In Silico Fatigue Optimization of TAVR Stent Designs with Physiological Motion in a Beating Heart Model

The rapid expansion of TAVR to younger, low-risk patients raises concerns regarding device durability. Necessarily, extended stent lifetime will become more critical for new generation devices. In vitro methods commonly used for TAVR stent fatigue testing exclude the effects of the beating heart. We present a more realistic in silico stent fatigue analysis utilizing a beating heart model in which TAVR stents experience complex, nonuniform dynamic loading. Virtual TAVR deployments were simulated in the SIMULIA Living Heart Human Model of a beating heart using stent models of the self-expandable nitinol 26-mm CoreValve and Evolut R devices, and a 27-mm PolyV-2. Stent deformation was monitored over three cardiac cycles, and fatigue resistance was evaluated for the nitinol stents using finite element analysis via ABAQUS/Explicit. In all models, there were elements in which strains exceeded fatigue failure. The PolyV-2 stent had far fewer failing elements since its struts were optimized to reduce the strain in stent joints, achieving better fatigue resistance in the stent crown and waist elements. Different stent sections showed markedly different fatigue resistance due to the varying loading conditions. This study demonstrates the utility of advanced in silico analysis of devices deployed within a beating heart that mimics in vivo loading, offering a cost-effective alternative to human or animal trials and establishing a platform to assess the impact of device design on device durability. The limited fatigue life of TAVR stents indicated here highlights a clinical complication that may eventually develop as younger, lower-risk TAVR patients, age.Comment: 24 pages, 13 figures, 2 table

Reverse Phase Proteomic Array Profiling of Asparagine Synthetase Expression in Newly Diagnosed Acute Myeloid Leukemia

Asparaginase-based therapy is a cornerstone in acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) treatment, capitalizing on the methylation status of the asparagine synthetase (ASNS) gene, which renders ALL cells reliant on extracellular asparagine. Contrastingly, ASNS expression in acute myeloid leukemia (AML) has not been thoroughly investigated, despite studies suggesting that AML with chromosome 7/7q deletions might have reduced ASNS levels. Here, we leverage reverse phase protein arrays to measure ASNS expression in 810 AML patients and assess its impact on outcomes. We find that AML with inv(16) has the lowest overall ASNS expression. While AML with deletion 7/7q had ASNS levels slightly lower than those of AML without deletion 7/7q, this observation was not significant. Low ASNS expression correlated with improved overall survival (46 versus 54 weeks, respectively

Rank-based data synthesis of common bean on-farm trials across four Central American countries

Location-specific information is required to support decision making in crop vari-ety management, especially under increasingly challenging climate conditions. Datasynthesis can aggregate data from individual trials to produce information that sup-ports decision making in plant breeding programs, extension services, and of farmers.Data from on-farm trials using the novel approach of triadic comparison of technolo-gies (tricot) are increasingly available, from which more insights could be gainedusing a data synthesis approach. The objective of our study was to present the appli-cability of a rank-based data synthesis approach to several datasets from tricot trialsAbbreviations:AIC, Akaike information criteria; AOA, area of applicability; DAP, daily accumulated precipitation; DI, dissimilarity index; DP, dailyprecipitation; DSRF, daily solar radiation flux; tricot, triadic comparison of technologies.This is an open access article under the terms of theCreative Commons AttributionLicense, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the originalwork is properly cited.©2022 The Authors. Crop Science published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Crop Science Society of America.2246wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/csc2Crop Science.2022;62:2246–2266.BROWNET AL.2247Crop Scienceto generate location-specific information supporting decision making in crop varietymanagement. Our study focuses on tricot data from 14 trials of common bean (Phase-olus vulgarisL.) performed between 2015 and 2018 across four countries in CentralAmerica (Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua). The combined data of17 common bean genotypes were rank aggregated and analyzed with the Plackett–Luce model. Model-based recursive partitioning was used to assess the influenceof spatially explicit environmental covariates on the performance of common beangenotypes. Location-specific performance was predicted for the three main grow-ing seasons in Central America. We demonstrate how the rank-based data synthesismethodology allows integrating tricot trial data from heterogenous sources to providelocation-specific information to support decision making in crop variety manage-ment. Maps of genotype performance can support decision making in crop varietyevaluation such as variety recommendations to farmers and variety release processes

Wnt2 coordinates the commitment of mesoderm to hematopoietic, endothelial, and cardiac lineages in embryoid bodies

Our recent gene expression profiling analyses demonstrated that Wnt2 is highly expressed in Flk1(+) cells, which serve as common progenitors of endothelial cells, blood cells, and mural cells. In this report, we characterize the role of Wnt2 in mesoderm development during embryonic stem (ES) cell differentiation by creating ES cell lines in which Wnt2 was deleted. Wnt2(-/-) embryoid bodies (EBs) generated increased numbers of Flk1(+) cells and blast colony-forming cells compared with wild-type EBs, and had higher Flk1 expression at comparable stages of differentiation. Although Flk1(+) cells were increased, we found that endothelial cell and terminal cardiomyocyte differentiation was impaired, but hematopoietic cell differentiation was enhanced and smooth muscle cell differentiation was unchanged in Wnt2(-/-) Ells. Later stage Wnt2(-/-) EBs had either lower or undetectable expression of endothelial and cardiac genes compared with wild-type EBs. Consistently, vascular plexi were poorly formed and neither beating cardiomyocytes nor alpha-actinin-staining cells were detectable in later stage Wnt2(-/-) EBs. In contrast, hematopoietic cell gene expression was upregulated, and the number of hematopoietic progenitor colonies was significantly enhanced in Wnt2(-/-) EBs. Our data indicate that Wnt2 functions at multiple stages of development during ES cell differentiation and during the commitment and diversification of mesoderm: as a negative regulator for hemangioblast differentiation and hematopoiesis but alternatively as a positive regulator for endothelial and terminal cardiomyocyte differentiation

Just a game? Unjustified virtual violence produces guilt in empathetic players

Many avid gamers discount violent conduct in video games as morally insignificant as "it is just a game." However, recent debates among users, regarding video games featuring inappropriate forms of virtual violence, suggest a more complex truth. Two ex- periments (

Optimasi Portofolio Resiko Menggunakan Model Markowitz MVO Dikaitkan dengan Keterbatasan Manusia dalam Memprediksi Masa Depan dalam Perspektif Al-Qur`an

Risk portfolio on modern finance has become increasingly technical, requiring the use of sophisticated mathematical tools in both research and practice. Since companies cannot insure themselves completely against risk, as human incompetence in predicting the future precisely that written in Al-Quran surah Luqman verse 34, they have to manage it to yield an optimal portfolio. The objective here is to minimize the variance among all portfolios, or alternatively, to maximize expected return among all portfolios that has at least a certain expected return. Furthermore, this study focuses on optimizing risk portfolio so called Markowitz MVO (Mean-Variance Optimization). Some theoretical frameworks for analysis are arithmetic mean, geometric mean, variance, covariance, linear programming, and quadratic programming. Moreover, finding a minimum variance portfolio produces a convex quadratic programming, that is minimizing the objective function ðð¥with constraintsð ð 𥠥 ðandð´ð¥ = ð. The outcome of this research is the solution of optimal risk portofolio in some investments that could be finished smoothly using MATLAB R2007b software together with its graphic analysis

Measurement of t(t)over-bar normalised multi-differential cross sections in pp collisions at root s=13 TeV, and simultaneous determination of the strong coupling strength, top quark pole mass, and parton distribution functions

Peer reviewe

Measurement of the top quark forward-backward production asymmetry and the anomalous chromoelectric and chromomagnetic moments in pp collisions at √s = 13 TeV

Abstract The parton-level top quark (t) forward-backward asymmetry and the anomalous chromoelectric (d̂ t) and chromomagnetic (μ̂ t) moments have been measured using LHC pp collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, collected in the CMS detector in a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb−1. The linearized variable AFB(1) is used to approximate the asymmetry. Candidate t t ¯ events decaying to a muon or electron and jets in final states with low and high Lorentz boosts are selected and reconstructed using a fit of the kinematic distributions of the decay products to those expected for t t ¯ final states. The values found for the parameters are AFB(1)=0.048−0.087+0.095(stat)−0.029+0.020(syst),μ̂t=−0.024−0.009+0.013(stat)−0.011+0.016(syst), and a limit is placed on the magnitude of | d̂ t| < 0.03 at 95% confidence level. [Figure not available: see fulltext.

MUSiC : a model-unspecific search for new physics in proton-proton collisions at root s=13TeV

Results of the Model Unspecific Search in CMS (MUSiC), using proton-proton collision data recorded at the LHC at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb(-1), are presented. The MUSiC analysis searches for anomalies that could be signatures of physics beyond the standard model. The analysis is based on the comparison of observed data with the standard model prediction, as determined from simulation, in several hundred final states and multiple kinematic distributions. Events containing at least one electron or muon are classified based on their final state topology, and an automated search algorithm surveys the observed data for deviations from the prediction. The sensitivity of the search is validated using multiple methods. No significant deviations from the predictions have been observed. For a wide range of final state topologies, agreement is found between the data and the standard model simulation. This analysis complements dedicated search analyses by significantly expanding the range of final states covered using a model independent approach with the largest data set to date to probe phase space regions beyond the reach of previous general searches.Peer reviewe