In this paper, speed selection of the time periodic traveling waves for a three species time-periodic Lotka-Volterra competition system is studied via the upper-lower solution method as well as the comparison principle. Through constructing specific types of upper and lower solutions to the system, the speed selection of the minimal wave speed can be determined under some sets of sufficient conditions composed of the parameters in the system.

Objective: To determine the association between placental lesions and lifetime cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk screening at 6 months postpartum following preeclampsia (PE). Design: Observational cohort study. Setting: Tertiary care centres in Ottawa and Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Population: Women diagnosed with PE who received cardiovascular screening at 6 months postpartum. Methods: Placentas from women diagnosed with PE were evaluated for histopathological lesions according to a standardised synoptic data collection form with blinding to clinical outcomes apart from gestational age at delivery. At 6 months postpartum, each participant was screened for cardiovascular risk factors and a lifetime cardiovascular risk score was calculated. A risk score >35% was deemed high risk for lifetime CVD. Main Outcome Measures: The association between placental lesions and lifetime CVD risk was assessed using odds ratios (OR, 95% confidence intervals). Results: Of the 85 participants, 53 (62.4%) screened high-risk for lifetime CVD. High-risk women had more severe lesions of maternal vascular malperfusion (MVM). MVM lesions with a severity score >2 resulted in a 3-fold increased risk of screening high risk for lifetime CVD (OR 3.10 [1.20-7.92]). MVM lesion score >2 was moderately predictive of high-risk screening (AUC 0.63 [0.51,0.75]; sensitivity: 71.8% [54.6,84.4]; specificity: 54.7% [41.5,67.3]). When clinical data was added, the model’s predictive performance improved (AUC 0.73 [0.62,0.84] sensitivity 78.4% [65.4,87.5]; specificity 51.6% [34.8,68.0]). Conclusions: PE women with MVM are more likely to screen high-risk for lifetime CVD compared to women without these lesions. Placenta pathology may provide a unique modality to identify women for postpartum cardiovascular screening.

Coastal marshes are transitional areas between terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and vulnerable to climate change and anthropogenic activities. In recent decades the reclamation of coastal marshes remarkably increased and their effects on microbial communities present in coastal marshes have been studied with great interest. However, most of these studies focused on microbial community composition and diversity. The processes underlying functional community assembly and spatiotemporal effect often ignored. Therefore, community structure and assembly mechanisms of ammonia-oxidising prokaryotes in long-term reclaimed coastal marshes have not been studied. Here using qPCR and IonS5TMXL sequencing platform, we investigated spatiotemporal dynamics, assembly processes and diversity patterns in ammonia-oxidising prokaryotes in over 1000 years reclaimed coastal salt marsh soils. The taxonomic & phylogenetic diversity and composition of the ammonia-oxidizers showed apparent spatiotemporal variations along reclamation of soil. The phylogenetic null modelling-based analysis showed across all sites, the archaeal ammonia-oxidising community assembled by deterministic process (84.71%). The ammonia-oxidising bacterial community was formed more by a stochastic process in coastal marshes and at stage 60 years (|βNTI|<2), despite its relatively dominant deterministic process (55.2%). The deterministic assembly process and nitrification activity in reclaimed soils was positively correlated. Archaeal amoA gene abundance were also positively correlated with the nitrification rate. Our study revealed that during the 1000 years of reclamation coastal marshes both ammonia-oxidising communities responded differently to diversity change and assembly processes and nitrification activity. These findings provide a better understanding of how long-term reclamation affect soil N cycling and assembly dynamics of ammonia-oxidising communities.

Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells are the industry standard cell line for high yield expression of biopharmaceuticals. However, leveraging the influencers of specific productivity to expedite generation of high productivity clones remains a challenge. One factor impacting specific productivity is the strong, constitutive activity of the CMV promoter used in most vectors for transgene applications. In this study, we sought to understand the influence of DNA methylation along the CMV promoter in driving transcription in higher vs lower productivity cell lines. Bisulfite pyrosequencing was used to characterize the CMV methylation pattern in parental (lower productivity) and DHFR-amplified (higher productivity) monoclonal antibody-expressing cell lines. In-silico analysis of promoter sequence revealed a large CpG island covering the transcription factor binding sites for CREB1 and NFκB. Variable methylation of specific CpG sites appears correlated with transcription factor binding. Treatment of the cells with 5’-azacytidine, a known DNA hypomethylation agent, led to methylation reduction in the CMV promoter, particularly upstream of the NFκB binding consensus region. This induced DNA hypomethylation correlated with cell line-specific increases in RNA expression and specific productivity. These encouraging findings suggest that site-specific methylation along the CMV promoter plays an underutilized, and important role in improving transgene transcription using the CMV promoter and de-bottlenecking the production capacity of CHO cell lines.

Network-on-chip (NoC) is an efficient interconnection designing method for solving the limitations of buses in connecting IP cores. Power consumption is one of the most important issues in this area, solving this problem can lead to a more reliable and efficient design of NoC. Besides, there is another problem which is the More's law is reaching an end. In this paper, we used a new approach, which improves designing points, so we can design NoC architecture more efficiently based on previous designs. Briefly, this method adds one step before the overall change of architecture which tests if the current design can be improved if we change some internal characteristics. For validation, we applied this method by using wire NoC, and changing its bottlenecks, and make them more efficient by using mapping and adding antennas for wireless communication. While this method seems simple at the first sight, but the result can help many designing, which are vital for industries, and technologies like Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) and Internet of Things (IoT) devices. Briefly, this method can be used in NoC architectures and make them more efficient in a new style for new purposes. The results compared with the basic designing method with the new improved method; power and Energy improvements are respectively 25% and 46% with mapping and wireless improvements and approximately 60% more than traditional NoC in comparison with the basic method in this approach. This method also paves the way for green computing by avoiding producing more chemicals and products from a reusability perspective.

We studied COVID-19 hospitalisation rates in elderly Maltese residents, aged 80 years and older, after national attainment of 70% first-dose coverage of COVID-19 vaccine in this age cohort. The milestone resulted in almost 50% reduction of hospital admissions, as confirmed by time series modelling using national SARS-CoV-2 infection rates as the comparator. The reduction was not seen in younger, as yet unvaccinated, age groups, where hospital admissions actually increased during the same period following a third wave of infections.

\cite{o}All over the world, education is viewed as the bedrock for any developing nation. Schools serve as platforms through which the future of any nation is formed. Education plays a decisive role in the development of any nation. It is the best endowment from government to its citizen. Peace Education is a participatory and interactive process of instruction and learning as such should be given utmost attention. The educational curricula should provide a programme that addresses psychological and physical violence, through violence prevention, conflict resolution and mediation. This paper looks into the need to institutionalize Peace Education in post secondary schools and highlight its significance in preserving the future of the nation by reducing violence and inculcating the culture of peace.

Generally, high bioelectroactivity of anodophilic biofilm favors high power generation of microbial fuel cell (MFC), however, it is not clear whether it can promote denitrification of MFC synchronously. In this study, the impact of anodophilic biofilms bioelectroactivity on denitrification behavior of single-chamber air-cathode MFC (SAMFC) in steady state was studied for the first time. Anodophilic biofilms of various bioelectroactivity were acclimated at conditions of open circuit (OC), Rext of 1000Ω and 20Ω (denoted as SAMFC-OC, SAMFC-1000Ω and SAMFC-20Ω, respectively) and run for 100 days in the presence of nitrate. Electrochemical tests and microbial analysis results showed that the anode of the SAMFC-20Ω delivered higher oxidation and denitrification current response and had a higher abundance of electroactive bacteria, like Geobacter, Pseudomonas and Comamonas, which possessed bidirectional electron transfer function, demonstrating a higher bioelectroactivity of the anodophilic biofilm. Moreover, these electroactive bacteria favored the accumulation of denitrifers, like Thauera and Alicycliphilus, probably by consuming trace oxygen through catalyzing oxygen reduction. The SAMFC-20Ω not only delivered a 61.7% higher power than the SAMFC-1000Ω, but also achieved a stable and high denitrification rate constant (kDN) of 1.9, which was 50% and 40% higher than that of the SAMFC-OC and SAMFC-1000Ω, respectively. It could be concluded that the high bioelectroactivity of the anodophilic biofilms not only favored high power generation of the SAMFC, but also promote the growth of denitrifers at the anodes and strengthened denitrification. This study provided an effective method and important theoretical basis for enhancing power generation and denitrification performance of the SAMFC synchronously.

3D scene flow presents the 3D motion of each point in the 3D space, which forms the fundamental 3D motion perception for autonomous driving and server robots. Although the RGBD camera or LiDAR capture discrete 3D points in space, the objects and motions usually are continuous in the macro world. That is, the objects keep themselves consistent as they flow from the current frame to the next frame. Based on this insight, the Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN) is utilized to self-learn 3D scene flow with no need for ground truth. The fake point cloud of the second frame is synthesized from the predicted scene flow and the point cloud of the first frame. The adversarial training of the generator and discriminator is realized through synthesizing indistinguishable fake point cloud and discriminating the real point cloud and the synthesized fake point cloud. The experiments on KITTI scene flow dataset show that our method realizes promising results without ground truth. Just like a human observing a real-world scene, the proposed approach is capable of determining the consistency of the scene at different moments in spite of the exact flow value of each point is unknown in advance.   Corresponding author(s) Email: wanghesheng@sjtu.edu.cn

Land plants harbour robust roots to grow in diverse soil ecosystems. The distal end of the primary root tip has specialized tissue, called “root cap.” The evolution of root cap-like structures in early plants rudimentary roots and well-developed root caps in vascular plants hints towards developing an adaptive trait for a localized plant habitat. Root cap interacts with soil and assists roots in penetrating the below ground, avoid/adsorb metals, uptake water, minerals, and regulates rhizosphere microbiota that drives plant-soil feedback. Besides, the root cap governs lateral root patterning and directs root growth in varying conditions. This review article presents the retrospective and our perspective on root cap characters for root-soil interaction. We discussed the anatomy of root cap among the different taxa of land plants and their relevance in diverse habitats and elucidated the root cap functions under various growth conditions. We took advantage of recently published single-cell RNAseq data and shed light on biological relevance of root cap cell-type enriched genes from arabidopsis, rice, maize, and tomato. Additionally, analyzed the transcription factor binding site enrichment in root cap enriched genes and constructed gene-regulatory networks operating in root cap to contribute its multi-faceted role in plant growth and adaptation.

Authors’ names: Diane Laure Meli Tiwa1,2, Dominic Leandry Angong Wouna1, Francky Teddy Endomba3,4.

Photosynthetic bacteria can be useful biotechnological tools – they produce a variety of valuable products, including high purity hydrogen, and can simultaneously treat recalcitrant wastewaters. However, while photobioreactors have been designed and modelled for photosynthetic algae and cyanobacteria, there has been less work on understanding the effect of light in photosynthetic bacterial fermentations. In order to design photobioreactors, and processes using these organisms, robust models of light penetration, utilisation and conversion are needed. This article uses experimental data from a tubular photobioreactor designed to focus in on light intensity effects, to model the effect of light intensity on the growth of Rhodopseudomonas palustris, a model photosynthetic bacterium. The work demonstrates that growth is controlled by light intensity, and that this organism does experience photoinhibition above 600 W/m2, which has implications for outdoor applications. Further, the work presents a model for light penetration in circular photobioreactors, which tends to be the most common geometry. The work extends the modelling tools for these organisms, and will allow for better photobioreactor design, and the integration of modelling tools in designing processes which use photosynthetic bacteria.

Understanding emerging pollutant (EP) dynamics in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) is key to improved processing. The main route by which EPs enter the water environment is the WWTP. Data to parametrise existing complex wastewater treatment models from operational WWTP is of limited availability. In particular, to help gain insight into the dynamics of EP, data on the activated sludge model developed by the International Water Association (IWA) for xenobiotic (ASM-X) is sparse. Also, sampling both influent and effluent concentrations of pollutants at the same time fails to take into account the hydraulic retention time (HRT) and plug flow across the WWTP. This case study considered three EPs, namely trimethoprim (TRI), oseltamivir (OSE) and doxycycline (DOX). We investigated the link between the relationship of the influent and effluent load to HRT across the WWTP using correlation analysis. The results suggest that HRT of WWTP have a wider range than those reported. Also, we proposed an alternative modelling approach, which describes the full-scale WWTP as one process. The modelling results show a good fit (based on the likelihood ratio test at a significance level of α= 0.05) compared to the measured effluent EP concentrations.

Penetrating brain injury is a rare pathology generally requiring emergency surgical intervention. We discuss a case of penetrating brain injury by the umbrella in which surgical intervention was performed 14 days after the injury, and obtained good clinical results.

Angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma (AITL) is a special subtype of peripheral T-cell lymphoma, Histopathological examination is the main basis for the diagnosis of the disease, but the diagnosis is challenging. The study has shown that combining immunohistochemistry and gene rearrangement can increase the diagnostic accuracy

Background This meta-analysis aimed to compare the potential effects of local anesthesia (LA) and general anesthesia (GA) for transcather aortic value implantation (TAVI). Measurements All relevant studies were searched from the Pubmed, EMbase, Web of Science and the Cochrane Library (January 1, 2016 to June 1, 2021). The main outcomes of this literature meta-analysis were 30-day mortality, procedural time, new pacemaker implantation, total stay in hospital, the use of vasoactive drug, intra-and postoperative complications and emergencies, including conversion to open, myocardial infraction, pulmonary complication, vascular complication, renal injury/failure, stroke, transesophageal echocardiography, life-threatening/major bleeding, cardiac tamponade, emergency PCI. Pooled risk ratio (RR) and mean difference (MD) together with 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated. Results A total of seventeen studies including 20938 patients in the final analysis fulfilled the inclusion criteria. Intra-and postoperative complications (myocardial infraction, vascular complication, renal injury/failure, stoke, cardiac tamponade) undergoing TAVI in serious AS patients under GA do not offer significant difference compared with LA. No differences are observed between LA and GA for new pacemaker implantation, total stay in hospital, transesophageal echocardiography, emergency PCI. GA is associated with more adverse events, like the more overall mortality (RR 0.69, p=0.600), pulmonary complications (RR 0.54, p=0.278), life-threatening/major bleeding (RR 0.85, p=0.855), the more times of coversion to open (RR 0.22, p=0.746). LA has many advantages, including a shorter procedure duration (MD=-0.38, p=0.000) and a reduction of the use of vasoactive drug (RR 0.57，P=0.000). Conclusions For TAVI, both LA with or without sedation and GA are feasible and safe. LA appears a feasible alternative to GA for AS patients undergo TAVI.

Background: Information regarding the effect of a multidisciplinary team (MDT) to improve cardiometabolic risk factors (CMRF) in routine clinical settings is lacking. Methods: In this one-year retrospective chart review (2018), 598 adults (African American 59%, Hispanic 35%, Caucasian 6%) with a mean age of 43.8 ± 14.0 were included. Qualifying patients (≥ 1 CMRF of overweight/obesity, prediabetes/diabetes, or hypertension) who were treated under an MDT protocol were compared to patients who qualified for MDT but were treated solely by a primary care provider (PCP). The MDT protocol included endocrinology-oriented visits, lifestyle counseling, care coordination, and shared medical appointments. Linear and binary regression were performed to identify the factors associated with CMRF changes. Results: Patients treated by MDT had a greater reduction (β, 95% CI) in weight (- 4.29 kg, -7.62, -0.97), BMI (-1.43 kg/m2, -2.68, -0.18), SBP (- 2.18 mmHg, -4.09, -0.26), and DBP (- 1.97 mmHg, -3.34, -0.60). They also had 77% higher odds of reducing ≥ 5% their initial weight, 83% higher odds of reducing 1 point of BMI, and 59% higher odds of reducing ≥2 mmHg DBP. No association was observed for MDT intervention and A1c changes. Conclusion: Compared to PCP, MDT-protocolized intervention improves CMRF in a multi-ethnic adult cohort in a routine clinical setting. Patient’s activation to access the best care and overcoming barriers from patients (weight perception, social determinants increasing no-shows to visits), providers (obesity stigma, clinical inertia), and health system (time constraints and high paperwork imposed by payers) is a priority.

15 patients successfully received submental artery perforator flaps with its pedicle elongated. The lesions were located in tongue,oropharynx,gingiva,mandible,auricle,infraorbital skin,buccal mucosa and parotid gland.All patients are satisfied with the reconstruction. 15 patients’ donor sites were recovered well and the flaps survival was 100% with no post-operation or further major complications occurred

Background:The pathogenesis of osteoarthritis (OA) implicates a low-grade inflammation associated to the activation of the innate immune system. Toll like receptor (TLR) stimulation triggers the release of inflammatory mediators, which aggravate OA severity. The aim was to study the preventive effect of 6-shogaol (6S), a potential TLR4 inhibitor, on the treatment of experimental knee OA. Experimentalapproach:OA was induced in C57BL6 mice by surgical section of the medial meniscotibial ligament, which received 6S for eight weeks. Cartilage damage, inflammatory mediator presence, and disease markers were assessed in the joint tissues by immunohistochemistry. Computational modeling was used to predict binding modes of 6S into the TLR4/MD2 receptor and its permeability across cellular membranes. Employing LPS-stimulated chondrocytes and MAPK assay we clarified 6S action mechanisms. Results:6S treatment was able to prevent articular cartilage lesions, synovitis, and the presence of pro-inflammatory mediators and disease markers in OA animals. Molecular modeling studies predicted 6S interaction with the TLR4/MD-2 heterodimer in an antagonist conformation through its binding into the MD-2 pocket. In cell culture, we confirmed that 6S reduced LPS-induced TLR4 inflammatory signaling pathways. Besides, MAPK assay demonstrated that 6S directly inhibits the ERK1/2 phosphorylation activity. Conclusion:6S evoked a preventive action on cartilage and synovial inflammation in OA mice. 6S effect may take place not only by hindering the interaction between TLR4 ligands and the TLR4/MD-2 complex in chondrocytes, but also through inhibition of ERK phosphorylation, implying a pleiotropic effect on different mediators activated during OA, which proposes it as an attractive drug for OA treatment.

Stuck drain tube is a rare postoperative complication. We present a case of 27 years female who underwent right salpingectomy with abdominal drain on left side. Postoperatively drain couldn't be removed and diagnosis of stuck drain was made. Laparotomy revealed Fallopian tube entering through both eyes of the drain tube.

Primary leimyosarcoma of the inferior vena cava is considered as rare vascular retroperitoneal sarcoma. Although radical resection with free margin is necessary, vascular strategies are very challenging.

A document by Amit K Maiti. Click on the document to view its contents.

Background: Diabetes mellitus has been associated with many different musculoskeletal system problems. Objective: This study aims to show the prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders in patients with diabetes and to reveal their relationship to the metabolic parameters and microvascular complications. Methods: Seven hundred two diabetic patients who consecutively applied to our clinic between March 2017 and February 2018 were included in this prospective cross-sectional study. The relationship of the musculoskeletal disorders including carpal tunnel syndrome, Dupuytren’s contracture, adhesive capsulitis, flexor tenosynovitis, limited joint mobility syndrome, Charcot arthropathy, diabetic foot and gout to the patients’ age, gender, type of diabetes, duration of diabetes, metabolic parameters, and microvascular complications were evaluated. Results: Musculoskeletal system disorders were detected in 45.9% (n = 322) of the 702 diabetic patients evaluated in our study. The most common disorders were carpal tunnel syndrome 17.7% (n = 124), Dupuytren’s contracture 14.4% (n = 101), and adhesive capsulitis 13.8% (n = 97). A statistically significant relationship of the HbA1c level with Dupuytren’s contracture, carpal tunnel syndrome, and adhesive capsulitis was detected (p<0.05). Conclusions: Patients’ age, duration of diabetes, HbA1c level, and presence of microvascular complications are associated with musculoskeletal disorders in this population.

Because of their challenging taxonomy, arthropods are traditionally underrepresented in biological inventories and monitoring programs. However, arthropods are the largest component of biodiversity, and no assessment can be considered informative without including them. Arthropod immature stages are often discarded during sorting, despite frequently representing more than half of the collected individuals. To date, little effort has been devoted to characterising the impact of discarding non-adult specimens on our diversity estimates. Here, we use a metabarcoding approach to analyse spiders from white oak communities in the Iberian Peninsula collected with standardised protocols, to assess (1) the contribution of juvenile stages to local diversity estimates, and (2) their effect on the diversity patterns inferred across communities. We further investigate the ability of metabarcoding to inform on abundance. We obtained 363 and 331 species as adults and juveniles, respectively. Species represented only by juveniles represented an increase of 35% with respect to those identified from adults in the whole sampling. Differences in composition between communities were greatly reduced when immature stages were taken considered, especially across latitudes. Moreover, our results revealed that metabarcoding data are to a certain extent quantitative, but some sort of taxonomic conversion factor may be necessary to provide accurate informative estimates. Although our findings do not question the relevance of the information provided by adult-based inventories, they also reveal that juveniles provide a novel and relevant layer of knowledge that, especially in areas with marked seasonality, may influence our interpretations, providing more accurate information from standardised biological inventories.