Safety, Tolerability, and Pharmacokinetics of ARC-520 Injection, an RNA Interference-Based Therapeutic for the Treatment of Chronic Hepatitis B Virus Infection, in Healthy Volunteers

published_or_final_versio

L Band Brightness Temperature Observations Over a Corn Canopy During the Entire Growth Cycle

During a field campaign covering the 2002 corn growing season, a dual polarized tower mounted L-band (1.4 GHz) radiometer (LRAD) provided brightness temperature (T(sub B)) measurements at preset intervals, incidence and azimuth angles. These radiometer measurements were supported by an extensive characterization of land surface variables including soil moisture, soil temperature, vegetation biomass, and surface roughness. During the period from May 22, 2002 to August 30, 2002 a range of vegetation water content (W) of 0.0 to 4.3 kg/square m, ten days of radiometer and ground measurements were available. Using this data set, the effects of corn vegetation on surface emissions are investigated by means of a semi-empirical radiative transfer model. Additionally, the impact of roughness on the surface emission is quantified using T(sub B) measurements over bare soil conditions. Subsequently, the estimated roughness parameters, ground measurements and horizontally (H)-polarized T(sub B) are employed to invert the H-polarized transmissivity (gamma-h) for the monitored corn growing season

Rest, zest and my innovative best: sleep and mood as drivers of entrepreneurs’ innovative behavior

This study investigates the antecedents of an entrepreneur’s day-level innovative behavior. Drawing on 2,420 data points from a 10-day experience sampling study with 121 entrepreneurs, we find that sleep quality is a precursor to an entrepreneur’s subsequent innovative behavior, in accordance with the effort-recovery model. Moreover, sleep quality is positively related to high-activation positive moods (e.g., enthusiastic, inspired) and negatively related to high-activation negative moods (e.g., tension, anxiety). Our multilevel structural equation model indicates that high-activation positive moods mediate the relationship between sleep quality and innovative behavior on a given day. These results are relevant for managing entrepreneurial performance

L Band Brightness Temperature Observations over a Corn Canopy during the Entire Growth Cycle

During a field campaign covering the 2002 corn growing season, a dual polarized tower mounted L-band (1.4 GHz) radiometer (LRAD) provided brightness temperature (TB) measurements at preset intervals, incidence and azimuth angles. These radiometer measurements were supported by an extensive characterization of land surface variables including soil moisture, soil temperature, vegetation biomass, and surface roughness. In the period May 22 to August 30, ten days of radiometer and ground measurements are available for a corn canopy with a vegetation water content (W) range of 0.0 to 4.3 kg m−2. Using this data set, the effects of corn vegetation on surface emissions are investigated by means of a semi-empirical radiative transfer model. Additionally, the impact of roughness on the surface emission is quantified using TB measurements over bare soil conditions. Subsequently, the estimated roughness parameters, ground measurements and horizontally (H)-polarized TB are employed to invert the H-polarized transmissivity (γh) for the monitored corn growing season

The migration of physicians from sub-Saharan Africa to the United States of America: measures of the African brain drain

BACKGROUND: The objective of this paper is to describe the numbers, characteristics, and trends in the migration to the United States of physicians trained in sub-Saharan Africa. METHODS: We used the American Medical Association 2002 Masterfile to identify and describe physicians who received their medical training in sub-Saharan Africa and are currently practicing in the USA. RESULTS: More than 23% of America's 771 491 physicians received their medical training outside the USA, the majority (64%) in low-income or lower middle-income countries. A total of 5334 physicians from sub-Saharan Africa are in that group, a number that represents more than 6% of the physicians practicing in sub-Saharan Africa now. Nearly 86% of these Africans practicing in the USA originate from only three countries: Nigeria, South Africa and Ghana. Furthermore, 79% were trained at only 10 medical schools. CONCLUSIONS: Physician migration from poor countries to rich ones contributes to worldwide health workforce imbalances that may be detrimental to the health systems of source countries. The migration of over 5000 doctors from sub-Saharan Africa to the USA has had a significantly negative effect on the doctor-to-population ratio of Africa. The finding that the bulk of migration occurs from only a few countries and medical schools suggests policy interventions in only a few locations could be effective in stemming the brain drain

Pros and Cons of Peginterferon Versus Nucleos(t)ide Analogues for Treatment of Chronic Hepatitis B

The emergence of new and more potent treatment options has markedly changed the treatment landscape of chronic hepatitis B. Both peginterferon and nucleos(t)ide analogues have considerable advantages and limitations, and current treatment guidelines refrain from clearly suggesting a first-line treatment option. Peginterferon offers the advantage of higher sustained response rates in both hepatitis B early antigen (HBeAg)-positive and HBeAg-negative patients, at the price of considerable side effects and high costs. Nucleos(t)ide analogues offer easy daily oral dosing, and newly registered agents can maintain viral suppression for prolonged treatment duration. However, relapse is common after therapy discontinuation and extended therapy therefore often necessary. Prolonged treatment with nucleos(t)ide analogues may enhance chances of virologic and serologic response at the potential cost of the emergence of viral resistance and side effects. Baseline and on-treatment prediction of response may help select patients for peginterferon therapy and can aid individualized treatment decisions concerning therapy continuation or discontinuation

Formin homology 2 domains occur in multiple contexts in angiosperms

BACKGROUND: Involvement of conservative molecular modules and cellular mechanisms in the widely diversified processes of eukaryotic cell morphogenesis leads to the intriguing question: how do similar proteins contribute to dissimilar morphogenetic outputs. Formins (FH2 proteins) play a central part in the control of actin organization and dynamics, providing a good example of evolutionarily versatile use of a conserved protein domain in the context of a variety of lineage-specific structural and signalling interactions. RESULTS: In order to identify possible plant-specific sequence features within the FH2 protein family, we performed a detailed analysis of angiosperm formin-related sequences available in public databases, with particular focus on the complete Arabidopsis genome and the nearly finished rice genome sequence. This has led to revision of the current annotation of half of the 22 Arabidopsis formin-related genes. Comparative analysis of the two plant genomes revealed a good conservation of the previously described two subfamilies of plant formins (Class I and Class II), as well as several subfamilies within them that appear to predate the separation of monocot and dicot plants. Moreover, a number of plant Class II formins share an additional conserved domain, related to the protein phosphatase/tensin/auxilin fold. However, considerable inter-species variability sets limits to generalization of any functional conclusions reached on a single species such as Arabidopsis. CONCLUSIONS: The plant-specific domain context of the conserved FH2 domain, as well as plant-specific features of the domain itself, may reflect distinct functional requirements in plant cells. The variability of formin structures found in plants far exceeds that known from both fungi and metazoans, suggesting a possible contribution of FH2 proteins in the evolution of the plant type of multicellularity

Identification of new participants in the rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) oocyte maturation and ovulation processes using cDNA microarrays

BACKGROUND: The hormonal control of oocyte maturation and ovulation as well as the molecular mechanisms of nuclear maturation have been thoroughly studied in fish. In contrast, the other molecular events occurring in the ovary during post-vitellogenesis have received far less attention. METHODS: Nylon microarrays displaying 9152 rainbow trout cDNAs were hybridized using RNA samples originating from ovarian tissue collected during late vitellogenesis, post-vitellogenesis and oocyte maturation. Differentially expressed genes were identified using a statistical analysis. A supervised clustering analysis was performed using only differentially expressed genes in order to identify gene clusters exhibiting similar expression profiles. In addition, specific genes were selected and their preovulatory ovarian expression was analyzed using real-time PCR. RESULTS: From the statistical analysis, 310 differentially expressed genes were identified. Among those genes, 90 were up-regulated at the time of oocyte maturation while 220 exhibited an opposite pattern. After clustering analysis, 90 clones belonging to 3 gene clusters exhibiting the most remarkable expression patterns were kept for further analysis. Using real-time PCR analysis, we observed a strong up-regulation of ion and water transport genes such as aquaporin 4 (aqp4) and pendrin (slc26). In addition, a dramatic up-regulation of vasotocin (avt) gene was observed. Furthermore, angiotensin-converting-enzyme 2 (ace2), coagulation factor V (cf5), adam 22, and the chemokine cxcl14 genes exhibited a sharp up-regulation at the time of oocyte maturation. Finally, ovarian aromatase (cyp19a1) exhibited a dramatic down-regulation over the post-vitellogenic period while a down-regulation of Cytidine monophosphate-N-acetylneuraminic acid hydroxylase (cmah) was observed at the time of oocyte maturation. CONCLUSION: We showed the over or under expression of more that 300 genes, most of them being previously unstudied or unknown in the fish preovulatory ovary. Our data confirmed the down-regulation of estrogen synthesis genes during the preovulatory period. In addition, the strong up-regulation of aqp4 and slc26 genes prior to ovulation suggests their participation in the oocyte hydration process occurring at that time. Furthermore, among the most up-regulated clones, several genes such as cxcl14, ace2, adam22, cf5 have pro-inflammatory, vasodilatory, proteolytics and coagulatory functions. The identity and expression patterns of those genes support the theory comparing ovulation to an inflammatory-like reaction

WebCARMA: a web application for the functional and taxonomic classification of unassembled metagenomic reads

Gerlach W, Jünemann S, Tille F, Goesmann A, Stoye J. WebCARMA: a web application for the functional and taxonomic classification of unassembled metagenomic reads. BMC Bioinformatics. 2009;10(1):430.Background Metagenomics is a new field of research on natural microbial communities. High-throughput sequencing techniques like 454 or Solexa-Illumina promise new possibilities as they are able to produce huge amounts of data in much shorter time and with less efforts and costs than the traditional Sanger technique. But the data produced comes in even shorter reads (35-100 basepairs with Illumina, 100-500 basepairs with 454-sequencing). CARMA is a new software pipeline for the characterisation of species composition and the genetic potential of microbial samples using short, unassembled reads. Results In this paper, we introduce WebCARMA, a refined version of CARMA available as a web application for the taxonomic and functional classification of unassembled (ultra-)short reads from metagenomic communities. In addition, we have analysed the applicability of ultra-short reads in metagenomics. Conclusions We show that unassembled reads as short as 35 bp can be used for the taxonomic classification of a metagenome. The web application is freely available at http://webcarma.cebitec.uni-bielefeld.d