Promoter Complexity and Tissue-Specific Expression of Stress Response Components in Mytilus galloprovincialis, a Sessile Marine Invertebrate Species

The mechanisms of stress tolerance in sessile animals, such as molluscs, can offer fundamental insights into the adaptation of organisms for a wide range of environmental challenges. One of the best studied processes at the molecular level relevant to stress tolerance is the heat shock response in the genus Mytilus. We focus on the upstream region of Mytilus galloprovincialis Hsp90 genes and their structural and functional associations, using comparative genomics and network inference. Sequence comparison of this region provides novel evidence that the transcription of Hsp90 is regulated via a dense region of transcription factor binding sites, also containing a region with similarity to the Gamera family of LINE-like repetitive sequences and a genus-specific element of unknown function. Furthermore, we infer a set of gene networks from tissue-specific expression data, and specifically extract an Hsp class-associated network, with 174 genes and 2,226 associations, exhibiting a complex pattern of expression across multiple tissue types. Our results (i) suggest that the heat shock response in the genus Mytilus is regulated by an unexpectedly complex upstream region, and (ii) provide new directions for the use of the heat shock process as a biosensor system for environmental monitoring

Disinfection of Ocular Cells and Tissues by Atmospheric-Pressure Cold Plasma

Background: Low temperature plasmas have been proposed in medicine as agents for tissue disinfection and have received increasing attention due to the frequency of bacterial resistance to antibiotics. This study explored whether atmospheric-pressure cold plasma (APCP) generated by a new portable device that ionizes a flow of helium gas can inactivate ocular pathogens without causing significant tissue damage. Methodology and Principal Findings: We tested the APCP effects on cultured Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Candida albicans, Aspergillus fumigatus and Herpes simplex virus-1, ocular cells (conjunctival fibroblasts and keratocytes) and ex-vivo corneas. Exposure to APCP for 0.5 to 5 minutes significantly reduced microbial viability (colony-forming units) but not human cell viability (MTT assay, FACS and Tunel analysis) or the number of HSV-1 plaque-forming units. Increased levels of intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) in exposed microorganisms and cells were found using a FACS-activated 2',7'-dichlorofluorescein diacetate probe. Immunoassays demonstrated no induction of thymine dimers in cell cultures and corneal tissues. A transient increased expression of 8-OHdG, genes and proteins related to oxidative stress (OGG1, GPX, NFE2L2) was determined in ocular cells and corneas by HPLC, qRT-PCR and Western blot analysis. Conclusions: A short application of APCP appears to be an efficient and rapid ocular disinfectant for bacteria and fungi without significant damage on ocular cells and tissues, although the treatment of conjunctival fibroblasts and keratocytes caused a time-restricted generation of intracellular ROS and oxidative stress-related responses

Effects of smoking on the ex vivo

Background and Objective:  Smoking is associated with increased severity of periodontitis. The underlying mechanisms of this phenomenon are not well understood. The purpose of the present study was to compare the monocyte-derived T cell directing (Th1/Th2) response and pro-inflammatory cytokine production in ex vivo whole blood cell cultures (WBCC) of smoking and non-smoking chronic periodontitis patients. Material and Methods:  Venous blood was collected from 29 periodontitis patients (18 non-smokers and 11 smokers) receiving supportive periodontal treatment, and diluted 10-fold for WBCC. The WBCC were stimulated for 18 h with Neisseria meningitidis lipo-oligosaccharide (LOS) orPorphyromonas gingivalis sonic extract (Pg-SE). The production of the T cell directing cytokines interleukin (IL)-12 p40 and IL-10, as well as the pro-inflammatory cytokines IL-1β, IL-6 and IL-8, was measured in the culture supernatants. Results:  After LOS stimulation of WBCC, smokers showed a lower IL-12 p40/IL-10 ratio than non-smokers (P < 0.05). Interleukin-1β production was significantly lower in smokers compared with non-smokers after stimulation with either LOS or Pg-SE (P < 0.05). Interleukin-6 and IL-8 production was similar in WBCC from both smokers and non-smokers, for both LOS and Pg-SE. Conclusion:  A more pronounced Th2 response in smoking periodontitis patients may be related to increased severity of the disease

R&D Progress on The SuperB Silicon Vertex Tracker

The SuperB asymmetric e+-e&#8722; collider has been recently approved by the Italian Government. With a design luminosity two orders of magnitude greater than the past B-Factories and by exploiting the low-energy beam polarization, within few years it is expected to start the study of rare B and D meson decays, where New Physics might show up, and lepton flavour violation in tau decays. Due to the reduced center of mass boost, the vertex resolution must be improved to achieve the same proper-time difference resolution for B decays obtained in BaBar. Thus, based on the layout of the BaBar vertex detector, the SuperB Silicon Vertex Tracker must be equipped with an extra innermost layer (the Layer0), very close to the interaction point. The most stringent physics requirements concern the low material budget and the high-background working conditions of the Layer0: striplets modules, with short strips on high resistivity silicon sensors, are the baseline solution foreseen for the beginning of data taking; an upgrade to pixel sensors, more robust against high background occupancy, is planned at the full luminosity. The latest results on the various pixel options explored by a specific R&D program on different pixel technologies will be described: CMOS MAPS, pixel sensors realized on multiple layers with a vertical integration technology and hybrid pixels

R&D progress on the SuperB silicon vertex tracker

The SuperB asymmetric e+-e- collider has been recently approved by the Italian Government. With a design luminosity two orders of magnitude greater than the past B-Factories and by exploiting the low-energy beam polarization, within few years it is expected to start the study of rare B and D meson decays, where New Physics might show up, and lepton flavour violation in tau decays. Due to the reduced center of mass boost, the vertex resolution must be improved to achieve the same proper-time difference resolution for B decays obtained in BaBar. Thus, based on the layout of the BaBar vertex detector, the SuperB Silicon Vertex Tracker must be equipped with an extra innermost layer (the Layer0), very close to the interaction point. The most stringent physics requirements concern the low material budget and the high-background working conditions of the Layer0: striplets modules, with short strips on high resistivity silicon sensors, are the baseline solution foreseen for the beginning of data taking; an upgrade to pixel sensors, more robust against high background occupancy, is planned at the full luminosity. The latest results on the various pixel options explored by a specific R&D program on different pixel technologies will be described: CMOS MAPS, pixel sensors realized on multiple layers with a vertical integration technology and hybrid pixels. © Copyright owned by the author(s) under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike Licence

The SLIM5 low mass silicon tracker demonstrator

A low material budget silicon demonstrator has been tested by the SLIM5 collaboration with 12 GeV/c protons at the PS-T9 beam line at CERN. Two devices were placed inside a reference telescope and their characteristics were measured. The first was a 4k-Pixel Matrix of Deep N Well MAPS, developed in a 130 nm CMOS technology, providing digital sparsified readout. The other one was a high resistivity double-sided silicon detector, with short strips at a 45∘ angle to the detector's edge, read out by the FSSR2 chip. In this paper we describe the main features of both sensors. The primary goal of the test was to measure the efficiency and the resolution of the DUTs under different conditions of threshold setting and incident angle of the impinging particles. The data-driven approach of the readout chips has been fully exploited by the DAQ system to take data with a track-based level-1 trigger provided by a pattern matching algorithm with very low latency