Search

The study investigates the fabrication and analysis of nickel microparticle-reinforced composites fabricated using the digital light processing (DLP) technique. A slurry is prepared by incorporating Ni-micro particles into a resin vat; it is thoroughly mixed to achieve homogeneity. Turbidity fluctuations are observed, initially peaking at 50% within the first two minutes of mixing and then stabilizing at 30% after 15–60 min. FTIR spectroscopy with varying Ni wt.% is performed to study the alterations in the composite material’s molecular structure and bonding environment. Spectrophotometric analysis revealed distinctive transmittance signatures at specific wavelengths, particularly within the visible light spectrum, with a notable peak at 532 nm. The effects of printing orientation in the X, Y, and Z axes were also studied. Mechanical properties were computed using tensile strength, surface roughness, and hardness. The results indicate substantial enhancements in the tensile properties, with notable increases of 75.5% in the ultimate tensile strength and 160% in the maximum strain. Minimal alterations in surface roughness and hardness suggest favorable printability. Microscopic examination revealed characteristic fracture patterns in the particulate composite at different values for the wt.% of nickel. The findings demonstrate the potential of DLP-fabricated Ni-reinforced composites for applications demanding enhanced mechanical performance while maintaining favorable printability, paving the way for further exploration in this domain.

Summary The design of two overlapping genes in a microbial genome is an emerging technique for adding more reliable control mechanisms in engineered organisms for increased stability. The design of functional overlapping gene pairs is a challenging procedure, and computational design tools are used to improve the efficiency to deploy successful designs in genetically engineered systems. GENTANGLE (Gene Tuples ArraNGed in overLapping Elements) is a high-performance containerized pipeline for the computational design of two overlapping genes translated in different reading frames of the genome. This new software package can be used to design and test gene entanglements for microbial engineering projects using arbitrary sets of user-specified gene pairs. Availability and implementation The GENTANGLE source code and its submodules are freely available on GitHub at https://github.com/BiosecSFA/gentangle. The DATANGLE (DATA for genTANGLE) repository contains related data and results and is freely available on GitHub at https://github.com/BiosecSFA/datangle. The GENTANGLE container is freely available on Singularity Cloud Library at https://cloud.sylabs.io/library/khyox/gentangle/gentangle.sif. The GENTANGLE repository wiki (https://github.com/BiosecSFA/gentangle/wiki), website (https://biosecsfa.github.io/gentangle/), and user manual contain detailed instructions on how to use the different components of software and data, including examples and reproducing the results. The code is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License version 3 (https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on natural-fiber-reinforced polymer composite is continuously developing. Natural fibers from flora have received considerable attention from researchers because their use in biobased composites is safe and sustainable for the environment. Natural fibers that mixed with Carbon Fiber and or Glass Fiber are low-cost, lightweight, and biodegradable and have lower environmental influences than metal-based materials. This study highlights and comprehensively reviews the natural fibers utilized as reinforcements in polyester composites, including jute, bamboo, sisal, kenaf, flax, and banana. The properties of composite materials consisting of natural and synthetic fibers, such as tensile strength, flexural strength, fatigue, and hardness, are investigated in this study. This paper aims to summarize, classify, and collect studies related to the latest composite hybrid science consisting of natural and synthetic fibers and their applications. Furthermore, this paper includes but is not limited to preparation, mechanism, characterization, and evaluation of hybrid composite laminates in different methods and modes. In general, natural fiber composites produce a larger volume of composite, but their strength is weaker than GFRP/CFRP even with the same number of layers. The use of synthetic fibers combined with natural fibers can provide better strength of hybrid composite.

Background: Sepsis is a dysregulated systemic inflammatory response triggered by infection, resulting in organ dysfunction. A major challenge in clinical pediatrics is to identify sepsis early and then quickly intervene to reduce morbidity and mortality. As blood biomarkers hold promise as early sepsis diagnostic tools, we aimed to measure a large number of blood inflammatory biomarkers from pediatric sepsis patients to determine their predictive ability, as well as their correlations with clinical variables and illness severity scores. Methods: Pediatric patients that met sepsis criteria were enrolled, and clinical data and blood samples were collected. Fifty-eight inflammatory plasma biomarker concentrations were determined using immunoassays. The data were analyzed with both conventional statistics and machine learning. Results: Twenty sepsis patients were enrolled (median age 13 years), with infectious pathogens identified in 75%. Vasopressors were administered to 85% of patients, while 55% received invasive ventilation and 20% were ventilated non-invasively. A total of 24 inflammatory biomarkers were significantly different between sepsis patients and age/sex-matched healthy controls. Nine biomarkers (IL-6, IL-8, MCP-1, M-CSF, IL-1RA, hyaluronan, HSP70, MMP3, and MMP10) yielded AUC parameters > 0.9 (95% CIs: 0.837-1.000; p < 0.001). Boruta feature reduction yielded 6 critical biomarkers with their relative importance: IL-8 (12.2%), MCP-1 (11.6%), HSP70 (11.6%), hyaluronan (11.5%), M-CSF (11.5%), and IL-6 (11.5%); combinations of 2 biomarkers yielded AUC values of 1.00 (95% CI: 1.00–1.00; p < 0.001). Specific biomarkers strongly correlated with illness severity scoring, as well as other clinical variables. IL-3 specifically distinguished bacterial versus viral infection (p < 0.005). Conclusions: Specific inflammatory biomarkers were identified as markers of pediatric sepsis and strongly correlated to both clinical variables and sepsis severity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Youth (aged 15 to 29 years) account for one quarter of new HIV cases in Canada. Of those, men-who-have-sex-with-men make up one third to one half of new cases in that age range. Moreover, Indigenous youth are over-represented in the proportion of new cases. The use of emtricitabine/tenofovir disoproxil fumarate as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) significantly reduces the risk of HIV acquisition in adults. Its use was expanded to include youth over 35 kg by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2018. However, PrEP uptake remains low among adolescents. Prescriber-identified barriers include lack of experience, concerns about safety, unfamiliarity with follow-up guidelines, and costs. This article provides an overview of PrEP for youth in Canada, and its associated safety and side effect profiles. Hypothetical case vignettes highlight some of the many demographics of youth who could benefit from PrEP. We present a novel flow diagram that explains the baseline workup, prescribing guidelines, and follow-up recommendations in the Canadian context. Additional counselling points highlight some of the key discussions that should be elicited when prescribing PrEP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the use of advanced placement programs (AP) in Broward County, Florida, as an intervention strategy to narrow the achievement gap among student groups. Found that AP coursework can be extended to a wider range of students than previously thought, including minority students. (Contains 16 references, 7 tables, and 4 figures.) (Author/MLF)

Social corbiculate bees are major pollinators. They have characteristic bacterial microbiomes associated with their hives and their guts. In honeybees and bumblebees, worker guts contain a microbiome composed of distinctive bacterial taxa shown to benefit hosts. These benefits include stimulating immune and metabolic pathways, digesting or detoxifying food, and defending against pathogens and parasites. Stressors including toxins and poor nutrition disrupt the microbiome and increase susceptibility to opportunistic pathogens. Administering probiotic bacterial strains may improve the health of individual bees and of hives, and several commercial probiotics are available for bees. However, evidence for probiotic benefits is lacking or mixed. Most bacterial species used in commercial probiotics are not native to bee guts. We present new experimental results showing that cultured strains of native bee gut bacteria colonize robustly while bacteria in a commercial probiotic do not establish in bee guts. A defined community of native bee gut bacteria resembles unperturbed native gut communities in its activation of genes for immunity and metabolism in worker bees. Although many questions remain unanswered, the development of natural probiotics for honeybees, or for commercially managed bumblebees, is a promising direction for protecting the health of managed bee colonies. This article is part of the theme issue 'Natural processes influencing pollinator health: from chemistry to landscapes'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Host-associated microbiomes, particularly gut microbiomes, often harbor related but distinct microbial lineages, but how this diversity arises and is maintained is not well understood. A prerequisite for lineage diversification is reproductive isolation imposed by barriers to gene flow. In host-associated microbes, genetic recombination can be disrupted by confinement to different hosts, for example following host speciation, or by niche partitioning within the same host. Taking advantage of the simple gut microbiome of social bees, we explore the diversification of two groups of gut-associated bacteria, Gilliamella and Snodgrassella, which have evolved for 80 million y with honey bees and bumble bees. Our analyses of sequenced genomes show that these lineages have diversified into discrete populations with limited gene flow. Divergence has occurred between symbionts of different host species and, in some cases, between symbiont lineages within a single host individual. Populations have acquired genes to adapt to specific hosts and ecological niches; for example, Gilliamella lineages differ markedly in abilities to degrade dietary polysaccharides and to use the resulting sugar components. Using engineered fluorescent bacteria in vivo, we show that Gilliamella lineages localize to different hindgut regions, corresponding to differences in their abilities to use spatially concentrated nitrogenous wastes of hosts. Our findings show that bee gut bacteria can diversify due to isolation in different host species and also due to spatial niche partitioning within individual hosts, leading to barriers to gene flow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sand ingestion is a substantial problem for gas turbine engines operating in austere environments. If an engine is subjugated to high doses of calcium-magnesium-alumino-silicate or CMAS, the constituents of sand, it can result in degradation of the thermal barrier coating, TBC, requiring costly maintenance. As a result, Athena, a simulation framework, is being modified to address this issue. However, from the visualization perspective, the volume of data generated by Athena and other software necessitates the use of in-situ, in reaction, visualization due to an I/O bandwidth bottleneck. Typically, the visualization step is handled post-simulation (post-processing), but in-situ, data analysis visualization occurs intra-simulation eliminating the need to write the simulation output to disk. Thus, the development of a robust, portable in-situ visualization implementation is a necessity. In addition, an image-based visualization tool, CinemaScience, must be implemented for one of the two modes of in-situ visualization, batch mode. Live mode is highly interactive and allows the use of the graphical user interface while batch mode is the opposite. Batch mode merely feeds a list of steps into a visualization tool (Paraview, in this case) to be carried out at each timestep. As a result, successful implementation of in-situ visualization through the use of Paraview Catalyst and the add-on of CinemaScience culminates in a viable solution to big data simulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Honey bees are essential pollinators threatened by colony losses linked to the spread of parasites and pathogens. Here, we report a new approach for manipulating bee gene expression and protecting bee health. We engineered a symbiotic bee gut bacterium, Snodgrassella alvi, to induce eukaryotic RNA interference (RNAi) immune responses. We show that engineered S. alvi can stably recolonize bees and produce double-stranded RNA to activate RNAi and repress host gene expression, thereby altering bee physiology, behavior, and growth. We used this approach to improve bee survival after a viral challenge, and we show that engineered S. alvi can kill parasitic Varroa mites by triggering the mite RNAi response. This symbiont-mediated RNAi approach is a tool for studying bee functional genomics and potentially for safeguarding bee health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The thermal tolerance of an organism limits its ecological and geographic ranges and is potentially affected by dependence on temperature-sensitive symbiotic partners. Aphid species vary widely in heat sensitivity, but almost all aphids are dependent on the nutrient-provisioning intracellular bacterium Buchnera, which has evolved with aphids for 100 million years and which has a reduced genome potentially limiting heat tolerance. We addressed whether heat sensitivity of Buchnera underlies variation in thermal tolerance among 5 aphid species. We measured how heat exposure of juvenile aphids affects later survival, maturation time, and fecundity. At one extreme, heat exposure of Aphis gossypii enhanced fecundity and had no effect on the Buchnera titer. In contrast, heat suppressed Buchnera populations in Aphis fabae, which suffered elevated mortality, delayed development and reduced fecundity. Likewise, in Acyrthosiphon kondoi and Acyrthosiphon pisum, heat caused rapid declines in Buchnera numbers, as well as reduced survivorship, development rate, and fecundity. Fecundity following heat exposure is severely decreased by a Buchnera mutation that suppresses the transcriptional response of a gene encoding a small heat shock protein. Similarly, absence of this Buchnera heat shock gene may explain the heat sensitivity of Ap. fabae. Fluorescent in situ hybridization revealed heat-induced deformation and shrinkage of bacteriocytes in heat-sensitive species but not in heat-tolerant species. Sensitive and tolerant species also differed in numbers and transcriptional responses of heat shock genes. These results show that shifts in Buchnera heat sensitivity contribute to host variation in heat tolerance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mounting evidence suggests that lymphocytes have the capacity to contribute to the regulation of systemic circulatory control. We postulated that T and natural killer (NK) cells could modify basal microvascular activity under physiologically normal conditions. In situ intravital microscopy of mouse cremaster vasculature was used to evaluate arteriolar reactivities to the vasoconstrictors angiotensin II (ANG II) and phenylephrine (Phe) and the vasodilators acetylcholine (ACh) and adenosine (Ado) in normal [+/+; wild type (WT)] and genetically immunodeficient (T-B-NK+ or T-B-\NK-) C57BL/6 and BALB/c mice, strain backgrounds with differentially polarized T cell cytokine production. Immunodeficient mice tended to have smaller baseline and maximal diameters of third-order cremaster arterioles than their congenic WT partners. In C57BL/6, baseline diameters were similar in T-B- mice without or with NK cells; in BALB/c, baseline diameters were larger in T-B-NK- mice than in T-B-NK+ mice. Thus, at baseline, lymphocytes tended to promote vasodilation, except BALB/c NK cells, which mediated mild vasoconstriction. The presence of NK cells suppressed dilations to Ado in both strains, to ACh in the C57BL/6 strain, and dilatory responses to ANG II in C57BL/6 and to Phe in BALB/c. In the BALB/c strain, the presence of T and B cells promoted vasodilatory responses to Ado, attenuated dilations to low ACh concentrations, and exaggerated dilation and constriction responses to ANG II. Thus, under agonist challenge, NK cells generally promote constriction, whereas influences of T and B cells depend upon the stimulus. Therefore, lymphocytes or their products have physiological influences on microvascular arteriolar reactivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The medium of Japanese animation is a powerhouse in the world of alternative entertainment. Proselytization by fans ignited the anime movement in America. despite Japanese copyright holders' abandonment of the American market. This historical and cultural analysis demonstrates that fans' continual infringement of copyright between 1976 and 1993 spurred the progress of commerce and the arts. Introducing the concept of cultural sinks, this analysis explains these phenomena in terms of demand formation, the role of commons and the causational links between the fans, artists, rights holders and markets that characterize the globalization of culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biopolymers derived from bioresources have gained significant interest over the past decade owing to the industrial shift toward more environmentally friendly materials and devices. These organic materials are highly favored as an important alternative to conventional materials because of their lightweight nature and high strength and stiffness. Hence, the use of biopolymers is being extended to several fields, including packaging, agriculture, automotive, medical, and electronics. Electrochemical energy storage devices, such as batteries and supercapacitors, can be fabricated via custom biopolymer production methods. They are either chemically produced from bioresources or are genetically modified organisms. Although the prospective applications of biopolymers are limited, they still need to be used in combination with other materials in composites. This helps to improve their inherent physical characteristics in addition to the electrochemical performance of the biologically active molecules. The current review provides a detailed introduction to several biopolymer production methods and a comprehensive account of recent advances, especially the use of different additives in bioresource-derived polymer composites for both batteries and supercapacitors. [Display omitted] • Supercapacitors and battery development is a rapid growing research field. • Bio-resource polymers well utilized for fabricating supercapacitors/batteries. • Literature strongly evident their performance/promising alternate for electrodes. • Bio-polymer composites for supercapacitors and battery application were reviewed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary Peptides have great potential to combat antibiotic resistance. While many platforms can screen peptides for their ability to bind to target cells, there are virtually no platforms that directly assess the functionality of peptides. This limitation is exacerbated when identifying antimicrobial peptides because the phenotype, death, selects against itself and has caused a scientific bottleneck that confines research to a few naturally occurring classes of antimicrobial peptides. We have used this seeming dissonance to develop Surface Localized Antimicrobial Display (SLAY), a platform that allows screening of unlimited numbers of peptides of any length, composition, and structure in a single tube for antimicrobial activity. Using SLAY, we screened ∼800,000 random peptide sequences for antimicrobial function and identified thousands of active sequences, dramatically increasing the number of known antimicrobial sequences. SLAY hits present with different potential mechanisms of peptide action and access to areas of antimicrobial physicochemical space beyond what nature has evolved. Video Abstract [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following pulmonary infection with Francisella tularensis, we observed an unexpected but significant reduction of alkaline phosphatase, an enzyme normally up-regulated following inflammation. However, no reduction was observed in mice infected with a closely related Gram-negative pneumonic organism (Klebsiella pneumoniae) suggesting the inhibition may be Francisella-specific. In similar fashion to in vivo observations, addition of Francisella lysate to exogenous alkaline phosphatase (tissue-nonspecific isozyme) was inhibitory. Partial purification and subsequent proteomic analysis indicated the inhibitory factor to be the heat shock protein DnaK. Incubation with increasing amounts of anti-DnaK antibody reduced the inhibitory effect in a dose-dependent manner. Furthermore, DnaK contains an adenosine triphosphate binding domain at its N terminus, and addition of adenosine triphosphate enhances dissociation of DnaK with its target protein, e.g. alkaline phosphatase. Addition of adenosine triphosphate resulted in decreased DnaK co-immunoprecipitated with alkaline phosphatase as well as reduction of Francisella-mediated alkaline phosphatase inhibition further supporting the binding of Francisella DnaK to alkaline phosphatase. Release of DnaK via secretion and/or bacterial cell lysis into the extracellular milieu and inhibition of plasma alkaline phosphatase could promote an orchestrated, inflammatory response advantageous to Francisella. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]