Compartmentalized Production of CCL17 In Vivo: Strong Inducibility in Peripheral Dendritic Cells Contrasts Selective Absence from the Spleen

Dendritic cells (DCs)* fulfill an important regulatory function at the interface of the innate and adaptive immune system. The thymus and activation-regulated chemokine (TARC/CCL17) is produced by DCs and facilitates the attraction of activated T cells. Using a fluorescence-based in vivo reporter system, we show that CCL17 expression in mice is found in activated Langerhans cells and mature DCs located in various lymphoid and nonlymphoid organs, and is up-regulated after stimulation with Toll-like receptor ligands. DCs expressing CCL17 belong to the CD11b+CD8−Dec205+ DC subset, including the myeloid-related DCs located in the subepithelial dome of Peyer's patches. CCL17-deficient mice mount diminished T cell–dependent contact hypersensitivity responses and display a deficiency in rejection of allogeneic organ transplants. In contrast to lymphoid organs located at external barriers of the skin and mucosa, CCL17 is not expressed in the spleen, even after systemic microbial challenge or after in vitro stimulation. These findings indicate that CCL17 production is a hallmark of local DC stimulation in peripheral organs but is absent from the spleen as a filter of blood-borne antigens

Local anesthesia in piglets undergoing castration-A comparative study to investigate the analgesic effects of four local anesthetics on the basis of acute physiological responses and limb movements

Surgical castration of male piglets without analgesia is a painful procedure. This prospective, randomized and double-blinded study aimed to evaluate the analgesic effects of four different local anesthetics for piglet castration during the first week of life. In total, 54 piglets aged 3 to 7 days were distributed into 6 treatment groups: handling (H);castration without pain relief (sodium chloride, NaCl);and castration with a local anesthetic: 4% procaine (P), 2% lidocaine (L), 0.5% bupivacaine (B) or 20 mg/ml mepivacaine (M). By excluding stress and fear as disruptive factors via a minimum anesthesia model, all piglets received individual minimum alveolar concentration (MAC) isoflurane anesthesia. Twenty minutes before castration, all treatment groups except group H received one injection per testis. Then, 0.5 ml of a local anesthetic or NaCl was injected intratesticularly (i.t.), and 0.5 ml was administered subscrotally. Acute physiological responses to noxious stimuli at injection and castration were evaluated by measuring blood pressure (BP), heart rate (HR), cortisol, epinephrine, norepinephrine and chromogranin A (CgA);limb movements were quantified. The results confirm that castration without analgesia is highly painful. Surgical castration without pain relief revealed significant changes in mean arterial blood pressure (MAP) and HR. Local anesthetic administration significantly reduced changes in BP and HR associated with castration. Piglets receiving a preoperative local anesthetic exhibited the fewest limb movements during castration, while the NaCl group exhibited the most. Injection itself was not associated with significant changes in MAP or HR. However, many piglets exhibited limb movements during injection, indicating that the injection itself causes nociceptive pain. No significant differences were found between groups regarding parameters of plasma cortisol, catecholamines and CgA. In conclusion, all four local anesthetics administered are highly effective at reducing signs of nociception during castration under light isoflurane anesthesia. However, injection of a local anesthetic seems to be painful

Standard indicators for the social appropriation of science: Lessons learned.

This book is the result of a two-and-a-halfyear close collaboration between the seven partners of the Erasmus+ KA203 project “Knowledge, beliefs, perceptions about the science of European students (Persist_EU)”. One of the project’s main objectives was to develop a tool to evaluate European students’ initial knowledge when configuring their beliefs and perceptions about different science topics. Once the tool (platform) had been designed, the next step consisted of carrying out activities (Science camps), which would allow validating the platform and identifying changes in perception (through questionnaires with Likert scales), which students experienced during their participation in training activities, organised within the framework of the project. For this, five Science camps were organised in five European universities, two in central Europe (Germany, Slovakia), and three nations in southern Europe (Portugal, Spain and Italy). Therefore, we make sure to cover differences related to socio-geopolitical issues. The topics that were chosen for the debate were climate change, genetically-modified organisms (GMOs), complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) and vaccines, and it was expected that around 100 students would participate in each of the universities of the PERSIST_EU consortium (Valencia, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Trnava, Lisbon, and Vicenza).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

MRI in LARS1 deficiency—Spectrum, patterns, and correlation with acute neurological deterioration

Leucine aminoacyl tRNA-synthetase 1 (LARS1)-deficiency (infantile liver failure syndrome type 1 (ILFS1)) has a multisystemic phenotype including fever-associated acute liver failure (ALF), chronic neurologic abnormalities, and encephalopathic episodes. In order to better characterize encephalopathic episodes and MRI changes, 35 cranial MRIs from 13 individuals with LARS1 deficiency were systematically assessed and neurological phenotype was analyzed. All individuals had developmental delay and 10/13 had seizures. Encephalopathic episodes in 8/13 were typically associated with infections, presented with seizures and reduced consciousness, mostly accompanied by hepatic dysfunction, and recovery in 17/19 episodes. Encephalopathy without hepatic dysfunction occurred in one individual after liver transplantation. On MRI, 5/7 individuals with MRI during acute encephalopathy had deep gray matter and brainstem changes. Supratentorial cortex involvement (6/13) and cerebellar watershed injury (4/13) occurred with seizures and/or encephalopathy. Abnormal brainstem contour on sagittal images (8/13), atrophy (8/13), and myelination delay (8/13) were not clearly associated with encephalopathy. The pattern of deep gray matter and brainstem changes are apparently characteristic of encephalopathy in LARS1-deficiency, differing from patterns of hepatic encephalopathy or metabolic stroke in organic acidurias and mitochondrial diseases. While the pathomechanism remains unclear, fever and energy deficit during infections might be causative; thus, sufficient glucose and protein intake along with pro-active fever management is suggested. As severe episodes were observed during influenza infections, we strongly recommend seasonal vaccination.</p

Ältere Einfamilienhausgebiete im Umbruch: eine unterschätzte planerische Herausforderung - zur Situation in Nordrhein-Westfalen

Das Thema "Einfamilienhausgebiete im Umbruch" ist eine unterschätzte Herausforderung für viele Kommunen. Derzeit steht es noch nicht im Fokus politischer, planerischer und wissenschaftlicher Debatten. Insbesondere die Flüchtlingszuwanderung in den letzten Jahren hat die Diskussion um die Gestaltung von Raumentwicklung unter Schrumpfungsbedingungen in vielen Regionen ausgesetzt. Dabei werden die grundsätzlichen demografischen und gesellschaftlichen Megatrends von Schrumpfung, Alterung und Metropolisierung durch kurzfristige demografische Trendänderungen in der langfristigen Entwicklungsperspektive nicht merklich verändert werden. Die Auswirkungen des demografischen und gesellschaftlichen Wandels und die damit verbundene veränderte Marktsituation führen zu einer Umbruchsituation in immer mehr Einfamilienhaus-Gebieten (kurz: EFH-Gebiete) der 1950er bis 1970er Jahre. Es lassen sich regional unterschiedliche Betroffenheiten älterer EFH-Gebiete identifizieren. Dementsprechend lassen sich für unterschiedliche Raumkategorien verschiedene städtebauliche Ziele und Handlungsbedarfe mit unterschiedlichen Prioritäten hinsichtlich des Umgangs mit älteren Einfamilienhausbeständen ableiten

Mobility in a Globalised World 2017

The term mobility has different meanings in the following science disciplines. In economics, mobility is the ability of an individual or a group to improve their eco-nomic status in relation to income and wealth within their lifetime or between gen-erations. In information systems and computer science, mobility is used for the concept of mobile computing, in which a computer is transported by a person dur-ing normal use. Logistics creates by the design of logistics networks the infrastruc-ture for the mobility of people and goods. Electric mobility is one of today’s solu-tions from an engineering perspective to reduce the need of energy resources and environmental impact. Moreover, for urban planning, mobility is the crunch ques-tion about how to optimise the different needs for mobility and how to link differ-ent transportation systems. In this publication we collected the ideas of practitioners, researchers, and gov-ernment officials regarding the different modes of mobility in a globalised world, focusing on both domestic and international issues

Molecular hydrogen in Lyman Alpha Emitters

We present a physically motivated model to estimate the molecular hydrogen (H2) content of high-redshift (z~5.7,6.6) Lyman Alpha Emitters (LAEs) extracted from a suite of cosmological simulations. We find that the H2 mass fraction, (f_H2), depends on three main LAE physical properties: (a) star formation rate, (b) dust mass, and (c) cold neutral gas mass. At z~5.7, the value of f_H2 peaks and ranges between 0.5-0.9 for intermediate mass LAEs with stellar mass M_* ~ 10^{9-10} solar mass, decreasing for both smaller and larger galaxies. However, the largest value of the H2 mass is found in the most luminous LAEs. These trends also hold at z\sim6.6, although, due to a lower dust content, f_H2(z=6.6)\sim0.5 f_H2(z=5.7) when averaged over all LAEs; they arise due to the interplay between the H2 formation/shielding controlled by dust and the intensity of the ultraviolet (UV) Lyman-Werner photo-dissociating radiation produced by stars. We then predict the carbon monoxide (CO) luminosities for such LAEs and check that they are consistent with the upper limits found by Wagg et al. (2009) for two z>6 LAEs. At z\sim(5.7, 6.6), the lowest CO rotational transition observable for both samples with the actual capabilities of Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) is the CO(6-5). We find that at z\sim5.7, about 1-2% of LAEs, i.e., those with an observed Lyman Alpha luminosity larger than 10^{43.2} erg/s would be detectable with an integration time of 5-10 hours (S/N=5); at z\sim6.6 none of the LAEs would be detectable in CO, even with an ALMA integration time of 10 hours. We also build the CO `flux function', i.e., the number density of LAEs as a function of the line-integrated CO flux, S_CO, and show that it peaks at S_CO = 0.1 mJy at z\sim5.7, progressively shifting to lower values at higher redshifts. We end by discussing the model uncertainties.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRA

The impact of clustering and angular resolution on far-infrared and millimeter continuum observations

Follow-up observations at high-angular resolution of bright submillimeter galaxies selected from deep extragalactic surveys have shown that the single-dish sources are comprised of a blend of several galaxies. Consequently, number counts derived from low- and high-angular-resolution observations are in tension. This demonstrates the importance of resolution effects at these wavelengths and the need for realistic simulations to explore them. We built a new 2 deg simulation of the extragalactic sky from the far-infrared to the submillimeter. It is based on an updated version of the 2SFM (two star-formation modes) galaxy evolution model. Using global galaxy properties generated by this model, we used an abundance-matching technique to populate a dark-matter lightcone and thus simulate the clustering. We produced maps from this simulation and extracted the sources, and we show that the limited angular resolution of single-dish instruments has a strong impact on (sub)millimeter continuum observations. Taking into account these resolution effects, we are reproducing a large set of observables, as number counts and their evolution with redshift and cosmic infrared background power spectra. Our simulation consistently describes the number counts from single-dish telescopes and interferometers. In particular, at 350 and 500 \uce\ubcm, we find that the number counts measured by Herschel between 5 and 50 mJy are biased towards high values by a factor 2, and that the redshift distributions are biased towards low redshifts. We also show that the clustering has an important impact on the Herschel pixel histogram used to derive number counts from P(D) analysis. We find that the brightest galaxy in the beam of a 500 \uce\ubcm Herschel source contributes on average to only 60% of the Herschel flux density, but that this number will rise to 95% for future millimeter surveys on 30 m-class telescopes (e.g., NIKA2 at IRAM). Finally, we show that the large number density of red Herschel sources found in observations but not in models might be an observational artifact caused by the combination of noise, resolution effects, and the steepness of color- and flux density distributions. Our simulation, called Simulated Infrared Dusty Extragalactic Sky (SIDES), is publicly available

Predictions for Ultra-Deep Radio Counts of Star-Forming Galaxies

We have worked out predictions for the radio counts of star-forming galaxies down to nJy levels, along with redshift distributions down to the detection limits of the phase 1 Square Kilometer Array MID telescope (SKA1-MID) and of its precursors. Such predictions were obtained by coupling epoch dependent star formation rate (SFR) functions with relations between SFR and radio (synchrotron and free-free) emission. The SFR functions were derived taking into account both the dust obscured and the unobscured star-formation, by combining far-infrared (FIR), ultra-violet (UV) and H_alpha luminosity functions up to high redshifts. We have also revisited the South Pole Telescope (SPT) counts of dusty galaxies at 95,GHz performing a detailed analysis of the Spectral Energy Distributions (SEDs). Our results show that the deepest SKA1-MID surveys will detect high-z galaxies with SFRs two orders of magnitude lower compared to Herschel surveys. The highest redshift tails of the distributions at the detection limits of planned SKA1-MID surveys comprise a substantial fraction of strongly lensed galaxies. We predict that a survey down to 0.25 microJy at 1.4 GHz will detect about 1200 strongly lensed galaxies per square degree, at redshifts of up to 10. For about 30% of them the SKA1-MID will detect at least 2 images. The SKA1-MID will thus provide a comprehensive view of the star formation history throughout the re-ionization epoch, unaffected by dust extinction. We have also provided specific predictions for the EMU/ASKAP and MIGHTEE/MeerKAT survey