Studies on energy transformation in the freshwater snail Pila globosa 1. Influence of feeding rate

The effects of eleven chosen feeding levels ranging from 0 to 198 mg damp dry (plant) Ceratophyllumlg live snail /day on the absorption, conversion and metabolism of the snail Pi/a globosa (of 1•9 g body weight) have been studied. Absorption rates increased from 3•0 to 21•0 mg dry food /g live snail/day in snails fed 3-4-28'8 mg dry food/ g live snail/day. In these snails, absorption efficiency decreased from 87•5 to 73•0 %

Targeted action to increase inclusion at the Wellcome Sanger Institute

\ua9 2024, Ahmed et al.The Sanger Excellence Fellowship has been established to increase the representation of researchers with Black-heritage backgrounds at a leading research centre in the UK

In vitro antibacterial activity of tissue extracts from four channids against enteric pathogens

In vitro antibacterial activity of tissue extracts from four channids against enteric pathogens. International Journal of Agricultural Technology 9(6):1437-1445. Abstract The aim of this study was to identify the presence of antimicrobial activity in tissues of selected Channa species. Atotal of 20 solvent fractions from the tissue were obtained by solid-phase extraction and the fractions were assayed for antimicrobial activity. The screening of antimicrobial activity for all the fractions were tested against five enteric pathogens including Salmonella typhi, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella vulgaris, Shigella dysenteriae, Shigella boydii. The activity was measured in terms of zone of inhibition in mm. The tissue that showed efficient antibacterial activity was subjected to SDS-PAGE to find out the molecular weights. Efficient antibacterial activity was observed from the methanol extract of all the Channa species. A maximum zone of inhibition was observed in Channa striatus against Shigelladysenteriae. It is therefore suggested that Channa striatus can be a potential source of an antimicrobial protein for specific human pathogens

Mapping human development at single-cell resolution.

Human development is regulated by spatiotemporally restricted molecular programmes and is pertinent to many areas of basic biology and human medicine, such as stem cell biology, reproductive medicine and childhood cancer. Mapping human development has presented significant technological, logistical and ethical challenges. The availability of established human developmental biorepositories and the advent of cutting-edge single-cell technologies provide new opportunities to study human development. Here, we present a working framework for the establishment of a human developmental cell atlas exploiting single-cell genomics and spatial analysis. We discuss how the development atlas will benefit the scientific and clinical communities to advance our understanding of basic biology, health and disease

The Malaysian market for audit services: Ethnicity, multinational companies and auditor choice

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which ethnic association (i.e.Chinese and Bumiputra ownerships) and national issues (i.e. the presence of foreign corporations)influence the audit services market in Malaysia. Specifically, the paper aims to examine the effects of ethnicity and foreign ownership on choice of auditor.Design/methodology/approach – Two logit models are used; the first is to test on ethnic auditor (Chinese/non-Chinese) choice while the second is related to the choice of quality-differentiated auditor.The data is obtained from annual reports of the population of the Bursa Malaysia listed companies for both the Main Board and the Second Board for the periods 1993-1995.Findings – The logit regressions confirm our prediction of ethnic networking and preferential treatment on the auditor selection process. Research limitations/implications – The first limitation lies on the auditor choice model where the model is developed from a demand perspective, assuming that the auditors are willing to supply services to any client even though it is very unlikely in the real world.The model also assumes that the audit engagement process for foreign-controlled companies is purely transacted in the Malaysian market.However, foreign multinational corporations might determine the selection of the auditor at the headquarter offices and the Malaysian subsidiaries might simply be directed to engage a given auditor. Another limitation relates to the results of the logit regressions as the study has documented an ethnic association between auditor and auditee rather than establishing a causal relationship. Practical implications – An important implication of these findings relates to auditor independence. The Malaysian Institute of Accountants (MIA) has made rules prescribing the code of professional conduct and ethics of public accountants known as the MIA By-Laws (on Professional Conduct and Ethics) but it seems to neglect the diversity of local culture in addressing independence. Whilst the auditor is divorced from financial and familial interests, the ethnic sentiments might impair auditor independence especially in an audit conflict situation. Originality/value – The paper provides important insights into the existence of Chinese business practices in Malaysia and auditor selection process in this country

Pertobatan Akademis

The biggest difficulty of humans cannot change or advance the quality of life is an unwillingness to change their errors and shortcomings and to repent from it. There is also willing to change but they do not change just because no action and do not really do it. There are also people who have already known that it is true, accurate, should be performed and corresponding to the norms, but still they live in sin and self-interest to ignore the interests of others. Even worse is evil (sin) is often covered in hypocrisy behind beautiful, sweet, gentle, and courteous words to make people mesmerized/hypnotized. In the case of real repentance, it should demand a match between words and actions. If there is repentance, there is a change and peace. Therefore, humans must sincerely repent and strive for it

MultiMAP: dimensionality reduction and integration of multimodal data.

Multimodal data is rapidly growing in many fields of science and engineering, including single-cell biology. We introduce MultiMAP, a novel algorithm for dimensionality reduction and integration. MultiMAP can integrate any number of datasets, leverages features not present in all datasets, is not restricted to a linear mapping, allows the user to specify the influence of each dataset, and is extremely scalable to large datasets. We apply MultiMAP to single-cell transcriptomics, chromatin accessibility, methylation, and spatial data and show that it outperforms current approaches. On a new thymus dataset, we use MultiMAP to integrate cells along a temporal trajectory. This enables quantitative comparison of transcription factor expression and binding site accessibility over the course of T cell differentiation, revealing patterns of expression versus binding site opening kinetics

Macrophage proliferation distinguishes 2 subgroups of knee osteoarthritis patients

Osteoarthritis (OA) is a leading cause of disability, globally. Despite an emerging role for synovial inflammation in OA pathogenesis, attempts to target inflammation therapeutically have had limited success. A better understanding of the cellular and molecular processes occurring in the OA synovium is needed to develop novel therapeutics. We investigated macrophage phenotype and gene expression in synovial tissue of OA and inflammatory-arthritis (IA) patients. Compared with IA, OA synovial tissue contained higher but variable proportions of macrophages (P < 0.001). These macrophages exhibited an activated phenotype, expressing folate receptor-2 and CD86, and displayed high phagocytic capacity. RNA sequencing of synovial macrophages revealed 2 OA subgroups. Inflammatory-like OA (iOA) macrophages are closely aligned to IA macrophages and are characterized by a cell proliferation signature. In contrast, classical OA (cOA) macrophages display cartilage remodeling features. Supporting these findings, when compared with cOA, iOA synovial tissue contained higher proportions of macrophages (P < 0.01), expressing higher levels of the proliferation marker Ki67 (P < 0.01). These data provide new insight into the heterogeneity of OA synovial tissue and suggest distinct roles of macrophages in pathogenesis. Our findings could lead to the stratification of OA patients for suitable disease-modifying treatments and the identification of novel therapeutic targets