Altered Cytokine Response of Human Brain Endothelial Cells after Stimulation with Malaria Patient Plasma

Infections with the deadliest malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum, are accompanied by a strong immunological response of the human host. To date, more than 30 cytokines have been detected in elevated levels in plasma of malaria patients compared to healthy controls. Endothelial cells (ECs) are a potential source of these cytokines, but so far it is not known if their cytokine secretion depends on the direct contact of the P. falciparum-infected erythrocytes (IEs) with ECs in terms of cytoadhesion. Culturing ECs with plasma from malaria patients (27 returning travellers) resulted in significantly increased secretion of IL-11, CXCL5, CXCL8, CXCL10, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and angiopoietin-like protein 4 (ANGPTL4) if compared to matching controls (22 healthy individuals). The accompanying transcriptome study of the ECs identified 43 genes that were significantly increased in expression (≥1.7 fold) after co-incubation with malaria patient plasma, including cxcl5 and angptl4. Further bioinformatic analyses revealed that biological processes such as cell migration, cell proliferation and tube development were particularly affected in these ECs. It can thus be postulated that not only the cytoadhesion of IEs, but also molecules in the plasma of malaria patients exerts an influence on ECs, and that not only the immunological response but also other processes, such as angiogenesis, are altered

Understanding challenges in studying visitor’s compliance to recreational funding models : Lessons learnt from a study of cross-country skiers in Sweden

This study is the first research output coming out from a newly launched project on Recreational mobility and trails in mountain destinations: Understanding Behavioural insights and New technology in relation to funding systems for high quality trails in a Swedish context, funded by the Swedish KK-foundation. The overall purpose is to analyse prerequisites for funding and management of trails as part of developing nature-based tourist destinations. This specific study looks at the challenge of understanding the consumer behaviour of tourists when it comes to the decision to contribute to trail funding by buying a trail pass and to understand if and how context of resort ownership, other visitors’ behaviour and the social norm, matters for the decision. With a quantitative approach and 346 filled in surveys we are sharing lessons learnt hwo to measure actual behaviour towards criticial questions

Understanding challenges in studying visitor’s compliance to recreational funding models : Lessons learnt from a study of cross-country skiers in Sweden

This study is the first research output coming out from a newly launched project on Recreational mobility and trails in mountain destinations: Understanding Behavioural insights and New technology in relation to funding systems for high quality trails in a Swedish context, funded by the Swedish KK-foundation. The overall purpose is to analyse prerequisites for funding and management of trails as part of developing nature-based tourist destinations. This specific study looks at the challenge of understanding the consumer behaviour of tourists when it comes to the decision to contribute to trail funding by buying a trail pass and to understand if and how context of resort ownership, other visitors’ behaviour and the social norm, matters for the decision. With a quantitative approach and 346 filled in surveys we are sharing lessons learnt hwo to measure actual behaviour towards criticial questions

Understanding challenges in studying visitor’s compliance to recreational funding models : Lessons learnt from a study of cross-country skiers in Sweden

This study is the first research output coming out from a newly launched project on Recreational mobility and trails in mountain destinations: Understanding Behavioural insights and New technology in relation to funding systems for high quality trails in a Swedish context, funded by the Swedish KK-foundation. The overall purpose is to analyse prerequisites for funding and management of trails as part of developing nature-based tourist destinations. This specific study looks at the challenge of understanding the consumer behaviour of tourists when it comes to the decision to contribute to trail funding by buying a trail pass and to understand if and how context of resort ownership, other visitors’ behaviour and the social norm, matters for the decision. With a quantitative approach and 346 filled in surveys we are sharing lessons learnt hwo to measure actual behaviour towards criticial questions

Ectopic Expression of Plasmodium vivax vir Genes in P. falciparum Affects Cytoadhesion via Increased Expression of Specific var Genes

Plasmodium falciparum-infected erythrocytes (PfIEs) adhere to endothelial cell receptors (ECRs) of blood vessels mainly via PfEMP1 proteins to escape elimination via the spleen. Evidence suggests that P. vivax-infected reticulocytes (PvIRs) also bind to ECRs, presumably enabled by VIR proteins, as shown by inhibition experiments and studies with transgenic P. falciparum expressing vir genes. To test this hypothesis, our study investigated the involvement of VIR proteins in cytoadhesion using vir gene-expressing P. falciparum transfectants. Those VIR proteins with a putative transmembrane domain were present in Maurer’s clefts, and some were also present in the erythrocyte membrane. The VIR protein without a transmembrane domain (PVX_050690) was not exported. Five of the transgenic P. falciparum cell lines, including the one expressing PVX_050690, showed binding to CD36. We observed highly increased expression of specific var genes encoding PfEMP1s in all CD36-binding transfectants. These results suggest that ectopic vir expression regulates var expression through a yet unknown mechanism. In conclusion, the observed cytoadhesion of P. falciparum expressing vir genes depended on PfEMP1s, making this experimental unsuitable for characterizing VIR proteins

MedShapeNet -- A Large-Scale Dataset of 3D Medical Shapes for Computer Vision

16 pagesPrior to the deep learning era, shape was commonly used to describe the objects. Nowadays, state-of-the-art (SOTA) algorithms in medical imaging are predominantly diverging from computer vision, where voxel grids, meshes, point clouds, and implicit surface models are used. This is seen from numerous shape-related publications in premier vision conferences as well as the growing popularity of ShapeNet (about 51,300 models) and Princeton ModelNet (127,915 models). For the medical domain, we present a large collection of anatomical shapes (e.g., bones, organs, vessels) and 3D models of surgical instrument, called MedShapeNet, created to facilitate the translation of data-driven vision algorithms to medical applications and to adapt SOTA vision algorithms to medical problems. As a unique feature, we directly model the majority of shapes on the imaging data of real patients. As of today, MedShapeNet includes 23 dataset with more than 100,000 shapes that are paired with annotations (ground truth). Our data is freely accessible via a web interface and a Python application programming interface (API) and can be used for discriminative, reconstructive, and variational benchmarks as well as various applications in virtual, augmented, or mixed reality, and 3D printing. Exemplary, we present use cases in the fields of classification of brain tumors, facial and skull reconstructions, multi-class anatomy completion, education, and 3D printing. In future, we will extend the data and improve the interfaces. The project pages are: https://medshapenet.ikim.nrw/ and https://github.com/Jianningli/medshapenet-feedbac