The European corn borer (ECB) Ostrinia nubilalis is a widespread pest of cereals. Mating disruption with the sex pheromone is a potentially attractive method for managing this pest. The goal of this study was to develop a biotechnological method for the production of ECB sex pheromone. Our approach was to engineer the oleaginous yeast Yarrowia lipolytica to produce (Z)-11-tetradecenol (Z11-14:OH), which can be chemically acetylated to (Z)-11-tetradecenyl acetate (Z11-14:OAc), the main pheromone component of the Z-race of O. nubilalis. Fatty acyl-CoA desaturases (FAD) and fatty acyl-CoA reductases (FAR) from nine different species of Lepidoptera were screened individually and in combinations. A titer of 29.2±1.6 mg/L Z11-14:OH was reached in small-scale cultivation with an optimal combination of a FAD (Lbo_PPTQ) from Lobesia botrana and FAR (HarFAR) from Helicoverpa armigera. When the second copies of FAD and FAR genes were introduced, the titer improved 2.1-fold. The native FAS1 gene’s overexpression led to a further 1.5-fold titer increase. When the same engineered strain was cultivated in controlled 1 L bioreactors in fed-batch mode, 188.1±13.4 mg/L of Z11-14:OH was obtained. Fatty alcohols were chemically acetylated to obtain Z11-14:OAc. Electroantennogram experiments showed that males of the Z-race of O. nubilalis were responsive to biologically-derived pheromone blend. Behavioral bioassays in a wind tunnel revealed attraction of male O. nubilalis at a level similar to that of the chemically synthesized pheromone used as a control, although full precopulatory behavior was observed less often. The study paves the way for the production of ECB pheromone by fermentation.

Background: Patients treated for lymphoma are at risk of cardiovascular adverse events. Global longitudinal strain (GLS) and global circumferential strain (GCS) were reported for predicting cardiovascular adverse events in patients treated with doxorubicin. However, the prognostic value of RV ejection fraction by 3D transthoracic echocardiography (3D TTE) have not been elucidated yet. We hypothesized that RV echocardiography parameters increases the sensitivity for predicting the later CAE. Methods: In this retrospective study, ninety-six patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma with normal cardiac function treated with R-CHOP regimen were studied between January 2013 and January 2015 by 3D TTE. Basic demographic data, oncology and echocardiography parameters were measured. The main outcomes were the proportion of patients with grade 3–4 cardiovascular adverse events (CAE). The association of pre-chemotherapy and post-chemotherapy echocardiography parameters with CAEs was analyzed using proportional hazard analysis. Results: Over a median follow-up period of 6.1 years (range, 4.9-7.6 years) after the completion of chemotherapy, 18 of 96 patients (19%) experienced CAEs. Univariate predictors of CAE (P < .05) were LVGLS, LVGCS, RVEF, and RVESV. Multivariate analysis of all significant univariate variables showed that RVEF (hazard ratio, 0.848; 95% confidence interval,0.785–0.916; P < .001) were significantly and independently associated with CAE. Stepwise analysis of the multivariate associations showed an increase in the global x2 value after adding LVEF (P < .001) to significant clinical variables. Conclusion: LVGLS and RVEF were significantly and independently associated with CAE in patients. Adding RVEF to other clinical variables provided incremental prognostic information.

This is a review of the article "Interactive Supercomputing with Jupyter: Lessons Learned from the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center," for the Leadership Computing department of Computing in Science and Engineering. The article was invited to complement a Special Issue on "Jupyter in Computational Science."CommentsIn the abstract, the last sentence capitalizes "Jupyter Project" but then later says "engage with the Project".  I think the second project should be lower case or you could have a capital "Jupyter", but project should not be capitalized.  Given this is the "leadership computing" column, could you also put in a connection between the scalability of leadership computing to enable the interactive computing with Jupyter?  It is talking about this indirectly, but it would be nice to make that more explicit and up-front for the "leadership computing" column.In section 1, it ends with the following sentence "Efforts to support Jupyter at NERSC began in the context of a tectonic shift in user workload driven by the explosion of data from..."  This is a bit of a mouthful of a sentence.  Can you break it into more bitesized pieces?Maybe put second paragraph that introduces NERSC into the "how it started and how it's going" section (seems to interrupt the flow between paragraph 1 and paragraph 3).It would be nice to mention that the inventor of Jupyter notebooks and JupyterHub is in-house.  Was there any recognition by him about these emerging use-cases that led him to develop JupyterHub as a new deployment mechanism (JupyterHub didn't just appear... I think there was likely some motivation that led to its development to serve this emerging community??)  So it would be nice if the story of how you came to deploy JupyterHub seemed more purposeful and driven by emerging community needs.  I think there is a background story there from Fernando's perspective that would show how the community needs drove to the Hub's creation. (its outside of NERSC, but it is inside of UCB/LBL).  It would show how research and deployment at NERSC work together.In the Phase 3 discussion, the JupyterLab comes out of the blue.  Is there some experience at NERSC or other data centers that fed into the design of JupyterLab?  Should JupyterLab be the centerpiece of your Phase3 deployment?  It seems to deserve its own phase (phase 4 or be the centerpiece of phase 3).There is a lot of good discussion of the technical details of the deployment of Jupyter, which is interesting.  It would be nice if you had more descriptions of the many different use cases and scientific activity that has been enabled by this infrastructure (opportunity for more pretty pictures and scientific impact).  I would recommend even making your "lessons learned" section more compact and use the space to describe cool science projects that benefit from this infrastructure and talk more about the scientific impact of this new paradigm of HPC access.

Climate change causes upward shift of forest lines worldwide, with consequences on soil biota and carbon (C). Using a space-for-time approach, we analyse compositional changes in the soil biota across the forest line ecotone, an important transition zone between different ecosystems. We collected soil samples along transects stretching from subalpine mountain birch forests to low-alpine vegetation. Soil fungi and micro-eukaryotes were surveyed using DNA metabarcoding of the 18S and ITS2 markers, while ergosterol was used to quantify fungal biomass. We observed a strong shift in the soil biota across the forest line ecotone: Below the forest line, there were higher proportions of basidiomycetes and mucoromycetes, including ectomycorrhizal and saprotrophic fungi. Above, we observed relatively more root-associated ascomycetes, including Archaeorhizomycetes, ericoid mycorrhizal fungi and dark septate endophytes. Ergosterol and percentage C content in soil strongly and positively correlated with the abundance of root-associated ascomycetes. The predominance of ectomycorrhizal and saprotrophic fungi below the forest line likely promote high C turnover, while root-associated ascomycetes above the forest line may enhance C sequestration. With further rise in forest lines, there will be a corresponding shift in the belowground biota linked to C sequestration processes.

We report the clinical and radiological outcomes of a 30-year-old female with femoral head fracture following a posterior hip dislocation. The patient was managed using safe surgical hip dislocation and reviewed the literature on Pipkin type I fractures.

A document by Hossein Shaqaqi. Click on the document to view its contents.

In this case report we present a case of a eight years old boy who presented with progressive orbital cellulitis causing endangered vision secondary to carious primary maxillary molar. The patient was appropriately managed with intravenous antibiotics, steroids and surgical decompression. Significant morbidity was overcome by multi-specialty team approach.

Objectives: To assess the feasibility of using Image1 S™ endoscopic enhancement system for discrimination of the vascular patterns in laryngeal lesions. Design: Forty patients presenting with benign, dysplastic and malign laryngeal lesions were examined with Image1 S system. The vascular patterns were classified by a group of the authors/ according to the ELS guideline, as perpendicular or longitudinal, in all lesions. Endoscopic images of the vascular patterns are evaluated through an online survey by a group of otolaryngologists with different levels of clinical expertise. The qualitative evaluation of the vascular patterns in two groups were compared to investigate the consistency. The relationship between the vascular patterns and the pathological results was statistically analyzed. Results: Eleven patient presented with benign, 13 patients with dysplastic and 16 patients with malignant pathology. The vascular patterns were longitudinal in 9 lesions, perpendicular in 28 lesions and undetectable in 3 lesions. The relevance between the vascularization pattern and the pathological diagnosis was found to be significant (χ2= 20.30, p < 0,001). The qualitative evaluation of the vascular patterns by the two groups of observers was significantly close to each other (=0.63). The survey also showed that spectral modes producing high contrast images were preferred by 81,9% of the participants over white light images. Conclusion: This study demonstrated the usefulness and feasibility of Image1 S endoscopic enhancement system to predict the diagnosis from vascular changes in laryngeal lesions.

Stir bar sorptive extraction (SBSE) was compared with standardized pump sampling regarding the prospects to assess airborne levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in indoor environments. A historic railway water tower, which will be preserved aa technical monument for museum purposes, was sampled with both approaches because built-in insulation material was suspected to release PAHs to the indoor air. The 16 PAH on the US EPA list were quantified using gas chromatography with mass selection detection in filters from pump sampling after solvent extraction and on SBSE devices after thermal desorption. SBSE was seen to sample detectable PAH masses with excellent repeatability and a congener pattern largely similar to that observed with pump sampling. Congener patterns were however significantly different from that in the PAH source because release from the insulation material is largely triggered by the respective congener vapor pressures. Absolute masses in the ng range sampled by SBSE corresponded to airborne concentrations in the ng L -1 range determined by pump sampling. Principle differences between SBSE and pump sampling as well as prospects of SBSE as cost-effective and versatile complement of pump sampling are discussed.

Reprogram Frozen Embryo Transfers to Allow For a More “Natural” Approach

In this paper, an elegant and easy to implement numerical method using matrix mechanics approach is proposed, to solve the time independent Schrodinger equation (TISE) for Morse potential. It is specifically applied to non-homogeneous diatomic molecule HCl to obtain its rotating-vibrator spectrum. While matrix diagonalization technique is utilised for solving TISE, model parameters for Morse potential are optimized using variational Monte-Carlo (VMC) approach by minimizing χ 2 − value. Thus, validation with experimental vibrational frequencies is completely numerical based with no recourse to analytical solutions. The ro-vibrational spectra of HCl molecule obtained using the optimized parameters through VMC have resulted in least χ 2 − value as compared to those determined using best parameters from multiple regression analysis of analytical expressions. Numerical algorithm for solving the Hamiltonian matrix has been implemented utilizing Free Open Source Software (FOSS) Scilab and simulation results are matching well with those obtained using analytical solutions from Nikiforov-Uvarov (NU) method and asymptotic iteration method (AIM).

Understanding the genetic properties of adaptive trait evolution is a fundamental crux of biological inquiry that links molecular processes to biological diversity. Important uncertainties persist regarding the genetic predictability of adaptive trait change, the role of standing variation, and whether adaptation tends to result in the fixation of favored variants. Here, we use the recurrent evolution of enhanced ethanol resistance in Drosophila melanogaster during this species' worldwide expansion as a promising system to add to our understanding of the genetics of adaptation. We find that elevated ethanol resistance has evolved at least three times in different cooler regions of the species' modern range - not only at high latitude but also in two African high altitude regions - and that ethanol and cold resistance may have a partially shared genetic basis. Applying a bulk segregant mapping framework, we find that the genetic architecture of ethanol resistance evolution differs substantially not only between our three resistant populations, but also between two crosses involving the same European population. We then apply population genetic scans for local adaptation within our quantitative trait locus regions, and we find potential contributions of genes with annotated roles in spindle localization, membrane composition, sterol and alcohol metabolism, and other processes. We also apply simulation-based analyses that confirm the variable genetic basis of ethanol resistance and hint at a moderately polygenic architecture. However, these simulations indicate that larger-scale studies will be needed to more clearly quantify the genetic architecture of adaptive evolution, and to firmly connect trait evolution to specific causative loci.

To study the effect of the invasion of Bursaphelenchus xylophilus on the functional relationship between woody plants and insect communities, the populations of tree species and insect communities were investigative in the Masson pine forests with different infestation durations of B. xylophilus. In this study, the number of Pinus massoniana began to decrease sharply, whereas the total number of other tree species in the arboreal layer increased gradually with the infestation duration of B. xylophilus. The principal component analysis ordination biplot shows that there was a significant change in the spatial distribution of woody plant species in different Masson pine forest stands. Additionally, a total of 7,188 insect specimens was obtained. The insect population showed an upward trend in stand types with the increase of pine wilt disease infection periods, which demonstrated that the insect community had been significantly affected by the invasion of B. xylophilus. The structure of insect functional groups changed from herbivorous (He) > omnivorous (Om) > predatory (Pr) > parasitic (Pa) > detritivorous (De) in the control stand to He > Pa > Om, De > Pr after B. xylophilus infestation in the forests. The results showed that the populations of He, Pa, and De increased after the invasion of B. xylophilus, but the populations of Pr decreased. Moreover, the redundancy analysis ordination bi-plots reflected the complicated functional relationship between woody plant communities and insects after the invasion of B. xylophilus. The present study provides insights into the changes in the community structure of woody plants and insects, as well as the functional relationship between woody plant communities and insect communities after invasion of B. xylophilus.

Dens are places for cavernicolous animals to hibernate, reproduce, and avoid predators and harsh weather conditions, and thus they have a vital impact on their survival. M. himalayana is the main large cavernicolous rodent on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. The analysis of den traits and their ecological functions can reveal mechanisms by which marmots have adapted to their environment, which is important for further understanding the ecological significance of this species. From July to August 2019 (warm season), we used unmanned aerial vehicles to fly at low altitudes and slow speeds to locate 131 marmot burrows (45 on shaded slopes, 51 on sunny slopes, and 35 on flat areas) in the northeastern Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. We then measured the physical characteristics (den density, entrance size, first tunnel length, volume, orientation and plant characteristics near the den entrance) of these dens on site. The physical parameters of the M. himalayana dens showed that they function to protect the marmots from natural enemies and bad weather, provide good drainage, and maintain a stable microclimate around the entrance. This is a result of the marmot’s adaptation to the harsh environment (cold and humidity) of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.

A document by Bretislav Friedrich. Click on the document to view its contents.

SARS coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in the viral spike (S) encoding a SARS-COV-2 SPIKE D614G mutation protein predominate over time in locales revealing the dynamic aspects of its key viral processes where it is found, implying that this change enhances viral transmission. It has also been observed that retroviruses infected ACE2-expressing cells pseudotyped with SG614 that is presently affecting a growing number of countries markedly more efficiently than those with SD614. The availability of newer powerful computational resources, molecular modeling techniques, and cheminformatics quality data have made it feasible to generate reliable algebraic calculations to design new chemical entities, merging chemicals, recoring natural products, and a lot of other substances fuelling further development and growth of this AI-quantum based drug design field to balance the trade-off between the structural complexity and the quality of such biophysics predictions that cannot be obtained by any other method. In this paper, we strongly combine topology geometric methods targeting at the atomistic level the protein apparatus of the SARS-COV-2 virus that are simple in machine learning anti-viral characteristics, to propose computer-aided rational drug design strategies efficient in computing docking usage, and powerful enough to achieve very high accuracy levels for this in-silico effort for the generation of the AI-Quantum designed molecule the RoccustyrnaTM small molecule, a multi-targeting druggable scaffold (1S,2R,3S)‐2‐({[(1S,2S,4S,5R)‐4‐ethenyl‐4‐sulfonylbicyclo[3.2.0]heptan‐2‐yl]oxy}amino)‐3‐[(2R,5R)‐5‐(2‐methyl‐6‐methylidene‐6,9‐dihydro‐3H‐purin‐9‐yl)‐3‐methylideneoxolan‐2‐yl]phosphirane‐1‐carbonitrile targeting the COVID-19-SARS-COV-2 SPIKE D614G mutation using Chern-Simons Topology Euclidean Geometric in a Lindenbaum-Tarski generated QSAR automating modeling and Artificial Intelligence-Driven Predictive Neural Networks.

Νovel SARS coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) of the family Coronaviridae starting in China and spreading around the world is an enveloped, positive-sense, single-stranded RNA of the genus betacoronavirus encoding the SARS-COV-2 (2019-NCOV, Coronavirus Disease 2019. Remdesivir drug, or GS-5734 lead compound, first described in 2016 as a potential anti-viral agent for Ebola diseade and has also being researched as a potential therapeutic agent against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the coronavirus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Computer-aided drug design (CADD), Structure and Ligand based Drug Repositioning strategies based on parallel docking methodologies have been widely used for both modern drug development and drug repurposing to find effective treatments against this disease. Quantum mechanics, molecular mechanics, molecular dynamics (MD), and combinations have shown superior performance to other drug design approaches providing an unprecedented opportunity in the rational drug development fields and for the developing of innovative drug repositioning methods. We tested 18 phytochemical small molecule libraries and predicted their synergies in COVID-19 (2019- NCOV), to devise therapeutic strategies, repurpose existing ones in order to counteract highly pathogenic SARS-CoV-2 infection. We anticipate that our geometry hashing driven quantum deep learing similarity approaches which is based on separated pairs of short consecutive matching fragments, can be used for the development of anticoronaviral drug combinations in large scale HTS screenings, and to maximize the safety and efficacy of the Remdesivir, Colchicine and Ursolic acid drugs already known to induce synergy with potential therapeutic value or drug repositioning to COVID-19 patients.

In considerazione della sempre minore disponibilità di acque di buona qualità, un tema, oggetto di attenzione sia scientifica che legislativa, è la possibilità di riutilizzo delle acque reflue. Obiettivo del riutilizzo è la limitazione del prelievo delle acque superficiali e sotterranee, e la riduzione degli scarichi sui corpi idrici recettori. Il trattamento biologico rappresenta la fase più importante del ciclo depurativo delle acque reflue. I naturali processi biologici sono sfruttati all’interno degli impianti a fanghi attivi (CAS). Gli impianti di depurazione MBR si sono affermati nel panorama nazionale e internazionale come una consolidata alternativa ai convenzionali impianti a fanghi attivi, in particolare laddove sia necessario contenere l’ingombro planimetrico e/o garantire un effluente di qualità elevata. L’attività di tirocinio, svolta presso il Laboratorio di Ingegneria Sanitaria Ambientale (SEED) dell’Università degli Studi di Salerno, è stata finalizzata in una prima fase allo studio approfondito e al confronto tra le tipologie di trattamento convenzionali e innovative e, nella seconda fase, alla progettazione di modelli virtuali tridimensionali che rappresentano impianti innovativi, basati sull’utilizzo della tecnologia MBR.

For the treatment of Covid-19 patients with remdesivir, poor renal- and liver function were both exclusion criteria in randomized clinical trials (RCTs) and contra-indication for treatment. Also, nephrotoxicity and hepatotoxicity are reported as adverse events. We retrospectively reviewed renal- and liver functions of covid-19 patients who received remdesivir in the 15 days after treatment initiation. Approximately 20% of the patient population met RCT exclusion criteria. In total, 11% of the patients had a decrease in estimated glomerular filtration rate larger than 10 ml/min/1.73m2. Also, 25% and 35% had increased alanine transaminase and aspartate transaminase levels, respectively. However, serious adverse events were limited. Therefore, contra-indications based on kidney- and liver function should not be absolute for remdesivir treatment in patients with Covid-19 if these functions are monitored regularly.

Background: Case study of 30 years male having suspending mass found over upper surface of soft palate hanging in nasopharynx. Methods: After evaluation, patient underwent combined approach (Trans-oral + Endoscopic) excision. Results: Histopathological examination concluded possibility of intra-oral lipoma. Conclusion: Palatal mass (lipoma) requires surgical excision post complete evaluation.

Fish bones have a risk of damaging the mucosa when lodged in the pharynx. Fish bones migrated into surrounding tissues is relatively unusual. We present 2 cases of patients who ingested fish bone, which migrated into retropharyngeal space and hypopharynx. All fish bones were removed without complications.

Introduction Multiple contact-based ablation technologies have been developed to allow real-time judgement of lesion effectiveness; local impedance (LI) guided ablation and the role of ultra-high density (UHD) mapping have not yet been evaluated for cavotricuspid isthmus dependent atrial flutter (CTI-AFL). Methods This non-randomised observational study evaluated patients undergoing CTI-AFL ablation using conventional, contact force (CF) and LI guided strategies. Ablation metrics were collected, and in the LI cohort, the use of UHD mapping for breakthrough was evaluated. Results 30 patients were included, 10 in each group. Mean total ablation time was significantly shorter with LI (3.2±1.3min) vs conventional (5.6±2.7min) and CF (5.7±2.0min, p=0.0042). Time from start of ablation to CTI block was numerically shorter with LI (14.2±8.0min) vs conventional and CF (19.7±14.1 and 22.5±19.1min, p=0.4408). There were no differences in the number of lesions required to achieve block, procedural success, complication rates or recurrence. 15/30 patients did not achieve block following first-pass ablation. UHD mapping rapidly identified breakthrough in the 5 LI patients, including epicardial-endocardial breakthrough (EEB) away from the line. Conclusion The use of LI for real-time assessment of lesion formation resulted in significantly less ablation requirement. UHD mapping rapidly identified breakthrough, including EEB, which would likely have been difficult to identify otherwise and possibly require extensive ablation, contributing towards shortening of time to CTI block with LI.

Background and Purpose: Ischemic stroke remains one of the leading causes of death in the population. In addition, mitochondrial dysfunction is an essential part of the pathogenesis of cerebral ischemia and is a promising pharmacotherapeutic target. Experimental Approach: the work was performed on male Wistar rats, which were simulated cerebral ischemia by irreversible occlusion of the middle cerebral artery. 4-hydroxy-3,5-di-tret-butyl cinnamic acid (25 mg/kg, 50 mg/kg and 100 mg/kg) was injected intraperitoneally for 3 days after ischemia (daily). On the 4th day of the experiment, the changes of rat’s cognitive functions in the Morris water maze test, cellular respiration processes, the activity of the mitochondrial respiratory chain complexes and citrate synthase activity, the intensity of oxidative stress and apoptosis reactions were assessed. Key Results: it was found that the administration of 4-hydroxy-3,5-di-tret-butyl cinnamic acid at doses of 25 mg/kg and 50 mg/kg practically equivalently promotes the restoration of aerobic metabolism reactions and the activity of the mitochondrial respiratory chain complexes, decrease of the intensity of oxidative stress reactions and apoptosis, as well as an increase in the activity of citrate synthase. As a result, the restoration of mitochondrial function in the hippocampal cells contributed to the restoration of the animal’s spatial memory. Conclusion and Implications: a study showed that 4-hydroxy-3,5-di-tret-butyl cinnamic acid at doses of 25 mg/kg and 50 mg/kg has a neuroprotective effect on hippocampal neurons under conditions of permanent occlusion of the middle cerebral artery, realized by restoration of mitochondrial function.

Introduction: The impact of catheter ablation for atrial fibrillation (AF) on cardiovascular events and mortality is controversial. We investigated the impact of sinus rhythm maintenance on major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events after AF ablation from a Japanese multicenter cohort of AF ablation. Methods and Results: We investigated 2737 consecutive patients (25.6% female, mean age 63.4 ± 10.3 years) who underwent a first catheter ablation for AF from the Atrial Fibrillation registry to Follow the long-teRm Outcomes and use of aNTIcoagulants aftER Ablation (AF Frontier Ablation Registry). The primary endpoint was a composite of stroke, transient ischemic attack, cardiovascular events, and all-cause death. During a mean follow-up of 25.2 months, 2070 (75.6%) patients were free from AF after catheter ablation, and the primary composite endpoint occurred in 122 (4.5%) patients. The AF nonrecurrence group had a significantly lower incidence of the primary endpoint (1.7 per 100 person-years) compared with the AF recurrence group (3.2 per 100 person-years; P = 0.001). The multivariate analysis revealed that freedom from AF (hazard ratio 0.57; 95% confidence interval 0.39–0.83; P = 0.003) was independently associated with the incidence of the composite event.¬¬ Conclusion: In the multicenter cohort of AF ablation, sinus rhythm maintenance after catheter ablation was independently associated with lower rates of major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events.