SYSGENET: a meeting report from a new European network for systems genetics

The first scientific meeting of the newly established European SYSGENET network took place at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig, April 7-9, 2010. About 50 researchers working in the field of systems genetics using mouse genetic reference populations (GRP) participated in the meeting and exchanged their results, phenotyping approaches, and data analysis tools for studying systems genetics. In addition, the future of GRP resources and phenotyping in Europe was discussed

Mitochondrial polymorphisms in rat genetic models of hypertension

Hypertension is a complex trait that has been studied extensively for genetic contributions of the nuclear genome. We examined mitochondrial genomes of the hypertensive strains: the Dahl Salt-Sensitive (S) rat, the Spontaneously Hypertensive Rat (SHR), and the Albino Surgery (AS) rat, and the relatively normotensive strains: the Dahl Salt-Resistant (R) rat, the Milan Normotensive Strain (MNS), and the Lewis rat (LEW). These strains were used previously for linkage analysis for blood pressure (BP) in our laboratory. The results provide evidence to suggest that variations in the mitochondrial genome do not account for observed differences in blood pressure between the S and R rats. However, variants were detected among the mitochondrial genomes of the various hypertensive strains, S, SHR, and AS, and also among the normotensive strains R, MNS, and LEW. A total of 115, 114, 106, 106, and 16 variations in mtDNA were observed between the comparisons S versus LEW, S versus MNS, S versus SHR, S versus AS, and SHR versus AS, respectively. Among the 13 genes coding for proteins of the electron transport chain, 8 genes had nonsynonymous variations between S, LEW, MNS, SHR, and AS. The lack of any sequence variants between the mitochondrial genomes of S and R rats provides conclusive evidence that divergence in blood pressure between these two inbred strains is exclusively programmed through their nuclear genomes. The variations detected among the various hypertensive strains provides the basis to construct conplastic strains and further evaluate the effects of these variants on hypertension and associated phenotypes

Development and evaluation of low-volume tests to detect and characterize antibodies to SARS-CoV-2

Low-volume antibody assays can be used to track SARS-CoV-2 infection rates in settings where active testing for virus is limited and remote sampling is optimal. We developed 12 ELISAs detecting total or antibody isotypes to SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid, spike protein or its receptor binding domain (RBD), 3 anti-RBD isotype specific luciferase immunoprecipitation system (LIPS) assays and a novel Spike-RBD bridging LIPS total-antibody assay. We utilized pre-pandemic (n=984) and confirmed/suspected recent COVID-19 sera taken pre-vaccination rollout in 2020 (n=269). Assays measuring total antibody discriminated best between pre-pandemic and COVID-19 sera and were selected for diagnostic evaluation. In the blind evaluation, two of these assays (Spike Pan ELISA and Spike-RBD Bridging LIPS assay) demonstrated >97% specificity and >92% sensitivity for samples from COVID-19 patients taken >21 days post symptom onset or PCR test. These assays offered better sensitivity for the detection of COVID-19 cases than a commercial assay which requires 100-fold larger serum volumes. This study demonstrates that low-volume in-house antibody assays can provide good diagnostic performance, and highlights the importance of using well-characterized samples and controls for all stages of assay development and evaluation. These cost-effective assays may be particularly useful for seroprevalence studies in low and middle-income countries

Delineamentos para uma teoria da Museologia

The guiding principles in the formulation of a Museology theory were established\ud and disseminated internationally from the mid-1980s, and are related to the creation of the\ud International Committee for Museology (Icofom), associated with the International Council of\ud Museums (Icom). The opinions regarding the nature of so-called museological knowledge\ud were issued under the very specific conditions of each groups composition and of the intellectual\ud work undertook in the occasion. Despite the difficulties with the wording, risen in tandem with\ud the exercise (the terminology problem), we focused on the conjuncture that surrounded the\ud formulation: the environment, the aims, the way in which it was composed and the foundations\ud that characterise it, as well as some of the discussions that took place, which revealed aspects\ud that have been handed down as a legacy in this field of specialization

Pulp Fiber Bending Stiffness in Wet and Dry State Measured from Moment of Inertia and Modulus of Elasticity

The bending stiffness of pulp fibers in both dry and wet states is of great importance with respect to many optical and physical paper properties. We introduce a method that evaluates fiber bending stiffness from the fibers’ Young’s modulus (E) and the area moment of inertia (I) from the fiber cross section. The values for E and I in the dry state are obtained from single fiber tensile testing and image analysis of the fiber cross section. The values for the wet state are estimated from literature results for decreasing elastic modulus due to wetting and by the measurement of swollen, freeze-dried fiber cross sections by serial sectioning. We show a comparison between the results from our method and the bending stiffness of individual fibers measured with other methods

Eye movements during text reading align with the rate of speech production

Across languages, the speech signal is characterized by a predominant modulation of the amplitude spectrum between about 4.3 and 5.5 Hz, reflecting the production and processing of linguistic information chunks (syllables and words) every similar to 200 ms. Interestingly, similar to 200 ms is also the typical duration of eye fixations during reading. Prompted by this observation, we demonstrate that German readers sample written text at similar to 5 Hz. A subsequent meta-analysis of 142 studies from 14 languages replicates this result and shows that sampling frequencies vary across languages between 3.9 Hz and 5.2 Hz. This variation systematically depends on the complexity of the writing systems (character-based versus alphabetic systems and orthographic transparency). Finally, we empirically demonstrate a positive correlation between speech spectrum and eye movement sampling in low-skilled non-native readers, with tentative evidence from post hoc analysis suggesting the same relationship in low-skilled native readers. On the basis of this convergent evidence, we propose that during reading, our brain's linguistic processing systems imprint a preferred processing rate-that is, the rate of spoken language production and perception-onto the oculomotor system