Characterization And Evaluation Of The Immunogenizity Of Chloroplast-Derived 19-Kilodalton C-Terminal Merozoite Surface Antigen 1 (MSP1) of Plasmodium Yoelii Yoelii

Malaria is a protozoan disease caused in humans by four different species of the genus Plasmodium (P. falciparum, P. vivax, P. ovale, P. malarie) and in rodents by Plasmodium yoelii yoelii. It has been reported that 1.5 to 3 million deaths occur worldwide due to malaria and the DALY (Daily affected life years) reports about 0.76% of world population affected by the disease in some of the major countries like Africa, Asia, Latin America etc., Due to the development of resistance to drugs by the parasite, there is an urgent need and prime importance for the development of an effective vaccine against malaria. During its entire life cycle, the plasmodium sp. expresses various stagespecific proteins that are considered potential candidates for vaccine development; the major ones belong to the (i) sporozoite, (ii) erythrocytic, (iii) gametocytic stages. Merozoite surface protein 1 (MSP1) is expressed on the surface of the parasite during the erythrocytic stage, which is considered as a potential vaccine candidate. The C-terminal portion of MSP1 is considered to be an effective vaccine candidate from inhibiting the parasite invasion into RBC. PyMSP119 has been expressed in plants via the chloroplast transformation. The site specific integration of PyMSP119 gene within chloroplast genome was confirmed by PCR using specific primers and the percentage of homoplasmy vs. heteroplasmy was confirmed by Southern blot. The expression of chloroplast-derived PyMSP119 plants was confirmed by western blot using anti- PyMSP119 antibodies. These experiments showed a 17kDa protein under reducing conditions. The expression levels of PyMSP119 protein varied within transgenic plants were up to ~2% of total soluble protein (TSP) within mature leaves. To test the functionality of chloroplast-derived PyMSP119 protein, mice were immunized with the enriched chloroplast-derived PyMSP119 protein with Freund\u27s adjuvant. The immune response of anti- PyMSP119 antibodies were tested against standard PyMSP119 protein and it yielded 1:7000 IgG titers. The immunized mice were challenged with P.yoelii infected red blood cells (35-40% parasitemia) and the percentage parasitemia suggested an inverse correlation with the immune titers. However, the concrete conclusions can be made when the study is extended to a larger animal group

Uniform selenization of crack-free films of Cu(In,Ga)Se2 nanocrystals

Crack-free films of Cu(In,Ga)Se2 (CIGS) nanocrystals were deposited with uniform thickness (>1 μm) on Mo-coated glass substrates using an ink-based, automated ultrasonic spray process, then selenized and incorporated into photovoltaic devices (PVs). The device performance depended strongly on the homogeneity of the selenized films. Cracks in the spray-deposited films resulted in uneven selenization rates and sintering by creating paths for rapid, uncontrollable selenium (Se) vapor penetration. To make crack-free films, the nanocrystals had to be completely coated with capping ligands in the ink. The selenization rate of crack-free films then depended on the thickness of the nanocrystal layer, the temperature, and duration of Se vapor exposure. Either inadequate or excessive Se exposure leads to poor device performance, generating films that were either partially sintered or exhibited significant accumulation of carbon and selenium. The deposition of uniform nanocrystal films is expected to be important for a variety of electronic and optoelectronic device applications.Fil: Harvey, Taylor B.. Texas A&M University; Estados UnidosFil: Bonafé, Franco Paúl. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Investigaciones en Físico-química de Córdoba. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Ciencias Químicas. Instituto de Investigaciones en Físico-química de Córdoba; ArgentinaFil: Updegrave, Ty. University of Texas at Austin; Estados UnidosFil: Voggu, Vikas Reddy. University of Texas at Austin; Estados UnidosFil: Thomas, Cherrelle. University of Texas at Austin; Estados UnidosFil: Kamarajugadda, Sirish C.. University of Texas at Austin; Estados UnidosFil: Stolle, C. Jackson. University of Texas at Austin; Estados UnidosFil: Pernik, Douglas. University of Texas at Austin; Estados UnidosFil: Du, Jiang. University of Texas at Austin; Estados UnidosFil: Korgel, Brian A.. University of Texas at Austin; Estados Unido

SOD2 immunoexpression predicts lymph node metastasis in penile cancer

BACKGROUND: Superoxide dismutase-2 (SOD2) is considered one of the most important antioxidant enzymes that regulate cellular redox state in normal and tumorigenic cells. Overexpression of this enzyme in lung, gastric, colorectal, breast cancer and cervical cancer malignant tumors has been observed. Its relationship with inguinal lymph node metastasis in penile cancer is unknown. METHODS: SOD2 protein expression levels were determined by immunohistochemistry in 125 usual type squamous cell carcinomas of the penis from a Brazilian cancer center. The casuistic has been characterized by means of descriptive statistics. An exploratory logistic regression has been proposed to evaluate the independent predictive factors of lymph node metastasis. RESULTS: SOD2 expression in more than 50% of cells was observed in 44.8% of primary penile carcinomas of the usual type. This expression pattern was associated with lymph node metastasis both in the uni and multivariate analysis. CONCLUSIONS: Our results indicate that SOD2 expression predicts regional lymph node metastasis. The potential clinical implication of this observation warrants further studies.Dr. Lara Termini (FAPESP 2005/57274-9); Dr. Luisa Lina Villa (FAPESP 2008/57889-1 and CNPq 573799/2008-3)

Epithelial cancers in the post-genomic era: should we reconsider our lifestyle?

The age-related epithelial cancers of the breast, colorectum and prostate are the most prevalent and are increasing in our aging populations. Epithelial cells turnover rapidly and mutations naturally accumulate throughout life. Most epithelial cancers arise from this normal mutation rate. All elderly individuals will harbour many cells with the requisite mutations and most will develop occult neoplastic lesions. Although essential for initiation, these mutations are not sufficient for the progression of cancer to a life-threatening disease. This progression appears to be dependent on context: the tissue ecosystem within individuals and lifestyle exposures across populations of individuals. Together, this implies that the seeds may be plentiful but they only germinate in the right soil. The incidence of these cancers is much lower in Eastern countries but is increasing with Westernisation and increases more acutely in migrants to the West. A Western lifestyle is strongly associated with perturbed metabolism, as evidenced by the epidemics of obesity and diabetes: this may also provide the setting enabling the progression of epithelial cancers. Epidemiology has indicated that metabolic biomarkers are prospectively associated with cancer incidence and prognosis. Furthermore, within cancer research, there has been a rediscovery that a switch in cell metabolism is critical for cancer progression but this is set within the metabolic status of the host. The seed may only germinate if the soil is fertile. This perspective brings together the different avenues of investigation implicating the role that metabolism may play within the context of post-genomic concepts of cancer

Whole body biomechanics of vertical ladder climbing with varying rung separations

Climbing a vertical ladder continues to be a safety concern for both manufacturer and professional users. Among these professional users are the wind service technicians who climb the wind towers greater than 80m to perform a variety of maintenance work (BLS, 2010). These technicians are getting injured at a frequent rate (USPC, 2011). Among these, musculoskeletal injuries associated with the knee joint are dominant (Reid & McMulin, 2006). Published literature on ladder climbing has mainly addressed the accidents related to slips and falls (Armstrong, 2009; McInyere, 1983; Dewar, 1977) and a few studies have addressed the musculoskeletal injuries associated with slanted ladders (Hoozemans & Louche, 2005; Bloswick, 1990). Currently a gap in the literature exists with respect to the potential risk of musculoskeletal injuries associated with vertical ladder climbing. That is the aim of this study, to predict the lower limb internal joint forces and moments during a vertical ladder climbing activity and associate the outcome of this analysis to the causes of musculoskeletal injuries. Six male and six female adult subjects participated in this study. Participants climbed an instrumented vertical laboratory ladder similar to ladders used on wind towers. Independent variables for this experiment included three levels of climbing speed, two levels of climbing direction, three levels of rung separation, three levels of subject anthropometry and two levels of gender. Dependent measures included measured hand and foot forces, predicted lower and upper joint moments and EMG activity of the lower limb flexor and extensor muscles. Synchronized kinetic and kinematic data collected during the experimental trials was provided to a two-dimensional dynamic link-segment model. The output from the model included the predicted internal forces and moments at the ankle, knee and hip joint. Results indicated climbing style, climbing speed and rung separation distance had a significant effect on predicted peak lower joint moments. Excessive muscle contractions were observed during ladder ascent than the descent for all four lower limb flexor and extensor muscles. The results concluded that climbing the ladder using side rails as support was more strenuous than climbing the ladder with rungs as support

Multi-Features Assisted Age Invariant Face Recognition and Retrieval Using CNN with Scale Invariant Heat Kernel Signature

Face recognition across aging emerges as a significant area among researchers due to its applications such as law enforcement, security. However, matching human faces with different age gaps is still bottleneck due to face appearance variations caused by aging process. In regard to mitigate such inconsistency, this chapter offers five sequential processes that are Image Quality Evaluation (IQE), Preprocessing, Pose Normalization, Feature Extraction and Fusion, and Feature Recognition and Retrieval. Primarily, our method performs IQE process in order to evaluate the quality of image and thus increases the performance of our Age Invariant Face Recognition (AIFR). In preprocessing, we carried out two processes that are Illumination Normalization and Noise Removal that have resulted in high accuracy in face recognition. Feature extraction adopts two descriptors such as Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) and Scale Invariant Heat Kernel Signature (SIHKS). CNN extracts texture feature, and SIHKS extracts shape and demographic features. These features plays vital role in improving accuracy of AIFR and retrieval. Feature fusion is established using Canonical Correlation Analysis (CCA) algorithm. Our work utilizes Support Vector Machine (SVM) to recognize and retrieve images. We implement these processes in FG-NET database using MATLAB2017b tool. At last, we validate performance of our work using seven performance metrics that are Accuracy, Recall, Rank-1 Score, Precision, F-Score, Recognition rate and computation time