Hybrid practices in cord blood banking: rethinking the commodification of human tissues in the bioeconomy

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Taylor & Francis via the DOI in this record.The STS and bioethical literature on umbilical cord blood (UCB) banking nowadays discusses the field as divided into opposite institutional arrangements, public versus private banking. Public banks represent a model sharing economy, private banks a market economy that capitalizes hopes and tissues, and new hybrid forms that are emerging. We challenge that this distinction is analytically valuable for understanding the various forms of marketization, commodification and biovalue production that mark the UCB economy. Our analysis of current UCB banking practices, especially hybrid one’s, and their inherent visions of the future, shows that hybrid UCB banking criss-crosses the different economic models and concepts of commodification. The private, public, hybrid distinction is thus inadequate for a critically analysis of the complex UCB bioeconomies. Drawing on the perspective of social welfare systems analysis, however, the tripartite distinction emphasises an important ethical and biopolitical commitment to equality in current and future health care

Assets, Commodities and Biosocialities. Multiple Biovalues in Hybrid Biobanking Practices

This is the final version. Available on open access from STS Italia via the URL in this record.Biobanks are crucial institutions in the infrastructure of contemporary life sciences. They depend on the participation of donors who give tissues and data. Through their participa-tion, donors can build identities and form biosociality. Biobanks are key sites in the cur-rent bioeconomy, that enable the generation of value from those tissues and bioinfor-mation, transformed into assets or commodities. We define biobanks as hybrid zones of heterogeneous practices that blur the boundaries between institutional sectors and ways of producing economic values. On that basis we introduce a novel empirical, realist approach to the analysis of biobanking economies, explaining the different economic and social biovalues that emerge from the practices of valuing and interacting between the research-ers, biobank staff and donor participants in specific banking activities. We discuss why STS studies on biobanking should explore the concrete practices through which multiple biovalues as well as biosocialities are produced simultaneously and in configurations of mutual interdependence

Depinning of three-dimensional drops from wettability defects

Substrate defects crucially influence the onset of sliding drop motion under lateral driving. A finite force is necessary to overcome the pinning influence even of microscale heterogeneities. The depinning dynamics of three-dimensional drops is studied for hydrophilic and hydrophobic wettability defects using a long-wave evolution equation for the film thickness profile. It is found that the nature of the depinning transition explains the experimentally observed stick-slip motion.Comment: 6 pages, 9 figures, submitted to ep

Thin film evolution equations from (evaporating) dewetting liquid layers to epitaxial growth

In the present contribution we review basic mathematical results for three physical systems involving self-organising solid or liquid films at solid surfaces. The films may undergo a structuring process by dewetting, evaporation/condensation or epitaxial growth, respectively. We highlight similarities and differences of the three systems based on the observation that in certain limits all of them may be described using models of similar form, i.e., time evolution equations for the film thickness profile. Those equations represent gradient dynamics characterized by mobility functions and an underlying energy functional. Two basic steps of mathematical analysis are used to compare the different system. First, we discuss the linear stability of homogeneous steady states, i.e., flat films; and second the systematics of non-trivial steady states, i.e., drop/hole states for dewetting films and quantum dot states in epitaxial growth, respectively. Our aim is to illustrate that the underlying solution structure might be very complex as in the case of epitaxial growth but can be better understood when comparing to the much simpler results for the dewetting liquid film. We furthermore show that the numerical continuation techniques employed can shed some light on this structure in a more convenient way than time-stepping methods. Finally we discuss that the usage of the employed general formulation does not only relate seemingly not related physical systems mathematically, but does as well allow to discuss model extensions in a more unified way

Modelagem bioeconômica da transferência de embriões em bovinos.

O objetivo deste trabalho foi desenvolver um modelo matemático orientado a eventos de simulação, para auxiliar tomadas de decisão relativas à transferência de embriões em bovinos, considerando-se as dinâmicas de dois componentes da transferência de embriões: receptoras e embriões. Na simulação, não se avaliaram respostas individuais de doadoras a coletas consecutivas e eventos correspondentes na transferência de embriões. Simulou-se o mesmo protocolo para superovulação a todas as doadoras. Receptoras foram sincronizadas simulando-se o uso de prostaglandina. O número de embriões viáveis produzido por doadora e sua variabilidade tiveram como base um processo aleatório de simulação de Monte Carlo, que pressupôs uma distribuição exponencial negativa de densidade de probabilidade. Custos e receitas foram inseridos no modelo por meio de um cenário-base para calcular indicadores econômicos de rentabilidade. A análise sugeriu a impraticabilidade da atividade, se realizada diante do cenário proposto (VPL ? R$: 57.596,69). A partir do cenário proposto, o custo médio estimado foi de R$ 1.178,19, e de R$ 980,03, para se obter uma prenhez a partir de uma situação otimizada, sugerida pelo modelo (5/100; 5/190)

Robust area coverage with connectivity maintenance

Robot swarms herald the ability to solve complex tasks using a large collection of simple devices. However, engineering a robotic swarm is far from trivial, with a major hurdle being the definition of the control laws leading to the desired globally coordinated behavior. Communication is a key element for coordination and it is considered one of the current most important challenges for swarm robotics. In this paper, we study the problem of maintaining robust swarm connectivity while performing a coverage task based on the Voronoi tessellation of an area of interest. We implement our methodology in a team of eight Khepera IV robots. With the assumptions that robots have a limited sensing and communication range - and cannot rely on centralized processing - we propose a tri-objective control law that outperforms other simpler strategies (e.g. a potential-based coverage) in terms of network connectivity, robustness to failure, and area coverage

Algorithm for automatic genotype calling of single nucleotide polymorphisms using the full course of TaqMan real-time data

Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are often determined using TaqMan real-time PCR assays (Applied Biosystems) and commercial software that assigns genotypes based on reporter probe signals at the end of amplification. Limitations to the large-scale application of this approach include the need for positive controls or operator intervention to set signal thresholds when one allele is rare. In the interest of optimizing real-time PCR genotyping, we developed an algorithm for automatic genotype calling based on the full course of real-time PCR data. Best cycle genotyping algorithm (BCGA), written in the open source language R, is based on the assumptions that classification depends on the time (cycle) of amplification and that it is possible to identify a best discriminating cycle for each SNP assay. The algorithm is unique in that it classifies samples according to the behavior of blanks (no DNA samples), which cluster with heterozygous samples. This method of classification eliminates the need for positive controls and permits accurate genotyping even in the absence of a genotype class, for example when one allele is rare. Here, we describe the algorithm and test its validity, compared to the standard end-point method and to DNA sequencing