Reconstitution of human microglia and resident T cells in the brain of humanized DRAGA mice.

Humanized mouse models are valuable tools for investigating the human immune system in response to infection and injury. We have previously described the human immune system (HIS)-DRAGA mice (HLA-A2.HLA-DR4.

A Cadaveric Case Report of a Double Right Coronary Artery and Its Clinical Implications.

A double right coronary artery is one of the rarest variations of the coronary arterial system. This case report presents a unique variation: a right coronary and an accessory coronary artery arise from a single ostium within the right aortic sinus. The two vessels appeared externally to have a common trunk but were partitioned internally by a carina-like septum.

A Unique Arc of Bühler Variant Connecting the Arteries of the Foregut, Midgut, and Hindgut and Its Surgical Significance.

This case report presents a rare variation of the arc of Bühler (AOB) in a cadaver during the abdominal dissection assignment in the Ross Anatomy Lab at William Carey University College of Osteopathic Medicine. The AOB is a patent anastomotic channel between the celiac trunk and the superior mesenteric artery independent of the gastroduodenal artery and dorsal pancreatic artery. This report describes in detail a complex and extensive branching pattern of a unique AOB variant.

Hemophilia A subjects with an intron-22 gene inversion mutation show CD4 T-effector responses to multiple epitopes in FVIII.

Background: Almost half of severe hemophilia A (HA) is caused by an intron 22 inversion mutation (Int22Inv), which disrupts the 26-exon gene. Inverted mRNA exons 1-22 are transcribed, while mRNA, containing exons 23-26, is transcribed from a promoter within intron 22. Neither FVIII activity nor FVIII antigen (cross-reacting material, CRM) are detectable in plasma of patients with an intron-22 inversion.

Medical and economic burden of delirium on hospitalization outcomes of acute respiratory failure: A retrospective national cohort.

Although delirium in patients with acute respiratory failure (ARF) may evolve in any hospital setting, previous studies on the impact of delirium on ARF were restricted to those in the intensive care unit (ICU). The data about the impact of delirium on ARF hospitalizations outside of the ICU is limited. Therefore, we conducted the first national study to examine the effect-magnitude of delirium on ARF in all hospital settings, that is, in the ICU as well as on the general medical floor.

A Novel Framework Using Deep Auto-Encoders Based Linear Model for Data Classification.

This paper proposes a novel data classification framework, combining sparse auto-encoders (SAEs) and a post-processing system consisting of a linear system model relying on Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm. All the sensitive and high-level features are extracted by using the first auto-encoder which is wired to the second auto-encoder, followed by a Softmax function layer to classify the extracted features obtained from the second layer. The two auto-encoders and the Softmax classifier are stacked in order to be trained in a supervised approach using the well-known backpropagation algorithm to enhance the performance of the neural network.

A Human-Immune-System (HIS) humanized mouse model (DRAGA: HLA-A2. HLA-DR4. Rag1 KO.IL-2Rγc KO. NOD) for COVID-19.

We report the first Human Immune System (HIS)-humanized mouse model ("DRAGA": HLA-A2.HLA-DR4.Rag1KO.

Hemophilia A Inhibitor Subjects Show Unique PBMC Gene Expression Profiles That Include Up-Regulated Innate Immune Modulators.

Formation of pathological anti-FVIII antibodies, or "inhibitors," is the most serious complication of therapeutic FVIII infusions, affecting up to 1/3 of severe Hemophilia A (HA) patients. Inhibitor formation is a classical T-cell dependent adaptive immune response. As such, it requires help from the innate immune system.

Seroprevalence and demographic factors associated with hepatitis B, hepatitis C and HIV infection from a hospital emergency department testing programme, London, United Kingdom, 2015 to 2016.

BackgroundProgress towards HIV, hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) elimination requires local prevalence estimates and linkage to care (LTC) of undiagnosed or disengaged cases.AimWe aimed to estimate seroprevalence, factors associated with positive blood-borne virus (BBV) serology and numbers needed to screen (NNS) to detect a new BBV diagnosis and achieve full LTC from emergency department (ED) BBV testing.MethodsDuring a 9-month programme in an ED in east London, England, testing was offered to adult attendees having a full blood count (FBC).

Unifying the seeds auto-generation (SAGE) with knee cartilage segmentation framework: data from the osteoarthritis initiative.

Purpose: Manual segmentation is sensitive to operator bias, while semiautomatic random walks segmentation offers an intuitive approach to understand the user knowledge at the expense of large amount of user input. In this paper, we propose a novel random walks seed auto-generation (SAGE) hybrid model that is robust to interobserver error and intensive user intervention.

Methods: Knee image is first oversegmented to produce homogeneous superpixels.

Proteomics and Network Analyses Reveal Inhibition of Akt-mTOR Signaling in CD4 T Cells by Mycobacterium tuberculosis Mannose-Capped Lipoarabinomannan.

Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) cell wall glycolipid mannose-capped lipoarabinomannan (ManLAM) inhibits CD4 T-cell activation by inhibiting proximal T-cell receptor (TCR) signaling when activated by anti-CD3. To understand the impact of ManLAM on CD4 T-cell function when both the TCR-CD3 complex and major costimulator CD28 are engaged, we performed label-free quantitative MS and network analysis. Mixed-effect model analysis of peptide intensity identified 149 unique peptides representing 131 proteins that were differentially regulated by ManLAM in anti-CD3- and anti-CD28-activated CD4 T cells.

Toll like Receptor 2 engagement on CD4 T cells promotes TH9 differentiation and function.

We have recently demonstrated that mycobacterial ligands engage Toll like receptor 2 (TLR2) on CD4 T cells and up-regulate T-cell receptor (TCR) triggered Th1 responses in vitro and in vivo. To better understand the role of T-cell expressed TLR2 on CD4 T-cell differentiation and function, we conducted a gene expression analysis of murine naïve CD4 T-cells stimulated in the presence or absence of TLR2 co-stimulation. Unexpectedly, naïve CD4 T-cells co-stimulated via TLR2 showed a significant up-regulation of Il9 mRNA compared to cells co-stimulated via CD28.

Investigation of random walks knee cartilage segmentation model using inter-observer reproducibility: Data from the osteoarthritis initiative.

Background: Existing knee cartilage segmentation methods have reported several technical drawbacks. In essence, graph cuts remains highly susceptible to image noise despite extended research interest; active shape model is often constraint by the selection of training data while shortest path have demonstrated shortcut problem in the presence of weak boundary, which is a common problem in medical images.

Objectives: The aims of this study is to investigate the capability of random walks as knee cartilage segmentation method.

Novel high throughput pooled shRNA screening identifies NQO1 as a potential drug target for host directed therapy for tuberculosis.

Unlabelled: Chemical regulation of macrophage function is one key strategy for developing host-directed adjuvant therapies for tuberculosis (TB). A critical step to develop these therapies is the identification and characterization of specific macrophage molecules and pathways with a high potential to serve as drug targets. Using a barcoded lentivirus-based pooled short-hairpin RNA (shRNA) library combined with next generation sequencing, we identified 205 silenced host genes highly enriched in mycobacteria-resistant macrophages.

SMARTbot: A Behavioral Analysis Framework Augmented with Machine Learning to Identify Mobile Botnet Applications.

Botnet phenomenon in smartphones is evolving with the proliferation in mobile phone technologies after leaving imperative impact on personal computers. It refers to the network of computers, laptops, mobile devices or tablets which is remotely controlled by the cybercriminals to initiate various distributed coordinated attacks including spam emails, ad-click fraud, Bitcoin mining, Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS), disseminating other malwares and much more. Likewise traditional PC based botnet, Mobile botnets have the same operational impact except the target audience is particular to smartphone users.

Mannose-Capped Lipoarabinomannan from Mycobacterium tuberculosis Induces CD4+ T Cell Anergy via GRAIL.

Mycobacterium tuberculosis cell wall glycolipid, lipoarabinomannan, can inhibit CD4(+) T cell activation by downregulating the phosphorylation of key proximal TCR signaling molecules: Lck, CD3ζ, ZAP70, and LAT. Inhibition of proximal TCR signaling can result in T cell anergy, in which T cells are inactivated following an Ag encounter, yet remain viable and hyporesponsive. We tested whether mannose-capped lipoarabinomannan (LAM)-induced inhibition of CD4(+) T cell activation resulted in CD4(+) T cell anergy.

Randomized Controlled Trial on the Effect of Channa striatus Extract on Measurement of the Uterus, Pulsatility Index, Resistive Index of Uterine Artery and Superficial Skin Wound Artery in Post Lower Segment Caesarean Section Women.

Aim: To compare the mean of anteroposterior (AP) measurements of the uterus in longitudinal and oblique transverse planes, and the pulsatility index (PI) and resistive index (RI) of the uterine artery and superficial skin wound artery between patients taking Channa striatus and placebo.

Background: Channa striatus, also known as haruan, is a fresh water snakehead fish consumed in many parts of Southeast Asia. Channa striatus is also normally consumed by women postpartum to promote wound healing as well as to reduce post-operative pain.

Decoding of visual information from human brain activity: A review of fMRI and EEG studies.

Brain is the command center for the body and contains a lot of information which can be extracted by using different non-invasive techniques. Electroencephalography (EEG), Magnetoencephalography (MEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) are the most common neuroimaging techniques to elicit brain behavior. By using these techniques different activity patterns can be measured within the brain to decode the content of mental processes especially the visual and auditory content.

Interactive knee cartilage extraction using efficient segmentation software: data from the osteoarthritis initiative.

In medical image segmentation, manual segmentation is considered both labor- and time-intensive while automated segmentation often fails to segment anatomically intricate structure accordingly. Interactive segmentation can tackle shortcomings reported by previous segmentation approaches through user intervention. To better reflect user intention, development of suitable editing functions is critical.

A lightweight distributed framework for computational offloading in mobile cloud computing.

The latest developments in mobile computing technology have enabled intensive applications on the modern Smartphones. However, such applications are still constrained by limitations in processing potentials, storage capacity and battery lifetime of the Smart Mobile Devices (SMDs). Therefore, Mobile Cloud Computing (MCC) leverages the application processing services of computational clouds for mitigating resources limitations in SMDs.

Medical image visual appearance improvement using bihistogram Bezier curve contrast enhancement: data from the Osteoarthritis Initiative.

Well-defined image can assist user to identify region of interest during segmentation. However, complex medical image is usually characterized by poor tissue contrast and low background luminance. The contrast improvement can lift image visual quality, but the fundamental contrast enhancement methods often overlook the sudden jump problem.

TLR2 engagement on CD4(+) T cells enhances effector functions and protective responses to Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

We have previously demonstrated that mycobacterial lipoproteins engage TLR2 on human CD4(+) T cells and upregulate TCR-triggered IFN-γ secretion and cell proliferation in vitro. Here we examined the role of CD4(+) T-cell-expressed TLR2 in Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) Ag-specific T-cell priming and in protection against MTB infection in vivo. Like their human counterparts, mouse CD4(+) T cells express TLR2 and respond to TLR2 costimulation in vitro.

Blocking the urotensin II receptor pathway ameliorates the metabolic syndrome and improves cardiac function in obese mice.

The metabolic syndrome is defined by the presence of hyperlipidemia, obesity, hypertension, and diabetes. The syndrome is associated with significant cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. The aim of the present study was to determine the role of the vasoactive peptide urotensin II (UII) in the pathogenesis of the metabolic syndrome.