Progress in pulsed laser deposited two-dimensional layered materials for device applications

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Human motion tracking based on complementary Kalman filter

Miniaturized Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) has been widely used in many motion capturing applications. In order to overcome stability and noise problems of IMU, a lot of efforts have been made to develop appropriate data fusion method to obtain reliable orientation estimation from IMU data. This article presents a method which models the errors of orientation, gyroscope bias and magnetic disturbance, and compensate the errors of state variables with complementary Kalman filter in a body motion capture system. Experimental results have shown that the proposed method significantly reduces the accumulative orientation estimation errors

Thylakoid-bound ascorbate peroxidase increases resistance to salt stress and drought in Brassica napus

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are cellular indicators of stress. In plants, they function as secondary messengers in response to environmental stress. Ascorbate peroxidase (APX) is an important enzyme directly involved in the scavenging of ROS. In this study, we aimed at identifying the function of the Brassica napus thylakoid APX (tAPX). Germination efficiencies of seeds of B. napus plants over expressing tAPX were higher than those of the seeds of the control plants; this was true both on Murashige and Skoog medium with 300 mM mannitol and with 150 mM NaCl. Further experiments showed that 40-day-old seedlings of the control plants turned yellow, withered, and subsequently died, when treated with 150 mM NaCl for 12 days. In contrast, transgenic plants over expressing tAPX survived this treatment and had at least three green leaves at the end of the experiment. When 40-dayold seedlings were withheld water for 10 days, followed by a 2 day recovery, the control plants exhibited smaller leaves and shorter stems in comparison to tAPX-over expressing plants. In addition, compared with control plants, tAPX-overexpressing plants show reduced hydrogen peroxide accumulation and increased APX relative activity. Our results demonstrate that tAPX plays an important role in resistance to salt stress and drought in plants.Key words: tAPX, transgenic lines, Brassica napus, salt stress, water deficiency

How To Perform Meaningful Estimates of Genetic Effects

Although the genotype-phenotype map plays a central role both in Quantitative and Evolutionary Genetics, the formalization of a completely general and satisfactory model of genetic effects, particularly accounting for epistasis, remains a theoretical challenge. Here, we use a two-locus genetic system in simulated populations with epistasis to show the convenience of using a recently developed model, NOIA, to perform estimates of genetic effects and the decomposition of the genetic variance that are orthogonal even under deviations from the Hardy-Weinberg proportions. We develop the theory for how to use this model in interval mapping of quantitative trait loci using Halley-Knott regressions, and we analyze a real data set to illustrate the advantage of using this approach in practice. In this example, we show that departures from the Hardy-Weinberg proportions that are expected by sampling alone substantially alter the orthogonal estimates of genetic effects when other statistical models, like F2 or G2A, are used instead of NOIA. Finally, for the first time from real data, we provide estimates of functional genetic effects as sets of effects of natural allele substitutions in a particular genotype, which enriches the debate on the interpretation of genetic effects as implemented both in functional and in statistical models. We also discuss further implementations leading to a completely general genotype-phenotype map

An IoT-Enabled Stroke Rehabilitation System Based on Smart Wearable Armband and Machine Learning

Surface electromyography signal plays an important role in hand function recovery training. In this paper, an IoT-enabled stroke rehabilitation system was introduced which was based on a smart wearable armband (SWA), machine learning (ML) algorithms, and a 3-D printed dexterous robot hand. User comfort is one of the key issues which should be addressed for wearable devices. The SWA was developed by integrating a low-power and tiny-sized IoT sensing device with textile electrodes, which can measure, pre-process, and wirelessly transmit bio-potential signals. By evenly distributing surface electrodes over user's forearm, drawbacks of classification accuracy poor performance can be mitigated. A new method was put forward to find the optimal feature set. ML algorithms were leveraged to analyze and discriminate features of different hand movements, and their performances were appraised by classification complexity estimating algorithms and principal components analysis. According to the verification results, all nine gestures can be successfully identified with an average accuracy up to 96.20%. In addition, a 3-D printed five-finger robot hand was implemented for hand rehabilitation training purpose. Correspondingly, user's hand movement intentions were extracted and converted into a series of commands which were used to drive motors assembled inside the dexterous robot hand. As a result, the dexterous robot hand can mimic the user's gesture in a real-time manner, which shows the proposed system can be used as a training tool to facilitate rehabilitation process for the patients after stroke

Ambient fabrication of flexible and large-area organic light-emitting devices using slot-die coating

The grand vision of manufacturing large-area emissive devices with low-cost roll-to-roll coating methods, akin to how newspapers are produced, appeared with the emergence of the organic light-emitting diode about 20 years ago. Today, small organic light-emitting diode displays are commercially available in smartphones, but the promise of a continuous ambient fabrication has unfortunately not materialized yet, as organic light-emitting diodes invariably depend on the use of one or more time- and energy-consuming process steps under vacuum. Here we report an all-solution-based fabrication of an alternative emissive device, a light-emitting electrochemical cell, using a slot-die roll-coating apparatus. The fabricated flexible sheets exhibit bidirectional and uniform light emission, and feature a fault-tolerant >1-μm-thick active material that is doped in situ during operation. It is notable that the initial preparation of inks, the subsequent coating of the constituent layers and the final device operation all could be executed under ambient air

Mapping quantitative trait loci in line cross with repeat records

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Phenotypes with repeat records from one individual or multiple individuals were often encountered in practices of mapping QTL in linecross. The current genetic mapping method for a trait with repeat records is adopted by simply replacing the phenotype by the average value of the repeat records. This simple treatment has not sufficiently utilized the information from the replication and ignored the impacts of the permanent environmental effects on the accuracy of the estimated QTL.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We propose to map QTL by using the repeatability model to directly analyze the repeat records rather than simply analyze the mean phenotype, improving the efficiency of QTL detecting because of adequately utilizing the information from data and allowing for the permanent environmental effects. A maximum likelihood method implemented via the expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm is applied to perform the parameter estimation of the repeatability model. The superiority of the mapping method based on the repeatability model over simple analysis using the mean phenotype was demonstrated by a series of simulations.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Our results suggest that the proposed method can serve as a powerful alternative to existing methods. By mean of the repeatability model, utilizing the repeat records on individual may improve the efficiency of QTL detecting in line cross.</p

Transthoracic echocardiography reference values in juvenile and adult 129/Sv mice

Background In the recent years, the use of Doppler-echocardiography has become a standard non-invasive technique in the analysis of cardiac malformations in genetically modified mice. Therefore, normal values have to be established for the most commonly used inbred strains in whose genetic background those mutations are generated. Here we provide reference values for transthoracic echocardiography measurements in juvenile (3 weeks) and adult (8 weeks) 129/Sv mice. Methods Echocardiographic measurements were performed using B-mode, M-mode and Doppler-mode in 15 juvenile (3 weeks) and 15 adult (8 weeks) mice, during isoflurane anesthesia. M-mode measurements variability of left ventricle (LV) was determined. Results Several echocardiographic measurements significantly differ between juvenile and adult mice. Most of these measurements are related with cardiac dimensions. All B-mode measurements were different between juveniles and adults (higher in the adults), except for fractional area change (FAC). Ejection fraction (EF) and fractional shortening (FS), calculated from M-mode parameters, do not differ between juvenile and adult mice. Stroke volume (SV) and cardiac output (CO) were significantly different between juvenile and adult mice. SV was 31.93 ± 8.67 μl in juveniles vs 70.61 ± 24.66 μl in adults, ρ < 0.001. CO was 12.06 ± 4.05 ml/min in juveniles vs 29.71 ± 10.13 ml/min in adults, ρ < 0.001. No difference was found in mitral valve (MV) and tricuspid valve (TV) related parameters between juvenile and adult mice. It was demonstrated that variability of M-mode measurements of LV is minimal. Conclusions This study suggests that differences in cardiac dimensions, as wells as in pulmonary and aorta outflow parameters, were found between juvenile and adult mice. However, mitral and tricuspid inflow parameters seem to be similar between 3 weeks and 8 weeks mice. The reference values established in this study would contribute as a basis to future studies in post-natal cardiovascular development and diagnosing cardiovascular disorders in genetically modified mouse mutant lines.Peer Reviewe

Identification and functional characterisation of CRK12:CYC9, a novel cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK)-cyclin complex in Trypanosoma brucei

The protozoan parasite, Trypanosoma brucei, is spread by the tsetse fly and causes trypanosomiasis in humans and animals. Both the life cycle and cell cycle of the parasite are complex. Trypanosomes have eleven cdc2-related kinases (CRKs) and ten cyclins, an unusually large number for a single celled organism. To date, relatively little is known about the function of many of the CRKs and cyclins, and only CRK3 has previously been shown to be cyclin-dependent in vivo. Here we report the identification of a previously uncharacterised CRK:cyclin complex between CRK12 and the putative transcriptional cyclin, CYC9. CRK12:CYC9 interact to form an active protein kinase complex in procyclic and bloodstream T. brucei. Both CRK12 and CYC9 are essential for the proliferation of bloodstream trypanosomes in vitro, and we show that CRK12 is also essential for survival of T. brucei in a mouse model, providing genetic validation of CRK12:CYC9 as a novel drug target for trypanosomiasis. Further, functional characterisation of CRK12 and CYC9 using RNA interference reveals roles for these proteins in endocytosis and cytokinesis, respectively