Measurement of the 18Ne(a,p_0)21Na reaction cross section in the burning energy region for X-ray bursts

The 18Ne(a,p)21Na reaction provides one of the main HCNO-breakout routes into the rp-process in X-ray bursts. The 18Ne(a,p_0)21Na reaction cross section has been determined for the first time in the Gamow energy region for peak temperatures T=2GK by measuring its time-reversal reaction 21Na(p,a)18Ne in inverse kinematics. The astrophysical rate for ground-state to ground-state transitions was found to be a factor of 2 lower than Hauser-Feshbach theoretical predictions. Our reduced rate will affect the physical conditions under which breakout from the HCNO cycles occurs via the 18Ne(a,p)21Na reaction.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication on Physical Review Letter

Measurement of two-halo neutron transfer reaction p(11^{11}Li,9^{9}Li)t at 3AA MeV

The p(\nuc{11}{Li},\nuc{9}{Li})t reaction has been studied for the first time at an incident energy of 3$A$ MeV delivered by the new ISAC-2 facility at TRIUMF. An active target detector MAYA, build at GANIL, was used for the measurement. The differential cross sectionshave been determined for transitions to the \nuc{9}{Li} ground andthe first excited states in a wide range of scattering angles. Multistep transfer calculations using different \nuc{11}{Li} model wave functions, shows that wave functions with strong correlations between the halo neutrons are the most successful in reproducing the observation.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, submitted to Physical Review Letter

Multiplexed profiling of GPCR activities by combining split TEV assays and EXT-based barcoded readouts

G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) are the largest class of cell surface receptors and are implicated in the physiological regulation of many biological processes. The high diversity of GPCRs and their physiological functions make them primary targets for therapeutic drugs. For the generation of novel compounds, however, selectivity towards a given target is a critical issue in drug development as structural similarities between members of GPCR subfamilies exist. Therefore, the activities of multiple GPCRs that are both closely and distantly related to assess compound selectivity need to be tested simultaneously. Here, we present a cell-based multiplexed GPCR activity assay, termed GPCRprofiler, which uses a beta-arrestin recruitment strategy and combines split TEV protein-protein interaction and EXT-based barcode technologies. This approach enables simultaneous measurements of receptor activities of multiple GPCR-ligand combinations by applying massively parallelized reporter assays. In proof-of-principle experiments covering 19 different GPCRs, both the specificity of endogenous agonists and the polypharmacological effects of two known antipsychotics on GPCR activities were demonstrated. Technically, normalization of barcode reporters across individual assays allows quantitative pharmacological assays in a parallelized manner. In summary, the GPCRprofiler technique constitutes a flexible and scalable approach, which enables simultaneous profiling of compound actions on multiple receptor activities in living cells

Expression of Lineage Transcription Factors Identifies Differences in Transition States of Induced Human Oligodendrocyte Differentiation

Oligodendrocytes (OLs) are critical for myelination and are implicated in several brain disorders. Directed differentiation of human-induced OLs (iOLs) from pluripotent stem cells can be achieved by forced expression of different combinations of the transcription factors SOX10 (S), OLIG2 (O), and NKX6.2 (N). Here, we applied quantitative image analysis and single-cell transcriptomics to compare different transcription factor (TF) combinations for their efficacy towards robust OL lineage conversion. Compared with S alone, the combination of SON increases the number of iOLs and generates iOLs with a more complex morphology and higher expression levels of myelin-marker genes. RNA velocity analysis of individual cells reveals that S generates a population of oligodendrocyte-precursor cells (OPCs) that appear to be more immature than those generated by SON and to display distinct molecular properties. Our work highlights that TFs for generating iOPCs or iOLs should be chosen depending on the intended application or research question, and that SON might be beneficial to study more mature iOLs while S might be better suited to investigate iOPC biology

Disease progression in Plasmodium knowlesi malaria is linked to variation in invasion gene family members.

Emerging pathogens undermine initiatives to control the global health impact of infectious diseases. Zoonotic malaria is no exception. Plasmodium knowlesi, a malaria parasite of Southeast Asian macaques, has entered the human population. P. knowlesi, like Plasmodium falciparum, can reach high parasitaemia in human infections, and the World Health Organization guidelines for severe malaria list hyperparasitaemia among the measures of severe malaria in both infections. Not all patients with P. knowlesi infections develop hyperparasitaemia, and it is important to determine why. Between isolate variability in erythrocyte invasion, efficiency seems key. Here we investigate the idea that particular alleles of two P. knowlesi erythrocyte invasion genes, P. knowlesi normocyte binding protein Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb, influence parasitaemia and human disease progression. Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb reference DNA sequences were generated from five geographically and temporally distinct P. knowlesi patient isolates. Polymorphic regions of each gene (approximately 800 bp) were identified by haplotyping 147 patient isolates at each locus. Parasitaemia in the study cohort was associated with markers of disease severity including liver and renal dysfunction, haemoglobin, platelets and lactate, (r = ≥ 0.34, p =  <0.0001 for all). Seventy-five and 51 Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb haplotypes were resolved in 138 (94%) and 134 (92%) patient isolates respectively. The haplotypes formed twelve Pknbpxa and two Pknbpxb allelic groups. Patients infected with parasites with particular Pknbpxa and Pknbpxb alleles within the groups had significantly higher parasitaemia and other markers of disease severity. Our study strongly suggests that P. knowlesi invasion gene variants contribute to parasite virulence. We focused on two invasion genes, and we anticipate that additional virulent loci will be identified in pathogen genome-wide studies. The multiple sustained entries of this diverse pathogen into the human population must give cause for concern to malaria elimination strategists in the Southeast Asian region

Heliyon

Purpose: Restraint is often used when administering procedures to children. However, no metrologically scale to measure the restraint intensity had yet been validated. This study validated the metrological criteria of a scale measuring the restraint intensity, Procedural Restraint Intensity in Children (PRIC), used during procedures in children. Design and methods: The PRIC scale performance was measured by a group of 7 health professionals working in a children's hospital, by watching 20 videos of health care procedures. This group included 2 physicians, 1 pediatric resident, and 4 nurses. The intra-class correlation coefficients were calculated to evaluate the inter-rater and test-retest reliability and the construct validity with the correlation between PRIC scale and a numerical rating scale. Results: One hundred and forty measurements were made. Inter-rater and test-retest correlation coefficients were 0.98 and 0.98, respectively. The 2 scales were positively correlated with a Spearman coefficient of 0.93. Conclusions: This study validated the Procedural Restraint Intensity in Children (PRIC) scale in metrological terms with some limitation. However, there is not gold standard scale to precisely validate the reliability of this tool and this study has been conducted in "experimental" conditions. Nevertheless, this is the first scale measuring the intensity of physical restraint with a metrological validation. The next step will be to validate it in real clinical situations

Crow Deaths Caused by West Nile Virus during Winter

In New York, an epizootic of American crow (Corvus brachyrhynchos) deaths from West Nile virus (WNV) infection occurred during winter 2004–2005, a cold season when mosquitoes are not active. Detection of WNV in feces collected at the roost suggests lateral transmission through contact or fecal contamination

Cross section measurements of the 3He(alpha, gamma) 7Be reaction using DRAGON at TRIUMF.

4 pags., 2 figs. -- Nuclear Physics in Astrophysics V 3–8 April 2011, Eilat, IsraelWe present our initial efforts with the DRAGON separator at TRIUMF facility towards obtaining the energy dependence of the astrophysical S-factor for 3He(¿, ¿)7Be reaction in the energy range of Ecm = 2 to 3 MeV that was recommended by the recent evaluations. A comparison between the existing data and our new complementary Madrid data, together with the recent theoretical calculations, is also given in the context of our ongoing work.This work has been supported by the UK STFC