Involvement of osmo-sensitive calcium influx in human sperm activation

OBJECTIVE: To compare the efficacy of Yagin, a factor Xa inhibitor derived from the leech Hirudo medicinalis, with those of heparin and hirudin as adjuncts to recombinant tissue-type plasminogen activator (rTPA) thrombolysis in a rabbit thrombosis model. METHODS: Thirty-one animals were allocated randomly to three groups, all administered four boluses of 0.25 mg/kg rTPA every 10 min for 30 min, 17 mg/kg aspirin intravenously, and heparin (as a 100 IU/kg bolus followed by infusion of 50 IU/kg heparin per h), hirudin (as a 2 mg/kg bolus followed by infusion of 1 mg/kg hirudin per h), or Yagin (as an 80 micrograms/kg bolus followed by infusion of 43 micrograms/kg Yagin per h). RESULTS: Administration of Yagin was associated with a significant acceleration of the reflow time, this time being 14.5 +/- 1.2 min with Yagin, 25.8 +/- 5.2 min with heparin (P < 0.0001, versus Yagin), and 28.7 +/- 16.0 min with hirudin (P = 0.012, versus Yagin). Overall patency did not differ significantly among the three groups. CONCLUSIONS: At the indicated single doses, inhibition of factor Xa by a relatively low concentration of Yagin was found to be superior than that with either heparin or hirudin for accelerating rTPA thrombolysis.     

Will Model-based Definition replace engineering drawings throughout the product lifecycle? A global perspective from aerospace industry

The Model-based Definition (MBD) approach is gaining popularity in various industries. MBD represents a trend in Computer-aided Design (CAD) that promises reduced time-to-market and improved product quality. Its main goal is to improve and accelerate the design, manufacturing and inspection processes by integrating drawing annotations directly onto a 3D model, therefore obviating the need to generate engineering drawings. However, its implementation throughout the whole product lifecycle has not yet been fully adopted. Traditional engineering drawings still play an essential part in the capture and distribution of non-geometric information. Based on thirty-four interviews conducted within the Engineering, Drafting, Configuration Management, Airworthiness and Certification, Manufacturing, Inspection and Knowledge Management departments from two Canadian Aerospace companies, the objective of this paper is to report on the main barriers that need to be overcome in order to fully implement the MBD initiative. In addition, the necessary elements and specific requirements needed to evaluate the capacities of emergent tools are proposed.     

Functional Materials for Two‐Photon Polymerization in Microfabrication

Direct laser writing methods based on two‐photon polymerization (2PP) are powerful tools for the on‐demand printing of precise and complex 3D architectures at the micro and nanometer scale. While much progress was made to increase the resolution and the feature size throughout the years, by carefully designing a material, one can confer specific functional properties to the printed structures thus making them appealing for peculiar and novel applications. This Review summarizes the state‐of‐the‐art of functional resins and photoresists used in 2PP, discussing both the range of material functions available and the methods used to prepare them, highlighting advantages and disadvantages of different classes of materials in achieving certain properties.     

A septin-based hierarchy of proteins required for localized deposition of chitin in the Saccharomyces cerevisiae cell wall

Just before bud emergence, a Saccharomyces cerevisiae cell forms a ring of chitin in its cell wall; this ring remains at the base of the bud as the bud grows and ultimately forms part of the bud scar marking the division site on the mother cell. The chitin ring seems to be formed largely or entirely by chitin synthase III, one of the three known chitin synthases in S. cerevisiae. The chitin ring does not form normally in temperature-sensitive mutants defective in any of four septins, a family of proteins that are constituents of the "neck filaments" that lie immediately subjacent to the plasma membrane in the mother-bud neck. In addition, a synthetic-lethal interaction was found between cdc12-5, a temperature-sensitive septin mutation, and a mutant allele of CHS4, which encodes an activator of chitin synthase III. Two-hybrid analysis revealed no direct interaction between the septins and Chs4p but identified a novel gene, BNI4, whose product interacts both with Chs4p and Cdc10p and with one of the septins, Cdc10p; this analysis also revealed an interaction between Chs4p and Chs3p, the catalytic subunit of chitin synthase III. Bni4p has no known homologues; it contains a predicted coiled-coil domain, but no other recognizable motifs. Deletion of BNI4 is not lethal, but causes delocalization of chitin deposition and aberrant cellular morphology. Overexpression of Bni4p also causes delocalization of chitin deposition and produces a cellular morphology similar to that of septin mutants. Immunolocalization experiments show that Bni4p localizes to a ring at the mother-bud neck that lies predominantly on the mother-cell side (corresponding to the predominant site of chitin deposition). This localization depends on the septins but not on Chs4p or Chs3p. A GFP-Chs4p fusion protein also localizes to a ring at the mother-bud neck on the mother-cell side. This localization is dependent on the septins, Bni4p, and Chs3p. Chs3p, whose normal localization is similar to that of Chs4p, does not localize properly in bni4, chs4, or septin mutant strains or in strains that accumulate excess Bni4p. In contrast, localization of the septins is essentially normal in bni4, chs4, and chs3 mutant strains and in strains that accumulate excess Bni4p. Taken together, these results suggest that the normal localization of chitin synthase III activity is achieved by assembly of a complex in which Chs3p is linked to the septins via Chs4p and Bni4p.     

Tattoo‐Paper Transfer as a Versatile Platform for All‐Printed Organic Edible Electronics

The use of natural or bioinspired materials to develop edible electronic devices is a potentially disruptive technology that can boost point‐of‐care testing. The technology exploits devices that can be safely ingested, along with pills or even food, and operated from within the gastrointestinal tract. Ingestible electronics can potentially target a significant number of biomedical applications, both as therapeutic and diagnostic tool, and this technology may also impact the food industry, by providing ingestible or food‐compatible electronic tags that can “smart” track goods and monitor their quality along the distribution chain. Temporary tattoo‐paper is hereby proposed as a simple and versatile platform for the integration of electronics onto food and pharmaceutical capsules. In particular, the fabrication of all‐printed organic field‐effect transistors on untreated commercial tattoo‐paper, and their subsequent transfer and operation on edible substrates with a complex nonplanar geometry is demonstrated.     

Ubiquitination is required for the retro-translocation of a short-lived luminal endoplasmic reticulum glycoprotein to the cytosol for degradation by the proteasome

In the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), an efficient "quality control system" operates to ensure that mutated and incorrectly folded proteins are selectively degraded. We are studying ER-associated degradation using a truncated variant of the rough ER-specific type I transmembrane glycoprotein, ribophorin I. The truncated polypeptide (RI332) consists of only the 332 amino-terminal amino acids of the protein corresponding to most of its luminal domain and, in contrast to the long-lived endogenous ribophorin I, is rapidly degraded. Here we show that the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway is involved in the destruction of the truncated ribophorin I. Thus, when RI332 that itself appears to be a substrate for ubiquitination was expressed in a mutant hamster cell line harboring a temperature-sensitive mutation in the ubiquitin-activating enzyme E1 affecting ubiquitin-dependent proteolysis, the protein is dramatically stabilized at the restrictive temperature. Moreover, inhibitors of proteasome function effectively block the degradation of RI332. Cell fractionation experiments indicate that RI332 accumulates in the cytosol when degradation is prevented by proteasome inhibitors but remains associated with the lumen of the ER under ubiquitination-deficient conditions, suggesting that the release of the protein into the cytosol is ubiquitination-dependent. Accordingly, when ubiquitination is impaired, a considerable amount of RI332 binds to the ER chaperone calnexin and to the Sec61 complex that could effect retro-translocation of the polypeptide to the cytosol. Before proteolysis of RI332, its N-linked oligosaccharide is cleaved in two distinct steps, the first of which might occur when the protein is still associated with the ER, as the trimmed glycoprotein intermediate efficiently interacts with calnexin and Sec61. From our data we conclude that the steps that lead a newly synthesized luminal ER glycoprotein to degradation by the proteasome are tightly coupled and that especially ubiquitination plays a crucial role in the retro-translocation of the substrate protein for proteolysis to the cytosol.     

Path-oriented keyword search over graph-modeled Web data

Keyword based search systems are becoming increasingly popular and are considered a key feature in many information management systems. Keyword based search approaches have the significant advantage of not requiring users to know how data is organized or stored. Typical approaches assume the dataset to be modeled as a graph, where answers to queries are sub-graphs ranked according to some criteria. Exploring the graph and building and ranking quality pose a number of challenges. In this paper, we discuss Yaanii, an approach for effective Keyword Search over graph-modeled Web data. Yaanii contains a novel approach to keyword search, by extracting the best results from the first set of answers and then combining a solution building algorithm with a ranking technique. In addition to the algorithms and the processes for building result sets, we provide a detailed study of the computational and ranking complexity of Yaanii and compare it with other approaches. We show that Yaanii is superior in terms of efficiency and quality of returned results from both the experimental and theoretical aspects.     

A distributed semantic network model for a collaborative intelligent system

A methodology based on topology theory to model a semantic network for a collaborative system is given. This framework is used to support the creation of a semantic network and to define the associated intelligent cooperative system. Our methodology is illustrated via a set of agents whose knowledge-base is a semantic network. By a series of functions applied on a base of entities, issued from the application domain, a family of sets are synthesized with their subspaces correlated. The resultant subspaces and their relations form a network of elementary and complex concepts that can be naturally represented with the IDEF1x language. A prototype Multi-Agent System (MAS), set up with the Zeus platform,¹ was developed for the Process Plan domain, which was used as a case study. Full correspondence among the subspaces, the semantic network IDEF1x information model and the MAS implementation is obtained by employing this framework.     

Chemical Profiling of Bosana Virgin Olive Oils Produced in Different Areas of Sardinia

In a 3-year study, the chemical compositions of extra virgin olive oils (EVOO) of Bosana variety deriving from three different growing areas in Northern Sardinia were characterized, together with the pedo-climatic conditions of the three different growing areas, to gauge any differences at the chemical level. The main chemical differences in the oils from the three-studied areas were recorded in the fatty acid profiles [palmitic, oleic, and linoleic acid; sum of saturated (SFA), monounsaturated (MUFA), and polyunsaturated (PUFA) fatty acids]: these dissimilarities were ascribable to the environmental characteristics of the Alghero area, while others analytical parameters such as tocopherols, pigments, phenolic, and volatile compounds were not affected by production area. Fatty acids profile revealed a clear relation with temperature at a mesoclimate level, allowing a clusterization of the production areas. Our study provided evidences that pedo-climatic factors affect the quality of EVOO; in particular, in the case of Bosana cultivar the acidic fraction resulted one of the main traits differentiating the olive growing areas.     

Surface analysis of aminated polypropylene films as an adhesion promoter to polycarbonate film

The surface composition of aminated polypropylene films (PP‐g‐NH₂) and their adhesion to polycarbonate (PC) film were evaluated. The detection of amine groups on PP‐g‐NH₂ surfaces was obtained by X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Contact angle measurements showed a decreased in the polarity on PP‐g‐NH₂ surface The adhesion between laminated films of PP‐g‐NH₂ and PC was evaluated by T‐peel test and optical microscopy. PC deposited on the PP‐g‐NH₂ surfaces was confirmed by FTIR‐ATR and SEM analysis of delaminated films, which is an indicative of an interaction between reactive sites of each polymer. The adhesion performance between PC and PP was improved by using amine modified polypropylene (PP‐g‐NH₂). © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2011