The role of microRNAs in acute myeloid leukemia

MicroRNAs (miRs) are short (18-22 nucleotides) non-coding RNAs that are important in regulating gene expression. MiR expression is deregulated in many types of cancers, including leukemias. In acute myeloid leukemia (AML), the expression of specific miRs has been linked with both prognostically and cytogenetically defined subgroups. Recent studies have shown that deregulation of miR expression is not simply a consequence of AML but a potential contributer to leukemogenesis. This commentary will focus on select findings that describe the different mechanistic roles for miRs in the development of leukemia

Experimental Evaluation of Nearest Neighbor Exploration Approach in Field Environments

© 2017 IEEE. Inspecting surface conditions in 3-D environments such as steel bridges is a complex, time-consuming, and often hazardous undertaking that is an essential part of tasks such as bridge maintenance. Developing an autonomous exploration strategy for a mobile climbing robot would allow for such tasks to be completed more quickly and more safely than is possible with human inspectors. The exploration strategy tested in this paper, called the nearest neighbors exploration approach (NNEA), aims to reduce the overall exploration time by reducing the number of sensor position evaluations that need to be performed. NNEA achieves this by first considering at each time step only a small set of poses near to the current robot as candidates for the next best view. This approach is compared with another exploration strategy for similar robots performing the same task. The improvements between the new and previous strategy are demonstrated through trials on a test rig, and also in field trials on a ferromagnetic bridge structure. Note to Practitioners-This paper was motivated by the problem of inspecting confined spaces for rust and flaking paint with a manipulator robot arm. Existing approaches involve creating a large set of candidate robot poses to take a scan from. Evaluating all these candidate poses is very time consuming if full coverage is guaranteed. This paper suggests a principled method for restricting the size of this set in a way that does not reduce inspection coverage but decreases overall time taken for inspection

Emergent Universe from A Composition of Matter, Exotic Matter and Dark Energy

A specific class of flat Emergent Universe (EU) is considered and its viability is tested in view of the recent observations. Model parameters are constrained from Stern data for Hubble Parameter and Redshift ($H(z)$ vs. $z$) and from a model independent measurement of BAO peak parameter. It is noted that a composition of Exotic matter, dust and dark energy, capable of producing an EU, can not be ruled out with present data. Evolution of other relevant cosmological parameters, viz. density parameter ($\Omega$), effective equation of state (EOS) parameter ($\omega_{eff}$) are also shown.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures (accepted in MNRAS

Quantum Mechanics as a Framework for Dealing with Uncertainty

Quantum uncertainty is described here in two guises: indeterminacy with its concomitant indeterminism of measurement outcomes, and fuzziness, or unsharpness. Both features were long seen as obstructions of experimental possibilities that were available in the realm of classical physics. The birth of quantum information science was due to the realization that such obstructions can be turned into powerful resources. Here we review how the utilization of quantum fuzziness makes room for a notion of approximate joint measurement of noncommuting observables. We also show how from a classical perspective quantum uncertainty is due to a limitation of measurability reflected in a fuzzy event structure -- all quantum events are fundamentally unsharp.Comment: Plenary Lecture, Central European Workshop on Quantum Optics, Turku 2009

Fragmentation and OB Star Formation in High-Mass Molecular Hub-Filament System

Filamentary structures are ubiquitously seen in the interstellar medium. The concentrated molecular mass in the filaments allows fragmentation to occur in a shorter timescale than the timescale of the global collapse. Such hierarchical fragmentation may further assist the dissipation of excessive angular momentum. It is crucial to resolve the morphology and the internal velocity structures of the molecular filaments observationally. We perform 0".5-2".5 angular resolution interferometric observations toward the nearly face-on OB cluster forming region G33.92+0.11. Observations of various spectral lines as well as the millimeter dust continuum emission, consistently trace several $\sim$1 pc scale, clumpy molecular arms. Some of the molecular arms geometrically merge to an inner 3.0$^{{\scriptsize{+2.8}}}_{{-\scriptsize{1.4}}}\cdot10^{3}$\,$M_{\odot}$, 0.6 pc scale central molecular clump, and may directly channel the molecular gas to the warm ($\sim$50 K) molecular gas immediately surrounding the centrally embedded OB stars. The NH$_{3}$ spectra suggest a medium turbulence line width of FWHM$\lesssim$2\,km\,s$^{-1}$ in the central molecular clump, implying a $\gtrsim$10 times larger molecular mass than the virial mass. Feedbacks from shocks and the centrally embedded OB stars and localized (proto)stellar clusters, likely play a key role in the heating of molecular gas and could lead to the observed chemical stratification. Although (proto)stellar feedbacks are already present, G33.92+0.11 chemically appears to be at an early evolutionary stage given by the low abundance limit of SO$_{2}$ observed in this region.Comment: 37 pages, 23 figure

Constraints on Exotic Matter for An Emergent Universe

We study a composition of normal and exotic matter which is required for a flat Emergent Universe scenario permitted by the equation of state (EOS)($p=A\rho-B\rho^{1/2}$) and predict the range of the permissible values for the parameters $A$ and $B$ to explore a physically viable cosmological model. The permitted values of the parameters are determined taking into account the $H(z)-z$ data obtained from observations, a model independent BAO peak parameter and CMB shift parameter (WMAP7 data). It is found that although $A$ can be very close to zero, most of the observations favours a small and negative $A$. As a consequence, the effective Equation of State parameter for this class of Emergent Universe solutions remains negative always. We also compared the magnitude ($\mu (z)$) vs. redshift($z$) curve obtained in the model with that obtained from the union compilation data. According to our analysis the class of Emergent Universe solutions considered here is not ruled out by the observations.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figures, 1 tabl

A sliding window approach to exploration for 3D map building using a biologically inspired bridge inspection robot

© 2015 IEEE. This paper presents a Sliding Window approach to viewpoint selection when exploring an environment using a RGB-D sensor mounted to the end-effector of an inchworm climbing robot for inspecting areas inside steel bridge archways which cannot be easily accessed by workers. The proposed exploration approach uses a kinematic chain robot model and information theory-based next best view calculations to predict poses which are safe and are able to reduce the information remaining in an environment. At each exploration step, a viewpoint is selected by analysing the Pareto efficiency of the predicted information gain and the required movement for a set of candidate poses. In contrast to previous approaches, a sliding window is used to determine candidate poses so as to avoid the costly operation of assessing the set of candidates in its entirety. Experimental results in simulation and on a prototype climbing robot platform show the approach requires fewer gain calculations and less robot movement, and therefore is more efficient than other approaches when exploring a complex 3D steel bridge structure