Reference standards for follicular density in ovarian cortex from birth to sexual maturity.

Research Question: Are age-normalized reference values for human ovarian cortical follicular density adequate for tissue quality control in fertility preservation?

Design: Published quantitative data on the number of follicles in samples without known ovarian pathology were converted into cortical densities to create reference values. Next, a sample cohort of 126 girls (age 1-24 years, mean ± SD 11 ± 6) with cancer, severe haematological disease or Turner syndrome were used to calculate Z-scores for cortical follicular density based on the reference values.

Results: No difference was observed between Z-scores in samples from untreated patients (0.

Identification of phthalate mixture exposure targets in the human and mouse ovary in vitro.

Chemical health risk assessment is based on single chemicals, but humans and wildlife are exposed to extensive mixtures of industrial substances and pharmaceuticals. Such exposures are life-long and correlate with multiple morbidities, including infertility. How combinatorial effects of chemicals should be handled in hazard characterization and risk assessment are open questions.

A Pockels cell enabled heterodyne phase contrast imaging diagnostic for detection of ion cyclotron emission.

This work describes a novel optical heterodyne detection scheme that significantly extends the frequency response of the phase contrast imaging method to detect electron density fluctuations in tens of megahertz frequency range. The system employs a variable frequency electro-optic modulator to allow operation at any frequency in the range 10-40 MHz without the need to realign the system. The frequency coverage of the system makes it suitable to measure the radial structure of the electron density component of ion cyclotron emission on devices having confining magnetic field of a few tesla, thus extending the purely temporal measurements provided so far by magnetic probes.

Nitrate fertilization may delay autumn leaf senescence, while amino acid treatments do not.

Fertilization with nitrogen (N)-rich compounds leads to increased growth but may compromise phenology and winter survival of trees in boreal regions. During autumn, N is remobilized from senescing leaves and stored in other parts of the tree to be used in the next growing season. However, the mechanism behind the N fertilization effect on winter survival is not well understood, and it is unclear how N levels or forms modulate autumn senescence.

Stem girdling affects the onset of autumn senescence in aspen in interaction with metabolic signals.

Autumn senescence in aspen (Populus tremula) is precisely timed every year to relocate nutrients from leaves to storage organs before winter. Here we demonstrate how stem girdling, which leads to the accumulation of photosynthates in the crown, influences senescence. Girdling resulted in an early onset of senescence, but the chlorophyll degradation was slower and nitrogen more efficiently resorbed than during normal autumn senescence.

Overview of the Wendelstein 7-X phase contrast imaging diagnostic.

A phase contrast imaging (PCI) diagnostic has been developed for the Wendelstein 7-X (W7-X) stellarator. This diagnostic, funded by the U.S.

Autumn senescence in aspen is not triggered by day length.

Autumn senescence in mature aspens, grown under natural conditions, is initiated at almost the same date every year. The mechanism of such precise timing is not understood but we have previously shown that the signal must be derived from light. We studied variation in bud set and autumn senescence in a collection of 116 natural Eurasian aspen (Populus tremula) genotypes, from 12 populations in Sweden and planted in one northern and one southern common garden, to test the hypothesis that onset of autumn senescence is triggered by day length.

Contrasting patterns of cytokinins between years in senescing aspen leaves.

Cytokinins are plant hormones that typically block or delay leaf senescence. We profiled 34 different cytokinins/cytokinin metabolites (including precursors, conjugates and degradation products) in leaves of a free-growing mature aspen (Populus tremula) before and after the initiation of autumnal senescence over three consecutive years. The levels and profiles of individual cytokinin species, or classes/groups, varied greatly between years, despite the fact that the onset of autumn senescence was at the same time each year, and senescence was not associated with depletion of either active or total cytokinin levels.

Reynolds number scaling of the influence of boundary layers on the global behavior of laboratory quasi-Keplerian flows.

We present fluid velocity measurements in a modified Taylor-Couette device operated in the quasi-Keplerian regime, where it is observed that nearly ideal flows exhibit self-similarity under scaling of the Reynolds number. In contrast, nonideal flows show progressive departure from ideal Couette as the Reynolds number is increased. We present a model that describes the observed departures from ideal Couette rotation as a function of the fluxes of angular momentum across the boundaries, capturing the dependence on Reynolds number and boundary conditions.

A design path for the hierarchical self-assembly of patchy colloidal particles.

Patchy colloidal particles are promising candidates for building blocks in directed self-assembly. To be successful the surface patterns need to be simple enough to be synthesized, while feature-rich enough to cause the colloidal particles to self-assemble into desired structures. Achieving this is a challenge for traditional synthesis methods.

Loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) for point-of-care detection of asymptomatic low-density malaria parasite carriers in Zanzibar.

Background: Asymptomatic, low parasite density malaria infections are difficult to detect with currently available point-of-care diagnostics. This study piloted a loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) kit for field-friendly, high-throughput detection of asymptomatic malaria infections during mass screening and treatment (MSAT) in Zanzibar, a malaria pre-elimination setting.

Methods: Screening took place in three known hotspot areas prior to the short rains in November.

Nonlinear stability of laboratory quasi-Keplerian flows.

Experiments in a modified Taylor-Couette device, spanning Reynolds numbers of 10(5) to greater than 10(6), reveal the nonlinear stability of astrophysically relevant flows. Nearly ideal rotation, expected in the absence of axial boundaries, is achieved for a narrow range of operating parameters. Departures from optimal control parameters identify centrifugal instability of boundary layers as the primary source of turbulence observed in former experiments.

Predicting self-assembled patterns on spheres with multicomponent coatings.

Patchy colloids are promising candidates for building blocks in directed self-assembly, but large scale synthesis of colloids with controlled surface patterns remains challenging. One potential fabrication method is to self-assemble the surface patterns themselves, allowing complex morphologies to organize spontaneously. For this approach to be competitive, prediction and control of the pattern formation process are necessary.

Using the uncertainty principle to design simple interactions for targeted self-assembly.

We present a method that systematically simplifies isotropic interactions designed for targeted self-assembly. The uncertainty principle is used to show that an optimal simplification is achieved by a combination of heat kernel smoothing and Gaussian screening of the interaction potential in real and reciprocal space. We use this method to analytically design isotropic interactions for self-assembly of complex lattices and of materials with functional properties.

Chiral surfaces self-assembling in one-component systems with isotropic interactions.

We show that chiral symmetry can be broken spontaneously in one-component systems with isotropic interactions, i.e., many-particle systems having maximal a priori symmetry.

Observation of a free-Shercliff-layer instability in cylindrical geometry.

We report on observations of a free-Shercliff-layer instability in a Taylor-Couette experiment using a liquid metal over a wide range of Reynolds numbers, Re∼10(3)-10(6). The free Shercliff layer is formed by imposing a sufficiently strong axial magnetic field across a pair of differentially rotating axial end cap rings. This layer is destabilized by a hydrodynamic Kelvin-Helmholtz-type instability, characterized by velocity fluctuations in the r-θ plane.

Designing isotropic interactions for self-assembly of complex lattices.

We present a direct method for solving the inverse problem of designing isotropic potentials that cause self-assembly into target lattices. Each potential is constructed by matching its energy spectrum to the reciprocal representation of the lattice to guarantee that the desired structure is a ground state. We use the method to self-assemble complex lattices not previously achieved with isotropic potentials, such as a snub square tiling and the kagome lattice.

Novel self-assembled morphologies from isotropic interactions.

We present results from particle simulations with isotropic medium range interactions in two dimensions. At low temperature novel types of aggregated structures appear. We show that these structures can be explained by spontaneous symmetry breaking in analytic solutions to an adaptation of the spherical spin model.

Universality of striped morphologies.

We present a method for predicting the low-temperature behavior of spherical and Ising spin models with isotropic potentials. For the spherical model the characteristic length scales of the ground states are exactly determined but the morphology is shown to be degenerate with checkerboard patterns, stripes and more complex morphologies having identical energy. For the Ising models we show that the discretization breaks the degeneracy causing striped morphologies to be energetically favored and therefore they arise universally as ground states to potentials whose Hankel transforms have nontrivial minima.

A novel strategy based on histological protein profiling in-silico for identifying potential biomarkers in urinary bladder cancer.

Objective: To screen a publicly available immunohistochemistry (IHC) based web-atlas, to identify key proteins in bladder cancer that might serve as potential biomarkers.

Materials And Methods: The first version of the Human Protein Atlas (HPA 1.0), with 660 proteins, was visually examined to identify proteins with a variable staining pattern among the 12 tissue samples representing bladder cancer.

Observation of reversed shear Alfvén eigenmodes between sawtooth crashes in the Alcator C-Mod tokamak.

Groups of frequency chirping modes observed between sawtooth crashes in the Alcator C-Mod tokamak are interpreted as reversed shear Alfvén eigenmodes near the q=1 surface. These modes indicate that a reversed shear q profile is generated during the relaxation phase of the sawtooth cycle. Two important parameters, q_{min} and its radial position, are deduced from comparisons of measured density fluctuations with calculations from the ideal MHD code NOVA.

Long-term follow-up of patients with uveitis associated with juvenile idiopathic arthritis: a cohort study.

Purpose: To analyze the clinical and visual outcome of 55 consecutive patients with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA)-associated uveitis examined 7 and 24 years after the onset of the eye disease.

Methods: A retrospective study.

Results: Fifty-five out of 350 patients with JIA developed uveitis (15.

Palmoplantar pustulosis and sternocostoclavicular arthro-osteitis.

Seventeen patients with shoulder pain and radiographic involvement of the sternoclavicular or sternocostal joints, or both, are described. Eleven of these patients also had palmoplantar pustulosis. Histological examination of the joints showed chronic and subacute inflammation, increased osteoblastic activity, and cartilage degeneration.

A case of blackthorn synovitis.

A seven-year-old boy fell against a blackthorn bush and found that thorns had penetrated the skin over the left knee. Aseptic synovitis developed with repeated febrile episodes. With the suspicion of septic arthritis, the patient was treated with antibiotics on repeated occasions, two negative joint aspirations and a knee joint exploration were performed.