Nanoassisted Laser Desorption-Ionization-MS Imaging of Tumors

The ability of nanoassisted laser desorption-ionization mass spectrometry (NALDI-MS) imaging to provide selective chemical monitoring with proper spatial distribution of lipid profiles from tumor tissues after plate imprinting has been tested. NALDI-MS imaging identified and mapped several potential lipid biomarkers in a murine model of melanoma tumor (inoculation of B16/F10 cells). It also confirmed that the in vivo treatment of tumor bearing mice with synthetic supplement containing phosphoethanolamine (PHO-S) promoted an accentuated decrease in relative abundance of the tumor biomarkers. NALDI-MS imaging is a matrix-free LDI protocol based on the selective imprinting of lipids in the NALDI plate followed by the removal of the tissue. It therefore provides good quality and selective chemical images with preservation of spatial distribution and less interference from tissue material. The test case described herein illustrates the potential of chemically selective NALDI-MS imaging for biomarker discovery.     

Mathematical modeling of the partial hydrogenation of vegetable oil in a monolithic stirrer reactor

Experimental and theoretical studies on the partial hydrogenation of vegetable oil in a monolithic stirrer reactor are reported. A complete mathematical model of the reactor was developed, including hydrogenation and isomerization kinetics, catalyst deactivation, external gas–liquid and liquid–solid as well as internal mass transfer. The experimental studies were carried out in a Pd/Al₂O₃/Al monolithic stirrer reactor, at a wide range of temperatures (353–373 K), pressures (414–552 kPa), and catalyst loadings (0.00084–0.00527 kg_Pd,exp m^?3). Based on this model, simulated data can be used to evaluate the catalyst (Pd/Al₂O₃/Al) and the hydrogenation process in consecutive catalytic tests under different operating conditions. © 2014 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 60: 3524–3533, 2014     

A Perinatal Palatable High-Fat Diet Increases Food Intake and Promotes Hypercholesterolemia in Adult Rats

The main goal of the present study was to evaluate the long-term effects of a perinatal palatable high-fat diet on the food intake and cholesterol profile of adult rats. Male Wistar rats (aged 22 days) were divided into two groups according to their mother’s diet during gestation and lactation (C _p, n = 10; pups from control mothers; and HL_p n = 10; pups from mothers fed a palatable high-fat diet). At the 76th day, pups were housed individually for 14 days, and daily food consumption was determined during a period of 6 days. Blood from 100-day-old rats was sampled by cardiac puncture. Fasting (12 h) serum glucose, total cholesterol, LDL-C, HDL-C, triglycerides (TG), and VLDL-C levels were determined. The measurement of food intake was higher in the animals submitted to a hyperlipidic diet during the perinatal period. Serum total cholesterol, LDL-C, HDL-C, TG, VLDL-C and glycemia were increased in the HL_p group compared to the control group. Our findings show that an early life environment with a high-fat diet can contribute to metabolic disease in later life.     

Crossing textual and visual content in different application scenarios

This paper deals with multimedia information access. We propose two new approaches for hybrid text-image information processing that can be straightforwardly generalized to the more general multimodal scenario. Both approaches fall in the trans-media pseudo-relevance feedback category. Our first method proposes using a mixture model of the aggregate components, considering them as a single relevance concept. In our second approach, we define trans-media similarities as an aggregation of monomodal similarities between the elements of the aggregate and the new multimodal object. We also introduce the monomodal similarity measures for text and images that serve as basic components for both proposed trans-media similarities. We show how one can frame a large variety of problem in order to address them with the proposed techniques: image annotation or captioning, text illustration and multimedia retrieval and clustering. Finally, we present how these methods can be integrated in two applications: a travel blog assistant system and a tool for browsing the Wikipedia taking into account the multimedia nature of its content.

Delivering public value through open government data initiatives in a Smart City context

By using ICT in an innovative way, governments can improve the delivery of services and interaction with stakeholders. Open data is a way to help public organizations became more open and improve interaction with stakeholders. This paper aims to identify what are the public values enhancements acquired on smart city environment that discloses open data. We propose a conceptual model to analyze the smart city initiative. We contextualized the model taking a smart city domain by analyzing three related-initiatives that comprises open data in a smart city case carried at Rio de Janeiro Operations Center (COR) in Brazil by seven deep-interviewees directly involved - from inside and outside – in this case. The findings reveal evidences that open data initiatives contribute to enhance the delivery of public value in smart city contexts.     

The effect of hydrodynamic conditions on the detection of aqueous solutions of toluene by means of an inverted graded-index fiber

This paper deals with the effect of hydrodynamic conditions on the detection of toluene dissolved in water by means of fibers with a truncated parabolic inverted-graded index (IGI) profile. The detection is based on refractive-index changes of a detection layer of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) applied on the fiber which are induced by penetration of toluene into the layer. The dependence of the response of the sensing fiber placed in a flow cell on the flow velocity of the detected aqueous solution of toluene has been investigated. The sensing fiber was successively exposed to flows of distilled water and aqueous solutions of toluene. The fiber responses were measured for three chosen concentrations of the toluene solutions and for five flow velocities of the solutions. From these results the dependence of the relative decrease of the output signal on the flow velocity was determined. It has been found that the magnitude of output signal changes is approximately proportional to the solution concentration and the rate of the signal changes in the tested concentration range depends approximately linearly on the solution flow velocity.     

Data collection in global software engineering research: learning from past experience

Global Software Engineering has become a standard in today’s software industry. Research in distributed software development poses severe challenges that are due to the spatial and temporal distribution of the actors, as well as to language, intercultural and organizational aspects. These challenges occur in addition to “traditional” challenges of the domain itself in large-scale software projects, like coordination and communication issues, requirements volatily, lack of domain knowledge, among others. While several authors have reported empirical studies of global software development projects, the methodological difficulties and challenges of this type of studies have not been sufficiently discussed. In this paper, we share our experiences of collecting and analysing qualitative data in the context of Global Software Engineering projects. We discuss strategies for gaining access to field sites, building trust and documenting distributed and complex work practices in the context of several research projects we have conducted in the past 9 years. The experiences described in this paper illustrate the need to deal with fundamental problems, such as understanding local languages and different cultures, observing synchronous interaction, or dealing with barriers imposed by political conflicts between the sites. Based on our findings, we discuss some practical implications and strategies that can be used by other researchers and provide some recommendations for future research in methodological aspects of Global Software Engineering.     

New,Non‐quinone Fluorogeldanamycin Derivatives Strongly Inhibit Hsp90

Streptomyces hygroscopicus is a natural producer of geldanamycin. Mutasynthetic supplementation of an AHBA‐blocked mutant with all possible monofluoro 3‐aminobenzoic acids provided new fluorogeldanamycins. These showed strong antiproliferative activity and inhibitory effects on human heat shock protein Hsp90. Binding to Hsp90 in the low nanomolar range was determined from molecular modelling, AFM analysis and by calorimetric studies.