The Effect Of Peroxisome Proliferatorr Activated Receptor Gamma (Pparγ) On The Expression Of Foxp3, Tigit, Icos And Histone Proteins In Natural T-Regulatory Cells

Natural T Regulatory (nTreg) cells represent approximately 8-10% of the total CD4+ T cell population. These cells are crucial for immune homeostasis and autoimmunity prevention. Previous study showed that peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPARγ) ligands suppress Forkhead box P3 (FoxP3) expression in nTreg cells following 72 hours in vitro culture. Current study was performed to elucidate the effects of PPARγ ligands on T cell immunoreceptor with Ig and ITIM domains (TIGIT) and Inducible T cell costimulator (ICOS) expressions in activated nTreg cells isolated from Balb/c mice. We also focused on histone modifications on FoxP3 gene expression in activated nTreg cells following PPARγ ligand, 15-Deoxy-△(12,14)-prostaglandin J2 (15d-PGJ2) and its inhibitor, GW9662 treatment in type 1 diabetes (T1D) mouse model. Spleens of Balb/c, NOD and NOR mice were harvested through cervical dislocation. CD4+CD25+ cells were isolated using MoFlow automated sorter or Magnetic-activated cell sorting (MACS) magnetic separation and purity was analyzed by flow cytometry method. Isolated CD4+CD25+ cells were cultured for 72 hours in supplemented RPMI in the presence of anti-CD3/CD28 antibodies and IL-2 cytokine. In Balb/c mice, sorted cells treated with or without 15d-PGJ2 or ciglitazone for TIGIT and ICOS surface marker profiling. In NOD/NOR mice, isolated cells were treated with 15d-PGJ2 or ciglitazone with or without GW9662 inhibitor

An Behavioral Finance Analysis Using Learning Vector Quantization in the Taiwan Stock Market Index Future

There are various types of trading behavior in the stock market. And the buying or selling activities in many investment strategies are influenced by numerous factors respectively, such as fundamental analysis, macroeconomic analysis, and news analysis. Consequently, various factors will reflect on market price. Random Walk in financial engineering is not the focus in this paper. Otherwise, the importance of the technique analysis about Taiwan Stock Index Futures will be emphasized in this research. It is the intention of this paper to investigate the information content of Open, High, Low, Close prices in the previous trading day and relative higher and lower points in the prior period of the current trading day, as well as their prices in analyzing Taiwan Stock Index Future. The predictability of Learning Vector Quantizationl Network can clearly be seen from the empirical result

Ambient Air Pollution, Smoking, and Reproductive Outcomes

The number of studies addressing the possible effects of air pollutants on human reproduction, especially prenatal outcomes, has grown extensively. However, the plausible biological mechanisms by which air pollutants influence prenatal outcomes remain unclear. The aims of this dissertation are (1) to determine whether ambient air pollution exposure (including particles of less than 10 µm (PM10) and less than 2.5 µm diameter (PM2.5), carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, and ozone) contributes to increased inflammatory response by measuring C-reactive protein (CRP) concentrations during early pregnancy, and (2) to examine associations between ambient air pollution exposures and blood pressure changes during pregnancy. In addition, because smoking during pregnancy is a risk factor for some adverse birth outcomes such as preterm delivery, and inflammation has been suggested to increase the risk of preterm delivery, the other aim of this dissertation was to examine whether systemic inflammation mediates the link between smoking and preterm delivery. The study population was selected from the Prenatal Exposures and Preeclampsia Prevention study (PEPP) conducted in Pittsburgh, PA between 1997 and 2001. Space-time Kriging interpolation for ambient station measures at the maternal ZIP code was performed to estimate maternal air pollution exposure. Multiple linear and logistic regressions were employed to evaluate associations between air pollution, CRP concentrations, and blood pressure changes during pregnancy. Positive associations between particulate (both PM2.5 and PM10) and ozone air pollution and elevated CRP concentrations in non-smoking women during early pregnancy were observed. For blood pressure changes, we found that first trimester exposure to PM10 and ozone air pollution was associated to increases in mean systolic and diastolic blood pressure changes during pregnancy. For smoking and preterm study, no evidence that systemic inflammation mediates this association was found. Our findings provide some new evidence that associations between particulate air pollution and adverse birth outcomes may be mediated by systemic inflammation and blood pressure changes. These findings have considerable public health significance to further prevent the adverse birth outcomes associated with air pollution exposure

In Situ Monitoring of Temperature inside Lithium-Ion Batteries by Flexible Micro Temperature Sensors

Lithium-ion secondary batteries are commonly used in electric vehicles, smart phones, personal digital assistants (PDA), notebooks and electric cars. These lithium-ion secondary batteries must charge and discharge rapidly, causing the interior temperature to rise quickly, raising a safety issue. Over-charging results in an unstable voltage and current, causing potential safety problems, such as thermal runaways and explosions. Thus, a micro flexible temperature sensor for the in in-situ monitoring of temperature inside a lithium-ion secondary battery must be developed. In this work, flexible micro temperature sensors were integrated into a lithium-ion secondary battery using the micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) process for monitoring temperature in situ

Cloning, expression and purification of squalene synthase from Candida tropicalis in Pichia pastoris

Squalene synthase (SS) is the key precursor and first committed enzyme of the sterol biosynthesis pathway. In a previous work, SS has been identified as one of the immunogenic proteins that could be a potential diagnostic candidate for the pathogenic fungus Candida tropicalis. In this study, SS from C. tropicalis was cloned and expressed as recombinant protein in Pichia pastoris to investigate its reactivity with serum antibodies. ERG9 gene that encodes for SS was amplified by PCR and cloned in-frame into pPICZB expression vector. The recombinant construct was then transformed into P. pastoris GS115 host strain. Expression of the recombinant protein was confirmed by SDS–PAGE and Western blot analysis using anti-His tag probe. Optimal protein production was achieved by cultivating the culture with 1.0% methanol for 72 h. The recombinant protein was purified to approximately 97% pure in a single step immobilized metal affinity chromatography with a yield of 70.3%. Besides, the purified protein exhibited specific reactivity with immune sera on Western blot. This is the first report on heterologous expression of antigenic SS from C. tropicalis in P. pastoris which can be exploited for large-scale production and further research. The results also suggested that the protein might be of great value as antigen candidate for serodiagnosis of Candida infection

Existence theorems for a crystal surface model involving the p-Laplace operator

The manufacturing of crystal films lies at the heart of modern nanotechnology. How to accurately predict the motion of a crystal surface is of fundamental importance. Many continuum models have been developed for this purpose, including a number of PDE models, which are often obtained as the continuum limit of a family of kinetic Monte Carlo models of crystal surface relaxation that includes both the solid-on-solid and discrete Gaussian models. In this paper we offer an analytical perspective into some of these models. To be specific, we study the existence of a weak solution to the boundary value problem for the equation - \Delta e^{-\mbox{div}\left(|\nabla u|^{p-2}\nabla u\right)}+au=f, where $p>1, a>0$ are given numbers and $f$ is a given function. This problem is derived from a crystal surface model proposed by J.L.~Marzuola and J.~Weare (2013 Physical Review, E 88, 032403). The mathematical challenge is due to the fact that the principal term in our equation is an exponential function of a p-Laplacian. Existence of a suitably-defined weak solution is established under the assumptions that $p\in(1,2], \ N\leq 4$, and $f\in W^{1,p}$. Our investigations reveal that the key to our existence assertion is how to control the set where -\mbox{div}\left(|\nabla u|^{p-2}\nabla u\right) is $\pm\infty$

XRCC1, but not APE1 and hOGG1 gene polymorphisms is a risk factor for pterygium.

PurposeEpidemiological evidence suggests that UV irradiation plays an important role in pterygium pathogenesis. UV irradiation can produce a wide range of DNA damage. The base excision repair (BER) pathway is considered the most important pathway involved in the repair of radiation-induced DNA damage. Based on previous studies, single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 8-oxoguanine glycosylase-1 (OGG1), X-ray repair cross-complementing-1 (XRCC1), and AP-endonuclease-1 (APE1) genes in the BER pathway have been found to affect the individual sensitivity to radiation exposure and induction of DNA damage. Therefore, we hypothesize that the genetic polymorphisms of these repair genes increase the risk of pterygium.MethodsXRCC1, APE1, and hOGG1 polymorphisms were studied using fluorescence-labeled Taq Man probes on 83 pterygial specimens and 206 normal controls.ResultsThere was a significant difference between the case and control groups in the XRCC1 genotype (p=0.038) but not in hOGG1 (p=0.383) and APE1 (p=0.898). The odds ratio of the XRCC1 A/G polymorphism was 2.592 (95% CI=1.225-5.484, p=0.013) and the G/G polymorphism was 1.212 (95% CI=0.914-1.607), compared to the A/A wild-type genotype. Moreover, individuals who carried at least one C-allele (A/G and G/G) had a 1.710 fold increased risk of developing pterygium compared to those who carried the A/A wild type genotype (OR=1.710; 95% CI: 1.015-2.882, p=0.044). The hOGG1 and APE1 polymorphisms did not have an increased odds ratio compared with the wild type.ConclusionsXRCC1 (Arg399 Glu) is correlated with pterygium and might become a potential marker for the prediction of pterygium susceptibility