The mineralogy, petrology, geochemistry and petrogenesis of the Mountain Poser gabbroic pluton, southern California.

Dept. of Geology and Geological Engineering. Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis1979 .W544. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 40-07, page: . Thesis (M.Sc.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 1979

VEG-04: The Effects of Light Quality on Mizuna Mustard Growth, Nutritional Composition, and Organoleptic Acceptability for a Space Diet

Growing fresh, nutritious, palatable produce for crew consumption during spaceflight may provide health-promoting, bioavailable nutrients and enhance the astronaut dietary experience as we move toward longer-duration missions. Tending plants may also serve as a countermeasure for crew psychological stresses associated with spaceflight. However, requirements to support consistent growth of a variety of high quality, nutritious crops under spaceflight environmental conditions remain unclear. This study explores the potential to grow crops for consumption on the International Space Station (ISS) using the Veggie vegetable-production system. VEG-04A and B were two flight tests conducted in 2019 with the leafy green crop mizuna mustard. Mizuna was grown in two Veggie chambers simultaneously, with the chambers set to different red-to-blue light formulations; one Veggie was programmed as "red-rich" and the second as "blue-rich." Light quality is known to impact plant growth, nutrition, microbiology, and organoleptic characteristics on Earth, and the Veggie flight tests examined how these impacts might differ in microgravity. VEG-04A, a 35-day growth test with a single harvest, was initiated in June and harvested in July 2019. At harvest, the astronauts froze half of the edible plant tissue to return to Earth and weighed the remaining half using the Mass Measurement Device (MMD). Weighed samples were then cleaned with produce-sanitizing wipes, and consenting crew members participated in organoleptic evaluation of the fresh produce. The remaining sanitized produce was available for crew consumption as desired. Frozen flight samples were returned at the end of August for microbial and chemical analyses to assess food safety and nutritional quality. No pathogens were detected on VEG-04A flight or ground control samples. On average, bacterial and fungal counts were significantly lower on ground control samples than flight samples. VEG-04B, a 56-day test with multiple harvests from the same plants, assessed sustained productivity. VEG-04B was initiated in October 2019 with three harvests at four, six, and eight weeks after initiation. Challenges with the watering program occurred early during VEG-04A, and several plants failed to survive in both the flight and ground control operations. Thus, prior to VEG-04B, an extra test was conducted to tailor water timing and volumes. This test determined that mizuna grew best if the wicks inside the plant pillow were allowed to dry after plants germinated, reducing persistent water around the stem. The wicks changed from being a conduit for water out of the plant pillow to being a conduit for air into the root zone. This test allowed a fine tuning of methods for VEG-04B. It is our hope that these tests on ISS will help mitigate the risk of an inadequate food supply for long-duration missions by adding fresh vegetables to the crew diet. This research was co-funded by the Human Research Program and Space Biology (MTL#1075) in the ILSRA 2015 NRA call

Relative Burden of Cancer and Noncancer Mortality Among Long-Term Survivors of Breast, Prostate, and Colorectal Cancer in the US

IMPORTANCE: Improvements in cancer outcomes have led to a need to better understand long-term oncologic and nononcologic outcomes and quantify cancer-specific vs noncancer-specific mortality risks among long-term survivors. OBJECTIVE: To assess absolute and relative cancer-specific vs noncancer-specific mortality rates among long-term survivors of cancer, as well as associated risk factors. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This cohort study included 627 702 patients in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results cancer registry with breast, prostate, or colorectal cancer who received a diagnosis between January 1, 2003, and December 31, 2014, who received definitive treatment for localized disease and who were alive 5 years after their initial diagnosis (ie, long-term survivors of cancer). Statistical analysis was conducted from November 2022 to January 2023. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Survival time ratios (TRs) were calculated using accelerated failure time models, and the primary outcome of interest examined was death from index cancer vs alternative (nonindex cancer) mortality across breast, prostate, colon, and rectal cancer cohorts. Secondary outcomes included subgroup mortality in cancer-specific risk groups, categorized based on prognostic factors, and proportion of deaths due to cancer-specific vs noncancer-specific causes. Independent variables included age, sex, race and ethnicity, income, residence, stage, grade, estrogen receptor status, progesterone receptor status, prostate-specific antigen level, and Gleason score. Follow-up ended in 2019. RESULTS: The study included 627 702 patients (mean [SD] age, 61.1 [12.3] years; 434 848 women [69.3%]): 364 230 with breast cancer, 118 839 with prostate cancer, and 144 633 with colorectal cancer who survived 5 years or more from an initial diagnosis of early-stage cancer. Factors associated with shorter median cancer-specific survival included stage III disease for breast cancer (TR, 0.54; 95% CI, 0.53-0.55) and colorectal cancer (colon: TR, 0.60; 95% CI, 0.58-0.62; rectal: TR, 0.71; 95% CI, 0.69-0.74), as well as a Gleason score of 8 or higher for prostate cancer (TR, 0.61; 95% CI, 0.58-0.63). For all cancer cohorts, patients at low risk had at least a 3-fold higher noncancer-specific mortality compared with cancer-specific mortality at 10 years of diagnosis. Patients at high risk had a higher cumulative incidence of cancer-specific mortality than noncancer-specific mortality in all cancer cohorts except prostate. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: This study is the first to date to examine competing oncologic and nononcologic risks focusing on long-term adult survivors of cancer. Knowledge of the relative risks facing long-term survivors may help provide pragmatic guidance to patients and clinicians regarding the importance of ongoing primary and oncologic-focused care

The interaction of Wnt-11 and signalling cascades in prostate cancer

Prostate cancer (PCa) is the second most common cancer among the male population. Conventional therapies target androgen signalling, which drives tumour growth; however, they provide limited survival benefits for patients. It is essential, therefore, to develop a more specific biomarker than the current gold standard, PSA testing. The Wnt signalling pathway induces expression of target genes through cell surface receptors. A non-canonical member of this family, Wnt-11, is evolutionarily highly conserved and is normally expressed by various cells in the developing embryo, as well as in the heart, liver and skeletal muscle of adult humans. We comprehensively review several cell signalling pathways to explain how they interact with Wnt-11, demonstrating its use as a potential biomarker for PCa. Several studies have shown that the expression of Wnt-11 is associated with gastric, renal and colorectal adenocarcinomas and PCa. Moreover, Wnt-11 affects extracellular matrix composition and cytoskeletal rearrangement, and it is required for proliferation and/or survival during cell differentiation. It was found that PCa cell lines express high levels of Wnt-11, which allows differentiation of the epithelial prostate tumour cells to neuron-like (NE) cells. The NE cells produce additional factors that can cause regression after treatment. Accumulating evidence shows that Wnt-11 could be a potential biomarker in diagnosing PCa. Many studies have shown both non-canonical and canonical Wnts interact with several signalling cascades such as PKC, JNK, NF-κB, Rho, PKA and PI3K. In particular, evidence demonstrates Wnt-11 is involved in the progression of PCa, thus it could have the potential to become both a specific disease marker and an important therapeutic target

Graphical user interfaces in an engineering educational environment

Graphical user interfaces (GUIs) are being increasingly used in the classroom to provide users of computer simulations with a friendly and visual approach to specifying all input parameters and increased configuration flexibility. In this study, the authors first describe a number of software and language options that are available to build GUIs. Subsequently, a comprehensive comparative assessment of possible alternatives is undertaken in the light of a benchmark educational program used in a course on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) at the University of Michigan. For the GUIs presented, their educational value with respect to flexible data entry and post-processing of results has been demonstrated. In addition, the authors offer recommendations for pros and cons of available options in terms of platform independence, ease of programming, facilitation of interaction with students, and flexibility. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Comput Appl Eng Educ 13: 48–59, 2005; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com); DOI 10.1002/cae.20029Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/35190/1/20029_ftp.pd

The role of melanin pathways in extremotolerance and virulence of <em>Fonsecaea</em> revealed by <em>de novo</em> assembly transcriptomics using illumina paired-end sequencing

AbstractMelanisation has been considered to be an important virulence factor of Fonsecaea monophora. However, the biosynthetic mechanisms of melanisation remain unknown. We therefore used next generation sequencing technology to investigate the transcriptome and digital gene expression data, which are valuable resources to better understand the molecular and biological mechanisms regulating melanisation in F. monophora. We performed de novo transcriptome assembly and digital gene expression (DGE) profiling analyses of parent (CBS 122845) and albino (CBS 125194) strains using the Illumina RNA-seq system. A total of 17 352 annotated unigenes were found by BLAST search of NR, Swiss-Prot, Gene Ontology, Clusters of Orthologous Groups and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) (E-value <1e‒5). A total of 2 283 unigenes were judged to be the differentially expressed between the two genotypes. We identified most of the genes coding for key enzymes involved in melanin biosynthesis pathways, including polyketide synthase (pks), multicopper oxidase (mco), laccase, tyrosinase and homogentisate 1,2-dioxygenase (hmgA). DEG analysis showed extensive down-regulation of key genes in the DHN pathway, while up-regulation was noted in the DOPA pathway of the albino mutant. The transcript levels of partial genes were confirmed by real time RT-PCR, while the crucial role of key enzymes was confirmed by either inhibitor or substrate tests in vitro. Meanwhile, numbers of genes involved in light sensing, cell wall synthesis, morphology and environmental stress were identified in the transcriptome of F. monophora. In addition, 3 353 SSRs (Simple Sequence Repeats) markers were identified from 21 600 consensus sequences. Blocking of the DNH pathway is the most likely reason of melanin deficiency in the albino strain, while the production of pheomelanin and pyomelanin were probably regulated by unknown transcription factors on upstream of both pathways. Most of genes involved in environmental tolerance to oxidants, irradiation and extreme temperatures were also assembled and annotated in transcriptomes of F. monophora. In addition, thousands of identified cSSR (combined SSR) markers will favour further genetic linkage studies. In conclusion, these data will contribute to understanding the regulation of melanin biosynthesis and help to improve the studies of pathogenicity of F. monophora