Effects of Murphy number on quadrupedal running gait based on a simple model

The 11th International Symposium on Adaptive Motion of Animals and Machines. Kobe University, Japan. 2023-06-06/09. Adaptive Motion of Animals and Machines Organizing Committee.Poster Session P4

Involvement of MAPKs in ICAM-1 Expression in Glomerular Endothelial Cells in Diabetic Nephropathy

Inflammatory processes are involved in the pathogenesis of diabetic nephropathy. The aim of this study was to clarify the role of mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathways for induction of intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM-1) expression in glomerular endothelial cells under diabetic conditions. We examined the expression of ICAM-1 in the kidneys of experimental diabetic rats. Human glomerular endothelial cells (GE cells) were exposed to normal glucose concentration, high glucose concentration (HG), or high mannitol concentration (HM), and then the expression of the ICAM-1 protein and the phosphorylation of the 3 subfamilies of mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) were determined using Western blot analysis. Next, to evaluate the involvement of MAPKs in HG- or HM-induced ICAM-1 expression, we preincubated GE cells with the inhibitors for ERK, p38 or JNK 1h prior to the application of glucose or mannitol. Expression of ICAM-1 was increased in the glomeruli of diabetic rats. Both HG and HM induced ICAM-1 expression and phosphorylation of ERK1/2, p38 and JNK in GE cells. Expression of ICAM-1 was significantly attenuated by inhibitors of ERK, p38 and JNK. We conclude that activation of ERK1/2, p38 and JNK cascades may be involved in ICAM-1 expression in glomerular endothelial cells under diabetic conditions

Temporal characteristics of facial ensemble in individuals with autism spectrum disorder: examination from arousal and attentional allocation

IntroductionIndividuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) show atypical recognition of facial emotions, which has been suggested to stem from arousal and attention allocation. Recent studies have focused on the ability to perceive an average expression from multiple spatially different expressions. This study investigated the effect of autistic traits on temporal ensemble, that is, the perception of the average expression from multiple changing expressions.MethodsWe conducted a simplified temporal-ensemble task and analyzed behavioral responses, pupil size, and viewing times for eyes of a face. Participants with and without diagnosis of ASD viewed serial presentations of facial expressions that randomly switched between emotional and neutral. The temporal ratio of the emotional expressions was manipulated. The participants estimated the intensity of the facial emotions for the overall presentation.ResultsWe obtained three major results: (a) many participants with ASD were less susceptible to the ratio of anger expression for temporal ensembles, (b) they produced significantly greater pupil size for angry expressions (within-participants comparison) and smaller pupil size for sad expressions (between-groups comparison), and (c) pupil size and viewing time to eyes were not correlated with the temporal ensemble.DiscussionThese results suggest atypical temporal integration of anger expression and arousal characteristics in individuals with ASD; however, the atypical integration is not fully explained by arousal or attentional allocation

Different Characteristics of Cognitive Impairment in Elderly Schizophrenia and Alzheimer's Disease in the Mild Cognitive Impairment Stage

We compared indices of the revised version of the Wechsler Memory Scale (WMS-R) and scaled scores of the five subtests of the revised version of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS-R) in 30 elderly schizophrenia (ES) patients and 25 Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients in the amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) stage (AD-aMCI). In the WMS-R, attention/concentration was rated lower and delayed recall was rated higher in ES than in AD-aMCI, although general memory was comparable in the two groups. In WAIS-R, digit symbol substitution, similarity, picture completion, and block design scores were significantly lower in ES than in AD-aMCI, but the information scores were comparable between the two groups. Delayed recall and forgetfulness were less impaired, and attention, working memory and executive function were more impaired in ES than in AD-aMCI. These results should help clinicians to distinguish ES combined with AD-aMCI from ES alone

A multi-decade record of high quality fCO2 data in version 3 of the Surface Ocean CO2 Atlas (SOCAT)

The Surface Ocean CO2 Atlas (SOCAT) is a synthesis of quality-controlled fCO2 (fugacity of carbon dioxide) values for the global surface oceans and coastal seas with regular updates. Version 3 of SOCAT has 14.7 million fCO2 values from 3646 data sets covering the years 1957 to 2014. This latest version has an additional 4.6 million fCO2 values relative to version 2 and extends the record from 2011 to 2014. Version 3 also significantly increases the data availability for 2005 to 2013. SOCAT has an average of approximately 1.2 million surface water fCO2 values per year for the years 2006 to 2012. Quality and documentation of the data has improved. A new feature is the data set quality control (QC) flag of E for data from alternative sensors and platforms. The accuracy of surface water fCO2 has been defined for all data set QC flags. Automated range checking has been carried out for all data sets during their upload into SOCAT. The upgrade of the interactive Data Set Viewer (previously known as the Cruise Data Viewer) allows better interrogation of the SOCAT data collection and rapid creation of high-quality figures for scientific presentations. Automated data upload has been launched for version 4 and will enable more frequent SOCAT releases in the future. High-profile scientific applications of SOCAT include quantification of the ocean sink for atmospheric carbon dioxide and its long-term variation, detection of ocean acidification, as well as evaluation of coupled-climate and ocean-only biogeochemical models. Users of SOCAT data products are urged to acknowledge the contribution of data providers, as stated in the SOCAT Fair Data Use Statement. This ESSD (Earth System Science Data) “living data” publication documents the methods and data sets used for the assembly of this new version of the SOCAT data collection and compares these with those used for earlier versions of the data collection (Pfeil et al., 2013; Sabine et al., 2013; Bakker et al., 2014). Individual data set files, included in the synthesis product, can be downloaded here: doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.849770. The gridded products are available here: doi:10.3334/CDIAC/OTG.SOCAT_V3_GRID

Numerical simulations of granular dynamics II: Particle dynamics in a shaken granular material

Surfaces of planets and small bodies of our Solar System are often covered by a layer of granular material that can range from a fine regolith to a gravel-like structure of varying depths. Therefore, the dynamics of granular materials are involved in many events occurring during planetary and small-body evolution thus contributing to their geological properties. We demonstrate that the new adaptation of the parallel N-body hard-sphere code pkdgrav has the capability to model accurately the key features of the collective motion of bidisperse granular materials in a dense regime as a result of shaking. As a stringent test of the numerical code we investigate the complex collective ordering and motion of granular material by direct comparison with laboratory experiments. We demonstrate that, as experimentally observed, the scale of the collective motion increases with increasing small-particle additive concentration. We then extend our investigations to assess how self-gravity and external gravity affect collective motion. In our reduced-gravity simulations both the gravitational conditions and the frequency of the vibrations roughly match the conditions on asteroids subjected to seismic shaking, though real regolith is likely to be much more heterogeneous and less ordered than in our idealised simulations. We also show that collective motion can occur in a granular material under a wide range of inter-particle gravity conditions and in the absence of an external gravitational field. These investigations demonstrate the great interest of being able to simulate conditions that are to relevant planetary science yet unreachable by Earth-based laboratory experiments

The ASTRO-H X-ray Observatory

The joint JAXA/NASA ASTRO-H mission is the sixth in a series of highly successful X-ray missions initiated by the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS). ASTRO-H will investigate the physics of the high-energy universe via a suite of four instruments, covering a very wide energy range, from 0.3 keV to 600 keV. These instruments include a high-resolution, high-throughput spectrometer sensitive over 0.3-2 keV with high spectral resolution of Delta E < 7 eV, enabled by a micro-calorimeter array located in the focal plane of thin-foil X-ray optics; hard X-ray imaging spectrometers covering 5-80 keV, located in the focal plane of multilayer-coated, focusing hard X-ray mirrors; a wide-field imaging spectrometer sensitive over 0.4-12 keV, with an X-ray CCD camera in the focal plane of a soft X-ray telescope; and a non-focusing Compton-camera type soft gamma-ray detector, sensitive in the 40-600 keV band. The simultaneous broad bandpass, coupled with high spectral resolution, will enable the pursuit of a wide variety of important science themes.Comment: 22 pages, 17 figures, Proceedings of the SPIE Astronomical Instrumentation "Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2012: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray

In vitro potency, in vitro and in vivo efficacy of liposomal alendronate in combination with γδ T cell immunotherapy in mice

Nitrogen-containing bisphosphonate (N-BP), including zoledronic acid (ZOL) and alendronate (ALD), have been proposed as sensitisers in γδ T cell immunotherapy in pre-clinical and clinical studies. Therapeutic efficacy of N-BPs is hampered by their rapid renal excretion and high affinity for bone. Liposomal formulations of N-BP have been proposed to improve accumulation in solid tumours. Liposomal alendronate (L-ALD) has been suggested as a suitable alternative to liposomal ZOL (L-ZOL), due to unexpected mice death experienced in pre-clinical studies with the latter. Only one study so far has proven the therapeutic efficacy of L-ALD, in combination with γδ T cell immunotherapy, after intraperitoneal administration of γδ T cell resulting in delayed growth of ovarian cancer in mice. This study aims to assess the in vitro efficacy of L-ALD, in combination with γδ T cell immunotherapy, in a range of cancerous cell lines, using L-ZOL as a comparator. The therapeutic efficacy was tested in a pseudo-metastatic lung mouse model, following intravenous injection of γδ T cell, L-ALD or the combination. In vivo biocompatibility and organ biodistribution studies of L-BPs were undertaken simultaneously. Higher concentrations of L-ALD (40–60 μM) than L-ZOL (3–10 μM) were required to produce a comparative reduction in cell viability in vitro, when used in combination with γδ T cells. Significant inhibition of tumour growth was observed after treatment with both L-ALD and γδ T cells in pseudo-metastatic lung melanoma tumour-bearing mice after tail vein injection of both treatments, suggesting that therapeutically relevant concentrations of L-ALD and γδ T cell could be achieved in the tumour sites, resulting in significant delay in tumour growth

Hitomi (ASTRO-H) X-ray Astronomy Satellite

The Hitomi (ASTRO-H) mission is the sixth Japanese x-ray astronomy satellite developed by a large international collaboration, including Japan, USA, Canada, and Europe. The mission aimed to provide the highest energy resolution ever achieved at E  >  2  keV, using a microcalorimeter instrument, and to cover a wide energy range spanning four decades in energy from soft x-rays to gamma rays. After a successful launch on February 17, 2016, the spacecraft lost its function on March 26, 2016, but the commissioning phase for about a month provided valuable information on the onboard instruments and the spacecraft system, including astrophysical results obtained from first light observations. The paper describes the Hitomi (ASTRO-H) mission, its capabilities, the initial operation, and the instruments/spacecraft performances confirmed during the commissioning operations for about a month

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead