Automated analysis of 16-color polychromatic flow cytometry data maps immune cell populations and reveals a distinct inhibitory receptor signature in systemic sclerosis

Background. The phenotypic profiles of both peripheral blood and tissue-resident immune cells have been linked to the health status of individuals with infectious and autoimmune diseases, as well as cancer. In light of the promising clinical trial results of agents that block the Inhibitory Receptor (IR) Programmed Death 1 (PD-1) axis, novel flow cytometric panels that simultaneously measure multiple IRs on several immune cell subsets could provide the distinct IR signatures to target in combinational therapies for many disease states. Also, due to the paucity of human samples, larger (14+ color) ‘1-tube’ panels for immune cell characterization ex vivo are of a high value in translational studies. Development of fluorescent-based panels offer several advantages as compared with analogous mass cytometric methods, including the ability to sort multiple populations of interest from the sample for further study. However, automated platforms of multi-dimensional single cell analysis that allow objective and comprehensive population characterization are severely underutilized on data generated from large polychromatic panels. Methods. A 16-color flow cytometry (FCM) panel was developed and optimized for the simultaneous characterization and purification of multiple human immune cell populations on a 4- laser BD FACSARIA II cell sorter. FCM data of samples obtained from healthy subjects and individuals with systemic sclerosis (SSc) were loaded into Cytobank cloud, then compensated and analyzed with SPADE clustering algorithm. The viSNE algorithm was also employed to compress the data into a 2D map of phenotypic space that was subsequently clustered using SPADE. For comparison, the FCM data were also analyzed manually using FlowJo software. Results. Our novel 16-color panel recognizes CD3, CD4, CD8, CD45RO, CD25, CD127, CD16, CD56, γδTCR, vα24, PD-1, LAG-3, CTLA-4, and TIM-3; it also contains a CD1d-tetramer and a live-dead dye (with CD19 and CD14 included as a combined dump channel). This panel allows combinational IR signatures to be determined from CD4+ T, CD8+ T, Natural Killer (NK), invariant Natural Killer (iNKT), and gamma delta (γδ) immune cell subsets within one sample. We have successfully identified all subsets of interest using automatic SPADE and viSNE algorithms integrated into Cytobank services, and demonstrated a distinctive phenotype of IR distribution on healthy versus systemic sclerosis subject groups. Conclusions. Methods of automatic analysis that were originally developed for processing multi-dimensional mass cytometry can be applied to polychromatic FCM datasets and provide robust results, including subset identification and distinct IR signatures in healthy compared to diseased subject groups

Estudio de cúmulos abiertos jovenes

Una nueva ZAMS observacional está siendo determinada mediante cúmulos abiertos jóvenes. A partir de datos fotométricos existentes en la literatura se está realizando un análisis que tiene como punto de partida la reducción de todos ellos en forma homogénea. Este punto es considerado de gran importancia. Se intenta calibrar en el sistema fotométrico UBV la magnitud visual absoluta en función de ambos índices de color para aquellas estrellas más tempranas que B0.Asociación Argentina de Astronomí

Définition des familles de produits à l'aide de la logique floue

Dans cette thèse, la contribution principale porte sur la conception des familles de produits par l'application de la logique floue, ceci afin d’améliorer le processus de prise de décisions. Nous considérons que la formation des familles de produits, permet aux entreprises d'offrir une grande variété de produits. Cela permet alors de satisfaire une grande variété de différents types de clients sur un marché cible, et d’éviter une diversification coûteuse par la conception et la fabrication de produits personnalisés pour chaque client. La logique floue permet d’entrer l'information à fournir en des termes linguistiques familièrement exprimés par les personnes. C’est-à-dire qu’elle permet de considérer une information plus conforme à celle exprimée par les consommateurs; elle n'est pas limitée au maniement de variables binaires comme la logique booléenne. La logique floue à travers la formulation de différentes fonctions d'appartenance, est capable d'évaluer une variété de réponses pour une variable et pas seulement un «oui» ou un «non». Après l'analyse de littérature en ce qui concerne la logique floue et le développement des familles de produits. Nous concluons que le processus de prise de décisions est fondamental pour une formation effective des familles de produits et que le classement flou représente la base des processus de prise de décisions aidés par la logique floue. Pour cela, dans ce travail, différents outils assistés par la logique floue ont été développés et appliqués en cherchant à atteindre l'objectif principal. Premièrement, une procédure de classement flou a été améliorée pour permettre d'évaluer les relations de préférences entre plusieurs nombres flous avec différentes fonctions d’appartenance. L’amélioration de cette procédure a été la définition de vingt-neuf cas généraux pour représenter les différentes situations qui peuvent se présenter entre deux nombres flous. Ces cas généraux ont été aussi présentés comme un cadre de référence qui permet d'inclure d'autres fonctions d’appartenance. Postérieurement, en ce qui concerne la conception de familles de produits, différents outils ont été développés, appliqués et finalement intégrés dans une méthodologie globale pour la formation de familles de produits.----------ABSTRACT In this thesis, the main contribution is concerned to the design of product families by applying fuzzy logic, in order to improve the decision making process. We consider that the formation of product families enables companies to offer a wide variety of products allowing the satisfaction of different types of customers into the target market, and avoiding a costly diversification by designing customized products for each customer. Fuzzy logic allows entering information provided in linguistic terms familiarly expressed by the people. That is to say, it allows considering more consistent information close to the expressed by customers and it is not limited to handle binary variables as the Boolean logic. Fuzzy logic through the formulation of different membership functions can evaluate more answers of a variable instead of a just a “yes” or a “not”. After carrying out the literature review, regarding to the fuzzy logic and to the product family development. We concluded that the process of decision making is fundamental for the effectively formation of families of products, and that the fuzzy ranking is the basis of such process. In this work, various fuzzy logic-aided tools have been developed and applied aiming at achieving the main objective. First, an improved fuzzy ranking procedure for decision making in product has been proposed to permit the evaluation of the fuzzy preference relations among several fuzzy numbers with different membership functions. This fuzzy ranking procedure has been supported by the definition of twenty-nine general cases, which is enough to consider all the possible situations between two normal fuzzy numbers. These general cases have been presented as a framework to facilitate the inclusion of other membership functions. Later, regarding the design of product families, different tools have been developed, implemented, and integrated into a global methodology to form families of products. These tools include: a ranking procedure for fuzzy decision-making in product design to compare different products, a method to select products based on the fuzzy preferences of the customers, an iterative method to configure products for specific customers, a method to configure different products to satisfy the different segments of the market, and finally the integration of all these tools in a global methodology for designing families of products by using fuzzy logic

Playing With the City: Street Art and Videogames

In this paper we introduce and describe the phenomenon of videogame street art as a specific kind of street art. We consider its materiality and significance, and conceptualize it in the light of a double manifestation of play: the playful appropriation of the city by the artist and the fact that Street art encapsulates the act of playing videogames in a visual form. Digital play spills out of our computer screens and occupies the urban space with the explicit intention of involving spectators, who are invited to play in symbolic ways that actualize nostalgic memories of gaming and can be related to a more general “play turn” in our culture. </p

Desarrollo, feminismo y género: cinco teorías y una canción desesperada desde el Sur

En el presente trabajo se revisaron cinco teorías que tienen que ver con los temas de Desarrollo y Feminismo, incluida la perspectiva de Género, dicho análisis llevo a la reflexión de que se precisa de la igualdad humana, apuntalada en la igualdad de género para dar pie a la sostenibilidad global. Se concluye que un paradigma viable podría ser: mirar, entender e interpretar el mundo desde la perspectiva de la reproducción y la sostenibilidad de la vida. La implementación de procesos de análisis, reflexión y acciones desde el enfoque de Feminismos Descoloniales y/o Diversos; herramientas metodológicas: la historia conceptual, el análisis crítico de discurso y las sociologías transgresivas, permitirían  acontecimientos de liberación de la Madre Tierra y de la humanidad

Formas de hierro y aluminio en suelos con diferentes usos en la zona norte del departamento del magdalena, colombia

En el estudio se evaluaron las diferentes formas de hierro (Fe) y aluminio (Al) presentes en suelos cultiva-dos y en áreas de bosque de la zona norte del departamento del Magdalena (Colombia). Se seleccionaron seis zonas de muestreo localizados entre 0 y 1000 m.s.n.m. Se utilizaron tres técnicas selectivas de ex-tracción de Fe y Al con los agentes extractantes: pirofosfato de sodio, oxalato ácido de amonio, y ditionito citrato bicarbonato. los contenidos totales de Fe y Al fueron determinados mediante un ataque ácido y cuantificación por absorción atómica. El análisis de varianza multivariado mostró diferencias significativas (P and lt; 0.05) entre zonas y usos del suelo para todas las formas de Fe y Al extraídas, las cuales fueron mayores en suelos de bosques, en comparación con suelos de cultivo. Una alta proporción de Fe forma parte estructural de silicatos, en menor proporción de oxihidroxidos cristalinos y en una proporción muy baja se encuentra ligado a compuestos orgánicos; esto refleja una pobre evolución del humus en las zonas estudiadas. El Al extraído con oxalato amónico fue bajo ( and lt; 3% del Al total), lo que sugiere que un alto contenido de Al forma parte de estructuras cristalinas