Biochemical and genetic characterisation of ciliary transition zone transmembrane proteins in cystic kidney disease and ciliopathies

Meckel-Gruber syndrome (MKS) and Joubert syndrome (JBTS) are rare autosomal recessive genetic disorders caused by genetic defects in proteins responsible for primary cilia formation, maintenance or function. Primary cilia regulate essential cellular and developmental processes and have a complex compartmentalized organization. This project focuses on transmembrane proteins (TMEMs) that form the “MKS/JBTS functional module” at the ciliary transition zone compartment. These include TMEM17 TMEM67, TMEM138, TMEM216, TMEM231 and TMEM237 that, when mutated, cause MKS or JBTS. The detailed biochemical and genetic interactions that form this functional module remain unclear. This project describes biochemical and cell biological approaches to understand the functional roles of ciliary TMEMs. Biochemical interactions were defined through a series of co-immunoprecipitation assays of epitope-tagged and endogenous ciliary TMEM proteins. This showed that TMEM17 interacts with TMEM138, TMEM237, TMEM216, TMEM67 and the intraflagellar transport protein IFT88. Tandem affinity purification (TAP) followed by mass spectroscopy confirmed that TMEM17 interacted with TMEM237. In addition, reciprocal biochemical interactions confirmed novel interactions between TMEM237-TMEM216 and TMEM237-TMEM17. TMEM17 also interacted with the pre-mRNA splicing factors (PRPF8 and PRPF6) that do not have an established role in the ciliary apparatus. Genetic interactions were also determined between ciliary TMEMs and other ciliary proteins (RPGRIP1L, CEP290 and IFT88) chosen because they localize to different ciliary compartments and appear to form distinct functional modules. Genetic interactions were inferred from co-localization studies in 3D reconstituted confocal microscopy images following a series of RNAi knockdowns. This highlighted the significance of the TMEM17-TMEM67 genetic interaction in organizing ciliary sub-compartments. Finally, both biochemical and genetic interactions delineated the existence of a novel complex between TMEM237, TMEM17 and TMEM138 with the ciliary protein IFT88. These results provide new insights into how ciliary trafficking and ciliogenesis could be mediated through interactions with TMEM components at the ciliary transition zone

Islamic perspectives on preconception, prenatal, and perinatal counseling

With advances in prenatal imaging, genetic testing, and medical treatment of premature neonates, new bioethical challenges have arisen. Many Muslims turn to their faith and religious leaders to help navigate these novel challenges. This article briefly discusses the factors that are involved in religious leaders issuing a fatwa, or religious opinion. Using clinical scenarios, this article reviews the current discourse amongst Islamic scholars and laws in Muslim-majority countries regarding challenging bioethical topics surrounding preconception counseling, antenatal testing and termination of pregnancy, as well as Islamic scholars’ attempts to determine a minimum gestational age of viability using primary religious texts, the Quran and hadith. Challenges and shortcomings in the Islamic perspective on these issues are also addressed to highlight areas in which further research should be pursued. A deeper understanding of Islamic religious perspectives on these topics can help clinicians in providing care that is informed by patients’ cultural and religious values

Prediction of Citrus Diseases Using Machine Learning And Deep Learning: Classifier, Models SLR

Citrus diseases have been major issues for citrus growing worldwide for many years they can lead significantly reduce fruit quality. the most harmful citrus diseases are citrus canker, citrus greening, citrus black spot, citrus leaf miner which can have significant economic losses of citrus industry in worldwide prevention and management strategies like chemical treatments. Citrus diseases existing in all over the world where citrus is growing its effects the citrus tree root, citrus tree leaf, citrus tree orange etc. Existing of citrus diseases is highly impact on economic factor that can also produce low quality fruits and increased the rate for diseases management. Sanitation and routine monitoring can be effective in managing certain citrus diseases, but others may require more intensive treatments like chemical or biological control methods.Comment: 13 pages, 9 figure

Fixed point results for a pair of fuzzy mappings and related applications in b-metric like spaces

AbstractThis paper is devoted to finding out some realization of the concept of b-metric like space. First, we attain a fixed point for two fuzzy mappings satisfying a suitable requirement of contractiveness. Subsequently, we apply such a result to graphic contractions. Also, we attain a unique solution for a system of integral equations, and lastly we give an application to ensure that there exists a common bounded solution of a suitable functional equation in dynamic programming

The Role of Mass Communication in the Parliamentary Elections’ Campaigns in the Kingdom of Bahrain in 2014: A Field Study

This study aimed at identifying the nature of the communication methods used in the election campaigns by the members of the Bahraini parliament who won the membership of the 2014 election. It also explored to what extent these members had adopted various types of communication in their campaigns and had taken into account cultural, social, and political diversity of the public in choosing the means of communication methods. It also investigates how parliamentary members used to measure public reaction to their media messages during their election campaigns and how they measured the effectiveness of these communication methods as the basis for their success of their campaigns. The qualitative descriptive approach was followed using a structured questionnaire consisting of 29 items of which the validity and reliability were assured. This instrument was administered to 39 out of the 40 Bahraini parliament members during an individual meeting. The Statistical Package of the Social Sciences SPSS was used for data analysis. The results of the data analysis revealed that the Instagram and WhatsApp were the most effective means of social communication used by the members in their campaigns. It was found that the radio and TV were the least used means by the members. In addition, in terms of demographic age groups, it was revealed that adolescents received the most attention from the members as a target audience. This is in contrast to children who, as an audience, received the least attention

Sufficient conditions to solve two systems of integral equations via fixed point results

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to study the solution of two systems of nonlinear integral equations via fixed point results in a complete dislocated b-metric space. Also the notion of graphic contractions on a closed set for two families of graph dominated multivalued mappings is introduced. Our results generalize some previous results in the existing literature

The Use of Fintech and Its Impact on Financial Intermediation – A Comparison of Saudi Arabia with Other GCC Economies

CC BY-NC-ND 4.0This study analyses the use of Fintech/digital finance in Saudi Arabia, comparing the use of various digital finance tools across other Gulf Cooperation Countries (GCC). The study uses the Global Financial Development Indicators Data from 2011, 2014, and 2018 published by the World bank. Graphical trend analysis, covariance, and correlation analysis are used to examine the role of digital payments, the use of the credit card, and use of the debit card to find out their impact on Fintech and the distribution of credit to the private sector. The results suggest that the use of financial technology is increasing in the GCC region, and the use of digital payments, debit cards, and credit cards have a linear dependence on each other and positively contribute to the distribution of credit to the private sector – hence, to financial intermediation in certain aspects. The results also show that Saudi Arabia is ranked four among six regional economies in terms of the use of digital finance. It is also observed that the country has potential for Fintech growth both in terms of supply and demand. To tap into this potential, regulators have introduced a regulatory sandbox to facilitate Fintech startups. Based on the evaluation, cooperation among traditional financial institutions, Fintech startups, technology companies, regulators, and academia could reduce the potential challenges and enhance Fintech in Saudi Arabia

Muslim perspectives on palliative care in perinatal and neonatal patients: a mini-review

Muslims comprise nearly a quarter of the worldwide population, with significant populations in the United States, Canada, and Europe. As clinicians, it is important to be familiar with Islamic religious and cultural perspectives on medical treatment, life-prolonging measures and comfort and palliative care, but historically, this has been a gap in the literature. Recently, there have been multiple papers discussing Islamic bioethics, particularly in regards to end of life care in adults; however, there has been a lack of literature discussing the Islamic perspective on issues related to neonatal and perinatal end of life care. This paper uses clinical scenarios to review key relevant principles of Islamic law, discussing the primary and secondary sources used in formulating fatawa, including the Quran, hadith, qiyas, and ‘urf, and the importance of preservation of life and upholding of human dignity (karamah). Neonatal and perinatal scenarios are used to specifically explore the Islamic perspective on withholding and withdrawal of life-sustaining measures and determining what constitutes an acceptable quality of life. In some Islamic cultures the expertise of the patient's physician is given significant weight in making these judgments, and as such, families may appreciate frank assessment of the situation by the clinical team. Because of the various factors involved in issuing religious ruling, or fatwa, there is a wide spectrum of opinions on these rulings, and physicians should be aware of these differences, seek counsel and guidance from local Islamic leaders, and support families in their decision-making process

Invariant Scattering Transform for Medical Imaging

Invariant scattering transform introduces new area of research that merges the signal processing with deep learning for computer vision. Nowadays, Deep Learning algorithms are able to solve a variety of problems in medical sector. Medical images are used to detect diseases brain cancer or tumor, Alzheimer's disease, breast cancer, Parkinson's disease and many others. During pandemic back in 2020, machine learning and deep learning has played a critical role to detect COVID-19 which included mutation analysis, prediction, diagnosis and decision making. Medical images like X-ray, MRI known as magnetic resonance imaging, CT scans are used for detecting diseases. There is another method in deep learning for medical imaging which is scattering transform. It builds useful signal representation for image classification. It is a wavelet technique; which is impactful for medical image classification problems. This research article discusses scattering transform as the efficient system for medical image analysis where it's figured by scattering the signal information implemented in a deep convolutional network. A step by step case study is manifested at this research work.Comment: 11 pages, 8 figures and 1 tabl