Factors associated with the performance and cost-effectiveness of using lymphatic filariasis transmission assessment surveys for monitoring soil-transmitted helminths: a case study in Kenya.

Transmission assessment surveys (TAS) for lymphatic filariasis have been proposed as a platform to assess the impact of mass drug administration (MDA) on soil-transmitted helminths (STHs). This study used computer simulation and field data from pre- and post-MDA settings across Kenya to evaluate the performance and cost-effectiveness of the TAS design for STH assessment compared with alternative survey designs. Variations in the TAS design and different sample sizes and diagnostic methods were also evaluated. The district-level TAS design correctly classified more districts compared with standard STH designs in pre-MDA settings. Aggregating districts into larger evaluation units in a TAS design decreased performance, whereas age group sampled and sample size had minimal impact. The low diagnostic sensitivity of Kato-Katz and mini-FLOTAC methods was found to increase misclassification. We recommend using a district-level TAS among children 8-10 years of age to assess STH but suggest that key consideration is given to evaluation unit size

Nanog Prion-like Assembly Mediates Dna Bridging to Facilitate Chromatin Reorganization and Activation of Pluripotency

Human NANOG expression resets stem cells to ground-state pluripotency. Here we identify the unique features of human NANOG that relate to its dose-sensitive function as a master transcription factor. NANOG is largely disordered, with a C-terminal prion-like domain that phase-transitions to gel-like condensates. Full-length NANOG readily forms higher-order oligomers at low nanomolar concentrations, orders of magnitude lower than typical amyloids. Using single-molecule Förster resonance energy transfer and fluorescence cross-correlation techniques, we show that NANOG oligomerization is essential for bridging DNA elements in vitro. Using chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing and Hi-C 3.0 in cells, we validate that NANOG prion-like domain assembly is essential for specific DNA recognition and distant chromatin interactions. Our results provide a physical basis for the indispensable role of NANOG in shaping the pluripotent genome. NANOG\u27s unique ability to form prion-like assemblies could provide a cooperative and concerted DNA bridging mechanism that is essential for chromatin reorganization and dose-sensitive activation of ground-state pluripotency

Robust estimation of bacterial cell count from optical density

Optical density (OD) is widely used to estimate the density of cells in liquid culture, but cannot be compared between instruments without a standardized calibration protocol and is challenging to relate to actual cell count. We address this with an interlaboratory study comparing three simple, low-cost, and highly accessible OD calibration protocols across 244 laboratories, applied to eight strains of constitutive GFP-expressing E. coli. Based on our results, we recommend calibrating OD to estimated cell count using serial dilution of silica microspheres, which produces highly precise calibration (95.5% of residuals <1.2-fold), is easily assessed for quality control, also assesses instrument effective linear range, and can be combined with fluorescence calibration to obtain units of Molecules of Equivalent Fluorescein (MEFL) per cell, allowing direct comparison and data fusion with flow cytometry measurements: in our study, fluorescence per cell measurements showed only a 1.07-fold mean difference between plate reader and flow cytometry data

Keynes meets Merton: Examining risk and return relation based on fundamentals

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New insights into the regulatory role of microRNA in tumor angiogenesis and clinical implications

Abstract Angiogenesis is essential for tumor growth and metastasis. Understanding the regulation of tumor angiogenesis has become increasingly important. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small noncoding RNAs that function in diverse biological processes via post-transcriptional regulation. Extensive studies have revealed two important regulatory roles of miRNAs in tumor angiogenesis: miRNAs in tumor cells affect the activity of endothelial cells via non-cell-autonomous mechanisms, and miRNAs in endothelial cells regulate the cell-autonomous behavior. Recent advances have further highlighted the role of tumor-derived extracellular vesicles in the regulation of tumor angiogenesis via transferring miRNAs to endothelial cells. In this review, we summarize the regulatory role of miRNA in tumor angiogenesis, with a highlight on clinical implications of miRNAs as biomarkers for anti-angiogenic therapy response, and as therapeutic interventions against tumor angiogenesis in vivo

Characterization of crude bacterial urease for CaCO₃ precipitation and cementation of silty sand

Biocementation catalyzed by ureolytic bacteria or enzyme urease is a promising technique for the treatment of liquefiable soil. Silty sand is often encountered in natural conditions and is often prone to earthquake liquefaction. However, the applicability of the biocementation to silty sand is still a challenge. In this study, we proposed and tested a new method of applying the biocementation to silty sand. In this method, crude urease obtained from the lysis of ureolytic bacteria was used for the soil treatment instead of using live bacteria directly. It was found that crude urease could be successfully obtained from bacteria using the ultrasonic cell lysis method. The activity of the crude urease was relatively high in 0.01-1 mol/L of urea concentrations and 5-11 pH values and increased in temperature in the tested range (10°C-50°C). The results of the CaCO3 precipitation reaction tests showed that crude urease was capable of hydrolyzing urea and could be used in the biocementation treatment when the initial urea concentration was not higher than 0.5 mol/L. Triaxial consolidated undrained tests and CaCO3 content measurements were conducted on the silty sand samples treated by either urease or live bacteria. Silty sand samples treated by urease had higher shear strengths and more dilative stress-strain responses during the undrained shear as compared with the samples treated by live bacteria. In the bacteria-treated samples, CaCO3 was prone to accumulating at the injection side of the samples, while the treatment using crude urease can alleviate such a problem by showing higher CaCO3 contents at farther locations of the samples.Ministry of Education (MOE)Nanyang Technological UniversityThis work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 51608169, 41630638, 51609093, and51578214), the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2016YFC0800205), the Ministry of Education, Singapore (No. MOE2015-T2-2-142), and the Centre for Usable Space, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Genetic Algorithm for High-Dimensional Emotion Recognition from Speech Signals

Feature selection plays a crucial role in establishing an effective speech emotion recognition system. To improve recognition accuracy, people always extract as many features as possible from speech signals. However, this may reduce efficiency. We propose a hybrid filter–wrapper feature selection based on a genetic algorithm specifically designed for high-dimensional (HGA) speech emotion recognition. The algorithm first utilizes Fisher Score and information gain to comprehensively rank acoustic features, and then these features are assigned probabilities for inclusion in subsequent operations according to their ranking. HGA improves population diversity and local search ability by modifying the initial population generation method of genetic algorithm (GA) and introducing adaptive crossover and a new mutation strategy. The proposed algorithm clearly reduces the number of selected features in four common English speech emotion datasets. It is confirmed by K-nearest neighbor and random forest classifiers that it is superior to state-of-the-art algorithms in accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-Score