bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Receptor-ligand rebinding kinetics in confinement
Authors: Erbaş A. , Olvera de la Cruz M. , Marko J. F.
Published: July 2018

Rebinding kinetics of molecular ligands plays a critical role in biomachinery, from regulatory networks to protein transcription, and is also a key factor for designing drugs and high-precision biosensors. In this study, we investigate initial release and rebinding of ligands to their binding sites grafted on a planar surface, a situation commonly observed in single molecule experiments and which occurs during exocytosisin vivo. Via scaling arguments and molecular dynamic simulations, we analyze the dependence of non-equilibrium rebinding kinetics on two intrinsic length scales: average separation distance between the binding sites and dimensions of diffusion volume (e.g., height of the experimental reservoir in which diffusion takes place or average distance between receptor-bearing surfaces). We obtain time-dependent scaling laws for on rates and for the cumulative number of rebinding events (the time integral of on rates) for various regimes. Our analyses reveal that, for diffusion-limited cases, the on rate decreases via multiple power law regimes prior to the terminal steady-state regime, in which the on rate becomes constant. At intermediate times, at which particle density has not yet become uniform throughout the reservoir, the number of rebindings exhibits a distinct plateau regime due to the three dimensional escape process of ligands from their binding sites. The duration of this regime depends on the average separation distance between binding sites. Following the three-dimensional diffusive escape process, a one-dimensional diffusive regime describes on rates. In the reaction-limited scenario, ligands with higher affinity to their binding sites (e.g., longer residence times) delay the power laws. Our results can be useful for extracting hidden time scales in experiments where kinetic rates for ligand-receptor interactions are measured in microchannels, as well as for cell signaling via diffusing molecules.
A novel virulence phenotype rapidly assesses Candida fungal pathogenesis in healthy and immunocompromised Caenorhabditis elegans hosts
Authors: Feistel Dorian J. , Elmostafa Rema , Nguyen Nancy , Penley McKenna , Morran Levi , Hickman Meleah A.
Published: July 2018

The yeast Candida albicans is an opportunistic pathogen of humans, meaning that despite commensal interactions with its host, it can transition to a harmful pathogen. While C. albicans is the predominant species isolated in the human mycobiome and implicated in fungal infection, infections due to non-albicans Candida species are rapidly rising. Studying the factors that contribute to virulence is often challenging and frequently depends on many contexts including host immune status and pathogen genetic background. Here, we utilize the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans as a perspicuous and efficient model host system to study fungal infections of Candida pathogens. We find that in addition to reducing lifetime host survival, exposure to C. albicans results in delayed reproduction, which significantly reduced lineage growth over multiple generations. Furthermore, we assessed fungal pathogen virulence in C. elegans hosts compromised for innate immune function and detected increased early mortality, reduced brood sizes and delayed reproduction relative to infected healthy hosts. Importantly, by assessing virulence in both healthy and immunocompromised host backgrounds we reveal the pathogen potential in non-albicans Candida species. Taken together, we present a novel lineage growth assay to measure reduction in host fitness associated with fungal infection and demonstrate significant interactions between pathogen and host immune function that contribute to virulence.
Study of Sterilization Effects on Marine Vibrio sp. using Interaction of Cavitation with Shock Wave in a Narrow Water Chamber
Authors: Wang J. , Abe A. , Koita T. , Sun M. , Wang Y. , Huang C.
Published: July 2018

When underwater shock waves are generated by an electric discharge in a narrow water chamber, the instant release of a great amount of energy causes the propagation of a shear wave in wall material with the deformation of the chamber wall. The shear waves produce decompression in water and result in the growth of bubble nuclei. Subsequently, those oscillating cavitation bubbles are exposed to the shock pressures, and thus free radicals and rebound shock waves are generated due to their violent collapses. Eventually, marine bacteria around them are inactivated by these productions. In the present study, we investigate the sterilization effects of these oscillating bubbles and cavitation-shock interaction by bio-experiments, respectively. Furthermore, the chemical action of free radicals on marine bacteria is discussed. The generation of the OH radicals is clarified by measuring the concentration of the H2O2. To estimate the generation condition of the OH radicals, a bubble dynamic model consisting of an oscillation model for the growth of bubble nuclei and an impact model to describe the cavitation-shock interaction is developed. Finally, the theoretical estimation by the bubble dynamic model is discussed under the conditions of the present experiments.
Massively parallel characterization of regulatory dynamics during neural induction
Authors: Inoue Fumitaka , Kreimer Anat , Ashuach Tal , Ahituv Nadav , Yosef Nir
Published: July 2018

The molecular components governing neural induction remain largely unknown. Here, we applied a suite of genomic and computational tools to comprehensively identify these components. We performed RNA-seq, ChIP-seq (H3K27ac, H3K27me3) and ATAC-seq on human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) at seven early neural differentiation time points (0-72 hours) and identified thousands of induced genes and regulatory regions. We analyzed the function of ~2,500 selected regions using massively parallel reporter assays at all time points. We found numerous temporal enhancers that correlated with similarly timed epigenetic marks and gene expression. Development of a prioritization method that incorporated all genomic data identified key transcription factors (TFs) involved in neural induction. Individual overexpression of eleven TFs and several combinations in hESCs found novel neural induction regulators. Combined, our results provide a comprehensive map of genes and functional regulatory elements involved in neural induction and identify master regulator TFs that are instrumental for this process.

One Sentence Summary

Using numerous genomic assays and computational tools we characterized the dynamic changes that take place during neural induction.
Toxoplasma does not secrete the GRA16 and GRA24 effectors beyond the parasitophorous vacuole membrane of tissue cysts
Authors: Krishnamurthy Shruthi , Saeij Jeroen PJ
Published: July 2018

After invasion, Toxoplasma resides in a parasitophorous vacuole (PV) that is surrounded by the PV membrane (PVM). Once inside the PV, tachyzoites secrete dense granule proteins (GRAs) of which some, such as GRA16 and GRA24, are transported beyond the PVM likely via a putative translocon. However, once tachyzoites convert into bradyzoites within cysts, it is not known if secreted GRAs can traffic beyond the cyst wall membrane. We used the tetracycline inducible system to drive expression of HA epitope tagged GRA16 and GRA24 after inducing stage conversion and show that these proteins are not secreted beyond the cyst wall membrane.
Forecasting autism gene discovery with machine learning and genome-scale data
Authors: Brueggeman Leo , Koomar Tanner , Michaelson Jacob J
Published: July 2018

Background

Genes are one of the most powerful windows into the biology of autism, and it has been estimated that perhaps a thousand or more genes may confer risk. However, less than 100 genes are currently viewed as having robust enough evidence to be considered true "autism genes". Massive genetic studies are underway to produce data to implicate additional genes, but this approach, although necessary, is costly and slow-moving.

Methods

We approach autism gene discovery as a machine learning problem, rather than a genetic association problem, and use genome-scale data as predictors for identifying further genes that have similar properties in the feature space compared to established autism risk genes. This approach, which we call forecASD, integrates spatiotemporal gene expression, heterogeneous network data, and previous gene-level predictors of autism association into an ensemble classifier that yields a single score that indexes each gene’s evidence for being involved in the etiology of autism.

Results

We demonstrate that forecASD has substantially increased sensitivity and specificity compared to previous gene-level predictors of autism association, including genetic measures such as TADA. On an independent test set, consisting of newly-released pilot data from the SPARK Genomics Consortium, we show that forecASD best predicts which genes will have an excess of likely gene disrupting (LGD) de novo mutations. We further use independent data from a recent post mortem study of case/control gene expression to show that forecASD is also a significant predictor of genes implicated in ASD through differential expression. Using forecASD results, we show which molecular pathways are currently under-represented in the autism literature and likely represent under-appreciated biological mechanisms of autism. Finally, forecASD correctly predicted 12 of 16 genes implicated at FDR=0.2 by the latest ASD gene discovery study, while also identifying the most likely false positives among the candidate genes.

Conclusions

These results demonstrate that forecASD bridges the gap between genetic- and expression-based ASD gene discovery, and provides a data-driven replacement to much of the manual filtering and curation that is a critical step in ensuring the robustness of gene discovery studies.
bFGF expression is differentially regulated by cocaine seeking versus extinction in learning-related brain regions
Authors: Doncheck Elizabeth M. , Hafenbreidel Madalyn , Ruder Sarah A. , Fitzgerald Michael K. , Torres Lilith , Mueller Devin
Published: July 2018

In cocaine use disorder, relapse can be elicited by drug-associated cues despite long periods of abstinence. The persistence of drug-associated cues in eliciting drug seeking suggests enduring changes in structural and functional plasticity, which may be mediated by basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF, FGF2). Stimulant drug use increases bFGF expression in reward- and learning-related brain regions, such as the infralimbic medial-prefrontal cortex (IL-mPFC), and we previously found that this increase was reversed by extinction. However, whether bFGF expression is similarly modified in other brain regions is unknown. Therefore, we used the conditioned place preference (CPP) paradigm to assess bFGF expression following cocaine-associated CPP or extinction of that CPP within the mPFC, nucleus accumbens (NAc), hippocampus (Hipp), and basolateral amygdala (BLA). bFGF expression was increased in IL-mPFC and NAc-Core and -Shell following a cocaine-associated CPP, an effect reversed by extinction. Conversely, bFGF expression was increased in BLA following extinction, but no significant changes were observed in PL-mPFC or either dorsal or ventral Hipp. These results demonstrate differential regulation of bFGF following cocaine-associated CPP or extinction of that CPP in discrete brain regions. Changes in bFGF expression may regulate long-lasting drug-induced plasticity that underlies persistent drug-associated memories, and therefore present potential prophylactic targets.
The glue that holds an organization together: building organizational vision with top management teams
Authors: Lattuch Frank , Dankert Patricia
Published: July 2018

Purpose

Top-management teams often have no shared understanding of the organizational vision, or they find it unhelpful for decision-making due to its vague and uninspiring style. The purpose of this paper is to test a theory-based workshop to effectively develop a shared vision for organizational development and learning.

Design/methodology/approach

Based on the Collins and Porras (2008) vision framework, the authors tested a workshop design with top management teams.

Findings

The outlined vision workshop is a useful tool to develop a shared organizational vision in a systematic way.

Originality/value

This paper provides a practical approach to vision building that is relevant and shared by top management teams. Lessons drawn from the case analysis provide insights into the means by which organizations can shape their development through a compelling, guiding force.
Automatic enrolment to pension plans in small organisations: a research agenda
Authors: Maloney Maureen , McCarthy Alma
Published: July 2018

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to analyse how firm size impacts pension workforce coverage with a particular focus on automatic enrolment (AE) to pension plans in small organisations.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper examines the alignment of government AE interests with those of small employers, their employees and pension providers to better understand how firm size impacts pension workforce coverage.

Findings

The alignment of interests between stakeholders (government, pension providers, employers and employees) differs between large and small organisations, and empirical findings from large organisations cannot be assumed to apply in small organisations.

Research limitations/implications

The paper calls attention to the need for future empirical research and identifies a number of research questions for further analysis to examine how AE impacts pension participation in small organisations and advance the field.

Originality/value

The policy of automatically enroling employees into occupational pension plans, recently legislated for all eligible workers in the UK and under consideration in the USA and Ireland, was developed from research conducted in a small number of large organisations. Pension coverage is particularly inadequate for the large number of employees working in small organisations (1–49 employees). However, little research attention has been focussed on pensions in small organisations with pension policy makers assuming that legislated AE will work as effectively in small organisations as it did in large organisations. This paper addresses this gap in the field.
Earning tenure with outstanding teaching
Authors: Leech Nancy L. , Schnittka Jessica , Haug Carolyn A.
Published: July 2018

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to investigate motivation to teach for higher education faculty within schools of education.

Design/methodology/approach

This study utilized survey research methods to collect data from higher education faculty at nine universities identified from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of teaching website.

Findings

The predictor variables of gender, years of teaching in higher education, percent of overall workload devoted to teaching and two dummy variables for type of institution (i.e. doctoral granting and research II institution) when considered together did not statistically significantly predict whether or not a faculty person achieved tenure with outstanding teaching. In total, 14 of the factors influencing teaching (FIT)-choice scale components statistically significantly predicted whether or not a faculty person achieved tenure with outstanding teaching, only social dissuasion statistically significantly added to the model.

Originality/value

This is the first study to use the FIT-choice scale with university education faculty, and the findings suggest that higher education faculty may be motivated to produce high-quality instruction based on different factors than K-12 teachers.
Regulating bank leverage
Authors: Bleck Alexander
Published: July 2018

Purpose

This paper aims to study the design of bank capital regulation and points out a conceptual downside of risk-sensitive regulation. The author argues that when a bank is better informed about its risk than the regulator, designing regulation is subject to the Lucas critique. The second-best regulation could be risk-insensitive, which provides an explanation for the leverage ratio as a backstop to risk-based capital requirements. This paper offers empirical predictions and implications for policy.

Design/methodology/approach

The argument in the paper is based on analytical results from mechanism design.

Findings

Optimal bank regulation could be risk-insensitive, as is observed in practice in the form of the leverage ratio rule.

Originality/value

Counter to conventional wisdom, the paper argues and provides a new explanation for why bank regulation should not be sensitive to the risk of the bank. The paper then offers empirical predictions and implications for policy.
Determinants of employee trust during organisational change in higher institutions
Authors: Vosse Bart Jeroen Franciscus , Aliyu Olayemi Abdullateef
Published: July 2018

Purpose

The researchers in this study aim to understand the impact of a recent merger between two high performing institutions, on employee trust and well-being. The purpose of this paper is to quantitatively test the relationships between communication initiatives, human resource management initiatives, and cultural congruence and their impact on employee trust during organisational change.

Design/methodology/approach

To empirically validate these hypothesised relationships, 139 employees of the organisation were surveyed; the data were analysed using structural equation modelling.

Findings

The results indicate that HR planning and successful communication by the organisation are vital if a merger is to achieve the gains envisioned at its inception.

Research limitations/implications

Future research may explore longitudinal study to establish time of how employee trust are affected from the early merger announcement stage, during the merger-related activities and most importantly the post-merger period. The researchers are of the opinion, that understanding the impacts of change and how employee trust is affected during change is vital. The scope of this study permitted only three independent variables, consideration should be given for further research to explore the influence other activities may have on trust such as policy, government restraint, governance and internationalisation.

Practical implications

These results further establish the need for educational and commercial organisations to focus on internal and external relationship management and on communication strategies that can affect employees before, during and after a merger.

Social implications

Understanding factors that will influence employee vulnerability is important for any organisation as it is possibly the first step to understanding what planning needs to take place to foster change and consider contingencies pre, during and post-merger related change. Considerable thought and planning should be given to the re building of culture and regaining of lost trust post-merger.

Originality/value

This is the first empirical research that quantitatively test the relationships between communication initiatives, human resource initiatives, cultural congruence and their impact on employee trust during organisational change in higher academic institution. This particular study has further add value to change management research, particularly from New Zealand perspective where there is little literature on the current Institute of Technology and Polytechnic sector merger.
Exploring the application of co-design to transformative service research
Authors: Hurley Erin , Trischler Jakob , Dietrich Timo
Published: July 2018

Purpose

This paper aims to investigate in a transformative service research (TSR) context how users can be involved through co-design and what contributions they can make during this process.

Design/methodology/approach

A six-step co-design process was used to plan and facilitate two co-design sessions that involved a total of 24 participants. The collected data include field notes, transcripts from group discussions, recordings of idea presentations and the evaluation of ideas.

Findings

A recruitment strategy that uses strong networks and sensitizes users through generating awareness of the underlying issue can prevent the waste of valuable resources. During the facilitation stage, experts need to find the fine line between close guidance and giving voice to the users. User-generated ideas set the starting point for new value propositions that more effectively support users in their value creation processes.

Research limitations/implications

The findings are limited to one specific sample and design task. Future research is required that investigates the application of co-design to other TSR contexts.

Practical implications

In TSR, organizations will need to follow a different co-design approach owing to the sensitive nature of the design task and/or users that are not driven by innovation-related motivations. Organizations should tap into their networks to raise awareness and recruit suitable participants. To capture users’ unique insights and foster the collective creativity, facilitation should focus on enabling participants through the use of design tools and team management.

Originality/value

The study contributes new insights into requirements, challenges and benefits of applying co-design to TSR contexts. The study shows that ordinary users, if empowered, can give important insights into the design of new value propositions.
Modeling sequential bargains and personalities in democratic deliberation systems
Authors: Nepomuceno Thyago Celso Cavalcante , de Moura Jadielson Alves , Costa Ana Paula Cabral Seixas
Published: July 2018

Purpose

This paper aims to introduce a negotiation support system (NSS) with a theoretical modeling that considers the aspects of human personality and negotiator’s behavior to assist the decision-making of public managers and stakeholders in democratic bargaining processes and support social-efficient outcomes.

Design/methodology/approach

A game theoretical modeling of public participatory negotiations characterized by complete and perfect information is explored with the inclusion of personality aspects and negotiation styles. The importance of the negotiation knowledge disclosure in the sequential bargains of participative budgeting is highlighted by an experiment with 162 state-owned companies’ managers and graduate students to present the contribution of the system’s applicability.

Findings

A considerable number of Pareto-efficient deliberation agreements are obtained with few interactions when the negotiation strategies and the personality aspects of opponents and stakeholders are freely available (a symmetry in the public negotiation knowledge). In addition to the set of Pareto-efficient agreements, those with the best social outcome (i.e. that maximize the group satisfaction despite individual losses) are observed when the informational tool for personality and negotiation style inference is enabled.

Originality/value

Many scholars argue for Pareto-efficient allocation instead of equal divisions of resources within participative democracies and public governance. This work provides a new system with an empirical application and theoretical modeling which may support those arguments based on the nonverbal negotiation aspects.
Individual environmental scanning as a barrier to collective processes in organizations
Authors: Borges Natália Marroni , Janissek-Muniz Raquel
Published: July 2018

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to understand how illusion of control (IOC) can affect the implementation of formal processes of environmental scanning in organizations.

Design/methodology/approach

Based on the proposed research question, an exploratory study was chosen, which could collaborate with future studies. There were conducted three semi-structured interviews with CEOs working in medium/large technology companies.

Findings

Behavioral traits were identified—such as overconfidence and underestimation of risks—which are directly related to the IOC’s theory. The belief that there is no added value to the company in adopting organizational strategic processes—such as environmental scanning—answers the research question and contributes to the development of new studies.

Research limitations/implications

This study has as limitation the fact that it proposed the interviews to an inexpressive number of respondents, exclusively with the intention to explore better the relation between the IOC and the formal processes of environmental scanning.

Practical implications

This research advances the understanding of the difficulty in adopting formal environmental scanning practices in organizations. It can also help understand the motivations of executives for adopting (or not adopting) such practices. Finally, it is possible to know and understand the individual approach to environmental scanning, as well as its limitations.

Originality/value

This research discusses the themes of IOC and environmental scanning, demonstrating how cognitive factors can affect strategic decision making in an organization. Although the IOC is well-developed in the field of psychology, it can be very helpful in understanding business management and executive behavior.
Robust and efficient vanishing point detection in unstructured road scenes for assistive navigation
Authors: Han Jiaming , Yang Zhong , Hu Guoxiong , Fang Ting , Xu Hao
Published: July 2018

Purpose

This paper aims to propose a robust and efficient method for vanishing point detection in unstructured road scenes.

Design/methodology/approach

The proposed method includes two main stages: drivable region estimation and vanishing point detection. In drivable region estimation stage, the road image is segmented into a set of patches; then the drivable region is estimated by the patch-wise manifold ranking. In vanishing point detection stage, the LSD method is used to extract the straight lines; then a series of principles are proposed to remove the noise lines. Finally, the vanishing point is detected by a novel voting strategy.

Findings

The proposed method is validated on various unstructured road images collected from the real world. It is more robust and more efficient than the state-of-the-art method and the other three recent methods. Experimental results demonstrate that the detected vanishing point is practical for vision-sensor-based navigation in complex unstructured road scenes.

Originality/value

This paper proposes a patch-wise manifold ranking method to estimate the drivable region that contains most of the informative clues for vanishing point detection. Based on the removal of the noise lines through a series of principles, a novel voting strategy is proposed to detect the vanishing point.
Delaying conservation actions matters for species vulnerable to climate change
Authors: Naujokaitis‐Lewis Ilona , Pomara Lars Y. , Zuckerberg Benjamin
Published: July 2018

Climate change vulnerability assessments are commonly used to identify species or populations at risk from global climate change, but few translate impact assessments to climate change adaptation actions. Furthermore, most climate change adaptation efforts emphasize where to implement management actions, whereas timing remains largely overlooked. The rate of modern climate change introduces urgency in evaluating whether delaying conservation actions compromises their efficacy for reaching important conservation targets.

We evaluated the importance of multiple climate change adaptation strategies including timing of actions on preventing extinctions for a threatened climate‐sensitive species, the Eastern Massasauga rattlesnake (Sistrurus catenatus). We parameterized a range‐wide population viability analysis model that related demographic sensitivities to drought events and human‐modified land cover to assess vulnerability to future climate change. Using simulations, we assessed the efficacy and trade‐offs associated with alternative climate adaptation strategies aimed at maximizing the number of future populations including when to initiate conservation actions, duration of management, number of managed populations, and local management effectiveness.

Population‐level projections under future climate change scenarios revealed a broad‐scale pattern of range contraction in the southwestern portion of the current range. Along the extinction gradient, we identified demographic strongholds and refugia critical for population persistence under climate change as well as populations at high risk of extinction and candidates for climate change adaptation actions.

In the context of future climate change, the timing of conservation actions was crucial; acting earlier maximized chances of achieving conservation targets. Even considering uncertainty in climate change projections, delaying actions was less efficient and introduced undesirable trade‐offs including the need to implement conservation actions for longer or targeting more populations to achieve a similar conservation target.

Synthesis and applications. Our findings highlight how acting quickly reduces risk and improves outcomes for a highly vulnerable species under future climate change. Climate change vulnerability assessments require translation of model‐based outputs into tractable information for climate change adaptation planning. Quantifying trade‐offs associated with the multidimensional decision space related to species conservation and recovery planning is a critical step in climate change adaptation.
Correlation between attitudes, concerns, self‐efficacy and teaching intentions in inclusive education evidence from German pre‐service teachers using international scales
Authors: Miesera Susanne , DeVries Jeffrey M. , Jungjohann Jana , Gebhardt Markus
Published: July 2018

The inclusion of pupils with special educational needs (SEN) in schools is an ongoing challenge – it demands the development of an adapted teaching and learning environment, which, in turn, requires a corresponding teacher education programme. Studies indicate that personal characteristics of the respective teachers are one of the main influencing factors on the classroom environment. This article reports on a study of the role of teacher‐related factors, attitudes, concerns and efficacy in inclusion by testing existing survey instruments of 909 pre‐service teachers in Germany. A confirmatory factor analysis was applied to new German translations of four instruments:Attitudes Towards Inclusion Scale,Intention to Teach in Inclusive Classroom Scale,Concerns about Inclusive Education Scale, and theTeacher Efficacy for Inclusive Practices. With minor modifications, models demonstrated good fit measures and partial measurement invariance between special school pre‐service teachers and general pre‐service teachers. A combined model of all four scales confirmed that lower concerns were related to attitudes that are more positive, greater self‐efficacy and stronger intentions to teaching inclusively. Implications for teacher‐training and comparisons to other international samples are discussed.
Consequence of Elevated Fibroblast Growth Factor 23 Levels in Acute Kidney Injury, Renal Recovery and Overall Survival in Intensive Care Unit Patients After Major Surgery
Authors: Sakan Sanja , Premuzic Vedran , Bandic Pavlovic Daniela , Basic‐Jukic Nikolina
Published: July 2018

The main goal of our study was to investigate the role of increased fibroblast growth factor 23 (FGF23) levels on renal recovery and overall survival. We conducted a prospective case‐control cohort study, which included 121 adult cases who developed AKI after major surgical procedures. The subjects were followed‐up until the last enrolled patient survived 180 days or until the time of death. Higher FGF23 levels positively correlated with serum creatinine levels (P < 0.05). Significantly higher number of patients without diuresis and with FGF23 ≤ 709 RU/mL survived when compared to patients without diuresis and with FGF23 ≥ 709 RU/mL (P < 0.001). FGF23 levels >709 RU/mL were a good predictive tool for overall mortality in a 6‐month period (P < 0.05). This is the first study to analyze the impact of FGF23 values on short‐term renal recovery and survival of patients with AKI after major surgery. The FGF23 increase related to AKI especially in more severe stages and in patients without diuresis is an independent risk factor for mortality.
Effect of Neutral pH Icodextrin Peritoneal Dialysis Fluid on Mesothelial Cells
Authors: Higuchi Chieko , Kuriyma Junko , Sakura Hiroshi
Published: July 2018

Conventional acidic icodextrin peritoneal dialysate (CI) has low biocompatibility due to its low pH, and a neutral pH icodextrin dialysate (NI) was developed. The influence of NI on the peritoneum has not been clarified. The effects of the two dialysates on cultured rat mesothelial cells were examined. CI, but not NI, increased α‐smooth muscle actin, collagen type 1 and 3, and P21 mRNA expressions. CI with neutralized pH did not improve these harmful effects. With NI+ glucose degradation products (GDPs: same concentration as CI), mRNA expressions were comparable to those with NI alone. However, if NI + GDPs was acidified, mRNA levels matched those with CI. The proportion in the G2/M phase of the cell cycle was lower with CI than with NI stimulation. From these results, CI stimulated epithelial‐mesenchymal transition, fibrotic changes, inhibited cell growth, and induced cell senescence. These effects were attributed to the combined low pH and high GDPs.
Communicating health—Optimising young adults’ engagement with health messages using social media: Study protocol
Authors: Lombard Catherine , Brennan Linda , Reid Michael , Klassen Karen M. , Palermo Claire , Walker Troy , Lim Megan S.C. , Dean Moira , Mccaffrey Tracy A. , Truby Helen
Published: July 2018

Background

Obesity is a global health problem. Understanding how to utilise social media (SM) as a platform for intervention and engagement with young adults (YAs) will help the practitioners to harness this media more effectively for obesity prevention.

Aim

Communicating health (CH) aims to understand the use of SM by YAs, including Aboriginal YAs, and in doing so will improve the effectiveness of SM strategies to motivate, engage and retain YAs in interventions to reduce the risk of obesity, and identify and disseminate effective ways for health professionals to deliver obesity prevention interventions via SM.

Methods

The present study describes the theoretical framework and methodologies for the CH study, which is organised into four interrelated phases, each building on the outcomes of preceding phases. Phase 1 is a mixed methods approach to understand how YAs use SM to navigate their health issues, including healthy eating. Phase 2 utilises co‐creation workshops where YAs and public health practitioners collaboratively generate healthy eating messages and communication strategies. Phase 3 evaluates these messages in a real‐world setting. Phase 4 is the translation phase where public health practitioners use outcomes from CH to inform future strategies and to develop tools for SM for use by stakeholders and the research community.

Discussion

The outcomes will include a rich understanding of psychosocial drivers and behaviours associated with healthy eating and will provide insight into the use of SM to reach and influence the health and eating behaviours of YAs.
Capture enrichment of aquatic environmental DNA: A first proof of concept
Authors: Wilcox Taylor M. , Zarn Katherine E. , Piggott Maxine P. , Young Michael K. , McKelvey Kevin S. , Schwartz Michael K.
Published: July 2018

Environmental DNA (eDNA) sampling—the detection of genetic material in the environment to infer species presence—has rapidly grown as a tool for sampling aquatic animal communities. A potentially powerful feature of environmental sampling is that all taxa within the habitat shed DNA and so may be detectable, creating opportunity for whole‐community assessments. However, animal DNA in the environment tends to be comparatively rare, making it necessary to enrich for genetic targets from focal taxa prior to sequencing. Current metabarcoding approaches for enrichment rely on bulk amplification using conserved primer annealing sites, which can result in skewed relative sequence abundance and failure to detect some taxa because of PCR bias. Here, we test capture enrichment via hybridization as an alternative strategy for target enrichment using a series of experiments on environmental samples and laboratory‐generated, known‐composition DNA mixtures. Capture enrichment resulted in detecting multiple species in both kinds of samples, and postcapture relative sequence abundance accurately reflected initial relative template abundance. However, further optimization is needed to permit reliable species detection at the very low‐DNA quantities typical of environmental samples (<0.1 ng DNA). We estimate that our capture protocols are comparable to, but less sensitive than, current PCR‐based eDNA analyses.
Economic Foundations of the Territorial State System
Authors: Acharya Avidit , Lee Alexander
Published: July 2018

The contemporary world is organized into a system of territorial states in which rulers exercise authority inside clearly defined boundaries and recognize the authority of other rulers outside those boundaries. We develop a model to explain how the major economic and military developments in Europe starting in the fifteenth century contributed to the development of this system. Our model rationalizes the system as an economic cartel in which self‐interested and forward‐looking rulers maintain high tax revenues by reducing competition in the “market for governance.”
Building Bigness: Reputation, Prominence, and Social Capital in Rural South India
Authors: Power Eleanor A. , Ready Elspeth
Published: July 2018

Anthropologists have long been concerned with how reputations help people gain the support of others. Here, we study the support ties among adult residents of two Tamil villages, asking how reputational standing in each village mediates access to social support. We find that a reputation for influence has the weakest effect on support ties with others, while a reputation for generosity has the strongest. Further, a reputation for influence is not associated with greater connections to people of “high position” outside the village. Given the weak effects of a reputation for influence, we turn to a network measure of social capital, weighted PageRank centrality. While persons who are recognized as influential often also have an influential network position, there are many others who have similarly high centrality—including, notably, many women. Consequently, we suggest that much of the anthropological evidence for the benefits of prominence may actually reflect the returns to greater social capital and that both may be shaped in large part by acts of generosity and mutual support. By studying social capital, we can achieve a more complete accounting of the many different social strategies employed by all persons, not simply the few who achieve prominence. [reputation, social capital, network analysis, prominence, India]
DAC is dead? Implications for teaching development studies
Authors: Kilby Patrick
Published: July 2018

This paper argues that the Western paradigm of foreign aid promoted by the Development Assistance Committee is rapidly losing relevance in development studies and its related academic teaching programmes. The longstanding Southern‐led approaches to aid and development are now coming to the fore. China's Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence (finalised at Bandung in 1955) and the Eight Principles for Economic Aid and Technical Assistance to Other Countries (1964) are increasingly emphasised as points of difference to Western aid. It is the rise of the South that has challenged the dominant development paradigm(s) over the past 50 years. The discipline of development studies has been slow to address these challenges in how it trains future development practitioners. I will argue that development studies programmes in Australian universities have a focus on Western foreign aid: either questioning its hegemonic nature as a tool for neo‐liberal or neo‐colonial development on the one hand; or questioning aid effectiveness and how well it addresses contemporary challenges. This paper explores the challenges in examining South–South cooperation and a different development paradigm in producing relevant development studies curricula and pedagogies.
The ethics of (not) giving back
Authors: Hammett Daniel , Jackson Lucy , Vickers Daniel
Published: July 2018

Recent concerns with academic research ‘giving back’ and ‘having impact’ are encouraging the adoption of various practices through which academics are able to share research findings with host communities. While we support the laudable principles behind these efforts, in this contribution we reflect on the viability of such practices in relation to overseas, undergraduate fieldclasses. Drawing on our experiences of leading and teaching on a range of international fieldclasses, we explore the complexities of giving back and caution against a drift towards universalising such practices in specific ways. Instead we call for greater critical honesty as to the potential for fieldclasses to give back in multiple ways and the need to avoid inadvertently doing harm when seeking to engage in ethical practices.
Blueprints for the rational design of therapeutic mutacin 1140 variants
Authors: Kers Johan A. , Sharp R. Eryl , Muley Sheela , Mayo Melissa , Colbeck Jeffrey , Zhu Yihui , DeFusco Anthony W. , Park Jae H. , Handfield Martin
Published: July 2018

Lantibiotics represent a large untapped pipeline of attractive scaffolds for the development of novel antibiotics. Saturation mutagenesis was employed to substitute every amino acid of a lantibiotic called mutacin 1140 (MU1140), creating an unbiased expression library of 418 variants that was used to study the permissiveness to mutagenesis and the “drugability” of several compounds. Contrasting previous reports, the results from this study supported that not all residues involved in lanthionine bridge formation were critical for maintaining optimal activity. While substitutions in lanthionine bridges in Ring A, C, and D invariably lead to inactive variants, permissive substitutions in Abu8 and Ala11 (Ring B) were observed, albeit infrequently. Further, the data generated suggested that the unsaturated bond from Dha5 (Ser5) may not be critically involved in Lipid‐II binding but still important for conferring optimal activity. This study identified additional permissive mutations of Ser5, including Ser5His, Ser5Met, Ser5Gln, and Ser5Leu. In contrast, no permissive substitutions were identified for Dhb14, which suggested that this residue may be critical for optimal activity. Novel blueprints are proposed for directing further development of MU1140 variants and other lantibiotics, which may enable the rational design, development, manufacture, and formulation of an entirely new class of anti‐infectives.
Peri‐implant tissue healing at implants with different designs and placement protocols: An experimental study in dogs
Authors: Oskarsson Monika , Otsuki Motohiro , Welander Maria , Abrahamsson Ingemar
Published: July 2018

Objectives

To compare the peri‐implant tissue response to subcrestal or crestal placement of implants with or without “platform‐switched” implant/abutment connections.

Material and methods

On each side of the mandible in six Labrador dogs, two “platform‐switched” (PS) implants and two implants with matching implant/abutment diameters (PM) were placed in a crestal or a 1.5 mm subcrestal position. Sulcus formers/abutments were connected, baseline radiographs obtained and the distance between the abutment‐fixture junction (A/F) and the marginal bone level (B) was determined. Five months later, radiographic and clinical examinations were repeated and biopsies were obtained and processed for histological analysis.

Results

The radiographic analysis showed that marginal bone level changes occurred during the first observation period (13 weeks). PS‐implants showed minor marginal bone level alterations during the full observation period (20 weeks), regardless of placement depth. For PM‐implants, placement had a significant impact on bone level changes; crestal placement resulted in a mean bone loss of 0.4 mm and subcrestal placement in a 1.5 mm bone loss. The histometric measurements resulted in a distance A/F‐B of 0.6 and 0.0 mm for PS implants, placed in a crestal or subcrestal position, respectively. The corresponding distance at PM‐implants was 1.5 mm irrespective of placement protocol. The peri‐implant mucosa was thicker at subcrestally placed implants as compared to a crestal placement.

Conclusions

Bone remodeling occurred within the early healing phase. During the full 20 weeks of observation, PS‐implants demonstrated significantly less crestal bone loss compared to PM‐implants.
Use of ambiguous detections to improve estimates from species distribution models
Authors: Louvrier Julie , Molinari‐Jobin Anja , Kéry Marc , Chambert Thierry , Miller David , Zimmermann Fridolin , Marboutin Eric , Molinari Paolo , Müeller Oliver , Černe Rok , Gimenez Olivier
Published: July 2018

As large carnivores recover throughout Europe, their distribution needs to be studied to determine their conservation status and assess the potential for human‐carnivore conflicts. However, efficient monitoring of many large carnivore species is challenging due to their rarity, elusive behavior, and large home ranges. Their monitoring can include opportunistic sightings from citizens in addition to designed surveys. Two types of detection errors may occur in such monitoring schemes: false negatives and false positives. False‐negative detections can be accounted for in species distribution models (SDMs) that deal with imperfect detection. False‐positive detections, due to species misidentification, have rarely been accounted for in SDMs. Generally, researchers use ad hoc data‐filtering methods to discard ambiguous observations prior to analysis. These practices may discard valuable ecological information on the distribution of a species. We investigated the costs and benefits of including data types that may include false positives rather than discarding them for SDMs of large carnivores. We used a dynamic occupancy model that simultaneously accounts for false negatives and positives to jointly analyze data that included both unambiguous detections and ambiguous detections. We used simulations to compare the performances of our model with a model fitted on unambiguous data only. We tested the 2 models in 4 scenarios in which parameters that control false‐positive detections and true detections varied. We applied our model to data from the monitoring of the Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx) in the European Alps. The addition of ambiguous detections increased the precision of parameter estimates. For the Eurasian lynx, incorporating ambiguous detections produced more precise estimates of the ecological parameters and revealed additional occupied sites in areas where the species is likely expanding. Overall, we found that ambiguous data should be considered when studying the distribution of large carnivores through the use of dynamic occupancy models that account for misidentification.