Transcription Factors Bind Thousands of Active and Inactive Regions in the Drosophila Blastoderm

Identifying the genomic regions bound by sequence-specific regulatory factors is central both to deciphering the complex DNA cis-regulatory code that controls transcription in metazoans and to determining the range of genes that shape animal morphogenesis. We used whole-genome tiling arrays to map sequences bound in Drosophila melanogaster embryos by the six maternal and gap transcription factors that initiate anterior–posterior patterning. We find that these sequence-specific DNA binding proteins bind with quantitatively different specificities to highly overlapping sets of several thousand genomic regions in blastoderm embryos. Specific high- and moderate-affinity in vitro recognition sequences for each factor are enriched in bound regions. This enrichment, however, is not sufficient to explain the pattern of binding in vivo and varies in a context-dependent manner, demonstrating that higher-order rules must govern targeting of transcription factors. The more highly bound regions include all of the over 40 well-characterized enhancers known to respond to these factors as well as several hundred putative new cis-regulatory modules clustered near developmental regulators and other genes with patterned expression at this stage of embryogenesis. The new targets include most of the microRNAs (miRNAs) transcribed in the blastoderm, as well as all major zygotically transcribed dorsal–ventral patterning genes, whose expression we show to be quantitatively modulated by anterior–posterior factors. In addition to these highly bound regions, there are several thousand regions that are reproducibly bound at lower levels. However, these poorly bound regions are, collectively, far more distant from genes transcribed in the blastoderm than highly bound regions; are preferentially found in protein-coding sequences; and are less conserved than highly bound regions. Together these observations suggest that many of these poorly bound regions are not involved in early-embryonic transcriptional regulation, and a significant proportion may be nonfunctional. Surprisingly, for five of the six factors, their recognition sites are not unambiguously more constrained evolutionarily than the immediate flanking DNA, even in more highly bound and presumably functional regions, indicating that comparative DNA sequence analysis is limited in its ability to identify functional transcription factor targets

The Constrained Maximal Expression Level Owing to Haploidy Shapes Gene Content on the Mammalian X Chromosome.

X chromosomes are unusual in many regards, not least of which is their nonrandom gene content. The causes of this bias are commonly discussed in the context of sexual antagonism and the avoidance of activity in the male germline. Here, we examine the notion that, at least in some taxa, functionally biased gene content may more profoundly be shaped by limits imposed on gene expression owing to haploid expression of the X chromosome. Notably, if the X, as in primates, is transcribed at rates comparable to the ancestral rate (per promoter) prior to the X chromosome formation, then the X is not a tolerable environment for genes with very high maximal net levels of expression, owing to transcriptional traffic jams. We test this hypothesis using The Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) and data from the Functional Annotation of the Mammalian Genome (FANTOM5) project. As predicted, the maximal expression of human X-linked genes is much lower than that of genes on autosomes: on average, maximal expression is three times lower on the X chromosome than on autosomes. Similarly, autosome-to-X retroposition events are associated with lower maximal expression of retrogenes on the X than seen for X-to-autosome retrogenes on autosomes. Also as expected, X-linked genes have a lesser degree of increase in gene expression than autosomal ones (compared to the human/Chimpanzee common ancestor) if highly expressed, but not if lowly expressed. The traffic jam model also explains the known lower breadth of expression for genes on the X (and the Z of birds), as genes with broad expression are, on average, those with high maximal expression. As then further predicted, highly expressed tissue-specific genes are also rare on the X and broadly expressed genes on the X tend to be lowly expressed, both indicating that the trend is shaped by the maximal expression level not the breadth of expression per se. Importantly, a limit to the maximal expression level explains biased tissue of expression profiles of X-linked genes. Tissues whose tissue-specific genes are very highly expressed (e.g., secretory tissues, tissues abundant in structural proteins) are also tissues in which gene expression is relatively rare on the X chromosome. These trends cannot be fully accounted for in terms of alternative models of biased expression. In conclusion, the notion that it is hard for genes on the Therian X to be highly expressed, owing to transcriptional traffic jams, provides a simple yet robustly supported rationale of many peculiar features of X's gene content, gene expression, and evolution

Collision detection on transmission lines with optical interferometer

V diplomski nalogi skušamo ugotoviti, v kolikšni meri je možno zaznavati in klasificirati trke na jeklenicah daljnovodov z optičnim interferometrom. Na začetku predstavimo osnovne pojme interferometrije in opišemo uporabljen optični interferometer. V jedru diplomske naloge natančneje opišemo eksperimentalni protokol in obdelavo signalov. Nadaljujemo z implementacijo algoritmov za segmentacijo in klasifikacijo zajetih signalov ter predstavimo dobljene rezultate. Segmentacijo izvedemo v domeni števila prehodov signala skozi ničlo, za klasifikacijo pa uporabimo večplastno nevronsko mrežo z algoritmom vzvratnega učenja. Rezultati študije nakazujejo, da sta implementirani segmentacija in klasifikacija uspešni v 77 % izvedenih trkov različnih predmetov.We analyse feasibility of collision detection on transmission lines with optical interferometer. We first provide a brief introduction into interferometry, along with a description of the optical interferometer used for measurements in this study. Afterwards, we describe the conducted experimental protocol and signal processing methodology. The focus is on implementation of algorithms for signal segmentation and collision classification. We used zero-crossing algorithm to transform signals into segmentation domain. Classification of collisions is done with a multilayer neural network trained by the backpropagation algorithm. The results demonstrate an average success rate of 77% for segmentation and classification of collision with five different objects

Sistematización de la experiencia de un ambiente de aprendizaje enriquecido por TIC durante la práctica clínica en fisioterapia cardiopulmonar en un hospital de nivel II de la ciudad de Cali

Esta investigación se centra en la caracterización de la experiencia de 4 estudiantes de fisioterapia de IX semestre de la Institución Universitaria Escuela Nacional del Deporte (IUEND) durante la implementación de un ambiente de aprendizaje enriquecido con Tecnologías de la Información y la Comunicación (TIC) en la práctica clínico – asistencial en Salud Cardiopulmonar; la cual se fundamenta en el hacer y pone a prueba las bases conceptuales del ciclo de fundamentación; todo esto con el fin de identificar las experiencias significativas que facilitan el aprendizaje y desarrollo de competencias clínicas, además analizar si este tipo de estrategias de enseñanza -aprendizaje permite al estudiante y al docente asesor superar inconvenientes propios de la práctica clínica como: optimizar tiempos de atención a pacientes, estudio independiente y trabajo colaborativo, retomar e integrar gran cantidad de conceptos y procedimientos aprendidos en IV semestre con las nuevas experiencias y la realidad del paciente; y a la vez cumplir con funciones administrativas propios del rol del fisioterapeuta asistencial (estadística, indicadores, desarrollo de guías, etc.) que dificultan el proceso de aprendizaje; concluyendo que los ambientes mediados por TIC pueden lograr superar estas dificultades y favorecer finalmente el aprendizaje significativo (juicio clínico), en el que se fundamenta el ciclo de práctica profesional