A Role for Human Renal Tubular Epithelial Cells in Direct Allo-Recognition by CD4+ T-Cells and the Effect of Ischemia-Reperfusion

Direct allorecognition is the earliest and most potent immune response against a kidney allograft. Currently, it is thought that passenger donor professional antigen-presenting cells (APCs) are responsible. Further, many studies support that graft ischemia-reperfusion injury increases the probability of acute rejection. We evaluated the possible role of primary human proximal renal tubular epithelial cells (RPTECs) in direct allorecognition by CD4+ T-cells and the effect of anoxia-reoxygenation. In cell culture, we detected that RPTECs express all the required molecules for CD4+ T-cell activation (HLA-DR, CD80, and ICAM-1). Anoxia-reoxygenation decreased HLA-DR and CD80 but increased ICAM-1. Following this, RPTECs were co-cultured with alloreactive CD4+ T-cells. In T-cells, zeta chain phosphorylation and c-Myc increased, indicating activation of T-cell receptor and co-stimulation signal transduction pathways, respectively. T-cell proliferation assessed with bromodeoxyuridine assay and with the marker Ki-67 increased. Previous culture of RPTECs under anoxia raised all the above parameters in T-cells. FOXP3 remained unaffected in all cases, signifying that proliferating T-cells were not differentiated towards a regulatory phenotype. Our results support that direct allorecognition may be mediated by RPTECs even in the absence of donor-derived professional APCs. Also, ischemia-reperfusion injury of the graft may enhance the above capacity of RPTECs, increasing the possibility of acute rejection.     

Sensitization of MCF7 Cells with High Notch1 Activity by Cisplatin and Histone Deacetylase Inhibitors Applied Together

Histone deacetylase inhibitors (HDIs) are promising anti-cancer agents that inhibit proliferation of many types of cancer cells including breast carcinoma (BC) cells. In the present study, we investigated the influence of the Notch1 activity level on the pharmacological interaction between cisplatin (CDDP) and two HDIs, valproic acid (VPA) and suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid (SAHA, vorinostat), in luminal-like BC cells. The type of drug–drug interaction between CDDP and HDIs was determined by isobolographic analysis. MCF7 cells were genetically modified to express differential levels of Notch1 activity. The cytotoxic effect of SAHA or VPA was higher on cells with decreased Notch1 activity and lower for cells with increased Notch1 activity than native BC cells. The isobolographic analysis demonstrated that combinations of CDDP with SAHA or VPA at a fixed ratio of 1:1 exerted additive or additive with tendency toward synergism interactions. Therefore, treatment of CDDP with HDIs could be used to optimize a combined therapy based on CDDP against Notch1-altered luminal BC. In conclusion, the combined therapy of HDIs and CDDP may be a promising therapeutic tool in the treatment of luminal-type BC with altered Notch1 activity.     

UPR: deadlock-free dynamic network reconfiguration by exploiting channel dependency graph compatibility

The Journal of Supercomputing - Deadlock-free dynamic network reconfiguration process is usually studied from the routing algorithm restrictions and resource reservation perspective. The dynamic...     

Boundedness properties of nonlinear quasi-dissipative systems

Boundedness results for feedback interconnections of quasi-dissipative systems are presented. A classical result due to Hill and Moylan is generalized to the case of finite power gain stability of feedback interconnection of quasi-dissipative systems. It is also shown that under the assumption of strong finite-time detectability, such an interconnection has uniformly ultimately bounded trajectories for any uniformly bounded input.     

Immunoglobulin A levels in southern elephant seal (Mirounga leonina) milk during the suckling period

Immunoglobulin A (IgA) levels in milk samples from southern elephant seals at King George Island, Antarctica are reported. IgA levels were determined throughout the suckling period (approximately 23 days). The IgA concentration in southern elephant seal milk was lower than in other mammals and, unlike most mammalian milk, was not high during early lactation. There was not a definite pattern in IgA levels, which fluctuated within narrow limits throughout the suckling period (mean +/- SD, 30.81 +/- 6.38 mg IgA/100 g milk). If IgG was present, its level was too low to be detected by the method used. This is the first evidence in Southern elephant seal of the possibility of transmission of passive immunity after birth involving secretion of IgA in the milk.     

Optimization techniques for curved path computing

Participating media with an inhomogeneous index of refraction make light follow curved paths. Simulating this in a global illumination environment has usually been neglected due to the complexity of the calculations involved, sacrificing accurate physical simulations for efficient visual results. This paper aims to simulate non-linear media in a more reasonable time than previous works without losing physical correctness. Accuracy is achieved by solving the Eikonal equation of geometrical optics, which describes the path followed by a light beam that traverses a non-linear medium. This equation is used in the context of a photon mapping extension.     

Effects of Sc2O3 and MgO passivation layerson the output power of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs

The low temperature (100°C) deposition of Sc₂O₃ or MgO layers is found to significantly increase the output power of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs. At 4 GHz, there was a better than 3 dB increase in output power of 0.5×100 μm² HEMTs for both types of oxide passivation layers. Both Sc₂ O₃ and MgO produced larger output power increases at 4 GHz than conventional plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposited (PECVD) SiN_x passivation which typically showed ⩽2 dB increase on the same types of devices. The HEMT gain also in general remained linear over a wider input power range with the Sc₂O₃ or MgO passivation. These films appear promising for reducing the effects of surface states on the DC and RF performance of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs