The increase in hydric volume is associated to contractile impairment in the calf after the world's most extreme mountain ultra-marathon.

BACKGROUND: Studies have recently focused on the effect of running a mountain ultra-marathon (MUM) and their results show muscular inflammation, damage and force loss. However, the link between peripheral oedema and muscle force loss is not really established. We tested the hypothesis that, after a MUM, lower leg muscles' swelling could be associated with muscle force loss. The knee extensor (KE) and the plantar flexor (PF) muscles' contractile function was measured by supramaximal electrical stimulations, potentiated low- and high-frequency doublets (PS10 and PS100) of the KE and the PF were measured by transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation and bioimpedance was used to assess body composition in the runners (n = 11) before (Pre) and after (Post) the MUM and compared with the controls (n = 8). RESULTS: The maximal voluntary contraction of the KE and the PF significantly decreased by 20 % Post-MUM in the runners. Hydration of the non-fat mass (NF-Hyd) and extracellular water volume (Ve) were increased by 12 % Post-MUM (p < 0.001) in the runners. Calf circumference (+2 %, p < 0.05) was also increased. Significant relationships were found for percentage increases in Ve and NF-Hyd with percentage decrease in PS10 of the PF (r = -0.68 and r = -0.70, p < 0.05) and with percentage increase of calf circumference (r = 0.72 and r = 0.73, p < 0.05) in the runners. CONCLUSIONS: The present study suggests that increases in circumference and in hydric volume are associated to contractile impairment in the calf in ultra-marathon runners

Metagenomics approaches for the detection and surveillance of emerging and recurrent plant pathogens

Globalization has a dramatic effect on the trade and movement of seeds, fruits and vegetables, with a corresponding increase in economic losses caused by the introduction of transboundary plant pathogens. Current diagnostic techniques provide a useful and precise tool to enact surveillance protocols regarding specific organisms, but this approach is strictly targeted, while metabarcoding and shotgun metagenomics could be used to simultaneously detect all known pathogens and potentially new ones. This review aims to present the current status of high-throughput sequencing (HTS) diagnostics of fungal and bacterial plant pathogens, discuss the challenges that need to be addressed, and provide direction for the development of methods for the detection of a restricted number of related taxa (specific surveillance) or all of the microorganisms present in a sample (general surveillance). HTS techniques, particularly metabarcoding, could be useful for the surveillance of soilborne, seedborne and airborne pathogens, as well as for identifying new pathogens and determining the origin of outbreaks. Metabarcoding and shotgun metagenomics still suffer from low precision, but this issue can be limited by carefully choosing primers and bioinformatic algorithms. Advances in bioinformatics will greatly accelerate the use of metagenomics to address critical aspects related to the detection and surveillance of plant pathogens in plant material and foodstuffs

The IgA nephropathy Biobank. An important starting point for the genetic dissection of a complex trait

BACKGROUND: IgA nephropathy (IgAN) or Berger's disease, is the most common glomerulonephritis in the world diagnosed in renal biopsied patients. The involvement of genetic factors in the pathogenesis of the IgAN is evidenced by ethnic and geographic variations in prevalence, familial clustering in isolated populations, familial aggregation and by the identification of a genetic linkage to locus IGAN1 mapped on 6q22–23. This study seems to imply a single major locus, but the hypothesis of multiple interacting loci or genetic heterogeneity cannot be ruled out. The organization of a multi-centre Biobank for the collection of biological samples and clinical data from IgAN patients and relatives is an important starting point for the identification of the disease susceptibility genes. DESCRIPTION: The IgAN Consortium organized a Biobank, recruiting IgAN patients and relatives following a common protocol. A website was constructed to allow scientific information to be shared between partners and to divulge obtained data (URL: ). The electronic database, the core of the website includes data concerning the subjects enrolled. A search page gives open access to the database and allows groups of patients to be selected according to their clinical characteristics. DNA samples of IgAN patients and relatives belonging to 72 multiplex extended pedigrees were collected. Moreover, 159 trios (sons/daughters affected and healthy parents), 1068 patients with biopsy-proven IgAN and 1040 healthy subjects were included in the IgAN Consortium Biobank. Some valuable and statistically productive genetic studies have been launched within the 5(th )Framework Programme 1998–2002 of the European project No. QLG1-2000-00464 and preliminary data have been published in "Technology Marketplace" website: . CONCLUSION: The first world IgAN Biobank with a readily accessible database has been constituted. The knowledge gained from the study of Mendelian diseases has shown that the genetic dissection of a complex trait is more powerful when combined linkage-based, association-based, and sequence-based approaches are performed. This Biobank continuously expanded contains a sample size of adequately matched IgAN patients and healthy subjects, extended multiplex pedigrees, parent-child trios, thus permitting the combined genetic approaches with collaborative studies

Cardio-respiratory monitoring in archery using a smart textile based on flexible fiber bragg grating sensors

In precision sports, the control of breathing and heart rate is crucial to help the body to remain stable in the shooting position. To improve stability, archers try to adopt similar breathing patterns and to have a low heartbeat during each shot. We proposed an easy-to-use and unobtrusive smart textile (ST) which is able to detect chest wall excursions due to breathing and heart beating. The sensing part is based on two FBGs housed into a soft polymer matrix to optimize the adherence to the chest wall and the system robustness. The ST was assessed on volunteers to figure out its performance in the estimation of respiratory frequency (fR) and heart rate (HR). Then, the system was tested on two archers during four shooting sessions. This is the first study to monitor cardio-respiratory activity on archers during shooting. The good performance of the ST is supported by the low mean absolute percentage error for fR and HR estimation (≤1.97% and ≤5.74%, respectively), calculated with respect to reference signals (flow sensor for fR, photopletismography sensor for HR). Moreover, results showed the capability of the ST to estimate fR and HR during different phases of shooting action. The promising results motivate future investigations to speculate about the influence of fR and HR on archers’ performance

Testing significance relative to a fold-change threshold is a TREAT

Motivation: Statistical methods are used to test for the differential expression of genes in microarray experiments. The most widely used methods successfully test whether the true differential expression is different from zero, but give no assurance that the differences found are large enough to be biologically meaningful

SIR-C/X-SAR data calibration and ground truth campaign over the NASA-CB1 test-site

During the Space Shuttle Endeavour mission in October 1994, a remote-sensing campaign was carried out with the objectives of both radiometric and polarimetric calibration and ground truth data acquisition of bare soils. This paper presents the results obtained in the experiment. Polarimetric cross-talk and channel imbalance values, as well as radiometric calibration parameters, have been found to be within the science requirements for SAR images. Regarding ground truth measurements, a wide spread in the height rms values and correlation lengths has been observed, which has motivated a critical revisiting of surface parameters descriptors

Au-Ag template stripped pattern for scanning probe investigations of DNA arrays produced by Dip Pen Nanolithography

We report on DNA arrays produced by Dip Pen Nanolithography (DPN) on a novel Au-Ag micro patterned template stripped surface. DNA arrays have been investigated by atomic force microscopy (AFM) and scanning tunnelling microscopy (STM) showing that the patterned template stripped substrate enables easy retrieval of the DPN-functionalized zone with a standard optical microscope permitting a multi-instrument and multi-technique local detection and analysis. Moreover the smooth surface of the Au squares (abput 5-10 angstrom roughness) allows to be sensitive to the hybridization of the oligonucleotide array with label-free target DNA. Our Au-Ag substrates, combining the retrieving capabilities of the patterned surface with the smoothness of the template stripped technique, are candidates for the investigation of DPN nanostructures and for the development of label free detection methods for DNA nanoarrays based on the use of scanning probes.Comment: Langmuir (accepted

Multi-membership gene regulation in pathway based microarray analysis

This article is available through the Brunel Open Access Publishing Fund. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Background: Gene expression analysis has been intensively researched for more than a decade. Recently, there has been elevated interest in the integration of microarray data analysis with other types of biological knowledge in a holistic analytical approach. We propose a methodology that can be facilitated for pathway based microarray data analysis, based on the observation that a substantial proportion of genes present in biochemical pathway databases are members of a number of distinct pathways. Our methodology aims towards establishing the state of individual pathways, by identifying those truly affected by the experimental conditions based on the behaviour of such genes. For that purpose it considers all the pathways in which a gene participates and the general census of gene expression per pathway. Results: We utilise hill climbing, simulated annealing and a genetic algorithm to analyse the consistency of the produced results, through the application of fuzzy adjusted rand indexes and hamming distance. All algorithms produce highly consistent genes to pathways allocations, revealing the contribution of genes to pathway functionality, in agreement with current pathway state visualisation techniques, with the simulated annealing search proving slightly superior in terms of efficiency. Conclusions: We show that the expression values of genes, which are members of a number of biochemical pathways or modules, are the net effect of the contribution of each gene to these biochemical processes. We show that by manipulating the pathway and module contribution of such genes to follow underlying trends we can interpret microarray results centred on the behaviour of these genes.The work was sponsored by the studentship scheme of the School of Information Systems, Computing and Mathematics, Brunel Universit

Emerging Use of Gene Expression Microarrays in Plant Physiology

Microarrays have become an important technology for the global analysis of gene expression in humans, animals, plants, and microbes. Implemented in the context of a well-designed experiment, cDNA and oligonucleotide arrays can provide highthroughput, simultaneous analysis of transcript abundance for hundreds, if not thousands, of genes. However, despite widespread acceptance, the use of microarrays as a tool to better understand processes of interest to the plant physiologist is still being explored. To help illustrate current uses of microarrays in the plant sciences, several case studies that we believe demonstrate the emerging application of gene expression arrays in plant physiology were selected from among the many posters and presentations at the 2003 Plant and Animal Genome XI Conference. Based on this survey, microarrays are being used to assess gene expression in plants exposed to the experimental manipulation of air temperature, soil water content and aluminium concentration in the root zone. Analysis often includes characterizing transcript profiles for multiple post-treatment sampling periods and categorizing genes with common patterns of response using hierarchical clustering techniques. In addition, microarrays are also providing insights into developmental changes in gene expression associated with fibre and root elongation in cotton and maize, respectively. Technical and analytical limitations of microarrays are discussed and projects attempting to advance areas of microarray design and data analysis are highlighted. Finally, although much work remains, we conclude that microarrays are a valuable tool for the plant physiologist interested in the characterization and identification of individual genes and gene families with potential application in the fields of agriculture, horticulture and forestry