Protection by Inhaled Hydrogen Therapy in a Rat Model of Acute Lung Injury can be Tracked \u3cem\u3ein vivo\u3c/em\u3e Using Molecular Imaging

Inhaled hydrogen gas (H2) provides protection in rat models of human acute lung injury (ALI). We previously reported that biomarker imaging can detect oxidative stress and endothelial cell death in vivo in a rat model of ALI. Our objective was to evaluate the ability of 99mTc-hexamethylpropyleneamineoxime (HMPAO) and 99mTc-duramycin to track the effectiveness of H2 therapy in vivo in the hyperoxia rat model of ALI. Rats were exposed to room air (normoxia), 98% O2 + 2% N2 (hyperoxia) or 98% O2 + 2% H2 (hyperoxia+H2) for up to 60 h. In vivo scintigraphy images were acquired following injection of 99mTc-HMPAO or 99mTc-duramycin. For hyperoxiarats, 99mTc-HMPAO and 99mTc-duramycin lung uptake increased in a time-dependent manner, reaching a maximum increase of 270% and 150% at 60 h, respectively. These increases were reduced to 120% and 70%, respectively, in hyperoxia+H2 rats. Hyperoxia exposure increased glutathione content in lung homogenate (36%) more than hyperoxia+H2 (21%), consistent with increases measured in 99mTc-HMPAO lung uptake. In 60-h hyperoxia rats, pleural effusion, which was undetectable in normoxia rats, averaged 9.3 gram/rat, and lung tissue 3-nitrotyrosine expression increased by 790%. Increases were reduced by 69% and 59%, respectively, in 60-h hyperoxia+H2 rats. This study detects and tracks the anti-oxidant and anti-apoptotic properties of H2 therapy in vivo after as early as 24 h of hyperoxia exposure. The results suggest the potential utility of these SPECT biomarkers for in vivo assessment of key cellular pathways in the pathogenesis of ALI and for monitoring responses to therapies

STILF - A spatiotemporal interval logic formalism for reasoning about events in remote sensing data

Although several studies perform time series analysis using remote sensing data provided by Earth observation satellites, few have been explored concerning the reasoning about land use change using these data. Besides, exists the challenge of make the best use of big Earth observation data sets to represent change. In this context, this work presents a new formalism - STILF (Spatiotemporal Interval Logic Formalism), and shows how to use it for reasoning about land use change using big Earth observation data. Extending the ideas from Allen’s interval temporal logic, we introduce predicates holds(o, p, t) and occur(o, p, Te) to build a general framework to reason about events. Events can be defined as complete entities on their respective time intervals and their lifetime is limited while objects persist in time, with a defined begin and end. Since events are intrinsically related to the objects they modify, a geospatial event formalism should specify not only what happens, but also which objects are affected by such changes. The formalism proposed and predicates extended from Allen''''''''s ideas can model and capture changes using big Earth observation data, and also allows reasoning about land use trajectories in regional or global areas. Examples for tropical forest area application is presented to better understand our proposal using STILF. For the future, the proposed formalism will be include other temporal analysis tools to thinking about events related the land use and cover change

Effect of dietary sunflower hulls on nutrient digestibility, ileal morphology, and volatile fatty acid concentration in broilers and pullets fed a broiler diet from 1 to 21 days of age

The effects of sunflower hulls (SFH) inclusion on performance, TTAR of nutrients, ileal mucosa morphology, and volatile fatty acid (VFA) concentration in the ceca were studied in birds from 1 to 21 d of age. There were 4 treatments organized as 2 × 2 factorial with 2 chicken lines (broilers vs. pullets) and 2 levels of SFH (0 vs. 3%). Each treatment was replicated 7 times (10 birds). The corn-soybean meal control diet contained 3,010 kcal AMEn/kg, 1.25% digestible Lys, and 8.7% NDF. In the experimental diet, SFH was included at the expense (wt:wt) of the control diet. Diets were offered in mash form. No interactions between main effects were detected for any trait. From 1 to 21 d of age, ADG was greater and FCR was better in broilers than in pullets (P < 0.001) but SFH inclusion did not affect bird performance. The TTAR of all nutrients was higher (P < 0.05) in broilers than in pullets. The inclusion of SFH improved AMEn of the diet (P < 0.05) at both ages and DM and N retention (P < 0.001) at 21 d. Broilers had larger villus and deeper crypt (P < 0.01) than pullets. Broilers tended to have higher (P = 0.077) cecal proportion of acetate than pullets but no effects were observed for the other VFA. SFH inclusion tended to increased villus height (P < 0.05) and cecal proportion of acetate and propionate (P < 0.01). In summary, broilers grew faster, were more efficient, had higher ileum absorptive capacity, TTAR of nutrients than pullets. The inclusion of 3% SFH in substitution (wt:wt) of the whole diet improved AMEn without showing any negative effect on growth performance of the bird

Theory of Light Emission in Sonoluminescence as Thermal Radiation

Based on the model proposed by Hilgenfeldt {\it at al.} [Nature {\bf 398}, 401 (1999)], we present here a comprehensive theory of thermal radiation in single-bubble sonoluminescence (SBSL). We first invoke the generalized Kirchhoff's law to obtain the thermal emissivity from the absorption cross-section of a multilayered sphere (MLS). A sonoluminescing bubble, whose internal structure is determined from hydrodynamic simulations, is then modelled as a MLS and in turn the thermal radiation is evaluated. Numerical results obtained from simulations for argon bubbles show that our theory successfully captures the major features observed in SBSL experiments.Comment: 17 pages, 20 figure

Barriers and facilitators to HIV and syphilis rapid diagnostic testing in antenatal care settings in low-income and middle-income countries: A systematic review

Background Testing and treatment during pregnancy is a well-established and cost-effective prevention strategy, which relies largely on use of rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs). Yet, in many low-income and-middle-income countries, the uptake of RDTs is suboptimal. A qualitative meta-synthesis was conducted to identify the barriers and enablers to use of HIV and syphilis RDTs among pregnant women in low-income and middle-income countries. Methods This review was conducted using PRISMA guidelines. Eligible studies included peer-reviewed publications, which used qualitative methods to explore HIV and syphilis RDT in antenatal care clinics in low-income and middle-income countries. Studies focusing on perspectives of pregnant women, healthcare workers and/or stakeholders were included. We used an inductive approach informed by a modified socioecological model to synthesise the data. Results 62 manuscripts met the eligibility criteria. For pregnant women, initial acceptance of the RDT and continuation in antenatal care depends on the perception that engaging in testing will be a beneficial experience for their baby and themselves, often influenced by the provision of services that are gender-sensitive, confidential, respectful, flexible and considers their well-being into the future. Local sociocultural beliefs about pregnancy and diseases, awareness of diseases and gender roles in society also influenced RDT acceptability among pregnant women. For healthcare workers, the ability to provide high-quality RDT care required ongoing training, accurate and easy to use tests, support from supervisors and communities, sufficient resources and staffing to provide services, and reliable salary. At the stakeholder level, well-developed guidelines and health system infrastructures were imperative to the delivery of RDT in antenatal clinics. Conclusion Our findings highlight clear gaps to the provision of sustainable and culturally acceptable maternal HIV and/or syphilis screening using RDTs. In addition, greater attention needs to be paid to community stakeholders in promoting the uptake of RDT in antenatal clinics. PROSPERO registration number CRD42018112190

Flipped and Unflipped SU(5) as Type IIA Flux Vacua

On Type IIA orientifolds with flux compactifications in supersymmetric AdS vacua, we for the first time construct SU(5) models with three anti-symmetric {\bf 10} representations and without symmetric {\bf 15} representations. We show that all the pairs of the anti-fundamental {\bf \bar 5} and fundamental {\bf 5} representations can obtain GUT/string-scale vector-like masses after the additional gauge symmetry breaking via supersymmetry preserving Higgs mechanism. Then we have exact three {\bf \bar 5}, and no other chiral exotic particles that are charged under SU(5) due to the non-abelian anomaly free condition. Moreover, we can break the SU(5) gauge symmetry down to the SM gauge symmetry via D6-brane splitting, and solve the doublet-triplet splitting problem. Assuming that the extra one (or several) pair(s) of Higgs doublets and adjoint particles obtain GUT/string-scale masses via high-dimensional operators, we only have the MSSM in the observable sector below the GUT scale. Then the observed low energy gauge couplings can be generated via RGE running if we choose the suitable grand unified gauge coupling by adjusting the string scale. Furthermore, we construct the first flipped SU(5) model with exact three {\bf 10}, and the first flipped SU(5) model in which all the Yukawa couplings are allowed by the global U(1) symmetries.Comment: RevTex4, 34 pages, 17 table

The effect of a mono component protease and different AMEn levels in broiler diets on growth performance from 1 to 18 days of age.

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the effect of the inclusion of a mono component serine protease (RONOZYME ProAct, DSM Nutritional Products) in diets with two different AMEn contents on apparent ileal digestibility (AID) of amino acids (AA) and growth performance in broilers from 1 to 18 days of age

dtwSat: Time-Weighted Dynamic Time Warping for Satellite Image Time Series Analysis in R

The opening of large archives of satellite data such as LANDSAT, MODIS and the SENTINELs has given researchers unprecedented access to data, allowing them to better quantify and understand local and global land change. The need to analyse such large data sets has lead to the development of automated and semi-automated methods for satellite image time series analysis. However, few of the proposed methods for re mote sensing time series analysis are available as open source software. In this paper we present the R package dtwSat . This package provides an implementation of the Time-Weighted Dynamic Time Warping method for land cover mapping using sequence of multi-band satellite images. Methods based on dynamic time warping are flexible to handle irregular sampling and out-of-phase time series, and they have achieved significant result s in time series analysis. dtwSat is available from the Comprehensive R Archive Network and contributes to making methods for satellite time series analysis available to a larger audience. The package supports the full cycle of land cover classification using image time series, ranging from selecting temporal patterns to visualising and assessing the results

Towards a Realistic Type IIA T^6/Z_4 Orientifold Model with Background Fluxes, Part 1: Moduli Stabilization

We apply the methods of DeWolfe et al. [hep-th/0505160] to a T^6/Z_4 orientifold model. This is the first step in an attempt to build a phenomenologically interesting meta-stable de Sitter model with small cosmological constant and standard model gauge groups.Comment: 1+30 pages, 2 figures, LaTeX, v2: minor corrections, stability analysis of b_a moduli added, refs added, version accepted for publication in JHE