Crystallization and preliminary crystallographic studies of an antimicrobial protein from Pharbitis nil

An antimicrobial protein from seeds of Pharbitis nil (Pn-AMP) which shows an antifungal activity towards several agriculturally important plant pathogens has been crystallized in the presence of equimolar N-acetylglucosamine with sodium citrate as precipitant. The crystal belongs to the hexagonal space group P6(1)22 (or P6(5)22), with unit-cell parameters a = b = 29.33 (5), c = 133.44 (12) Angstrom. Native data were collected using a crystal at 100 K to a resolution of 1.78 Angstrom.open2

Lipid profiles and outcomes of patients with prior cancer and subsequent myocardial infarction or stroke

Patients with cancer are at increased risk of myocardial infarction (MI) and stroke. Guidelines do not address lipid profile targets for these patients. Within the lipid profiles, we hypothesized that patients with cancer develop MI or stroke at lower low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) concentrations than patients without cancer and suffer worse outcomes. We linked nationwide longitudinal MI, stroke and cancer registries from years 2007-2017. We identified 42,148 eligible patients with MI (2421 prior cancer; 39,727 no cancer) and 43,888 eligible patients with stroke (3152 prior cancer; 40,738 no cancer). Median LDL-C concentration was lower in the prior cancer group than the no cancer group at incident MI [2.43 versus 3.10 mmol/L, adjusted ratio 0.87 (95% CI 0.85-0.89)] and stroke [2.81 versus 3.22 mmol/L, adjusted ratio 0.93, 95% CI 0.91-0.95)]. Similarly, median triglyceride and total cholesterol concentrations were lower in the prior cancer group, with no difference in high density lipoprotein cholesterol. Prior cancer was associated with higher post-MI mortality [adjusted hazard ratio (HR) 1.48, 95% CI 1.37-1.59] and post-stroke mortality (adjusted HR 1.95, 95% CI 1.52-2.52). Despite lower LDL-C concentrations, patients with prior cancer had worse post-MI and stroke mortality than patients without cancer

The lower mass function of the young open cluster Blanco 1: from 30 Mjup to 3 Mo

We performed a deep wide field optical survey of the young (~100-150 Myr) open cluster Blanco1 to study its low mass population well down into the brown dwarf regime and estimate its mass function over the whole cluster mass range.The survey covers 2.3 square degrees in the I and z-bands down to I ~ z ~ 24 with the CFH12K camera. Considering two different cluster ages (100 and 150 Myr), we selected cluster member candidates on the basis of their location in the (I,I-z) CMD relative to the isochrones, and estimated the contamination by foreground late-type field dwarfs using statistical arguments, infrared photometry and low-resolution optical spectroscopy. We find that our survey should contain about 57% of the cluster members in the 0.03-0.6 Mo mass range, including 30-40 brown dwarfs. The candidate's radial distribution presents evidence that mass segregation has already occured in the cluster. We took it into account to estimate the cluster mass function across the stellar/substellar boundary. We find that, between 0.03Mo and 0.6Mo, the cluster mass distribution does not depend much on its exact age, and is well represented by a single power-law, with an index alpha=0.69 +/- 0.15. Over the whole mass domain, from 0.03Mo to 3Mo, the mass function is better fitted by a log-normal function with m0=0.36 +/- 0.07Mo and sigma=0.58 +/- 0.06. Comparison between the Blanco1 mass function, other young open clusters' MF, and the galactic disc MF suggests that the IMF, from the substellar domain to the higher mass part, does not depend much on initial conditions. We discuss the implications of this result on theories developed to date to explain the origin of the mass distribution.Comment: 18 pages, 15 figures and 5 tables accepted in A&

Mosquito coil emissions and health implications.

Burning mosquito coils indoors generates smoke that can control mosquitoes effectively. This practice is currently used in numerous households in Asia, Africa, and South America. However, the smoke may contain pollutants of health concern. We conducted the present study to characterize the emissions from four common brands of mosquito coils from China and two common brands from Malaysia. We used mass balance equations to determine emission rates of fine particles (particulate matter < 2.5 microm in diameter; PM(2.5)), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), aldehydes, and ketones. Having applied these measured emission rates to predict indoor concentrations under realistic room conditions, we found that pollutant concentrations resulting from burning mosquito coils could substantially exceed health-based air quality standards or guidelines. Under the same combustion conditions, the tested Malaysian mosquito coils generated more measured pollutants than did the tested Chinese mosquito coils. We also identified a large suite of volatile organic compounds, including carcinogens and suspected carcinogens, in the coil smoke. In a set of experiments conducted in a room, we examined the size distribution of particulate matter contained in the coil smoke and found that the particles were ultrafine and fine. The findings from the present study suggest that exposure to the smoke of mosquito coils similar to the tested ones can pose significant acute and chronic health risks. For example, burning one mosquito coil would release the same amount of PM(2.5) mass as burning 75-137 cigarettes. The emission of formaldehyde from burning one coil can be as high as that released from burning 51 cigarettes

Assessing newborn body composition using principal components analysis: differences in the determinants of fat and skeletal size

BACKGROUND: Birth weight is a composite of skeletal size and soft tissue. These components are likely to have different growth patterns. The aim of this paper is to investigate the association between established determinants of birth weight and these separate components. METHODS: Weight, length, crown-rump, knee-heel, head circumference, arm circumference, and skinfold thicknesses were measured at birth in 699 healthy, term, UK babies recruited as part of the Exeter Family Study of Childhood Health. Corresponding measurements were taken on both parents. Principal components analysis with varimax rotation was used to reduce these measurements to two independent components each for mother, father and baby: one highly correlated with measures of fat, the other with skeletal size. RESULTS: Gestational age was significantly related to skeletal size, in both boys and girls (r = 0.41 and 0.52), but not fat. Skeletal size at birth was also associated with parental skeletal size (maternal: r = 0.24 (boys), r = 0.39 (girls) ; paternal: r = 0.16 (boys), r = 0.25 (girls)), and maternal smoking (0.4 SD reduction in boys, 0.6 SD reduction in girls). Fat was associated with parity (first borns smaller by 0.45 SD in boys; 0.31 SD in girls), maternal glucose (r = 0.18 (boys); r = 0.27 (girls)) and maternal fat (r = 0.16 (boys); r = 0.36 (girls)). CONCLUSION: Principal components analysis with varimax rotation provides a useful method for reducing birth weight to two more meaningful components: skeletal size and fat. These components have different associations with known determinants of birth weight, suggesting fat and skeletal size may have different regulatory mechanisms, which would be important to consider when studying the associations of birth weight with later adult disease

Stress-induced anhedonia is associated with hypertrophy of medium spiny neurons of the nucleus accumbens

There is accumulating evidence that the nucleus accumbens (NAc) has an important role in the pathophysiology of depression. As the NAc is a key component in the neural circuitry of reward, it has been hypothesized that anhedonia, a core symptom of depression, might be related to dysfunction of this brain region. Neuronal morphology and expression of plasticity-related molecules were examined in the NAc of rats displaying anhedonic behavior (measured in the sucrose-consumption test) in response to chronic mild stress. To demonstrate the relevance of our measurements to depression, we tested whether the observed changes were sensitive to reversal with antidepressants (imipramine and fluoxetine). Data show that animals displaying anhedonic behavior display an hypertrophy of medium spiny neurons in the NAc and, in parallel, have increased expression of the genes encoding for brain-derived neurotrophic factor, neural cell adhesion molecule and synaptic protein synapsin 1. Importantly, the reversal of stress-induced anhedonia by antidepressants is linked to a restoration of gene-expression patterns and dendritic morphology in the NAc. Using an animal model of depression, we show that stress induces anhedonic behavior that is associated with specific changes in the neuronal morphology and in the gene-expression profile of the NAc that are effectively reversed after treatment with antidepressants.The present work was funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Technology (FCT), project PTDC/SAU-NEU/105180/2008. FM and PL are recipients of postdoctoral fellowships and MM is recipient of a doctoral fellowship, all from FCT, Portugal

From red to white urine: a patient's nightmare with a rather benign outcome

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Chyluria is a medical condition with presence of chyle in the urine. The disease is most prevalent in endemic regions of Africa and the Indian subcontinent where it is mostly caused by parasitic infections, particularly lymphatic filariasis due to wucheria bancrofti. Non-parasitic chyluria, however, is a very rare finding.</p> <p>Case Presentation</p> <p>We report the case of a 48 year old woman who developed a lymphorenal fistula with chyluria following ureterrenoscopy with biopsies taken for urological work-up of persistent macrohematuria. Renal biopsy confirmed the diagnosis of benign familial hematuria due to thin basement nephropathy, a condition frequently associated with episodes of macrohematuria.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>This case highlights a rare case of non-parasitic chyluria as a complication of urological work-up for macrohematuria of benign nature.</p

The morphologies of massive galaxies at 1 < z < 3 in the CANDELS-UDS field : compact bulges, and the rise and fall of massive discs

We have used high-resolution, Hubble Space Telescope, near-infrared imaging to conduct a detailed analysis of the morphological properties of the most massive galaxies at high redshift, modelling the WFC3/IR H-160-band images of the similar or equal to 200 galaxies in the CANDELS-UDS field with photometric redshifts 1 10(11)M(circle dot). We have explored the results of fitting single-Sersic and bulge+disc models, and have investigated the additional errors and potential biases introduced by uncertainties in the background and the on-image point spread function. This approach has enabled us to obtain formally acceptable model fits to the WFC3/IR images of > 90 per cent of the galaxies. Our results indicate that these massive galaxies at 1 2 the compact bulges display effective radii a factor of similar or equal to 4 smaller than local ellipticals of comparable mass. These trends also appear to extend to the bulge components of disc-dominated galaxies. In addition, we find that, while such massive galaxies at low redshift are generally bulge-dominated, at redshifts 1 2 they are mostly disc-dominated. The majority of the disc-dominated galaxies are actively forming stars, although this is also true for many of the bulge-dominated systems. Interestingly, however, while most of the quiescent galaxies are bulge-dominated, we find that a significant fraction (25-40 per cent) of the most quiescent galaxies, with specific star formation rates sSFR < 10(-10) yr(-1), have disc-dominated morphologies. Thus, while our results show that the massive galaxy population is undergoing dramatic changes at this crucial epoch, they also suggest that the physical mechanisms which quench star formation activity are not simply connected to those responsible for the morphological transformation of massive galaxies into present-day giant ellipticals

A Bit-Vector Differential Model for the Modular Addition by a Constant

ARX algorithms are a class of symmetric-key algorithms constructed by Addition, Rotation, and XOR, which achieve the best software performances in low-end microcontrollers. To evaluate the resistance of an ARX cipher against differential cryptanalysis and its variants, the recent automated methods employ constraint satisfaction solvers, such as SMT solvers, to search for optimal characteristics. The main difficulty to formulate this search as a constraint satisfaction problem is obtaining the differential models of the non-linear operations, that is, the constraints describing the differential probability of each non-linear operation of the cipher. While an efficient bit-vector differential model was obtained for the modular addition with two variable inputs, no differential model for the modular addition by a constant has been proposed so far, preventing ARX ciphers including this operation from being evaluated with automated methods. In this paper, we present the first bit-vector differential model for the n-bit modular addition by a constant input. Our model contains O(log2(n)) basic bit-vector constraints and describes the binary logarithm of the differential probability. We also represent an SMT-based automated method to look for differential characteristics of ARX, including constant additions, and we provide an open-source tool ArxPy to find ARX differential characteristics in a fully automated way. To provide some examples, we have searched for related-key differential characteristics of TEA, XTEA, HIGHT, and LEA, obtaining better results than previous works. Our differential model and our automated tool allow cipher designers to select the best constant inputs for modular additions and cryptanalysts to evaluate the resistance of ARX ciphers against differential attacks.acceptedVersio