Use of the virtual slide and the dynamic real-time telepathology systems for a consultation and the frozen section intra-operative diagnosis in thoracic/pulmonary pathology.

We report the results of a study designed for assessment of the diagnostic accuracy and usability of internet-based digital microscopy: the dynamic real-time telepathology system (Coolscope) and the Virtual microscopy (Aperio Scan Scope) system, in the context of pulmonary pathology. The systems were implemented to the routine pulmonary pathology workflows and used for the intra-operative frozen-section primary diagnosis as well as for the secondary (consultative) diagnosis. The histological material presented for the teleconsultations included the samples of lung parenchyma, bronchial biopsy and resected lung/bronchi tumours. For the primary diagnosis 4 categories of material can be distinguished (304 samples): 1) the frozen sections of lung tumours, resected bronchial margins and lymph nodes; 2) fine needle aspiration [FNA] biopsies (TBNA; EBUS-TBNA, EUS-FNA; 3) oligobiopsies of bronchus, oesophagus, skin; and 4) exfoliative cytology. The telepathology diagnoses compared with conventional light microscopy diagnoses showed very high concordance for the Coolscope and Aperio Virtual Slide modality: 87.5% and 100%, respectively - within the group of teleconsultations. For the frozen sections, the primary telediagnoses were concordant with the light microscopy paraffin sections diagnoses in 100% for Aperio; and in 97.5% for Coolscope. An excellent agreement (100%) was seen in the telediagnoses and conventional slides diagnoses for FNA, oligobiopsies and cytology - for both telepathology systems. These results provide some encouragement for the implementation of Coolscope and virtual slide-based telepathology (Aperio) system to the routine histopathological diagnostics

The ABCB7-Like Transporter PexA in Rhodobacter capsulatus Is Involved in the Translocation of Reactive Sulfur Species

The mitochondrial ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporters ABCB7 in humans, Atm1 in yeast and ATM3 in plants, are highly conserved in their overall architecture and particularly in their glutathione binding pocket located within the transmembrane spanning domains. These transporters have attracted interest in the last two decades based on their proposed role in connecting the mitochondrial iron–sulfur (Fe–S) cluster assembly with its cytosolic Fe–S cluster assembly (CIA) counterpart. So far, the specific compound that is transported across the membrane remains unknown. In this report we characterized the ABCB7-like transporter Rcc02305 in Rhodobacter capsulatus, which shares 47% amino acid sequence identity with its mitochondrial counterpart. The constructed interposon mutant strain in R. capsulatus displayed increased levels of intracellular reactive oxygen species without a simultaneous accumulation of the cellular iron levels. The inhibition of endogenous glutathione biosynthesis resulted in an increase of total glutathione levels in the mutant strain. Bioinformatic analysis of the amino acid sequence motifs revealed a potential aminotransferase class-V pyridoxal-5′-phosphate (PLP) binding site that overlaps with the Walker A motif within the nucleotide binding domains of the transporter. PLP is a well characterized cofactor of L-cysteine desulfurases like IscS and NFS1 which has a role in the formation of a protein-bound persulfide group within these proteins. We therefore suggest renaming the ABCB7-like transporter Rcc02305 in R. capsulatus to PexA for PLP binding exporter. We further suggest that this ABC-transporter in R. capsulatus is involved in the formation and export of polysulfide species to the periplasm

Expanding the genetic heterogeneity of retinitis pigmentosa and Leber congenital amaurosis.

Contains fulltext : 127381.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen, 10 juli 2014Promotor : Cremers, F.P.M. Co-promotores : Collin, R.W.J., Hollander, A.I. den, Born, L.I. van de

A Framework for Planning and Execution of Drone Swarm Missions in a Hostile Environment

This article presents a framework for planning a drone swarm mission in a hostile environment. Elements of the planning framework are discussed in detail, including methods of planning routes for drone swarms using mixed integer linear programming (MILP) and methods of detecting potentially dangerous objects using EO/IR camera images and synthetic aperture radar (SAR). Methods of detecting objects in the field are used in the mission planning process to re-plan the swarm’s flight paths. The route planning model is discussed using the example of drone formations managed by one UAV that communicates through another UAV with the ground control station (GCS). This article presents practical examples of using algorithms for detecting dangerous objects for re-planning of swarm routes. A novelty in the work is the development of these algorithms in such a way that they can be implemented on mobile computers used by UAVs and integrated with MILP tasks. The methods of detection and classification of objects in real time by UAVs equipped with SAR and EO/IR are presented. Different sensors require different methods to detect objects. In the case of infrared or optoelectronic sensors, a convolutional neural network is used. For SAR images, a rule-based system is applied. The experimental results confirm that the stream of images can be analyzed in real-time

A new approach to the histogram-based segmentation of synthetic aperture radar images

Radar machine vision is an emerging research field in the mobile robotics. Because Synthetic Aperture Radars (SAR) are robust against weather and light condition, they pro‐ vide more useful and reliable information than optical images. On the other hand, the data processing is more complicated and less researched than visible light images processing. The main goal of our research is to build sim‐ ple and efficient method of SAR image analysis. In this ar‐ ticle we describe our research related to SAR image seg‐ mentation and attempts to detect elements such as the buildings, roads and forest areas. Tests were carried out for the images made available by Leonardo Airborne & Space System Company

The influence of osmotic dehydration on colour and mechanical properties of freeze-dried strawberries

W pracy przedstawiono wpływ odwadniania osmotycznego i rodzaju substancji osmotycznej na barwę i właściwości mechaniczne liofilizowanych truskawek poddanych obróbce osmotycznej. Truskawki zostały wstępnie odwodnione w roztworach glukozy i sacharozy o aktywności wody (aw) 0,9. Owoce były suszone sublimacyjnie przy temperaturze półek grzejnych liofilizatora 50°C. W pracy wykazano, że zastosowanie sacharozy i glukozy do odwadniania osmotycznego nie wpłynęło na istotne zmiany wartości współczynników i wskaźników barwy dla większości powierzchni oraz rozdrobnionych liofilizowanych truskawek. Zastosowanie odwadniania osmotycznego spowodowało zmianę przebiegu krzywych ściskania suszy liofilizowanych w temperaturze 50°C. Zaobserwowano liczne załamania krzywych ściskania. Odwadnianie spowodowało obniżenie siły potrzebnej do odkształcenia suszu jak i pracy wykonanej na to odkształcenie w porównaniu z suszami nieodwadnianymi.In this work the effect of osmotic dehydration and type of osmotic solution on the colour and mechanical properties of osmotically dehydrated freeze-dried strawberries was shown. Strawberries were osmotically dehydrated in glucose and sucrose solutions with water activity of 0.9. Fruit were freeze-dried at heating shelves temperature of 50°C. It was shown that osmotic pre-treatment in sucrose and glucose solution does not cause any significant changes of colour coefficients and index for a majority of surfaces and for fragmented freeze-dried strawberries. The use of osmotic dehydration caused changes in the shape of compression curves for strawberries freeze-dried at tem-perature of 50°C. Many deflections were observed in the compression curves. Osmotic dehydration caused a decrease in the compression force necessary for deformation of dried fruit and work done to obtain this deformation in comparison to strawberries dried without osmotic pre-treatment