Neutrino Target-of-Opportunity Sky Coverage and Scheduler for EUSO-SPB2

Very-high-energy neutrinos can be observed by detecting air shower signals. Detection of transient target of opportunity (ToO) neutrino sources is part of a broader multimessenger program. The Extreme Universe Space Observatory on a Super Pressure Balloon 2 (EUSO-SPB2) Mission, launched on May 12, 2023, was equipped with an optical Cherenkov Telescope (CT) designed to detect up-going air showers sourced by Earth-skimming neutrinos that interact near the Earth's limb. Presented here is an overview of the sky coverage and ToO scheduler software for EUSO-SPB2. By using the balloon trajectory coordinates and setting constraints on the positions of the Sun and Moon to ensure dark skies, we can determine if and when a source direction is slightly below the Earth's limb. From a source catalog, CT scheduling and pointing is performed to optimize the search for high-energy neutrinos coming from astrophysical sources. Some sample results for EUSO-SPB2 are shown.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures, ICRC2023 Conference Proceeding

Overview of the EUSO-SPB2 Target of Opportunity program using the Cherenkov Telescope

During the Extreme Universe Space Observatory on a Super Pressure Balloon 2 (EUSO-SPB2) mission, we planned Target of Opportunity (ToO) operations to follow up on possible sources of $\gtrsim 10 \, {\rm PeV}$ neutrinos. The original plan before flight was to point the onboard Cherenkov Telescope (CT) to catch the source's path on the sky just below Earth's horizon. By using the Earth as a tau-neutrino to tau-lepton converter, the CT would then be able to look for optical extensive air shower signals induced by tau-lepton decays in the atmosphere. The CT had a field of view of $6.4^\circ$ vertical $\times$ $12.8^\circ$ horizontal. Possible neutrino source candidates include gamma ray bursts, tidal disruption events and other bursting or flaring sources. In addition, follow-ups of binary neutron star mergers would have been possible after the start of the O4 observation run from LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA. The resulting exposure is modeled using the NuSpaceSim framework in ToO mode. With the launch of the EUSO-SPB2 payload on the 13th May 2023, this summarizes the ToO program status and preliminary data, as available

A narrative synthesis of women's out-of-body experiences during childbirth

Introduction Some women have a dissociated, out-of-body experience (OBE) during childbirth, which may be described as seeing the body from above or floating above the body. This review examines this phenomenon using narratives from women who have experienced intrapartum OBEs. Methods A narrative synthesis of qualitative research was employed to systematically synthesize OBE narratives from existing studies. Strict inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied. The included papers were critiqued by 2 of the authors to determine the appropriateness of the narrative synthesis method, procedural transparency, and soundness of the interpretive approach. Results Women experiencing OBEs during labor and birth report a disembodied state in the presence of stress or trauma. Three forms of OBEs are described: floating above the scene, remaining close to the scene, or full separation of a body part from the main body. Women had clear recall of OBEs, describing the experience and point of occurrence. Women who reported OBEs had experienced current or previous traumatic childbirth, or trauma in a non-birth situation. OBEs as prosaic experiences were not identified. Discussion OBEs are part of the lived experience of some women giving birth. The OBEs in this review were trauma related with some women disclosing previous posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It is not evident whether there is a connection between PTSD and OBEs at present, and OBEs may serve as a potential coping mechanism in presence of trauma. Clinicians should legitimize women’s disclosure of OBEs and explore and ascertain their impact, either as a normal coping mechanism or a precursor to perinatal mental illness. Research into the function of OBEs and any relationship to PTSD may assist in early interventions for childbearing women

Comparison of bone regenerative capacity of donor-matched human adipose–derived and bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells

Adipose-derived stem cells (ASC) have been used as an alternative to bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSC) for bone tissue engineering. However, the efficacy of ASC in bone regeneration in comparison with BMSC remains debatable, since inconsistent results have been reported. Comparing ASC with BMSC obtained from different individuals might contribute to this inconsistency in results. Therefore, this study aimed to compare the bone regenerative capacity of donor-matched human ASC and BMSC seeded onto poly(L-lactide-co-ε-caprolactone) scaffolds using calvarial bone defects in nude rats. First, donor-matched ASC and BMSC were seeded onto the co-polymer scaffolds to evaluate their in vitro osteogenic differentiation. Seeded scaffolds and scaffolds without cells (control) were then implanted in calvarial defects in nude rats. The expression of osteogenesis-related genes was examined after 4 weeks. Cellular activity was investigated after 4 and 12 weeks. Bone formation was evaluated radiographically and histologically after 4, 12, and 24 weeks. In vitro, ASC and BMSC demonstrated mineralization. However, BMSC showed higher alkaline phosphatase activity than ASC. In vivo, human osteogenesis–related genes Runx2 and collagen type I were expressed in defects with scaffold/cells. Defects with scaffold/BMSC had higher cellular activity than defects with scaffold/ASC. Moreover, bone formation in defects with scaffold/BMSC was greater than in defects with scaffold/ASC, especially at the early time-point. These results suggest that although ASC have the potential to regenerate bone, the rate of bone regeneration with ASC may be slower than with BMSC. Accordingly, BMSC are more suitable for bone regenerative applications.publishedVersio

Method Families Concept: Application to Decision-Making Methods

International audienceThe role of variability in Software engineering grows increasingly as it allows developing solutions that can be easily adapted to a specific context and reusing existing knowledge. In order to deal with variability in the method engineering (ME) domain, we suggest applying the notion of method families. Method components are organized as a method family, which is configured in the given situation into a method line. In this paper, we motivate the concept of method families by comparing the existing approaches of ME. We detail then the concept of method families and illustrate it with a family of decision-making (DM) methods that we call MADISE

The effectiveness of position- and composition-specific gap costs for protein similarity searches

The flexibility in gap cost enjoyed by Hidden Markov Models (HMMs) is expected to afford them better retrieval accuracy than position-specific scoring matrices (PSSMs). We attempt to quantify the effect of more general gap parameters by separately examining the influence of position- and composition-specific gap scores, as well as by comparing the retrieval accuracy of the PSSMs constructed using an iterative procedure to that of the HMMs provided by Pfam and SUPERFAMILY, curated ensembles of multiple alignments. We found that position-specific gap penalties have an advantage over uniform gap costs. We did not explore optimizing distinct uniform gap costs for each query. For Pfam, PSSMs iteratively constructed from seeds based on HMM consensus sequences perform equivalently to HMMs that were adjusted to have constant gap transition probabilities, albeit with much greater variance. We observed no effect of composition-specific gap costs on retrieval performance.Comment: 17 pages, 4 figures, 2 table

Improving model construction of profile HMMs for remote homology detection through structural alignment

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Remote homology detection is a challenging problem in Bioinformatics. Arguably, profile Hidden Markov Models (pHMMs) are one of the most successful approaches in addressing this important problem. pHMM packages present a relatively small computational cost, and perform particularly well at recognizing remote homologies. This raises the question of whether structural alignments could impact the performance of pHMMs trained from proteins in the <it>Twilight Zone</it>, as structural alignments are often more accurate than sequence alignments at identifying motifs and functional residues. Next, we assess the impact of using structural alignments in pHMM performance.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We used the SCOP database to perform our experiments. Structural alignments were obtained using the 3DCOFFEE and MAMMOTH-mult tools; sequence alignments were obtained using CLUSTALW, TCOFFEE, MAFFT and PROBCONS. We performed leave-one-family-out cross-validation over super-families. Performance was evaluated through ROC curves and paired two tailed t-test.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>We observed that pHMMs derived from structural alignments performed significantly better than pHMMs derived from sequence alignment in low-identity regions, mainly below 20%. We believe this is because structural alignment tools are better at focusing on the important patterns that are more often conserved through evolution, resulting in higher quality pHMMs. On the other hand, sensitivity of these tools is still quite low for these low-identity regions. Our results suggest a number of possible directions for improvements in this area.</p

A Family of Chemoreceptors in Tribolium castaneum (Tenebrionidae: Coleoptera)

Chemoperception in invertebrates is mediated by a family of G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCR). To date nothing is known about the molecular mechanisms of chemoperception in coleopteran species. Recently the genome of Tribolium castaneum was sequenced for use as a model species for the Coleoptera. Using blast searches analyses of the T. castaneum genome with previously predicted amino acid sequences of insect chemoreceptor genes, a putative chemoreceptor family consisting of 62 gustatory receptors (Grs) and 26 olfactory receptors (Ors) was identified. The receptors have seven transmembrane domains (7TMs) and all belong to the GPCR receptor family. The expression of the T. castaneum chemoreceptor genes was investigated using quantification real- time RT-PCR and in situ whole mount RT-PCR analysis in the antennae, mouth parts, and prolegs of the adults and larvae. All of the predicted TcasGrs were expressed in the labium, maxillae, and prolegs of the adults but TcasGr13, 19, 28, 47, 62, 98, and 61 were not expressed in the prolegs. The TcasOrs were localized only in the antennae and not in any of the beetles gustatory organs with one exception; the TcasOr16 (like DmelOr83b), which was localized in the antennae, labium, and prolegs of the beetles. A group of six TcasGrs that presents a lineage with the sugar receptors subfamily in Drosophila melanogaster were localized in the lacinia of the Tribolium larvae. TcasGr1, 3, and 39, presented an ortholog to CO2 receptors in D. melanogaster and Anopheles gambiae was recorded. Low expression of almost all of the predicted chemoreceptor genes was observed in the head tissues that contain the brains and suboesophageal ganglion (SOG). These findings demonstrate the identification of a chemoreceptor family in Tribolium, which is evolutionarily related to other insect species