PUMAH : Pan-tilt Ultrasound Mid-Air Haptics

International audienceFocused ultrasound mid-air haptic interfaces are ideal for providing tactile feedback in Virtual Reality (VR), as they do not require the user to be tethered to, hold, or wear any device. Using an array of ultrasound emitters, they generate focused points of oscillating high pressure in mid-air, eliciting vibrotactile sensations when encountering a user's skin. These arrays feature a large vertical workspace, but are not capable of displaying stimuli far beyond their horizontal limits, severely limiting their workspace in the lateral dimensions. This demo presents the PUMAH, a low-cost 2 degrees-of-freedom robotic system rotating a focused ultrasound array around the pan and tilt axes, enabling multi-directional tactile feedback and increasing the array's workspace volume more than 14-fold

The TAL1 complex targets the FBXW7 tumor suppressor by activating miR-223 in human T cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia

The oncogenic transcription factor TAL1/SCL is aberrantly expressed in 60% of cases of human T cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL) and initiates T-ALL in mouse models. By performing global microRNA (miRNA) expression profiling after depletion of TAL1, together with genome-wide analysis of TAL1 occupancy by chromatin immunoprecipitation coupled to massively parallel DNA sequencing, we identified the miRNA genes directly controlled by TAL1 and its regulatory partners HEB, E2A, LMO1/2, GATA3, and RUNX1. The most dynamically regulated miRNA was miR-223, which is bound at its promoter and up-regulated by the TAL1 complex. miR-223 expression mirrors TAL1 levels during thymic development, with high expression in early thymocytes and marked down-regulation after the double-negative-2 stage of maturation. We demonstrate that aberrant miR-223 up-regulation by TAL1 is important for optimal growth of TAL1-positive T-ALL cells and that sustained expression of miR-223 partially rescues T-ALL cells after TAL1 knockdown. Overexpression of miR-223 also leads to marked down-regulation of FBXW7 protein expression, whereas knockdown of TAL1 leads to up-regulation of FBXW7 protein levels, with a marked reduction of its substrates MYC, MYB, NOTCH1, and CYCLIN E. We conclude that TAL1-mediated up-regulation of miR-223 promotes the malignant phenotype in T-ALL through repression of the FBXW7 tumor suppressor.National Cancer Institute (U.S.) (5P01CA109901)National Cancer Institute (U.S.) (5P01CA68484)National Cancer Institute (U.S.) (1K99CA157951)National Institutes of Health (U.S.). Intramural Research ProgramCenter for Cancer Research (National Cancer Institute (U.S.)

Bacteria isolated from lung modulate asthma susceptibility in mice

Asthma is a chronic, non-curable, multifactorial disease with increasing incidence in industrial countries. This study evaluates the direct contribution of lung microbial components in allergic asthma in mice. Germ-Free and Specific-Pathogen-Free mice display similar susceptibilities to House Dust Mice-induced allergic asthma, indicating that the absence of bacteria confers no protection or increased risk to aeroallergens. In early life, allergic asthma changes the pattern of lung microbiota, and lung bacteria reciprocally modulate aeroallergen responsiveness. Primo-colonizing cultivable strains were screened for their immunoregulatory properties following their isolation from neonatal lungs. Intranasal inoculation of lung bacteria influenced the outcome of allergic asthma development: the strain CNCM I 4970 exacerbated some asthma features whereas the pro-Th1 strain CNCM I 4969 had protective effects. Thus, we confirm that appropriate bacterial lung stimuli during early life are critical for susceptibility to allergic asthma in young adults

Theoretical constraints on the effects of pH, salinity, and temperature on clumped isotope signatures of dissolved inorganic carbon species and precipitating carbonate minerals

The use of carbonate 'clumped isotope' thermometry as a geochemical technique to determine temperature of formation of a carbonate mineral is predicated on the assumption that the mineral has attained an internal thermodynamic equilibrium. If true, then the clumped isotope signature is dependent solely upon the temperature of formation of the mineral without the need to know the isotopic or elemental composition of coeval fluids. However, anomalous signatures can arise under disequilibrium conditions that can make the estimation of temperatures uncertain by several degrees Celsius. Here we use ab initio calculations to examine the potential disequilibrium mineral signatures that may arise from the incorporation of dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) species (predominantly aqueous carbonate and bicarbonate ions) into growing crystals without full equilibration with the crystal lattice.We explore theoretically the nature of clumping in the individual DIC species and the composite DIC pool under varying pH, salinity, temperature, and isotopic composition, and speculate about their effects upon the resultant disequilibrium clumping of the precipitates. We also calculate equilibrium clumped signatures for the carbonate minerals calcite, aragonite, and witherite. Our models indicate that each DIC species has a distinct equilibrium clumped isotope signature such that, δ47(H2CO3)>δ47HCO3->δ47(equilibrium calcite)>δ47CO32-, and predict a difference between δ47HCO3-andδ47CO32->0.033‰ at 25°C, and that δ47 (aragonite)>δ47 (calcite)>δ47 (witherite). We define the calcite clumped crossover pH as the pH at which the composite δ47 (DIC pool)=δ47 (equilibrium calcite). If disequilibrium δ47 (calcite) is misinterpreted as equilibrium δ47 (calcite), it is possible to overestimate or underestimate the growth temperature by small but significant amounts. Increases in salinity lower the clumped crossover pH and may cause larger effects. Extreme effects of pH, salinity, and temperature, such as between cold freshwater lakes at high latitudes to hot hypersaline environments, are predicted to have sizeable effects on the clumped isotope composition of aqueous DIC pools.In order to determine the most reliable and efficient modeling methods to represent aqueous dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) species and carbonate minerals, we performed convergence and sensitivity testing on several different levels of theory. We used 4 different techniques for modeling the hydration of DIC: gas phase, implicit solvation (PCM and SMD), explicit solvation (ion with 3 water molecules) and supermolecular clusters (ion plus 21 to 32 water molecules with geometries generated by molecular dynamics). For each solvation technique, we performed sensitivity testing by combining different levels of theory (up to 8 ab initio/hybrid methods, each with up to 5 different sizes of basis sets) to understand the limits of each technique. We looked at the degree of convergence with the most complex (and accurate) models in order to select the most reliable and efficient modeling methods. The B3LYP method combined with the 6-311++G(2d,2p) basis set with supermolecular clusters worked well. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd

The influence of oxygen isotope exchange between CO2 and H2O in natural CO2-rich spring waters: implications for geothermometry

Oxygen isotope ratio (δ18O) value deviations from the Meteoric Water Line with no significant change in the hydrogen isotope (δ2H) composition have been reported in naturally occurring CO2-rich waters from around the world. Here we review the effects of oxygen isotope exchange with CO2, high temperature equilibration with bedrock minerals and mineral dissolution and precipitation reactions on the CO2-rich water isotopic composition. We present two case studies from Daylesford (Australia) and Pah Tempe (Utah, USA) mineral springs, where we use a numerical geochemical modelling approach to resolve the influence of low temperature water-rock interactions and CO2 equilibration on the observed oxygen isotope ranges observed in the mineral waters. In both cases, we find that mineral dissolution – precipitation reactions are unlikely to have a significant effect on the groundwater isotopic compositions, and that the observed δ18O values in natural CO2 springs can be simply explained by equilibrium fractionation between water and free phase CO2. Traditionally, the interaction of CO2 and water in a natural CO2-rich groundwater setting has only been associated with water 18O depletion and this is the first study to consider 18O enrichment. We establish that in a natural setting, CO2 and water equilibration can result in water 18O depletion or enrichment, and that the change in the oxygen isotope composition ultimately depends on the initial CO2 and water δ18O values. Our new conceptual model therefore provides a mechanism to explain water 18O enrichment at ambient temperatures. This finding is critical for the use of δ18O in groundwater geothermometry and for the interpretation of natural water circulation depths: we argue that in some cases, natural waters previously interpreted as geothermal based on their oxygen isotope composition may actually have acquired their isotopic signature through interaction with CO2 at ambient temperatures

Expanded encyclopaedias of DNA elements in the human and mouse genomes

All data are available on the ENCODE data portal: www.encodeproject. org. All code is available on GitHub from the links provided in the methods section. Code related to the Registry of cCREs can be found at https:// github.com/weng-lab/ENCODE-cCREs. Code related to SCREEN can be found at https://github.com/weng-lab/SCREEN.© The Author(s) 2020. The human and mouse genomes contain instructions that specify RNAs and proteins and govern the timing, magnitude, and cellular context of their production. To better delineate these elements, phase III of the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) Project has expanded analysis of the cell and tissue repertoires of RNA transcription, chromatin structure and modification, DNA methylation, chromatin looping, and occupancy by transcription factors and RNA-binding proteins. Here we summarize these efforts, which have produced 5,992 new experimental datasets, including systematic determinations across mouse fetal development. All data are available through the ENCODE data portal (https://www.encodeproject.org), including phase II ENCODE1 and Roadmap Epigenomics2 data. We have developed a registry of 926,535 human and 339,815 mouse candidate cis-regulatory elements, covering 7.9 and 3.4% of their respective genomes, by integrating selected datatypes associated with gene regulation, and constructed a web-based server (SCREEN; http://screen.encodeproject.org) to provide flexible, user-defined access to this resource. Collectively, the ENCODE data and registry provide an expansive resource for the scientific community to build a better understanding of the organization and function of the human and mouse genomes.This work was supported by grants from the NIH under U01HG007019, U01HG007033, U01HG007036, U01HG007037, U41HG006992, U41HG006993, U41HG006994, U41HG006995, U41HG006996, U41HG006997, U41HG006998, U41HG006999, U41HG007000, U41HG007001, U41HG007002, U41HG007003, U54HG006991, U54HG006997, U54HG006998, U54HG007004, U54HG007005, U54HG007010 and UM1HG009442

SkeweR: a 3D Interaction Technique for 2-User Collaborative Manipulation of Objects in Virtual Environments

International audienceThis paper describes a novel 3D interaction technique called the “SkeweR”, dedicated to the 2-user collaborative manipulation of objects in virtual environments. This technique enables two users to move simultaneously the same virtual object in 3D. For this aim, each user manipulates the object by one crushing point, like handling the extremity of a skewer. The SkeweR uses only translation information from the users' motions to change both the position and orientation of the manipulated object. By using more crushing points, this technique could easily be extended to 3 or more users. Thus, the SkeweR technique could be used to improve the collaborative manipulation of objects in numerous applications of Virtual Reality, such as: virtual prototyping, maintenance and training simulations, architectural mock-up reviews, etc