The effect of electromyography triggered electrical stimulation to abdominal muscles on sitting balance, respiratory functions, and abdominal muscle thickness in complete spinal cord injury: a randomized controlled trial.

Complete thoracic spinal cord injury (SCI) results in a loss of innervation to the abdominal muscles, which affects trunk stability and performance of activities of daily living from a sitting position. Respiratory function is also affected, leading to frequent pulmonary complications. Given the importance of trunk stability and respiratory function, we investigated the effects of electromyography triggered electrical stimulation (EMG-ES) applied to the abdominal muscles on sitting balance, respiratory functions and abdominal muscle thickness in individuals with complete thoracic SCI.

Tsunami deposits in Tunisia contemporaneous of the large 365 CE Crete earthquake and Mediterranean Sea catastrophic event.

New field investigations along the East Tunisian coastline reveal sedimentary deposits and damaged localities that may account for a catastrophic event during the late Holocene. North of Sfax city, ~ 3.4 m high cliff coastal marine and alluvial terraces show 20 to 50-cm-thick chaotic layer with sandy coarse gravels mixed with reworked pebbles, broken shells of gastropods and molluscs, organic matter and Roman pottery.

Adaptive tracking algorithm for trajectory analysis of cells and layer-by-layer assessment of motility dynamics.

Tracking biological objects such as cells or subcellular components imaged with time-lapse microscopy enables us to understand the molecular principles about the dynamics of cell behaviors. However, automatic object detection, segmentation and extracting trajectories remain as a rate-limiting step due to intrinsic challenges of video processing. This paper presents an adaptive tracking algorithm (Adtari) that automatically finds the optimum search radius and cell linkages to determine trajectories in consecutive frames.

Genetically Encoded Fluorescent Probe for Detection of Heme-Induced Conformational Changes in Cytochrome c.

Cytochrome c (Cytc) is a key redox protein for energy metabolism and apoptosis in cells. The activation of Cytc is composed of several steps, including its transfer to the mitochondrial membrane, binding to cytochrome c heme lyase (CCHL) and covalent attachment to heme. The spectroscopic methods are often applied to study the structural changes of Cytc.

Evaluation of peripapillary choroidal vascularity index in young smokers.

This retrospective study aimed to compare the peripapillary choroidal vascularity index (CVI) between young smokers who smoked less than 5 packs/year and non-smokers. The study included 52 smokers and 67 non-smokers, and comprehensive eye examinations were performed on all participants. Axial lengths (AL) were measured, and peripapillary enhanced depth imaging optical coherence tomography (EDI-OCT) images were obtained and evaluated using the Open Source ImageJ software.