Analysis of spatio-temporal variability of lightning activity and wildfires in Western Siberia during 2016-2021

This research compares the spatial and temporal variability of lightning activity associated with wildfires in several natural geographical zones ofWestern Siberia from 2016–2021. The study was based on the World Wide Lightning Location Network (WWLLN) and The Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS) for the warm (April–October) season. It was revealed that areas of hotspots and lightning activity most often coincide in the southwestern part of the territory (near Khanty-Mansiysk and Tyumen), in the mountain regions (Kuznetsk Alatau, Altai), and in the northern part of Kazakhstan. Maximum values of lightning occur in July for the whole territory of Western Siberia, and maximum values of hotspots occur in April in the central and southern regions of Western Siberia. Despite the largest number of fires in the south of the territory, the probability of ignition from lightning over the whole warm season is higher in the northern parts ofWestern Siberia; it reaches up to 30%. Thus, the revealed lightning–fire association allows us to better understand this process in the region that will be useful in the prediction of the potential fire danger in different natural zones

Modern trends in surgical treatment of chronic pancreatitis and its evolutive complications

Catedra 2 Chirurgie, LCŞ „Chirurgie Reconstructivă a Tractului Digestiv”, USMF “Nicolae Testemiţanu”, IMSP SCR, Chişinău, Republica Moldova, Al XII-lea Congres al Asociației Chirurgilor „Nicolae Anestiadi” din Republica Moldova cu participare internațională 23-25 septembrie 2015Introducere: Pancreatita cronică (PC) şi complicaţiile sale sunt o afecţiune cronică cu potenţial evolutiv şi progresiv invalidant, chiar şi în contextul unor terapii ce se înscriu în linia protocoalelor terapeutice moderne. Scop: Evaluarea strategiilor terapeutice moderne în PC şi complicaţiilor sale evolutive. Material şi metode: Studiul prezintă rezultatele tratamentului chirurgical aplicat la 460 pacienţi cu PC şi complicaţiile sale, desfăşurat în perioada 1992-2014 în Clinica Chirurgie nr.1 din cadrul Catedrei 2 Chirurgie. Operaţiile de elecţie au inclus: pancreatojejunostomie pe ansa Roux (PJS) – 125 (27,78%) cazuri, splanhnicectomia toracoscopică – 28 (6,09%) cazuri, stentare endoscopică a ductului Wirsung – 6 (1,3%) cazuri, duodenopancreatectomie cefalică (DPC) – 4 (0,87%) cazuri, chistpancreaticojejunostomie (CPJS) pe ansă Roux – 156 (33,91%) cazuri, drenare externă a PP – 61 (13,26%) cazuri, puncţie ecoghidată a PP – 8 (1,74%) cazuri. Pentru cazurile de PC complicată cu icter mecanic – PJS cu colecisto- sau coledocojejunostomie pe ansă bispiculată a lá Roux – 10 (2,17%) cazuri, CPJS cu colecisto- sau coledoco-jejunostomie pe ansă bispiculată a lá Roux – 31 (6,74%) cazuri, colecisto-(coledoco)-jejunostomie pe ansă Roux – 35 (7,61%) cazuri. Rezultate: Mortalitate postoperatorie precoce a fost inregistarată în 1 (0,22%) caz. Evoluţia pacienţilor a fost favorabilă în 380 (82,6%) cazuri. Rata complicaţiilor precoce a constituit 43 (9,34%) cazuri din totalul pacienţilor. Complicaţiile tardive s-au manifestat în 21 (4,57%) cazuri, necesitând reintervenţie chirurgicală clasică la 13 (2,83%) pacienţi şi miniinvazivă la 14 (3,04%) pacienţi. Concluzii: La pacientul cu PC şi complicaţiile sale evolutive marcate de asocieri lezionale, tratamentul chirurgical trebuie definit pentru fiecare caz în parte, luînd în consideraţie riscurile şi beneficiile. Caracterul lezional al ţesutului pancreatic şi starea ductului pancreatic reprezintă punctele cruciale în managementul PC şi complicaţiile sale evolutive.Introduction: Chronic pancreatitis (CP) and its complications is a chronic disease which can be evolutionary and progressive disabling, even in the context of the therapies that are included on the modern therapeutic protocols. Aim: Evaluation of the modern therapeutic strategies in CP and its progressive complications. Material and methods: The study presents the results of surgical treatment applied to 460 patients with CP and its complications, held during 1992-2014 in the Surgical Clinic Nr.1. The elective surgeries included: cyst pancreatojejunoanastomosis (CPJA) on the loop by Roux – 125 (27.78%) cases, the thoracoscopic splanhnicectomy – 28 (6.09%) cases, endoscopic stenting of the Wirsung duct – 6 (1.3%) cases, cephalic duodenopancreatectomy (DPC) – 4 (0.87%) cases, cyst pancreatojejunoanastomosis (CPJS) on Roux-loop 156 (33.91%) cases, external drainage of PP – 61 (13.26%) cases, ultrasound-guided puncture of PP – 8 (1.74%) cases. In the cases of CP complicated with mechanical jaundice – PJS with cholecysto- or choledochojejunoanastomosis on the loop by Roux – 10 (2.17%) cases, CPJS with cholecysto- or choledochojejunoanastomosis on the loop by Roux – 31 (6.74%) cases, cholecysto- or choledochojejunoanastomosis on the loop by Roux – 35 (7.61%) cases. Results: It was registered 1 (0.22%) case of early postoperative mortality. The patients evolution was favorable in 380 (82.6%) cases. The rate of early complications was in 43 (9.34%) cases. Late complications were recorded in 21 (4.57%) cases, reason for 12 (4.42%) of them required a new opened surgery and 14 (3.04%) a minimally invasive. Conclusions: In the case of a patient with CP and its evolutionary complications, marked by lesional associations, the surgical treatment must be defined for each case, taking into account the risks and benefits. The lesional character of the pancreatic tissue and the condition of the pancreatic duct are very important in CP management and its evolutionary complications

Annotations for Rule-Based Models

The chapter reviews the syntax to store machine-readable annotations and describes the mapping between rule-based modelling entities (e.g., agents and rules) and these annotations. In particular, we review an annotation framework and the associated guidelines for annotating rule-based models of molecular interactions, encoded in the commonly used Kappa and BioNetGen languages, and present prototypes that can be used to extract and query the annotations. An ontology is used to annotate models and facilitate their description

efam: an expanded, metaproteome-supported HMM profile database of viral protein families

Motivation: Viruses infect, reprogram and kill microbes, leading to profound ecosystem consequences, from elemental cycling in oceans and soils to microbiome-modulated diseases in plants and animals. Although metagenomic datasets are increasingly available, identifying viruses in them is challenging due to poor representation and annotation of viral sequences in databases. Results: Here, we establish efam, an expanded collection of Hidden Markov Model (HMM) profiles that represent viral protein families conservatively identified from the Global Ocean Virome 2.0 dataset. This resulted in 240 311 HMM profiles, each with at least 2 protein sequences, making efam >7-fold larger than the next largest, panecosystem viral HMM profile database. Adjusting the criteria for viral contig confidence from 'conservative' to 'eXtremely Conservative' resulted in 37 841 HMM profiles in our efam-XC database. To assess the value of this resource, we integrated efam-XC into VirSorter viral discovery software to discover viruses from less-studied, ecologically distinct oxygen minimum zone (OMZ) marine habitats. This expanded database led to an increase in viruses recovered from every tested OMZ virome by similar to 24% on average (up to similar to 42%) and especially improved the recovery of often-missed shorter contigs (<5 kb). Additionally, to help elucidate lesser-known viral protein functions, we annotated the profiles using multiple databases from the DRAM pipeline and virion-associated metaproteomic data, which doubled the number of annotations obtainable by standard, single-database annotation approaches. Together, these marine resources (efam and efam-XC) are provided as searchable, compressed HMM databases that will be updated bi-annually to help maximize viral sequence discovery and study from any ecosystem

A metabolite-derived protein modification integrates glycolysis with KEAP1-NRF2 signalling.

Mechanisms that integrate the metabolic state of a cell with regulatory pathways are necessary to maintain cellular homeostasis. Endogenous, intrinsically reactive metabolites can form functional, covalent modifications on proteins without the aid of enzymes1,2, and regulate cellular functions such as metabolism3-5 and transcription6. An important 'sensor' protein that captures specific metabolic information and transforms it into an appropriate response is KEAP1, which contains reactive cysteine residues that collectively act as an electrophile sensor tuned to respond to reactive species resulting from endogenous and xenobiotic molecules. Covalent modification of KEAP1 results in reduced ubiquitination and the accumulation of NRF27,8, which then initiates the transcription of cytoprotective genes at antioxidant-response element loci. Here we identify a small-molecule inhibitor of the glycolytic enzyme PGK1, and reveal a direct link between glycolysis and NRF2 signalling. Inhibition of PGK1 results in accumulation of the reactive metabolite methylglyoxal, which selectively modifies KEAP1 to form a methylimidazole crosslink between proximal cysteine and arginine residues (MICA). This posttranslational modification results in the dimerization of KEAP1, the accumulation of NRF2 and activation of the NRF2 transcriptional program. These results demonstrate the existence of direct inter-pathway communication between glycolysis and the KEAP1-NRF2 transcriptional axis, provide insight into the metabolic regulation of the cellular stress response, and suggest a therapeutic strategy for controlling the cytoprotective antioxidant response in several human diseases

Pancreatic insulinomas – clinical, diagnostical and therapeutical aspects

Introduction. Insulinomas are neuroendocrine tumors with low incidence (1-4 persons per million of general population), and represents 1-2% of total pancreatic neoplasm. Material and methods. The study presents the results of surgical treatment applied to 9 patients diagnosed with pancreatic endocrine tumor (PET) - between 1993 - 2016 in the Departament of surgery Nr.2 The diagnostic management has included a clinical and laboratory examination, (glycemic profile, the glycemic index during hypoglycemic and convulsive crises, glycemic levels after the administration of glucose solutions of 40%, assessment of the level of serum insulin, echography, CT, MRI. Results. The symptomatology is dominated by neuropsychiatric symptoms – 8 (88,8%) cases, adrenergic symptoms – 6 (66,6%) cases, digestive - 5 (55,56%) cases and Cushingoid syndrome 1 (11,1%) case. After evaluating the glycemic profile, the glycemic level of hypoglycemic and convulsions crisis was within 2-3,0mmol; the glycemic level after the administration of glucose solutions of 40% was 3,8-5,5mmol, the level of serum insulin was increased 32,45U/mL, level of C-peptide - 4,6 ng/ml. The elective surgeries included: tumor enucleation in 5 (55,6%) cases, corporeal-caudal pancreatectomy with spleen preservation in 3 (33,33%) cases, corporeal- caudal pancreatectomy with splenectomy in 1 (11,1%) case. Mortality and morbidity perioperative were 0. Conclusion. Delays in diagnosis are caused by a non-specific symptomatology (cardiac, neurological, psychiatric symptoms), the pancreatic enucleoresection being the treatement of election

UBVRI Light Curves of 44 Type Ia Supernovae

We present UBVRI photometry of 44 type-Ia supernovae (SN Ia) observed from 1997 to 2001 as part of a continuing monitoring campaign at the Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. The data set comprises 2190 observations and is the largest homogeneously observed and reduced sample of SN Ia to date, nearly doubling the number of well-observed, nearby SN Ia with published multicolor CCD light curves. The large sample of U-band photometry is a unique addition, with important connections to SN Ia observed at high redshift. The decline rate of SN Ia U-band light curves correlates well with the decline rate in other bands, as does the U-B color at maximum light. However, the U-band peak magnitudes show an increased dispersion relative to other bands even after accounting for extinction and decline rate, amounting to an additional ~40% intrinsic scatter compared to B-band.Comment: 84 authors, 71 pages, 51 tables, 10 figures. Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal. Version with high-res figures and electronic data at http://astron.berkeley.edu/~saurabh/cfa2snIa

Gravitational Waves From Known Pulsars: Results From The Initial Detector Era

We present the results of searches for gravitational waves from a large selection of pulsars using data from the most recent science runs (S6, VSR2 and VSR4) of the initial generation of interferometric gravitational wave detectors LIGO (Laser Interferometric Gravitational-wave Observatory) and Virgo. We do not see evidence for gravitational wave emission from any of the targeted sources but produce upper limits on the emission amplitude. We highlight the results from seven young pulsars with large spin-down luminosities. We reach within a factor of five of the canonical spin-down limit for all seven of these, whilst for the Crab and Vela pulsars we further surpass their spin-down limits. We present new or updated limits for 172 other pulsars (including both young and millisecond pulsars). Now that the detectors are undergoing major upgrades, and, for completeness, we bring together all of the most up-to-date results from all pulsars searched for during the operations of the first-generation LIGO, Virgo and GEO600 detectors. This gives a total of 195 pulsars including the most recent results described in this paper.United States National Science FoundationScience and Technology Facilities Council of the United KingdomMax-Planck-SocietyState of Niedersachsen/GermanyAustralian Research CouncilInternational Science Linkages program of the Commonwealth of AustraliaCouncil of Scientific and Industrial Research of IndiaIstituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare of ItalySpanish Ministerio de Economia y CompetitividadConselleria d'Economia Hisenda i Innovacio of the Govern de les Illes BalearsNetherlands Organisation for Scientific ResearchPolish Ministry of Science and Higher EducationFOCUS Programme of Foundation for Polish ScienceRoyal SocietyScottish Funding CouncilScottish Universities Physics AllianceNational Aeronautics and Space AdministrationOTKA of HungaryLyon Institute of Origins (LIO)National Research Foundation of KoreaIndustry CanadaProvince of Ontario through the Ministry of Economic Development and InnovationNational Science and Engineering Research Council CanadaCarnegie TrustLeverhulme TrustDavid and Lucile Packard FoundationResearch CorporationAlfred P. Sloan FoundationAstronom

Sensitivity to Gravitational Waves from Compact Binary Coalescences Achieved during LIGO's Fifth and Virgo's First Science Run

We summarize the sensitivity achieved by the LIGO and Virgo gravitational wave detectors for compact binary coalescence (CBC) searches during LIGO's fifth science run and Virgo's first science run. We present noise spectral density curves for each of the four detectors that operated during these science runs which are representative of the typical performance achieved by the detectors for CBC searches. These spectra are intended for release to the public as a summary of detector performance for CBC searches during these science runs.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figure