Epithelial-Cell-Derived Phospholipase A2 Group 1B Is an Endogenous Anthelmintic.

Immunity to intestinal helminth infections has been well studied, but the mechanism of helminth killing prior to expulsion remains unclear. Here we identify epithelial-cell-derived phospholipase A2 group 1B (PLA2g1B) as a host-derived endogenous anthelmintic. PLA2g1B is elevated in resistant mice and is responsible for killing tissue-embedded larvae. Despite comparable activities of other essential type-2-dependent immune mechanisms, Pla2g1b-/- mice failed to expel the intestinal helminths Heligmosomoides polygyrus or Nippostrongylus brasiliensis. Expression of Pla2g1b by epithelial cells was dependent upon intestinal microbiota, adaptive immunity, and common-gamma chain-dependent signaling. Notably, Pla2g1b was downregulated in susceptible mice and inhibited by IL-4R-signaling in vitro, uncoupling parasite killing from expulsion mechanisms. Resistance was restored in Pla2g1b-/- mice by treating infective H. polygyrus L3 larvae with PLA2g1B, which reduced larval phospholipid abundance. These findings uncover epithelial-cell-derived Pla2g1b as an essential mediator of helminth killing, highlighting a previously overlooked mechanism of anti-helminth immunity

Basic Atomic Physics

Contains reports on four research projects.Joint Services Electronics Program Contract DAAL03-92-C-0001National Science Foundation Grant PHY 89-19381U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-90-J-1322National Science Foundation Grant PHY 89-21769U.S. Army - Office of Scientific Research Contract DAAL03-89-K-0082U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-89-J-1207U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-90-J-164

Basic Atomic Physics

Contains reports on five research projects.National Science Foundation Grant PHY 89-19381National Science Foundation Grant PHY 92-21489U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-90-J-1322Joint Services Electronics Program Contract DAAL03-92-C-0001National Science Foundation Grant PHY 89-21769U.S. Army - Office of Scientific Research Grant DAAL03-92-G-0229U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-89-J-1207U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-90-J-164

Blocking representation in the ERA-Interim driven EURO-CORDEX RCMs

While Regional Climate Models (RCMs) have been shown to yield improved simulations compared to General Circulation Model (GCM), their representation of large-scale phenomena like atmospheric blocking has been hardly addressed. Here, we evaluate the ability of RCMs to simulate blocking situations present in their reanalysis driving data and analyse the associated impacts on anomalies and biases of European 2-m air temperature (TAS) and precipitation rate (PR). Five RCM runs stem from the EURO-CORDEX ensemble while three RCMs are WRF models with different nudging realizations, all of them driven by ERA-Interim for the period 1981?2010. The detected blocking systems are allocated to three sectors of the Euro-Atlantic region, allowing for a characterization of distinctive blocking-related TAS and PR anomalies. Our results indicate some misrepresentation of atmospheric blocking over the EURO-CORDEX domain, as compared to the driving reanalysis. Most of the RCMs showed fewer blocks than the driving data, while the blocking misdetection was negligible for RCMs strongly conditioned to the driving data. A higher resolution of the RCMs did not improve the representation of atmospheric blocking. However, all RCMs are able to reproduce the basic anomaly structure of TAS and PR connected to blocking. Moreover, the associated anomalies do not change substantially after correcting for the misrepresentation of blocking in RCMs. The overall model bias is mainly determined by pattern biases in the representations of surface parameters during non-blocking situations. Biases in blocking detections tend to have a secondary influence in the overall bias due to compensatory effects of missed blockings and non-blockings. However, they can lead to measurable effects in the presence of a strong blocking underestimation.This work was funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) under the project: Understanding Contrasts in high Mountain hydrology in Asia (UNCOMUN: I 1295-N29). This research was supported by the Faculty of Environmental, Regional and Educational Sciences (URBI), University of Graz, as well as the Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Economy (BMWFW) by funding the OeAD Grant Marietta Blau. This work was partially supported (JMG and SH) by the project MULTI-SDM (CGL2015-66583- R, MINECO/FEDER). DB was supported by the PALEOSTRAT (CGL2015-69699-R) project funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO)