High-throughput screening of encapsulated islets using wide-field lens-free on-chip imaging

Islet microencapsulation is a promising solution to diabetes treatment, but its quality control based on manual microscopic inspection is extremely low-throughput, highly variable and laborious. This study presents a high-throughput islet-encapsulation quality screening system based on lens-free on-chip imaging with a wide field-of-view of 18.15 cm^2, which is more than 100 times larger than that of a lens-based optical microscope, enabling it to image and analyze ~8,000 microcapsules in a single frame. Custom-written image reconstruction and processing software provides the user with clinically important information, such as microcapsule count, size, intactness, and information on whether each capsule contains an islet. This high-throughput and cost-effective platform can be useful for researchers to develop better encapsulation protocols as well as perform quality control prior to transplantation

A bulky glycocalyx fosters metastasis formation by promoting G1 cell cycle progression.

Metastasis depends upon cancer cell growth and survival within the metastatic niche. Tumors which remodel their glycocalyces, by overexpressing bulky glycoproteins like mucins, exhibit a higher predisposition to metastasize, but the role of mucins in oncogenesis remains poorly understood. Here we report that a bulky glycocalyx promotes the expansion of disseminated tumor cells in vivo by fostering integrin adhesion assembly to permit G1 cell cycle progression. We engineered tumor cells to display glycocalyces of various thicknesses by coating them with synthetic mucin-mimetic glycopolymers. Cells adorned with longer glycopolymers showed increased metastatic potential, enhanced cell cycle progression, and greater levels of integrin-FAK mechanosignaling and Akt signaling in a syngeneic mouse model of metastasis. These effects were mirrored by expression of the ectodomain of cancer-associated mucin MUC1. These findings functionally link mucinous proteins with tumor aggression, and offer a new view of the cancer glycocalyx as a major driver of disease progression

Eastern South Dakota Wetlands

Diverse and extensive wetland resources have always been familiar parts of the landscape to farmers, hunters, and residents of eastern South Dakota. The journals and oral histories of adventurers, trappers, and natives and immigrants reveal how wetlands shaped the wildlife and the people who lived on and modified the land to meet their own needs. The history of South Dakota wetlands parallels the history and interactions of people and wetlands elsewhere in North America and the world. This interaction can best be characterized as constant conflict. Driven primarily by economics, farmers the world over expended tremendous energy to reclaim and rehabilitate wet soils and wetlands. Their efforts alerted wildlife biologists, who sounded clear alarms in the 1950s about the loss of wetlands and about what that loss implied for the future of waterfowl and hunting. Eventually, farmers became aware that drainage districts, their costs, and their failures were adversely affecting farm families as often as they helped them. This report deals with the present. It outlines the true abundance and characteristics of eastern South Dakota wetlands, whether still pristine, modified, or constructed by man. It provides a clear statement of the kinds and numbers of wetlands and why they are important. It is a foundation for reasoned dialog about the future of wetlands. The past decade has seen unprecedented public debate about wetlands, with issues of property rights and anti-government sentiment woven in. Underlying this heated public dialog is the knowledge that wetlands have tremendous values, ranging from financial returns to flood control and wildlife habitat. These values become real and measurable in South Dakota. If wetlands are eliminated and the land no longer can absorb excess snowmelt or precipitation) the water overruns the land here and then goes downstream to flood someone else. Constant drainage can kill the golden goose of economic returns from hunting and other recreation. Landowners and biologists are now trying to undo harmful wetland modifications of the past. The future of many of these wetlands is still to be played out in eastern South Dakota and elsewhere. That future still holds the key to the majestic flights of waterfowl through future wet and dry cycles. Almost a million water bodies of all kinds are present in eastern South Dakota; this report is a powerful reminder of their dominant role in the lives of people and wildlife. [Forward by Rollin D. Sparrowe, Wildlife Management Institute]https://openprairie.sdstate.edu/nrm_book/1003/thumbnail.jp

Training the Foot Soldiers of Inquiry: Development and Evaluation of a Graduate Teaching Assistant Learning Community

As part of a Howard Hughes Program for Innovation in Science Education grant at Iowa State University, a series of interdisciplinary graduate teaching assistant learning communities (TALC) were developed. The purpose of these communities was to create an environment to facilitate teaching assistants\u27 pedagogical development and training to enhance the implementation of inquiry experiences in the undergraduate laboratories. The TALC evaluated in this study were held for two consecutive semesters and included teaching assistants who facilitated multi-week course-based research experiences in their respective STEM courses. Topics discussed during the TALC were based on the teaching assistants\u27 concerns related to teaching this type of course. Evaluation consisted of weekly reflection responses, a pre- and post-survey of instructional methods they consider to facilitate inquiry, pre-post definitions of inquiry-based instruction, and end-of-semester evaluations of the learning community experiences. This article outlines the development of the TALC and findings from the various forms of evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR

Rapid response tools and datasets for post-fire modeling: linking Earth Observations and process-based hydrological models to support post-fire remediation

Preparation is key to utilizing Earth Observations and process-based models to support post-wildfire mitigation. Post-fire flooding and erosion can pose a serious threat to life, property and municipal water supplies. Increased runoff and sediment delivery due to the loss of surface cover and fire-induced changes in soil properties are of great concern. Remediation plans and treatments must be developed and implemented before the first major storms in order to be effective. One of the primary sources of information for making remediation decisions is a soil burn severity map derived from Earth Observation data (typically Landsat) that reflects fire induced changes in vegetation and soil properties. Slope, soils, land cover and climate are also important parameters that need to be considered. Spatially-explicit process-based models can account for these parameters, but they are currently under-utilized relative to simpler, lumped models because they are difficult to set up and require spatially-explicit inputs (digital elevation models, soils, and land cover). Our goal is to make process-based models more accessible by preparing spatial inputs before a fire, so that datasets can be rapidly combined with soil burn severity maps and formatted for model use. We are building an online database (http://geodjango.mtri.org/geowepp /) for the continental United States that will allow users to upload soil burn severity maps. The soil burn severity map is combined with land cover and soil datasets to generate the spatial model inputs needed for hydrological modeling of burn scars. Datasets will be created to support hydrological models, post-fire debris flow models and a dry ravel model. Our overall vision for this project is that advanced GIS surface erosion and mass failure prediction tools will be readily available for post-fire analysis using spatial information from a single online site

3D Determination of Area-at-Risk in Acute Myocardial Infarction

MRI methods for acute myocardial infarctio

Common Representation of Information Flows for Dynamic Coalitions

We propose a formal foundation for reasoning about access control policies within a Dynamic Coalition, defining an abstraction over existing access control models and providing mechanisms for translation of those models into information-flow domain. The abstracted information-flow domain model, called a Common Representation, can then be used for defining a way to control the evolution of Dynamic Coalitions with respect to information flow

Chronic cigarette smoking is linked with structural alterations in brain regions showing acute nicotinic drug-induced functional modulations

Background Whereas acute nicotine administration alters brain function which may, in turn, contribute to enhanced attention and performance, chronic cigarette smoking is linked with regional brain atrophy and poorer cognition. However, results from structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies comparing smokers versus nonsmokers have been inconsistent and measures of gray matter possess limited ability to inform functional relations or behavioral implications. The purpose of this study was to address these interpretational challenges through meta-analytic techniques in the service of clarifying the impact of chronic smoking on gray matter integrity and more fully contextualizing such structural alterations. Methods We first conducted a coordinate-based meta-analysis of structural MRI studies to identify consistent structural alterations associated with chronic smoking. Subsequently, we conducted two additional meta-analytic assessments to enhance insight into potential functional and behavioral relations. Specifically, we performed a multimodal meta-analytic assessment to test the structural?functional hypothesis that smoking-related structural alterations overlapped those same regions showing acute nicotinic drug-induced functional modulations. Finally, we employed database driven tools to identify pairs of structurally impacted regions that were also functionally related via meta-analytic connectivity modeling, and then delineated behavioral phenomena associated with such functional interactions via behavioral decoding. Results Across studies, smoking was associated with convergent structural decreases in the left insula, right cerebellum, parahippocampus, multiple prefrontal cortex (PFC) regions, and the thalamus. Indicating a structural?functional relation, we observed that smoking-related gray matter decreases overlapped with the acute functional effects of nicotinic agonist administration in the left insula, ventromedial PFC, and mediodorsal thalamus. Suggesting structural-behavioral implications, we observed that the left insula?s task-based, functional interactions with multiple other structurally impacted regions were linked with pain perception, the right cerebellum?s interactions with other regions were associated with overt body movements, interactions between the parahippocampus and thalamus were linked with memory processes, and interactions between medial PFC regions were associated with face processing. Conclusions Collectively, these findings emphasize brain regions (e.g., ventromedial PFC, insula, thalamus) critically linked with cigarette smoking, suggest neuroimaging paradigms warranting additional consideration among smokers (e.g., pain processing), and highlight regions in need of further elucidation in addiction (e.g., cerebellum). Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12993-016-0100-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

Follow the Rain? Environmental Drivers of Tyrannus Migration across the New World

Predictable seasonal changes in resources are thought to drive the timing of annual animal migrations; however, we currently understand little about which environmental cues or resources are tracked by different migratory bird species across the planet. Understanding which environmental cues or resources birds track in multiple migratory systems is a prerequisite to developing generalizable conservation plans for migratory birds in a changing global environment. Within the New World, climatic differences experienced by Nearctic–Neotropical migratory (NNM; i.e. breed in North America and spend the nonbreeding period in the Neotropics) and Neotropical austral migratory (NAM; i.e. breed and spend the nonbreeding period wholly within South America) bird species suggest that their migratory strategies may be shaped by unique selective pressures. We used data gathered from individuals fitted with light-level geolocators to build species distribution models (SDMs) to test which environmental factors drive the migratory strategies of species in each system. To do so, we evaluated whether temperature, precipitation, and primary productivity (NDVI) were related to the seasonal distributions of an NNM (Eastern Kingbird [Tyrannus tyrannus]) and NAM species (Fork-tailed Flycatcher [T. savana]). Both Eastern Kingbird and Fork-tailed Flycatcher locations were positively correlated with high precipitation during their nonbreeding seasons. Eastern Kingbird locations were positively correlated with both NDVI and temperature during their breeding season and both pre- and post-breeding migrations. Fork-tailed Flycatcher locations were positively correlated with both temperature and precipitation during both migrations, but only temperature during the breeding season. The value of extending the application of geolocator data, such as in SDMs, is underscored by the finding that precipitation was such an important predictor of the nonbreeding distributions of both types of migrants, as it remains unclear how global climate change will affect wet–dry cycles in the tropics