Time parameterization and stationary distributions in a relativistic gas

In this paper we consider the effect of different time parameterizations on the stationary velocity distribution function for a relativistic gas. We clarify the distinction between two such distributions, namely the J\"{u}ttner and the modified J\"{u}ttner distributions. Using a recently proposed model of a relativistic gas, we show that the obtained results for the proper-time averaging does not lead to modified J\"{u}ttner distribution (as recently conjectured), but introduces only a Lorentz factor $\gamma$ to the well-known J\"{u}ttner function which results from observer-time averaging. We obtain results for rest frame as well as moving frame in order to support our claim.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figure

Development of next generation Streptococcus pneumoniae vaccines conferring broad protection

Streptococcus pneumoniae is a major pathogen causing pneumonia with over 2 million deaths annually, especially in young children and the elderly. To date, at least 98 different pneumococcal capsular serotypes have been identified. Currently, the vaccines for prevention of S. pneumoniae infections are the 23-valent pneumococcal polysaccharide-based vaccine (PPV23) and the pneumococcal conjugate vaccines (PCV10 and PCV13). These vaccines only cover some pneumococcal serotypes and are unable to protect against non-vaccine serotypes and unencapsulated S. pneumoniae. This has led to a rapid increase in antibiotic-resistant non-vaccine serotypes. Hence, there is an urgent need to develop new, effective, and affordable pneumococcal vaccines, which could cover a wide range of serotypes. This review discusses the new approaches to develop effective vaccines with broad serotype coverage as well as recent development of promising pneumococcal vaccines in clinical trials. New vaccine candidates are the inactivated whole-cell vaccine strain (∆pep27∆comD mutant) constructed by mutations of specific genes and several protein-based S. pneumoniae vaccines using conserved pneumococcal antigens, such as lipoprotein and surface-exposed protein (PspA). Among the vaccines in Phase 3 clinical trials are the pneumococcal conjugate vaccines, PCV-15 (V114) and 20vPnC. The inactivated whole-cell and several protein-based vaccines are either in Phase 1 or 2 trials. Furthermore, the recent progress of nanoparticles that play important roles as delivery systems and adjuvants to improve the performance, as well as the immunogenicity of the nanovaccines, are reviewed

Investigating Sustainable Consumption Behavior Vis-à-vis Islamic Values: A systematic review

This paper aims to develop a rigorous, systematic exploration of the literature investigating the nexus between sustainable consumption behavior and Islamic values and identify the types of respondents used in the previous studies. Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) is used to structure the research field. This paper identified eight articles that report empirical evidence of the proposed research topic. Prior studies focused on three respondents: students, consumers in major cities, and consumers in the clothing industry. The assemblage of reviewed research papers is necessary for academia and government to achieve the shared prosperity vision by 2030. Keywords: Sustainable consumption behavior; Islamic Values; Religiosity; Muslim consumers eISSN: 2398-4287 © 2022. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open-access article under the CC-BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under the responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians/Africans/Arabians), and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ebpj.v7i21.347

The Effect of Fertilizer Treatments at Three Compactness Levels on Qualitative Traits of Sport Lawn in Winter Season

Lawn quality, which introduces by good color, density, uniformity and texture varies depending on the species, maintenance operation, and time of the year. In the current study, the effect of organic fertilizers containing Leaf Mold (LM), Rice Husk (RH), manure, Spent Mushroom Compost (SMC), a mixture of LM, RH and SMC (mixture 1), a mixture of LM, RH and manure (mixture 2), with the ratio of 1:1:1 and control (no fertilizer) at three levels of soil compactness including roller weights of 36, 56, 76 kilograms on qualitative traits of sport lawn were investigated in winter season. Treatments were applied in a strip plot design with three replications, in research farm of Gorgan University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources during fall 2008-2009. According to achieved results, manure and RH treatments in first and second compaction and manure treatment in third compaction level showed the highest amount of chlorophyll content. In visual assessment, the highest and lowest of lawn quality was observed in the manure and the control treatment respectively. In first and second compaction, the maximum height was observed in manure treatment. Control and LM treatments showed the minimum height. In third compaction, maximum and minimum heights were associated with manure and control treatment respectively

The Topical Ocular Delivery of Rapamycin to Posterior Eye Tissues and the Suppression of Retinal Inflammatory Disease

Treatment of posterior eye diseases with intravitreal injections of drugs, while effective, is invasive and associated with side effects such as retinal detachment and endophthalmitis. In this work, we have formulated a model compound, rapamycin (RAP), in nanoparticle-based eye drops and evaluated the delivery of RAP to the posterior eye tissues in a healthy rabbit. We have also studied the formulation in experimental autoimmune uveitis (EAU) mouse model with retinal inflammation. Aqueous RAP eye drops were prepared using N-palmitoyl-N-monomethyl-N,N-dimethyl-N,N,N-trimethyl-6-O-glycolchitosan (Molecular Envelope Technology - MET) containing 0.23 ± 0.001% w/v RAP with viscosity, osmolarity, and pH within the ocular comfort range, and the formulation (MET-RAP) was stable in terms of drug content at both refrigeration and room temperature for one month. The MET-RAP eye drops delivered RAP to the choroid-retina with a Cmax of 145 ± 49 ng/g (tmax = 1 hour). The topical application of the MET-RAP eye drops to the EAU mouse model resulted in significant disease suppression compared to controls, with activity similar to dexamethasone eye drops. The MET-RAP eye drops also resulted in a reduction of RORγt and an increase in both Foxp3 expression and IL-10 secretion, indicating a mechanism involving the inhibition of Th17 cells and the up-regulation of T-reg cells. The MET-RAP formulation delivers RAP to the posterior eye segments, and the formulation is active in EAU

AI2D-RST : A multimodal corpus of 1000 primary school science diagrams

This article introduces AI2D-RST, a multimodal corpus of 1000 English-language diagrams that represent topics in primary school natural sciences, such as food webs, life cycles, moon phases and human physiology. The corpus is based on the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence Diagrams (AI2D) dataset, a collection of diagrams with crowdsourced descriptions, which was originally developed to support research on automatic diagram understanding and visual question answering. Building on the segmentation of diagram layouts in AI2D, the AI2D-RST corpus presents a new multi-layer annotation schema that provides a rich description of their multimodal structure. Annotated by trained experts, the layers describe (1) the grouping of diagram elements into perceptual units, (2) the connections set up by diagrammatic elements such as arrows and lines, and (3) the discourse relations between diagram elements, which are described using Rhetorical Structure Theory (RST). Each annotation layer in AI2D-RST is represented using a graph. The corpus is freely available for research and teaching.Peer reviewe

Anti-cancer effects of Bifidobacterium species in colon cancer cells and a mouse model of carcinogenesis

Introduction Probiotics are suggested to prevent colorectal cancer (CRC). This study aimed to investigate the anticancer properties of some potential probiotics in vitro and in vivo. Materials and methods Anticancer effects of potential probiotic groups were investigated following of in LS174T cancer cells compared to IEC-18 normal cells. 1. a single strain of Bifidobacterium. breve, 2. a single strain of Lactobacillus. reuteri, 3. a cocktail of 5 strains of Lactobacilli (LC), 4. a cocktail of 5 strains of Bifidobacteria (BC), 5. a cocktail of 10 strains from Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium (L+B). Apoptosis rate, EGFR, HER-2 and PTGS-2 (COX-2 protein) expression levels were assessed as metrics of evaluating anticancer properties. Effect of BC, as the most effective group in vitro, was further assessed in mice models. Results BC induced ~21 and only ~3 apoptosis among LS174T and IEC-18 cells respectively. BC decreased the expression of EGFR by 4.4 folds, HER-2 by 6.7 folds, and PTGS-2 by 20 folds among the LS174T cells. In all these cases, BC did not interfere significantly with the expression of the genes in IEC-18 cells. This cocktail has caused only 1.1 folds decrease, 1.8 folds increase and 1.7 folds decrease in EGFR, HER-2 and PTGS-2 expression, respectively. Western blot analysis confirmed these results in the protein level. BC significantly ameliorated the disease activity index, restored colon length, inhibited the increase in incidence and progress of tumors to higher stages and grades. Conclusions BC was the most efficient treatment in this study. It had considerable �protective� anti-cancer properties and concomitantly down regulated EGFR, HER-2 and PTGS-2 (COX-2), while having significant anti-CRC effects on CRC mice models. In general, this potential probiotic could be considered as a suitable nutritional supplement to treat and prevent CRC. © 2020 Parisa et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited

The potential prognostic and therapeutic application of tissue and circulating microRNAs in cervical cancer

Cervical cancer (CC) is a common malignancy in women and a major cause of cancer- related mortality globally. Some novel biomarkers may enable the early diagnosis and monitoring of CC. MicroRNAs are small noncoding RNAs that control gene translation at a post transcriptional level. Hence the deregulation of these molecules can cause many diseases. There appears to be an association between aberrant miRNA expression and CC, but the molecular mechanisms involved in the development of CC remain unknown. The upregulation of some circulating miRNAs, e.g. miRNA-20a, miRNA-203, miRNA-21, miRNA-205, miRNA-218, and miR-485-5, as well as tissue specific-miRNAs, e.g. miR-7, miR-10a, miR-17-5p, miR-135b, miR-149 and miR-203 has been found in patients with CC. There is also growing evidence for the importance of miRNAs in the development of drug-resistance. This review therefore highlights recently published preclinical and clinical investigation performed on tissue-specific and circulating miRNAs, as potential biomarkers for the detection of patients at early stages of CC, in the prediction of prognosis, and monitoring of their response to therapy. Key word: cervical cancer, CIN, MiRNA, circulating biomarker, tissue-specific biomarker, HP

Microbial biodegradation of paraffin wax in Malaysian crude oil mediated by degradative enzymes

The deposition of paraffin wax in crude oil is a problem faced by the oil and gas industry during extraction, transportation, and refining of crude oil. Most of the commercialized chemical additives to prevent wax are expensive and toxic. As an environmentally friendly alternative, this study aims to find a novel thermophilic bacterial strain capable of degrading paraffin wax in crude oil to control wax deposition. To achieve this, the biodegradation of crude oil paraffin wax by 11 bacteria isolated from seawater and oil-contaminated soil samples was investigated at 70°C. The bacteria were identified as Geobacillus kaustophilus N3A7, NFA23, DFY1, Geobacillus jurassicus MK7, Geobacillus thermocatenulatus T7, Parageobacillus caldoxylosilyticus DFY3 and AZ72, Anoxybacillus geothermalis D9, Geobacillus stearothermophilus SA36, AD11, and AD24. The GCMS analysis showed that strains N3A7, MK7, DFY1, AD11, and AD24 achieved more than 70% biodegradation efficiency of crude oil in a short period (3 days). Notably, most of the strains could completely degrade C37–C40 and increase the ratio of C14–C18, especially during the initial 2 days incubation. In addition, the degradation of crude oil also resulted in changes in the pH of the medium. The degradation of crude oil is associated with the production of degradative enzymes such as alkane monooxygenase, alcohol dehydrogenase, lipase, and esterase. Among the 11 strains, the highest activities of alkane monooxygenase were recorded in strain AD24. A comparatively higher overall alcohol dehydrogenase, lipase, and esterase activities were observed in strains N3A7, MK7, DFY1, AD11, and AD24. Thus, there is a potential to use these strains in oil reservoirs, crude oil processing, and recovery to control wax deposition. Their ability to withstand high temperature and produce degradative enzymes for long-chain hydrocarbon degradation led to an increase in the short-chain hydrocarbon ratio, and subsequently, improving the quality of the oi