Stabilized mixed approximation of axisymmetric Brinkman flows

This paper is devoted to the numerical analysis of an augmented finite element approximation of the axisymmetric Brinkman equations. Stabilization of the variational formulation is achieved by adding suitable Galerkin least-squares terms, allowing us to transform the original problem into a formulation better suited for performing its stability analysis. The sought quantities (here velocity, vorticity, and pressure) are approximated by Raviart−Thomas elements of arbitrary order k ≥ 0, piecewise continuous polynomials of degree k + 1, and piecewise polynomials of degree k, respectively. The well-posedness of the resulting continuous and discrete variational problems is rigorously derived by virtue of the classical Babuška–Brezzi theory. We further establish a priori error estimates in the natural norms, and we provide a few numerical tests illustrating the behavior of the proposed augmented scheme and confirming our theoretical findings regarding optimal convergence of the approximate solutions

Proteomic and phosphoproteomic study of the macrophage response to candida albicans using silac and simac

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Influence of MWCNT/surfactant dispersions on the mechanical properties of Portland cement pastes

This work studies the reinforcing effect of Multi Walled Carbon Nanotubes (MWCNT) on cement pastes. A 0.35% solid concentration of MWCNT in powder was dispersed in deionized water with sodium dodecyl sulfate (cationic surfactant), cetylpyridinium chloride (anionic surfactant) and triton X-100 (amphoteric surfactant) using an ultrasonic tip processor. Three concentrations of each surfactant (1mM, 10mM and 100mM) were tested, and all samples were sonicated until an adequate dispersion degree was obtained. Cement pastes with additions of carbon nanotubes of 0.15% by mass of cement were produced in two steps; first the dispersions of MWCNT were combined with the mixing water using an ultrasonic tip processor to guarantee homogeneity, and then cement was added and mixed until a homogeneous paste was obtained. Direct tensile strength, apparent density and open porosity of the pastes were measured after 7 days of curing. It was found that the MWCNT/surfactants dispersions decrease the mechanical properties of the cement based matrix due to an increased porosity caused by the presence of surfactants. © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd

Expresión diferencial de proteínas del citoesqueleto del macrófago tras la interacción con Candida albicans: Problemas en la normalización de las muestras

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Diving into the mouse macrophage cytoskeletal proteome upon the interaction with candida albicans

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Effect of gallium and vanadium in NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3 catalysts on indole hydrodenitrogenation

The effect of Ga as support modifier and V as second promoter on the NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3 catalyst varying the synthesis method (SG: sol–gel synthesis vs I: impregnation synthesis) was studied. The catalysts were characterized by elemental analysis, textural properties, XRD, XPS, 27Al NMR, Raman, EDX elemental mapping and HRTEM. The chemical analyses by XRF showed coincidence between experimental and theoretical values according to stoichiometric values proposed to Mo/Ni = 6 and (V + Ni)/(V + Ni + Mo) = 0.35. The sol–gel synthesis method increased the surface area by incorporation of Ga3+ ions into the Al2O3 forming Ga–O–Al bonding; whereas the impregnation synthesis leads to decrease by blocking of alumina pores, as follows NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3(I) < NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3(SG) < Al2O3-Ga2O3(I) < NiMo/Al2O3 < Al2O3-Ga2O3(SG) < Al2O3. The values of BJH mesopores mean size between 6.13 and 7.68 nm. XRD and XPS confirmed a bulk structure typical of (NH4)4[NiMo6O24H6]·5H2O and the presence at the surface of Mo4+, Mo6+, NixSy, NiMoS, Ni2+, Ga3+ and V5+ species, respectively. Raman showed that the sol–gel synthesis method reduces the interactions Ni-Mo sulfide-support and improvement the sulfidation degree NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3(SG) as showed sulfur analysis CHONS. The largest proportion of AlO4 content using the impregnation method to add Ga was verified by 27Al solid-state MAS NMR. The EDS elemental mapping confirmed that Ni, Mo, Al, Ga, V and S are well-distributed on support. The HRTEM analysis shows that the length and stacking distribution of MoS2 crystallites varied from 5.67 to 6.01 nm and 2.46 to 2.74 when using the sol–gel and impregnation synthesis method, respectively. The catalytic results revealed that the synthesis method induced the presence of gallium on the surface influencing the dispersion V5+ species, whose effect could have some relation with strength and density of acid sites that in turn influence the dispersion of the MoS2 phase, which correlates well with the indole HDN activities. The activities as indole HDN pseudo-first-order rate constants’ values (kHDN) from 0.29 to 2.78 mol/(m2·h): NiMoV/Al2O3 < NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3(I) < NiMo/Al2O3 < NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3(SG). Nevertheless, the nature of the active site can be related with reaction pathways, that is, NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3(SG) and NiMoV/Al2O3-Ga2O3(I) catalysts produce ECH through HIND, while NiMoV/Al2O3 and NiMo/Al2O3 produce EB by hydrogenolysis of HIND to OEA. In the regard, the Ga and V act as structural promoters in the NiMo catalysts, allowing the largest generation of NiMoS M-edge-like and BRIM sites for HDN

The MAL protein is crucial for proper membrane condensation at the ciliary base, which is required for primary cilium elongation

The base of the primary cilium contains a zone of condensed membranes whose importance is not known. Here, we have studied the involvement of MAL, a tetraspanning protein that exclusively partitions into condensed membrane fractions, in the condensation of membranes at the ciliary base and investigated the importance of these membranes in primary cilium formation. We show that MAL accumulates at the ciliary base of epithelial MDCK cells. Knockdown of MAL expression resulted in a drastic reduction in the condensation of membranes at the ciliary base, the percentage of ciliated cells and the length of the cilia, but did not affect the docking of the centrosome to the plasma membrane or produce missorting of proteins to the pericentriolar zone or to the membrane of the remaining cilia. Rab8 (for which there are two isoforms, Rab8A and Rab8b), IFT88 and IFT20, which are important components of the machinery of ciliary growth, were recruited normally to the ciliary base of MAL-knockdown cells but were unable to elongate the primary cilium correctly. MAL, therefore, is crucial for the proper condensation of membranes at the ciliary base, which is required for efficient primary cilium extensionThis work was supported by the Ministerio de Economıa y Competitividad, Spain [grant numbers BFU2012-32532 and CONSOLIDER COAT CSD2009-00016 to M. A.A.]. G.A. was supported by the Amarouto Program for senior researchers from the Comunidad Autónoma de Madri

Monoubiquitination of syntaxin 3 leads to retrieval from the basolateral plasma membrane and facilitates cargo recruitment to exosomes

Syntaxin 3 (Stx3), a SNARE protein located and functioning at the apical plasma membrane of epithelial cells, is required for epithelial polarity. A fraction of Stx3 is localized to late endosomes/lysosomes, although how it traffics there and its function in these organelles is unknown. Here we report that Stx3 undergoes monoubiquitination in a conserved polybasic domain. Stx3 present at the basolateral—but not the apical—plasma membrane is rapidly endocytosed, targeted to endosomes, internalized into intraluminal vesicles (ILVs), and excreted in exosomes. A nonubiquitinatable mutant of Stx3 (Stx3-5R) fails to enter this pathway and leads to the inability of the apical exosomal cargo protein GPRC5B to enter the ILV/exosomal pathway. This suggests that ubiquitination of Stx3 leads to removal from the basolateral membrane to achieve apical polarity, that Stx3 plays a role in the recruitment of cargo to exosomes, and that the Stx3-5R mutant acts as a dominant-negative inhibitor. Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) acquires its membrane in an intracellular compartment and we show that Stx3-5R strongly reduces the number of excreted infectious viral particles. Altogether these results suggest that Stx3 functions in the transport of specific proteins to apical exosomes and that HCMV exploits this pathway for virion excretion

Genetic feature engineering enables characterisation of shared risk factors in immune-mediated diseases

Abstract: Background: Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified pervasive sharing of genetic architectures across multiple immune-mediated diseases (IMD). By learning the genetic basis of IMD risk from common diseases, this sharing can be exploited to enable analysis of less frequent IMD where, due to limited sample size, traditional GWAS techniques are challenging. Methods: Exploiting ideas from Bayesian genetic fine-mapping, we developed a disease-focused shrinkage approach to allow us to distill genetic risk components from GWAS summary statistics for a set of related diseases. We applied this technique to 13 larger GWAS of common IMD, deriving a reduced dimension “basis” that summarised the multidimensional components of genetic risk. We used independent datasets including the UK Biobank to assess the performance of the basis and characterise individual axes. Finally, we projected summary GWAS data for smaller IMD studies, with less than 1000 cases, to assess whether the approach was able to provide additional insights into genetic architecture of less common IMD or IMD subtypes, where cohort collection is challenging. Results: We identified 13 IMD genetic risk components. The projection of independent UK Biobank data demonstrated the IMD specificity and accuracy of the basis even for traits with very limited case-size (e.g. vitiligo, 150 cases). Projection of additional IMD-relevant studies allowed us to add biological interpretation to specific components, e.g. related to raised eosinophil counts in blood and serum concentration of the chemokine CXCL10 (IP-10). On application to 22 rare IMD and IMD subtypes, we were able to not only highlight subtype-discriminating axes (e.g. for juvenile idiopathic arthritis) but also suggest eight novel genetic associations. Conclusions: Requiring only summary-level data, our unsupervised approach allows the genetic architectures across any range of clinically related traits to be characterised in fewer dimensions. This facilitates the analysis of studies with modest sample size by matching shared axes of both genetic and biological risk across a wider disease domain, and provides an evidence base for possible therapeutic repurposing opportunities