Emerging tumor spheroids technologies for 3D in vitro cancer modeling

"Article in Press, Available online 31 October 2017" ; "S0163-7258(17)30268-1"Cancer is a leading cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide. Around 90% of deaths are caused by metastasis and just 10% by primary tumor. The advancement of treatment approaches is not at the same rhythm of the disease; making cancer a focal target of biomedical research. To enhance the understanding and promts the therapeutic delivery; concepts of tissue engineering are applied in the development of in vitro models that can bridge between 2D cell culture and animal models, mimicking tissue microenvironment. Tumor spheroid represents highly suitable 3D organoid-like framework elucidiating the intra and inter cellular signaling of cancer, like that formed in physiological niche. However, spheroids are of limited value in studying critical biological phenomenon such as tumor-stroma interactons involving extra cellular matrix or immune system. Therefore, a compelling need of tailoring spheroid technologies with physiologically relevant biomaterials or in silico models, is ever emerging. The diagnostic and prognostic role of spheroids rearrangements within biomaterials or microfluidic channel is indicative of patient management; particularly for the decision of targated therapy. Fragmented information on available in vitro spheroid models and lack of critical analysis on transformation aspects of these strategies; pushes the urge to comprehensively overview the recent technological advancements (e.g. bioprinting, micro-fluidic technologies or use of biomaterials to attain the third dimension) in the shed of tranlationable cancer research. In present article, relationships between current models and their possible exploitation in clinical success is explored with the highlight of existing challenges in defining therapeutic targets and screening of drug efficacy.The authors are thankful to European Union (Horizon 2020) funded project FoReCaST (No. 668983), the FCT fellowship to J. Silva-Correia (Grant No. SFRH/BPD/100590/2014), distinctions to J.M.O. under the Investigator FCT program (IF/00423/2012) and V.M.C. under the Investigator FCT program (IF/01214/2014) for supporting this work financially.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A history of “Busuanga,” an American hospital ship in Mindanao and Sulu, 1902-1919

American public health initiatives are usually seen as apolitical. In the context of the American occupation in the Philippines, however, readings of colonial documentary sources suggest that initiatives in the different socio-economic areas, including Public Health, have been used as a tool to advance colonial rule. Primary sources found in the Rockefeller Archive Center in New York, for example, reveal that the American government has initiated various initiatives in its colonies in collaboration with the Rockefeller Foundation. One of these initiatives is a medico-sanitary project in the Southern Philippines to attract the inhabitants of Mindanao and Sulu called the “Hospital Ship Busuanga.” This study presents a history of the Hospital Ship Busuanga as part of America’s policy of attraction in the Philippines. The history traces its journey first as a coast guard cutter in 1902, its transformation into a hospital ship in 1915, and finally its subsequent cease of operations in 1919. It looks into the roles played by doctors, missionaries, and government officials in the promotion and execution of the policy of attraction through the three main personalities involved in the creation and operation of the hospital ship Busuanga namely, Dr. Victor Heiser, Rt. Rev. Charles Brent and General Frank Carpenter. The study intends to serve as a lens in which one can find that the public health initiatives, like the Hospital Ship Busuanga have been used to serve more than its intended purpose

Zebrafish Skeleton Measurements using Image Analysis and Machine Learning Methods

The zebrafish is a model organism for biological studies on development and gene function. Our work aims at automating the detection of the cartilage skeleton and measuring several distances and angles to quantify its development following different experimental conditions

Classification phénotypique d'embryons de poissons zèbres par apprentissage supervisé

peer reviewe

Monitoring cutting- tool wear using signals from the control system

Varnost in zanesljivost delovanja industrijskih obdelovalnih postopkov je pomemben pogoj za gospodarsko donosnost. Motnje v postopku, kakor so kolizija,preobremenitev, izpad in obraba orodja, niso popolnoma razumljive in povzročajo napake proizvodnega sistema. Da bi preprečili vpliv različnih motenj obdelovalnega postopka, npr. obrabo in lom orodja, posvečajo moderni tehnoloski sistemi posebno pozornost napovedovanju stanja rezalnega orodja. Številne teorije o spremljanju skušajo klasificirati in pojasniti obrabo orodja, vendar se nobena ni dala zadovoljivih rezultatov, ki bi hkrati zagotovila prilagodljivo in preprosto obvladovanje postopka za sprejemljivo ceno. Brezzančna struktura modernega ali digitalnega krmiljenja odpira nove možnosti in perspektive v tem pogledu. V mnogih primerih kombinacija signalov digitalne opreme in internih podatkov krmilnega sistema stroja, skupaj z izpolnjenimi metodami analize signalov, lahko nadomesti zunanje sisteme za spremljanje. Vgradnje programskega modula za nadzor postopka v krmilni sistem stroja omogoča hitre reakcije, če se pojavijo motnje postopka, in sicer brez dodatnega povečanja računalniške opreme.Ta prispevek preučuje občutljivost signalov v nadzornem sistemu na postopke obrabe rezalnega orodja pri čelnem struženju.The safety and reliability of operation of industrial manufacturing processes is a very important prerequisite for economic production. Process disturbancessuch as collision, overload, breakdown and tool wear are not yet fully understood, and cause production-system failures. In order to prevent the effects of excess wear or eventual tool breakdown, modern technological systems pay particular attention to predicting the condition of tool. Numeroustheories of monitoring have tried to classify and explain tool wear, but none have given completely satisfactory results as yet, while at the same time ensuring flexible, simple and cost-effective process control. The open structure of modern digital control opens up new possibilities: in many cases the combination of digital plant signals and the internal data of the machine control system, along with advanced methods of signal analysis, can replace external control systems. The integration of a process-control software moduleinto the machine control system allows fast reactions, should there be any process disturbances, without any additional hardware expansion. This paper studies the sensitivity of signals contained in the control system to the cutting-tool wear processes in face turning

Data from: Phenotype classification of zebrafish embryos by supervised learning

Zebrafish is increasingly used to assess biological properties of chemical substances and thus is becoming a specific tool for toxicological and pharmacological studies. The effects of chemical substances on embryo survival and development are generally evaluated manually through microscopic observation by an expert and documented by several typical photographs. Here, we present a methodology to automatically classify brightfield images of wildtype zebrafish embryos according to their defects by using an image analysis approach based on supervised machine learning. We show that, compared to manual classification, automatic classification results in 90 to 100% agreement with consensus voting of biological experts in nine out of eleven considered defects in 3 days old zebrafish larvae. Automation of the analysis and classification of zebrafish embryo pictures reduces the workload and time required for the biological expert and increases the reproducibility and objectivity of this classification