Digital Commons Network^™

Iron Deprivation In Synechocystis : Inference Of Pathways, Non-Coding Rnas, And Regulatory Elements From Comprehensive Expression Profiling, Miguel A. Hernández-Prieto, Verena Schön, Jens Georg, Luísa Barreira, João Varela, Wolfgang R. Hess, Matthias E. Futschik

School of Biomedical Sciences

Iron is an essential cofactor in many metabolic reactions. Mechanisms controlling iron homeostasis need to respond rapidly to changes in extracellular conditions, but they must also keep the concentration of intracellular iron under strict control to avoid the generation of damaging reactive oxygen species. Due to its role as a redox carrier in photosynthesis, the iron quota in cyanobacteria is about 10 times higher than in model enterobacteria. The molecular details of how such a high quota is regulated are obscure. Here we present experiments that shed light on the iron regulatory system in cyanobacteria. We measured time-resolved changes in …

Non-Linear Global Pooling In The Discrimination Of Circular And Non-Circular Shapes, Gunnar Schmidtmann, Graeme J. Kennedy, Harry S. Orbach, Gunter Loffler

School of Health Professions

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Insulin-Like Growth Factors Signaling In Merlin-Deficient Human Schwannomas., Sylwia Ammoun, M. Caroline Schmid, Natalia Ristic, Lu Zhou, David Hilton, Emanuela Ercolano, Camille Carroll, C. Oliver Hanemann

Peninsula Medical School

Loss of the tumor suppressor merlin causes development of the tumors of the nervous system, such as schwannomas, meningiomas, and ependymomas occurring spontaneously or as part of a hereditary disease Neurofibromatosis Type 2 (NF2). Current therapies, (radio) surgery, are not always effective. Therefore, there is a need for drug treatments for these tumors. Schwannomas are the most frequent of merlin-deficient tumors and are hallmark for NF2. Using our in vitro human schwannoma model, we demonstrated that merlin-deficiency leads to increased proliferation, cell-matrix adhesion, and survival. Increased proliferation due to strong activation of extracellular-signal-regulated kinase 1/2 (ERK1/2) is caused by overexpression/activation …

Iterative Orthology Prediction Uncovers New Mitochondrial Proteins And Identifies C12orf62 As The Human Ortholog Of Cox14, A Protein Involved In The Assembly Of Cytochrome C Oxidase, R Szklarczyk, Bfj Wanschers, Td Cuypers, Jj Esseling, Et Al

School of Biomedical Sciences

BACKGROUND: Orthology is a central tenet of comparative genomics and ortholog identification is instrumental to protein function prediction. Major advances have been made to determine orthology relations among a set of homologous proteins. However, they depend on the comparison of individual sequences and do not take into account divergent orthologs. RESULTS: We have developed an iterative orthology prediction method, Ortho-Profile, that uses reciprocal best hits at the level of sequence profiles to infer orthology. It increases ortholog detection by 20% compared to sequence-to-sequence comparisons. Ortho-Profile predicts 598 human orthologs of mitochondrial proteins from Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Schizosaccharomyces pombe with 94% …

Emergent Auditory Feature Tuning In A Real-Time Neuromorphic Vlsi System., Sadique Sheik, Martin Coath, Giacomo Indiveri, Susan L. Denham, Thomas Wennekers, Elisabetta Chicca

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

Many sounds of ecological importance, such as communication calls, are characterized by time-varying spectra. However, most neuromorphic auditory models to date have focused on distinguishing mainly static patterns, under the assumption that dynamic patterns can be learned as sequences of static ones. In contrast, the emergence of dynamic feature sensitivity through exposure to formative stimuli has been recently modeled in a network of spiking neurons based on the thalamo-cortical architecture. The proposed network models the effect of lateral and recurrent connections between cortical layers, distance-dependent axonal transmission delays, and learning in the form of Spike Timing Dependent Plasticity (STDP), which …

Infrared Divergences In Plane Wave Backgrounds, Victor Dinu, Thomas Heinzl, Anton Ilderton

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

No abstract provided.

Strong-Field Qed And High-Power Lasers, Thomas Heinzl

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

No abstract provided.

Sigma Terms And Strangeness Content Of The Nucleon With N F  = 2 + 1 + 1 Twisted Mass Fermions, Simon Dinter, Vincent Drach, Roberto Frezzotti, Gregorio Herdoiza, Karl Jansen, Giancarlo Rossi

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

Abstract We study the nucleon matrix elements of the quark scalar-density operator using maximally twisted mass fermions with dynamical light (u,d), strange and charm degrees of freedom. We demonstrate that in this setup the nucleon matrix elements of the light and strange quark densities can be obtained with good statistical accuracy, while for the charm quark counterpart only a bound can be provided. The present calculation which is performed at only one value of the lattice spacing and pion mass serves as a technical feasibility study for a future computation of the scalar quark content of the nucleon with a …

Evaluation Of Disconnected Contributions Using Gpus, C Alexandrou, V Drach, K Hadjiyiannakou, K Jansen, G Koutsou, A Strelchenko, A Vaquero

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

We calculate on GPUs the disconnected diagrams associated with the nucleon form factors and moments of generalized parton distributions using Nf=2+1+1 twisted mass fermions. We employ the truncated solver method (TSM) for estimating the all-to-all propagators. Due to the fact that the TSM involves many low precision stochastic estimators, the usage of GPUs is essential to perform efficiently the contractions and the inversions.

Non-Invasive Prenatal Diagnostic Test Accuracy For Fetal Sex Using Cell-Free Dna A Review And Meta-Analysis, Caroline F. Wright, Yinghui Wei, Julian Pt Higgins, Gurdeep S. Sagoo

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

AbstractBackgroundCell-free fetal DNA (cffDNA) can be detected in maternal blood during pregnancy, opening the possibility of early non-invasive prenatal diagnosis for a variety of genetic conditions. Since 1997, many studies have examined the accuracy of prenatal fetal sex determination using cffDNA, particularly for pregnancies at risk of an X-linked condition. Here we report a review and meta-analysis of the published literature to evaluate the use of cffDNA for prenatal determination (diagnosis) of fetal sex. We applied a sensitive search of multiple bibliographic databases including PubMed (MEDLINE), EMBASE, the Cochrane library and Web of Science.ResultsNinety studies, incorporating 9,965 pregnancies and 10,587 …

Walking As A Meaningful Leisure Occupation: The Implications For Occupational Therapy, R Wensley, A Slade

School of Health Professions

Introduction: In response to growing interest in leisure in occupational therapy and the importance of understanding how occupations maintain, enhance and promote health and wellbeing, a qualitative phenomenological study was conducted to explore the experiences of walking for leisure. Method: Six healthy student participants, identified as regular walkers, were interviewed using a semi-structured format. Data were analysed following interpretative phenomenological analysis methodology. Findings: Participants expressed how and why walking was meaningful to them; the four main themes were social connectedness, wellbeing, connection to nature and achievement from a challenge. Findings suggest that occupational therapists could use walking and leisure occupations …

Writing Retreat: The Scholarship Of Teaching And Learning And Placement Learning: Impact And Evidence, S. Lea, Susan Eick, Lynne Callaghan

School of Health Professions

The aim of the writing retreat was for three previous members of the Centre for Excellence in Professional Placement Learning (Ceppl) to collaborate on three research papers which were initiated in November 2010 before the centre closed. The original objectives of the writing retreat were:

• To discuss the results and draft papers to be written by each of the three participants

• To finalise three draft REF standard papers for submission to the journal(s) Higher Education and Studies in Higher Education

The Japanese Multinational Enterprise Influence On Sustainability Reporting Practices Of Philippine Subsidiaries: A Theoretical Review, Michael Angelo A. Cortez

DLSU Business & Economics Review

Sustainability reporting has been standardized in Japanese non-financial reporting, taking into consideration its business environment, legal framework, and cultural values. Particular to environmental management, Japanese manufacturers have institutionalized sustainability reporting in their mode of governance in the past decade. On the other hand, there are no reporting guidelines yet on sustainability reporting in the Philippines, not withstanding the current greening of global economies.

This study aims to describe how Japanese multinational companies influence sustainability reporting practices of their Philippine subsidiaires by: (1) annotating significant theories and literature on organizations, institutions and networks; (2) deriving the most relevant theory; (3) and …

Producing Multimedia Resources For Teaching Medical Students About The Social Context Of Medicine: A Partnership Approach, Tracey Collett, Priska Schoenborn

Peninsula Medical School

No abstract provided.

Editorial Of E-Book On Action And Language Integration, A Cangelosi

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

Increasing theoretical and experimental research on action and language processing in humans and animals clearly demonstrates the strict interaction and co-dependence between language and action. This has been extensively demonstrated in neuroscientific investigations (e.g., Rizzolatti and Arbib, 1998; Cappa and Perani, 2003; Pulvermuller, 2003), psychology experiments (e.g., Glenberg and Kaschak, 2002; Pecher and Zwaan, 2005; Barsalou, 2008), evolutionary psychology (e.g., Corballis, 2002), and computational modeling (e.g., Cangelosi and Parisi, 2004; Massera et al., 2007; Cangelosi, 2010). All these studies have important implication both for the understanding of the action basis of cognition in natural and artificial cognitive systems, as well …

Fabrication And Mechanical Properties Of Chitosan Composite Membrane Containing Hydroxyapatite Particles, Hr Le, S Qu, Re Mackay, R Rothwell

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

This paper described the development of chitosan composites containing precipitated hydroxyapatite particles for potential applications in orthopaedic surgery or waste water treatment. The synthetic process and morphology of hydroxyapatite were reported. The effects of hydroxyapatite content on the microstructure and mechanical properties of composites were investigated. It was found that the Young’s Modulus of the composites decreases with hydroxyapatite content while the failure strength and strain increase with the hydroxyapatite content.

Bayesian Model Selection For Beta Autoregressive Processes, Roberto Casarin, L Dalla Valle, Fabrizio Leisen

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

No abstract provided.

Coastal Defence Evaluation: An Sprc Approach, Dominic E. Reeve, Jose M. Horrillo-Caraballo, Andrew Fox, Dave Simmonds, Sum H. Kwan, Shunqi Pan, Deborah Greaves

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

In this paper, we show how the methodology based on the Source-Pathway-Receptor-Consequence (SPRC) approach can be used to identify the risks of flooding and erosion. The methodology is applied to the Teign Estuary in Devon, UK to define the linkages between physical loads (waves, tides), sea defences, areas liable to flooding and the impacts of flooding.

Use Of Digital Holographic Cameras To Examine The Measurement And Understanding Of Sediment Suspension In The Nearshore, Daniel C. Conley, Daniel Buscombe, W. Alex M. Nimmo-Smith

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

We present results from a 3-week field experiment measuring surf-zone flows and sediment transport on a steep energetic beach in the south-west UK, including the first reported deployment of an in-line holographic camera ('holocam') in the surf zone, co-located with various optical backscatter sensors and an acoustic backscatter sensor (ABS). The extensive data set provides perhaps a unique opportunity to examine the performance of optical and acoustic backscatter instruments in a wide range of conditions including bubbly flows, as well as some fundamental aspects of sediment suspension processes such as the near-bed size-distribution of suspended sediment. The holocam, deployed with …