The deuteron: structure and form factors

A brief review of the history of the discovery of the deuteron in provided. The current status of both experiment and theory for the elastic electron scattering is then presented.Comment: 80 pages, 33 figures, submited to Advances in Nuclear Physic

Arthropod Phylogenetics in Light of Three Novel Millipede (Myriapoda: Diplopoda) Mitochondrial Genomes with Comments on the Appropriateness of Mitochondrial Genome Sequence Data for Inferring Deep Level Relationships

Background Arthropods are the most diverse group of eukaryotic organisms, but their phylogenetic relationships are poorly understood. Herein, we describe three mitochondrial genomes representing orders of millipedes for which complete genomes had not been characterized. Newly sequenced genomes are combined with existing data to characterize the protein coding regions of myriapods and to attempt to reconstruct the evolutionary relationships within the Myriapoda and Arthropoda. Results The newly sequenced genomes are similar to previously characterized millipede sequences in terms of synteny and length. Unique translocations occurred within the newly sequenced taxa, including one half of the Appalachioria falcifera genome, which is inverted with respect to other millipede genomes. Across myriapods, amino acid conservation levels are highly dependent on the gene region. Additionally, individual loci varied in the level of amino acid conservation. Overall, most gene regions showed low levels of conservation at many sites. Attempts to reconstruct the evolutionary relationships suffered from questionable relationships and low support values. Analyses of phylogenetic informativeness show the lack of signal deep in the trees (i.e., genes evolve too quickly). As a result, the myriapod tree resembles previously published results but lacks convincing support, and, within the arthropod tree, well established groups were recovered as polyphyletic. Conclusions The novel genome sequences described herein provide useful genomic information concerning millipede groups that had not been investigated. Taken together with existing sequences, the variety of compositions and evolution of myriapod mitochondrial genomes are shown to be more complex than previously thought. Unfortunately, the use of mitochondrial protein-coding regions in deep arthropod phylogenetics appears problematic, a result consistent with previously published studies. Lack of phylogenetic signal renders the resulting tree topologies as suspect. As such, these data are likely inappropriate for investigating such ancient relationships

The Role of Purported Mucoprotectants in Dealing with Irritable Bowel Syndrome, Functional Diarrhea, and Other Chronic Diarrheal Disorders in Adults

Chronic diarrhea is a frequent presenting symptom, both in primary care medicine and in specialized gastroenterology units. It is estimated that more than 5% of the global population suffers from chronic diarrhea. and that about 40% of these subjects are older than 60 years. The clinician is frequently faced with the need to decide which is the best therapeutic approach for these patients. While the origin of chronic diarrhea is diverse, impairment of intestinal barrier function, dysbiosis. and mucosal micro-inflammation are being increasingly recognized as underlying phenomena characterizing a variety of chronic diarrheal diseases. In addition to current pharmacological therapies, there is growing interest in alternative products such as mucoprotectants, which form a mucoadhesive film over the epithelium to reduce and protect against the development of altered intestinal permeability, dysbiosis, and mucosal micro-inflammation. This manuscript focuses on chronic diarrhea in adults, and we will review recent evidence on the ability of these natural compounds to improve symptoms associated with chronic diarrhea and to exert protective effects for the intestinal barrier

The human keratins: biology and pathology

The keratins are the typical intermediate filament proteins of epithelia, showing an outstanding degree of molecular diversity. Heteropolymeric filaments are formed by pairing of type I and type II molecules. In humans 54 functional keratin genes exist. They are expressed in highly specific patterns related to the epithelial type and stage of cellular differentiation. About half of all keratins—including numerous keratins characterized only recently—are restricted to the various compartments of hair follicles. As part of the epithelial cytoskeleton, keratins are important for the mechanical stability and integrity of epithelial cells and tissues. Moreover, some keratins also have regulatory functions and are involved in intracellular signaling pathways, e.g. protection from stress, wound healing, and apoptosis. Applying the new consensus nomenclature, this article summarizes, for all human keratins, their cell type and tissue distribution and their functional significance in relation to transgenic mouse models and human hereditary keratin diseases. Furthermore, since keratins also exhibit characteristic expression patterns in human tumors, several of them (notably K5, K7, K8/K18, K19, and K20) have great importance in immunohistochemical tumor diagnosis of carcinomas, in particular of unclear metastases and in precise classification and subtyping. Future research might open further fields of clinical application for this remarkable protein family

Molecular Tagging Velocimetry (MTV) and Its Automotive Applications

This work provides an overview of the technique of Molecular Tagging Ve-locimetry (MTV) and some of its automotive applications. The various ele-ments of MTV implementation are briefly described in terms of the available molecular tracers, methods of tagging, detection, and processing schemes. The automotive applications of this velocimetry technique are demonstrated in mapping the velocity field of the intake flow into a “steady flow rig ” model of an internal combustion engine and flow mapping of cycle-to-cycle variation in late compression of a motored IC engine. 1

CD9 and vimentin distinguish clear cell from chormophobe renal cell carcinoma.

Background: Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) and chromophobe renal cell carcinoma(chRCC) can usually be distinguished by histologic characteristics. Occasionally, diagnosis proveschallenging and diagnostic difficulty will likely increase as needle biopsies of renal lesions becomemore common.Methods: To identify markers that aid in differentiating ccRCC from chRCC, we used geneexpression profiles to identify candidate markers that correlate with histology. 39 antisera andantibodies, including 35 for transcripts identified from gene expression profiling, were evaluated.Promising markers were tested on a tissue microarray (TMA) containing 428 renal neoplasms.Strength of staining of each core on the TMA was formally scored and the distribution of stainingacross different types of renal neoplasms was analyzed.Results: Based on results from initial immunohistochemical staining of multitissue titer arrays, 23of the antisera and antibodies were selected for staining of the TMA. For 7 of these markers,strength of staining of each core on the TMA was formally scored. Vimentin (positive in ccRCC)and CD9 (positive in chRCC) best distinguished ccRCC from chRCC. The combination of vimentinnegativity and CD9 positivity was found to distinguish chRCC from ccRCC with a sensitivity of100.0% and a specificity of 95.2%.Conclusion: Based on gene expression analysis, we identify CD9 and vimentin as candidatemarkers for distinguishing between ccRCC and chRCC. In difficult cases and particularly when theamount of diagnostic tissue is limited, vimentin and CD9 staining could serve as a useful adjunct inthe differential diagnosis of ccRCC and chRCC