The synthesis of polyglutamate forms of folate by N. crassa

Synthesis of polyglutamate forms of folat

Validation of the Polish version of P-QoL questionnaire

Objective: Pelvic organ prolapse (POP) is a common morbidity that affects many women and significantly decreases quality of life. The severity and the impact of the prolapse on the quality of life are important parameters in the management and follow-up of affected patients. The aim of this validation study was to validate the Polish version of the Prolapse Quality of Life questionnaire (P-QoL). Material and methods: The P-QOL questionnaire was translated into Polish and administered to women recruited from two gynecological outpatient clinics (n = 231). Both symptomatic and asymptomatic women were included in the study and examined in supine position using the Pelvic Organ Prolapse Quantification System (POP-Q). The validity was assessed by comparing symptom scores and quality-of-life scores between symptomatic and asymptomatic women. Results: A total number of 154 symptomatic and 77 asymptomatic women were included. There was a strong correlation between severity of the disease based on physical findings (POP-Q scale) and the P-QoL scores in main prolapse quality-of-life domains. The overall scores for each life domain were significantly different between symptomatic and asymptomatic women (p < 0.001). All the questions regarding symptoms showed significant differences (p < 0.001) between both groups. Conclusions: The Polish version of P-QoL is a valid, reliable, and easily comprehensible instrument to assess quality of life and symptoms in Polish-speaking women suffering from urogenital prolapse

Innovation as an immanent attribute of an agile enterprise

Motivation: Each organization faces the challenge of operating in an environment that is unpredictable and turbulent. Emergence of business era caused that change had become a key feature that determines the economic environment of an enterprise. Market environment forces companies to seek strategic orientation that would allow them to use market opportunities and come to grips with growing customer demands. These goals can only be achieved by an organization that bears the hallmarks of agility. Therefore, one can assume that the condition of gaining competitive advantage and innovation of modern companies is possessing by them the attributes of agility. The agile organization is innovative, which means that it puts an emphasis on research and development, implements innovation, invests in new technologies and innovative programs.Aim: The purpose of this article is to analyse relationships between obtaining an ability to be innovative and agility attributes of an organization.Result: The presented research confirms that there is a connection between having agility attributes by a company and obtaining by it a high level of innovation. Many authors also specify important role of IT system in introducing product innovations and innovation processes.</p

Support for Internet-Based Commonsense Processing – Causal Knowledge Discovery Using Japanese “If” Forms

Abstract. This paper introduces our method for causal knowledge re-trieval from the Internet resources, its results and evaluation of using it in utterance creation process. Our system automatically retrieves common-sensical knowledge from the Web resources by using simple web-mining and information extraction techniques. For retrieving causal knowledge the system uses three of specific several Japanese “if ” forms. From the results we can conclude that Japanese web pages indexed by a common search engine spiders are enough to discover common causal relationships and this knowledge can be used for making Human-Computer Interfaces sound more natural and interesting than while using classic methods

A novel modified-indirect ELISA based on spherical body protein 4 for detecting antibody during acute and long-term infections with diverse Babesia bovis strains

Cattle sera positive by the RAP-1-based cELISA but negative by the SBP4-based MI-ELISA and IFA had negative results by Western blot analysis, suggesting possible false positive results in the cELISA. A. Molecular weight marker (48 to 180 Kd), B. K42-#21, C. W31-#Y-3, D. W31-#Y-11, E. W31-#0-3, F. W31-#Y-9, G. W31-#0-9, H. W31-#Y-10, I. W31-#Y-15, J. P21-#224, K. positive control serum with a band at 75kd representing B. bovis RAP-1 protein, J. negative control serum. Figure S2. Technical difference between the modified indirect ELISA and conventional indirect ELISA using rGST-SBP4 was illustrated in this figure. (DOCX 645 kb

Functional and multiscale 3D structural investigation of brain tissue through correlative in vivo physiology, synchrotron microtomography and volume electron microscopy

Understanding the function of biological tissues requires a coordinated study of physiology and structure, exploring volumes that contain complete functional units at a detail that resolves the relevant features. Here, we introduce an approach to address this challenge: Mouse brain tissue sections containing a region where function was recorded using in vivo 2-photon calcium imaging were stained, dehydrated, resin-embedded and imaged with synchrotron X-ray computed tomography with propagation-based phase contrast (SXRT). SXRT provided context at subcellular detail, and could be followed by targeted acquisition of multiple volumes using serial block-face electron microscopy (SBEM). In the olfactory bulb, combining SXRT and SBEM enabled disambiguation of in vivo-assigned regions of interest. In the hippocampus, we found that superficial pyramidal neurons in CA1a displayed a larger density of spine apparati than deeper ones. Altogether, this approach can enable a functional and structural investigation of subcellular features in the context of cells and tissues

MIFA: Metadata, Incentives, Formats, and Accessibility guidelines to improve the reuse of AI datasets for bioimage analysis

Artificial Intelligence methods are powerful tools for biological image analysis and processing. High-quality annotated images are key to training and developing new methods, but access to such data is often hindered by the lack of standards for sharing datasets. We brought together community experts in a workshop to develop guidelines to improve the reuse of bioimages and annotations for AI applications. These include standards on data formats, metadata, data presentation and sharing, and incentives to generate new datasets. We are positive that the MIFA (Metadata, Incentives, Formats, and Accessibility) recommendations will accelerate the development of AI tools for bioimage analysis by facilitating access to high quality training data.Comment: 16 pages, 3 figure

An approach for particle sinking velocity measurements in the 3–400 μm size range and considerations on the effect of temperature on sinking rates

The flux of organic particles below the mixed layer is one major pathway of carbon from the surface into the deep ocean. The magnitude of this export flux depends on two major processes—remineralization rates and sinking velocities. Here, we present an efficient method to measure sinking velocities of particles in the size range from approximately 3–400 μm by means of video microscopy (FlowCAM®). The method allows rapid measurement and automated analysis of mixed samples and was tested with polystyrene beads, different phytoplankton species, and sediment trap material. Sinking velocities of polystyrene beads were close to theoretical values calculated from Stokes’ Law. Sinking velocities of the investigated phytoplankton species were in reasonable agreement with published literature values and sinking velocities of material collected in sediment trap increased with particle size. Temperature had a strong effect on sinking velocities due to its influence on seawater viscosity and density. An increase in 9 °C led to a measured increase in sinking velocities of ~40 %. According to this temperature effect, an average temperature increase in 2 °C as projected for the sea surface by the end of this century could increase sinking velocities by about 6 % which might have feedbacks on carbon export into the deep ocean