310 research outputs found
Titanium-nitrogen reaction investigated for application to gettering systems
Titanium is one of several gettering materials available for removing nitrogen from inert gases. The reaction rate of titanium-metal sponge and nitrogen in argon-nitrogen mixtures was studied at 900 degrees C. The rate was found to depend upon the partial pressure of nitrogen in the gas phase. Mathematical relationships simulate titanium systems
Production of a Fusion Protein Consisting of the Enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli Heat Labile Toxin B Subunit and a Tuberculosis Antigen in Arabidopsis thaliana.
Social inequality in fetal growth: a comparative study of Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden in the period 1981-2000
Imaging in population science: cardiovascular magnetic resonance in 100,000 participants of UK Biobank - rationale, challenges and approaches
PMCID: PMC3668194SEP was directly funded by the National Institute for Health Research
Cardiovascular Biomedical Research Unit at Barts. SN acknowledges support
from the Oxford NIHR Biomedical Research Centre and from the Oxford
British Heart Foundation Centre of Research Excellence. SP and PL are
funded by a BHF Senior Clinical Research fellowship. RC is supported by a
BHF Research Chair and acknowledges the support of the Oxford BHF Centre
for Research Excellence and the MRC and Wellcome Trust. PMM gratefully
acknowledges training fellowships supporting his laboratory from the
Wellcome Trust, GlaxoSmithKline and the Medical Research Council
PROTEINCHALLENGE: Crowd sourcing in proteomics analysis and software development
AbstractIn large-scale proteomics studies there is a temptation, after months of experimental work, to plug resulting data into a convenient—if poorly implemented—set of tools, which may neither do the data justice nor help answer the scientific question. In this paper we have captured key concerns, including arguments for community-wide open source software development and “big data” compatible solutions for the future. For the meantime, we have laid out ten top tips for data processing. With these at hand, a first large-scale proteomics analysis hopefully becomes less daunting to navigate.However there is clearly a real need for robust tools, standard operating procedures and general acceptance of best practises. Thus we submit to the proteomics community a call for a community-wide open set of proteomics analysis challenges—PROTEINCHALLENGE—that directly target and compare data analysis workflows, with the aim of setting a community-driven gold standard for data handling, reporting and sharing. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: New Horizons and Applications for Proteomics [EuPA 2012]
High genetic diversity of common toad (Bufo bufo) populations under strong natural fragmentation on a Northern archipelago
The last decades have shown a surge in studies focusing on the interplay
between fragmented habitats, genetic variation, and conservation. In the present
study, we consider the case of a temperate pond-breeding anuran (the common
toad Bufo bufo) inhabiting a naturally strongly fragmented habitat at the
Northern fringe of the species’ range: islands offshore the Norwegian coast. A
total of 475 individuals from 19 populations (three mainland populations and
16 populations on seven adjacent islands) were genetically characterized using
nine microsatellite markers. As expected for a highly fragmented habitat, genetic
distances between populations were high (pairwise Fst values ranging between
0.06 and 0.33), with however little differences between populations separated by
ocean and populations separated by terrestrial habitat (mainland and on
islands). Despite a distinct cline in genetic variation from mainland populations
to peripheral islands, the study populations were characterized by overall high
genetic variation, in line with effective population sizes derived from
single-sample estimators which were on average about 20 individuals. Taken
together, our results reinforce the notion that spatial and temporal scales of
fragmentation need to be considered when studying the interplay between
landscape fragmentation and genetic erosion
Spontaneous preterm labor is associated with an increase in the proinflammatory signal transducer TLR4 receptor on maternal blood monocytes
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Localized inflammation and increased expression of TLR4 receptors within the uterus has been implicated in the pathogenesis of preterm labor. It remains unclear whether intrauterine inflammatory responses activate the maternal peripheral circulatory system. Therefore we determined whether increased TLR4 expression is present in the peripheral maternal white blood cells of women with spontaneous preterm labor.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>This is a cross-sectional study of 41 preterm labor cases and 41 non-preterm controls. For each case and control sample, RNA was purified from white blood cells and TLR4 mRNA pool size was evaluated by quantitative PCR. Protein expression levels were determined by flow cytometry. Statistical evaluation using multiple linear regressions was used to determine any significant differences between the cases and controls. The purpose was to determine association prevalence of TLR4 levels and preterm labor.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Adjusted mean TLR4 mRNA levels of 0.788 ± 0.037 (standard error) for preterm labor and 0.348 ± 0.038 for the corresponding pregnant control women were statistically significantly different <it>(P </it>= 0.002). Using the lower 95% confidence interval of the mean expression level in PTL subjects (0.7) as a cutoff value for elevated TLR4 mRNA levels, 25/41 (60.9%) of PTL patients expressed elevated TLR4 mRNA as compared to 0/41 (0%) in control subjects. The TLR4 receptor levels in the granulocyte fraction of white blood cells from preterm labor and pregnant controls were similar. However, TLR4<sup>+</sup>/CD14<sup>+</sup>monocytes were 2.3 times more frequent (70% vs. 30%) and TLR4 also had a 2.6-fold higher density (750 vs. 280 molecules per cell) in preterm labor women compared with pregnant controls. There was no difference in the levels of TLR4 in patients at term.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Patients with preterm labor exhibited elevated levels of CD14<sup>+ </sup>maternal blood monocytes each bearing enhanced expression of TLR4, indicating that the peripheral circulatory system is activated in patients with preterm labor. Elevated leukocyte TLR4 levels may be a useful biomarker associated with preterm labor.</p
Техніко-економічне обґрунтування переведення міських електричних мереж 6-10 кВ на рівень напруги 20 кВ з будівництвом нової силової підстанції
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