Excellent diagnostic characteristics for ultrafast gene profiling of DEFA1-IL1B-LTF in detection of prosthetic joint infections

The timely and exact diagnosis of prosthetic joint infection (PJI) is crucial for surgical decision-making. Intraoperatively, delivery of the result within an hour is required. Alpha-defensin lateral immunoassay of joint fluid (JF) is precise for the intraoperative exclusion of PJI; however, for patients with a limited amount of JF and/or in cases where the JF is bloody, this test is unhelpful. Important information is hidden in periprosthetic tissues that may much better reflect the current status of implant pathology. We therefore investigated the utility of the gene expression patterns of 12 candidate genes (TLR1, -2, -4, -6, and 10, DEFA1, LTF, IL1B, BPI, CRP, IFNG, and DEFB4A) previously associated with infection for detection of PJI in periprosthetic tissues of patients with total joint arthroplasty (TJA) (n = 76) reoperated for PJI (n = 38) or aseptic failure (n = 38), using the ultrafast quantitative reverse transcription-PCR (RT-PCR) Xxpress system (BJS Biotechnologies Ltd.). Advanced data-mining algorithms were applied for data analysis. For PJI, we detected elevated mRNA expression levels of DEFA1 (P < 0.0001), IL1B (P < 0.0001), LTF (P < 0.0001), TLR1 (P = 0.02), and BPI (P = 0.01) in comparison to those in tissues from aseptic cases. A feature selection algorithm revealed that the DEFA1-IL1B-LTF pattern was the most appropriate for detection/exclusion of PJI, achieving 94.5% sensitivity and 95.7% specificity, with likelihood ratios (LRs) for positive and negative results of 16.3 and 0.06, respectively. Taken together, the results show that DEFA1-IL1B-LTF gene expression detection by use of ultrafast qRT-PCR linked to an electronic calculator allows detection of patients with a high probability of PJI within 45 min after sampling. Further testing on a larger cohort of patients is needed.Web of Science5592697268

CHANTI: a Fast and Efficient Charged Particle Veto Detector for the NA62 Experiment at CERN

The design, construction and test of a charged particle detector made of scintillation counters read by Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPM) is described. The detector, which operates in vacuum and is used as a veto counter in the NA62 experiment at CERN, has a single channel time resolution of 1.14 ns, a spatial resolution of ~2.5 mm and an efficiency very close to 1 for penetrating charged particles

Usability of the SedLine® electroencephalographic monitor of depth of anaesthesia in pigs: a pilot study.

To investigate the usability of the SedLine® monitor in anaesthetized pigs. Five juvenile healthy pigs underwent balanced isoflurane-based general anaesthesia for surgical placement of a subcutaneous jugular venous port. The SedLine® was applied to continuously monitor electroencephalographic (EEG) activity and its modulation during anaesthesia. Computer tomography and magnetic resonance were performed to investigate the relationship between electrodes' positioning and anatomical structures. The pediatric SedLine® EEG-sensor could be easily applied and SedLine®-generated variables collected. An EEG Density Spectral Array (DS) was displayed over the whole procedure. During surgery, the EEG signal was dominated by elevated power in the delta range (0.5-4 Hz), with an underlying broadband signal (where power decreased with increasing frequency). The emergence period was marked by a decrease in delta power, and a more evenly distributed power over the 4-40 Hz frequency range. From incision to end of surgery, mean SedLine®-generated values (± standard deviation) were overall stable [23.0 (± 2.8) Patient State Index (PSI), 1.0% (± 3.8%) Suppression Ratio (SR), 8.8 Hz (± 2.5 Hz) Spectral Edge Frequency 95% (SEF) left, 7.7 Hz (± 2.4 Hz) SEF right], quickly changing during emergence [75.3 (± 11.1) PSI, 0.0 (± 0.0) SR, 12.5 (± 6.6) SEF left 10.4 (± 6.6) SEF right]. Based on the imaging performed, the sensor does not record EEG signals from the same brain areas as in humans. SedLine®-DSA and -generated variables seemed to reflect variations in depth of anaesthesia in pigs. Further studies are needed to investigate this correlation, as well as to define the species-specific brain structures monitored by the EEG-sensor

Breeding biology of a winter-breeding procellariiform in the North Atlantic, the Macaronesian shearwater Puffinus lherminieri baroli

The breeding success of burrow-nesting seabirds may be influenced by both nest site characteristics and oceanographic conditions influencing food availability at sea. In this study we describe the breeding biology of the winter-breeding Macaronesian shearwater (Puffinus lherminieri baroli), including nest site characteristics and interspecific competition. We also evaluate the possible effects of changing oceanographic conditions on breeding phenology and breeding success. The study was carried out over two breeding seasons on two islands in the North Atlantic Ocean, Cima Islet and Selvagem Grande. Oceanographic characteristics differed between years. On a regional scale, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) index was low and negative in 2011, and on a local scale, birds used areas with significantly lower values of chlorophyll a concentration and significantly higher values of sea surface temperature anomalies. Hatching success was higher in 2012 than in 2011. At both colonies, egg cracking was the main cause of hatching failure, but in 2011 several eggs on Selvagem Grande were deserted. In 2012 birds laid earlier and chicks had longer wings and were heavier. At both colonies, nests that were deeper, were sheltered from prevailing winds and had small chambers and a soil substrate had a higher probability of being used successfully by the birds. Nests occupied solely by Macaronesian shearwaters were much deeper and had less volume than nests shared with other species. Our study suggests that the breeding success of Macaronesian shearwaters is strongly related to nest site characteristics and that at-sea environmental conditions exert a strong influence on reproductive parameters, with birds breeding in a poor year (evaluated in terms of lower marine productivity) laying much later and their chicks growing at a slower rate than in a good year. The influence of nest site characteristics and environmental conditions may be very important for understanding the breeding ecology of Procellariiformes and may help explain the negative population trend of Macaronesian shearwaters

Peran Kepercayaan Politik Dan Kepuasan Demokrasi Terhadap Partisipasi Politik Mahasiswa

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk membuktikan hubungan kepercayaan politik dan kepuasan demokrasi dengan partisipasi politik mahasiswa. Sampel dalam penelitian ini sebanyak 307 mahasiswa yang berasal dari Universitas Islam Negeri Sultan Syarif Kasim Riau, Universitas Riau dan Universitas Islam Riau. Dalam mengumpulkan data menggunakan metode survey dengan kuesioner tentang kepercayaan politik, kepuasan demokrasi serta partisipasi politik. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan ada hubungan yang positif antara kepercayaan politik dan kepuasan demokrasi terhadap tingkat partisipasi politik mahasiswa. Artinya, semakin tinggi kepercayaan politik dan kepuasan demokrasi, maka semakin tinggi tingkat partisipasi politik mahasiswa. Sementara kepuasan demokrasi tidak berhubungan langsung dengan partisipasi politik tetapi melalui kepercayaan politik. Artinya kepercayaan politik menjadi variabel mediator antara kepuasan demokrasi dan partisipasi politik

Analysis of growth factor signaling in genetically diverse breast cancer lines

Background: Soluble growth factors present in the microenvironment play a major role in tumor development, invasion, metastasis, and responsiveness to targeted therapies. While the biochemistry of growth factor-dependent signal transduction has been studied extensively in individual cell types, relatively little systematic data are available across genetically diverse cell lines. Results: We describe a quantitative and comparative dataset focused on immediate-early signaling that regulates the AKT (AKT1/2/3) and ERK (MAPK1/3) pathways in a canonical panel of well-characterized breast cancer lines. We also provide interactive web-based tools to facilitate follow-on analysis of the data. Our findings show that breast cancers are diverse with respect to ligand sensitivity and signaling biochemistry. Surprisingly, triple negative breast cancers (TNBCs; which express low levels of ErbB2, progesterone and estrogen receptors) are the most broadly responsive to growth factors and HER2amp cancers (which overexpress ErbB2) the least. The ratio of ERK to AKT activation varies with ligand and subtype, with a systematic bias in favor of ERK in hormone receptor positive (HR+) cells. The factors that correlate with growth factor responsiveness depend on whether fold-change or absolute activity is considered the key biological variable, and they differ between ERK and AKT pathways. Conclusions: Responses to growth factors are highly diverse across breast cancer cell lines, even within the same subtype. A simple four-part heuristic suggests that diversity arises from variation in receptor abundance, an ERK/AKT bias that depends on ligand identity, a set of factors common to all receptors that varies in abundance or activity with cell line, and an “indirect negative regulation” by ErbB2. This analysis sets the stage for the development of a mechanistic and predictive model of growth factor signaling in diverse cancer lines. Interactive tools for looking up these results and downloading raw data are available at http://lincs.hms.harvard.edu/niepel-bmcbiol-2014/