Morphological and molecular pathology of CCL4‐induced hepatic fibrosis in connexin43‐deficient mice

Gap junction channels, formed by connexins (Cx), are involved in the maintenance of tissue homeostasis, cell growth, differentiation, and development. Several studies have shown that Cx43 is involved in the control of wound healing in dermal tissue. However, it remains unknown whether Cx43 plays a role in the control of liver fibrogenesis. Our study investigated the roles of Cx43 heterologous deletion on carbon tetrachloride (CCl₄)‐induced hepatic fibrosis in mice. We administered CCl₄ to both Cx43‐deficient (Cx43^+/?) and wild‐type mice and examined hepatocellular injury and collagen deposition by histological and ultrastructural analyses. Serum biochemical analysis was performed to quantify liver injury. Hepatocyte proliferation was analyzed immunohistochemically. Protein and messenger RNA (mRNA) expression of liver connexins were evaluated using immunohistochemistry as well as immunoblotting analysis and quantitative real‐time PCR. We demonstrated that Cx43^+/? mice developed excessive liver fibrosis compared with wild‐type mice after CCl₄‐induced chronic hepatic injury, with thick and irregular collagen fibers. Histopathological evaluation showed that Cx43^+/? mice present less necroinflammatory lesions in liver parenchyma and consequent reduction of serum aminotransferase activity. Hepatocyte cell proliferation was reduced in Cx43^+/? mice. There was no difference in Cx32 and Cx26 protein or mRNA expression in fibrotic mice. Protein expression of Cx43 increased in CCl₄‐treated mice, although with aberrant protein location on cytoplasm of perisinusoidal cells. Our results demonstrate that Cx43 plays an important role in the control and regulation of hepatic fibrogenesis. Microsc. Res. Tech., 2011. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Investigations of the electrical conduction mechanisms of polyaniline‐DBSA/poly(acrylonitrile‐butadiene styrene) blends

The electrical properties of Al/PANI‐DBSA/ABS/Au blend with PANI (5%) w/w have been investigated by using of current‐voltage (I‐V) measurements, in a temperature range of 100–313 K. The analysis of I‐V characteristics in the forward direction was based on thermionic emission mechanism for applied electrical field till ～3 × 10² V/cm. The thickness dependence of the current‐voltage relationship, clearly demonstrates that the electrical current for larger fields is space charge limited current (SCLC). Temperature dependences of the ideality factor, barrier height, and series resistance have been calculated. The mobility of carriers which is temperature dependent was calculated using the trap free SCLC as 1.53 × 10^?4 cm² V^?1 s^?1 at room temperature. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2014 , 131, 40688.     

Sketch-based warping of RGBN images

While current image deformation methods are careful in making the new geometry seem right, little attention has been given to the photometric aspects. We introduce a deformation method that results in coherently illuminated objects. For this task, we use RGBN images to support a relighting step integrated in a sketch-based deformation method. We warp not only colors but also normals. Normal warping requires smooth warping fields. We use sketches to specify sparse warping samples and impose additional constraints for region of interest control. To satisfy these new constraints, we present a novel image warping method based on Hermite–Birkhoff interpolation with radial basis functions that results in a smooth warping field. We also use sketches to help the system identify both lighting conditions and material from single images. We present results with RGBN images from different sources, including photometric stereo, synthetic images, and photographs.     

The effects of hydrogen sulfide on the polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell anode catalyst: H2S-Pt/C interaction products

The performance of a polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) operating on a simulated hydrocarbon reformate is described. The anode feed stream consisted of 80% H₂, ∼20% N₂, and 8 ppm hydrogen sulfide (H₂S). Cell performance losses are calculated by evaluating cell potential reduction due to H₂S contamination through lifetime tests. It is found that potential, or power, loss under this condition is a result of platinum surface contamination with elemental sulfur. Electrochemical mass spectroscopy (EMS) and electrochemical techniques are employed, in order to show that elemental sulfur is adsorbed onto platinum, and that sulfur dioxide is one of the oxidation products. Moreover, it is demonstrated that a possible approach for mitigating H₂S poisoning on the PEMFC anode catalyst is to inject low levels of air into the H₂S-contaminated anode feeding stream.     

An algorithm for the strip packing problem using collision free region and exact fitting placement

The irregular shape packing problem is approached. The container has a fixed width and an open dimension to be minimized. The proposed algorithm constructively creates the solution using an ordered list of items and a placement heuristic. Simulated annealing is the adopted metaheuristic to solve the optimization problem. A two-level algorithm is used to minimize the open dimension of the container. To ensure feasible layouts, the concept of collision free region is used. A collision free region represents all possible translations for an item to be placed and may be degenerated. For a moving item, the proposed placement heuristic detects the presence of exact fits (when the item is fully constrained by its surroundings) and exact slides (when the item position is constrained in all but one direction). The relevance of these positions is analyzed and a new placement heuristic is proposed. Computational comparisons on benchmark problems show that the proposed algorithm generated highly competitive solutions. Moreover, our algorithm updated some best known results.     

A proposal for extending UML-B to support a conceptual model

UML-B is a development process framework for Event-B based on a “UML-like” graphical formal notation that provides support for object-oriented modelling concepts, in particular, for class and state machine diagrams. However, this methodology has a gap for mapping requirements to formal specifications. To overcome this issue, we present a proposal for extending UML-B to support a conceptual model to provide an easier starting point for the actual development process. More precisely, we propose two diagrams to facilitate the passing from requirements to the initial formal model: a first one to represent system behavior based on UML 2 interaction overview diagram (IOD) and a second one for system structure based on boundary-control-entity stereotyped class diagram (BCE). We show how to translate the former into an Event-B specification and explain how to link the latter to the original UML-B using a simple ATM example as proof of concept.     

The static stability of support factor-based rectangular packings: an assessment by regression analysis

This work presents new insights about how solutions of support factor-based rectangular packings behave in relation to their static stability. In particular, we address the constrained two-dimensional packing problem, for the solution of which is used a known integer linear programming model that positions items over a grid of points. The model has embedded constraints based on a support factor parameter that ensure a minimum support for the base of items. The solutions obtained from the model are then evaluated by a procedure that verifies the conditions for the static stability. Computational tests were performed on a large variety of randomly generated instances, and the outputs were assessed by means of regression analysis (linear and logistic). The results show which characteristics of the instances contribute directly and inversely to the probability of obtaining statically stable packing patterns. This outcome may be useful to guide the choice of support factor values in some practical contexts.     

From mobility data to habits and common pathways

Many aspects of our lives are associated with places and the activities we perform on a daily basis. Most of them are recurrent and demand displacement of the individual between regular places like going to work, school or other important personal locations. To accomplish these recurrent daily activities, people tend to follow regular paths with similar temporal and spatial characteristics, especially because humans are frequently looking for uniformity to support their decisions and make their actions easier or even automatic. In this work, we propose a method for discovering common pathways across users' habits from human mobility data. By using a density-based clustering algorithm, we identify the most preferable locations the users visit, we apply a Gaussian mixture model over these places to automatically separate among all traces, the trajectories that follow patterns in order to discover the representations of individual's habits. By using the longest common sub-sequence algorithm, we search for the trajectories that are more similar over the set of users' habits trips by considering the distance that pairs of users or habits share on the same path. The proposed method is evaluated over two real-world GPS datasets and the results show that the approach is able to detect the most important places in a user's life, detect the routine activities and identify common routes between users that have similar habits paving the way for research techniques in carpooling, recommendation and prediction systems.