An E3-like Factor that Promotes SUMO Conjugation to the Yeast Septins

AbstractCovalent attachment of the ubiquitin-related protein SUMO to other proteins participates in many processes including signal transduction, transcriptional regulation, and growth control. We report the characterization of Siz1 as an E3-like factor in the SUMO pathway. Siz1 is required for SUMO attachment to the S. cerevisiae septins in vivo and strongly stimulates septin sumoylation in vitro. Siz1 and the related protein Siz2 promote SUMO conjugation to different substrates at different stages of the cell cycle and, together, are required for most SUMO conjugation in yeast. Siz1, Siz2, and the PIAS (protein inhibitor of activated STAT) proteins form a conserved family defined by an unusual RING-related motif. Our results suggest that this family functions by promoting SUMO conjugation to specific substrates

SERUM HOMOCYSTEINE AS A RISK FACTOR FOR STROKE: A PROSPECTIVE STUDY FROM A RURAL TERTIARY CARE CENTRE

Objective: Stroke is one of the leading causes of mortality and long-term disability in both developed and developing countries. Serum homocysteine level is one of the emerging modifiable risk factors for atherosclerosis which may result into a cerebrovascular accident. This study was designed to study the association of Serum Homocysteine level with the development of acute stroke at a rural tertiary care centre in North India.Methods: The present study was a prospective cross-sectional study conducted in the Department of Medicine, Maharishi Markandeshwar Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Mullana, Ambala. The study population included 100 patients presenting with Stroke (either ischemic or hemorrhagic) in the indoor and outdoor facilities in the Department of Medicine. 50 age and sex-matched healthy individuals were taken as controls. Serum total Homocysteine level was measured in all the cases and controls.Results: Majority of the patients suffered from ischemic stroke (78%), while only 22% patients had hemorrhagic stroke. The mean Serum Homocysteine level in stroke patients (19.88±8.78 μmol/l) was significantly higher than in controls (10.48±4.39 μmol/l) (p<0.01). In a subgroup analysis, stroke patients with a positive history of smoking had significantly higher homocysteine level as compared to non-smokers (p<0.05).Conclusion: Increased level of Serum Homocysteine is significantly associated with risk of cerebrovascular accident, which is independent of the risk attributed to traditional risk factors.Â

Primary angiosarcoma of the oral cavity in a young adult

Angiosarcoma is a rare neoplasm, constituting only 2% of all the soft tissue tumors and most frequently involves the skin of the head and neck region in elderly males. They are extremely aggressive tumors with high rates of metastasis and poor outcomes. We report a unique case of angiosarcoma involving an unusual site – upper alveolus and maxilla in a young patient highlighting the diagnostic challenges in such a scenario. A 29 years old female presented with a non-healing wound of the oral cavity, which had progressed to the current maximum size of 6.4 cm within one month. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan revealed the involvement of maxilla up to the floor of the orbit and adjacent soft tissue. However, no distant metastasis was detected on Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scan. Biopsy of the lesion showed an irregular, highly pleomorphic, and mitotically active epithelioid soft tissue tumor conclusively diagnosed as angiosarcoma

Critical Behavioral Traits Foster Peer Engagement in Online Mental Health Communities

Online Mental Health Communities (OMHCs), such as Reddit, have witnessed a surge in popularity as go-to platforms for seeking information and support in managing mental health needs. Platforms like Reddit offer immediate interactions with peers, granting users a vital space for seeking mental health assistance. However, the largely unregulated nature of these platforms introduces intricate challenges for both users and society at large. This study explores the factors that drive peer engagement within counseling threads, aiming to enhance our understanding of this critical phenomenon. We introduce BeCOPE, a novel behavior encoded Peer counseling dataset comprising over 10,118 posts and 58,279 comments sourced from 21 mental health-specific subreddits. The dataset is annotated using three major fine-grained behavior labels: (a) intent, (b) criticism, and (c) readability, along with the emotion labels. Our analysis indicates the prominence of ``self-criticism'' as the most prevalent form of criticism expressed by help-seekers, accounting for a significant 43% of interactions. Intriguingly, we observe that individuals who explicitly express their need for help are 18.01% more likely to receive assistance compared to those who present ``surveys'' or engage in ``rants.'' Furthermore, we highlight the pivotal role of well-articulated problem descriptions, showing that superior readability effectively doubles the likelihood of receiving the sought-after support. Our study emphasizes the essential role of OMHCs in offering personalized guidance and unveils behavior-driven engagement patterns

Comparative evaluation of antibacterial effect of nanoparticles and lasers against Endodontic Microbiota : an in vitro study

Present study was conducted with the aim of evaluating antimicrobial efficacy of silver (AgNP) and gold nanoparticles (AuNP) with and without Nd: YAG laser (L) irradiation against experimentally inoculated Enterococcus faecalis in infected human root dentin. 120 extracted single rooted human teeth were prepared and inoculated with E. faecalis for 24 hrs. The teeth were then randomly divided into 4 experimental group: AgNPs group: irrigation for 3minutes with 50 ?l of 100 ppm, the AuNPs group: irrigation with 50 ?l of 100 ppm, the AgNPs & Nd: YAG lasers group: irrigation with 50 ?l of 100 ppm + irradiation with 1.5W laser for 60 seconds, the AuNPs & Nd: YAG lasers group: irrigation with 50 ?l of 100 ppm + irradiation with 1.5W laser for 60 seconds. One control group consisting of 2% CHX irrigation for 3 minutes was also there (n = 20). The specimens were collected from the canal before and after irrigation, and colony forming units were observed. Significant difference was found among all the groups in comparison to the control group (p<0.05). The greatest reduction in CFU?s was observed with combination of AgNPs & Nd: YAG lasers group. AgNPs in combination with Nd: YAG laser irradiation has the potential to be used as root canal disinfectant

EzPC: Programmable, Efficient, and Scalable Secure Two-Party Computation for Machine Learning

We present EZPC: a secure two-party computation (2PC) framework that generates efficient 2PC protocols from high-level, easy-to-write, programs. EZPC provides formal correctness and security guarantees while maintaining performance and scalability. Previous language frameworks, such as CBMC-GC, ObliVM, SMCL, and Wysteria, generate protocols that use either arithmetic or boolean circuits exclusively. Our compiler is the first to generate protocols that combine both arithmetic sharing and garbled circuits for better performance. We empirically demonstrate that the protocols generated by our framework match or outperform (up to 19x) recent works that provide hand-crafted protocols for various functionalities such as secure prediction and matrix factorization

In vitro and in vivo assessment of polyherbal topical gel formulation for the treatment of acne vulgaris

Anti-acne herbal formulations are used for the treatment of acne vulgaris with the added advantage of not producing adverse effects unlike synthetic drugs. Phytoconstituents present in methanolic extracts of Camellia sinensis (CSME), Glycyrrhiza glabra (GGME) and Calendula officinalis (COME) have antibacterial and antioxidant properties. Validated HPTLC fingerprinting confirmed the presence of myricetin (CSME), glycyrrhizin (GGME) and kaempferol (COME) in these extracts. Extracts loaded with carbopol® 940 were used for the preparation of herbal (F1-F3) and polyherbal gel (PHF), followed by evaluation for pH, viscosity, spreadability and in vitro antibacterial potential against S. aureus, S. epidermidis and P.acnes. Polyherbal gel formulation indicated antibacterial potential and was further assessed for skin permeation by gamma scintigraphy using hydrophilic radiotracer 99mTc-DTPA and lipophilic radiotracer 99mTc-MIBI. Significant permeation (78.11%) was observed with hydrophilic radiotracer labeled 99mTc-DTPA-PHF and this suggested that the formulation was capable of sustained drug delivery for the treatment of moderate to severe type of acne.

CrypTFlow: Secure TensorFlow Inference

We present CrypTFlow, a first of its kind system that converts TensorFlow inference code into Secure Multi-party Computation (MPC) protocols at the push of a button. To do this, we build three components. Our first component, Athos, is an end-to-end compiler from TensorFlow to a variety of semi-honest MPC protocols. The second component, Porthos, is an improved semi-honest 3-party protocol that provides significant speedups for TensorFlow like applications. Finally, to provide malicious secure MPC protocols, our third component, Aramis, is a novel technique that uses hardware with integrity guarantees to convert any semi-honest MPC protocol into an MPC protocol that provides malicious security. The malicious security of the protocols output by Aramis relies on integrity of the hardware and semi-honest security of MPC. Moreover, our system matches the inference accuracy of plaintext TensorFlow. We experimentally demonstrate the power of our system by showing the secure inference of real-world neural networks such as ResNet50 and DenseNet121 over the ImageNet dataset with running times of about 30 seconds for semi-honest security and under two minutes for malicious security. Prior work in the area of secure inference has been limited to semi-honest security of small networks over tiny datasets such as MNIST or CIFAR. Even on MNIST/CIFAR, CrypTFlow outperforms prior work

SecFloat: Accurate Floating-Point meets Secure 2-Party Computation

We build a library SecFloat for secure 2-party computation (2PC) of 32-bit single-precision floating-point operations and math functions. The existing functionalities used in cryptographic works are imprecise and the precise functionalities used in standard libraries are not crypto-friendly, i.e., they use operations that are cheap on CPUs but have exorbitant cost in 2PC. SecFloat bridges this gap with its novel crypto-friendly precise functionalities. Compared to the prior cryptographic libraries, SecFloat is up to six orders of magnitude more precise and up to two orders of magnitude more efficient. Furthermore, against a precise 2PC baseline, SecFloat is three orders of magnitude more efficient. The high precision of SecFloat leads to the first accurate implementation of secure inference. All prior works on secure inference of deep neural networks rely on ad hoc float-to-fixed converters. We evaluate a model where the fixed-point approximations used in privacy-preserving machine learning completely fail and floating-point is necessary. Thus, emphasizing the need for libraries like SecFloat