Neurofibromin knockdown in glioma cell lines is associated with changes in cytokine and chemokine secretion in vitro.

The neurofibromin-1 tumor suppressor gene (NF1) is altered in approximately 20% of sporadic glioblastoma (GBM) cases. NF1 deficient GBM frequently shows a mesenchymal gene expression signature, suggesting a relationship between NF1 status and the tumor microenvironment. To identify changes in the production of secreted cytokines/chemokines in NF1 deficient glioma, we applied cytokine arrays to conditioned media from a panel of three GBM cell lines after siRNA-mediated NF1 knockdown. We identified increased secretion of platelet-derived growth factor AA (PDGF-AA), chitinase-3-like protein 1 (CHI3L1), interleukin-8 (IL-8), and endoglin (ENG) in different subsets of these cell lines. Secretion was associated with induction of the corresponding messenger RNA, suggesting a mechanism involving transcriptional upregulation. By contrast, in non-transformed immortalized normal human astrocytes, PDGF-AA secretion was increased upon NF1 knockdown, while secreted CHI3L1, ENG, and IL-8 were reduced or unchanged. Analysis of The Cancer Genome Atlas confirmed a relationship between glioma NF1 status and ENG and CHI3L1 in tumor samples. Overall, this study identifies candidate changes in secreted proteins from NF1 deficient glioma cells that could influence the tumor microenvironment, and suggests a direct link between NF1 loss and increased tumor cell production of CHI3L1 and endoglin, two factors implicated in mesenchymal identity in glioblastoma

Simulations of satellite Doppler wind observations

This study will involve two objectives: (1) to develop, through computer simulations, optimal satellite-based sensor scanning techniques for direct measurement of tropospheric winds on the meso- and synoptic scales; and (2) to construct simulations of remotely measured wind fields for assessing impact of such fields on the diagnosis and prognosis of atmospheric phenomena through the use of Observing System Simulation Experiments (OSSE). Using the LAWS Simulation Model (LSM), various global coverage scenarios have been investigated as part of an effort to define the optimal orbit, configuration and sampling strategies for observations of winds for use in global circulation models. Simulated data sets have been provided to GSFC, FSU and several LAWS team members. Particular emphasis has been on providing realistic cloud cover, cirrus backscatter, aerosol distribution and wind variance on scales less than 600 km. Progress is currently being made to incorporate other remote sensors (AIRS/AMSU, STIKSCAT) into the global OSSEs

Hog Houses for Nebraska

The material contained in this bulletin is a culmination of several years\u27 study and investigation of the different types of hog houses used in Nebraska. It is realized that the plans given will not suit all conditions that may arise, but an effort has been made to bring out the essential factors so that the plans may serve as a guide in planning a house suited to particular conditions

Hog Houses for Nebraska

The material contained in this bulletin is a culmination of several years\u27 study and investigation of the different types of hog houses used in Nebraska. It is realized that the plans given will not suit all conditions that may arise, but an effort has been made to bring out the essential factors so that the plans may serve as a guide in planning a house suited to particular conditions

Real-Time Data Processing in the Muon System of the D0 Detector

This paper presents a real-time application of the 16-bit fixed point Digital Signal Processors (DSPs), in the Muon System of the D0 detector located at the Fermilab Tevatron, presently the world's highest-energy hadron collider. As part of the Upgrade for a run beginning in the year 2000, the system is required to process data at an input event rate of 10 KHz without incurring significant deadtime in readout. The ADSP21csp01 processor has high I/O bandwidth, single cycle instruction execution and fast task switching support to provide efficient multisignal processing. The processor's internal memory consists of 4K words of Program Memory and 4K words of Data Memory. In addition there is an external memory of 32K words for general event buffering and 16K words of Dual Port Memory for input data queuing. This DSP fulfills the requirement of the Muon subdetector systems for data readout. All error handling, buffering, formatting and transferring of the data to the various trigger levels of the data acquisition system is done in software. The algorithms developed for the system complete these tasks in about 20 microseconds per event.Comment: 4 pages, Presented and published at the 11th IEEE NPSS Real Time Conference, held at Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA, from June 14-18, 199

Fracture resistance of zirconia-composite veneered crowns in comparison with zirconia-porcelain crowns.

The objectives were to evaluate the fracture resistance and stress concentration in zirconia/composite veneered crowns in comparison to zirconia/porcelain crowns using occlusal fracture resistance and by stress analysis using finite element analysis method. Zirconia substructures were divided into two groups based on the veneering material. A static load was applied occlusally using a ball indenter and the load to fracture was recorded in Newtons (N). The same crown design was used to create 3D crown models and evaluated using FEA. The zirconia/composite crowns subjected to static occlusal load showed comparable results to the zirconia/porcelain crowns. Zirconia/composite crowns showed higher stress on the zirconia substructure at 63.6 and 50.9 MPa on the zirconia substructure veneered with porcelain. In conclusion, zirconia/composite crowns withstood high occlusal loads similar to zirconia/porcelain crowns with no significant difference. However, the zirconia/composite crowns showed higher stress values than the zirconia/porcelain crowns at the zirconia substructure

Lateral stress evolution in chromium sulfide cermets with varying excess chromium

The shock response of chromium sulfide-chromium, a cermet of potential interest as a matrix material for ballistic applications, has been investigated at two molar ratios. Using a combustion synthesis technique allowed for control of the molar ratio of the material, which was investigated under near-stoichiometric (cermet) and excess chromium (interpenetrating composite) conditions, representing chromium:sulfur molar ratios of 1.15:1 and 4:1, respectively. The compacts were investigated via the plate-impact technique, which allowed the material to be loaded under a onedimensional state of strain. Embedded manganin stress gauges were employed to monitor the temporal evolution of longitudinal and lateral components of stress in both materials. Comparison of these two components has allowed assessment of the variation of material shear strength both with impact pressure/strain-rate and time for the two molar ratio conditions. The two materials exhibited identical material strength despite variations in their excess chromium content

Further investigations on the proliferative response of mouse bladder epithelium to 4-ethyl-sulphonylnaphthalene-1-sulphonamide.

4-ETHYLSULPHONYLNAPHTHALENE-1-SULPHONAMIDE (ENS*) induces hyperplasia of the bladder epithelium on administration to rats (Paget, 1958) and mice (Sen Gupta, 1962). Bladder tumours result from prolonged feeding of ENS to mice (Clayson and Bonser, 1965; Clayson, Pringle and Bonser, 1967). Hyperplasia is more severe and tumcours are more frequent in female than in male mice. The acute response to a single oral dose of ENS has been studied in some detail (Clayson et al., 1967; Lawson, Dzhioev, Lewis and Clayson, 1968; Levi, Cowen and Cooper, 1969). An increase in DNA synthesis, in the normally quiescent bladder epithelium, is induced at about 16 hours after the administration of the chemical, rises to a maximum at 30-36 hours and thereafter slowly declines. RNA synthesis, necessary for the increase in enzymes for DNA synthesis, occurs during the lag phase. Detailed histopathological, autoradiographic and stathmokinetic investigations show that DNA synthesis and subsequent mitosis occur in every cell layer and involve cells of all ploidies in this epithelium, in contradistinction to the behaviour of other multilayered epithelia in which DNA synthesis and mitosis i

Encrypted Shared Data Spaces

The deployment of Share Data Spaces in open, possibly hostile, environments arises the need of protecting the confidentiality of the data space content. Existing approaches focus on access control mechanisms that protect the data space from untrusted agents. The basic assumption is that the hosts (and their administrators) where the data space is deployed have to be trusted. Encryption schemes can be used to protect the data space content from malicious hosts. However, these schemes do not allow searching on encrypted data. In this paper we present a novel encryption scheme that allows tuple matching on completely encrypted tuples. Since the data space does not need to decrypt tuples to perform the search, tuple confidentiality can be guaranteed even when the data space is deployed on malicious hosts (or an adversary gains access to the host). Our scheme does not require authorised agents to share keys for inserting and retrieving tuples. Each authorised agent can encrypt, decrypt, and search encrypted tuples without having to know other agents’ keys. This is beneficial inasmuch as it simplifies the task of key management. An implementation of an encrypted data space based on this scheme is described and some preliminary performance results are given