolean implications to find relationships between variables of different data types (mutation, copy number alteration, DNA methylation and gene expression) from the glioblastoma (GBM) and ovarian serous cystadenoma (OV) data sets from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). We find hundreds of thousands of Boolean implications from these data sets. A direct comparison of the relationships found by Boolean implications and those found by commonly used methods for mining associations show that existing methods would miss relationships found by Boolean implications. Furthermore, many relationships exposed by Boolean implications reflect important aspects of cancer biology. Examples of our findings include cis relationships between copy number alteration, DNA methylation and expression of genes, a new hierarchy of mutations and recurrent copy number alterations, loss-of-heterozygosity of well-known tumor suppressors, and the hypermethylation phenotype associated with IDH1 mutations in GBM. The Boolean implication results used in the paper can be accessed at http://crookneck.stanford.edu/microarray/TCGANetworks/. PMID:25054200

GPR monitoring for non-uniform infiltration through a high permeable gravel layer in the test sand box

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kuroda, Seiichiro; Ishii, Nobuyuki; Morii, Toshihiro

2017-04-01

Recently capillary barriers have been known as a method to protect subsurface regions against infiltration from soil surface. It has essentially non-uniform structure of permeability or soil physical property. To identify the function of the capillary barrier, the site-characterization technique for non-uniform soil moisture distribution and infiltration process is needed. We built a sand box in which a thin high-permeable gravel layer was embedded and conducted a infiltration test, including non-uniform flow of soil water induced by capillary barrier effects. We monitored this process by various types of GPR measurements, including time-lapsed soundings with multi-frequency antenna and transmission measurements like one using cross-borehole radar. Finally we will discuss the applicability of GPR for monitoring the phenomena around the capillary barrier of soil. This work has partially supported by JSPS Grant-in-aid Scientific Research program, No.16H02580.

Multi-Resolution Unstructured Grid-Generation for Geophysical Applications on the Sphere

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Engwirda, Darren

2015-01-01

An algorithm for the generation of non-uniform unstructured grids on ellipsoidal geometries is described. This technique is designed to generate high quality triangular and polygonal meshes appropriate for general circulation modelling on the sphere, including applications to atmospheric and ocean simulation, and numerical weather predication. Using a recently developed Frontal-Delaunay-refinement technique, a method for the construction of high-quality unstructured ellipsoidal Delaunay triangulations is introduced. A dual polygonal grid, derived from the associated Voronoi diagram, is also optionally generated as a by-product. Compared to existing techniques, it is shown that the Frontal-Delaunay approach typically produces grids with near-optimal element quality and smooth grading characteristics, while imposing relatively low computational expense. Initial results are presented for a selection of uniform and non-uniform ellipsoidal grids appropriate for large-scale geophysical applications. The use of user-defined mesh-sizing functions to generate smoothly graded, non-uniform grids is discussed.

Standardization of vascular assessment of erectile dysfunction: standard operating procedures for duplex ultrasound.

PubMed

Sikka, Suresh C; Hellstrom, Wayne J G; Brock, Gerald; Morales, Antonio Martin

2013-01-01

In-office evaluation of erectile dysfunction by color duplex Doppler ultrasound (CDDU) may benefit the decision-making process in regard to choosing the most appropriate therapy. Unfortunately, there is no uniform standardization in performing CDDU resulting in high variability in data expression and interpretation when comparing results among various centers, especially when conducting multicenter trials. Establishing standard operating procedures (SOPs) is a major step that will help minimize such variability. This SOP describes CDDU procedure with focus on establishing uniformity and normative parameters. Measure intra-arterial diameter, peak systolic velocity, end-diastolic velocity, and resistive index for each cavernosal artery. After initial discussion with the patient about his history and International Index of Erectile Function evaluation describe procedural steps to the patient. Perform the CDDU in a relaxed state, scanning the entire penis (in B-mode image) using a 7.5- to 12-MHz linear array ultrasound probe. An intracorporal injection of a single or combination of vasoactive agents (e.g., prostaglandin E1, phentolamine, and papaverine) is then administered and CDDU performed at various time points, preferably with audiovisual sexual stimulation (AVSS). Monitor penile erection response (tumescence and rigidity) near peak blood flow. Self-stimulation or AVSS leaving the patient alone in room or redosing may be considered to decrease any anxiety and help achieve a maximum rigid erection. Considering the complexity and heterogeneity of CDDU evaluation, this communication will help in standardization and establish uniformity in such data interpretation. When indicated, invasive diagnostic testing involving (i) penile angiography and (ii) cavernosography/cavernosometry to establish veno-occlusive dysfunction may be recommended to facilitate further treatment options. © 2012 International Society for Sexual Medicine.

The Off-Site Plowshare and Vela Uniform Programs: Assessing Potential Environmental Liabilities through an Examination of Proposed Nuclear Projects,High Explosive Experiments, and High Explosive Construction Activities Volume 1 of 3

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Beck Colleen M,Edwards Susan R.,King Maureen L.

2011-09-01

This document presents the results of nearly six years (2002-2008) of historical research and field studies concerned with evaluating potential environmental liabilities associated with U.S. Atomic Energy Commission projects from the Plowshare and Vela Uniform Programs. The Plowshare Program's primary purpose was to develop peaceful uses for nuclear explosives. The Vela Uniform Program focused on improving the capability of detecting, monitoring and identifying underground nuclear detonations. As a result of the Project Chariot site restoration efforts in the early 1990s, there were concerns that there might be other project locations with potential environmental liabilities. The Desert Research Institute conducted archivalmore » research to identify projects, an analysis of project field activities, and completed field studies at locations where substantial fieldwork had been undertaken for the projects. Although the Plowshare and Vela Uniform nuclear projects are well known, the projects that are included in this research are relatively unknown. They are proposed nuclear projects that were not executed, proposed and executed high explosive experiments, and proposed and executed high explosive construction activities off the Nevada Test Site. The research identified 170 Plowshare and Vela Uniform off-site projects and many of these had little or no field activity associated with them. However, there were 27 projects that merited further investigation and field studies were conducted at 15 locations.« less

The Off-Site Plowshare and Vela Uniform Programs: Assessing Potential Environmental Liabilities through an Examination of Proposed Nuclear Projects,High Explosive Experiments, and High Explosive Construction Activities Volume 3 of 3

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Beck Colleen M.,Edwards Susan R.,King Maureen L.

2011-09-01

This document presents the results of nearly six years (2002-2008) of historical research and field studies concerned with evaluating potential environmental liabilities associated with U.S. Atomic Energy Commission projects from the Plowshare and Vela Uniform Programs. The Plowshare Program's primary purpose was to develop peaceful uses for nuclear explosives. The Vela Uniform Program focused on improving the capability of detecting, monitoring and identifying underground nuclear detonations. As a result of the Project Chariot site restoration efforts in the early 1990s, there were concerns that there might be other project locations with potential environmental liabilities. The Desert Research Institute conducted archivalmore » research to identify projects, an analysis of project field activities, and completed field studies at locations where substantial fieldwork had been undertaken for the projects. Although the Plowshare and Vela Uniform nuclear projects are well known, the projects that are included in this research are relatively unknown. They are proposed nuclear projects that were not executed, proposed and executed high explosive experiments, and proposed and executed high explosive construction activities off the Nevada Test Site. The research identified 170 Plowshare and Vela Uniform off-site projects and many of these had little or no field activity associated with them. However, there were 27 projects that merited further investigation and field studies were conducted at 15 locations.« less

The Off-Site Plowshare and Vela Uniform Programs: Assessing Potential Environmental Liabilities through an Examination of Proposed Nuclear Projects,High Explosive Experiments, and High Explosive Construction Activities Volume 2 of 3

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Beck Colleen M.,Edwards Susan R.,King Maureen L.

2011-09-01

This document presents the results of nearly six years (2002-2008) of historical research and field studies concerned with evaluating potential environmental liabilities associated with U.S. Atomic Energy Commission projects from the Plowshare and Vela Uniform Programs. The Plowshare Program's primary purpose was to develop peaceful uses for nuclear explosives. The Vela Uniform Program focused on improving the capability of detecting, monitoring and identifying underground nuclear detonations. As a result of the Project Chariot site restoration efforts in the early 1990s, there were concerns that there might be other project locations with potential environmental liabilities. The Desert Research Institute conducted archivalmore » research to identify projects, an analysis of project field activities, and completed field studies at locations where substantial fieldwork had been undertaken for the projects. Although the Plowshare and Vela Uniform nuclear projects are well known, the projects that are included in this research are relatively unknown. They are proposed nuclear projects that were not executed, proposed and executed high explosive experiments, and proposed and executed high explosive construction activities off the Nevada Test Site. The research identified 170 Plowshare and Vela Uniform off-site projects and many of these had little or no field activity associated with them. However, there were 27 projects that merited further investigation and field studies were conducted at 15 locations.« less

Molecular stages of rapid and uniform neuralization of human embryonic stem cells.

PubMed

Bajpai, R; Coppola, G; Kaul, M; Talantova, M; Cimadamore, F; Nilbratt, M; Geschwind, D H; Lipton, S A; Terskikh, A V

2009-06-01

Insights into early human development are fundamental for our understanding of human biology. Efficient differentiation of human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) into neural precursor cells is critical for future cell-based therapies. Here, using defined conditions, we characterized a new method for rapid and uniform differentiation of hESCs into committed neural precursor cells (designated C-NPCs). Dynamic gene expression analysis identified several distinct stages of ESC neuralization and revealed functional modules of coregulated genes and pathways. The first wave of gene expression changes, likely corresponding to the transition through primitive ectoderm, started at day 3, preceding the formation of columnar neuroepithelial rosettes. The second wave started at day 5, coinciding with the formation of rosettes. The majority of C-NPCs were positive for both anterior and posterior markers of developing neuroepithelium. In culture, C-NPCs became electrophysiologically functional neurons; on transplantation into neonatal mouse brains, C-NPCs integrated into the cortex and olfactory bulb, acquiring appropriate neuronal morphologies and markers. Compared to rosette-NPCs,(1) C-NPCs exhibited limited in vitro expansion capacity and did not express potent oncogenes such as PLAG1 or RSPO3. Concordantly, we never detected tumors or excessive neural proliferation after transplantation of C-NPCs into mouse brains. In conclusion, our study provides a framework for future analysis of molecular signaling during ESC neuralization.

Recent advances in modeling languages for pathway maps and computable biological networks.

PubMed

Slater, Ted

2014-02-01

As our theories of systems biology grow more sophisticated, the models we use to represent them become larger and more complex. Languages necessarily have the expressivity and flexibility required to represent these models in ways that support high-resolution annotation, and provide for simulation and analysis that are sophisticated enough to allow researchers to master their data in the proper context. These languages also need to facilitate model sharing and collaboration, which is currently best done by using uniform data structures (such as graphs) and language standards. In this brief review, we discuss three of the most recent systems biology modeling languages to appear: BEL, PySB and BCML, and examine how they meet these needs. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Analytical model of radiation-induced precipitation at the surface of dilute binary alloy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pechenkin, V. A.; Stepanov, I. A.; Konobeev, Yu. V.

2002-12-01

Growth of precipitate layer at the foil surface of an undersaturated binary alloy under uniform irradiation is treated analytically. Analytical expressions for the layer growth rate, layer thickness limit and final component concentrations in the matrix are derived for coherent and incoherent precipitate-matrix interfaces. It is shown that the high temperature limit of radiation-induced precipitation is the same for both types of interfaces, whereas layer thickness limits are different. A parabolic law of the layer growth predicted for both types of interfaces is in agreement with experimental data on γ '-phase precipitation at the surface of Ni-Si dilute alloys under ion irradiation. Effect of sputtering on the precipitation rate and on the low temperature limit of precipitation under ion irradiation is discussed.

Surface structure of neutron stars with high magnetic fields

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Fushiki, I.; Gudmundsson, E. H.; Pethick, C. J.

1989-01-01

The equation of state of cold dense matter in strong magnetic fields is calculated in the Thomas-Fermi and Thomas-Fermi-Dirac approximations. For use in the latter calculation, a new expression is derived for the exchange energy of the uniform electron gas in a strong magnetic field. Detailed calculations of the density profile in the surface region of a neutron star are described for a variety of equations of state, and these show that the surface density profile is strongly affected by the magnetic field, irrespective of whether or not matter in a magnetic field has a condensed state bound with respect to isolated atoms. It is also shown that, as a consequence of the field dependence of the screening potential, magnetic fields can significantly increase nuclear reaction rates.

Spherical Pendulum Small Oscillations for Slewing Crane Motion

PubMed Central

Perig, Alexander V.; Stadnik, Alexander N.; Deriglazov, Alexander I.

2014-01-01

The present paper focuses on the Lagrange mechanics-based description of small oscillations of a spherical pendulum with a uniformly rotating suspension center. The analytical solution of the natural frequencies' problem has been derived for the case of uniform rotation of a crane boom. The payload paths have been found in the inertial reference frame fixed on earth and in the noninertial reference frame, which is connected with the rotating crane boom. The numerical amplitude-frequency characteristics of the relative payload motion have been found. The mechanical interpretation of the terms in Lagrange equations has been outlined. The analytical expression and numerical estimation for cable tension force have been proposed. The numerical computational results, which correlate very accurately with the experimental observations, have been shown. PMID:24526891

Shape and fission instabilities of ferrofluids in non-uniform magnetic fields

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vieu, Thibault; Walter, Clément

2018-04-01

We study static distributions of ferrofluid submitted to non-uniform magnetic fields. We show how the normal-field instability is modified in the presence of a weak magnetic field gradient. Then we consider a ferrofluid droplet and show how the gradient affects its shape. A rich phase transitions phenomenology is found. We also investigate the creation of droplets by successive splits when a magnet is vertically approached from below and derive theoretical expressions which are solved numerically to obtain the number of droplets and their aspect ratio as function of the field configuration. A quantitative comparison is performed with previous experimental results, as well as with our own experiments, and yields good agreement with the theoretical modeling.

A thick-walled sphere rotating in a uniform magnetic field: The next step to de-spin a space object

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nurge, Mark A.; Youngquist, Robert C.; Caracciolo, Ryan A.; Peck, Mason; Leve, Frederick A.

2017-08-01

Modeling the interaction between a moving conductor and a static magnetic field is critical to understanding the operation of induction motors, eddy current braking, and the dynamics of satellites moving through Earth's magnetic field. Here, we develop the case of a thick-walled sphere rotating in a uniform magnetic field, which is the simplest, non-trivial, magneto-statics problem that leads to complete closed-form expressions for the resulting potentials, fields, and currents. This solution requires knowledge of all of Maxwell's time independent equations, scalar and vector potential equations, and the Lorentz force law. The paper presents four cases and their associated experimental results, making this topic appropriate for an advanced student lab project.

A new treatment of the albedo radiation pressure in the case of a uniform albedo and of a spherical satellite

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Borderies, Nicole; Longaretti, Pierre-Yves

1990-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to present a model for the radiation pressure acceleration of a spherical satellite, due to the radiation reflected by a planet with a uniform albedo. A particular choice of variables allows one to reduce the surface integrals over the lit portion of the planet visible to the satellite to one-dimensional integrals. Exact analytical expressions are found for the integrals corresponding to the case where the spacecraft does not 'see' the terminator. The other integrals can be computer either numerically, or analytical in an approximate form. The results are compared with those of Lochry (1966). The model is applied to Magellan, a spacecraft orbiting Venus.

Monitoring uniform and localized corrosion in reinforced mortar using high-frequency guided longitudinal wages

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ervin, Benjamin L.; Reis, Henrique; Bernhard, Jennifer T.; Kuchma, Daniel A.

2008-03-01

High-frequency guided longitudinal waves have been used in a through-transmission arrangement to monitor reinforced mortar specimens undergoing both accelerated uniform and localized corrosion. High-frequency guided longitudinal waves were chosen because they have the fastest propagation velocity and lowest theoretical attenuation for the rebar/mortar system. This makes the modes easily discernible and gives them the ability to travel over long distances. The energy of the high-frequency longitudinal waves is located primarily in the center of the rebar, leading to less leakage into the surrounding mortar. The results indicate that the guided mechanical waves are sensitive to both forms of corrosion attack in the form of attenuation, with less sensitivity at higher frequencies. Also promising is the ability to discern uniform corrosion from localized corrosion in a through-transmission arrangement by examination of the frequency domain.

Uniformly sized gold nanoparticles derived from PS-b-P2VP block copolymer templates for the controllable synthesis of Si nanowires.

PubMed

Lu, Jennifer Q; Yi, Sung Soo

2006-04-25

A monolayer of gold-containing surface micelles has been produced by spin-coating solution micelles formed by the self-assembly of the gold-modified polystyrene-b-poly(2-vinylpyridine) block copolymer in toluene. After oxygen plasma removed the block copolymer template, highly ordered and uniformly sized nanoparticles have been generated. Unlike other published methods that require reduction treatments to form gold nanoparticles in the zero-valent state, these as-synthesized nanoparticles are in form of metallic gold. These gold nanoparticles have been demonstrated to be an excellent catalyst system for growing small-diameter silicon nanowires. The uniformly sized gold nanoparticles have promoted the controllable synthesis of silicon nanowires with a narrow diameter distribution. Because of the ability to form a monolayer of surface micelles with a high degree of order, evenly distributed gold nanoparticles have been produced on a surface. As a result, uniformly distributed, high-density silicon nanowires have been generated. The process described herein is fully compatible with existing semiconductor processing techniques and can be readily integrated into device fabrication.

Normal Component of Induced Velocity for Entire Field of a Uniformly Loaded Lifting Rotor with Highly Swept Wake as Determined by Electromagnetic Analog

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Castles, Walter, Jr.; Durham, Howard L., Jr.; Kevorkian, Jirair

1959-01-01

Values of the normal component of induced velocity throughout the entire field of a uniformly loaded r(rotor at high high speed are presented in the form of charts and tables. Many points were found by an electromagnetic analog, details of which are given. Comparisons of computed and analog values for the induced velocity indicate that the latter are sufficiently accurate for engineering purposes.

10 CFR 431.264 - Uniform test method for the measurement of flow rate for commercial prerinse spray valves.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

..., the water consumption flow rate of commercial prerinse spray valves. (b) Testing and Calculations. The test procedure to determine the water consumption flow rate for prerinse spray valves, expressed in... the previous step. Round the final water consumption value to one decimal place as follows: (1) A...

ALLOTYPE EXCLUSION IN UNIFORM RABBIT ANTIBODY TO STREPTOCOCCAL CARBOHYDRATE

PubMed Central

Kindt, Thomas J.; Todd, Charles W.; Eichmann, Klaus; Krause, Richard M.

1970-01-01

Rabbit antibodies to streptococcal polysaccharide are described which show selectivity of expression of the allotypic specificities on both the heavy (H) and light (L) chains. One of these antibodies binds weakly to Sephadex. A purification method based on this binding has yielded antibody completely lacking any group a allotypic marker on its H chains. PMID:5419853

The Incongruence of the Breton Linguistic Landscape for Young Speakers of Breton

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hornsby, Michael

2008-01-01

Globalisation processes, often accused of imposing uniformity the world over, also open up opportunities for minorities (including linguistic ones) to exploit a variety of spaces for self-definition and self-expression. The expansion in the use of minority languages in public signage is one consequence of this present phase of reorientation in…

Controlling Growth High Uniformity Indium Selenide (In2Se3) Nanowires via the Rapid Thermal Annealing Process at Low Temperature.

PubMed

Hsu, Ya-Chu; Hung, Yu-Chen; Wang, Chiu-Yen

2017-09-15

High uniformity Au-catalyzed indium selenide (In 2 Se 3) nanowires are grown with the rapid thermal annealing (RTA) treatment via the vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) mechanism. The diameters of Au-catalyzed In 2 Se 3 nanowires could be controlled with varied thicknesses of Au films, and the uniformity of nanowires is improved via a fast pre-annealing rate, 100 °C/s. Comparing with the slower heating rate, 0.1 °C/s, the average diameters and distributions (standard deviation, SD) of In 2 Se 3 nanowires with and without the RTA process are 97.14 ± 22.95 nm (23.63%) and 119.06 ± 48.75 nm (40.95%), respectively. The in situ annealing TEM is used to study the effect of heating rate on the formation of Au nanoparticles from the as-deposited Au film. The results demonstrate that the average diameters and distributions of Au nanoparticles with and without the RTA process are 19.84 ± 5.96 nm (30.00%) and about 22.06 ± 9.00 nm (40.80%), respectively. It proves that the diameter size, distribution, and uniformity of Au-catalyzed In 2 Se 3 nanowires are reduced and improved via the RTA pre-treated. The systemic study could help to control the size distribution of other nanomaterials through tuning the annealing rate, temperatures of precursor, and growth substrate to control the size distribution of other nanomaterials. Graphical Abstract Rapid thermal annealing (RTA) process proved that it can uniform the size distribution of Au nanoparticles, and then it can be used to grow the high uniformity Au-catalyzed In 2 Se 3 nanowires via the vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) mechanism. Comparing with the general growth condition, the heating rate is slow, 0.1 °C/s, and the growth temperature is a relatively high growth temperature, > 650 °C. RTA pre-treated growth substrate can form smaller and uniform Au nanoparticles to react with the In 2 Se 3 vapor and produce the high uniformity In 2 Se 3 nanowires. The in situ annealing TEM is used to realize the effect of heating rate on Au nanoparticle formation from the as-deposited Au film. The byproduct of self-catalyzed In 2 Se 3 nanoplates can be inhibited by lowering the precursors and growth temperatures.

A Design Method and an Application for Contrarotating Propellers

DTIC Science & Technology

1990-01-01

force gen- stricted to uniform flow , it fhowed that the analysis of CR pro- erated by the contrarotating propeller to be balanced by the drag... uniform flow at where the operating point of the propeller for a typical high-speed sur- ,/2 face ship. Force measurements for the CR propelier in... experimental thrust coefficient, torque Bronze. Since this propeller set is designed for uniform flow , coefficient, and efficiency for the CR propellers

Variation in relative water content, proline accumulation and stress gene expression in two cowpea landraces under drought.

PubMed

Zegaoui, Zahia; Planchais, Séverine; Cabassa, Cécile; Djebbar, Reda; Abrous Belbachir, Ouzna; Carol, Pierre

2017-11-01

Many landraces of cowpea [Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp.] are adapted to particular geographical and climatic conditions. Here we describe two landraces grown respectively in arid and temperate areas of Algeria and assess their physiological and molecular responses to drought stress. As expected, when deprived of water cowpea plants lose water over time with a gradual reduction in transpiration rate. The landraces differed in their relative water content (RWC) and whole plant transpiration rate. The landrace from Menia, an arid area, retained more water in adult leaves. Both landraces responded to drought stress at the molecular level by increasing expression of stress-related genes in aerial parts, including proline metabolism genes. Expression of gene(s) encoding proline synthesis enzyme P5CS was up regulated and gene expression of ProDH, a proline catabolism enzyme, was down regulated. Relatively low amounts of proline accumulated in adult leaves with slight differences between the two landraces. During drought stress the most apical part of plants stayed relatively turgid with a high RWC compared to distal parts that wilted. Expression of key stress genes was higher and more proline accumulated at the apex than in distal leaves indicating that cowpea has a non-uniform stress response at the whole plant level. Our study reveals a developmental control of water stress through preferential proline accumulation in the upper tier of the cowpea plant. We also conclude that cowpea landraces display physiological adaptations to water stress suited to the arid and temperate climates in which they are cultivated. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.

Differential plasma membrane targeting of voltage-dependent calcium channel subunits expressed in a polarized epithelial cell line

PubMed Central

Brice, Nicola L; Dolphin, Annette C

1999-01-01

Voltage-dependent calcium channels (VDCCs) show a highly non-uniform distribution in many cell types, including neurons and other polarized secretory cells. We have examined whether this can be mimicked in a polarized epithelial cell line (Madin-Darby canine kidney), which has been used extensively to study the targeting of proteins. We expressed the VDCC α1A, α1B or α1C subunits either alone or in combination with accessory subunits α2-δ and the different β subunits, and examined their localization immunocytochemically. An α1 subunit was only targeted to the plasma membrane if co-expressed with the accessory subunits. The combination α1C/α2-δ and all β subunits was always localized predominantly to the basolateral membrane. It has been suggested that this is equivalent to somatodendritic targeting in neurons. In contrast, the α1B subunit was expressed at the apical membrane with all the accessory subunit combinations, by 24 h after microinjection. This membrane destination shows some parallels with axonal targeting in neurons. The α1A subunit was consistently observed at the apical membrane in the combinations α1A/α2-δ/β1b or β4. In contrast, when co-expressed with α2-δ/β2a, α1A was clearly targeted to the basolateral membrane. In conclusion, the VDCC α1 subunit appears to be the primary determinant for targeting the VDCC complex, but the β subunit can modify this destination, particularly for α1A. PMID:10066897

Alloy nanoparticle synthesis using ionizing radiation

DOEpatents

Nenoff, Tina M [Sandia Park, NM; Powers, Dana A [Albuquerque, NM; Zhang, Zhenyuan [Durham, NC

2011-08-16

A method of forming stable nanoparticles comprising substantially uniform alloys of metals. A high dose of ionizing radiation is used to generate high concentrations of solvated electrons and optionally radical reducing species that rapidly reduce a mixture of metal ion source species to form alloy nanoparticles. The method can make uniform alloy nanoparticles from normally immiscible metals by overcoming the thermodynamic limitations that would preferentially produce core-shell nanoparticles.

Time Domain Version of the Uniform Geometrical Theory of Diffraction

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rousseau, Paul R.

1995-01-01

A time domain (TD) version of the uniform geometrical theory of diffraction which is referred to as the TD-UTD is developed to analyze the transient electromagnetic scattering from perfectly conducting objects that are large in terms of pulse width. In particular, the scattering from a perfectly conducting arbitrary curved wedge and an arbitrary smooth convex surface are treated in detail. Note that the canonical geometries of a circular cylinder and a sphere are special cases of the arbitrary smooth convex surface. These TD -UTD solutions are obtained in the form of relatively simple analytical expressions valid for early to intermediate times. The geometries treated here can be used to build up a transient solution to more complex radiating objects via space-time localization, in exactly the same way as is done by invoking spatial localization properties in the frequency domain UTD. The TD-UTD provides the response due to an excitation of a general astigmatic impulsive wavefront with any polarization. This generalized impulse response may then be convolved with other excitation time pulses, to find even more general solutions due to other excitation pulses. Since the TD-UTD uses the same rays as the frequency domain UTD, it provides a simple picture for transient radiation or scattering and is therefore just as physically appealing as the frequency domain UTD. The formulation of an analytic time transform (ATT), which produces an analytic time signal given a frequency response function, is given here. This ATT is used because it provides a very efficient method of inverting the asymptotic high frequency UTD representations to obtain the corresponding TD-UTD expressions even when there are special UTD transition functions which may not be well behaved at the low frequencies; also, using the ATT avoids the difficulties associated with the inversion of UTD ray fields that traverse line or smooth caustics. Another useful aspect of the ATT is the ability to perform an efficient convolution with a broad class of excitation pulse functions, where the frequency response of the excitation function must be expressed as a summation of complex exponential functions.

Differential regulation of HIF-1α and HIF-2α in neuroblastoma: Estrogen-related receptor alpha (ERRα) regulates HIF2A transcription and correlates to poor outcome

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hamidian, Arash; Stedingk, Kristoffer von; Munksgaard Thorén, Matilda

2015-06-05

Hypoxia-inducible factors (HIFs) are differentially regulated in tumor cells. While the current paradigm supports post-translational regulation of the HIF-α subunits, we recently showed that hypoxic HIF-2α is also transcriptionally regulated via insulin-like growth factor (IGF)-II in the childhood tumor neuroblastoma. Here, we demonstrate that transcriptional regulation of HIF-2α seems to be restricted to neural cell-derived tumors, while HIF-1α is canonically regulated at the post-translational level uniformly across different tumor forms. Enhanced expression of HIF2A mRNA at hypoxia is due to de novo transcription rather than increased mRNA stability, and chemical stabilization of the HIF-α proteins at oxygen-rich conditions unexpectedly leadsmore » to increased HIF2A transcription. The enhanced HIF2A levels do not seem to be dependent on active HIF-1. Using a transcriptome array approach, we identified members of the Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma coactivator (PGC)/Estrogen-related receptor (ERR) complex families as potential regulators of HIF2A. Knockdown or inhibition of one of the members, ERRα, leads to decreased expression of HIF2A, and high expression of the ERRα gene ESRRA correlates with poor overall and progression-free survival in a clinical neuroblastoma material consisting of 88 tumors. Thus, targeting of ERRα and pathways regulating transcriptional HIF-2α are promising therapeutic avenues in neuroblastoma. - Highlights: • Transcriptional control of HIF-2α is restricted to neural cell-derived tumors. • Enhanced transcription of HIF2A is not due to increased mRNA stability. • Chemical stabilization of the HIF-α subunits leads to increased HIF2A transcription. • ERRα regulates HIF2A mRNA expression in neuroblastoma. • High expression of ESRRA correlates to poor outcome in neuroblastoma.« less

Bladder cancer cells secrete while normal bladder cells express but do not secrete AGR2

DOE PAGES

Ho, Melissa E.; Quek, Sue -Ing; True, Lawrence D.; ...

2016-02-15

Anterior gradient 2 (AGR2) is a cancer-associated secreted protein found predominantly in adenocarcinomas. Given its ubiquity in solid tumors, cancer-secreted AGR2 could be a useful biomarker in urine or blood for early detection. Normal organs express AGR2 and might also secrete AGR2, which would impact on the utility of AGR2 as a cancer biomarker. Uniform AGR2 expression is found in the normal bladder urothelium. Little AGR2 is, however, secreted by the urothelial cells as no measurable amounts could be detected in urine. The urinary proteomes of healthy people contain no listing for AGR2. The blood proteomes also contain no significantmore » peptide counts for AGR2 suggesting that little urothelial secretion into capillaries of the lamina propria. Expression is lost in urothelial carcinoma, but 25% primary tumors retained AGR2 expression in a cohort of lymph node positive cases. AGR2 is secreted by the urothelial carcinoma cells as urinary AGR2 was measured in the voided urine of 25% of the cases analyzed in a cohort of cancer vs. non-cancer urine, which matched the frequency of AGR2-positive urothelial carcinoma. Since cancer cells secrete AGR2 while normal cells do not, its measurement in body fluids could be used to indicate tumor presence. In addition to secretion, AGR2 is also localized to the cell surface. Thus, secretion/cell surface localization of AGR2 is pecific to cancer while expression itself is not. Lastly, since AGR2 is found in many solid tumor types, this tumor-associated antigen constitutes a highly promising therapeutic target.« less

Bladder cancer cells secrete while normal bladder cells express but do not secrete AGR2

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ho, Melissa E.; Quek, Sue -Ing; True, Lawrence D.

Anterior gradient 2 (AGR2) is a cancer-associated secreted protein found predominantly in adenocarcinomas. Given its ubiquity in solid tumors, cancer-secreted AGR2 could be a useful biomarker in urine or blood for early detection. Normal organs express AGR2 and might also secrete AGR2, which would impact on the utility of AGR2 as a cancer biomarker. Uniform AGR2 expression is found in the normal bladder urothelium. Little AGR2 is, however, secreted by the urothelial cells as no measurable amounts could be detected in urine. The urinary proteomes of healthy people contain no listing for AGR2. The blood proteomes also contain no significantmore » peptide counts for AGR2 suggesting that little urothelial secretion into capillaries of the lamina propria. Expression is lost in urothelial carcinoma, but 25% primary tumors retained AGR2 expression in a cohort of lymph node positive cases. AGR2 is secreted by the urothelial carcinoma cells as urinary AGR2 was measured in the voided urine of 25% of the cases analyzed in a cohort of cancer vs. non-cancer urine, which matched the frequency of AGR2-positive urothelial carcinoma. Since cancer cells secrete AGR2 while normal cells do not, its measurement in body fluids could be used to indicate tumor presence. In addition to secretion, AGR2 is also localized to the cell surface. Thus, secretion/cell surface localization of AGR2 is pecific to cancer while expression itself is not. Lastly, since AGR2 is found in many solid tumor types, this tumor-associated antigen constitutes a highly promising therapeutic target.« less

Merkel Cell Polyomavirus Small T Antigen Induces Cancer and Embryonic Merkel Cell Proliferation in a Transgenic Mouse Model.

PubMed

Shuda, Masahiro; Guastafierro, Anna; Geng, Xuehui; Shuda, Yoko; Ostrowski, Stephen M; Lukianov, Stefan; Jenkins, Frank J; Honda, Kord; Maricich, Stephen M; Moore, Patrick S; Chang, Yuan

2015-01-01

Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCV) causes the majority of human Merkel cell carcinomas (MCC) and encodes a small T (sT) antigen that transforms immortalized rodent fibroblasts in vitro. To develop a mouse model for MCV sT-induced carcinogenesis, we generated transgenic mice with a flox-stop-flox MCV sT sequence homologously recombined at the ROSA locus (ROSAsT), allowing Cre-mediated, conditional MCV sT expression. Standard tamoxifen (TMX) administration to adult UbcCreERT2; ROSAsT mice, in which Cre is ubiquitously expressed, resulted in MCV sT expression in multiple organs that was uniformly lethal within 5 days. Conversely, most adult UbcCreERT2; ROSAsT mice survived low-dose tamoxifen administration but developed ear lobe dermal hyperkeratosis and hypergranulosis. Simultaneous MCV sT expression and conditional homozygous p53 deletion generated multi-focal, poorly-differentiated, highly anaplastic tumors in the spleens and livers of mice after 60 days of TMX treatment. Mouse embryonic fibroblasts from these mice induced to express MCV sT exhibited anchorage-independent cell growth. To examine Merkel cell pathology, MCV sT expression was also induced during mid-embryogenesis in Merkel cells of Atoh1CreERT2/+; ROSAsT mice, which lead to significantly increased Merkel cell numbers in touch domes at late embryonic ages that normalized postnatally. Tamoxifen administration to adult Atoh1CreERT2/+; ROSAsT and Atoh1CreERT2/+; ROSAsT; p53flox/flox mice had no effects on Merkel cell numbers and did not induce tumor formation. Taken together, these results show that MCV sT stimulates progenitor Merkel cell proliferation in embryonic mice and is a bona fide viral oncoprotein that induces full cancer cell transformation in the p53-null setting.

p57KIP2 expression and loss of heterozygosity during immortal conversion of cultured human mammary epithelial cells

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nijjar, Tarlochan; Wigington, Don; Garbe, James C.

1999-08-01

The authors have uncovered a novel role for the cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor, p57KIP2, during the immortalization of cultured human mammary epithelial cells (HMEC). HMEC immortalized following chemical carcinogen exposure initially expressed little or no telomerase activity, and their telomeres continued to shorten with passage. Cell populations whose mean terminal restriction fragment (TRF) length declined and exhibited slow heterogeneous growth, and contained many non-proliferative cells. These conditionally immortal HMEC cultures accumulated large quantities of p57 protein. With continued passage, the conditionally immortal cell populations very graduall2048nverted to a fully immortal phenotype of good uniform growth, expression of high levels of telomerasemore » activity, and stabilization of telomere length. The fully immortal good growing HMEC did not accumulate p57 in G0 or during the cell cycle. DNA and RNA analysis of mass populations and individual subclones of conditionally immortal HMEC line 184A1 showed that continued growth of conditionally immortal cells with critically short telomeres was repeatedly accompanied by loss of the expressed p57 allele, and transient expression of the previously imprinted allele. Conditionally immortal 184A1 with mean TRF > 3 kb infected with retroviruses containing the p57 gene exhibited premature slow heterogeneous growth. Conversely, exogenous expression of hTERT, the catalytic subunit of telomerase, in 184A1 with mean TRF > 3 kb prevented both the slow heterogeneous growth phase and accumulation of p57 in cycling populations. These data indicate that in HMEC which have overcome replicative senescence, p57 may provide an additional barrier against indefinite proliferation. Overcoming p57 mediated growth inhibition in these cells may be crucial for acquisition of the unlimited growth potential thought to be critical for malignant progression.« less

The effect of precursor types on the magnetic properties of Y-type hexa-ferrite composite

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kim, Chin Mo; Na, Eunhye; Kim, Ingyu

2015-05-07

With magnetic composite including uniform magnetic particles, we expect to realize good high-frequency soft magnetic properties. We produced needle-like (α-FeOOH) nanoparticles with nearly uniform diameter and length of 20 and 500 nm. Zn-doped Y-type hexa-ferrite samples were prepared by solid state reaction method using the uniform goethite and non-uniform hematite (Fe{sub 2}O{sub 3}) with size of <1 μm, respectively. The micrographs observed by scanning electron microscopy show that more uniform hexagonal plates are observed in ZYG-sample (Zn-doped Y-type hexa-ferrite prepared with non-uniform hematite) than in ZYH-sample (Zn-doped Y-type hexa-ferrite prepared with uniform goethite). The permeability (μ′) and loss tangent (δ) atmore » 2 GHz are 2.31 and 0.07 in ZYG-sample and 2.0 and 0.07 in ZYH sample, respectively. We can observe that permeability and loss tangent are strongly related to the particle size and uniformity based on the nucleation, growth, and two magnetizing mechanisms: spin rotation and domain wall motion. The complex permeability spectra also can be numerically separated into spin rotational and domain wall resonance components.« less

Dose uniformity of budesonide Easyhaler® under simulated real-life conditions and with low inspiration flow rates.

PubMed

Haikarainen, Jussi; Rytilä, Paula; Roos, Sirkku; Metsärinne, Sirpa; Happonen, Anita

2017-01-01

Budesonide Easyhaler® multidose dry powder inhaler is approved for the treatment of asthma. Objectives were to determine the delivered dose (DD) uniformity of budesonide Easyhaler® in simulated real-world conditions and with different inspiration flow rates (IFRs). Three dose delivery studies were performed using 100, 200, and 400 µg/dose strengths of budesonide. Dose uniformity was assessed during in-use periods of 4-6 months after exposure to high temperature (30°C) and humidity (60% relative humidity) and after dropping and vibration testing. The influence of various IFRs (31, 43, and 54 L/min) on the DD was also investigated. Acceptable dose uniformity was declared when mean DD were within 80-120% of expected dose; all data reported descriptively. DD was constant (range: 93-109% of expected dose) at all in-use periods and after exposure to high temperature and humidity for a duration of up to 6 months. DD post-dropping and -vibration were unaffected (range 98-105% of expected dose). Similarly, DD was constant and within 10% of expected dose across all IFRs. Results indicate that budesonide Easyhaler® delivers consistently accurate doses in various real-life conditions. Budesonide Easyhaler® can be expected to consistently deliver a uniform dose and improve asthma control regardless of high temperature and humidity or varying IFR.

Burning Graphene Layer-by-Layer

PubMed Central

Ermakov, Victor A.; Alaferdov, Andrei V.; Vaz, Alfredo R.; Perim, Eric; Autreto, Pedro A. S.; Paupitz, Ricardo; Galvao, Douglas S.; Moshkalev, Stanislav A.

2015-01-01

Graphene, in single layer or multi-layer forms, holds great promise for future electronics and high-temperature applications. Resistance to oxidation, an important property for high-temperature applications, has not yet been extensively investigated. Controlled thinning of multi-layer graphene (MLG), e.g., by plasma or laser processing is another challenge, since the existing methods produce non-uniform thinning or introduce undesirable defects in the basal plane. We report here that heating to extremely high temperatures (exceeding 2000 K) and controllable layer-by-layer burning (thinning) can be achieved by low-power laser processing of suspended high-quality MLG in air in “cold-wall” reactor configuration. In contrast, localized laser heating of supported samples results in non-uniform graphene burning at much higher rates. Fully atomistic molecular dynamics simulations were also performed to reveal details of oxidation mechanisms leading to uniform layer-by-layer graphene gasification. The extraordinary resistance of MLG to oxidation paves the way to novel high-temperature applications as continuum light source or scaffolding material. PMID:26100466

The influence of local effects on thermal sensation under non-uniform environmental conditions--gender differences in thermophysiology, thermal comfort and productivity during convective and radiant cooling.

PubMed

Schellen, L; Loomans, M G L C; de Wit, M H; Olesen, B W; van Marken Lichtenbelt, W D

2012-09-10

Applying high temperature cooling concepts, i.e. high temperature cooling (T(supply) is 16-20°C) HVAC systems, in the built environment allows the reduction in the use of (high quality) energy. However, application of high temperature cooling systems can result in whole body and local discomfort of the occupants. Non-uniform thermal conditions, which may occur due to application of high temperature cooling systems, can be responsible for discomfort. Contradictions in literature exist regarding the validity of the often used predicted mean vote (PMV) index for both genders, and the index is not intended for evaluating the discomfort due to non-uniform environmental conditions. In some cases, however, combinations of local and general discomfort factors, for example draught under warm conditions, may not be uncomfortable. The objective of this study was to investigate gender differences in thermophysiology, thermal comfort and productivity in response to thermal non-uniform environmental conditions. Twenty healthy subjects (10 males and 10 females, age 20-29 years) were exposed to two different experimental conditions: a convective cooling situation (CC) and a radiant cooling situation (RC). During the experiments physiological responses, thermal comfort and productivity were measured. The results show that under both experimental conditions the actual mean thermal sensation votes significantly differ from the PMV-index; the subjects are feeling colder than predicted. Furthermore, the females are more uncomfortable and dissatisfied compared to the males. For females, the local sensations and skin temperatures of the extremities have a significant influence on whole body thermal sensation and are therefore important to consider under non-uniform environmental conditions. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Students Wearing Police Uniforms Exhibit Biased Attention toward Individuals Wearing Hoodies

PubMed Central

Civile, Ciro; Obhi, Sukhvinder S.

2017-01-01

Police provide an essential public service and they often operate in difficult circumstances, requiring high-speed cognition. Recent incidents involving apparent profiling and aggressive behavior have led to accusations that the police are sometimes biased. Given that previous research has shown a link between clothing and cognition, we investigated the question of whether the police uniform itself might induce a bias in social attention. To address this question, and using a Canadian university student sample, we assessed whether wearing a police uniform biases attention toward black faces compared to white faces, and low-status individuals compared to high-status individuals. In Experiment 1 (n = 28), participants wore either a police-style uniform or mechanic overalls, and performed a shape categorization task in the presence of a distractor that could be either: a black face, a white face, a person wearing a hoodie (whom we propose will be associated with low SES), or a person wearing a suit (whom we propose will be associated with high SES). Participants wearing the police-style uniform exhibited biased attention, indexed by slower reaction times (RTs), in the presence of low-SES images. In Experiment 2 (n = 28), we confirmed this bias using a modified Dot-Probe task – an alternate measure of attentional bias in which we observed faster RTs to a dot probe that was spatially aligned with a low SES image. Experiment 3 (n = 56) demonstrated that attentional bias toward low-SES targets appears only when participants wear the police-style uniform, and not when they are simply exposed to it – by having it placed on the desk in front of them. Our results demonstrate that wearing a police-style uniform biases attention toward low-SES targets. Thus, wearing a police-style uniform may induce a kind of “status-profiling” in which individuals from low-status groups become salient and capture attention. We note that our results are limited to university students and that it will be important to extend them to members of the community and law-enforcement officers. We discuss how uniforms might exert their effects on cognition by virtue of the power and cultural associations they evoke in the wearer. PMID:28220086

Thermophoretic force on nonspherical particles in the free-molecule regime

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yu, Song; Wang, Jun; Xia, Guodong; Zong, Luxiang

2018-05-01

The present paper is devoted to studying the thermophoresis of a nonspherical convex particle suspended in a gas with nonuniform temperature distribution in the free-molecule regime. Based on the gas kinetic theory and the assumption of a rigid-body collision for the gas-particle interaction, analytical expressions for the thermophoretic forces are obtained for several typical nonspherical bodies, including cylinders, spheroids, needles, disks, and cuboids. The orientation dependences of the thermophoretic forces and thermophoretic velocities are evaluated based on these expressions. It is found that the influence of the pitching effect of the nonspheres can be significant. The expressions for the orientation-averaged thermophoretic forces are also obtained under the assumption of a uniform particle orientation distribution.

Formation process of graphite film on Ni substrate with improved thickness uniformity through precipitation control

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, Seul-Gi; Hu, Qicheng; Nam, Ki-Bong; Kim, Mun Ja; Yoo, Ji-Beom

2018-04-01

Large-scale graphitic thin film with high thickness uniformity needs to be developed for industrial applications. Graphitic films with thicknesses ranging from 3 to 20 nm have rarely been reported, and achieving the thickness uniformity in that range is a challenging task. In this study, a process for growing 20 nm-thick graphite films on Ni with improved thickness uniformity is demonstrated and compared with the conventional growth process. In the film grown by the process, the surface roughness and coverage were improved and no wrinkles were observed. Observations of the film structure reveal the reasons for the improvements and growth mechanisms.

Fitness Probability Distribution of Bit-Flip Mutation.

PubMed

Chicano, Francisco; Sutton, Andrew M; Whitley, L Darrell; Alba, Enrique

2015-01-01

Bit-flip mutation is a common mutation operator for evolutionary algorithms applied to optimize functions over binary strings. In this paper, we develop results from the theory of landscapes and Krawtchouk polynomials to exactly compute the probability distribution of fitness values of a binary string undergoing uniform bit-flip mutation. We prove that this probability distribution can be expressed as a polynomial in p, the probability of flipping each bit. We analyze these polynomials and provide closed-form expressions for an easy linear problem (Onemax), and an NP-hard problem, MAX-SAT. We also discuss a connection of the results with runtime analysis.

Entanglement of the vacuum between left, right, future, and past: The origin of entanglement-induced quantum radiation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Higuchi, Atsushi; Iso, Satoshi; Ueda, Kazushige; Yamamoto, Kazuhiro

2017-10-01

The Minkowski vacuum state is expressed as an entangled state between the left and right Rindler wedges when it is constructed on the Rindler vacuum. In this paper, we further examine the entanglement structure and extend the expression to the future (expanding) and past (shrinking) Kasner spacetimes. This clarifies the origin of the quantum radiation produced by an Unruh-DeWitt detector in uniformly accelerated motion in the four-dimensional Minkowski spacetime. We also investigate the two-dimensional massless case where the quantum radiation vanishes but the same entanglement structure exists.

Analytical Expressions for Deformation from an Arbitrarily Oriented Spheroid in a Half-Space

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cervelli, P. F.

2013-12-01

Deformation from magma chambers can be modeled by an elastic half-space with an embedded cavity subject to uniform pressure change along its interior surface. For a small number of cavity shapes, such as a sphere or a prolate spheroid, closed-form, analytical expressions for deformation have been derived, although these only approximate the uniform-pressure-change boundary condition, with the approximation becoming more accurate as the ratio of source depth to source dimension increases. Using the method of Elshelby [1957] and Yang [1988], which consists of a distribution of double forces and centers of dilatation along the vertical axis, I have derived expressions for displacement from a finite spheroid of arbitrary orientation and aspect ratio that are exact in an infinite elastic medium and approximate in a half-space. The approximation, like those for other cavity shapes, becomes increasingly accurate as the depth to source ratio grows larger, and is accurate to within a few percent in most real-world cases. I have also derived expressions for the deformation-gradient tensor, i.e., the derivatives of each component of displacement with respect to each coordinate direction. These can be transformed easily into the strain and stress tensors. The expressions give deformation both at the surface and at any point within the half-space, and include conditional statements that account for limiting cases that would otherwise prove singular. I have developed MATLAB code for these expressions (and their derivatives), which I use to demonstrate the accuracy of the approximation by showing how well the uniform-pressure-change boundary condition is satisfied in a variety of cases. I also show that a vertical, oblate spheroid with a zero-length vertical axis is equivalent to the penny-shaped crack of Fialko [2001] in an infinite medium and an excellent approximation in a half-space. Finally, because, in many cases, volume change is more tangible than pressure change, I have derived an equation that relates these two quantities for the spheroid: volume change equals pressure change × 2/3 × π/μ × a constant that depends on Poisson's ratio and the spheroid geometry. Eshelby, J. D., The determination of the elastic field of an ellipsoidal inclusion and related problems, Proc. R. Soc. London, Ser. A, 241, 376-396, 1957. Fialko, Y., Khazan, Y, and Simons, M. Deformation due to a pressurized horizontal circular crack in an elastic half-space, with applications to volcano geodesy, Geophys. J. Int., no. 146, 181-190, 2001. Yang, X., Davis, P. M., and Dieterich, J.H, Deformation from inflation of a dipping finite prolate spheroid in an Elastic Half-Space as a model for volcanic stressing, J. Geophys. Res., vol. 93, no. B5, 4249-4257, 1988.

Solution-Processable High-Purity Semiconducting SWCNTs for Large-Area Fabrication of High-Performance Thin-Film Transistors.

PubMed

Gu, Jianting; Han, Jie; Liu, Dan; Yu, Xiaoqin; Kang, Lixing; Qiu, Song; Jin, Hehua; Li, Hongbo; Li, Qingwen; Zhang, Jin

2016-09-01

For the large-area fabrication of thin-film transistors (TFTs), a new conjugated polymer poly[9-(1-octylonoyl)-9H-carbazole-2,7-diyl] is developed to harvest ultrahigh-purity semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes. Combined with spectral and nanodevice characterization, the purity is estimated up to 99.9%. High density and uniform network formed by dip-coating process is liable to fabricate high-performance TFTs on a wafer-scale and the as-fabricated TFTs exhibit a high degree of uniformity. © 2016 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Agrin in Alzheimer's Disease: Altered Solubility and Abnormal Distribution within Microvasculature and Brain Parenchyma

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Donahue, John E.; Berzin, Tyler M.; Rafii, Michael S.; Glass, David J.; Yancopoulos, George D.; Fallon, Justin R.; Stopa, Edward G.

1999-05-01

Agrin is a heparan sulfate proteoglycan that is widely expressed in neurons and microvascular basal lamina in the rodent and avian central nervous system. Agrin induces the differentiation of nerve-muscle synapses, but its function in either normal or diseased brains is not known. Alzheimer's disease (AD) is characterized by loss of synapses, changes in microvascular architecture, and formation of neurofibrillary tangles and senile plaques. Here we have asked whether AD causes changes in the distribution and biochemical properties of agrin. Immunostaining of normal, aged human central nervous system revealed that agrin is expressed in neurons in multiple brain areas. Robust agrin immunoreactivity was observed uniformly in the microvascular basal lamina. In AD brains, agrin is highly concentrated in both diffuse and neuritic plaques as well as neurofibrillary tangles; neuronal expression of agrin also was observed. Furthermore, patients with AD had microvascular alterations characterized by thinning and fragmentation of the basal lamina. Detergent extraction and Western blotting showed that virtually all the agrin in normal brain is soluble in 1% SDS. In contrast, a large fraction of the agrin in AD brains is insoluble under these conditions, suggesting that it is tightly associated with β -amyloid. Together, these data indicate that the agrin abnormalities observed in AD are closely linked to β -amyloid deposition. These observations suggest that altered agrin expression in the microvasculature and the brain parenchyma contribute to the pathogenesis of AD.

Kaon Condensation and the Non-Uniform Nuclear Matter

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maruyama, Toshiki; Tatsumi, Toshitaka; Voskresensky, Dmitri N.; Tanigawa, Tomonori; Chiba, Satoshi

2004-04-01

Non-uniform structures of nuclear matter are studied in a wide density-range. Using the density functional theory with a relativistic mean-field model, we examine non-uniform structures at sub-nuclear densities (nuclear "pastas") and at high densities, where kaon condensate is expected. We try to give a unified view about the change of the matter structure as density increases, carefully taking into account the Coulomb screening effects from the viewpoint of first-order phase transition.

Activity-dependent formation of a vesicular inhibitory amino acid transporter gradient in the superior olivary complex of NMRI mice.

PubMed

Ebbers, Lena; Weber, Maren; Nothwang, Hans Gerd

2017-10-26

In the mammalian superior olivary complex (SOC), synaptic inhibition contributes to the processing of binaural sound cues important for sound localization. Previous analyses demonstrated a tonotopic gradient for postsynaptic proteins mediating inhibitory neurotransmission in the lateral superior olive (LSO), a major nucleus of the SOC. To probe, whether a presynaptic molecular gradient exists as well, we investigated immunoreactivity against the vesicular inhibitory amino acid transporter (VIAAT) in the mouse auditory brainstem. Immunoreactivity against VIAAT revealed a gradient in the LSO and the superior paraolivary nucleus (SPN) of NMRI mice, with high expression in the lateral, low frequency processing limb and low expression in the medial, high frequency processing limb of both nuclei. This orientation is opposite to the previously reported gradient of glycine receptors in the LSO. Other nuclei of the SOC showed a uniform distribution of VIAAT-immunoreactivity. No gradient was observed for the glycine transporter GlyT2 and the neuronal protein NeuN. Formation of the VIAAT gradient was developmentally regulated and occurred around hearing-onset between postnatal days 8 and 16. Congenital deaf Claudin14 -/- mice bred on an NMRI background showed a uniform VIAAT-immunoreactivity in the LSO, whereas cochlear ablation in NMRI mice after hearing-onset did not affect the gradient. Additional analysis of C57Bl6/J, 129/SvJ and CBA/J mice revealed a strain-specific formation of the gradient. Our results identify an activity-regulated gradient of VIAAT in the SOC of NRMI mice. Its absence in other mouse strains adds a novel layer of strain-specific features in the auditory system, i.e. tonotopic organization of molecular gradients. This calls for caution when comparing data from different mouse strains frequently used in studies involving transgenic animals. The presence of strain-specific differences offers the possibility of genetic mapping to identify molecular factors involved in activity-dependent developmental processes in the auditory system. This would provide an important step forward concerning improved auditory rehabilitation in cases of congenital deafness.

Response to non-uniform salinity in the root zone of the halophyte Atriplex nummularia: growth, photosynthesis, water relations and tissue ion concentrations

PubMed Central

Bazihizina, Nadia; Colmer, Timothy D.; Barrett-Lennard, Edward G.

2009-01-01

Background and Aims Soil salinity is often heterogeneous, yet the physiology of halophytes has typically been studied with uniform salinity treatments. An evaluation was made of the growth, net photosynthesis, water use, water relations and tissue ions in the halophytic shrub Atriplex nummularia in response to non-uniform NaCl concentrations in a split-root system. Methods Atriplex nummularia was grown in a split-root system for 21 d, with either the same or two different NaCl concentrations (ranging from 10 to 670 mm), in aerated nutrient solution bathing each root half. Key Results Non-uniform salinity, with high NaCl in one root half (up to 670 mm) and 10 mm in the other half, had no effect on shoot ethanol-insoluble dry mass, net photosynthesis or shoot pre-dawn water potential. In contrast, a modest effect occurred for leaf osmotic potential (up to 30 % more solutes compared with uniform 10 mm NaCl treatment). With non-uniform NaCl concentrations (10/670 mm), 90 % of water was absorbed from the low salinity side, and the reduction in water use from the high salinity side caused whole-plant water use to decrease by about 30 %; there was no compensatory water uptake from the low salinity side. Leaf Na+ and Cl− concentrations were 1·9- to 2·3-fold higher in the uniform 670 mm treatment than in the 10/670 mm treatment, whereas leaf K+ concentrations were 1·2- to 2·0-fold higher in the non-uniform treatment. Conclusions Atriplex nummularia with one root half in 10 mm NaCl maintained net photosynthesis, shoot growth and shoot water potential even when the other root half was exposed to 670 mm NaCl, a concentration that inhibits growth by 65 % when uniform in the root zone. Given the likelihood of non-uniform salinity in many field situations, this situation would presumably benefit halophyte growth and physiology in saline environments. PMID:19556265

Effects of fixture rotation on coating uniformity for high-performance optical filter fabrication

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rubin, Binyamin; George, Jason; Singhal, Riju

2018-04-01

Coating uniformity is critical in fabricating high-performance optical filters by various vacuum deposition methods. Simple and planetary rotation systems with shadow masks are used to achieve the required uniformity [J. B. Oliver and D. Talbot, Appl. Optics 45, 13, 3097 (2006); O. Lyngnes, K. Kraus, A. Ode and T. Erguder, in `Method for Designing Coating Thickness Uniformity Shadow Masks for Deposition Systems with a Planetary Fixture', 2014 Technical Conference Proceedings, Optical Coatings, August 13, 2014, DOI: 10.14332/svc14.proc.1817.]. In this work, we discuss the effect of rotation pattern and speed on thickness uniformity in an ion beam sputter deposition system. Numerical modeling is used to determine statistical distribution of random thickness errors in coating layers. The relationship between thickness tolerance and production yield are simulated theoretically and demonstrated experimentally. Production yields for different optical filters produced in an ion beam deposition system with planetary rotation are presented. Single-wavelength and broadband optical monitoring systems were used for endpoint monitoring during filter deposition. Limitations of thickness tolerances that can be achieved in systems with planetary rotation are shown. Paths for improving production yield in an ion beam deposition system are described.

Effects of Magnetic field on Peristalsis transport of a Carreau Fluid in a tapered asymmetric channel

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Prakash, J.; Balaji, N.; Siva, E. P.; Kothandapani, M.; Govindarajan, A.

2018-04-01

The paper is concerned with effects of a uniform applied magnetic field on a Carreau fluid flow in a tapered asymmetric channel with peristalsis. The channel non-uniform & asymmetry are formed by choosing the peristaltic wave train on the tapered walls to have different amplitude and phase (ϕ). The governing equations of the Carreau model in two - dimensional peristaltic flow phenomena are constructed under assumptions of long wave length and low Reynolds number approximations. The simplified non - linear governing equations are solved by regular perturbation method. The expressions for pressure rise, frictional force, velocity and stream function are determined and the effects of different parameters like non-dimensional amplitudes walls (a and b), non - uniform parameter (m), Hartmann number (M), phase difference (ϕ),power law index (n) and Weissenberg numbers (We) on the flow characteristics are discussed. It is viewed that the rheological parameter for large (We), the curves of the pressure rise are not linear but it behaves like a Newtonian fluid for very small Weissenberg number.

Postbuckling analysis of multi-layered graphene sheets under non-uniform biaxial compression

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Farajpour, Ali; Arab Solghar, Alireza; Shahidi, Alireza

2013-01-01

In this article, the nonlinear buckling characteristics of multi-layered graphene sheets are investigated. The graphene sheet is modeled as an orthotropic nanoplate with size-dependent material properties. The graphene film is subjected by non-uniformly distributed in-plane load through its thickness. To include the small scale and the geometrical nonlinearity effects, the governing differential equations are derived based on the nonlocal elasticity theory in conjunction with the von Karman geometrical model. Explicit expressions for the postbuckling loads of single- and double-layered graphene sheets with simply supported edges under biaxial compression are obtained. For numerical results, six types of armchair and zigzag graphene sheets with different aspect ratio are considered. The present formulation and method of solution are validated by comparing the results, in the limit cases, with those available in the open literature. Excellent agreement between the obtained and available results is observed. Finally, the effects of nonlocal parameter, buckling mode number, compression ratio and non-uniform parameter on the postbuckling behavior of multi-layered graphene sheets are studied.

The prognostic value of a seven-microRNA classifier as a novel biomarker for the prediction and detection of recurrence in glioma patients.

PubMed

Chen, Wanghao; Yu, Qiang; Chen, Bo; Lu, Xingyu; Li, Qiaoyu

2016-08-16

Glioma is often diagnosed at a later stage, and the high risk of recurrence remains a major challenge. We hypothesized that the microRNA expression profile may serve as a biomarker for the prognosis and prediction of glioblastoma recurrence. We defined microRNAs that were associated with good and poor prognosis in 300 specimens of glioblastoma from the Cancer Genome Atlas. By analyzing microarray gene expression data and clinical information from three random groups, we identified 7 microRNAs that have prognostic and prognostic accuracy: microRNA-124a, microRNA-129, microRNA-139, microRNA-15b, microRNA-21, microRNA-218 and microRNA-7. The differential expression of these miRNAs was verified using an independent set of glioma samples from the Affiliated People's Hospital of Jiangsu University. We used the log-rank test and the Kaplan-Meier method to estimate correlations between the miRNA signature and disease-free survival/overall survival. Using the LASSO model, we observed a uniform significant difference in disease-free survival and overall survival between patients with high-risk and low-risk miRNA signature scores. Furthermore, the prognostic capability of the seven-miRNA signature was demonstrated by receiver operator characteristic curve analysis. A Circos plot was generated to examine the network of genes and pathways predicted to be targeted by the seven-miRNA signature. The seven-miRNA-based classifier should be useful in the stratification and individualized management of patients with glioma.

Phonon Avoided and Scalable Cascade Lasers (PASCAL)

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-11-01

up We fully developed the mask-less nanolithography technique. The SEM micrographs show that highly uniform nanoholes and nanopillars array can be...by the technique and we produced a large area of high uniform nanoholes perforated in Al films, which is a big step towards making quantum dot...spheres on photoresist ’ • A. W A - " > EN • • • ^Ti—i Figure 14 - SEM images series showing nanoholes generated with

Instrumentational complexity of music genres and why simplicity sells.

PubMed

Percino, Gamaliel; Klimek, Peter; Thurner, Stefan

2014-01-01

Listening habits are strongly influenced by two opposing aspects, the desire for variety and the demand for uniformity in music. In this work we quantify these two notions in terms of instrumentation and production technologies that are typically involved in crafting popular music. We assign an 'instrumentational complexity value' to each music style. Styles of low instrumentational complexity tend to have generic instrumentations that can also be found in many other styles. Styles of high complexity, on the other hand, are characterized by a large variety of instruments that can only be found in a small number of other styles. To model these results we propose a simple stochastic model that explicitly takes the capabilities of artists into account. We find empirical evidence that individual styles show dramatic changes in their instrumentational complexity over the last fifty years. 'New wave' or 'disco' quickly climbed towards higher complexity in the 70s and fell back to low complexity levels shortly afterwards, whereas styles like 'folk rock' remained at constant high instrumentational complexity levels. We show that changes in the instrumentational complexity of a style are related to its number of sales and to the number of artists contributing to that style. As a style attracts a growing number of artists, its instrumentational variety usually increases. At the same time the instrumentational uniformity of a style decreases, i.e. a unique stylistic and increasingly complex expression pattern emerges. In contrast, album sales of a given style typically increase with decreasing instrumentational complexity. This can be interpreted as music becoming increasingly formulaic in terms of instrumentation once commercial or mainstream success sets in.

In vitro and in vivo studies on the degradation of high-purity Mg (99.99wt.%) screw with femoral intracondylar fractured rabbit model.

PubMed

Han, Pei; Cheng, Pengfei; Zhang, Shaoxiang; Zhao, Changli; Ni, Jiahua; Zhang, Yuanzhuang; Zhong, Wanrun; Hou, Peng; Zhang, Xiaonong; Zheng, Yufeng; Chai, Yimin

2015-09-01

High-purity magnesium (HP Mg) takes advantage in no alloying toxic elements and slower degradation rate in lack of second phases and micro-galvanic corrosion. In this study, as rolled HP Mg was fabricated into screws and went through in vitro immersion tests, cytotoxicity test and bioactive analysis. The HP Mg screws performed uniform corrosion behavior in vitro, and its extraction promoted cell viability, bone alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity, and mRNA expression of osteogenic differentiation related gene, i.e. ALP, osteopontin (OPN) and RUNX2 of human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (hBMSCs). Then HP Mg screws were implanted in vivo as load-bearing implant to fix bone fracture and subsequently gross observation, range of motion (ROM), X-ray scanning, qualitative micro-computed tomography (μCT) analysis, histological analysis, bending-force test and SEM morphology of retrieved screws were performed respectively at 4, 8, 16 and 24 weeks. As a result, the retrieved HP Mg screws in fixation of rabbit femoral intracondylar fracture showed uniform degradation morphology and enough bending force. However, part of PLLA screws was broken in bolt, although its screw thread was still intact. Good osseointegration was revealed surrounding HP Mg screws and increased bone volume and bone mineral density were detected at fracture gap, indicating the rigid fixation and enhanced fracture healing process provided by HP Mg screws. Consequently, the HP Mg showed great potential as internal fixation devices in intra-articular fracture operation. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Robust time-shifted spoke pulse design in the presence of large B0 variations with simultaneous reduction of through-plane dephasing, B1+ effects, and the specific absorption rate using parallel transmission.

PubMed

Guérin, Bastien; Stockmann, Jason P; Baboli, Mehran; Torrado-Carvajal, Angel; Stenger, Andrew V; Wald, Lawrence L

2016-08-01

To design parallel transmission spokes pulses with time-shifted profiles for joint mitigation of intensity variations due to B1+ effects, signal loss due to through-plane dephasing, and the specific absorption rate (SAR) at 7T. We derived a slice-averaged small tip angle (SA-STA) approximation of the magnetization signal at echo time that depends on the B1+ transmit profiles, the through-slice B0 gradient and the amplitude and time-shifts of the spoke waveforms. We minimize a magnitude least-squares objective based on this signal equation using a fast interior-point approach with analytical expressions of the Jacobian and Hessian. Our algorithm runs in less than three minutes for the design of two-spoke pulses subject to hundreds of local SAR constraints. On a B0/B1+ head phantom, joint optimization of the channel-dependent time-shifts and spoke amplitudes allowed signal recovery in high-B0 regions at no increase of SAR. Although the method creates uniform magnetization profiles (ie, uniform intensity), the flip angle varies across the image, which makes it ill-suited to T1-weighted applications. The SA-STA approach presented in this study is best suited to T2*-weighted applications with long echo times that require signal recovery around high B0 regions. Magn Reson Med 76:540-554, 2016. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

JIGSAW-GEO (1.0): Locally Orthogonal Staggered Unstructured Grid Generation for General Circulation Modelling on the Sphere

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Engwirda, Darren

2017-01-01

An algorithm for the generation of non-uniform, locally orthogonal staggered unstructured spheroidal grids is described. This technique is designed to generate very high-quality staggered VoronoiDelaunay meshes appropriate for general circulation modelling on the sphere, including applications to atmospheric simulation, ocean-modelling and numerical weather prediction. Using a recently developed Frontal-Delaunay refinement technique, a method for the construction of high-quality unstructured spheroidal Delaunay triangulations is introduced. A locally orthogonal polygonal grid, derived from the associated Voronoi diagram, is computed as the staggered dual. It is shown that use of the Frontal-Delaunay refinement technique allows for the generation of very high-quality unstructured triangulations, satisfying a priori bounds on element size and shape. Grid quality is further improved through the application of hill-climbing-type optimisation techniques. Overall, the algorithm is shown to produce grids with very high element quality and smooth grading characteristics, while imposing relatively low computational expense. A selection of uniform and non-uniform spheroidal grids appropriate for high-resolution, multi-scale general circulation modelling are presented. These grids are shown to satisfy the geometric constraints associated with contemporary unstructured C-grid-type finite-volume models, including the Model for Prediction Across Scales (MPAS-O). The use of user-defined mesh-spacing functions to generate smoothly graded, non-uniform grids for multi-resolution-type studies is discussed in detail.

JIGSAW-GEO (1.0): locally orthogonal staggered unstructured grid generation for general circulation modelling on the sphere

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Engwirda, Darren

2017-06-01

An algorithm for the generation of non-uniform, locally orthogonal staggered unstructured spheroidal grids is described. This technique is designed to generate very high-quality staggered Voronoi-Delaunay meshes appropriate for general circulation modelling on the sphere, including applications to atmospheric simulation, ocean-modelling and numerical weather prediction. Using a recently developed Frontal-Delaunay refinement technique, a method for the construction of high-quality unstructured spheroidal Delaunay triangulations is introduced. A locally orthogonal polygonal grid, derived from the associated Voronoi diagram, is computed as the staggered dual. It is shown that use of the Frontal-Delaunay refinement technique allows for the generation of very high-quality unstructured triangulations, satisfying a priori bounds on element size and shape. Grid quality is further improved through the application of hill-climbing-type optimisation techniques. Overall, the algorithm is shown to produce grids with very high element quality and smooth grading characteristics, while imposing relatively low computational expense. A selection of uniform and non-uniform spheroidal grids appropriate for high-resolution, multi-scale general circulation modelling are presented. These grids are shown to satisfy the geometric constraints associated with contemporary unstructured C-grid-type finite-volume models, including the Model for Prediction Across Scales (MPAS-O). The use of user-defined mesh-spacing functions to generate smoothly graded, non-uniform grids for multi-resolution-type studies is discussed in detail.

10 CFR Appendix V to Subpart B of... - Uniform Test Method for Measuring the Energy Consumption of Ceiling Fan Light Kits

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... with ceiling fan light kits that have medium screw base sockets shall conform to the requirements... testing pin-based fluorescent lamps packaged with ceiling fan light kits that have pin-based sockets shall... base sockets, measure the efficacy, expressed in lumens per watt, in accordance with the test...

New reversing design method for LED uniform illumination.

PubMed

Wang, Kai; Wu, Dan; Qin, Zong; Chen, Fei; Luo, Xiaobing; Liu, Sheng

2011-07-04

In light-emitting diode (LED) applications, it is becoming a big issue that how to optimize light intensity distribution curve (LIDC) and design corresponding optical component to achieve uniform illumination when distance-height ratio (DHR) is given. A new reversing design method is proposed to solve this problem, including design and optimization of LIDC to achieve high uniform illumination and a new algorithm of freeform lens to generate the required LIDC by LED light source. According to this method, two new LED modules integrated with freeform lenses are successfully designed for slim direct-lit LED backlighting with thickness of 10mm, and uniformities of illuminance increase from 0.446 to 0.915 and from 0.155 to 0.887 when DHRs are 2 and 3 respectively. Moreover, the number of new LED modules dramatically decreases to 1/9 of the traditional LED modules while achieving similar uniform illumination in backlighting. Therefore, this new method provides a practical and simple way for optical design of LED uniform illumination when DHR is much larger than 1.

A novel scene-based non-uniformity correction method for SWIR push-broom hyperspectral sensors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hu, Bin-Lin; Hao, Shi-Jing; Sun, De-Xin; Liu, Yin-Nian

2017-09-01

A novel scene-based non-uniformity correction (NUC) method for short-wavelength infrared (SWIR) push-broom hyperspectral sensors is proposed and evaluated. This method relies on the assumption that for each band there will be ground objects with similar reflectance to form uniform regions when a sufficient number of scanning lines are acquired. The uniform regions are extracted automatically through a sorting algorithm, and are used to compute the corresponding NUC coefficients. SWIR hyperspectral data from airborne experiment are used to verify and evaluate the proposed method, and results show that stripes in the scenes have been well corrected without any significant information loss, and the non-uniformity is less than 0.5%. In addition, the proposed method is compared to two other regular methods, and they are evaluated based on their adaptability to the various scenes, non-uniformity, roughness and spectral fidelity. It turns out that the proposed method shows strong adaptability, high accuracy and efficiency.

Group 2 Innate Lymphoid Cells Exhibit a Dynamic Phenotype in Allergic Airway Inflammation

PubMed Central

Li, Bobby W. S.; Stadhouders, Ralph; de Bruijn, Marjolein J. W.; Lukkes, Melanie; Beerens, Dior M. J. M.; Brem, Maarten D.; KleinJan, Alex; Bergen, Ingrid; Vroman, Heleen; Kool, Mirjam; van IJcken, Wilfred F. J.; Rao, Tata Nageswara; Fehling, Hans Jörg; Hendriks, Rudi W.

2017-01-01

Group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2) are implicated in allergic asthma as an early innate source of the type 2 cytokines IL-5 and IL-13. However, their induction in house dust mite (HDM)-mediated airway inflammation additionally requires T cell activation. It is currently unknown whether phenotypic differences exist between ILC2s that are activated in a T cell-dependent or T cell-independent fashion. Here, we compared ILC2s in IL-33- and HDM-driven airway inflammation. Using flow cytometry, we found that surface expression levels of various markers frequently used to identify ILC2s were dependent on their mode of activation, highly variable over time, and differed between tissue compartments, including bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid, lung, draining lymph nodes, and spleen. Whereas in vivo IL-33-activated BAL fluid ILC2s exhibited an almost uniform CD25+CD127+T1/ST2+ICOS+KLRG1+ phenotype, at a comparable time point after HDM exposure BAL fluid ILC2s had a very heterogeneous surface marker phenotype. A major fraction of HDM-activated ILC2s were CD25lowCD127+T1/ST2low ICOSlowKLRG1low, but nevertheless had the capacity to produce large amounts of type 2 cytokines. HDM-activated CD25low ILC2s in BAL fluid and lung rapidly reverted to CD25high ILC2s upon in vivo stimulation with IL-33. Genome-wide transcriptional profiling of BAL ILC2s revealed ~1,600 differentially expressed genes: HDM-stimulated ILC2s specifically expressed genes involved in the regulation of adaptive immunity through B and T cell interactions, whereas IL-33-stimulated ILC2s expressed high levels of proliferation-related and cytokine genes. In both airway inflammation models ILC2s were present in the lung submucosa close to epithelial cells, as identified by confocal microscopy. In chronic HDM-driven airway inflammation ILC2s were also found inside organized cellular infiltrates near T cells. Collectively, our findings show that ILC2s are phenotypically more heterogeneous than previously thought, whereby their surface marker and gene expression profile are highly dynamic. PMID:29250067

Internal conflict, market uniformity, and transparency in price competition between teams☆

PubMed Central

Kurschilgen, Michael; Morell, Alexander; Weisel, Ori

2017-01-01

The way profits are divided within successful teams imposes different degrees of internal conflict. We experimentally examine how the level of internal conflict, and whether such conflict is transparent to other teams, affects teams' ability to compete vis-à-vis each other, and, consequently, market outcomes. Participants took part in a repeated Bertrand duopoly game between three-player teams which had either the same or different level of internal conflict (uniform vs. mixed). Profit division was either private-pay (high conflict; each member received her own asking price) or equal-pay (low conflict; profits were divided equally). We find that internal conflict leads to (tacit) coordination on high prices in uniform private-pay duopolies, but places private-pay teams at a competitive disadvantage in mixed duopolies. Competition is softened by transparency in uniform markets, but intensified in mixed markets. We propose an explanation of the results and discuss implications for managers and policy makers. (D43, L22, C92) PMID:29180831

Characterization and Processing of Non-Uniformities in Back-Illuminated CCDs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lemm, Alia D.; Della-Rose, Devin J.; Maddocks, Sally

2018-01-01

In astronomical photometry, Charged Coupled Device (CCD) detectors are used to achieve high precision photometry and must be properly calibrated to correct for noise and pixel non-uniformities. Uncalibrated images may contain bias offset, dark current, bias structure and uneven illumination. In addition, standard data reduction is often not sufficient to “normalize” imagery to single-digit millimagnitude (mmag) precision. We are investigating an apparent non-uniformity, or interference pattern, in a back-illuminated sensor, the Alta U-47, attached to a DFM Engineering 41-cm Ritchey-Chrétien f/8 telescope. Based on the amplitude of this effect, we estimate that instrument magnitude peak-to-valley deviations of 50 mmag or more may result. Our initial testing strongly suggests that reflected skylight from high pressure sodium city lights may be the cause of this interference pattern. Our research goals are twofold: to fully characterize this non-uniformity and to determine the best method to remove this interference pattern from our reduced CCD images.

Intelligent Engine Systems: Acoustics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wojno, John; Martens, Steve; Simpson, Benjamin

2008-01-01

An extensive study of new fan exhaust nozzle technologies was performed. Three new uniform chevron nozzles were designed, based on extensive CFD analysis. Two new azimuthally varying variants were defined. All five were tested, along with two existing nozzles, on a representative model-scale, medium BPR exhaust nozzle. Substantial acoustic benefits were obtained from the uniform chevron nozzle designs, the best benefit being provided by an existing design. However, one of the azimuthally varying nozzle designs exhibited even better performance than any of the uniform chevron nozzles. In addition to the fan chevron nozzles, a new technology was demonstrated, using devices that enhance mixing when applied to an exhaust nozzle. The acoustic benefits from these devices applied to medium BPR nozzles were similar, and in some cases superior to, those obtained from conventional uniform chevron nozzles. However, none of the low noise technologies provided equivalent acoustic benefits on a model-scale high BPR exhaust nozzle, similar to current large commercial applications. New technologies must be identified to improve the acoustics of state-of-the-art high BPR jet engines.

Uniformity of dc and rf performance of MBE-grown AlGaN/GaN HEMTS on HVPE-grown buffers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gillespie, J. K.; Fitch, R. C.; Moser, N.; Jenkins, T.; Sewell, J.; Via, D.; Crespo, A.; Dabiran, A. M.; Chow, P. P.; Osinsky, A.; Mastro, M. A.; Tsvetkov, D.; Soukhoveev, V.; Usikov, A.; Dmitriev, V.; Luo, B.; Pearton, S. J.; Ren, F.

2003-10-01

AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) were grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) on 2 in. diameter GaN buffer layers grown by hydride vapor epitaxy (HVPE) on sapphire substrates. HEMTs with 1 μm gate length displayed excellent dc and rf performance uniformity with up to 258 separate devices measured for each parameter. The drain-source saturation current was 561 mA with a standard deviation of 1.9% over the 2 in. diameter, with a corresponding transconductance of 118 ± 3.9 mS/mm. The threshold voltage was -5.3 ± 0.07 V. The rf performance uniformity was equally good, with an fT of 8.6 ± 0.8 GHz and fmax of 12.8 ± 2.5 GHz. The results show the excellent uniformity of the MBE technique for producing AlGaN/GaN HEMTs and also the ability of HVPE to provide high quality buffers at low cost.

Effective potentials in nonlinear polycrystals and quadrature formulae

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Michel, Jean-Claude; Suquet, Pierre

2017-08-01

This study presents a family of estimates for effective potentials in nonlinear polycrystals. Noting that these potentials are given as averages, several quadrature formulae are investigated to express these integrals of nonlinear functions of local fields in terms of the moments of these fields. Two of these quadrature formulae reduce to known schemes, including a recent proposition (Ponte Castañeda 2015 Proc. R. Soc. A 471, 20150665 (doi:10.1098/rspa.2015.0665)) obtained by completely different means. Other formulae are also reviewed that make use of statistical information on the fields beyond their first and second moments. These quadrature formulae are applied to the estimation of effective potentials in polycrystals governed by two potentials, by means of a reduced-order model proposed by the authors (non-uniform transformation field analysis). It is shown how the quadrature formulae improve on the tangent second-order approximation in porous crystals at high stress triaxiality. It is found that, in order to retrieve a satisfactory accuracy for highly nonlinear porous crystals under high stress triaxiality, a quadrature formula of higher order is required.

Effective potentials in nonlinear polycrystals and quadrature formulae.

PubMed

Michel, Jean-Claude; Suquet, Pierre

2017-08-01

This study presents a family of estimates for effective potentials in nonlinear polycrystals. Noting that these potentials are given as averages, several quadrature formulae are investigated to express these integrals of nonlinear functions of local fields in terms of the moments of these fields. Two of these quadrature formulae reduce to known schemes, including a recent proposition (Ponte Castañeda 2015 Proc. R. Soc. A 471 , 20150665 (doi:10.1098/rspa.2015.0665)) obtained by completely different means. Other formulae are also reviewed that make use of statistical information on the fields beyond their first and second moments. These quadrature formulae are applied to the estimation of effective potentials in polycrystals governed by two potentials, by means of a reduced-order model proposed by the authors (non-uniform transformation field analysis). It is shown how the quadrature formulae improve on the tangent second-order approximation in porous crystals at high stress triaxiality. It is found that, in order to retrieve a satisfactory accuracy for highly nonlinear porous crystals under high stress triaxiality, a quadrature formula of higher order is required.

Uniform magnetic fields in density-functional theory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tellgren, Erik I.; Laestadius, Andre; Helgaker, Trygve; Kvaal, Simen; Teale, Andrew M.

2018-01-01

We construct a density-functional formalism adapted to uniform external magnetic fields that is intermediate between conventional density functional theory and Current-Density Functional Theory (CDFT). In the intermediate theory, which we term linear vector potential-DFT (LDFT), the basic variables are the density, the canonical momentum, and the paramagnetic contribution to the magnetic moment. Both a constrained-search formulation and a convex formulation in terms of Legendre-Fenchel transformations are constructed. Many theoretical issues in CDFT find simplified analogs in LDFT. We prove results concerning N-representability, Hohenberg-Kohn-like mappings, existence of minimizers in the constrained-search expression, and a restricted analog to gauge invariance. The issue of additivity of the energy over non-interacting subsystems, which is qualitatively different in LDFT and CDFT, is also discussed.

The uniform asymptotic swallowtail approximation - Practical methods for oscillating integrals with four coalescing saddle points

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Connor, J. N. L.; Curtis, P. R.; Farrelly, D.

1984-01-01

Methods that can be used in the numerical implementation of the uniform swallowtail approximation are described. An explicit expression for that approximation is presented to the lowest order, showing that there are three problems which must be overcome in practice before the approximation can be applied to any given problem. It is shown that a recently developed quadrature method can be used for the accurate numerical evaluation of the swallowtail canonical integral and its partial derivatives. Isometric plots of these are presented to illustrate some of their properties. The problem of obtaining the arguments of the swallowtail integral from an analytical function of its argument is considered, describing two methods of solving this problem. The asymptotic evaluation of the butterfly canonical integral is addressed.

Potential formulation of the dispersion relation for a uniform, magnetized plasma with stationary ions in terms of a vector phasor

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Johnson, Robert W.

2012-06-01

The derivation of the helicon dispersion relation for a uniform plasma with stationary ions subject to a constant background magnetic field is reexamined in terms of the potential formulation of electrodynamics. Under the same conditions considered by the standard derivation, the nonlinear self-coupling between the perturbed electron flow and the potential it generates is addressed. The plane wave solution for general propagation vector is determined for all frequencies and expressed in terms of a vector phasor. The behavior of the solution as described in vacuum units depends upon the ratio of conductivity to the magnitude of the background field. Only at low conductivity and below, the cyclotron frequency can significant propagation occur as determined by the ratio of skin depth to wavelength.

Overcoming the Invisibility of Metrology: A Reading Measurement Network for Education and the Social Sciences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fisher, William P., Jr.; Stenner, A. Jackson

2013-09-01

The public and researchers in psychology and the social sciences are largely unaware of the huge resources invested in metrology and standards in science and commerce, for understandable reasons, but with unfortunate consequences. Measurement quality varies widely in fields lacking uniform standards, making it impossible to coordinate local behaviours and decisions in tune with individually observed instrument readings. However, recent developments in reading measurement have effectively instituted metrological traceability methods within elementary and secondary English and Spanish language reading education in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and Australia. Given established patterns in the history of science, it may be reasonable to expect that widespread routine reproduction of controlled effects expressed in uniform units in the social sciences may lead to significant developments in theory and practice.

Uniform magnetic fields in density-functional theory.

PubMed

Tellgren, Erik I; Laestadius, Andre; Helgaker, Trygve; Kvaal, Simen; Teale, Andrew M

2018-01-14

We construct a density-functional formalism adapted to uniform external magnetic fields that is intermediate between conventional density functional theory and Current-Density Functional Theory (CDFT). In the intermediate theory, which we term linear vector potential-DFT (LDFT), the basic variables are the density, the canonical momentum, and the paramagnetic contribution to the magnetic moment. Both a constrained-search formulation and a convex formulation in terms of Legendre-Fenchel transformations are constructed. Many theoretical issues in CDFT find simplified analogs in LDFT. We prove results concerning N-representability, Hohenberg-Kohn-like mappings, existence of minimizers in the constrained-search expression, and a restricted analog to gauge invariance. The issue of additivity of the energy over non-interacting subsystems, which is qualitatively different in LDFT and CDFT, is also discussed.

Small non-coding RNA profiling in human biofluids and surrogate tissues from healthy individuals: description of the diverse and most represented species.

PubMed

Ferrero, Giulio; Cordero, Francesca; Tarallo, Sonia; Arigoni, Maddalena; Riccardo, Federica; Gallo, Gaetano; Ronco, Guglielmo; Allasia, Marco; Kulkarni, Neha; Matullo, Giuseppe; Vineis, Paolo; Calogero, Raffaele A; Pardini, Barbara; Naccarati, Alessio

2018-01-09

The role of non-coding RNAs in different biological processes and diseases is continuously expanding. Next-generation sequencing together with the parallel improvement of bioinformatics analyses allows the accurate detection and quantification of an increasing number of RNA species. With the aim of exploring new potential biomarkers for disease classification, a clear overview of the expression levels of common/unique small RNA species among different biospecimens is necessary. However, except for miRNAs in plasma, there are no substantial indications about the pattern of expression of various small RNAs in multiple specimens among healthy humans. By analysing small RNA-sequencing data from 243 samples, we have identified and compared the most abundantly and uniformly expressed miRNAs and non-miRNA species of comparable size with the library preparation in four different specimens (plasma exosomes, stool, urine, and cervical scrapes). Eleven miRNAs were commonly detected among all different specimens while 231 miRNAs were globally unique across them. Classification analysis using these miRNAs provided an accuracy of 99.6% to recognize the sample types. piRNAs and tRNAs were the most represented non-miRNA small RNAs detected in all specimen types that were analysed, particularly in urine samples. With the present data, the most uniformly expressed small RNAs in each sample type were also identified. A signature of small RNAs for each specimen could represent a reference gene set in validation studies by RT-qPCR. Overall, the data reported hereby provide an insight of the constitution of the human miRNome and of other small non-coding RNAs in various specimens of healthy individuals.

Effect of wafer geometry on lithography chucking processes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Turner, Kevin T.; Sinha, Jaydeep K.

2015-03-01

Wafer flatness during exposure in lithography tools is critical and is becoming more important as feature sizes in devices shrink. While chucks are used to support and flatten the wafer during exposure, it is essential that wafer geometry be controlled as well. Thickness variations of the wafer and high-frequency wafer shape components can lead to poor flatness of the chucked wafer and ultimately patterning problems, such as defocus errors. The objective of this work is to understand how process-induced wafer geometry, resulting from deposited films with non-uniform stress, can lead to high-frequency wafer shape variations that prevent complete chucking in lithography scanners. In this paper, we discuss both the acceptable limits of wafer shape that permit complete chucking to be achieved, and how non-uniform residual stresses in films, either due to patterning or process non-uniformity, can induce high spatial frequency wafer shape components that prevent chucking. This paper describes mechanics models that relate non-uniform film stress to wafer shape and presents results for two example cases. The models and results can be used as a basis for establishing control strategies for managing process-induced wafer geometry in order to avoid wafer flatness-induced errors in lithography processes.

Light sheet theta microscopy for rapid high-resolution imaging of large biological samples.

PubMed

Migliori, Bianca; Datta, Malika S; Dupre, Christophe; Apak, Mehmet C; Asano, Shoh; Gao, Ruixuan; Boyden, Edward S; Hermanson, Ola; Yuste, Rafael; Tomer, Raju

2018-05-29

Advances in tissue clearing and molecular labeling methods are enabling unprecedented optical access to large intact biological systems. These developments fuel the need for high-speed microscopy approaches to image large samples quantitatively and at high resolution. While light sheet microscopy (LSM), with its high planar imaging speed and low photo-bleaching, can be effective, scaling up to larger imaging volumes has been hindered by the use of orthogonal light sheet illumination. To address this fundamental limitation, we have developed light sheet theta microscopy (LSTM), which uniformly illuminates samples from the same side as the detection objective, thereby eliminating limits on lateral dimensions without sacrificing the imaging resolution, depth, and speed. We present a detailed characterization of LSTM, and demonstrate its complementary advantages over LSM for rapid high-resolution quantitative imaging of large intact samples with high uniform quality. The reported LSTM approach is a significant step for the rapid high-resolution quantitative mapping of the structure and function of very large biological systems, such as a clarified thick coronal slab of human brain and uniformly expanded tissues, and also for rapid volumetric calcium imaging of highly motile animals, such as Hydra, undergoing non-isomorphic body shape changes.

Bayesian Correlation Analysis for Sequence Count Data

PubMed Central

Lau, Nelson; Perkins, Theodore J.

2016-01-01

Evaluating the similarity of different measured variables is a fundamental task of statistics, and a key part of many bioinformatics algorithms. Here we propose a Bayesian scheme for estimating the correlation between different entities’ measurements based on high-throughput sequencing data. These entities could be different genes or miRNAs whose expression is measured by RNA-seq, different transcription factors or histone marks whose expression is measured by ChIP-seq, or even combinations of different types of entities. Our Bayesian formulation accounts for both measured signal levels and uncertainty in those levels, due to varying sequencing depth in different experiments and to varying absolute levels of individual entities, both of which affect the precision of the measurements. In comparison with a traditional Pearson correlation analysis, we show that our Bayesian correlation analysis retains high correlations when measurement confidence is high, but suppresses correlations when measurement confidence is low—especially for entities with low signal levels. In addition, we consider the influence of priors on the Bayesian correlation estimate. Perhaps surprisingly, we show that naive, uniform priors on entities’ signal levels can lead to highly biased correlation estimates, particularly when different experiments have widely varying sequencing depths. However, we propose two alternative priors that provably mitigate this problem. We also prove that, like traditional Pearson correlation, our Bayesian correlation calculation constitutes a kernel in the machine learning sense, and thus can be used as a similarity measure in any kernel-based machine learning algorithm. We demonstrate our approach on two RNA-seq datasets and one miRNA-seq dataset. PMID:27701449

The Moon Mineralogy (M3) Imaging Spectrometer: Early Assessment of the Spectral, Radiometric, Spatial and Uniformity Properties

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Green, Robert O.; Pieters, C. M.; Boardman, J.; Barr, D.; Bruce, C.; Bousman, J.; Chatterjee, A.; Eastwood, M.; Essandoh, V.; Geier, S.;

Many-junction photovoltaic device performance under non-uniform high-concentration illumination

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Valdivia, Christopher E.; Wilkins, Matthew M.; Chahal, Sanmeet S.; Proulx, Francine; Provost, Philippe-Olivier; Masson, Denis P.; Fafard, Simon; Hinzer, Karin

2017-09-01

A parameterized 3D distributed circuit model was developed to calculate the performance of III-V solar cells and photonic power converters (PPC) with a variable number of epitaxial vertically-stacked pn junctions. PPC devices are designed with many pn junctions to realize higher voltages and to operate under non-uniform illumination profiles from a laser or LED. Performance impacts of non-uniform illumination were greatly reduced with increasing number of junctions, with simulations comparing PPC devices with 3 to 20 junctions. Experimental results using Azastra Opto's 12- and 20-junction PPC illuminated by an 845 nm diode laser show high performance even with a small gap between the PPC and optical fiber output, until the local tunnel junction limit is reached.

Early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer: neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin as a marker of pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasia

PubMed Central

Moniaux, N; Chakraborty, S; Yalniz, M; Gonzalez, J; Shostrom, V K; Standop, J; Lele, S M; Ouellette, M; Pour, P M; Sasson, A R; Brand, R E; Hollingsworth, M A; Jain, M; Batra, S K

2008-01-01

Pancreatic cancer is a highly lethal malignancy with a dismal 5-year survival of less than 5%. The scarcity of early biomarkers has considerably hindered our ability to launch preventive measures for this malignancy in a timely manner. Neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL), a 24-kDa glycoprotein, was reported to be upregulated nearly 27-fold in pancreatic cancer cells compared to normal ductal cells in a microarray analysis. Given the need for biomarkers in the early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, we investigated the expression of NGAL in tissues with the objective of examining if NGAL immunostaining could be used to identify foci of pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasia, premalignant lesions preceding invasive cancer. To examine a possible correlation between NGAL expression and the degree of differentiation, we also analysed NGAL levels in pancreatic cancer cell lines with varying grades of differentiation. Although NGAL expression was strongly upregulated in pancreatic cancer, and moderately in pancreatitis, only a weak expression could be detected in the healthy pancreas. The average composite score for adenocarcinoma (4.26±2.44) was significantly higher than that for the normal pancreas (1.0) or pancreatitis (1.0) (P<0.0001). Further, although both well- and moderately differentiated pancreatic cancer were positive for NGAL, poorly differentiated adenocarcinoma was uniformly negative. Importantly, NGAL expression was detected as early as the PanIN-1 stage, suggesting that it could be a marker of the earliest premalignant changes in the pancreas. Further, we examined NGAL levels in serum samples. Serum NGAL levels were above the cutoff for healthy individuals in 94% of pancreatic cancer and 62.5% each of acute and chronic pancreatitis samples. However, the difference between NGAL levels in pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer was not significant. A ROC curve analysis revealed that ELISA for NGAL is fairly accurate in distinguishing pancreatic cancer from non-cancer cases (area under curve=0.75). In conclusion, NGAL is highly expressed in early dysplastic lesions in the pancreas, suggesting a possible role as an early diagnostic marker for pancreatic cancer. Further, serum NGAL measurement could be investigated as a possible biomarker in pancreatitis and pancreatic adenocarcinoma. PMID:18392050

Which missing value imputation method to use in expression profiles: a comparative study and two selection schemes.

PubMed

Brock, Guy N; Shaffer, John R; Blakesley, Richard E; Lotz, Meredith J; Tseng, George C

2008-01-10

Gene expression data frequently contain missing values, however, most down-stream analyses for microarray experiments require complete data. In the literature many methods have been proposed to estimate missing values via information of the correlation patterns within the gene expression matrix. Each method has its own advantages, but the specific conditions for which each method is preferred remains largely unclear. In this report we describe an extensive evaluation of eight current imputation methods on multiple types of microarray experiments, including time series, multiple exposures, and multiple exposures x time series data. We then introduce two complementary selection schemes for determining the most appropriate imputation method for any given data set. We found that the optimal imputation algorithms (LSA, LLS, and BPCA) are all highly competitive with each other, and that no method is uniformly superior in all the data sets we examined. The success of each method can also depend on the underlying "complexity" of the expression data, where we take complexity to indicate the difficulty in mapping the gene expression matrix to a lower-dimensional subspace. We developed an entropy measure to quantify the complexity of expression matrixes and found that, by incorporating this information, the entropy-based selection (EBS) scheme is useful for selecting an appropriate imputation algorithm. We further propose a simulation-based self-training selection (STS) scheme. This technique has been used previously for microarray data imputation, but for different purposes. The scheme selects the optimal or near-optimal method with high accuracy but at an increased computational cost. Our findings provide insight into the problem of which imputation method is optimal for a given data set. Three top-performing methods (LSA, LLS and BPCA) are competitive with each other. Global-based imputation methods (PLS, SVD, BPCA) performed better on mcroarray data with lower complexity, while neighbour-based methods (KNN, OLS, LSA, LLS) performed better in data with higher complexity. We also found that the EBS and STS schemes serve as complementary and effective tools for selecting the optimal imputation algorithm.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kubo, Yoshinao; Yoshii, Hiroaki; Kamiyama, Haruka

Ezrin, radixin, and moesin (ERM) proteins supply functional linkage between integral membrane proteins and cytoskeleton in mammalian cells to regulate membrane protein dynamisms and cytoskeleton rearrangement. To assess potential role of the ERM proteins in HIV-1 lifecycle, we examined if suppression of ERM function in human cells expressing HIV-1 infection receptors influences HIV-1 envelope (Env)-mediated HIV-1-vector transduction and cell-cell fusion. Expression of an ezrin dominant negative mutant or knockdown of ezrin, radixin, or moesin with siRNA uniformly decreased transduction titers of HIV-1 vectors having X4-tropic Env. In contrast, transduction titers of R5-tropic Env HIV-1 vectors were decreased only by radixinmore » knockdown: ezrin knockdown had no detectable effects and moesin knockdown rather increased transduction titer. Each of the ERM suppressions had no detectable effects on cell surface expression of CD4, CCR5, and CXCR4 or VSV-Env-mediated HIV-1 vector transductions. Finally, the individual knockdown of ERM mRNAs uniformly decreased efficiency of cell-cell fusion mediated by X4- or R5-tropic Env and HIV-1 infection receptors. These results suggest that (i) the ERM proteins function as positive regulators of infection by X4-tropic HIV-1, (ii) moesin additionally functions as a negative regulator of R5-tropic HIV-1 virus infection at the early step(s) after the membrane fusion, and (iii) receptor protein dynamisms are regulated differently in R5- and X4-tropic HIV-1 infections.« less

l-Arginine induces antioxidant response to prevent oxidative stress via stimulation of glutathione synthesis and activation of Nrf2 pathway.

PubMed

Liang, Mingcai; Wang, Zhengxuan; Li, Hui; Cai, Liang; Pan, Jianghao; He, Hongjuan; Wu, Qiong; Tang, Yinzhao; Ma, Jiapei; Yang, Lin

2018-05-01

Arginine is a conditionally essential amino acid. To elucidate the influence of l-arginine on the activation of endogenous antioxidant defence, male Wistar rats were orally administered daily with l-arginine at different levels of 25, 50, 100 mg/100 g body weight. After 7 and 14 days feeding, the antioxidative capacities and glutathione (GSH) contents in the plasma and in the liver were uniformly enhanced with the increasing consumption of l-arginine, whereas the oxidative stress was effectively suppressed by l-arginine treatment. After 14 days feeding, the mRNA levels and protein expressions of Keap1 and Cul3 were gradually reduced by increasing l-arginine intake, resulting that the nuclear factor Nrf2 was activated. Upon activation of Nrf2, the expressions of antioxidant responsive element (ARE)-dependent genes and proteins (GCLC, GCLM, GS, GR, GST, GPx, CAT, SOD, NQO1, HO-1) were up-regulated by l-arginine feeding, indicating an upward trend in antioxidant capacity uniformly with the increasing consumption of l-arginine. The present study demonstrates that the supplementation of l-arginine stimulates GSH synthesis and activates Nrf2 pathway, leading to the up-regulation of ARE-driven antioxidant expressions via Nrf2-Keap1 pathway. Results suggest the availability of l-arginine is a critical factor to suppress oxidative stress and induce an endogenous antioxidant response. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Uniform cell-autonomous tumorigenesis of the choroid plexus by papovavirus large T antigens.

PubMed Central

Chen, J D; Van Dyke, T

1991-01-01

The simian virus 40 (SV40) large tumor antigen (T antigen) under its natural regulatory elements induces choroid plexus papillomas in transgenic mice. Because these tumors develop focally after several months, it has been suggested that secondary cellular alterations are required to induce a tumor in this tissue. In contrast to SV40, the related lymphotropic papovavirus early region induces rapid nonfocal choroid plexus neoplasia in transgenic mice. Here, using hybrid gene constructs, we showed that T antigen from either virus in in fact sufficient to induce these tumors. Their abilities to induce proliferative abnormalities in other tissues, such as kidney and thymus, were also indistinguishable. Differences in the rate of choroid plexus tumorigenesis reflected differences in the control regions of the two viruses, rather than differences in T antigen per se. Under SV40 regulation, expression was limited to a fraction of the choroid plexus cells prior to the formation of focal tumors. When SV40 T antigen was placed under lymphotropic papovavirus control, in contrast, expression was generally uniform in the choroid plexus and rapid expansion of the tissue ensued. We found a direct relationship between T-antigen expression, morphological transformation, and proliferation of the choroid plexus epithelial cells. Analysis of mosaic transgenic mice indicated further that T antigen exerts its mitogenic effect cell autonomously. These studies form the foundation for elucidating the role of various T-antigen subactivities in tumorigenesis. Images PMID:1658622

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Tomai, S.; Graduate School of Material Science, Nara Institute of Science and Technology, 8916-5, Takayama-cho, Ikoma, Nara 6300192; Terai, K.

We have developed a high-mobility and high-uniform oxide semiconductor using poly-crystalline semiconductor material composed of indium and zinc (p-IZO). A typical conduction mechanism of p-IZO film was demonstrated by the grain boundary scattering model as in polycrystalline silicon. The grain boundary potential of the 2-h-annealed IZO film was calculated to be 100 meV, which was comparable to that of the polycrystalline silicon. However, the p-IZO thin film transistor (TFT) measurement shows rather uniform characteristics. It denotes that the mobility deterioration around the grain boundaries is lower than the case for low-temperature polycrystalline silicon. This assertion was made based on the differencemore » of the mobility between the polycrystalline and amorphous IZO film being much smaller than is the case for silicon transistors. Therefore, we conclude that the p-IZO is a promising material for a TFT channel, which realizes high drift mobility and uniformity simultaneously.« less

Highly Uniform Carbon Nanotube Field-Effect Transistors and Medium Scale Integrated Circuits.

PubMed

Chen, Bingyan; Zhang, Panpan; Ding, Li; Han, Jie; Qiu, Song; Li, Qingwen; Zhang, Zhiyong; Peng, Lian-Mao

2016-08-10

Top-gated p-type field-effect transistors (FETs) have been fabricated in batch based on carbon nanotube (CNT) network thin films prepared from CNT solution and present high yield and highly uniform performance with small threshold voltage distribution with standard deviation of 34 mV. According to the property of FETs, various logical and arithmetical gates, shifters, and d-latch circuits were designed and demonstrated with rail-to-rail output. In particular, a 4-bit adder consisting of 140 p-type CNT FETs was demonstrated with higher packing density and lower supply voltage than other published integrated circuits based on CNT films, which indicates that CNT based integrated circuits can reach to medium scale. In addition, a 2-bit multiplier has been realized for the first time. Benefitted from the high uniformity and suitable threshold voltage of CNT FETs, all of the fabricated circuits based on CNT FETs can be driven by a single voltage as small as 2 V.

High compositional homogeneity of CdTe{sub x}Se{sub 1−x} crystals grown by the Bridgman method

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Roy, U. N.; Bolotnikov, A. E.; Camarda, G. S.

2015-02-01

We obtained high-quality CdTe{sub x}Se{sub 1−x} (CdTeSe) crystals from ingots grown by the vertical Bridgman technique. The compositional uniformity of the ingots was evaluated by X-ray fluorescence at BNL’s National Synchrotron Light Source X27A beam line. The compositional homogeneity was highly uniform throughout the ingot, and the effective segregation coefficient of Se was ∼1.0. This high uniformity offers potential opportunity to enhance the yield of the materials for both infrared substrate and radiation-detector applications, so greatly lowering the cost of production and also offering us the prospect to grow large-diameter ingots for use as large-area substrates and for producing highermore » efficiency gamma-ray detectors. The concentration of secondary phases was found to be much lower, by eight- to ten fold compared to that of conventional Cd{sub x}Zn{sub 1−x}Te (CdZnTe or CZT)« less

Fabrication of semiconductor-polymer compound nonlinear photonic crystal slab with highly uniform infiltration based on nano-imprint lithography technique.

PubMed

Qin, Fei; Meng, Zi-Ming; Zhong, Xiao-Lan; Liu, Ye; Li, Zhi-Yuan

2012-06-04

We present a versatile technique based on nano-imprint lithography to fabricate high-quality semiconductor-polymer compound nonlinear photonic crystal (NPC) slabs. The approach allows one to infiltrate uniformly polystyrene materials that possess large Kerr nonlinearity and ultrafast nonlinear response into the cylindrical air holes with diameter of hundred nanometers that are perforated in silicon membranes. Both the structural characterization via the cross-sectional scanning electron microscopy images and the optical characterization via the transmission spectrum measurement undoubtedly show that the fabricated compound NPC samples have uniform and dense polymer infiltration and are of high quality in optical properties. The compound NPC samples exhibit sharp transmission band edges and nondegraded high quality factor of microcavities compared with those in the bare silicon PC. The versatile method can be expanded to make general semiconductor-polymer hybrid optical nanostructures, and thus it may pave the way for reliable and efficient fabrication of ultrafast and ultralow power all-optical tunable integrated photonic devices and circuits.

Precisely Controlled Ultrathin Conjugated Polymer Films for Large Area Transparent Transistors and Highly Sensitive Chemical Sensors.

PubMed

Khim, Dongyoon; Ryu, Gi-Seong; Park, Won-Tae; Kim, Hyunchul; Lee, Myungwon; Noh, Yong-Young

2016-04-13

A uniform ultrathin polymer film is deposited over a large area with molecularlevel precision by the simple wire-wound bar-coating method. The bar-coated ultrathin films not only exhibit high transparency of up to 90% in the visible wavelength range but also high charge carrier mobility with a high degree of percolation through the uniformly covered polymer nanofibrils. They are capable of realizing highly sensitive multigas sensors and represent the first successful report of ethylene detection using a sensor based on organic field-effect transistors. © 2016 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Allocation of distinct organ fates from a precursor field requires a shift in expression and function of gene regulatory networks

PubMed Central

Zhu, Jinjin; Baker, Luke R.; Bashirullah, Arash

2018-01-01

A common occurrence in metazoan development is the rise of multiple tissues/organs from a single uniform precursor field. One example is the anterior forebrain of vertebrates, which produces the eyes, hypothalamus, diencephalon, and telencephalon. Another instance is the Drosophila wing disc, which generates the adult wing blade, the hinge, and the thorax. Gene regulatory networks (GRNs) that are comprised of signaling pathways and batteries of transcription factors parcel the undifferentiated field into discrete territories. This simple model is challenged by two observations. First, many GRN members that are thought to control the fate of one organ are actually expressed throughout the entire precursor field at earlier points in development. Second, each GRN can simultaneously promote one of the possible fates choices while repressing the other alternatives. It is therefore unclear how GRNs function to allocate tissue fates if their members are uniformly expressed and competing with each other within the same populations of cells. We address this paradigm by studying fate specification in the Drosophila eye-antennal disc. The disc, which begins its development as a homogeneous precursor field, produces a number of adult structures including the compound eyes, the ocelli, the antennae, the maxillary palps, and the surrounding head epidermis. Several selector genes that control the fates of the eye and antenna, respectively, are first expressed throughout the entire eye-antennal disc. We show that during early stages, these genes are tasked with promoting the growth of the entire field. Upon segregation to distinct territories within the disc, each GRN continues to promote growth while taking on the additional roles of promoting distinct primary fates and repressing alternate fates. The timing of both expression pattern restriction and expansion of functional duties is an elemental requirement for allocating fates within a single field. PMID:29351292

Genetic parameters for uniformity of harvest weight and body size traits in the GIFT strain of Nile tilapia.

PubMed

Marjanovic, Jovana; Mulder, Han A; Khaw, Hooi L; Bijma, Piter

2016-06-10

Animal breeding programs have been very successful in improving the mean levels of traits through selection. However, in recent decades, reducing the variability of trait levels between individuals has become a highly desirable objective. Reaching this objective through genetic selection requires that there is genetic variation in the variability of trait levels, a phenomenon known as genetic heterogeneity of environmental (residual) variance. The aim of our study was to investigate the potential for genetic improvement of uniformity of harvest weight and body size traits (length, depth, and width) in the genetically improved farmed tilapia (GIFT) strain. In order to quantify the genetic variation in uniformity of traits and estimate the genetic correlations between level and variance of the traits, double hierarchical generalized linear models were applied to individual trait values. Our results showed substantial genetic variation in uniformity of all analyzed traits, with genetic coefficients of variation for residual variance ranging from 39 to 58 %. Genetic correlation between trait level and variance was strongly positive for harvest weight (0.60 ± 0.09), moderate and positive for body depth (0.37 ± 0.13), but not significantly different from 0 for body length and width. Our results on the genetic variation in uniformity of harvest weight and body size traits show good prospects for the genetic improvement of uniformity in the GIFT strain. A high and positive genetic correlation was estimated between level and variance of harvest weight, which suggests that selection for heavier fish will also result in more variation in harvest weight. Simultaneous improvement of harvest weight and its uniformity will thus require index selection.

Brightness temperature - obtaining the physical properties of a non-equipartition plasma

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nokhrina, E. E.

2017-06-01

The limit on the intrinsic brightness temperature, attributed to `Compton catastrophe', has been established being 1012 K. Somewhat lower limit of the order of 1011.5 K is implied if we assume that the radiating plasma is in equipartition with the magnetic field - the idea that explained why the observed cores of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) sustained the limit lower than the `Compton catastrophe'. Recent observations with unprecedented high resolution by the RadioAstron have revealed systematic exceed in the observed brightness temperature. We propose means of estimating the degree of the non-equipartition regime in AGN cores. Coupled with the core-shift measurements, the method allows us to independently estimate the magnetic field strength and the particle number density at the core. We show that the ratio of magnetic energy to radiating plasma energy is of the order of 10-5, which means the flow in the core is dominated by the particle energy. We show that the magnetic field obtained by the brightness temperature measurements may be underestimated. We propose for the relativistic jets with small viewing angles the non-uniform magnetohydrodynamic model and obtain the expression for the magnetic field amplitude about two orders higher than that for the uniform model. These magnetic field amplitudes are consistent with the limiting magnetic field suggested by the `magnetically arrested disc' model.

Cancer Risk Assessment for Space Radiation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Richmond, Robert C.; Cruz, Angela; Bors, Karen; Curreri, Peter A. (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

Predicting the occurrence of human cancer following exposure to any agent causing genetic damage is a difficult task. This is because the uncertainty of uniform exposure to the damaging agent, and the uncertainty of uniform processing of that damage within a complex set of biological variables, degrade the confidence of predicting the delayed expression of cancer as a relatively rare event within any given clinically normal individual. The radiation health research priorities for enabling long-duration human exploration of space were established in the 1996 NRC Report entitled 'Radiation Hazards to Crews of Interplanetary Missions: Biological Issues and Research Strategies'. This report emphasized that a 15-fold uncertainty in predicting radiation-induced cancer incidence must be reduced before NASA can commit humans to extended interplanetary missions. That report concluded that the great majority of this uncertainty is biologically based, while a minority is physically based due to uncertainties in radiation dosimetry and radiation transport codes. Since that report, the biologically based uncertainty has remained large, and the relatively small uncertainty associated with radiation dosimetry has increased due to the considerations raised by concepts of microdosimetry. In a practical sense, however, the additional uncertainties introduced by microdosimetry are encouraging since they are in a direction of lowered effective dose absorbed through infrequent interactions of any given cell with the high energy particle component of space radiation. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

Survey of the variation in ultraviolet outputs from ultraviolet A sunbeds in Bradford.

PubMed

Wright, A L; Hart, G C; Kernohan, E; Twentyman, G

1996-02-01

Concerns have been expressed for some time regarding the growth of the cosmetic suntanning industry and the potential harmful effects resulting from these exposures. Recently published work has appeared to confirm a link between sunbed use and skin cancer. A previous survey in Oxford some years ago demonstrated significant output variations, and we have attempted to extend and update that work. Ultraviolet A, UVB and blue-light output measurements were made on 50 sunbeds using a radiometer fitted with broad-band filters and detectors. A number of irradiance measurements were made on each sunbed within each waveband so that the uniformity of the output could also be assessed. UVA outputs varied by a factor of 3, with a mean of 13.5 mW/cm2; UVB outputs varied by a factor of 60, with a mean of 19.2 microW/cm2; and blue-light outputs varied by a factor of 2.5, with a mean of 2.5 mW/cm2. Outputs fall on average to 80% of the central value at either end of the sunbed. Facial units in sunbeds ranged in output between 18 and 45 mW/cm2. Output uniformity shows wide variation, with 16% of the sunbeds having an axial coefficient of variation > 10%. UVB output is highly tube-specific. Eyewear used in sunbeds should also protect against blue light.

Soliton matter in the two-dimensional linear sigma model

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dodd, L.R.; Lohe, M.A.; Rossi, M.

1987-10-01

We consider a one-dimensional model of nuclear matter where the quark clusters are described by solutions of the sigma model on a linear lattice in the self-consistent mean field approximation. Exact expressions are given for the baglike solutions confined to a finite interval, corresponding in the infinite interval limit to the free solitons previously found by Campbell and Liao. Periodic, self-consistent solutions which satisfy Bloch's theorem are constructed. Their energies and associated quark sigma field distributions are calculated numerically as functions of the baryon spacing, and compared with those of the uniform quark plasma. The predicted configuration of the groundmore » state depends critically on the assumed manner of filling the lowest band of quark single-particle levels, and on the density. In the absence of additional repulsive forces in the model, we find that the high density massless quark plasma is energetically favored and that there is a smooth transition from the baglike state to a uniform plasma with nonvanishing sigma field at comparatively large lattice constants 2dapprox. =10m/sub q//sup -1/ (m/sub q/ is the quark mass). If dilute filling of the entire band is employed, the clustered state is stable and a first order phase transition can occur for a range of much smaller lattice spacings 2dapprox. =4m/sub q//sup -1/. .AE« less

Dynamic ductile fracture of a central crack

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tsai, Y. M.

1976-01-01

A central crack, symmetrically growing at a constant speed in a two dimensional ductile material subject to uniform tension at infinity, is investigated using the integral transform methods. The crack is assumed to be the Dugdale crack, and the finite stress condition at the crack tip is satisfied during the propagation of the crack. Exact expressions of solution are obtained for the finite stress condition at the crack tip, the crack shape, the crack opening displacement, and the energy release rate. All those expressions are written as the product of explicit dimensional quantities and a nondimensional dynamic correction function. The expressions reduce to the associated static results when the crack speed tends to zero, and the nondimensional dynamic correction functions were calculated for various values of the parameter involved.

Cell division in Escherichia coli cultures monitored at single cell resolution

PubMed Central

Roostalu, Johanna; Jõers, Arvi; Luidalepp, Hannes; Kaldalu, Niilo; Tenson, Tanel

2008-01-01

Background A fundamental characteristic of cells is the ability to divide. To date, most parameters of bacterial cultures, including cell division, have been measured as cell population averages, assuming that all bacteria divide at a uniform rate. Results We monitored the division of individual cells in Escherichia coli cultures during different growth phases. Our experiments are based on the dilution of green fluorescent protein (GFP) upon cell division, monitored by flow cytometry. The results show that the vast majority of E. coli cells in exponentially growing cultures divided uniformly. In cultures that had been in stationary phase up to four days, no cell division was observed. However, upon dilution of stationary phase culture into fresh medium, two subpopulations of cells emerged: one that started dividing and another that did not. These populations were detectable by GFP dilution and displayed different side scatter parameters in flow cytometry. Further analysis showed that bacteria in the non-growing subpopulation were not dead, neither was the difference in growth capacity reducible to differences in stationary phase-specific gene expression since we observed uniform expression of several stress-related promoters. The presence of non-growing persisters, temporarily dormant bacteria that are tolerant to antibiotics, has previously been described within growing bacterial populations. Using the GFP dilution method combined with cell sorting, we showed that ampicillin lyses growing bacteria while non-growing bacteria retain viability and that some of them restart growth after the ampicillin is removed. Thus, our method enables persisters to be monitored even in liquid cultures of wild type strains in which persister formation has low frequency. Conclusion In principle, the approaches developed here could be used to detect differences in cell division in response to different environmental conditions and in cultures of unicellular organisms other than E. coli. PMID:18430255

Highly uniform residual layers for arrays of 3D nanoimprinted cavities in Fabry-Pérot-filter-array-based nanospectrometers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Memon, Imran; Shen, Yannan; Khan, Abdullah; Woidt, Carsten; Hillmer, Hartmut

2016-04-01

Miniaturized optical spectrometers can be implemented by an array of Fabry-Pérot (FP) filters. FP filters are composed of two highly reflecting parallel mirrors and a resonance cavity. Each filter transmits a small spectral band (filter line) depending on its individual cavity height. The optical nanospectrometer, a miniaturized FP-based spectrometer, implements 3D NanoImprint technology for the fabrication of multiple FP filter cavities in a single process step. However, it is challenging to avoid the dependency of residual layer (RL) thickness on the shape of the printed patterns in NanoImprint. Since in a nanospectrometer the filter cavities vary in height between neighboring FP filters and, thus, the volume of each cavity varies causing that the RL varies slightly or noticeably between different filters. This is one of the few disadvantages of NanoImprint using soft templates such as substrate conformal imprint lithography which is used in this paper. The advantages of large area soft templates can be revealed substantially if the problem of laterally inhomogeneous RLs can be avoided or reduced considerably. In the case of the nanospectrometer, non-uniform RLs lead to random variations in the designed cavity heights resulting in the shift of desired filter lines. To achieve highly uniform RLs, we report a volume-equalized template design with the lateral distribution of 64 different cavity heights into several units with each unit comprising four cavity heights. The average volume of each unit is kept constant to obtain uniform filling of imprint material per unit area. The imprint results, based on the volume-equalized template, demonstrate highly uniform RLs of 110 nm thickness.

The Spatially Uniform Spectrum of the Fermi Bubbles: The Leptonic Active Galactic Nucleus Jet Scenario

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, H.-Y. K.; Ruszkowski, M.

2017-11-01

The Fermi bubbles are among the most important findings of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope; however, their origin is still elusive. One of the unique features of the bubbles is that their gamma-ray spectrum, including a high-energy cutoff at ˜110 GeV and the overall shape of the spectrum, is nearly spatially uniform. The high-energy spectral cutoff is suggestive of a leptonic origin due to synchrotron and inverse-Compton cooling of cosmic-ray (CR) electrons; however, even for a leptonic model, it is not obvious why the spectrum should be spatially uniform. In this work, we investigate the bubble formation in the leptonic active galactic nucleus (AGN) jet scenario using a new CRSPEC module in FLASH that allows us to track the evolution of a CR spectrum during the simulations. We show that the high-energy cutoff is caused by fast electron cooling near the Galactic center (GC) when the jets were launched. Afterwards, the dynamical timescale becomes the shortest among all relevant timescales, and therefore the spectrum is essentially advected with only mild cooling losses. This could explain why the bubble spectrum is nearly spatially uniform: the CRs from different parts of the bubbles as seen today all share the same origin near the GC at an early stage of the bubble expansion. We find that the predicted CR spatial and spectral distribution can simultaneously match the normalization, spectral shape, and high-energy cutoff of the observed gamma-ray spectrum and their spatial uniformity, suggesting that past AGN jet activity is a likely mechanism for the formation of the Fermi bubbles.

Design of light guide sleeve on hyperspectral imaging system for skin diagnosis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yan, Yung-Jhe; Chang, Chao-Hsin; Huang, Ting-Wei; Chiang, Hou-Chi; Wu, Jeng-Fu; Ou-Yang, Mang

2017-08-01

A hyperspectral imaging system is proposed for early study of skin diagnosis. A stable and high hyperspectral image quality is important for analysis. Therefore, a light guide sleeve (LGS) was designed for the embedded on a hyperspectral imaging system. It provides a uniform light source on the object plane with the determined distance. Furthermore, it can shield the ambient light from entering the system and increasing noise. For the purpose of producing a uniform light source, the LGS device was designed in the symmetrical double-layered structure. It has light cut structures to adjust distribution of rays between two layers and has the Lambertian surface in the front-end to promote output uniformity. In the simulation of the design, the uniformity of illuminance was about 91.7%. In the measurement of the actual light guide sleeve, the uniformity of illuminance was about 92.5%.

Differential Network Analysis Reveals Evolutionary Complexity in Secondary Metabolism of Rauvolfia serpentina over Catharanthus roseus

PubMed Central

Pathania, Shivalika; Bagler, Ganesh; Ahuja, Paramvir S.

2016-01-01

Comparative co-expression analysis of multiple species using high-throughput data is an integrative approach to determine the uniformity as well as diversification in biological processes. Rauvolfia serpentina and Catharanthus roseus, both members of Apocyanacae family, are reported to have remedial properties against multiple diseases. Despite of sharing upstream of terpenoid indole alkaloid pathway, there is significant diversity in tissue-specific synthesis and accumulation of specialized metabolites in these plants. This led us to implement comparative co-expression network analysis to investigate the modules and genes responsible for differential tissue-specific expression as well as species-specific synthesis of metabolites. Toward these goals differential network analysis was implemented to identify candidate genes responsible for diversification of metabolites profile. Three genes were identified with significant difference in connectivity leading to differential regulatory behavior between these plants. These genes may be responsible for diversification of secondary metabolism, and thereby for species-specific metabolite synthesis. The network robustness of R. serpentina, determined based on topological properties, was also complemented by comparison of gene-metabolite networks of both plants, and may have evolved to have complex metabolic mechanisms as compared to C. roseus under the influence of various stimuli. This study reveals evolution of complexity in secondary metabolism of R. serpentina, and key genes that contribute toward diversification of specific metabolites. PMID:27588023

Differential Network Analysis Reveals Evolutionary Complexity in Secondary Metabolism of Rauvolfia serpentina over Catharanthus roseus.

PubMed

Pathania, Shivalika; Bagler, Ganesh; Ahuja, Paramvir S

2016-01-01

Comparative co-expression analysis of multiple species using high-throughput data is an integrative approach to determine the uniformity as well as diversification in biological processes. Rauvolfia serpentina and Catharanthus roseus, both members of Apocyanacae family, are reported to have remedial properties against multiple diseases. Despite of sharing upstream of terpenoid indole alkaloid pathway, there is significant diversity in tissue-specific synthesis and accumulation of specialized metabolites in these plants. This led us to implement comparative co-expression network analysis to investigate the modules and genes responsible for differential tissue-specific expression as well as species-specific synthesis of metabolites. Toward these goals differential network analysis was implemented to identify candidate genes responsible for diversification of metabolites profile. Three genes were identified with significant difference in connectivity leading to differential regulatory behavior between these plants. These genes may be responsible for diversification of secondary metabolism, and thereby for species-specific metabolite synthesis. The network robustness of R. serpentina, determined based on topological properties, was also complemented by comparison of gene-metabolite networks of both plants, and may have evolved to have complex metabolic mechanisms as compared to C. roseus under the influence of various stimuli. This study reveals evolution of complexity in secondary metabolism of R. serpentina, and key genes that contribute toward diversification of specific metabolites.

Smooth Interfacial Scavenging for Resistive Switching Oxide via the Formation of Highly Uniform Layers of Amorphous TaOx.

PubMed

Tsurumaki-Fukuchi, Atsushi; Nakagawa, Ryosuke; Arita, Masashi; Takahashi, Yasuo

2018-02-14

We demonstrate that the inclusion of a Ta interfacial layer is a remarkably effective strategy for forming interfacial oxygen defects at metal/oxide junctions. The insertion of an interfacial layer of a reactive metal, that is, a "scavenging" layer, has been recently proposed as a way to create a high concentration of oxygen defects at an interface in redox-based resistive switching devices, and growing interest has been given to the underlying mechanism. Through structural and chemical analyses of Pt/metal/SrTiO 3 /Pt structures, we reveal that the rate and amount of oxygen scavenging are not directly determined by the formation free energies in the oxidation reactions of the scavenging metal and unveil the important roles of oxygen diffusibility. Active oxygen scavenging and highly uniform oxidation via scavenging are revealed for a Ta interfacial layer with high oxygen diffusibility. In addition, the Ta scavenging layer is shown to exhibit a highly uniform structure and to form a very flat interface with SrTiO 3 , which are advantageous for the fabrication of a steep metal/oxide contact.

Analytical approach to Eigen-emittance evolution in storage rings

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nash, Boaz

This dissertation develops the subject of beam evolution in storage rings with nearly uncoupled symplectic linear dynamics. Linear coupling and dissipative/diffusive processes are treated perturbatively. The beam distribution is assumed Gaussian and a function of the invariants. The development requires two pieces: the global invariants and the local stochastic processes which change the emittances, or averages of the invariants. A map based perturbation theory is described, providing explicit expressions for the invariants near each linear resonance, where small perturbations can have a large effect. Emittance evolution is determined by the damping and diffusion coefficients. The discussion is divided into the cases of uniform and non-uniform stochasticity, synchrotron radiation an example of the former and intrabeam scattering the latter. For the uniform case, the beam dynamics is captured by a global diffusion coefficent and damping decrement for each eigen-invariant. Explicit expressions for these quantities near coupling resonances are given. In many cases, they are simply related to the uncoupled values. Near a sum resonance, it is found that one of the damping decrements becomes negative, indicating an anti-damping instability. The formalism is applied to a number of examples, including synchrobetatron coupling caused by a crab cavity, a case of current interest where there is concern about operation near half integer betatron tune. In the non-uniform case, the moment evolution is computed directly, which is illustrated through the example of intrabeam scattering. Our approach to intrabeam scattering damping and diffusion has the advantage of not requiring a loosely-defined Coulomb Logarithm. It is found that in some situations there is a small difference between our results and the standard approaches such as Bjorken-Mtingwa, which is illustrated by comparison of the two approaches and with a measurement of Au evolution in RHIC. Finally, in combining IBS with the global invariants some general statements about IBS equilibrium can be made. Specifically, it is emphasized that no such equilibrium is possible in a non-smooth lattice, even below transition. Near enough to a synchrobetatron coupling resonance, it is found that even for a smooth ring, no IBS equilibrium occurs.

Heritable, De Novo Resistance to Leaf Rust and Other Novel Traits in Selfed Descendants of Wheat Responding to Inoculation with Wheat Streak Mosaic Virus

PubMed Central

Seifers, Dallas L.; Haber, Steve; Martin, Terry J.; McCallum, Brent D.

2014-01-01

Stable resistance to infection with Wheat streak mosaic virus (WSMV) can be evolved de novo in selfing bread wheat lines subjected to cycles of WSMV inoculation and selection of best-performing plants or tillers. To learn whether this phenomenon might be applied to evolve resistance de novo to pathogens unrelated to WSMV, we examined the responses to leaf rust of succeeding generations of the rust- and WSMV-susceptible cultivar ‘Lakin’ following WSMV inoculation and derived rust-resistant sublines. After three cycles of the iterative protocol five plants, in contrast to all others, expressed resistance to leaf and stripe rust. A subset of descendant sublines of one of these, ‘R1’, heritably and uniformly expressed the new trait of resistance to leaf rust. Such sublines, into which no genes from a known source of resistance had been introgressed, conferred resistance to progeny of crosses with susceptible parents. The F1 populations produced from crosses between, respectively, susceptible and resistant ‘Lakin’ sublines 4-3-3 and 4-12-3 were not all uniform in their response to seedling inoculation with race TDBG. In seedling tests against TDBG and MKPS races the F2s from F1 populations that were uniformly resistant had 3∶1 ratios of resistant to susceptible individuals but the F2s from susceptible F1 progenitors were uniformly susceptible. True-breeding lines derived from resistant individuals in F2 populations were resistant to natural stripe and leaf rust inoculum in the field, while the ‘Lakin’ progenitor was susceptible. The next generation of six of the ‘Lakin’-derived lines exhibited moderate to strong de novo resistance to stem rust races TPMK, QFCS and RKQQ in seedling tests while the ‘Lakin’ progenitor was susceptible. These apparently epigenetic effects in response to virus infection may help researchers fashion a new tool that expands the range of genetic resources already available in adapted germplasm. PMID:24497941

Guidelines for producing quality longleaf pine seeds

Treesearch

James P. Barnett; John M. McGilvray

2002-01-01

Longleaf pine (Pinus palustris Mill.) seeds are sensitive to damage during collection, processing, treatment, and storage. High-quality seeds are essential for successfully producing nursery crops that meet management goals and perform well in the field. Uniformity in the production of pine seedlings primarily depends on prompt and uniform seed...

Growing Plants Without Soil for Experimental Use.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Blankendaal, M.; And Others

Much of the current research in experimental plant biology requires highly uniform plants. To achieve this, many plants are grown under conditions in which the environment is carefully manipulated. This pamphlet has been prepared, therefore, to present and describe growth procedures which will produce vigorous, healthy, uniform plant material in…

Neutron transmutation doped Ge bolometers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Haller, E. E.; Kreysa, E.; Palaio, N. P.; Richards, P. L.; Rodder, M.

1983-01-01

Some conclusions reached are as follow. Neutron Transmutation Doping (NTD) of high quality Ge single crystals provides perfect control of doping concentration and uniformity. The resistivity can be tailored to any given bolometer operating temperature down to 0.1 K and probably lower. The excellent uniformity is advantaged for detector array development.

Tumour-associated neutrophils and loss of epithelial PTEN can promote corticosteroid-insensitive MMP-9 expression in the chronically inflamed lung microenvironment

PubMed Central

Vannitamby, Amanda; Seow, Huei Jiunn; Anderson, Gary; Vlahos, Ross; Thompson, Michelle; Steinfort, Daniel; Irving, Louis B; Bozinovski, Steven

2017-01-01

Matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9) is increased in a number of pathological lung conditions, where the proteinase contributes to deleterious remodelling of the airways. While both lung cancer and COPD are associated with increased MMP-9 expression, the cellular and molecular drivers of MMP-9 remain unresolved. In this study, MMP-9 transcript measured within the tumour region from patients with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and coexisting COPD was found to be uniformly increased relative to adjacent tumour-free tissue. MMP-9 gene expression and immunohistochemistry identified tumour-associated neutrophils, but not macrophages, as a predominant source of this proteinase. In addition, PTEN gene expression was significantly reduced in tumour and there was evidence of epithelial MMP-9 expression. To explore whether PTEN can regulate epithelial MMP-9 expression, a small interfering (si)RNA knockdown strategy was used in Beas-2B bronchial epithelial cells. PTEN knockdown by siRNA selectively increased MMP-9 expression in response to lipopolysaccharide in a corticosteroid-insensitive manner. In summary, tumour-associated neutrophils represent an important source of MMP-9 in NSCLC, and loss of epithelial PTEN may further augment steroid-insensitive expression. PMID:28202627

New reversing freeform lens design method for LED uniform illumination with extended source and near field

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Zhili; Zhang, Honghai; Zheng, Huai; Liu, Sheng

2018-03-01

In light-emitting diode (LED) array illumination (e.g. LED backlighting), obtainment of high uniformity in the harsh condition of the large distance height ratio (DHR), extended source and near field is a key as well as challenging issue. In this study, we present a new reversing freeform lens design algorithm based on the illuminance distribution function (IDF) instead of the traditional light intensity distribution, which allows uniform LED illumination in the above mentioned harsh conditions. IDF of freeform lens can be obtained by the proposed mathematical method, considering the effects of large DHR, extended source and near field target at the same time. In order to prove the claims, a slim direct-lit LED backlighting with DHR equal to 4 is designed. In comparison with the traditional lenses, illuminance uniformity of LED backlighting with the new lens increases significantly from 0.45 to 0.84, and CV(RMSE) decreases dramatically from 0.24 to 0.03 in the harsh condition. Meanwhile, luminance uniformity of LED backlighting with the new lens is obtained as high as 0.92 at the condition of extended source and near field. This new method provides a practical and effective way to solve the problem of large DHR, extended source and near field for LED array illumination.

Breast MRI at 7 Tesla with a bilateral coil and robust fat suppression.

PubMed

Brown, Ryan; Storey, Pippa; Geppert, Christian; McGorty, KellyAnne; Klautau Leite, Ana Paula; Babb, James; Sodickson, Daniel K; Wiggins, Graham C; Moy, Linda

2014-03-01

To develop a bilateral coil and fat suppressed T1-weighted sequence for 7 Tesla (T) breast MRI. A dual-solenoid coil and three-dimensional (3D) T1w gradient echo sequence with B1+ insensitive fat suppression (FS) were developed. T1w FS image quality was characterized through image uniformity and fat-water contrast measurements in 11 subjects. Signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and flip angle maps were acquired to assess the coil performance. Bilateral contrast-enhanced and unilateral high resolution (0.6 mm isotropic, 6.5 min acquisition time) imaging highlighted the 7T SNR advantage. Reliable and effective FS and high image quality was observed in all subjects at 7T, indicating that the custom coil and pulse sequence were insensitive to high-field obstacles such as variable tissue loading. 7T and 3T image uniformity was similar (P=0.24), indicating adequate 7T B1+ uniformity. High 7T SNR and fat-water contrast enabled 0.6 mm isotropic imaging and visualization of a high level of fibroglandular tissue detail. 7T T1w FS bilateral breast imaging is feasible with a custom radiofrequency (RF) coil and pulse sequence. Similar image uniformity was achieved at 7T and 3T, despite different RF field behavior and variable coil-tissue interaction due to anatomic differences that might be expected to alter magnetic field patterns. Copyright © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Breast MRI at 7 Tesla with a Bilateral Coil and Robust Fat Suppression

PubMed Central

Brown, Ryan; Storey, Pippa; Geppert, Christian; McGorty, KellyAnne; Leite, Ana Paula Klautau; Babb, James; Sodickson, Daniel K.; Wiggins, Graham C.; Moy, Linda

2013-01-01

Purpose To develop a bilateral coil and optimized fat suppressed T1-weighted sequence for 7T breast MRI. Materials and Methods A dual-solenoid coil and 3D T1w gradient echo sequence with B1+ insensitive fat suppression (FS) were developed for 7T. T1w FS image quality was characterized through image uniformity and fat/water contrast measurements in 11 subjects. Signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and flip angle maps were acquired to assess the coil performance. Bilateral contrast-enhanced and unilateral high resolution (0.6 mm isotropic, 6.5 min acquisition time) imaging highlighted the 7 T SNR advantage. Results Reliable and effective FS and high image quality was observed in all subjects at 7T, indicating that the custom coil and pulse sequence were insensitive to high-field obstacles such as variable tissue loading. 7T and 3T T1w FS image uniformity was similar (P=0.24), indicating adequate 7T B1+ uniformity. High 7T SNR and fat/water contrast enabled 0.6 mm isotropic imaging and visualization of a high level of fibroglandular tissue detail. Conclusion 7T T1w FS bilateral breast imaging is feasible with a custom RF coil and pulse sequence. Similar image uniformity was achieved at 7T and 3T, despite different RF field behavior and variable coil-tissue interaction due to anatomic differences that might be expected to alter magnetic field patterns. PMID:24123517

The ICAM-1 expression level determines the susceptibility of human endothelial cells to simulated microgravity.

PubMed

Buravkova, Ludmila B; Rudimov, Eugene G; Andreeva, Elena R; Grigoriev, Anatoly I

2018-03-01

Microgravity is a principal risk factor hampering human cardiovascular regulation during space flights. Endothelial dysfunction associated with the impaired integrity and uniformity of the monolayer represents a potential trigger for vascular damage. We characterized the expression profile of the multi-step cascade of adhesion molecules (ICAM-1, VCAM-1, E-selectin, VE-cadherin) in umbilical cord endothelial cells (ECs) after 24 h of exposure to simulated microgravity (SMG), pro-inflammatory cytokine TNF-α, and the combination of the two. Random Positioning Machine (RPM)-mediated SMG was used to mimic microgravity effects. SMG stimulated the expression of E-selectin, which is known to be involved in slowing leukocyte rolling. Primary ECs displayed heterogeneity with respect to the proportion of ICAM-1-positive cells. ECs were divided into two groups: pre-activated ECs displaying high proportion of ICAM-1 + -cells (ECs-1) (greater than 50%) and non-activated ECs with low proportion of ICAM-1 + -cells (ECs-2) (less than 25%). Only non-activated ECs-2 responded to SMG by elevating gene transcription and increasing ICAM-1 and VE-cadherin expression. This effect was enhanced after cumulative SMG-TNF-α exposure. ECs-1 displayed an unexpected decrease in number of E-selectin- and ICAM-1-positive ECs and pronounced up-regulation of VCAM1 upon activation of inflammation, which was partially abolished by SMG. Thus, non-activated ECs-2 are quite resistant to the impacts of microgravity and even exhibited an elevation of the VE-cadherin gene and protein expression, thus improving the integrity of the endothelial monolayer. Pre-activation of ECs with inflammatory stimuli may disturb the EC adhesion profile, attenuating its barrier function. These alterations may be among the mechanisms underlying cardiovascular dysregulation in real microgravity conditions. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Heterogeneous Cadherin Expression and Multicellular Aggregate Dynamics in Ovarian Cancer Dissemination.

PubMed

Klymenko, Yuliya; Johnson, Jeffrey; Bos, Brandi; Lombard, Rachel; Campbell, Leigh; Loughran, Elizabeth; Stack, M Sharon

2017-07-01

Epithelial ovarian carcinoma spreads via shedding of cells and multicellular aggregates (MCAs) from the primary tumor into peritoneal cavity, with subsequent intraperitoneal tumor cell:mesothelial cell adhesion as a key early event in metastatic seeding. Evaluation of human tumor extracts and tissues confirms that well-differentiated ovarian tumors express abundant E-cadherin (Ecad), whereas advanced lesions exhibit upregulated N-cadherin (Ncad). Two expression patterns are observed: "mixed cadherin," in which distinct cells within the same tumor express either E- or Ncad, and "hybrid cadherin," wherein single tumor cell(s) simultaneously expresses both cadherins. We demonstrate striking cadherin-dependent differences in cell-cell interactions, MCA formation, and aggregate ultrastructure. Mesenchymal-type Ncad+ cells formed stable, highly cohesive solid spheroids, whereas Ecad+ epithelial-type cells generated loosely adhesive cell clusters covered by uniform microvilli. Generation of "mixed cadherin" MCAs using fluorescently tagged cell populations revealed preferential sorting into cadherin-dependent clusters, whereas mixing of cell lines with common cadherin profiles generated homogeneous aggregates. Recapitulation of the "hybrid cadherin" Ecad+/Ncad+ phenotype, via insertion of the CDH2 gene into Ecad+ cells, resulted in the ability to form heterogeneous clusters with Ncad+ cells, significantly enhanced adhesion to organotypic mesomimetic cultures and peritoneal explants, and increased both migration and matrix invasion. Alternatively, insertion of CDH1 gene into Ncad+ cells greatly reduced cell-to-collagen, cell-to-mesothelium, and cell-to-peritoneum adhesion. Acquisition of the hybrid cadherin phenotype resulted in altered MCA surface morphology with increased surface projections and increased cell proliferation. Overall, these findings support the hypothesis that MCA cadherin composition impacts intraperitoneal cell and MCA dynamics and thereby affects ultimate metastatic success. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Canine tumor cross-species genomics uncovers targets linked to osteosarcoma progression

PubMed Central

2009-01-01

Background Pulmonary metastasis continues to be the most common cause of death in osteosarcoma. Indeed, the 5-year survival for newly diagnosed osteosarcoma patients has not significantly changed in over 20 years. Further understanding of the mechanisms of metastasis and resistance for this aggressive pediatric cancer is necessary. Pet dogs naturally develop osteosarcoma providing a novel opportunity to model metastasis development and progression. Given the accelerated biology of canine osteosarcoma, we hypothesized that a direct comparison of canine and pediatric osteosarcoma expression profiles may help identify novel metastasis-associated tumor targets that have been missed through the study of the human cancer alone. Results Using parallel oligonucleotide array platforms, shared orthologues between species were identified and normalized. The osteosarcoma expression signatures could not distinguish the canine and human diseases by hierarchical clustering. Cross-species target mining identified two genes, interleukin-8 (IL-8) and solute carrier family 1 (glial high affinity glutamate transporter), member 3 (SLC1A3), which were uniformly expressed in dog but not in all pediatric osteosarcoma patient samples. Expression of these genes in an independent population of pediatric osteosarcoma patients was associated with poor outcome (p = 0.020 and p = 0.026, respectively). Validation of IL-8 and SLC1A3 protein expression in pediatric osteosarcoma tissues further supported the potential value of these novel targets. Ongoing evaluation will validate the biological significance of these targets and their associated pathways. Conclusions Collectively, these data support the strong similarities between human and canine osteosarcoma and underline the opportunities provided by a comparative oncology approach as a means to improve our understanding of cancer biology and therapies. PMID:20028558

A Discrepancy Index for the Study of Participation with an Application to the Case of Higher Education in Italy

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Larcinese, Valentino

2008-01-01

This article proposes and applies a simple method to measure the distance from a situation of uniform participation. First, a discrepancy index based on the use of generalized Lorenz curves is presented. This index can be expressed in terms of means and Gini indices of relevant characteristics in the populations of participants and that of a…

Finite Volume Algorithms for Heat Conduction

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-05-01

scalar quantity). Although (3) is relatively easy to discretize by using finite differences , its form in generalized coordinates is not. Later, we...familiar with the finite difference method for discretizing differential equations. In fact, the Newton divided difference is the numerical analog for a...expression (8) for the average derivative matches the Newton divided difference formula, so for uniform one-dimensional meshes, the finite volume and

Basal area increment and growth efficiency as functions of canopy dynamics and stem mechanics

Treesearch

Thomas J. Dean

2004-01-01

Crown and canopy structurecorrelate with growth efficiency and also determine stem size and taper as described by the uniform stress principle of stem formation. A regression model was derived from this principle that expresses basal area increment in terms of the amount and vertical distribution of leaf area and change in these variables during a growth period. This...

Multi-Mode Analysis of Dual Ridged Waveguide Systems for Material Characterization

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-09-17

characterization is the process of determining the dielectric, magnetic, and magnetoelectric properties of a material. For simple (i.e., linear ...field expressions in terms of elementary functions (sines, cosines, exponentials and Bessel functions) and corresponding propagation constants of the...with material parameters 0 and µ0. • The MUT is simple ( linear , isotropic, homogeneous), and the sample has a uniform thickness. • The waveguide

N-Glycosylation Determines Ionic Permeability and Desensitization of the TRPV1 Capsaicin Receptor*

PubMed Central

Veldhuis, Nicholas A.; Lew, Michael J.; Abogadie, Fe C.; Poole, Daniel P.; Jennings, Ernest A.; Ivanusic, Jason J.; Eilers, Helge; Bunnett, Nigel W.; McIntyre, Peter

2012-01-01

The balance of glycosylation and deglycosylation of ion channels can markedly influence their function and regulation. However, the functional importance of glycosylation of the TRPV1 receptor, a key sensor of pain-sensing nerves, is not well understood, and whether TRPV1 is glycosylated in neurons is unclear. We report that TRPV1 is N-glycosylated and that N-glycosylation is a major determinant of capsaicin-evoked desensitization and ionic permeability. Both N-glycosylated and unglycosylated TRPV1 was detected in extracts of peripheral sensory nerves by Western blotting. TRPV1 expressed in HEK-293 cells exhibited various degrees of glycosylation. A mutant of asparagine 604 (N604T) was not glycosylated but did not alter plasma membrane expression of TRPV1. Capsaicin-evoked increases in intracellular calcium ([Ca2+]i) were sustained in wild-type TRPV1 HEK-293 cells but were rapidly desensitized in N604T TRPV1 cells. There was marked cell-to-cell variability in capsaicin responses and desensitization between individual cells expressing wild-type TRPV1 but highly uniform responses in cells expressing N604T TRPV1, consistent with variable levels of glycosylation of the wild-type channel. These differences were also apparent when wild-type or N604T TRPV1-GFP fusion proteins were expressed in neurons from trpv1−/− mice. Capsaicin evoked a marked, concentration-dependent increase in uptake of the large cationic dye YO-PRO-1 in cells expressing wild-type TRPV1, indicative of loss of ion selectivity, that was completely absent in cells expressing N604T TRPV1. Thus, TRPV1 is variably N-glycosylated and glycosylation is a key determinant of capsaicin regulation of TRPV1 desensitization and permeability. Our findings suggest that physiological or pathological alterations in TRPV1 glycosylation would affect TRPV1 function and pain transmission. PMID:22570472

Characterization of the Humoral Immune Response during Staphylococcus aureus Bacteremia and Global Gene Expression by Staphylococcus aureus in Human Blood

PubMed Central

den Reijer, Paul Martijn; Lemmens-den Toom, Nicole; Kant, Samantha; Snijders, Susan V.; Boelens, Hélène; Tavakol, Mehri; Verkaik, Nelianne J.; van Belkum, Alex; Verbrugh, Henri A.; van Wamel, Willem J. B.

2013-01-01

Attempts to develop an efficient anti-staphylococcal vaccine in humans have so far been unsuccessful. Therefore, more knowledge of the antigens that are expressed by Staphylococcus aureus in human blood and induce an immune response in patients is required. In this study we further characterize the serial levels of IgG and IgA antibodies against 56 staphylococcal antigens in multiple serum samples of 21 patients with a S. aureus bacteremia, compare peak IgG levels between patients and 30 non-infected controls, and analyze the expression of 3626 genes by two genetically distinct isolates in human blood. The serum antibody levels were measured using a bead-based flow cytometry technique (xMAP®, Luminex corporation). Gene expression levels were analyzed using a microarray (BµG@s microarray). The initial levels and time taken to reach peak IgG and IgA antibody levels were heterogeneous in bacteremia patients. The antigen SA0688 was associated with the highest median initial-to-peak antibody fold-increase for IgG (5.05-fold) and the second highest increase for IgA (2.07-fold). Peak IgG levels against 27 antigens, including the antigen SA0688, were significantly elevated in bacteremia patients versus controls (P≤0.05). Expression of diverse genes, including SA0688, was ubiquitously high in both isolates at all time points during incubation in blood. However, only a limited number of genes were specifically up- or downregulated in both isolates when cultured in blood, compared to the start of incubation in blood or during incubation in BHI broth. In conclusion, most staphylococcal antigens tested in this study, including many known virulence factors, do not induce uniform increases in the antibody levels in bacteremia patients. In addition, the expression of these antigens by S. aureus is not significantly altered by incubation in human blood over time. One immunogenic and ubiquitously expressed antigen is the putative iron-regulated ABC transporter SA0688. PMID:23308212

High-quality uniform dry transfer of graphene to polymers.

PubMed

Lock, Evgeniya H; Baraket, Mira; Laskoski, Matthew; Mulvaney, Shawn P; Lee, Woo K; Sheehan, Paul E; Hines, Daniel R; Robinson, Jeremy T; Tosado, Jacob; Fuhrer, Michael S; Hernández, Sandra C; Walton, Scott G

2012-01-11

In this paper we demonstrate high-quality, uniform dry transfer of graphene grown by chemical vapor deposition on copper foil to polystyrene. The dry transfer exploits an azide linker molecule to establish a covalent bond to graphene and to generate greater graphene-polymer adhesion compared to that of the graphene-metal foil. Thus, this transfer approach provides a novel alternative route for graphene transfer, which allows for the metal foils to be reused. © 2011 American Chemical Society

Construction of higher order accurate vortex and particle methods

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nicolaides, R. A.

1986-01-01

The standard point vortex method has recently been shown to be of high order of accuracy for problems on the whole plane, when using a uniform initial subdivision for assigning the vorticity to the points. If obstacles are present in the flow, this high order deteriorates to first or second order. New vortex methods are introduced which are of arbitrary accuracy (under regularity assumptions) regardless of the presence of bodies and the uniformity of the initial subdivision.

High quality uniform YBCO film growth by the metalorganic deposition using trifluoroacetates

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, S. S.; Zhang, Z. L.; Wang, L.; Gao, L. K.; Liu, J.

2017-03-01

A need exists for the large-area superconducting YBa2Cu3O7-x (YBCO) films with high critical current density for microwave communication and/or electric power applications. Trifluoroacetic metalorganic (TFA-MOD) method is a promising low cost technique for large-scale production of YBCO films, because it does not need high vacuum device and is easily applicable to substrates of various shape and size. In this paper, double-sided YBCO films with maximum 2 in diameter were prepared on LaAlO3 substrates by TFA-MOD method. Inductive critical current densitiy Jc, microwave surface resistance Rs, as well as the microstructure were characterized. A newly homemade furnace system was used to epitaxially grown YBCO films, which can improve the uniformity of YBCO film significantly by gas supply and temperature distribution proper design. Results showed that the large area YBCO films were very uniform in microstructure and thickness distribution, an average inductive Jc in excess of 6 MA/cm2 with uniform distribution, and low Rs (10 GHz) below 0.3 mΩ at 77 K were obtained. Andthe film filter may be prepared to work at temperatures lower than 74 K. These results are very close to the highest value of YBCO films made by conventional vacuum method, so we show a very promising route for large-scale production of high quality large-area YBCO superconducting films at a lower cost.

Design Considerations for High Temperature Power Inductors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Niedra, Janis M.

2005-01-01

A uniform B-field approximation model is used to develop design formulas for single-layer wound, toroidal core, ac power inductors that must handle a specified current. Such a geometry is well suited for high temperature, high frequency inductors, where removal of heat from the core becomes critical. Explicit expressions are derived for core radii, core and winding volumes, winding turns and core permeability as functions of a dimensional scaling ratio (S). A limit on the maximum allowed core B-field leads to the result that the minimum core volume is proportional to the permeability, which has a lower bound. Plots versus S are provided for a specific case, to show that good designs can be picked in the overlap regions around the minima in mass and overall size, where the mass and size are relatively flat. Data to 250 C are presented for an MPP core based inductor to show that a quasi-linear, high temperature inductor can be constructed with available materials. A similar development is applied to a toroidal air-core geometry, showing that for the same ratings, such an inductor is considerably bigger and more massive, at least in the single-layer version.

Spatial analysis and high resolution mapping of the human whole-brain transcriptome for integrative analysis in neuroimaging.

PubMed

Gryglewski, Gregor; Seiger, René; James, Gregory Miles; Godbersen, Godber Mathis; Komorowski, Arkadiusz; Unterholzner, Jakob; Michenthaler, Paul; Hahn, Andreas; Wadsak, Wolfgang; Mitterhauser, Markus; Kasper, Siegfried; Lanzenberger, Rupert

2018-08-01

The quantification of big pools of diverse molecules provides important insights on brain function, but is often restricted to a limited number of observations, which impairs integration with other modalities. To resolve this issue, a method allowing for the prediction of mRNA expression in the entire brain based on microarray data provided in the Allen Human Brain Atlas was developed. Microarray data of 3702 samples from 6 brain donors was registered to MNI and cortical surface space using FreeSurfer. For each of 18,686 genes, spatial dependence of transcription was assessed using variogram modelling. Variogram models were employed in Gaussian process regression to calculate best linear unbiased predictions for gene expression at all locations represented in well-established imaging atlases for cortex, subcortical structures and cerebellum. For validation, predicted whole-brain transcription of the HTR1A gene was correlated with [carbonyl- 11 C]WAY-100635 positron emission tomography data collected from 30 healthy subjects. Prediction results showed minimal bias ranging within ±0.016 (cortical surface), ±0.12 (subcortical regions) and ±0.14 (cerebellum) in units of log2 expression intensity for all genes. Across genes, the correlation of predicted and observed mRNA expression in leave-one-out cross-validation correlated with the strength of spatial dependence (cortical surface: r = 0.91, subcortical regions: r = 0.85, cerebellum: r = 0.84). 816 out of 18,686 genes exhibited a high spatial dependence accounting for more than 50% of variance in the difference of gene expression on the cortical surface. In subcortical regions and cerebellum, different sets of genes were implicated by high spatially structured variability. For the serotonin 1A receptor, correlation between PET binding potentials and predicted comprehensive mRNA expression was markedly higher (Spearman ρ = 0.72 for cortical surface, ρ = 0.84 for subcortical regions) than correlation of PET and discrete samples only (ρ = 0.55 and ρ = 0.63, respectively). Prediction of mRNA expression in the entire human brain allows for intuitive visualization of gene transcription and seamless integration in multimodal analysis without bias arising from non-uniform distribution of available samples. Extension of this methodology promises to facilitate translation of omics research and enable investigation of human brain function at a systems level. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Outer membrane vesicles as platform vaccine technology

PubMed Central

Stork, Michiel; van der Ley, Peter

2015-01-01

Abstract Outer membrane vesicles (OMVs) are released spontaneously during growth by many Gram‐negative bacteria. They present a range of surface antigens in a native conformation and have natural properties like immunogenicity, self‐adjuvation and uptake by immune cells which make them attractive for application as vaccines against pathogenic bacteria. In particular with Neisseria meningitidis, they have been investigated extensively and an OMV‐containing meningococcal vaccine has recently been approved by regulatory agencies. Genetic engineering of the OMV‐producing bacteria can be used to improve and expand their usefulness as vaccines. Recent work on meningitis B vaccines shows that OMVs can be modified, such as for lipopolysaccharide reactogenicity, to yield an OMV product that is safe and effective. The overexpression of crucial antigens or simultaneous expression of multiple antigenic variants as well as the expression of heterologous antigens enable expansion of their range of applications. In addition, modifications may increase the yield of OMV production and can be combined with specific production processes to obtain high amounts of well‐defined, stable and uniform OMV particle vaccine products. Further improvement can facilitate the development of OMVs as platform vaccine product for multiple applications. PMID:26912077

Three dimensional printing of calcium sulfate and mesoporous bioactive glass scaffolds for improving bone regeneration in vitro and in vivo

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Qi, Xin; Pei, Peng; Zhu, Min; Du, Xiaoyu; Xin, Chen; Zhao, Shichang; Li, Xiaolin; Zhu, Yufang

2017-02-01

In the clinic, bone defects resulting from infections, trauma, surgical resection and genetic malformations remain a significant challenge. In the field of bone tissue engineering, three-dimensional (3D) scaffolds are promising for the treatment of bone defects. In this study, calcium sulfate hydrate (CSH)/mesoporous bioactive glass (MBG) scaffolds were successfully fabricated using a 3D printing technique, which had a regular and uniform square macroporous structure, high porosity and excellent apatite mineralization ability. Human bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells (hBMSCs) were cultured on scaffolds to evaluate hBMSC attachment, proliferation and osteogenesis-related gene expression. Critical-sized rat calvarial defects were applied to investigate the effect of CSH/MBG scaffolds on bone regeneration in vivo. The in vitro results showed that CSH/MBG scaffolds stimulated the adhesion, proliferation, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity and osteogenesis-related gene expression of hBMSCs. In vivo results showed that CSH/MBG scaffolds could significantly enhance new bone formation in calvarial defects compared to CSH scaffolds. Thus 3D printed CSH/MBG scaffolds would be promising candidates for promoting bone regeneration.

Nanofabrication and characterization of a grating-based condenser for uniform illumination with hard X-rays.

PubMed

Liu, Jianpeng; Li, Xin; Chen, Shuo; Zhang, Sichao; Xie, Shanshan; Xu, Chen; Chen, Yifang; Deng, Biao; Mao, Chenwen

2017-05-01

In the development of full-field transmission X-ray microscopy for basic study in science and technology, a condenser capable of providing intense illumination with high uniformity and stability on tested specimens in order to achieve high-quality images is essential. The latest design of a square-shaped condenser based on diffractive gratings has demonstrated promising uniformity in illumination. This paper describes in more detail the development of such a beam shaper for hard X-rays at 10 keV with regard to its design, manufacture and optical characterization. The effect of the grating profile on the diffracted intensity has been theoretically predicted by numerical simulation using the finite-difference time-domain method. Based on this, the limitations of the grating-based condenser are discussed.

Controlled Growth and the Maintenance of Human Pluripotent Stem Cells by Cultivation with Defined Medium on Extracellular Matrix-Coated Micropatterned Dishes

PubMed Central

Takenaka, Chiemi; Miyajima, Hiroshi; Yoda, Yusuke; Imazato, Hideo; Yamamoto, Takako; Gomi, Shinichi; Ohshima, Yasuhiro; Kagawa, Kenichi; Sasaki, Tetsuji; Kawamata, Shin

2015-01-01

Here, we introduce a new serum-free defined medium (SPM) that supports the cultivation of human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) on recombinant human vitronectin-N (rhVNT-N)-coated dishes after seeding with either cell clumps or single cells. With this system, there was no need for an intervening sequential adaptation process after moving hPSCs from feeder layer-dependent conditions. We also introduce a micropatterned dish that was coated with extracellular matrix by photolithographic technology. This procedure allowed the cultivation of hPSCs on 199 individual rhVNT-N-coated small round spots (1 mm in diameter) on each 35-mm polystyrene dish (termed “patterned culture”), permitting the simultaneous formation of 199 uniform high-density small-sized colonies. This culture system supported controlled cell growth and maintenance of undifferentiated hPSCs better than dishes in which the entire surface was coated with rhVNT-N (termed “non-patterned cultures”). Non-patterned cultures produced variable, unrestricted cell proliferation with non-uniform cell growth and uneven densities in which we observed downregulated expression of some self-renewal-related markers. Comparative flow cytometric studies of the expression of pluripotency-related molecules SSEA-3 and TRA-1-60 in hPSCs from non-patterned cultures and patterned cultures supported this concept. Patterned cultures of hPSCs allowed sequential visual inspection of every hPSC colony, giving an address and number in patterned culture dishes. Several spots could be sampled for quality control tests of production batches, thereby permitting the monitoring of hPSCs in a single culture dish. Our new patterned culture system utilizing photolithography provides a robust, reproducible and controllable cell culture system and demonstrates technological advantages for the mass production of hPSCs with process quality control. PMID:26115194

Vapor and healing treatment for CH3NH3PbI3-xClx films toward large-area perovskite solar cells

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gouda, Laxman; Gottesman, Ronen; Tirosh, Shay; Haltzi, Eynav; Hu, Jiangang; Ginsburg, Adam; Keller, David A.; Bouhadana, Yaniv; Zaban, Arie

2016-03-01

Hybrid methyl-ammonium lead trihalide perovskites are promising low-cost materials for use in solar cells and other optoelectronic applications. With a certified photovoltaic conversion efficiency record of 20.1%, scale-up for commercial purposes is already underway. However, preparation of large-area perovskite films remains a challenge, and films of perovskites on large electrodes suffer from non-uniform performance. Thus, production and characterization of the lateral uniformity of large-area films is a crucial step towards scale-up of devices. In this paper, we present a reproducible method for improving the lateral uniformity and performance of large-area perovskite solar cells (32 cm2). The method is based on methyl-ammonium iodide (MAI) vapor treatment as a new step in the sequential deposition of perovskite films. Following the MAI vapor treatment, we used high throughput techniques to map the photovoltaic performance throughout the large-area device. The lateral uniformity and performance of all photovoltaic parameters (Voc, Jsc, Fill Factor, Photo-conversion efficiency) increased, with an overall improved photo-conversion efficiency of ~100% following a vapor treatment at 140 °C. Based on XRD and photoluminescence measurements, We propose that the MAI treatment promotes a ``healing effect'' to the perovskite film which increases the lateral uniformity across the large-area solar cell. Thus, the straightforward MAI vapor treatment is highly beneficial for large scale commercialization of perovskite solar cells, regardless of the specific deposition method.Hybrid methyl-ammonium lead trihalide perovskites are promising low-cost materials for use in solar cells and other optoelectronic applications. With a certified photovoltaic conversion efficiency record of 20.1%, scale-up for commercial purposes is already underway. However, preparation of large-area perovskite films remains a challenge, and films of perovskites on large electrodes suffer from non-uniform performance. Thus, production and characterization of the lateral uniformity of large-area films is a crucial step towards scale-up of devices. In this paper, we present a reproducible method for improving the lateral uniformity and performance of large-area perovskite solar cells (32 cm2). The method is based on methyl-ammonium iodide (MAI) vapor treatment as a new step in the sequential deposition of perovskite films. Following the MAI vapor treatment, we used high throughput techniques to map the photovoltaic performance throughout the large-area device. The lateral uniformity and performance of all photovoltaic parameters (Voc, Jsc, Fill Factor, Photo-conversion efficiency) increased, with an overall improved photo-conversion efficiency of ~100% following a vapor treatment at 140 °C. Based on XRD and photoluminescence measurements, We propose that the MAI treatment promotes a ``healing effect'' to the perovskite film which increases the lateral uniformity across the large-area solar cell. Thus, the straightforward MAI vapor treatment is highly beneficial for large scale commercialization of perovskite solar cells, regardless of the specific deposition method. Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available. See DOI: 10.1039/c5nr08658b

Investigation of MgF2 optical thin films with ultralow refractive indices prepared from autoclaved sols.

PubMed

Murata, Tsuyoshi; Ishizawa, Hitoshi; Tanaka, Akira

2008-05-01

We have successfully developed a process to form high quality MgF(2) thin films with ultralow refractive indices from autoclaved sols prepared from magnesium acetate and hydrofluoric acid. And we have confirmed that our porous MgF(2) coatings have not only high transmittance in the UV region but also high uniformity of film thickness. They can be uniformly formed on phiv 300 mm substrates as a single coating and as a hybrid coating with sublayers formed by physical vapor deposition. They are expected to be applied to various optics that need high transmittance in the UV region.

Agarose droplet microfluidics for highly parallel and efficient single molecule emulsion PCR.

PubMed

Leng, Xuefei; Zhang, Wenhua; Wang, Chunming; Cui, Liang; Yang, Chaoyong James

2010-11-07

An agarose droplet method was developed for highly parallel and efficient single molecule emulsion PCR. The method capitalizes on the unique thermoresponsive sol-gel switching property of agarose for highly efficient DNA amplification and amplicon trapping. Uniform agarose solution droplets generated via a microfluidic chip serve as robust and inert nanolitre PCR reactors for single copy DNA molecule amplification. After PCR, agarose droplets are gelated to form agarose beads, trapping all amplicons in each reactor to maintain the monoclonality of each droplet. This method does not require cocapsulation of primer labeled microbeads, allows high throughput generation of uniform droplets and enables high PCR efficiency, making it a promising platform for many single copy genetic studies.

Achievement of high diode sensitivity via spin torque-induced resonant expulsion in vortex magnetic tunnel junction

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tsunegi, Sumito; Taniguchi, Tomohiro; Yakushiji, Kay; Fukushima, Akio; Yuasa, Shinji; Kubota, Hitoshi

2018-05-01

We investigated the spin-torque diode effect in a magnetic tunnel junction with FeB free layer. Vortex-core expulsion was observed near the boundary between vortex and uniform states. A high diode voltage of 24 mV was obtained with alternative input power of 0.3 µW, corresponding to huge diode sensitivity of 80,000 mV/mW. In the expulsion region, a broad peak in the high frequency region was observed, which is attributed to the weak excitation of uniform magnetization by thermal noise. The high diode sensitivity is of great importance for device applications such as telecommunications, radar detectors, and high-speed magnetic-field sensors.

a Norm Pairing in Formal Modules

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vostokov, S. V.

1980-02-01

A pairing of the multiplicative group of a local field (a finite extension of the field of p-adic numbers Qp) with the group of points of a Lubin-Tate formal group is defined explicitly. The values of the pairing are roots of an isogeny of the formal group. The main properties of this pairing are established: bilinearity, invariance under the choice of a local uniformizing element, and independence of the method of expanding elements into series with respect to this uniformizing element. These properties of the pairing are used to prove that it agrees with the generalized Hilbert norm residue symbol when the field over whose ring of integers the formal group is defined is totally ramified over Qp. This yields an explicit expression for the generalized Hilbert symbol on the group of points of the formal group. Bibliography: 12 titles.

Potential formulation of the dispersion relation for a uniform, magnetized plasma with stationary ions in terms of a vector phasor

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Johnson, Robert W.

2012-06-15

The derivation of the helicon dispersion relation for a uniform plasma with stationary ions subject to a constant background magnetic field is reexamined in terms of the potential formulation of electrodynamics. Under the same conditions considered by the standard derivation, the nonlinear self-coupling between the perturbed electron flow and the potential it generates is addressed. The plane wave solution for general propagation vector is determined for all frequencies and expressed in terms of a vector phasor. The behavior of the solution as described in vacuum units depends upon the ratio of conductivity to the magnitude of the background field. Onlymore » at low conductivity and below, the cyclotron frequency can significant propagation occur as determined by the ratio of skin depth to wavelength.« less

Procedure for noise prediction and optimization of advanced technology propellers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jou, W. H.; Bernstein, S.

1979-01-01

The sound field due to a propeller operating at supersonic tip speed in a uniform flow was investigated. Using the fact that the wave front in a uniform stream is a convected sphere, the fundamental solution to the convected wave equation was easily obtained. The Fourier coefficients of the pressure signature were obtained by a far field approximation, and are expressed as an integral over the blade platform. It is shown that cones of silence exist fore and aft the propeller plane. The semiapex angles are shown. These angles are independent of the individual Mach components such as the flight Mach number and the rotation Mach number. The result is confirmed by the computation of the ray path of the emitted Mach waves. The Doppler amplification factor strengthens the signal behind the propeller while it weakens that upstream.

Couette flow of an incompressible fluid in a porous channel with mass transfer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Niranjana, N.; Vidhya, M.; Govindarajan, A.

2018-04-01

The present discussion deals with the study of couette flow through a porous medium of a viscous incompressible fluid between two infinite horizontal parallel porous flat plates with heat and mass transfer. The stationary plate and the plate in uniform motion are subjected to transverse sinusoidal injection and uniform suction of the fluid. Due to this type of injection velocity, the flow becomes three dimensional. The analytical solutions of the nonlinear partial differential equations of this problem are obtained by using perturbation technique. Expressions for the velocity, temperature fields and the rate of heat and mass transfers are obtained. Effects of the following parameters Schmidt number (Sc), Modified Grashof number (Gm) on the velocity, temperature and concentration fields are obtained numerically and depicted through graphs. The rate of heat and mass transfer are also analyzed.

The French are different. French and American medicine in the context of AIDS.

PubMed Central

Feldman, J

1992-01-01

Medicine has often been approached as a thing apart from culture, as a uniform Western science. Within the past 10 years, we have begun to recognize that medicine is a system of beliefs and practices intrinsically linked to its larger sociocultural context. Still, it is generally perceived as uniform across North America and Western Europe. My recent research on French and American medical perspectives on the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) challenges this view by exploring differences in the structure of health care, the physician-patient relationship, and the conceptualizations of disease, particularly AIDS. These differences are not specific to AIDS, but the disease serves to exemplify them and to act as a medium for expressing what makes French and American medicine distinct. Global epidemics such as AIDS require both international response and cross-cultural understanding. PMID:1413782

The quest for epigenetic regulation underlying unisexual flower development in Cucumis melo.

PubMed

Latrasse, David; Rodriguez-Granados, Natalia Y; Veluchamy, Alaguraj; Mariappan, Kiruthiga Gayathri; Bevilacqua, Claudia; Crapart, Nicolas; Camps, Celine; Sommard, Vivien; Raynaud, Cécile; Dogimont, Catherine; Boualem, Adnane; Benhamed, Moussa; Bendahmane, Abdelhafid

2017-01-01

Melon ( Cucumis melo ) is an important vegetable crop from the Cucurbitaceae family and a reference model specie for sex determination, fruit ripening and vascular fluxes studies. Nevertheless, the nature and role of its epigenome in gene expression regulation and more specifically in sex determination remains largely unknown. We have investigated genome wide H3K27me3 and H3K9ac histone modifications and gene expression dynamics, in five melon organs. H3K9ac and H3K27me3 were mainly distributed along gene-rich regions and constrained to gene bodies. H3K9ac was preferentially located at the TSS, whereas H3K27me3 distributed uniformly from TSS to TES. As observed in other species, H3K9ac and H3K27me3 correlated with high and low gene expression levels, respectively. Comparative analyses of unisexual flowers pointed out sex-specific epigenetic states of TFs involved in ethylene response and flower development. Chip-qPCR analysis of laser dissected carpel and stamina primordia, revealed sex-specific histone modification of MADS-box genes. Using sex transition mutants, we demonstrated that the female promoting gene, CmACS11 , represses the expression of the male promoting gene CmWIP1 via deposition of H3K27me3. Our findings reveal the organ-specific landscapes of H3K9ac and H3K27me3 in melon. Our results also provide evidence that the sex determination genes recruit histone modifiers to orchestrate unisexual flower development in monoecious species.

Lenalidomide consolidation treatment in patients with multiple myeloma suppresses myelopoieses but spares erythropoiesis.

PubMed

Wilk, Christian Matthias; Heinzler, Niklas; Boquoi, Amelie; Cadeddu, Ron-Patrick; Strapatsas, Tobias; Dienst, Ariane; Majidi, Fatemeh; Deenen, René; Bruns, Ingmar; Schroeder, Thomas; Köhrer, Karl; Haas, Rainer; Kobbe, Guido; Fenk, Roland

2016-11-15

New drugs for the treatment of multiple myeloma (MM) comprise immunomodulatory substances such as lenalidomide and related compounds. While lenalidomide has found its way into first-line treatment as well as into relapse therapy, little is known about lenalidomide effects on normal hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs). In this study, we investigated whether HSPCs are influenced by lenalidomide on a phenotypic, functional and gene expression level. For that purpose, samples from patients with MM were obtained who underwent equivalent first-line treatment including induction therapy, cytotoxic stem cell mobilization and high-dose melphalan therapy followed by autologous blood stem cell transplantation and a subsequent uniform lenalidomide consolidation treatment within a prospective clinical trial. We found that after six months of lenalidomide therapy, the number of CD34(+) HSPCs decreased. Additionally, lenalidomide affects the numerical composition of hematopoietic cells in the bone marrow while it does not affect long-term HSPC proliferation in vitro. We found a significant amplification of fetal hemoglobin (HbF) expression on a transcriptional level and can confirm a stimulated erythropoiesis on a phenotypic level. These effects were accompanied by silencing of the TGF-β signaling pathway on the gene expression and protein level that is known to be amplified in active MM. However, these pleiotropic effects gave no evidence for mutagenic potential. In conclusion, lenalidomide does not exert long-term effects on proliferation of HSPCs but instead promotes erythropoiesis by shifting hemoglobin expression toward HbF and by silencing the TGF-β signaling pathway. © 2016 UICC.

TransAtlasDB: an integrated database connecting expression data, metadata and variants

PubMed Central

Adetunji, Modupeore O; Lamont, Susan J; Schmidt, Carl J

2018-01-01

Abstract High-throughput transcriptome sequencing (RNAseq) is the universally applied method for target-free transcript identification and gene expression quantification, generating huge amounts of data. The constraint of accessing such data and interpreting results can be a major impediment in postulating suitable hypothesis, thus an innovative storage solution that addresses these limitations, such as hard disk storage requirements, efficiency and reproducibility are paramount. By offering a uniform data storage and retrieval mechanism, various data can be compared and easily investigated. We present a sophisticated system, TransAtlasDB, which incorporates a hybrid architecture of both relational and NoSQL databases for fast and efficient data storage, processing and querying of large datasets from transcript expression analysis with corresponding metadata, as well as gene-associated variants (such as SNPs) and their predicted gene effects. TransAtlasDB provides the data model of accurate storage of the large amount of data derived from RNAseq analysis and also methods of interacting with the database, either via the command-line data management workflows, written in Perl, with useful functionalities that simplifies the complexity of data storage and possibly manipulation of the massive amounts of data generated from RNAseq analysis or through the web interface. The database application is currently modeled to handle analyses data from agricultural species, and will be expanded to include more species groups. Overall TransAtlasDB aims to serve as an accessible repository for the large complex results data files derived from RNAseq gene expression profiling and variant analysis. Database URL: https://modupeore.github.io/TransAtlasDB/ PMID:29688361

Thermoelastic analysis of non-uniform pressurized functionally graded cylinder with variable thickness using first order shear deformation theory(FSDT) and perturbation method

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Khoshgoftar, M. J.; Mirzaali, M. J.; Rahimi, G. H.

2015-11-01

Recently application of functionally graded materials(FGMs) have attracted a great deal of interest. These materials are composed of various materials with different micro-structures which can vary spatially in FGMs. Such composites with varying thickness and non-uniform pressure can be used in the aerospace engineering. Therefore, analysis of such composite is of high importance in engineering problems. Thermoelastic analysis of functionally graded cylinder with variable thickness under non-uniform pressure is considered. First order shear deformation theory and total potential energy approach is applied to obtain the governing equations of non-homogeneous cylinder. Considering the inner and outer solutions, perturbation series are applied to solve the governing equations. Outer solution for out of boundaries and more sensitive variable in inner solution at the boundaries are considered. Combining of inner and outer solution for near and far points from boundaries leads to high accurate displacement field distribution. The main aim of this paper is to show the capability of matched asymptotic solution for different non-homogeneous cylinders with different shapes and different non-uniform pressures. The results can be used to design the optimum thickness of the cylinder and also some properties such as high temperature residence by applying non-homogeneous material.

Implementing Assessment Engineering in the Uniform Certified Public Accountant (CPA) Examination

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Burke, Matthew; Devore, Richard; Stopek, Josh

2013-01-01

This paper describes efforts to bring principled assessment design to a large-scale, high-stakes licensure examination by employing the frameworks of Assessment Engineering (AE), the Revised Bloom's Taxonomy (RBT), and Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA). The Uniform CPA Examination is practice-oriented and focuses on the skills of accounting. In…

School Uniform Revisited: Procedure, Pressure and Equality

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Carney, Damian; Sinclair, Adele

2006-01-01

The House of Lords' decision in "R. (on the application of Begum) v. The Headteacher and Governors of Denbigh High School" considered whether a particular school uniform policy infringed a student's right to manifest her religion under Article 9. This paper analyses the content of this decision, and explores how schools should approach…

Analyses of the Impact of School Uniforms on Violence in North Carolina Public High Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Johnson, Wesley Scott

2010-01-01

This study incorporated a multiple-methods design utilizing both quantitative and qualitative data. The quantitative portion investigated several annual reports distributed by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (NCDPI) to explore the impact of school uniform policies on incidents of crime and violence and occurrences of…

Large-area synthesis of high-quality and uniform monolayer WS2 on reusable Au foils

PubMed Central

Gao, Yang; Liu, Zhibo; Sun, Dong-Ming; Huang, Le; Ma, Lai-Peng; Yin, Li-Chang; Ma, Teng; Zhang, Zhiyong; Ma, Xiu-Liang; Peng, Lian-Mao; Cheng, Hui-Ming; Ren, Wencai

2015-01-01

Large-area monolayer WS2 is a desirable material for applications in next-generation electronics and optoelectronics. However, the chemical vapour deposition (CVD) with rigid and inert substrates for large-area sample growth suffers from a non-uniform number of layers, small domain size and many defects, and is not compatible with the fabrication process of flexible devices. Here we report the self-limited catalytic surface growth of uniform monolayer WS2 single crystals of millimetre size and large-area films by ambient-pressure CVD on Au. The weak interaction between the WS2 and Au enables the intact transfer of the monolayers to arbitrary substrates using the electrochemical bubbling method without sacrificing Au. The WS2 shows high crystal quality and optical and electrical properties comparable or superior to mechanically exfoliated samples. We also demonstrate the roll-to-roll/bubbling production of large-area flexible films of uniform monolayer, double-layer WS2 and WS2/graphene heterostructures, and batch fabrication of large-area flexible monolayer WS2 film transistor arrays. PMID:26450174

Beam uniformity of flat top lasers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chang, Chao; Cramer, Larry; Danielson, Don; Norby, James

2015-03-01

Many beams that output from standard commercial lasers are multi-mode, with each mode having a different shape and width. They show an overall non-homogeneous energy distribution across the spot size. There may be satellite structures, halos and other deviations from beam uniformity. However, many scientific, industrial and medical applications require flat top spatial energy distribution, high uniformity in the plateau region, and complete absence of hot spots. Reliable standard methods for the evaluation of beam quality are of great importance. Standard methods are required for correct characterization of the laser for its intended application and for tight quality control in laser manufacturing. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has published standard procedures and definitions for this purpose. These procedures have not been widely adopted by commercial laser manufacturers. This is due to the fact that they are unreliable because an unrepresentative single-pixel value can seriously distort the result. We hereby propose a metric of beam uniformity, a way of beam profile visualization, procedures to automatically detect hot spots and beam structures, and application examples in our high energy laser production.

Selection of reference genes for quantitative gene expression normalization in flax (Linum usitatissimum L.).

PubMed

Huis, Rudy; Hawkins, Simon; Neutelings, Godfrey

2010-04-19

Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) is currently the most accurate method for detecting differential gene expression. Such an approach depends on the identification of uniformly expressed 'housekeeping genes' (HKGs). Extensive transcriptomic data mining and experimental validation in different model plants have shown that the reliability of these endogenous controls can be influenced by the plant species, growth conditions and organs/tissues examined. It is therefore important to identify the best reference genes to use in each biological system before using qRT-PCR to investigate differential gene expression. In this paper we evaluate different candidate HKGs for developmental transcriptomic studies in the economically-important flax fiber- and oil-crop (Linum usitatissimum L). Specific primers were designed in order to quantify the expression levels of 20 different potential housekeeping genes in flax roots, internal- and external-stem tissues, leaves and flowers at different developmental stages. After calculations of PCR efficiencies, 13 HKGs were retained and their expression stabilities evaluated by the computer algorithms geNorm and NormFinder. According to geNorm, 2 Transcriptional Elongation Factors (TEFs) and 1 Ubiquitin gene are necessary for normalizing gene expression when all studied samples are considered. However, only 2 TEFs are required for normalizing expression in stem tissues. In contrast, NormFinder identified glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GADPH) as the most stably expressed gene when all samples were grouped together, as well as when samples were classed into different sub-groups.qRT-PCR was then used to investigate the relative expression levels of two splice variants of the flax LuMYB1 gene (homologue of AtMYB59). LuMYB1-1 and LuMYB1-2 were highly expressed in the internal stem tissues as compared to outer stem tissues and other samples. This result was confirmed with both geNorm-designated- and NormFinder-designated-reference genes. The use of 2 different statistical algorithms results in the identification of different combinations of flax HKGs for expression data normalization. Despite such differences, the use of geNorm-designated- and NormFinder-designated-reference genes enabled us to accurately compare the expression levels of a flax MYB gene in different organs and tissues. Our identification and validation of suitable flax HKGs will facilitate future developmental transcriptomic studies in this economically-important plant.

Electron beam method and apparatus for obtaining uniform discharges in electrically pumped gas lasers

DOEpatents

Fenstermacher, Charles A.; Boyer, Keith

1986-01-01

A method and apparatus for obtaining uniform, high-energy, large-volume electrical discharges in the lasing medium of a gas laser whereby a high-energy electron beam is used as an external ionization source to ionize substantially the entire volume of the lasing medium which is then readily pumped by means of an applied potential less than the breakdown voltage of the medium. The method and apparatus are particularly useful in CO.sub.2 laser systems.

Demonstration of a simplified optical mouse lighting module by integrating the non-Lambertian LED chip and the free-form surface.

PubMed

Pan, Jui-Wen; Tu, Sheng-Han

2012-05-20

A cost-effective, high-throughput, and high-yield method for the efficiency enhancement of an optical mouse lighting module is proposed. We integrated imprinting technology and free-form surface design to obtain a lighting module with high illumination efficiency and uniform intensity distribution. The imprinting technique can increase the light extraction efficiency and modulate the intensity distribution of light-emitting diodes. A modulated light source was utilized to add a compact free-form surface element to create a lighting module with 95% uniformity and 80% optical efficiency.

High loading uranium fuel plate

DOEpatents

Wiencek, Thomas C.; Domagala, Robert F.; Thresh, Henry R.

1990-01-01

Two embodiments of a high uranium fuel plate are disclosed which contain a meat comprising structured uranium compound confined between a pair of diffusion bonded ductile metal cladding plates uniformly covering the meat, the meat having a uniform high fuel loading comprising a content of uranium compound greater than about 45 Vol. % at a porosity not greater than about 10 Vol. %. In a first embodiment, the meat is a plurality of parallel wires of uranium compound. In a second embodiment, the meat is a dispersion compact containing uranium compound. The fuel plates are fabricated by a hot isostatic pressing process.

In-situ Formation of Reinforcement Phases in Ultra High Temperature Ceramic Composites

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stackpoole, Margaret M (Inventor); Gasch, Matthew J (Inventor); Olson, Michael W (Inventor); Hamby, Ian W. (Inventor); Johnson, Sylvia M (Inventor)

2013-01-01

A tough ultra-high temperature ceramic (UHTC) composite comprises grains of UHTC matrix material, such as HfB.sub.2, ZrB.sub.2 or other metal boride, carbide, nitride, etc., surrounded by a uniform distribution of acicular high aspect ratio reinforcement ceramic rods or whiskers, such as of SiC, is formed from uniformly mixing a powder of the UHTC material and a pre-ceramic polymer selected to form the desired reinforcement species, then thermally consolidating the mixture by hot pressing. The acicular reinforcement rods may make up from 5 to 30 vol % of the resulting microstructure.

Ultrasonic backscatter imaging by shear-wave-induced echo phase encoding of target locations.

PubMed

McAleavey, Stephen

2011-01-01

We present a novel method for ultrasound backscatter image formation wherein lateral resolution of the target is obtained by using traveling shear waves to encode the lateral position of targets in the phase of the received echo. We demonstrate that the phase modulation as a function of shear wavenumber can be expressed in terms of a Fourier transform of the lateral component of the target echogenicity. The inverse transform, obtained by measurements of the phase modulation over a range of shear wave spatial frequencies, yields the lateral scatterer distribution. Range data are recovered from time of flight as in conventional ultrasound, yielding a B-mode-like image. In contrast to conventional ultrasound imaging, where mechanical or electronic focusing is used and lateral resolution is determined by aperture size and wavelength, we demonstrate that lateral resolution using the proposed method is independent of the properties of the aperture. Lateral resolution of the target is achieved using a stationary, unfocused, single-element transducer. We present simulated images of targets of uniform and non-uniform shear modulus. Compounding for speckle reduction is demonstrated. Finally, we demonstrate image formation with an unfocused transducer in gelatin phantoms of uniform shear modulus.

Behavior of dusty real gas on adiabatic propagation of cylindrical imploding strong shock waves

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gangwar, P. K.

2018-05-01

In this paper, CCW method has been used to study the behavior of dusty real gas on adiabatic propagation of cylindrical imploding strong shock waves. The strength of overtaking waves is estimated under the assumption that both C+ and C- disturbances propagate in non-uniform region of same density distribution. It is assumed that the dusty gas is the mixture of a real gas and a large number of small spherical solid particles of uniform size. The solid particles are uniformly distributed in the medium. Maintaining equilibrium flow conditions, the expressions for shock strength has been derived both for freely propagation as well as under the effect of overtaking disturbances. The variation of all flow variables with propagation distance, mass concentration of solid particles in the mixture and the ratio of solid particles to the initial density of gas have been computed and discussed through graphs. It is found that the presence of dust particles in the gases medium has significant effects on the variation of flow variables and the shock is strengthened under the influence of overtaking disturbances. The results accomplished here been compared with those for ideal gas.

3D-printed gelatin scaffolds of differing pore geometry modulate hepatocyte function and gene expression.

PubMed

Lewis, Phillip L; Green, Richard M; Shah, Ramille N

2018-03-15

Three dimensional (3D) printing is highly amenable to the fabrication of tissue-engineered organs of a repetitive microstructure such as the liver. The creation of uniform and geometrically repetitive tissue scaffolds can also allow for the control over cellular aggregation and nutrient diffusion. However, the effect of differing geometries, while controlling for pore size, has yet to be investigated in the context of hepatocyte function. In this study, we show the ability to precisely control pore geometry of 3D-printed gelatin scaffolds. An undifferentiated hepatocyte cell line (HUH7) demonstrated high viability and proliferation when seeded on 3D-printed scaffolds of two different geometries. However, hepatocyte specific functions (albumin secretion, CYP activity, and bile transport) increases in more interconnected 3D-printed gelatin cultures compared to a less interconnected geometry and to 2D controls. Additionally, we also illustrate the disparity between gene expression and protein function in simple 2D culture modes, and that recreation of a physiologically mimetic 3D environment is necessary to induce both expression and function of cultured hepatocytes. Three dimensional (3D) printing provides tissue engineers the ability spatially pattern cells and materials in precise geometries, however the biological effects of scaffold geometry on soft tissues such as the liver have not been rigorously investigated. In this manuscript, we describe a method to 3D print gelatin into well-defined repetitive geometries that show clear differences in biological effects on seeded hepatocytes. We show that a relatively simple and widely used biomaterial, such as gelatin, can significantly modulate biological processes when fabricated into specific 3D geometries. Furthermore, this study expands upon past research into hepatocyte aggregation by demonstrating how it can be manipulated to enhance protein function, and how function and expression may not precisely correlate in 2D models. Copyright © 2018 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Age dependence of clinical and pathological manifestations of autoimmune demyelination. Implications for multiple sclerosis.

PubMed

Smith, M E; Eller, N L; McFarland, H F; Racke, M K; Raine, C S

1999-10-01

A prominent feature of the clinical spectrum of multiple sclerosis (MS) is its high incidence of onset in the third decade of life and the relative rarity of clinical manifestations during childhood and adolescence, features suggestive of age-related restriction of clinical expression. Experimental allergic encephalomyelitis (EAE), a model of central nervous system (CNS) autoimmune demyelination with many similarities to MS, has a uniform rapid onset and a high incidence of clinical and pathological disease in adult (mature) animals. Like MS, EAE is most commonly seen and studied in female adults. In this study, age-related resistance to clinical EAE has been examined with the adoptive transfer model of EAE in SJL mice that received myelin basic protein-sensitized cells from animals 10 days (sucklings) to 12 weeks (young adults) of age. A variable delay before expression of clinical EAE was observed between the different age groups. The preclinical period was longest in the younger (<14 days of age) animals, and shortest in animals 6 to 8 weeks old at time of transfer. Young animals initially resistant to EAE eventually expressed well-developed clinical signs by 6 to 7 weeks of age. This was followed by a remitting, relapsing clinical course. For each age at time of sensitization, increased susceptibility of females compared to males was observed. Examination of the CNS of younger animal groups during the preclinical period showed lesions of acute EAE. Older age groups developed onset of signs coincident with acute CNS lesions. This age-related resistance to clinical EAE in developing mice is reminiscent of an age-related characteristic of MS previously difficult to study in vivo. The associated subclinical CNS pathology and age-related immune functions found in young animals may be relevant to the increasing clinical expression of MS with maturation, and may allow study of factors associated with the known occasional poor correlation of CNS inflammation and demyelination and clinical changes in this disease.

Anterior-posterior regionalized gene expression in the Ciona notochord

PubMed Central

Veeman, Michael

2014-01-01

Background In the simple ascidian chordate Ciona the signaling pathways and gene regulatory networks giving rise to initial notochord induction are largely understood and the mechanisms of notochord morphogenesis are being systematically elucidated. The notochord has generally been thought of as a non-compartmentalized or regionalized organ that is not finely patterned at the level of gene expression. Quantitative imaging methods have recently shown, however, that notochord cell size, shape and behavior vary consistently along the anterior-posterior (AP) axis. Results Here we screen candidate genes by whole mount in situ hybridization for potential AP asymmetry. We identify 4 genes that show non-uniform expression in the notochord. Ezrin/radixin/moesin (ERM) is expressed more strongly in the secondary notochord lineage than the primary. CTGF is expressed stochastically in a subset of notochord cells. A novel calmodulin-like gene (BCamL) is expressed more strongly at both the anterior and posterior tips of the notochord. A TGF-β ortholog is expressed in a gradient from posterior to anterior. The asymmetries in ERM, BCamL and TGF-β expression are evident even before the notochord cells have intercalated into a single-file column. Conclusions We conclude that the Ciona notochord is not a homogeneous tissue but instead shows distinct patterns of regionalized gene expression. PMID:24288133

Anterior-posterior regionalized gene expression in the Ciona notochord.

PubMed

Reeves, Wendy; Thayer, Rachel; Veeman, Michael

2014-04-01

In the simple ascidian chordate Ciona, the signaling pathways and gene regulatory networks giving rise to initial notochord induction are largely understood and the mechanisms of notochord morphogenesis are being systematically elucidated. The notochord has generally been thought of as a non-compartmentalized or regionalized organ that is not finely patterned at the level of gene expression. Quantitative imaging methods have recently shown, however, that notochord cell size, shape, and behavior vary consistently along the anterior-posterior (AP) axis. Here we screen candidate genes by whole mount in situ hybridization for potential AP asymmetry. We identify 4 genes that show non-uniform expression in the notochord. Ezrin/radixin/moesin (ERM) is expressed more strongly in the secondary notochord lineage than the primary. CTGF is expressed stochastically in a subset of notochord cells. A novel calmodulin-like gene (BCamL) is expressed more strongly at both the anterior and posterior tips of the notochord. A TGF-β ortholog is expressed in a gradient from posterior to anterior. The asymmetries in ERM, BCamL, and TGF-β expression are evident even before the notochord cells have intercalated into a single-file column. We conclude that the Ciona notochord is not a homogeneous tissue but instead shows distinct patterns of regionalized gene expression. Copyright © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Osteoblasts generate harder, stiffer, and more delamination-resistant mineralized tissue on titanium than on polystyrene, associated with distinct tissue micro- and ultrastructure.

PubMed

Saruwatari, Lei; Aita, Hideki; Butz, Frank; Nakamura, Hiromi K; Ouyang, Jianyong; Yang, Yang; Chiou, Wen-An; Ogawa, Takahiro

2005-11-01

This study revealed that osteoblasts generate harder, stiffer, and more delamination-resistant mineralized tissue on titanium than on the tissue culture polystyrene, associated with modulated gene expression, uniform mineralization, well-crystallized interfacial calcium-phosphate layer, and intensive collagen deposition. Knowledge of this titanium-induced alteration of osteogenic potential leading to enhanced intrinsic biomechanical properties of mineralized tissue provides novel opportunities and implications for understanding and improving bone-titanium integration and engineering physiomechanically tolerant bone. Bone-titanium integration is a biological phenomenon characterized by continuous generation and preservation of peri-implant bone and serves as endosseous anchors against endogenous and exogenous loading, of which mechanisms are poorly understood. This study determines the intrinsic biomechanical properties and interfacial strength of cultured mineralized tissue on titanium and characterizes the tissue structure as possible contributing factors in biomechanical modulation. Rat bone marrow-derived osteoblastic cells were cultured either on a tissue culture-grade polystyrene dish or titanium-coated polystyrene dish having comparable surface topography. Nano-indentation and nano-scratch tests were undertaken on mineralized tissues cultured for 28 days to evaluate its hardness, elastic modulus, and critical load (force required to delaminate tissue). Gene expression was analyzed using RT-PCR. The tissue structural properties were examined by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), collagen colorimetry and localization with Sirius red stain, mineral quantification, and localization with von Kossa stain and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Hardness and elastic modulus of mineralized tissue on titanium were three and two times greater, respectively, than those on the polystyrene. Three times greater force was required to delaminate the tissue on titanium than that on the polystyrene. SEM of the polystyrene culture displayed a porous structure consisting of fibrous and globular components, whereas the titanium tissue culture appeared to be uniformly solid. Cell proliferation was remarkably reduced on titanium. Microscopic observations revealed that the mineralized tissue on titanium was composed of uniform collagen-supported mineralization from the titanium interface to the outer surface, with intensive collagen deposition at tissue-titanium interface. In contrast, tissue on the polystyrene was characterized by collagen-deficient mineralization at the polystyrene interface and calcium-free collagenous matrix formation in the outer tissue area. Such characteristic microstructure of titanium-associated tissue was corresponded with upregulated gene expression of collagen I and III, osteopontin, and osteocalcin mRNA. Cross-sectional TEM revealed the apposition of a high-contrast and well-crystallized calcium phosphate layer at the titanium interface but not at the polystyrene interface. Culturing osteoblasts on titanium, compared with polystyrene, enhances the hardness, elastic modulus, and interfacial strength of mineralized tissue to a higher degree. Titanium per se possesses an ability to alter cellular phenotypes and tissue micro- and ultrastructure that result in enhanced intrinsic biomechanical properties of mineralized tissue.

Instrumentational Complexity of Music Genres and Why Simplicity Sells

PubMed Central

Percino, Gamaliel; Klimek, Peter; Thurner, Stefan

2014-01-01

Listening habits are strongly influenced by two opposing aspects, the desire for variety and the demand for uniformity in music. In this work we quantify these two notions in terms of instrumentation and production technologies that are typically involved in crafting popular music. We assign an ‘instrumentational complexity value’ to each music style. Styles of low instrumentational complexity tend to have generic instrumentations that can also be found in many other styles. Styles of high complexity, on the other hand, are characterized by a large variety of instruments that can only be found in a small number of other styles. To model these results we propose a simple stochastic model that explicitly takes the capabilities of artists into account. We find empirical evidence that individual styles show dramatic changes in their instrumentational complexity over the last fifty years. ‘New wave’ or ‘disco’ quickly climbed towards higher complexity in the 70s and fell back to low complexity levels shortly afterwards, whereas styles like ‘folk rock’ remained at constant high instrumentational complexity levels. We show that changes in the instrumentational complexity of a style are related to its number of sales and to the number of artists contributing to that style. As a style attracts a growing number of artists, its instrumentational variety usually increases. At the same time the instrumentational uniformity of a style decreases, i.e. a unique stylistic and increasingly complex expression pattern emerges. In contrast, album sales of a given style typically increase with decreasing instrumentational complexity. This can be interpreted as music becoming increasingly formulaic in terms of instrumentation once commercial or mainstream success sets in. PMID:25551631

Heterogeneity of PTEN and ERG expression in prostate cancer on core needle biopsies: implications for cancer risk stratification and biomarker sampling.

PubMed

Shah, Rajal B; Bentley, James; Jeffery, Zach; DeMarzo, Angelo M

2015-05-01

ERG and PTEN biomarkers are increasingly being analyzed on prostate core biopsies (NBXs); ERG as a marker of clonality and number of separately arising tumor foci and PTEN for prognostic information. Yet, in patients with multiple biopsy cores positive for cancer (PCa), there is no standardized approach for interrogation of these biomarkers in terms of the number of positive cores to evaluate. A total of 194 NBX cases containing more than one positive core with cancer were evaluated for ERG overexpression and PTEN loss by immunostaining (immunohistochemistry) of all positive cores. ERG overexpression or PTEN loss in at least one cancer core was present in 111 (57%) and 69 (36%) cases respectively. ERG overexpression was significantly associated with PTEN loss (P < .0001), and PTEN loss was associated with a high Gleason score (P < .0001). Inter- and intra-tumor core staining heterogeneity for ERG overexpression occurred in 42% and 5% cases and for PTEN loss both intra- and inter-tumor core heterogeneity was 68%. PTEN staining was highly discordant between PCa sites regardless of laterality. When the Gleason score was non-uniform across PCa sites, the combination of cores showing the highest Gleason score and largest tumor volume provided the best representation of ERG overexpression (92%) and PTEN loss (98%). When grades were uniform across cancer sites, the highest tumor volume core was generally representative of ERG overexpression (90%) but was less representative for PTEN loss (76%). Our results suggest that knowledge of this heterogeneity is critical for developing optimal yet cost-effective strategies to identify these underlying molecular abnormalities. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Development of a novel alginate-polyvinyl alcohol-hydroxyapatite hydrogel for 3D bioprinting bone tissue engineered scaffolds.

PubMed

Bendtsen, Stephanie T; Quinnell, Sean P; Wei, Mei

2017-05-01

Three-dimensional printed biomaterials used as personalized tissue substitutes have the ability to promote and enhance regeneration in areas of defected tissue. The challenge with 3D printing for bone tissue engineering remains the selection of a material with optimal rheological properties for printing in addition to biocompatibility and capacity for uniform cell incorporation. Hydrogel biomaterials may provide sufficient printability to allow cell encapsulation and bioprinting of scaffolds with uniform cell distribution. In this study, a novel alginate-polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)-hydroxyapatite (HA) hydrogel formulation with optimal rheological properties for 3D bioprinting of mouse calvaria 3T3-E1 (MC3T3) cells into scaffolds of high shape fidelity has been developed. A systematic investigation was conducted to determine the effect of varying concentrations of alginate, phosphate, calcium, and the PVA-HA suspension in the formulation on the resulting viscosity and thus printability of the hydrogel. HA, the main mineral component in natural bone, was incorporated into the hydrogel formulation to create a favorable bone-forming environment due to its excellent osteoconductivity. Degradation studies in α-MEM cell culture media showed that the 3D printed alginate-PVA-HA scaffolds remained in-tact for 14 days. MC3T3 cells were well distributed and encapsulated throughout the optimal hydrogel formulation and expressed high viability through the completion of the 3D printing process. Thus, the development of this novel, osteoconductive, biodegradable, alginate-PVA-HA formulation and its ability to 3D bioprint tissue engineered scaffolds make it a promising candidate for treating personalized bone defects. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part A: 105A: 1457-1468, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

A rapid micro quantification method of paracetamol in suppositories using differential scanning calorimetry.

PubMed

Noordin, Mohamed I; Chung, L Y

2004-01-01

This study adopts Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) to analyze the thermal properties of samples (2.5-4.0 mg) from the tip, middle, and base sections of individual paracetamol suppositories, which were sampled carefully using a stainless steel scalpel. The contents of paracetamol present in the samples obtained from these sections were determined from the enthalpies of fusion of paracetamol and expressed as % w/w paracetamol to allow comparison of the amount of paracetamol found in each section. The tip, middle, and base sections contained 10.1+/-0.2%, 10.1+/-0.2%, and 10.3+/-0.2% w/w paracetamol, and are statistically similar (One-way anova; p>0.05). This indicates that the preparation technique adopted produces high quality suppositories in terms of content uniformity. The contents of paracetamol in the 120-mg paracetamol suppositories determined by DSC and UV spectrophotometry were statistically equivalent (Students's t-test; p>0.05), 120.8+/-2.6 mg and 120.8+/-1.5 mg, respectively, making DSC a clear alternative method for the measurement of content of drug in suppositories. The main advantages of the method are that samples of only 2.5-4.0 mg are required and the procedure does not require an extraction process, which allows for the analysis to be completed rapidly. In addition, it is highly sensitive and reproducible, with the lower detection limit at 4.0% w/w paracetamol, which is about 2.5 times lower than the content of paracetamol (10% w/w) present in our 120-mg paracetamol suppositories and commercial paracetamol suppositories, which contained about 125 mg paracetamol. Therefore, this method is particularly suited for determination of content uniformity in individual suppositories in quality control (QC) and in process quality control (PQC).

Modifying the size and uniformity of upconversion Yb/Er:NaGdF4 nanocrystals through alkaline-earth doping.

PubMed

Lei, Lei; Chen, Daqin; Huang, Ping; Xu, Ju; Zhang, Rui; Wang, Yuansheng

2013-11-21

NaGdF4 is regarded as an ideal upconversion (UC) host material for lanthanide (Ln(3+)) activators because of its unique crystal structure, high Ln(3+) solubility, low phonon energy and high photochemical stability, and Ln(3+)-doped NaGdF4 UC nanocrystals (NCs) have been widely investigated as bio-imaging and magnetic resonance imaging agents recently. To realize their practical applications, controlling the size and uniformity of the monodisperse Ln(3+)-doped NaGdF4 UC NCs is highly desired. Unlike the routine routes by finely adjusting the multiple experimental parameters, herein we provide a facile and straightforward strategy to modify the size and uniformity of NaGdF4 NCs via alkaline-earth doping for the first time. With the increase of alkaline-earth doping content, the size of NaGdF4 NCs increases gradually, while the size-uniformity is still retained. We attribute this "focusing" of size distribution to the diffusion controlled growth of NaGdF4 NCs induced by alkaline-earth doping. Importantly, adopting the Ca(2+)-doped Yb/Er:NaGdF4 NCs as cores, the complete Ca/Yb/Er:NaGdF4@NaYF4 core-shell particles with excellent size-uniformity can be easily achieved. However, when taking the Yb/Er:NaGdF4 NCs without Ca(2+) doping as cores, they could not be perfectly covered by NaYF4 shells, and the obtained products are non-uniform in size. As a result, the UC emission intensity of the complete core-shell NCs increases by about 30 times in comparison with that of the cores, owing to the effective surface passivation of the Ca(2+)-doped cores and therefore protection of Er(3+) in the cores from the non-radiative decay caused by surface defects, whereas the UC intensity of the incomplete core-shell NCs is enhanced by only 3 times.

Reading sentences of uniform word length: Evidence for the adaptation of the preferred saccade length during reading.

PubMed

Cutter, Michael G; Drieghe, Denis; Liversedge, Simon P

2017-11-01

In the current study, the effect of removing word length variability within sentences on spatial aspects of eye movements during reading was investigated. Participants read sentences that were uniform in terms of word length, with each sentence consisting entirely of three-, four-, or five-letter words, or a combination of these word lengths. Several interesting findings emerged. Adaptation of the preferred saccade length occurred for sentences with different uniform word length; participants would be more accurate at making short saccades while reading uniform sentences of three-letter words, while they would be more accurate at making long saccades while reading uniform sentences of five-letter words. Furthermore, word skipping was affected such that three- and four-letter words were more likely, and five-letter words less likely, to be directly fixated in uniform compared to non-uniform sentences. It is argued that saccadic targeting during reading is highly adaptable and flexible toward the characteristics of the text currently being read, as opposed to the idea implemented in most current models of eye movement control during reading that readers develop a preference for making saccades of a certain length across a lifetime of experience with a given language. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

Tablet splitting and weight uniformity of half-tablets of 4 medications in pharmacy practice.

PubMed

Tahaineh, Linda M; Gharaibeh, Shadi F

2012-08-01

Tablet splitting is a common practice for multiple reasons including cost savings; however, it does not necessarily result in weight-uniform half-tablets. To determine weight uniformity of half-tablets resulting from splitting 4 products available in the Jordanian market and investigate the effect of tablet characteristics on weight uniformity of half-tablets. Ten random tablets each of warfarin 5 mg, digoxin 0.25 mg, phenobarbital 30 mg, and prednisolone 5 mg were weighed and split by 6 PharmD students using a knife. The resulting half-tablets were weighed and evaluated for weight uniformity. Other relevant physical characteristics of the 4 products were measured. The average tablet hardness of the sampled tablets ranged from 40.3 N to 68.9 N. Digoxin, phenobarbital, and prednisolone half-tablets failed the weight uniformity test; however, warfarin half-tablets passed. Digoxin, warfarin, and phenobarbital tablets had a score line and warfarin tablets had the deepest score line of 0.81 mm. Splitting warfarin tablets produces weight-uniform half-tablets that may possibly be attributed to the hardness and the presence of a deep score line. Digoxin, phenobarbital, and prednisolone tablet splitting produces highly weight variable half-tablets. This can be of clinical significance in the case of the narrow therapeutic index medication digoxin.

Aneurysm permeability following coil embolization: packing density and coil distribution

PubMed Central

Chueh, Ju-Yu; Vedantham, Srinivasan; Wakhloo, Ajay K; Carniato, Sarena L; Puri, Ajit S; Bzura, Conrad; Coffin, Spencer; Bogdanov, Alexei A; Gounis, Matthew J

2015-01-01

Background Rates of durable aneurysm occlusion following coil embolization vary widely, and a better understanding of coil mass mechanics is desired. The goal of this study is to evaluate the impact of packing density and coil uniformity on aneurysm permeability. Methods Aneurysm models were coiled using either Guglielmi detachable coils or Target coils. The permeability was assessed by taking the ratio of microspheres passing through the coil mass to those in the working fluid. Aneurysms containing coil masses were sectioned for image analysis to determine surface area fraction and coil uniformity. Results All aneurysms were coiled to a packing density of at least 27%. Packing density, surface area fraction of the dome and neck, and uniformity of the dome were significantly correlated (p<0.05). Hence, multivariate principal components-based partial least squares regression models were used to predict permeability. Similar loading vectors were obtained for packing and uniformity measures. Coil mass permeability was modeled better with the inclusion of packing and uniformity measures of the dome (r2=0.73) than with packing density alone (r2=0.45). The analysis indicates the importance of including a uniformity measure for coil distribution in the dome along with packing measures. Conclusions A densely packed aneurysm with a high degree of coil mass uniformity will reduce permeability. PMID:25031179

The venom-gland transcriptome of the eastern coral snake (Micrurus fulvius) reveals high venom complexity in the intragenomic evolution of venoms

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Snake venom is shaped by the ecology and evolution of venomous species, and signals of positive selection in toxins have been consistently documented, reflecting the role of venoms as an ecologically critical phenotype. New World coral snakes (Elapidae) are represented by three genera and over 120 species and subspecies that are capable of causing significant human morbidity and mortality, yet coral-snake venom composition is poorly understood in comparison to that of Old World elapids. High-throughput sequencing is capable of identifying thousands of loci, while providing characterizations of expression patterns and the molecular evolutionary forces acting within the venom gland. Results We describe the de novo assembly and analysis of the venom-gland transcriptome of the eastern coral snake (Micrurus fulvius). We identified 1,950 nontoxin transcripts and 116 toxin transcripts. These transcripts accounted for 57.1% of the total reads, with toxins accounting for 45.8% of the total reads. Phospholipases A2 and three-finger toxins dominated expression, accounting for 86.0% of the toxin reads. A total of 15 toxin families were identified, revealing venom complexity previously unknown from New World coral snakes. Toxins exhibited high levels of heterozygosity relative to nontoxins, and overdominance may favor gene duplication leading to the fixation of advantageous alleles. Phospholipase A2 expression was uniformly distributed throughout the class while three-finger toxin expression was dominated by a handful of transcripts, and phylogenetic analyses indicate that toxin divergence may have occurred following speciation. Positive selection was detected in three of the four most diverse toxin classes, suggesting that venom diversification is driven by recurrent directional selection. Conclusions We describe the most complete characterization of an elapid venom gland to date. Toxin gene duplication may be driven by heterozygote advantage, as the frequency of polymorphic toxin loci was significantly higher than that of nontoxins. Diversification among toxins appeared to follow speciation reflecting species-specific adaptation, and this divergence may be directly related to dietary shifts and is suggestive of a coevolutionary arms race. PMID:23915248

The venom-gland transcriptome of the eastern coral snake (Micrurus fulvius) reveals high venom complexity in the intragenomic evolution of venoms.

PubMed

Margres, Mark J; Aronow, Karalyn; Loyacano, Jacob; Rokyta, Darin R

2013-08-02

Snake venom is shaped by the ecology and evolution of venomous species, and signals of positive selection in toxins have been consistently documented, reflecting the role of venoms as an ecologically critical phenotype. New World coral snakes (Elapidae) are represented by three genera and over 120 species and subspecies that are capable of causing significant human morbidity and mortality, yet coral-snake venom composition is poorly understood in comparison to that of Old World elapids. High-throughput sequencing is capable of identifying thousands of loci, while providing characterizations of expression patterns and the molecular evolutionary forces acting within the venom gland. We describe the de novo assembly and analysis of the venom-gland transcriptome of the eastern coral snake (Micrurus fulvius). We identified 1,950 nontoxin transcripts and 116 toxin transcripts. These transcripts accounted for 57.1% of the total reads, with toxins accounting for 45.8% of the total reads. Phospholipases A(2) and three-finger toxins dominated expression, accounting for 86.0% of the toxin reads. A total of 15 toxin families were identified, revealing venom complexity previously unknown from New World coral snakes. Toxins exhibited high levels of heterozygosity relative to nontoxins, and overdominance may favor gene duplication leading to the fixation of advantageous alleles. Phospholipase A(2) expression was uniformly distributed throughout the class while three-finger toxin expression was dominated by a handful of transcripts, and phylogenetic analyses indicate that toxin divergence may have occurred following speciation. Positive selection was detected in three of the four most diverse toxin classes, suggesting that venom diversification is driven by recurrent directional selection. We describe the most complete characterization of an elapid venom gland to date. Toxin gene duplication may be driven by heterozygote advantage, as the frequency of polymorphic toxin loci was significantly higher than that of nontoxins. Diversification among toxins appeared to follow speciation reflecting species-specific adaptation, and this divergence may be directly related to dietary shifts and is suggestive of a coevolutionary arms race.

Pair correlation function and nonlinear kinetic equation for a spatially uniform polarizable nonideal plasma

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Belyi, V.V.; Kukharenko, Y.A.; Wallenborn, J.

Taking into account the first non-Markovian correction to the Balescu-Lenard equation, we have derived an expression for the pair correlation function and a nonlinear kinetic equation valid for a nonideal polarized classical plasma. This last equation allows for the description of the correlational energy evolution and shows the global conservation of energy with dynamical polarization. {copyright} {ital 1996 The American Physical Society.}

Surveillance and Spatial Characterization of Aedes aegypti in Sint Eustatius, Netherlands Antilles

DTIC Science & Technology

2013-05-08

Thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Department of Preventive Medicine and Biometrics Graduate Program Uniformed Services...DSN: 295-9474 II Fa)(: 301-295 5772   iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to express my deepest appreciation to my thesis committee chairman... thesis . In addition I owe a large thank you to Dr. Achee, and LCDR Kochel for their time as committee members, and more importantly their dedication

The U.S. Response to NEOS: Avoiding a Black Swan Event

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-09-01

Ibid. 224 Rich, “Major Earthquake Scenario.” 44 number of different radio frequencies .225 Employing a uniform system increases communications ...officials from using the radio as a means of communicating important information to tsunami victims. Overall, Japan’s strategy for applying the lessons...MONITORING AGENCY NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES) N/A 10. SPONSORING / MONITORING AGENCY REPORT NUMBER 11 . SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES The views expressed in this

Between Knowing What Is Right and Knowing that Is It Wrong to Tell Others What Is Right: On Relativism, Uncertainty and Democracy in Environmental and Sustainability Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wals, Arjen E. J.

2010-01-01

This contribution provides an "outside" commentary on several of the articles provided in this special issue on environmental education and education in the context of sustainability in Denmark and Sweden. Although there is no uniform position or shared single outlook expressed in the articles in this special issue, there are some…

Adiabatic demagnetization of the antiferromagnetic spin-1/2 Heisenberg hexagonal cluster

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Deb, Moumita, E-mail: moumitadeb44@gmail.com; Ghosh, Asim Kumar, E-mail: asimkumar96@yahoo.com

2016-05-23

Exact analytic expressions of eigenvalues of the antiferromagnetic spin-1/2 Heisenberg hexagon in the presence of uniform magnetic field have been obtained. Magnetization process, nature of isentrops and properties of magneto caloric effect in terms of adiabatic demagnetization have been investigated. Theoretical results have been used to study the magneto caloric effect of the spin-1/2 Heisenberg hexagonal compound Cu{sub 3}WO{sub 6}.

10 CFR Appendix P to Subpart B of... - Uniform Test Method for Measuring the Energy Consumption of Pool Heaters

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

...-1994. The expression of fuel consumption for oil-fired pool heaters shall be in Btu. 4.2Average annual fossil fuel energy for pool heaters. The average annual fuel energy for pool heater, EF, is defined as... of pool operating hours=4464 h QIN=rated fuel energy input as defined according to 2.9.1 or 2.9.2 of...

Second derivative in the model of classical binary system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Abubekerov, M. K.; Gostev, N. Yu.

2016-06-01

We have obtained an analytical expression for the second derivatives of the light curve with respect to geometric parameters in the model of eclipsing classical binary systems. These expressions are essentially efficient algorithm to calculate the numerical values of these second derivatives for all physical values of geometric parameters. Knowledge of the values of second derivatives of the light curve at some point provides additional information about asymptotical behaviour of the function near this point and can significantly improve the search for the best-fitting light curve through the use of second-order optimization method. We write the expression for the second derivatives in a form which is most compact and uniform for all values of the geometric parameters and so make it easy to write a computer program to calculate the values of these derivatives.

The importance of carbon nanotube wire density, structural uniformity, and purity for fabricating homogeneous carbon nanotube-copper wire composites by copper electrodeposition

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sundaram, Rajyashree; Yamada, Takeo; Hata, Kenji; Sekiguchi, Atsuko

2018-04-01

We present the influence of density, structural regularity, and purity of carbon nanotube wires (CNTWs) used as Cu electrodeposition templates on fabricating homogeneous high-electrical performance CNT-Cu wires lighter than Cu. We show that low-density CNTWs (<0.6 g/cm3 for multiwall nanotube wires) with regular macro- and microstructures and high CNT content (>90 wt %) are essential for making homogeneous CNT-Cu wires. These homogeneous CNT-Cu wires show a continuous Cu matrix with evenly mixed nanotubes of high volume fractions (˜45 vol %) throughout the wire-length. Consequently, the composite wires show densities ˜5.1 g/cm3 (33% lower than Cu) and electrical conductivities ˜6.1 × 104 S/cm (>100 × CNTW conductivity). However, composite wires from templates with higher densities or structural inconsistencies are non-uniform with discontinuous Cu matrices and poor CNT/Cu mixing. These non-uniform CNT-Cu wires show conductivities 2-6 times lower than the homogeneous composite wires.

Controllable formation of high density SERS-active silver nanoprism layers on hybrid silica-APTES coatings

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pilipavicius, J.; Kaleinikaite, R.; Pucetaite, M.; Velicka, M.; Kareiva, A.; Beganskiene, A.

2016-07-01

In this work sol-gel process for preparation of the uniform hybrid silica-3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane (APTES) coatings on glass surface is presented from mechanistic point of view. The suggested synthetic approach is straightforward, scalable and provides the means to tune the amount of amino groups on the surface simply by changing concentration of APTES in the initial sol. Deposition rate of different size silver nanoprisms (AgNPRs) on hybrid silica coatings of various amounts of APTES were studied and their performance as SERS materials were probed. The acquired data shows that the deposition rate of AgNPRs can be tuned by changing the amount of APTES. The optimal amount of APTES was found to be crucial for successful AgNPRs assembly and subsequent uniformity of the final SERS substrate-too high APTES content may result in rapid non-stable aggregation and non-uniform assembly process. SERS study revealed that SERS enhancement is the strongest at moderate AgNPRs aggregation level whereas it significantly drops at high aggregation levels.

High Compositional Homogeneity of CdTe xSe 1-x Crystals Grown by the Bridgman Method

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Roy, U. N.; Bolotnikov, A. E.; Camarda, G. S.

2015-02-03

We obtained high-quality CdTe xSe 1-x (CdTeSe) crystals from ingots grown by the vertical Bridgman technique. The compositional uniformity of the ingots was evaluated by X-ray fluorescence at BNL’s National Synchrotron Light Source X27A beam line. The resulting compositional homogeneity was highly uniform throughout the ingot, and the effective segregation coefficient of Se was ~1.0. This uniformity offers potential opportunity to enhance the yield of the materials for both infrared substrate and radiation-detector applications, so greatly lowering the cost of production and also offering us the prospect to grow large-diameter ingots for use as large-area substrates and for producing highermore » efficiency gamma-ray detectors. The concentration of secondary phases was found to be much lower, by eight- to ten fold compared to that of conventional Cd xZn 1-xTe (CdZnTe or CZT).« less

The effects of culture and cohesiveness on intragroup conflict and effectiveness.

PubMed

Nibler, Roger; Harris, Karen L

2003-10-01

To investigate the influence of culture and cohesiveness on intragroup conflict and effectiveness, the authors made comparisons among groups of U.S. friends and strangers and among groups of Chinese friends and strangers. Groups consisting of 5 members of the same culture engaged in a decision-making task. Among U.S. participants, task conflict and performance results tended to vary together. U.S. strangers reported little task conflict (disagreements about fact or opinion) and performed relatively poorly, whereas U.S. friends' performances benefited from an uninhibited exchange of individual ideas and opinions. In contrast, Chinese participants reported uniformly high levels of intragroup conflict and experienced relatively low performance. The results suggest that a task conflict advantage, with which group members feel comfortable enough to freely express and exchange opinions and disagree with each other to achieve optimal outcomes, might be culture specific.

Paratesticular dedifferentiated liposarcoma with prominent myxoid stroma: report of a case and review of the literature.

PubMed

Tajima, Shogo; Koda, Kenji

2017-06-01

Paratesticular sarcoma is rare, but liposarcoma is its most common type. Paratesticular liposarcoma sometimes presents as dedifferentiated liposarcoma. Both high-grade and low-grade dedifferentiation have been reported. Herein, we presented a unique case of a 64-year-old man with low-grade dedifferentiated liposarcoma with prominent myxoid stroma. Well-differentiated liposarcoma components extended along the spermatic cord. The constituent cells of the dedifferentiated component were peculiar in that, they were relatively uniform cells with atypia and did not have pleomorphism to such an extent that it mimicked myxofibrosarcoma. This myxoid component was confidently differentiated from myxoid liposarcoma with the help of immunohistochemical analysis using CDK4 and MDM2. These two markers were also expressed in the well-differentiated component. It could therefore be confirmed that this sarcoma is dedifferentiated liposarcoma but is not mixed-type liposarcoma comprising well-differentiated liposarcoma and myxoid liposarcoma.

The CFS-PML in numerical simulation of ATEM

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Xuejiao; Ji, Yanju; Qiu, Shuo; Guan, Shanshan; Wu, Yanqi

2017-01-01

In the simulation of airborne transient electromagnetic method (ATEM) in time-domain, the truncated boundary reflection can bring a big error to the results. The complex frequency shifted perfectly matched layer (CFS-PML) absorbing boundary condition has been proved to have a better absorption of low frequency incident wave and can reduce the late reflection greatly. In this paper, we apply the CFS-PML to three-dimensional numerical simulation of ATEM in time-domain to achieve a high precision .The expression of divergence equation in CFS-PML is confirmed and its explicit iteration format based on the finite difference method and the recursive convolution technique is deduced. Finally, we use the uniformity half space model and the anomalous model to test the validity of this method. Results show that the CFS-PML can reduce the average relative error to 2.87% and increase the accuracy of the anomaly recognition.

An X-band high-impedance relativistic klystron amplifier with an annular explosive cathode

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Zhu, Danni; Zhang, Jun, E-mail: zhangjun@nudt.edu.cn; Zhong, Huihuang

2015-11-15

The feasibility of employing an annular beam instead of a solid one in the X-band high-impedance relativistic klystron amplifier (RKA) is investigated in theory and simulation. Small-signal theory analysis indicates that the optimum bunching distance, fundamental current modulation depth, beam-coupling coefficient, and beam-loaded quality factor of annular beams are all larger than the corresponding parameters of solid beams at the same beam voltage and current. An annular beam RKA and a solid beam RKA with almost the same geometric parameters are compared in particle-in-cell simulation. Output microwave power of 100 MW, gain of 50 dB, and power conversion efficiency of 42% aremore » obtained in an annular beam RKA. The annular beam needs a 15% lower uniform guiding magnetic field than the solid beam. Our investigations demonstrate that we are able to use a simple annular explosive cathode immersed in a lower uniform magnetic field instead of a solid thermionic cathode in a complicated partially shielding magnetic field for designing high-impedance RKA, which avoids high temperature requirement, complicated electron-optical system, large area convergence, high current density, and emission uniformity for the solid beam. An equivalent method for the annular beam and the solid beam on bunching features is proposed and agrees with the simulation. The annular beam has the primary advantages over the solid beam that it can employ the immersing uniform magnetic field avoiding the complicated shielding magnetic field system and needs a lower optimum guiding field due to the smaller space charge effect.« less

Friends with benefits: the role of huddling in mixed groups of torpid and normothermic animals.

PubMed

Nowack, Julia; Geiser, Fritz

2016-02-01

Huddling and torpor are widely used for minimizing heat loss by mammals. Despite the questionable energetic benefits from social heterothermy of mixed groups of warm normothermic and cold torpid individuals, the heterothermic Australian sugar glider (Petaurus breviceps) rests in such groups during the cold season. To unravel why they might do so, we examined torpor expression of two sugar glider groups of four individuals each in outside enclosures during winter. We observed 79 torpor bouts during 50 days of observation and found that torpor bouts were longer and deeper when all individuals of a group entered torpor together, and therefore infer that they would have saved more energy in comparison to short and shallow solitary torpor bouts. However, all gliders of either group only expressed torpor uniformly in response to food restriction, whereas on most occasions at least one individual per group remained normothermic. Nevertheless, the presence of warm gliders in mixed groups also appears to be of energetic advantage for torpid individuals, because nest box temperature was negatively correlated with the number of torpid gliders, and normothermic individuals kept the nest temperature at a value closer to the threshold for thermoregulatory heat production during torpor. Our study suggests that mixed groups of torpid and normothermic individuals are observed when environmental conditions are adverse but food is available, leading to intermediate energy savings from torpor. However, under especially challenging conditions and when animals are starving, energy savings are maximized by uniform and pronounced expression of torpor. © 2016. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd.

Acoustically enhanced microfluidic mixer to synthesize highly uniform nanodrugs without the addition of stabilizers.

PubMed

Le, Nguyen Hoai An; Van Phan, Hoang; Yu, Jiaqi; Chan, Hak-Kim; Neild, Adrian; Alan, Tuncay

2018-01-01

This article presents an acoustically enhanced microfluidic mixer to generate highly uniform and ultra-fine nanoparticles, offering significant advantages over conventional liquid antisolvent techniques. The method employed a 3D microfluidic geometry whereby two different phases - solvent and antisolvent - were introduced at either side of a 1 μm thick resonating membrane, which contained a through-hole. The vibration of the membrane rapidly and efficiently mixed the two phases, at the location of the hole, leading to the formation of nanoparticles. The versatility of the device was demonstrated by synthesizing budesonide (a common asthma drug) with a mean diameter of 135.7 nm and a polydispersity index of 0.044. The method offers a 40-fold reduction in the size of synthesized particles combined with a substantial improvement in uniformity, achieved without the need of stabilizers.

Non-Uniform Sampling and J-UNIO Automation for Efficient Protein NMR Structure Determination.

PubMed

Didenko, Tatiana; Proudfoot, Andrew; Dutta, Samit Kumar; Serrano, Pedro; Wüthrich, Kurt

2015-08-24

High-resolution structure determination of small proteins in solution is one of the big assets of NMR spectroscopy in structural biology. Improvements in the efficiency of NMR structure determination by advances in NMR experiments and automation of data handling therefore attracts continued interest. Here, non-uniform sampling (NUS) of 3D heteronuclear-resolved [(1)H,(1)H]-NOESY data yielded two- to three-fold savings of instrument time for structure determinations of soluble proteins. With the 152-residue protein NP_372339.1 from Staphylococcus aureus and the 71-residue protein NP_346341.1 from Streptococcus pneumonia we show that high-quality structures can be obtained with NUS NMR data, which are equally well amenable to robust automated analysis as the corresponding uniformly sampled data. © 2015 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Identification of suitable internal control genes for expression studies in Coffea arabica under different experimental conditions

PubMed Central

Barsalobres-Cavallari, Carla F; Severino, Fábio E; Maluf, Mirian P; Maia, Ivan G

2009-01-01

Background Quantitative data from gene expression experiments are often normalized by transcription levels of reference or housekeeping genes. An inherent assumption for their use is that the expression of these genes is highly uniform in living organisms during various phases of development, in different cell types and under diverse environmental conditions. To date, the validation of reference genes in plants has received very little attention and suitable reference genes have not been defined for a great number of crop species including Coffea arabica. The aim of the research reported herein was to compare the relative expression of a set of potential reference genes across different types of tissue/organ samples of coffee. We also validated the expression profiles of the selected reference genes at various stages of development and under a specific biotic stress. Results The expression levels of five frequently used housekeeping genes (reference genes), namely alcohol dehydrogenase (adh), 14-3-3, polyubiquitin (poly), β-actin (actin) and glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (gapdh) was assessed by quantitative real-time RT-PCR over a set of five tissue/organ samples (root, stem, leaf, flower, and fruits) of Coffea arabica plants. In addition to these commonly used internal controls, three other genes encoding a cysteine proteinase (cys), a caffeine synthase (ccs) and the 60S ribosomal protein L7 (rpl7) were also tested. Their stability and suitability as reference genes were validated by geNorm, NormFinder and BestKeeper programs. The obtained results revealed significantly variable expression levels of all reference genes analyzed, with the exception of gapdh, which showed no significant changes in expression among the investigated experimental conditions. Conclusion Our data suggests that the expression of housekeeping genes is not completely stable in coffee. Based on our results, gapdh, followed by 14-3-3 and rpl7 were found to be homogeneously expressed and are therefore adequate for normalization purposes, showing equivalent transcript levels in different tissue/organ samples. Gapdh is therefore the recommended reference gene for measuring gene expression in Coffea arabica. Its use will enable more accurate and reliable normalization of tissue/organ-specific gene expression studies in this important cherry crop plant. PMID:19126214

Current Density Measurements of an Annular-Geometry Ion Engine

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Shastry, Rohit; Patterson, Michael J.; Herman, Daniel A.; Foster, John E.

2012-01-01

The concept of the annular-geometry ion engine, or AGI-Engine, has been shown to have many potential benefits when scaling electric propulsion technologies to higher power. However, the necessary asymmetric location of the discharge cathode away from thruster centerline could potentially lead to non-uniformities in the discharge not present in conventional geometry ion thrusters. In an effort to characterize the degree of this potential non-uniformity, a number of current density measurements were taken on a breadboard AGI-Engine. Fourteen button probes were used to measure the ion current density of the discharge along a perforated electrode that replaced the ion optics during conditions of simulated beam extraction. Three Faraday probes spaced apart in the vertical direction were also used in a separate test to interrogate the plume of the AGI-Engine during true beam extraction. It was determined that both the discharge and the plume of the AGI-Engine are highly uniform, with variations under most conditions limited to +/-10% of the average current density in the discharge and +/-5% of the average current density in the plume. Beam flatness parameter measured 30 mm from the ion optics ranged from 0.85 - 0.95, and overall uniformity was shown to generally increase with increasing discharge and beam currents. These measurements indicate that the plasma is highly uniform despite the asymmetric location of the discharge cathode.

Influencing factors on the size uniformity of self-assembled SiGe quantum rings grown by molecular beam epitaxy.

PubMed

Cui, J; Lv, Y; Yang, X J; Fan, Y L; Zhong, Z; Jiang, Z M

2011-03-25

The size uniformity of self-assembled SiGe quantum rings, which are formed by capping SiGe quantum dots with a thin Si layer, is found to be greatly influenced by the growth temperature and the areal density of SiGe quantum dots. Higher growth temperature benefits the size uniformity of quantum dots, but results in low Ge concentration as well as asymmetric Ge distribution in the dots, which induces the subsequently formed quantum rings to be asymmetric in shape or even broken somewhere in the ridge of rings. Low growth temperature degrades the size uniformity of quantum dots, and thus that of quantum rings. A high areal density results in the expansion and coalescence of neighboring quantum dots to form a chain, rather than quantum rings. Uniform quantum rings with a size dispersion of 4.6% and an areal density of 7.8×10(8) cm(-2) are obtained at the optimized growth temperature of 640°C.

Development of response models for the Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) sensors. Part 2: Analysis of the ERBE integrating sphere ground calibration

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Halyo, Nesim; Taylor, Deborah B.

1987-01-01

An explicit solution of the spectral radiance leaving an arbitrary point on the wall of a spherical cavity with diffuse reflectivity is obtained. The solution is applicable to spheres with an arbitrary number of openings of any size and shape, an arbitrary number of light sources with possible non-diffuse characteristics, a non-uniform sphere wall temperature distribution, non-uniform and non-diffuse sphere wall emissivity and non-uniform but diffuse sphere wall spectral reflectivity. A general measurement equation describing the output of a sensor with a given field of view, angular and spectral response measuring the sphere output is obtained. The results are applied to the Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) integrating sphere. The sphere wall radiance uniformity, loading effects and non-uniform wall temperature effects are investigated. It is shown that using appropriate interpretation and processing, a high-accuracy short-wave calibration of the ERBE sensors can be achieved.

On the Time Variation of Dust Extinction and Gas Absorption for Type Ia Supernovae Observed Through Non-uniform Interstellar Medium

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Xiaosheng; Aldering, Gregory; Biederman, Moriah; Herger, Brendan

2018-01-01

For Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) observed through a non-uniform interstellar medium (ISM) in its host galaxy, we investigate whether the non-uniformity can cause observable time variations in dust extinction and in gas absorption due to the expansion of the SN photosphere with time. We show that, owing to the steep spectral index of the ISM density power spectrum, sizable density fluctuation amplitudes at the length scale of typical ISM structures (>~ 10 pc) will translate to much smaller fluctuations on the scales of a SN photosphere. Therefore the typical amplitude of time variation due to non-uniform ISM, of absorption equivalent widths and of extinction, would be small. As a result, we conclude that non-uniform ISM density should not impact cosmology measurements based on SNe Ia. We apply our predictions based on the ISM density power law power spectrum to the observations of two highly reddened SNe Ia, SN 2012cu and SN 2014J.

A Novel Method of High Accuracy, Wavefront Phase and Amplitude Correction for Coronagraphy

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bowers, Charles W.; Woodgate, Bruce E.; Lyon, Richard G.

2003-01-01

Detection of extra-solar, and especially terrestrial-like planets, using coronagraphy requires an extremely high level of wavefront correction. For example, the study of Woodruff et al. (2002) has shown that phase uniformity of order 10(exp -4)lambda(rms) must be achieved over the critical range of spatial frequencies to produce the approx. 10(exp 10) contrast needed for the Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF) mission. Correction of wavefront phase errors to this level may be accomplished by using a very high precision deformable mirror (DM). However, not only phase but also amplitude uniformity of the same scale (approx. 10(exp -4)) and over the same spatial frequency range must be simultaneously obtained to remove all residual speckle in the image plane. We present a design for producing simultaneous wavefront phase and amplitude uniformity to high levels from an input wavefront of lower quality. The design uses a dual Michelson interferometer arrangement incorporating two DM and a single, fixed mirror (all at pupils) and two beamsplitters: one with unequal (asymmetric) beam splitting and one with symmetric beam splitting. This design allows high precision correction of both phase and amplitude using DM with relatively coarse steps and permits a simple correction algorithm.

Use of high-granularity CdZnTe pixelated detectors to correct response non-uniformities caused by defects in crystals

DOE PAGES

Bolotnikov, A. E.; Camarda, G. S.; Cui, Y.; ...

2015-09-06

Following our successful demonstration of the position-sensitive virtual Frisch-grid detectors, we investigated the feasibility of using high-granularity position sensing to correct response non-uniformities caused by the crystal defects in CdZnTe (CZT) pixelated detectors. The development of high-granularity detectors able to correct response non-uniformities on a scale comparable to the size of electron clouds opens the opportunity of using unselected off-the-shelf CZT material, whilst still assuring high spectral resolution for the majority of the detectors fabricated from an ingot. Here, we present the results from testing 3D position-sensitive 15×15×10 mm 3 pixelated detectors, fabricated with conventional pixel patterns with progressively smallermore » pixel sizes: 1.4, 0.8, and 0.5 mm. We employed the readout system based on the H3D front-end multi-channel ASIC developed by BNL's Instrumentation Division in collaboration with the University of Michigan. We use the sharing of electron clouds among several adjacent pixels to measure locations of interaction points with sub-pixel resolution. By using the detectors with small-pixel sizes and a high probability of the charge-sharing events, we were able to improve their spectral resolutions in comparison to the baseline levels, measured for the 1.4-mm pixel size detectors with small fractions of charge-sharing events. These results demonstrate that further enhancement of the performance of CZT pixelated detectors and reduction of costs are possible by using high spatial-resolution position information of interaction points to correct the small-scale response non-uniformities caused by crystal defects present in most devices.« less

High-resolution imaging of selenium in kidneys: a localized selenium pool associated with glutathione peroxidase 3

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Malinouski, M.; Kehr, S.; Finney, L.

2012-04-17

Recent advances in quantitative methods and sensitive imaging techniques of trace elements provide opportunities to uncover and explain their biological roles. In particular, the distribution of selenium in tissues and cells under both physiological and pathological conditions remains unknown. In this work, we applied high-resolution synchrotron X-ray fluorescence microscopy (XFM) to map selenium distribution in mouse liver and kidney. Liver showed a uniform selenium distribution that was dependent on selenocysteine tRNA{sup [Ser]Sec} and dietary selenium. In contrast, kidney selenium had both uniformly distributed and highly localized components, the latter visualized as thin circular structures surrounding proximal tubules. Other parts ofmore » the kidney, such as glomeruli and distal tubules, only manifested the uniformly distributed selenium pattern that co-localized with sulfur. We found that proximal tubule selenium localized to the basement membrane. It was preserved in Selenoprotein P knockout mice, but was completely eliminated in glutathione peroxidase 3 (GPx3) knockout mice, indicating that this selenium represented GPx3. We further imaged kidneys of another model organism, the naked mole rat, which showed a diminished uniformly distributed selenium pool, but preserved the circular proximal tubule signal. We applied XFM to image selenium in mammalian tissues and identified a highly localized pool of this trace element at the basement membrane of kidneys that was associated with GPx3. XFM allowed us to define and explain the tissue topography of selenium in mammalian kidneys at submicron resolution.« less

Automated thinning increases uniformity of in-row spacing and plant size in romaine lettuce

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Low availability and high cost of farm hand labor make automated thinners a faster and cheaper alternative to hand thinning in lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.). However, the effects of this new technology on uniformity of plant spacing and size as well as crop yield are not proven. Three experiments wer...

Breathable ‘Second Skin’ for Smart Uniforms

ScienceCinema

Fornasiero, Francesco

2018-01-16

Aiming to protect soldiers from biological and chemical threats, a team of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists have created a material that is highly breathable yet protective from biological agents. This material is the first key component of futuristic smart uniforms that also will respond to and protect from environmental chemical hazards.

Dynamic measurements in non-uniform flows

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ershov, A. P.

2017-12-01

The response of gauges registering the flow velocity and pressure in highly non-uniform media (for example, a powder under shock compression or powdered low-density explosive) is simulated. The modeling employs an acoustic approach. Against the average level of the signal, the fluctuations generated by the heterogeneity of the medium are observed which may distort the results completely. For reliable measurements, gauges larger than the characteristic scale of the medium non-uniformity are required. Under this condition, electromagnetic flow measurements and the velocity interferometer system for any reflector (VISAR) produce quite similar flow velocity profiles with small level of noise.

Dynamic measurements in non-uniform flows

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ershov, A. P.

2018-07-01

The response of gauges registering the flow velocity and pressure in highly non-uniform media (for example, a powder under shock compression or powdered low-density explosive) is simulated. The modeling employs an acoustic approach. Against the average level of the signal, the fluctuations generated by the heterogeneity of the medium are observed which may distort the results completely. For reliable measurements, gauges larger than the characteristic scale of the medium non-uniformity are required. Under this condition, electromagnetic flow measurements and the velocity interferometer system for any reflector (VISAR) produce quite similar flow velocity profiles with small level of noise.

ZPR-6 assembly 7 high {sup 240}Pu core experiments : a fast reactor core with mixed (Pu,U)-oxide fuel and a centeral high{sup 240}Pu zone.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lell, R. M.; Morman, J. A.; Schaefer, R.W.

ZPR-6 Assembly 7 (ZPR-6/7) encompasses a series of experiments performed at the ZPR-6 facility at Argonne National Laboratory in 1970 and 1971 as part of the Demonstration Reactor Benchmark Program (Reference 1). Assembly 7 simulated a large sodium-cooled LMFBR with mixed oxide fuel, depleted uranium radial and axial blankets, and a core H/D near unity. ZPR-6/7 was designed to test fast reactor physics data and methods, so configurations in the Assembly 7 program were as simple as possible in terms of geometry and composition. ZPR-6/7 had a very uniform core assembled from small plates of depleted uranium, sodium, iron oxide,more » U{sub 3}O{sub 8} and Pu-U-Mo alloy loaded into stainless steel drawers. The steel drawers were placed in square stainless steel tubes in the two halves of a split table machine. ZPR-6/7 had a simple, symmetric core unit cell whose neutronic characteristics were dominated by plutonium and {sup 238}U. The core was surrounded by thick radial and axial regions of depleted uranium to simulate radial and axial blankets and to isolate the core from the surrounding room. The ZPR-6/7 program encompassed 139 separate core loadings which include the initial approach to critical and all subsequent core loading changes required to perform specific experiments and measurements. In this context a loading refers to a particular configuration of fueled drawers, radial blanket drawers and experimental equipment (if present) in the matrix of steel tubes. Two principal core configurations were established. The uniform core (Loadings 1-84) had a relatively uniform core composition. The high {sup 240}Pu core (Loadings 85-139) was a variant on the uniform core. The plutonium in the Pu-U-Mo fuel plates in the uniform core contains 11% {sup 240}Pu. In the high {sup 240}Pu core, all Pu-U-Mo plates in the inner core region (central 61 matrix locations per half of the split table machine) were replaced by Pu-U-Mo plates containing 27% {sup 240}Pu in the plutonium component to construct a central core zone with a composition closer to that in an LMFBR core with high burnup. The high {sup 240}Pu configuration was constructed for two reasons. First, the composition of the high {sup 240}Pu zone more closely matched the composition of LMFBR cores anticipated in design work in 1970. Second, comparison of measurements in the ZPR-6/7 uniform core with corresponding measurements in the high {sup 240}Pu zone provided an assessment of some of the effects of long-term {sup 240}Pu buildup in LMFBR cores. The uniform core version of ZPR-6/7 is evaluated in ZPR-LMFR-EXP-001. This document only addresses measurements in the high {sup 240}Pu core version of ZPR-6/7. Many types of measurements were performed as part of the ZPR-6/7 program. Measurements of criticality, sodium void worth, control rod worth and reaction rate distributions in the high {sup 240}Pu core configuration are evaluated here. For each category of measurements, the uncertainties are evaluated, and benchmark model data are provided.« less

Machining and grinding: High rate deformation in practice

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Follansbee, P.S.

1993-04-01

Machining and grinding are well-established material-working operations involving highly non-uniform deformation and failure processes. A typical machining operation is characterized by uncertain boundary conditions (e.g.,surface interactions), three-dimensional stress states, large strains, high strain rates, non-uniform temperatures, highly localized deformations, and failure by both nominally ductile and brittle mechanisms. While machining and grinding are thought to be dominated by empiricism, even a cursory inspection leads one to the conclusion that this results more from necessity arising out of the complicated and highly interdisciplinary nature of the processes than from the lack thereof. With these conditions in mind, the purpose of thismore » paper is to outline the current understanding of strain rate effects in metals.« less

Machining and grinding: High rate deformation in practice

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Follansbee, P.S.

1993-01-01

Machining and grinding are well-established material-working operations involving highly non-uniform deformation and failure processes. A typical machining operation is characterized by uncertain boundary conditions (e.g.,surface interactions), three-dimensional stress states, large strains, high strain rates, non-uniform temperatures, highly localized deformations, and failure by both nominally ductile and brittle mechanisms. While machining and grinding are thought to be dominated by empiricism, even a cursory inspection leads one to the conclusion that this results more from necessity arising out of the complicated and highly interdisciplinary nature of the processes than from the lack thereof. With these conditions in mind, the purpose of thismore » paper is to outline the current understanding of strain rate effects in metals.« less

Radiation pressure dynamics in planetary exospheres - A 'natural' framework

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bishop, James; Chamberlain, Joseph W.

1989-01-01

Exospheric theory is reformulated to provide for the analysis of dynamical underpinning of exospheric features. The formulation is based on the parabolic-cylindrical separability of the Hamiltonian that describes particle motions in the combined fields of planetary gravity and solar radiation pressure. An approximate solution for trajectory evolution in terms of orbital elements is derived and the role of the exopause in the tail phenomenon is discussed. Also, an expression is obtained for the bound constituent atom densities at outer planetocoronal positions along the planet-sun axis for the case of an evaporative, uniform exobase. This expression is used to estimate midnight density enhancements as a function of radial distance for the terrestrial planets.

Propagation of sound waves through a linear shear layer: A closed form solution

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Scott, J. N.

1978-01-01

Closed form solutions are presented for sound propagation from a line source in or near a shear layer. The analysis was exact for all frequencies and was developed assuming a linear velocity profile in the shear layer. This assumption allowed the solution to be expressed in terms of parabolic cyclinder functions. The solution is presented for a line monopole source first embedded in the uniform flow and then in the shear layer. Solutions are also discussed for certain types of dipole and quadrupole sources. Asymptotic expansions of the exact solutions for small and large values of Strouhal number gave expressions which correspond to solutions previously obtained for these limiting cases.

Measurement of Magnetic Field Uniformity For a Neutron Electric Dipole Moment Detector with New Lead Endcaps

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kulkarni, Anita; Filippone, Bradley; Slutsky, Simon; Swank, Christopher; Carr, Robert; Osthelder, Charles; Biswas, Aritra; Molina, Daniel

2016-09-01

Over the last several decades, physicists have been measuring the neutron electric dipole moment (nEDM) with greater and greater sensitivity. The latest experiment we are developing will have 100 times more sensitivity than the previous leading experiment. A nonzero nEDM could, among other consequences, explain the presence of more matter than antimatter in the universe. To measure the nEDM with high accuracy, it is necessary to have a very uniform magnetic field inside the detector since non-uniformities can create false signals via the geometric phase effect. One way to improve field uniformity is to add superconducting lead endcaps to the detector, which constrain the fields at their surfaces to be parallel to them. Here, we test how the endcaps improve field uniformity by measuring the magnetic field at various points in a 1/3-scale experimental volume, inferring what the field must be at all other points, and calculating gradients in the field. This knowledge could help guide further steps needed to improve field uniformity and characterize limitations to the sensitivity of nEDM measurements for the full-scale experiment. Rose Hills Foundation, National Science Foundation Grant 1506459, and Department of Energy.

Comparative expression analysis reveals lineage relationships between human and murine gliomas and a dominance of glial signatures during tumor propagation in vitro.

PubMed

Henriquez, Nico V; Forshew, Tim; Tatevossian, Ruth; Ellis, Matthew; Richard-Loendt, Angela; Rogers, Hazel; Jacques, Thomas S; Reitboeck, Pablo Garcia; Pearce, Kerra; Sheer, Denise; Grundy, Richard G; Brandner, Sebastian

2013-09-15

Brain tumors are thought to originate from stem/progenitor cell populations that acquire specific genetic mutations. Although current preclinical models have relevance to human pathogenesis, most do not recapitulate the histogenesis of the human disease. Recently, a large series of human gliomas and medulloblastomas were analyzed for genetic signatures of prognosis and therapeutic response. Using a mouse model system that generates three distinct types of intrinsic brain tumors, we correlated RNA and protein expression levels with human brain tumors. A combination of genetic mutations and cellular environment during tumor propagation defined the incidence and phenotype of intrinsic murine tumors. Importantly, in vitro passage of cancer stem cells uniformly promoted a glial expression profile in culture and in brain tumors. Gene expression profiling revealed that experimental gliomas corresponded to distinct subclasses of human glioblastoma, whereas experimental supratentorial primitive neuroectodermal tumors (sPNET) correspond to atypical teratoid/rhabdoid tumor (AT/RT), a rare childhood tumor. ©2013 AACR.

On the Spectrum of the Plenoptic Function.

PubMed

Gilliam, Christopher; Dragotti, Pier-Luigi; Brookes, Mike

2014-02-01

The plenoptic function is a powerful tool to analyze the properties of multi-view image data sets. In particular, the understanding of the spectral properties of the plenoptic function is essential in many computer vision applications, including image-based rendering. In this paper, we derive for the first time an exact closed-form expression of the plenoptic spectrum of a slanted plane with finite width and use this expression as the elementary building block to derive the plenoptic spectrum of more sophisticated scenes. This is achieved by approximating the geometry of the scene with a set of slanted planes and evaluating the closed-form expression for each plane in the set. We then use this closed-form expression to revisit uniform plenoptic sampling. In this context, we derive a new Nyquist rate for the plenoptic sampling of a slanted plane and a new reconstruction filter. Through numerical simulations, on both real and synthetic scenes, we show that the new filter outperforms alternative existing filters.

Development and validation of Indian Affective Picture Database.

PubMed

Sharma, Ujjwal; Bhushan, Braj

2017-11-28

Since culturally salient stimuli for emotion recognition are scarce in India, we developed and validated a set of 140 coloured pictures of six basic emotions along with a neutral expression. The expressions were posed by four expressers, two males and two females, with mean age of 25.25 (SD 3.77) years. The expressions were captured from five different angles keeping the background uniform. These pictures were shown to 350 undergraduates who labelled the emotion and rated their intensity. The mean biased hit rate was 93.02 (SD 7.33) and mean unbiased hit rate was .519 (SD .015). Within subjects ANOVA revealed significant main effect of emotion (F(1, 6) = 7.598, p < .001). The t-test value (23.116, p < .001) shows that the given emotion was identified correctly by participants beyond chance factors. The mean intensity rating was 5.94 (SD .77). Overall, the results reveal that the pictures are a valid set of affective stimuli. © 2017 International Union of Psychological Science.

SOX2 expression levels distinguish between neural progenitor populations of the developing dorsal telencephalon.

PubMed

Hutton, Scott R; Pevny, Larysa H

2011-04-01

The HMG-Box transcription factor SOX2 is expressed in neural progenitor populations throughout the developing and adult central nervous system and is necessary to maintain their progenitor identity. However, it is unclear whether SOX2 levels are uniformly expressed across all neural progenitor populations. In the developing dorsal telencephalon, two distinct populations of neural progenitors, radial glia and intermediate progenitor cells, are responsible for generating a majority of excitatory neurons found in the adult neocortex. Here we demonstrate, using both cellular and molecular analyses, that SOX2 is differentially expressed between radial glial and intermediate progenitor populations. Moreover, utilizing a SOX2(EGFP) mouse line, we show that this differential expression can be used to prospectively isolate distinct, viable populations of radial glia and intermediate cells for in vitro analysis. Given the limited repertoire of cell-surface markers currently available for neural progenitor cells, this provides an invaluable tool for prospectively identifying and isolating distinct classes of neural progenitor cells from the central nervous system. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Spatial differentiation of gene expression in Aspergillus niger colony grown for sugar beet pulp utilization

PubMed Central

Benoit, Isabelle; Zhou, Miaomiao; Vivas Duarte, Alexandra; Downes, Damien J.; Todd, Richard B.; Kloezen, Wendy; Post, Harm; Heck, Albert J. R.; Maarten Altelaar, A. F.; de Vries, Ronald P.

2015-01-01

Degradation of plant biomass to fermentable sugars is of critical importance for the use of plant materials for biofuels. Filamentous fungi are ubiquitous organisms and major plant biomass degraders. Single colonies of some fungal species can colonize massive areas as large as five soccer stadia. During growth, the mycelium encounters heterogeneous carbon sources. Here we assessed whether substrate heterogeneity is a major determinant of spatial gene expression in colonies of Aspergillus niger. We analyzed whole-genome gene expression in five concentric zones of 5-day-old colonies utilizing sugar beet pulp as a complex carbon source. Growth, protein production and secretion occurred throughout the colony. Genes involved in carbon catabolism were expressed uniformly from the centre to the periphery whereas genes encoding plant biomass degrading enzymes and nitrate utilization were expressed differentially across the colony. A combined adaptive response of carbon-catabolism and enzyme production to locally available monosaccharides was observed. Finally, our results demonstrate that A. niger employs different enzymatic tools to adapt its metabolism as it colonizes complex environments. PMID:26314379

Spatial differentiation of gene expression in Aspergillus niger colony grown for sugar beet pulp utilization.

PubMed

Benoit, Isabelle; Zhou, Miaomiao; Vivas Duarte, Alexandra; Downes, Damien J; Todd, Richard B; Kloezen, Wendy; Post, Harm; Heck, Albert J R; Maarten Altelaar, A F; de Vries, Ronald P

2015-08-28

Degradation of plant biomass to fermentable sugars is of critical importance for the use of plant materials for biofuels. Filamentous fungi are ubiquitous organisms and major plant biomass degraders. Single colonies of some fungal species can colonize massive areas as large as five soccer stadia. During growth, the mycelium encounters heterogeneous carbon sources. Here we assessed whether substrate heterogeneity is a major determinant of spatial gene expression in colonies of Aspergillus niger. We analyzed whole-genome gene expression in five concentric zones of 5-day-old colonies utilizing sugar beet pulp as a complex carbon source. Growth, protein production and secretion occurred throughout the colony. Genes involved in carbon catabolism were expressed uniformly from the centre to the periphery whereas genes encoding plant biomass degrading enzymes and nitrate utilization were expressed differentially across the colony. A combined adaptive response of carbon-catabolism and enzyme production to locally available monosaccharides was observed. Finally, our results demonstrate that A. niger employs different enzymatic tools to adapt its metabolism as it colonizes complex environments.

Isotope labeling of proteins in insect cells.

PubMed

Skora, Lukasz; Shrestha, Binesh; Gossert, Alvar D

2015-01-01

Protein targets of contemporary research are often membrane proteins, multiprotein complexes, secreted proteins, or other proteins of human origin. These are difficult to express in the standard expression host used for most nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) studies, Escherichia coli. Insect cells represent an attractive alternative, since they have become a well-established expression system and simple solutions have been developed for generation of viruses to efficiently introduce the target protein DNA into cells. Insect cells enable production of a larger fraction of the human proteome in a properly folded way than bacteria, as insect cells have a very similar set of cytosolic chaperones and a closely related secretory pathway. Here, the limited and defined glycosylation pattern that insect cells produce is an advantage for structural biology studies. For these reasons, insect cells have been established as the most widely used eukaryotic expression host for crystallographic studies. In the past decade, significant advancements have enabled amino acid type-specific as well as uniform isotope labeling of proteins in insect cells, turning them into an attractive expression host for NMR studies. © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Cusped magnetic field mercury ion thruster. Ph.D. Thesis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Beattie, J. R.

1976-01-01

The importance of a uniform current density profile in the exhaust beam of an electrostatic ion thruster is discussed in terms of thrust level and accelerator system lifetime. A residence time approach is used to explain the nonuniform beam current density profile of the divergent magnetic field thruster. Mathematical expressions are derived which relate the thruster discharge power loss, propellant utilization, and double to single ion density ratio to the geometry and plasma properties of the discharge chamber. These relationships are applied to a cylindrical discharge chamber model of the thruster. Experimental results are presented for a wide range of the discharge chamber length. The thruster designed for this investigation was operated with a cusped magnetic field as well as a divergent field geometry, and the cusped field geometry is shown to be superior from the standpoint of beam profile uniformity, performance, and double ion population.

Polarization radiation in the planetary atmosphere delimited by a heterogeneous diffusely reflecting surface

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Strelkov, S. A.; Sushkevich, T. A.

1983-01-01

Spatial frequency characteristics (SFC) and the scattering functions were studied in the two cases of a uniform horizontal layer with absolutely black bottom, and an isolated layer. The mathematical model for these examples describes the horizontal heterogeneities in a light field with regard to radiation polarization in a three dimensional planar atmosphere, delimited by a heterogeneous surface with diffuse reflection. The perturbation method was used to obtain vector transfer equations which correspond to the linear and nonlinear systems of polarization radiation transfer. The boundary value tasks for the vector transfer equation that is a parametric set and one dimensional are satisfied by the SFC of the nonlinear system, and are expressed through the SFC of linear approximation. As a consequence of the developed theory, formulas were obtained for analytical calculation of albedo in solving the task of dissemination of polarization radiation in the planetary atmosphere with uniform Lambert bottom.

Autonomous facial recognition system inspired by human visual system based logarithmical image visualization technique

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wan, Qianwen; Panetta, Karen; Agaian, Sos

2017-05-01

Autonomous facial recognition system is widely used in real-life applications, such as homeland border security, law enforcement identification and authentication, and video-based surveillance analysis. Issues like low image quality, non-uniform illumination as well as variations in poses and facial expressions can impair the performance of recognition systems. To address the non-uniform illumination challenge, we present a novel robust autonomous facial recognition system inspired by the human visual system based, so called, logarithmical image visualization technique. In this paper, the proposed method, for the first time, utilizes the logarithmical image visualization technique coupled with the local binary pattern to perform discriminative feature extraction for facial recognition system. The Yale database, the Yale-B database and the ATT database are used for computer simulation accuracy and efficiency testing. The extensive computer simulation demonstrates the method's efficiency, accuracy, and robustness of illumination invariance for facial recognition.

Radiation effects on the mixed convection flow induced by an inclined stretching cylinder with non-uniform heat source/sink.

PubMed

Hayat, Tasawar; Qayyum, Sajid; Alsaedi, Ahmed; Asghar, Saleem

2017-01-01

This study investigates the mixed convection flow of Jeffrey liquid by an impermeable inclined stretching cylinder. Thermal radiation and non-uniform heat source/sink are considered. The convective boundary conditions at surface are imposed. Nonlinear expressions of momentum, energy and concentration are transformed into dimensionless systems. Convergent homotopic solutions of the governing systems are worked out by employing homotopic procedure. Impact of physical variables on the velocity, temperature and concentration distributions are sketched and discussed. Numerical computations for skin friction coefficient, local Nusselt and Sherwood numbers are carried out. It is concluded that velocity field enhances for Deborah number while reverse situation is observed regarding ratio of relaxation to retardation times. Temperature and heat transfer rate are enhanced via larger thermal Biot number. Effect of Schmidt number on the concentration and local Sherwood number is quite reverse.

Radiation effects on the mixed convection flow induced by an inclined stretching cylinder with non-uniform heat source/sink

PubMed Central

Hayat, Tasawar; Qayyum, Sajid; Alsaedi, Ahmed; Asghar, Saleem

2017-01-01

This study investigates the mixed convection flow of Jeffrey liquid by an impermeable inclined stretching cylinder. Thermal radiation and non-uniform heat source/sink are considered. The convective boundary conditions at surface are imposed. Nonlinear expressions of momentum, energy and concentration are transformed into dimensionless systems. Convergent homotopic solutions of the governing systems are worked out by employing homotopic procedure. Impact of physical variables on the velocity, temperature and concentration distributions are sketched and discussed. Numerical computations for skin friction coefficient, local Nusselt and Sherwood numbers are carried out. It is concluded that velocity field enhances for Deborah number while reverse situation is observed regarding ratio of relaxation to retardation times. Temperature and heat transfer rate are enhanced via larger thermal Biot number. Effect of Schmidt number on the concentration and local Sherwood number is quite reverse. PMID:28441392

What was uniform about the fin-de-siècle sailor suit?

PubMed

Rose, Clare

2011-01-01

The sailor suits widely worn by children in late-nineteenth-century Britain have been interpreted at the time, and since, as expressions of an Imperial ethos. Yet, a closer examination of the ways that these garments were produced by mass manufacturers, mediated by advertisers and fashion advisors and consumed by families makes us question this characterization. Manufacturers interpreted sailor suits not as unchanging uniforms but as fashion items responding to seasonal changes. Consumers used them to assert social identities and social distinctions, selecting from the multiple variants available. Cultural commentators described sailor suits as emulating Royal practice—but also as ‘common’ and to be avoided. A close analysis of large samples of images and texts from the period 1870–1900 reveals how these different meanings overlapped, making the fin-de-siècle sailor suit a garment that undermines many of our assumptions.

Identification of an evolutionarily conserved regulatory element of the zebrafish col2a1a gene.

PubMed

Dale, Rodney M; Topczewski, Jacek

2011-09-15

Zebrafish (Danio rerio) is an excellent model organism for the study of vertebrate development including skeletogenesis. Studies of mammalian cartilage formation were greatly advanced through the use of a cartilage specific regulatory element of the Collagen type II alpha 1 (Col2a1) gene. In an effort to isolate such an element in zebrafish, we compared the expression of two col2a1 homologues and found that expression of col2a1b, a previously uncharacterized zebrafish homologue, only partially overlaps with col2a1a. We focused our analysis on col2a1a, as it is expressed in both the stacked chondrocytes and the perichondrium. By comparing the genomic sequence surrounding the predicted transcriptional start site of col2a1a among several species of teleosts we identified a small highly conserved sequence (R2) located 1.7 kb upstream of the presumptive transcriptional initiation site. Interestingly, neither the sequence nor location of this element is conserved between teleost and mammalian Col2a1. We generated transient and stable transgenic lines with just the R2 element or the entire 1.7 kb fragment 5' of the transcriptional initiation site. The identified regulatory elements enable the tracking of cellular development in various tissues by driving robust reporter expression in craniofacial cartilage, ear, notochord, floor plate, hypochord and fins in a pattern similar to the expression of endogenous col2a1a. Using a reporter gene driven by the R2 regulatory element, we analyzed the morphogenesis of the notochord sheath cells as they withdraw from the stack of initially uniform cells and encase the inflating vacuolated notochord cells. Finally, we show that like endogenous col2a1a, craniofacial expression of these reporter constructs depends on Sox9a transcription factor activity. At the same time, notochord expression is maintained after Sox9a knockdown, suggesting that other factors can activate expression through the identified regulatory element in this tissue. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Identification of an evolutionarily conserved regulatory element of the zebrafish col2a1a gene

PubMed Central

Dale, Rodney M.; Topczewski, Jacek

2011-01-01

Zebrafish (Danio rerio) is an excellent model organism for the study of vertebrate development including skeletogenesis. Studies of mammalian cartilage formation were greatly advanced through the use of a cartilage specific regulatory element of the Collagen type II alpha 1 (Col2a1) gene. In an effort to isolate such an element in zebrafish, we compared the expression of two col2a1 homologues and found that expression of col2a1b, a previously uncharacterized zebrafish homologue, only partially overlaps with col2a1a. We focused our analysis on col2a1a, as it is expressed in both the stacked chondrocytes and the perichondrium. By comparing the genomic sequence surrounding the predicted transcriptional start site of col2a1a among several species of teleosts we identified a small highly conserved sequence (R2) located 1.7 kb upstream of the presumptive transcriptional initiation site. Interestingly, neither the sequence nor location of this element is conserved between teleost and mammalian Col2a1. We generated transient and stable transgenic lines with just the R2 element or the entire 1.7 kb fragment 5’ of the transcriptional initiation site. The identified regulatory elements enable the tracking of cellular development in various tissues by driving robust reporter expression in craniofacial cartilage, ear, notochord, floor plate, hypochord and fins in a pattern similar to the expression of endogenous col2a1a. Using a reporter gene driven by the R2 regulatory element, we analyzed the morphogenesis of the notochord sheath cells as they withdraw from the stack of initially uniform cells and encase the inflating vacuolated notochord cells. Finally, we show that like endogenous col2a1a, craniofacial expression of these reporter constructs depends on Sox9a transcription factor activity. At the same time, notochord expression is maintained after Sox9a knockdown, suggesting that other factors can activate expression through the identified regulatory element in this tissue. PMID:21723274

Contiguous metallic rings: an inductive mesh with high transmissivity, strong electromagnetic shielding, and uniformly distributed stray light.

PubMed

Tan, Jiubin; Lu, Zhengang

2007-02-05

This paper presents the experimental study on an inductive mesh composed of contiguous metallic rings fabricated using UV-lithography on quartz glass. Experimental results indicate that, at the same period and linewidth as square mesh, ring mesh has better transmissivity for its higher obscuration ratio, stronger electromagnetic shielding performance for its smaller maximum aperture, and less degradation of imaging quality for its lower ratio and uniform distribution of high order diffraction energy. It is therefore concluded that this kind of ring mesh can be used as high-pass filters to provide electromagnetic shielding of optical transparent elements.

Study of LWIR and VLWIR Focal Plane Array Developments: Comparison Between p-on- n and Different n-on- p Technologies on LPE HgCdTe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gravrand, O.; Mollard, L.; Largeron, C.; Baier, N.; Deborniol, E.; Chorier, Ph.

2009-08-01

The very long infrared wavelength (>14 μm) is a very challenging range for the design of mercury cadmium telluride (HgCdTe) large focal plane arrays (FPAs). The need (mainly expressed by the space industry) for very long wave FPAs appears very difficult to fulfil. High homogeneity, low defect rate, high quantum efficiency, low dark current, and low excess noise are required. Indeed, for such wavelength, the corresponding HgCdTe gap becomes smaller than 100 meV and each step from the metallurgy to the technology becomes critical. This paper aims at presenting a status of long and very long wave FPAs developments at DEFIR (LETI-LIR/Sofradir joint venture). This study will focus on results obtained in our laboratory for three different ion implanted technologies: n-on- p mercury vacancies doped technology, n-on- p extrinsic doped technology, and p-on- n arsenic on indium technology. Special focus is given to 15 μm cutoff n/ p FPA fabricated in our laboratory demonstrating high uniformity, diffusion and shot noise limited photodiodes at 50 K.

Investigation of the Spatiotemporal Responses of Nanoparticles in Tumor Tissues with a Small-Scale Mathematical Model

PubMed Central

Chou, Cheng-Ying; Huang, Chih-Kang; Lu, Kuo-Wei; Horng, Tzyy-Leng; Lin, Win-Li

2013-01-01

The transport and accumulation of anticancer nanodrugs in tumor tissues are affected by many factors including particle properties, vascular density and leakiness, and interstitial diffusivity. It is important to understand the effects of these factors on the detailed drug distribution in the entire tumor for an effective treatment. In this study, we developed a small-scale mathematical model to systematically study the spatiotemporal responses and accumulative exposures of macromolecular carriers in localized tumor tissues. We chose various dextrans as model carriers and studied the effects of vascular density, permeability, diffusivity, and half-life of dextrans on their spatiotemporal concentration responses and accumulative exposure distribution to tumor cells. The relevant biological parameters were obtained from experimental results previously reported by the Dreher group. The area under concentration-time response curve (AUC) quantified the extent of tissue exposure to a drug and therefore was considered more reliable in assessing the extent of the overall drug exposure than individual concentrations. The results showed that 1) a small macromolecule can penetrate deep into the tumor interstitium and produce a uniform but low spatial distribution of AUC; 2) large macromolecules produce high AUC in the perivascular region, but low AUC in the distal region away from vessels; 3) medium-sized macromolecules produce a relatively uniform and high AUC in the tumor interstitium between two vessels; 4) enhancement of permeability can elevate the level of AUC, but have little effect on its uniformity while enhancement of diffusivity is able to raise the level of AUC and improve its uniformity; 5) a longer half-life can produce a deeper penetration and a higher level of AUC distribution. The numerical results indicate that a long half-life carrier in plasma and a high interstitial diffusivity are the key factors to produce a high and relatively uniform spatial AUC distribution in the interstitium. PMID:23565142

Widely tunable gas laser for remote sensing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rothe, D. E.

1988-01-01

An advanced, highly efficient and reliable Rare-Gas Halide laser was developed. It employs the following: (1) novel prepulse techniques and impedance matching for efficient energy transfer; (2) magnetic switches for high reliability; (3) x-ray preionization for discharge uniformity and beam quality; and (4) an integrated gas flow loop for compactness. When operated as a XeCl laser, the unit produces 2 J per pulse with good beam uniformity. Optical pulse duration is 100 ns. Pulse repetition rate was tested up to 25 Hz. Efficiency is 3 percent.

Convergence in High Probability of the Quantum Diffusion in a Random Band Matrix Model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Margarint, Vlad

2018-06-01

We consider Hermitian random band matrices H in d ≥slant 1 dimensions. The matrix elements H_{xy}, indexed by x, y \\in Λ \\subset Z^d, are independent, uniformly distributed random variable if |x-y| is less than the band width W, and zero otherwise. We update the previous results of the converge of quantum diffusion in a random band matrix model from convergence of the expectation to convergence in high probability. The result is uniformly in the size |Λ| of the matrix.

Characterization of perpendicular STT-MRAM by spin torque ferromagnetic resonance

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sha, Chengcen; Yang, Liu; Lee, Han Kyu; Barsukov, Igor; Zhang, Jieyi; Krivorotov, Ilya

We describe a method for simple quantitative measurement of magnetic anisotropy and Gilbert damping of the MTJ free layer in individual perpendicular STT-MRAM devices by spin torque ferromagnetic resonance (ST-FMR) with magnetic field modulation. We first show the dependence of ST-FMR spectra of an STT-MRAM element on out-of-plane magnetic field. In these spectra, resonances arising from excitation of the quasi-uniform and higher order spin wave eigenmodes of the free layer as well as acoustic mode of the synthetic antiferromagnet (SAF) are clearly seen. The quasi-uniform mode frequency at zero field gives magnetic anisotropy field of the free layer. Then we show dependence of the quasi-uniform mode linewidth on frequency is linear over a range of frequencies but deviatesfrom linearity in the low and high frequency regimes. Comparison to ST-FMR spectrareveals that the high frequency line broadening is linked to the SAF mode softening near the SAF spin flop transition at 5 kG. In the low field regime, the SAF mode frequency approaches that of the quasi-uniform mode, and resonant coupling of the modes leads to the line broadening. A linear fit to the linewidth data outside of the high and low field regimes gives the Gilbert damping parameter of the free layer. This work was supported by the Samsung Global MRAM Innovation Program.

Analytic approximations of Von Kármán plate under arbitrary uniform pressure—equations in integral form

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhong, XiaoXu; Liao, ShiJun

2018-01-01

Analytic approximations of the Von Kármán's plate equations in integral form for a circular plate under external uniform pressure to arbitrary magnitude are successfully obtained by means of the homotopy analysis method (HAM), an analytic approximation technique for highly nonlinear problems. Two HAM-based approaches are proposed for either a given external uniform pressure Q or a given central deflection, respectively. Both of them are valid for uniform pressure to arbitrary magnitude by choosing proper values of the so-called convergence-control parameters c 1 and c 2 in the frame of the HAM. Besides, it is found that the HAM-based iteration approaches generally converge much faster than the interpolation iterative method. Furthermore, we prove that the interpolation iterative method is a special case of the first-order HAM iteration approach for a given external uniform pressure Q when c 1 = - θ and c 2 = -1, where θ denotes the interpolation iterative parameter. Therefore, according to the convergence theorem of Zheng and Zhou about the interpolation iterative method, the HAM-based approaches are valid for uniform pressure to arbitrary magnitude at least in the special case c 1 = - θ and c 2 = -1. In addition, we prove that the HAM approach for the Von Kármán's plate equations in differential form is just a special case of the HAM for the Von Kármán's plate equations in integral form mentioned in this paper. All of these illustrate the validity and great potential of the HAM for highly nonlinear problems, and its superiority over perturbation techniques.

A non-uniformly under-sampled blade tip-timing signal reconstruction method for blade vibration monitoring.

PubMed

Hu, Zheng; Lin, Jun; Chen, Zhong-Sheng; Yang, Yong-Min; Li, Xue-Jun

2015-01-22

High-speed blades are often prone to fatigue due to severe blade vibrations. In particular, synchronous vibrations can cause irreversible damages to the blade. Blade tip-timing methods (BTT) have become a promising way to monitor blade vibrations. However, synchronous vibrations are unsuitably monitored by uniform BTT sampling. Therefore, non-equally mounted probes have been used, which will result in the non-uniformity of the sampling signal. Since under-sampling is an intrinsic drawback of BTT methods, how to analyze non-uniformly under-sampled BTT signals is a big challenge. In this paper, a novel reconstruction method for non-uniformly under-sampled BTT data is presented. The method is based on the periodically non-uniform sampling theorem. Firstly, a mathematical model of a non-uniform BTT sampling process is built. It can be treated as the sum of certain uniform sample streams. For each stream, an interpolating function is required to prevent aliasing in the reconstructed signal. Secondly, simultaneous equations of all interpolating functions in each sub-band are built and corresponding solutions are ultimately derived to remove unwanted replicas of the original signal caused by the sampling, which may overlay the original signal. In the end, numerical simulations and experiments are carried out to validate the feasibility of the proposed method. The results demonstrate the accuracy of the reconstructed signal depends on the sampling frequency, the blade vibration frequency, the blade vibration bandwidth, the probe static offset and the number of samples. In practice, both types of blade vibration signals can be particularly reconstructed by non-uniform BTT data acquired from only two probes.

A Non-Uniformly Under-Sampled Blade Tip-Timing Signal Reconstruction Method for Blade Vibration Monitoring

PubMed Central

Hu, Zheng; Lin, Jun; Chen, Zhong-Sheng; Yang, Yong-Min; Li, Xue-Jun

2015-01-01

High-speed blades are often prone to fatigue due to severe blade vibrations. In particular, synchronous vibrations can cause irreversible damages to the blade. Blade tip-timing methods (BTT) have become a promising way to monitor blade vibrations. However, synchronous vibrations are unsuitably monitored by uniform BTT sampling. Therefore, non-equally mounted probes have been used, which will result in the non-uniformity of the sampling signal. Since under-sampling is an intrinsic drawback of BTT methods, how to analyze non-uniformly under-sampled BTT signals is a big challenge. In this paper, a novel reconstruction method for non-uniformly under-sampled BTT data is presented. The method is based on the periodically non-uniform sampling theorem. Firstly, a mathematical model of a non-uniform BTT sampling process is built. It can be treated as the sum of certain uniform sample streams. For each stream, an interpolating function is required to prevent aliasing in the reconstructed signal. Secondly, simultaneous equations of all interpolating functions in each sub-band are built and corresponding solutions are ultimately derived to remove unwanted replicas of the original signal caused by the sampling, which may overlay the original signal. In the end, numerical simulations and experiments are carried out to validate the feasibility of the proposed method. The results demonstrate the accuracy of the reconstructed signal depends on the sampling frequency, the blade vibration frequency, the blade vibration bandwidth, the probe static offset and the number of samples. In practice, both types of blade vibration signals can be particularly reconstructed by non-uniform BTT data acquired from only two probes. PMID:25621612