Charge distribution in two-dimensional electrostatics

We examine the stability of ringlike configurations of N charges on a plane interacting through the potential $V(z_1,...,z_N)=\sum_i |z_i|^2-\sum_{i<j} ln|z_i-z_j|^2$. We interpret the equilibrium distributions in terms of a shell model and compare predictions of the model with the results of numerical simulations for systems with up to 100 particles.Comment: LaTe

The structure of the PapD-PapGII pilin complex reveals an open and flexible P5 pocket

P pili are hairlike polymeric structures that mediate binding of uropathogenic Escherichia coli to the surface of the kidney via the PapG adhesin at their tips. PapG is composed of two domains: a lectin domain at the tip of the pilus followed by a pilin domain that comprises the initial polymerizing subunit of the 1,000-plus-subunit heteropolymeric pilus fiber. Prior to assembly, periplasmic pilin domains bind to a chaperone, PapD. PapD mediates donor strand complementation, in which a beta strand of PapD temporarily completes the pilin domain's fold, preventing premature, nonproductive interactions with other pilin subunits and facilitating subunit folding. Chaperone-subunit complexes are delivered to the outer membrane usher where donor strand exchange (DSE) replaces PapD's donated beta strand with an amino-terminal extension on the next incoming pilin subunit. This occurs via a zip-in-zip-out mechanism that initiates at a relatively accessible hydrophobic space termed the P5 pocket on the terminally incorporated pilus subunit. Here, we solve the structure of PapD in complex with the pilin domain of isoform II of PapG (PapGIIp). Our data revealed that PapGIIp adopts an immunoglobulin fold with a missing seventh strand, complemented in parallel by the G1 PapD strand, typical of pilin subunits. Comparisons with other chaperone-pilin complexes indicated that the interactive surfaces are highly conserved. Interestingly, the PapGIIp P5 pocket was in an open conformation, which, as molecular dynamics simulations revealed, switches between an open and a closed conformation due to the flexibility of the surrounding loops. Our study reveals the structural details of the DSE mechanism

lncRNA requirements for mouse acute myeloid leukemia and normal differentiation

A substantial fraction of the genome is transcribed in a cell type-specific manner, producing long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs), rather than protein-coding transcripts. Here we systematically characterize transcriptional dynamics during hematopoiesis and in hematological malignancies. Our analysis of annotated and de novo assembled lncRNAs showed many are regulated during differentiation and mis-regulated in disease. We assessed lncRNA function via an in vivo RNAi screen in a model of acute myeloid leukemia. This identified several lncRNAs essential for leukemia maintenance, and found that a number act by promoting leukemia stem cell signatures. Leukemia blasts show a myeloid differentiation phenotype when these lncRNAs were depleted, and our data indicates that this effect is mediated via effects on the c-MYC oncogene. Bone marrow reconstitutions showed that a lncRNA expressed across all progenitors was required for the myeloid lineage, whereas the other leukemia-induced lncRNAs were dispensable in the normal setting

Engineering the Controlled Assembly of Filamentous Injectisomes in E. coli K-12 for Protein Translocation into Mammalian Cells.

Bacterial pathogens containing type III protein secretion systems (T3SS) assemble large needle-like protein complexes in the bacterial envelope, called injectisomes, for translocation of protein effectors into host cells. The application of these molecular syringes for the injection of proteins into mammalian cells is hindered by their structural and genomic complexity, requiring multiple polypeptides encoded along with effectors in various transcriptional units (TUs) with intricate regulation. In this work, we have rationally designed the controlled expression of the filamentous injectisomes found in enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) in the nonpathogenic strain E. coli K-12. All structural components of EPEC injectisomes, encoded in a genomic island called the locus of enterocyte effacement (LEE), were engineered in five TUs (eLEEs) excluding effectors, promoters and transcriptional regulators. These eLEEs were placed under the control of the IPTG-inducible promoter Ptac and integrated into specific chromosomal sites of E. coli K-12 using a marker-less strategy. The resulting strain, named synthetic injector E. coli (SIEC), assembles filamentous injectisomes similar to those in EPEC. SIEC injectisomes form pores in the host plasma membrane and are able to translocate T3-substrate proteins (e.g., translocated intimin receptor, Tir) into the cytoplasm of HeLa cells reproducing the phenotypes of intimate attachment and polymerization of actin-pedestals elicited by EPEC bacteria. Hence, SIEC strain allows the controlled expression of functional filamentous injectisomes for efficient translocation of proteins with T3S-signals into mammalian cells

A Dual-Branch CNN-LSTM Residual Network for Enhanced Windows Malware Detection

The persistent evolution of Windows malware presents a significant challenge to static‐analysis techniques, which often rely on handcrafted features and single‐modality models that struggle to generalize across diverse and obfuscated samples. This study proposes a novel Dual‐Branch CNN‐LSTM Residual Network that concurrently processes a uniform static feature vector as both a pseudo‐image and a sequential input, thereby capturing complementary spatial and temporal patterns without necessitating multiple preprocessing pipelines. The architecture incorporates residual connections in each branch to preserve gradient flow and facilitate deep learning. Experiments conducted on the EMBER dataset demonstrate that the proposed method attains an accuracy of 97.1 %, alongside a precision of 96.9 %, a recall of 97.1 %, and an F1-score of 97.0 %, surpassing existing single‐branch and traditional baseline models. These results underscore the capacity of dual‐branch residual fusion to improve detection performance while maintaining computational efficiency and robustness to feature obfuscation. The unified preprocessing scheme further simplifies cross‐dataset evaluation, paving the way for scalable deployment in real‐world Windows environment

Deep Learning Model for COVID-19 Diagnosis: Improving Accuracy and Sensitivity in Early Detection

The continuous COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, required fast and efficient diagnostic tools. This work presents a deep learning-based system, using convolutional neural networks, for the detection and diagnosis of COVID-19 through computed tomography tests, aiming to assist specialized medical professionals. A total of 746 Computed Tomography images (CT), were used in this work, one of the largest publicly available chest computed tomography dataset for research into COVID-19. Our proposed technique showed the accuracy of more than 99% for the training set, with high sensitivity and specificity, and achieved 97% on the validation set. Such results would hint at the very possible implementation of our deep CNN approach in clinical diagnostic settings, particularly for COVID-19 testing, to enhance early detection and management for patients

A socially assistive robot for long-term cardiac rehabilitation in the real world

What are the benefits of using a socially assistive robot for long-term cardiac rehabilitation? To answer this question we designed and conducted a real-world long-term study, in collaboration with medical specialists, at the Fundacion Cardioinfantil-Instituto de Cardiologia clinic (Bogota, Colombia) lasting 2.5 years. The study took place within the context of the outpatient phase of patients' cardiac rehabilitation programme and aimed to compare the patients' progress and adherence in the conventional cardiac rehabilitation programme (control condition) against rehabilitation supported by a fully autonomous socially assistive robot which continuously monitored the patients during exercise to provide immediate feedback and motivation based on sensory measures (robot condition). The explicit aim of the social robot is to improve patient motivation and increase adherence to the programme to ensure a complete recovery. We recruited 15 patients per condition. The cardiac rehabilitation programme was designed to last 36 sessions (18 weeks) per patient. The findings suggest that robot increases adherence (by 13.3%) and leads to faster completion of the programme. In addition, the patients assisted by the robot had more rapid improvement in their recovery heart rate, better physical activity performance and a higher improvement in cardiovascular functioning, which indicate a successful cardiac rehabilitation programme performance. Moreover, the medical staff and the patients acknowledged that the robot improved the patient motivation and adherence to the programme, supporting its potential in addressing the major challenges in rehabilitation programmes

Response of two Citrullus amarus accessions to isolates of three species of Meloidogyne and their graft compatibility with watermelon

[EN] The response of two Citrullus amarus accessions, BGV0005164 and BGV0005167, was assessed against different Meloidogyne arenaria, Meloidogyne incognita, and Meloidogyne javanica isolates in pot experiments and against M. incognita in plastic greenhouse. In the pot experiments, plants were inoculated with a second-stage juvenile per cm(3) of sterile sand and maintained in a growth chamber at 25 degrees C for 50 days. The watermelon cv. Sugar Baby was included as a susceptible control for comparison. At the end of the experiments, the number of egg masses and eggs per plant was determined, and the reproduction index was calculated as the percentage of the number of eggs produced in the C. amarus accessions with regard to that produced in the susceptible cv. Sugar Baby. In the plastic greenhouse experiment, the ungrafted watermelon cv. Sugar Baby and watermelons grafted onto each of the C. amarus accessions and onto the watermelon rootstock cv. Robusta were cultivated from May to August 2016 in plots with nematode densities from 46 to 1392 J2 per 250 cm(3) of soil at transplantation. At the end of the experiment, the galling index and the number of eggs per plant were determined, and the reproduction index was calculated. Additionally, the compatibility of the two accessions with the watermelon cv. Sugar Baby and the effect on fruit quality (weight, size, shape, firmness, pH, total soluble solids, and flesh color) were assessed under a hydroponic system in a greenhouse. The commercial rootstocks cv. Cobalt and cv. Robusta were also included. All the Meloidogyne isolates produced less egg masses and eggs per plant on the accessions than on Sugar Baby. Both accessions performed as resistant against M. arenaria, and from highly to moderately resistant to M. incognita and M. javanica in pot experiments. In the plastic greenhouse experiment, both C. amarus accessions performed as resistant to M. incognita. Both C. amarus accessions were compatible with the watermelon cv. Sugar Baby, but only the BGV0005167 accession did not influence the fruit quality. Then, the BGV0005167 accession is a promising rootstock for managing the three tropical root-knot nematode species without influencing watermelon fruit quality.The authors thank MINECO and FEDER for funding projects AGL2013-49040-C2-1-R, AGL2014-53398-C2-2-R-AR, AGL2017-89785-R, and AGL2017-85563-C2-1-R-AR. H. A. Garcia-Mendivil acknowledges CONACYT for suport through a pre-doctoral grant.Garcia-Mendivil, HA.; Munera, M.; Giné, A.; Escudero, N.; Picó Sirvent, MB.; Gisbert Domenech, MC.; Sorribas, FJ. (2019). Response of two Citrullus amarus accessions to isolates of three species of Meloidogyne and their graft compatibility with watermelon. Crop Protection. 119:208-213. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cropro.2019.02.005S20821311

Cucumis metuliferus is resistant to root-knot nematode Mi1.2 gene (a)virulent populations and a promising melon rootstock

[EN] Pot experiments were carried out to characterize the response of two Cucumis metuliferus accessions against (a)virulent Meloidogyne arenaria, M. incognita or M. javanica populations, to Mi1.2 gene and to determine the compatibility and the effect on physicochemical properties of cantaloupe melon. In addition, histopathological studies were conducted. Plants were inoculated in 200 cm3 -pots with 1 J2 cm-3 24 of soil containing sterilized sand a week after transplanting and maintained in a growth chamber at 25 ºC for 40 days. The susceptible cucumber cv. Dasher II or melon cv. Paloma were included for comparison. The number of egg masses and number of eggs per plant were assessed, and the reproduction index (RI) was calculated as the percentage of eggs produced on the C. metuliferus accessions respect those produced on the susceptible cultivars. The compatibility and fruit quality was assessed grafting three scions (two of Charentais type) and one of type Piel de Sapo under commercial greenhouse conditions. The resistance level of both C. metuliferus accessions ranged from highly (RI < 1%) to resistant (1% ¿RI ¿ 10%) irrespective of Meloidogyne populations. Melon plants grafted onto C. metuliferus accession BGV11135 grew as selfgrafted plants and did not modify negatively fruit quality traits. Giant cells induced by RKN on C. metuliferus were mostly poor developed compared to those on cucumber. Furthermore, necrotic areas surrounding the nematode were observed. C. metuliferus accession BGV11135 could be a promising melon rootstock to manage Meloidogyne spp. irrespective of its (a)virulent Mi1.2 condition without melon fruit quality reduction.This work was supported by AGL2013-49040-C2-1-R, and AGL2014-53398-C2-2-R projects from the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness, and cofounded with FEDER Funds. The authors would like to thank Semillas Fito for providing melon cv. Paloma, Dr Christine Vos (Scientia Terrae Research Institute) for her English revision and critical comments of the manuscript and Dr Nuria Escudero (Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya) for her support and critical comments on the manuscript.Expósito, A.; Munera, M.; Giné, A.; López Gómez, M.; Cáceres-Burbano, A.; Picó Sirvent, MB.; Gisbert Domenech, MC.... (2018). Cucumis metuliferus is resistant to root-knot nematode Mi1.2 gene (a)virulent populations and a promising melon rootstock. Plant Pathology. 67:1161-1167. https://doi.org/10.1111/ppa.12815S1161116767Cortada, L., Sorribas, F. J., Ornat, C., Kaloshian, I., & Verdejo-Lucas, S. (2008). Variability in infection and reproduction ofMeloidogyne javanicaon tomato rootstocks with theMiresistance gene. Plant Pathology, 57(6), 1125-1135. doi:10.1111/j.1365-3059.2008.01906.xDavis, A. R., Perkins-Veazie, P., Hassell, R., Levi, A., King, S. R., & Zhang, X. (2008). 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Quantitative approach for the early detection of selection for virulence of Meloidogyne incognita on resistant tomato in plastic greenhouses. Plant Pathology, 66(8), 1338-1344. doi:10.1111/ppa.12679Giné, A., López-Gómez, M., Vela, M. D., Ornat, C., Talavera, M., Verdejo-Lucas, S., & Sorribas, F. J. (2014). Thermal requirements and population dynamics of root-knot nematodes on cucumber and yield losses under protected cultivation. Plant Pathology, 63(6), 1446-1453. doi:10.1111/ppa.12217Giné, A., González, C., Serrano, L., & Sorribas, F. J. (2017). Population dynamics of Meloidogyne incognita on cucumber grafted onto the Cucurbita hybrid RS841 or ungrafted and yield losses under protected cultivation. 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Grafting of Herbaceous Vegetable and Ornamental Crops. Horticultural Reviews, 61-124. doi:10.1002/9780470650851.ch2Leonardi, C., Kyriacou, M. C., Gisbert, C., Oztekin, G. B., Mourão, I., & Rouphael, Y. (s. f.). Quality of grafted vegetables. Vegetable grafting: principles and practices, 216-244. doi:10.1079/9781780648972.0216Liu, B., Ren, J., Zhang, Y., An, J., Chen, M., Chen, H., … Ren, H. (2014). A new grafted rootstock against root-knot nematode for cucumber, melon, and watermelon. Agronomy for Sustainable Development, 35(1), 251-259. doi:10.1007/s13593-014-0234-5López-Gómez, M., Gine, A., Vela, M. D., Ornat, C., Sorribas, F. J., Talavera, M., & Verdejo-Lucas, S. (2014). Damage functions and thermal requirements ofMeloidogyne javanicaandMeloidogyne incognitaon watermelon. Annals of Applied Biology, 165(3), 466-473. doi:10.1111/aab.12154López-Gómez, M., Flor-Peregrín, E., Talavera, M., Sorribas, F. J., & Verdejo-Lucas, S. (2015). Population dynamics of Meloidogyne javanica and its relationship with the leaf chlorophyll content in zucchini. Crop Protection, 70, 8-14. doi:10.1016/j.cropro.2014.12.015López-Gómez, M., Talavera, M., & Verdejo-Lucas, S. (2015). Differential reproduction ofMeloidogyne incognitaandM. javanicain watermelon cultivars and cucurbit rootstocks. Plant Pathology, 65(1), 145-153. doi:10.1111/ppa.12394Omwega, C. O. (1988). A Nondestructive Technique for Screening Bean Germ Plasm for Resistance to Meloidogyne incognita. Plant Disease, 72(11), 970. doi:10.1094/pd-72-0970Ornat, C., Verdejo-Lucas, S., & Sorribas, F. J. (2001). A Population of Meloidogyne javanica in Spain Virulent to the Mi Resistance Gene in Tomato. Plant Disease, 85(3), 271-276. doi:10.1094/pdis.2001.85.3.271Seinhorst, J. W. (1965). The Relation Between Nematode Density and Damage To Plants. Nematologica, 11(1), 137-154. doi:10.1163/187529265x00582Sikora, R. A., & Fernández, E. (s. f.). Nematode parasites of vegetables. Plant parasitic nematodes in subtropical and tropical agriculture, 319-392. doi:10.1079/9780851997278.0319Sorribas, F. J., Ornat, C., Verdejo-Lucas, S., Galeano, M., & Valero, J. (2005). Effectiveness and profitability of the Mi-resistant tomatoes to control root-knot nematodes. European Journal of Plant Pathology, 111(1), 29-38. doi:10.1007/s10658-004-1982-xSoteriou, G. A., Kyriacou, M. C., Siomos, A. S., & Gerasopoulos, D. (2014). Evolution of watermelon fruit physicochemical and phytochemical composition during ripening as affected by grafting. Food Chemistry, 165, 282-289. doi:10.1016/j.foodchem.2014.04.120Talavera, M., Verdejo-Lucas, S., Ornat, C., Torres, J., Vela, M. D., Macias, F. J., … Sorribas, F. J. (2009). Crop rotations with Mi gene resistant and susceptible tomato cultivars for management of root-knot nematodes in plastic houses. Crop Protection, 28(8), 662-667. doi:10.1016/j.cropro.2009.03.015Talavera, M., Sayadi, S., Chirosa-Ríos, M., Salmerón, T., Flor-Peregrín, E., & Verdejo-Lucas, S. (2012). Perception of the impact of root-knot nematode-induced diseases in horticultural protected crops of south-eastern Spain. Nematology, 14(5), 517-527. doi:10.1163/156854112x635850Thies, J. A., Ariss, J. J., Hassell, R. L., Olson, S., Kousik, C. S., & Levi, A. (2010). Grafting for Management of Southern Root-Knot Nematode, Meloidogyne incognita, in Watermelon. Plant Disease, 94(10), 1195-1199. doi:10.1094/pdis-09-09-0640Trionfetti Nisini, P., Colla, G., Granati, E., Temperini, O., Crinò, P., & Saccardo, F. (2002). Rootstock resistance to fusarium wilt and effect on fruit yield and quality of two muskmelon cultivars. Scientia Horticulturae, 93(3-4), 281-288. doi:10.1016/s0304-4238(01)00335-1Tzortzakakis, E. A., Adam, M. A. M., Blok, V. C., Paraskevopoulos, C., & Bourtzis, K. (2005). Occurrence of Resistance-breaking Populations of Root-knot Nematodes on Tomato in Greece. European Journal of Plant Pathology, 113(1), 101-105. doi:10.1007/s10658-005-1228-6Verdejo-Lucas, S., Cortada, L., Sorribas, F. J., & Ornat, C. (2009). Selection of virulent populations ofMeloidogyne javanicaby repeated cultivation ofMiresistance gene tomato rootstocks under field conditions. Plant Pathology, 58(5), 990-998. doi:10.1111/j.1365-3059.2009.02089.xVerdejo-Lucas, S., Talavera, M., & Andrés, M. F. (2012). Virulence response to the Mi.1 gene of Meloidogyne populations from tomato in greenhouses. Crop Protection, 39, 97-105. doi:10.1016/j.cropro.2012.03.025WHITEHEAD, A. G., & HEMMING, J. R. (1965). A comparison of some quantitative methods of extracting small vermiform nematodes from soil. Annals of Applied Biology, 55(1), 25-38. doi:10.1111/j.1744-7348.1965.tb07864.xYe, D.-Y., Qi, Y.-H., Cao, S.-F., Wei, B.-Q., & Zhang, H.-S. (2017). Histopathology combined with transcriptome analyses reveals the mechanism of resistance to Meloidogyne incognita in Cucumis metuliferus. Journal of Plant Physiology, 212, 115-124. doi:10.1016/j.jplph.2017.02.002Donkers-Venne, D. T. H. M., Fargette, M., & Zijlstra, C. (2000). Identification of Meloidogyne incognita, M. javanica and M. arenaria using sequence characterised amplified region (SCAR) based PCR assays. Nematology, 2(8), 847-853. doi:10.1163/15685410075011279