A biomechanical model of anther opening reveals the roles of dehydration and secondary thickening

Understanding the processes that underlie pollen release is a prime target for controlling fertility to enable selective breeding and the efficient production of hybrid crops. Pollen release requires anther opening, which involves changes in the biomechanical properties of the anther wall. In this research, we develop and use a mathematical model to understand how these biomechanical processes lead to anther opening

Renal Thrombotic Microangiopathy in Mice with Combined Deletion of Endocytic Recycling Regulators EHD3 and EHD4

Eps15 Homology Domain-containing 3 (EHD3), a member of the EHD protein family that regulates endocytic recycling, is the first protein reported to be specifically expressed in the glomerular endothelium in the kidney; therefore we generated Ehd3–/– mice and assessed renal development and pathology. Ehd3–/– animals showed no overt defects, and exhibited no proteinuria or glomerular pathology. However, as the expression of EHD4, a related family member, was elevated in the glomerular endothelium of Ehd3–/– mice and suggested functional compensation, we generated and analyzed Ehd3–/–; Ehd4–/– mice. These mice were smaller, possessed smaller and paler kidneys, were proteinuric and died between 3–24 weeks of age. Detailed analyses of Ehd3–/–; Ehd4–/– kidneys demonstrated thrombotic microangiopathy (TMA)-like glomerular lesions including thickening and duplication of glomerular basement membrane, endothelial swelling and loss of fenestrations. Other changes included segmental podocyte foot process effacement, mesangial interposition, and abnormal podocytic and mesangial marker expression. The glomerular lesions observed were strikingly similar to those seen in human pre-eclampsia and mouse models of reduced VEGF expression. As altered glomerular endothelial VEGFR2 expression and localization and increased apoptosis was observed in the absence of EHD3 and EHD4, we propose that EHD-mediated endocytic traffic of key surface receptors such as VEGFR2 is essential for physiological control of glomerular function. Furthermore, Ehd3–/–; Ehd4–/– mice provide a unique model to elucidate mechanisms of glomerular endothelial injury which is observed in a wide variety of human renal and extra-renal diseases

REDUCE (Reviewing long-term antidepressant use by careful monitoring in everyday practice) internet and telephone support to people coming off long-term antidepressants: protocol for a randomised controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: Around one in ten adults take antidepressants for depression in England, and their long-term use is increasing. Some need them to prevent relapse, but 30-50% could possibly stop them without relapsing and avoid adverse effects and complications of long-term use. However, stopping is not always easy due to withdrawal symptoms and a fear of relapse of depression. When general practitioners review patients on long-term antidepressants and recommend to those who are suitable to stop the medication, only 6-8% are able to stop. The Reviewing long-term antidepressant use by careful monitoring in everyday practice (REDUCE) research programme aims to identify safe and cost-effective ways of helping patients taking long-term antidepressants taper off treatment when appropriate. METHODS: Design: REDUCE is a two-arm, 1:1 parallel group randomised controlled trial, with randomisation clustered by participating family practices. SETTING: England and north Wales. POPULATION: patients taking antidepressants for longer than 1 year for a first episode of depression or longer than 2 years for repeated episodes of depression who are no longer depressed and want to try to taper off their antidepressant use. INTERVENTION: provision of 'ADvisor' internet programmes to general practitioners or nurse practitioners and to patients designed to support antidepressant withdrawal, plus three patient telephone calls from a psychological wellbeing practitioner. The control arm receives usual care. Blinding of patients, practitioners and researchers is not possible in an open pragmatic trial, but statistical and health economic data analysts will remain blind to allocation. OUTCOME MEASURES: the primary outcome is self-reported nine-item Patient Health Questionnaire at 6 months for depressive symptoms. SECONDARY OUTCOMES: depressive symptoms at other follow-up time points, anxiety, discontinuation of antidepressants, social functioning, wellbeing, enablement, quality of life, satisfaction, and use of health services for costs. SAMPLE SIZE: 402 patients (201 intervention and 201 controls) from 134 general practices recruited over 15-18 months, and followed-up at 3, 6, 9 and 12 months. A qualitative process evaluation will be conducted through interviews with 15-20 patients and 15-20 practitioners in each arm to explore why the interventions were effective or not, depending on the results. DISCUSSION: Helping patients reduce and stop antidepressants is often challenging for practitioners and time-consuming for very busy primary care practices. If REDUCE provides evidence showing that access to internet and telephone support enables more patients to stop treatment without increasing depression we will try to implement the intervention throughout the National Health Service, publishing practical guidance for professionals and advice for patients to follow, publicised through patient support groups. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN:12417565. Registered on 7 October 2019

Study of CP violation in Dalitz-plot analyses of B0 --> K+K-KS, B+ --> K+K-K+, and B+ --> KSKSK+

We perform amplitude analyses of the decays $B^0 \to K^+K^-K^0_S$, $B^+ \rightarrow K^+K^-K^+$, and $B^+ \to K^0_S K^0_S K^+$, and measure CP-violating parameters and partial branching fractions. The results are based on a data sample of approximately $470\times 10^6$ $B\bar{B}$ decays, collected with the BABAR detector at the PEP-II asymmetric-energy $B$ factory at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. For $B^+ \to K^+K^-K^+$, we find a direct CP asymmetry in $B^+ \to \phi(1020)K^+$ of $A_{CP}= (12.8\pm 4.4 \pm 1.3)$, which differs from zero by $2.8 \sigma$. For $B^0 \to K^+K^-K^0_S$, we measure the CP-violating phase $\beta_{\rm eff} (\phi(1020)K^0_S) = (21\pm 6 \pm 2)^\circ$. For $B^+ \to K^0_S K^0_S K^+$, we measure an overall direct CP asymmetry of $A_{CP} = (4 ^{+4}_{-5} \pm 2)$. We also perform an angular-moment analysis of the three channels, and determine that the $f_X(1500)$ state can be described well by the sum of the resonances $f_0(1500)$, $f_2^{\prime}(1525)$, and $f_0(1710)$.Comment: 35 pages, 68 postscript figures. v3 - minor modifications to agree with published versio

Measurement of CP-violation asymmetries in D0 to Ks pi+ pi-

We report a measurement of time-integrated CP-violation asymmetries in the resonant substructure of the three-body decay D0 to Ks pi+ pi- using CDF II data corresponding to 6.0 invfb of integrated luminosity from Tevatron ppbar collisions at sqrt(s) = 1.96 TeV. The charm mesons used in this analysis come from D*+(2010) to D0 pi+ and D*-(2010) to D0bar pi-, where the production flavor of the charm meson is determined by the charge of the accompanying pion. We apply a Dalitz-amplitude analysis for the description of the dynamic decay structure and use two complementary approaches, namely a full Dalitz-plot fit employing the isobar model for the contributing resonances and a model-independent bin-by-bin comparison of the D0 and D0bar Dalitz plots. We find no CP-violation effects and measure an asymmetry of ACP = (-0.05 +- 0.57 (stat) +- 0.54 (syst))% for the overall integrated CP-violation asymmetry, consistent with the standard model prediction.Comment: 15 page

Cognitive Control Reflects Context Monitoring, Not Motoric Stopping, in Response Inhibition

The inhibition of unwanted behaviors is considered an effortful and controlled ability. However, inhibition also requires the detection of contexts indicating that old behaviors may be inappropriate – in other words, inhibition requires the ability to monitor context in the service of goals, which we refer to as context-monitoring. Using behavioral, neuroimaging, electrophysiological and computational approaches, we tested whether motoric stopping per se is the cognitively-controlled process supporting response inhibition, or whether context-monitoring may fill this role. Our results demonstrate that inhibition does not require control mechanisms beyond those involved in context-monitoring, and that such control mechanisms are the same regardless of stopping demands. These results challenge dominant accounts of inhibitory control, which posit that motoric stopping is the cognitively-controlled process of response inhibition, and clarify emerging debates on the frontal substrates of response inhibition by replacing the centrality of controlled mechanisms for motoric stopping with context-monitoring

Quantitative Trait Loci Associated with the Immune Response to a Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus Vaccine

Infectious disease is an important problem for animal breeders, farmers and governments worldwide. One approach to reducing disease is to breed for resistance. This linkage study used a Charolais-Holstein F2 cattle cross population (n = 501) which was genotyped for 165 microsatellite markers (covering all autosomes) to search for associations with phenotypes for Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus (BRSV) specific total-IgG, IgG1 and IgG2 concentrations at several time-points pre- and post-BRSV vaccination. Regions of the bovine genome which influenced the immune response induced by BRSV vaccination were identified, as well as regions associated with the clearance of maternally derived BRSV specific antibodies. Significant positive correlations were detected within traits across time, with negative correlations between the pre- and post-vaccination time points. The whole genome scan identified 27 Quantitative Trait Loci (QTL) on 13 autosomes. Many QTL were associated with the Thymus Helper 1 linked IgG2 response, especially at week 2 following vaccination. However the most significant QTL, which reached 5% genome-wide significance, was on BTA 17 for IgG1, also 2 weeks following vaccination. All animals had declining maternally derived BRSV specific antibodies prior to vaccination and the levels of BRSV specific antibody prior to vaccination were found to be under polygenic control with several QTL detected

Study of multi-muon events produced in p\bar{p} interactions at \sqrt{s}=1.96 TeV

68 pages, 46 figures, 11 tables. Submitted to Phys. Rev. D. Removed typos from the authors' listWe report the results of a study of multi-muon events produced at the Fermilab Tevatron collider and acquired with the CDF II detector using a dedicated dimuon trigger. The production cross section and kinematics of events in which both muon candidates are produced inside the beam pipe of radius 1.5 cm are successfully modeled by known processes which include heavy flavor production. In contrast, we are presently unable to fully account for the number and properties of the remaining events, in which at least one muon candidate is produced outside of the beam pipe, in terms of the same understanding of the CDF II detector, trigger, and event reconstruction.Peer reviewe

Comments and Reply on: “Study of multi-muon events produced in pˉp interactions at √s=1.96 TeV”

The European Physical Journal C—Particles and Fields—publishes scientific manuscripts of relevance to the scientific community following careful and strict peer reviewing and, whenever appropriate and necessary, through discussion with the authors, so as to optimise scientific content and style of presentation prior to publication. In some cases significant disagreement between authors and referees (and/or editors) of the journal cannot be resolved despite all efforts and best of intentions. While the journal—notwithstanding any appeals—retains the right to reject such manuscripts, the editors of this journal may decide, in cases deemed of exceptional interest and potential significance for the field, to accept the manuscript for publication, to amend it by “comments” of the editor(s) in charge and, if appropriate, by a “reply” of the authors of the commented manuscript. The present comment is on “Study of multi-muon events produced in $p\bar{p}$ interactions at $\sqrt{s}=1.96$ TeV” by T. Aaltonen et al. (the CDF Collaboration, Eur. Phys. J. C, 2010,Peer reviewe