Relative Booster Ideals of Distributive p-algebras

In this article, the definition and characterization of relative booster ideals in distributive p-algebras are given. The relationship between disjunctive relative booster ideals and normal relative booster ideals is established in the distributive p-algebras. A lattice congruence relation defined via the relative boosters is given and its quotient lattice structure is obtained

The homotopy theory of simplicial props

The category of (colored) props is an enhancement of the category of colored operads, and thus of the category of small categories. In this paper, the second in a series on "higher props," we show that the category of all small colored simplicial props admits a cofibrantly generated model category structure. With this model structure, the forgetful functor from props to operads is a right Quillen functor.Comment: Final version, to appear in Israel J. Mat

Optique: Zooming in on Big Data

Despite the dramatic growth of data accumulated by enterprises, obtaining value out of it is extremely challenging. In particular, the data access bottleneck prevents domain experts from getting the right piece of data within a constrained time frame. The Optique Platform unlocks the access to Big Data by providing end users support for directly formulating their information needs through an intuitive visual query interface. The submitted query is then transformed into highly optimized queries over the data sources, which may include streaming data, and exploiting massive parallelism in the backend whenever possible. The Optique Platform thus responds to one major challenge posed by Big Data in data-intensive industrial settings

Ontology Based Data Access in Statoil

Ontology Based Data Access (OBDA) is a prominent approach to query databases which uses an ontology to expose data in a conceptually clear manner by abstracting away from the technical schema-level details of the underlying data. The ontology is ‘connected’ to the data via mappings that allow to automatically translate queries posed over the ontology into data-level queries that can be executed by the underlying database management system. Despite a lot of attention from the research community, there are still few instances of real world industrial use of OBDA systems. In this work we present data access challenges in the data-intensive petroleum company Statoil and our experience in addressing these challenges with OBDA technology. In particular, we have developed a deployment module to create ontologies and mappings from relational databases in a semi-automatic fashion; a query processing module to perform and optimise the process of translating ontological queries into data queries and their execution over either a single DB of federated DBs; and a query formulation module to support query construction for engineers with a limited IT background. Our modules have been integrated in one OBDA system, deployed at Statoil, integrated with Statoil’s infrastructure, and evaluated with Statoil’s engineers and data

Angiotensin II Infusion Induces Marked Diaphragmatic Skeletal Muscle Atrophy

Advanced congestive heart failure (CHF) and chronic kidney disease (CKD) are characterized by increased angiotensin II (Ang II) levels and are often accompanied by significant skeletal muscle wasting that negatively impacts mortality and morbidity. Both CHF and CKD patients have respiratory muscle dysfunction, however the potential effects of Ang II on respiratory muscles are unknown. We investigated the effects of Ang II on diaphragm muscle in FVB mice. Ang II induced significant diaphragm muscle wasting (18.7±1.6% decrease in weight at one week) and reduction in fiber cross-sectional area. Expression of the E3 ubiquitin ligases atrogin-1 and muscle ring finger-1 (MuRF-1) and of the pro-apoptotic factor BAX was increased after 24 h of Ang II infusion (4.4±0.3 fold, 3.1±0.5 fold and 1.6±0.2 fold, respectively, compared to sham infused control) suggesting increased muscle protein degradation and apoptosis. In Ang II infused animals, there was significant regeneration of injured diaphragm muscles at 7 days as indicated by an increase in the number of myofibers with centralized nuclei and high expression of embryonic myosin heavy chain (E-MyHC, 11.2±3.3 fold increase) and of the satellite cell marker M-cadherin (59.2±22.2% increase). Furthermore, there was an increase in expression of insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1, 1.8±0.3 fold increase) in Ang II infused diaphragm, suggesting the involvement of IGF-1 in diaphragm muscle regeneration. Bone-marrow transplantation experiments indicated that although there was recruitment of bone-marrow derived cells to the injured diaphragm in Ang II infused mice (267.0±74.6% increase), those cells did not express markers of muscle stem cells or regenerating myofibers. In conclusion, Ang II causes marked diaphragm muscle wasting, which may be important for the pathophysiology of respiratory muscle dysfunction and cachexia in conditions such as CHF and CKD

Post-exercise contractility, diastolic function, and pressure: Operator-independent sensor-based intelligent monitoring for heart failure telemedicine

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>New sensors for intelligent remote monitoring of the heart should be developed. Recently, a cutaneous force-frequency relation recording system has been validated based on heart sound amplitude and timing variations at increasing heart rates.</p> <p>Aim</p> <p>To assess sensor-based post-exercise contractility, diastolic function and pressure in normal and diseased hearts as a model of a wireless telemedicine system.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We enrolled 150 patients and 22 controls referred for exercise-stress echocardiography, age 55 ± 18 years. The sensor was attached in the precordial region by an ECG electrode. Stress and recovery contractility were derived by first heart sound amplitude vibration changes; diastolic times were acquired continuously. Systemic pressure changes were quantitatively documented by second heart sound recording.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Interpretable sensor recordings were obtained in all patients (feasibility = 100%). Post-exercise contractility overshoot (defined as increase > 10% of recovery contractility vs exercise value) was more frequent in patients than controls (27% vs 8%, p < 0.05). At 100 bpm stress heart rate, systolic/diastolic time ratio (normal, < 1) was > 1 in 20 patients and in none of the controls (p < 0.01); at recovery systolic/diastolic ratio was > 1 in only 3 patients (p < 0.01 vs stress). Post-exercise reduced arterial pressure was sensed.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Post-exercise contractility, diastolic time and pressure changes can be continuously measured by a cutaneous sensor. Heart disease affects not only exercise systolic performance, but also post-exercise recovery, diastolic time intervals and blood pressure changes – in our study, all of these were monitored by a non-invasive wearable sensor.</p

Ultrafast and high-throughput mass spectrometric assay for therapeutic drug monitoring of antiretroviral drugs in pediatric HIV-1 infection applying dried blood spots

Kaletra® (Abott Laboratories) is a co-formulated medication used in the treatment of HIV-1-infected children, and it contains the two antiretroviral protease inhibitor drugs lopinavir and ritonavir. We validated two new ultrafast and high-throughput mass spectrometric assays to be used for therapeutic drug monitoring of lopinavir and ritonavir concentrations in whole blood and in plasma from HIV-1-infected children. Whole blood was blotted onto dried blood spot (DBS) collecting cards, and plasma was collected simultaneously. DBS collecting cards were extracted by an acetonitrile/water mixture while plasma samples were deproteinized with acetone. Drug concentrations were determined by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometry (MALDI-QqQ-MS/MS). The application of DBS made it possible to measure lopinavir and ritonavir in whole blood in therapeutically relevant concentrations. The MALDI-QqQ-MS/MS plasma assay was successfully cross-validated with a commonly used high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC)–ultraviolet (UV) assay for the therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) of HIV-1-infected patients, and it showed comparable performance characteristics. Observed DBS concentrations showed as well, a good correlation between plasma concentrations obtained by MALDI-QqQ-MS/MS and those obtained by the HPLC-UV assay. Application of DBS for TDM proved to be a good alternative to the normally used plasma screening. Moreover, collection of DBS requires small amounts of whole blood which can be easily performed especially in (very) young children where collection of large whole blood amounts is often not possible. DBS is perfectly suited for TDM of HIV-1-infected children; but nevertheless, DBS can also easily be applied for TDM of patients in areas with limited or no laboratory facilities

Whole-genome sequencing reveals host factors underlying critical COVID-19

Critical COVID-19 is caused by immune-mediated inflammatory lung injury. Host genetic variation influences the development of illness requiring critical care1 or hospitalization2–4 after infection with SARS-CoV-2. The GenOMICC (Genetics of Mortality in Critical Care) study enables the comparison of genomes from individuals who are critically ill with those of population controls to find underlying disease mechanisms. Here we use whole-genome sequencing in 7,491 critically ill individuals compared with 48,400 controls to discover and replicate 23 independent variants that significantly predispose to critical COVID-19. We identify 16 new independent associations, including variants within genes that are involved in interferon signalling (IL10RB and PLSCR1), leucocyte differentiation (BCL11A) and blood-type antigen secretor status (FUT2). Using transcriptome-wide association and colocalization to infer the effect of gene expression on disease severity, we find evidence that implicates multiple genes—including reduced expression of a membrane flippase (ATP11A), and increased expression of a mucin (MUC1)—in critical disease. Mendelian randomization provides evidence in support of causal roles for myeloid cell adhesion molecules (SELE, ICAM5 and CD209) and the coagulation factor F8, all of which are potentially druggable targets. Our results are broadly consistent with a multi-component model of COVID-19 pathophysiology, in which at least two distinct mechanisms can predispose to life-threatening disease: failure to control viral replication; or an enhanced tendency towards pulmonary inflammation and intravascular coagulation. We show that comparison between cases of critical illness and population controls is highly efficient for the detection of therapeutically relevant mechanisms of disease