Stmn1 up-regulates Cdx2 expression and participates in gastric intestinal metaplasia in vitro and in vivo: a randomized controlled trial

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Stmn1 is over-expressed in almost all pathological stages during gastric cancer development, such as chronic atrophic gastritis, dysplasia, and gastric cancer. IM is an important precancerous lesion of gastric cancer, however, whether Stmn1 was up-regulated or down-regulated in this stage is still unknown. We aimed to evaluate the expression level of Stmn1 in IM in vivo and its relationship with important gene of IM named Cdx2 in vitro.EXPERIMENTAL APPROACH: Wistar rats (n=12, sex in half) were gavaged with MNNG (167μg/ml) to induce IM model in stomach. After pathological examination with AB staining to confirm that the model was successful, relative expression level of Stmn1 was detected between normal group and model group using RT-qPCR. Human gastric cell line GES-1 was used to investigate whether Stmn1 influence expression level of IM essential gene Cdx2 by over-expressing or down-expressing experiments, RT-qPCR and western blot.KEY RESULTS: We have demonstrated that Stmn1 was up-regulated in IM model induced by MNNG in rats in vivo, and it could significantly up-regulate Cdx2 expression level in human gastric cell line GES-1 in vitro.CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS: We demonstrated that Stmn1 was involved in IM in this model and it could up-regulating Cdx2 in human gastric cell line GES-1 in vitro. These results suggested that Stmn1 might be a potential biomarker or candidate treatment target of IM in stomach.

Real time observer-based stator fault diagnosis for IM

This paper proposes a delta connected IM model that takes the Stator winding Inter-Turn Short Circuit (SITSC) fault into account. In order to detect the fault and evaluate its severity, an observer based FDI method is suggested. It allows the generation of residual using extended Kalman filter (EKF). To overcome the problem of the EKF initialization, the cyclic optimization method is applied to determine its tuning parameters. The advantage of the proposed approach is the real-time quantification of the fault severity and the quick fault detection. Using numerical simulation under both the healthy and the faulty conditions, the proposed IM model and EKF-based FDI approach are confirmed. Experimental results obtained by a real-time implementation on test-bench validate the simulated results.

Bewehrte Beton-Beton-Verbundfugen bei nachträglicher Verstärkung: Ermüdungsbeanspruchung/Interface between old and new concrete in case of subsequently strengthening: Fatigue loading

Zusammenfassung Mit der EOTA TR 066 steht ein Bemessungskonzept für Verbundfugen bei der nachträglichen Verstärkung mit Aufbeton bei ruhenden und ermüdungswirksamen Beanspruchungen zur Verfügung. Das Bemessungskonzept hat in entsprechender Form auch im Model Code 2010 seinen Niederschlag gefunden. Im Zuge eines Forschungsvorhabens wurden zur Validierung des Ermüdungsnachweises als Bestandteil des Bemessungskonzepts der EOTA TR 066 Bauteilversuche an der TU Dortmund unter zyklischer Belastung durchgeführt. Die Versuche bestätigten die Ergebnisse aus zuvor durchgeführten Kleinkörperversuchen an den Universitäten Innsbruck und Delft. Zudem konnte anhand von Messungen der Stahlspannungen in den Schubverbindern während der Versuchslaufzeit festgestellt werden, dass die Spannungsschwingbreiten bei sehr großer Rauigkeit (Rt ≥ 3 mm) der Verbundfuge und bei ausreichender Begrenzung der Schwingbreiten der zyklischen Beanspruchungen Δτiu so gering sind, sodass kein expliziter Nachweis gegen Ermüdung erforderlich ist. Die Anwendung des Nachweiskonzeptes ist an zusätzliche konstruktive, betontechnische und ausführungstechnische Bedingungen geknüpft. Im Vergleich zum derzeitigen Nachweisverfahren im DIN EN 1992–2/NA liefert das Bemessungskonzept deutlich wirtschaftlichere Ergebnisse.

All-atom Molecular Dynamics model for mycobacterial plasma membrane

Phosphatidyl-myo-inositol mannosides (PIMs) are an essential component of the cell envelope and the most predominant at the inner membrane (IM) of M. tuberculosis. In this work, we propose an Molecular Dynamics (MD) M. tuberculosis IM model composed of PIM2 lipids. The study was divided in three parts: influence of the temperature in the PIM2 membrane stability, self-assembly abilities of the PIM2 lipid and the behavior when a trans membrane protein is inserted in PIM2 membrane. Our results show that the model is able to reproduce the gel phase observed at 310 K and the transition to a fluid phase at 328.15 K. Also, the spontaneous self-assembly of randomly distributed lipids in a vesicular aggregate was observed. Finally, we observe that the PIM2 membrane is more stable than DPPC membranes when a Tap protein is inserted. Once Tap eflux pump is related to multidrug resistance of M. tuberculosis, this result indicated that the use of the proper lipid model is essential to the proper depiction and modeling of these systems.Graphical TOC Entry

Analysis of Sidebands Failures in Asynchronous Drives

This chapter deals with the diagnosis of induction motors (IM) with the so-called motor current signature analysis (MCSA). The MCSA is one of the most efficient techniques for the detection and the localization of electrical and mechanical failures, in which faults become apparent by harmonic components around the supply frequency. This chapter presents a summary of the most frequent faults and its consequences on the stator current spectrum of an IM. A three-phase IM model was used for simulation taking into account in one hand the normal healthy operation and in the other hand the broken rotor bars, the shorted turns in the stator windings, the voltage unbalance between phases of supply, and the abnormal behavior of load. The MCSA is used by many authors in literature for faults detection of IM. The major contribution of this work is to prove the efficiency of this diagnosis methodology to detect different faults simultaneously, in normal and abnormal functional conditions. The results illustrate good agreement between both simulated and experimental results.

Efficient Maximum-Likelihood Inference For The Isolation-With-Initial-Migration Model With Potentially Asymmetric Gene Flow

The isolation-with-migration (IM) model is commonly used to make inferences about gene flow during speciation, using polymorphism data. However, Becquet and Przeworski (2009) report that the parameter estimates obtained by fitting the IM model are very sensitive to the model's assumptions (including the assumption of constant gene flow until the present). This paper is concerned with the isolation-with-initial-migration (IIM) model of Wilkinson-Herbots (2012), which drops precisely this assumption. In the IIM model, one ancestral population divides into two descendant subpopulations, between which there is an initial period of gene flow and a subsequent period of isolation. We derive a very fast method of fitting an extended version of the IIM model, which also allows for asymmetric gene flow and unequal population sizes. This is a maximum-likelihood method, applicable to data on the number of segregating sites between pairs of DNA sequences from a large number of independent loci. In addition to obtaining parameter estimates, our method can also be used to distinguish between alternative models representing different evolutionary scenarios, by means of likelihood ratio tests. We illustrate the procedure on pairs of Drosophila sequences from approximately 30,000 loci. The computing time needed to fit the most complex version of the model to this data set is only a couple of minutes. The R code to fit the IIM model can be found in the supplementary files of this paper.

A Fast-Converging Algorithm for the Efficiency Optimization of Vector Controlled Induction Motor Drives Based on a Hybrid Magnetic Flux Controller Architecture

The paper introduces a magnetic flux control algorithm for the minimization of losses in Induction Motor (IM) drives. The proposed methodology accounts for search time delays and IM model deficiencies and has been applied to minimize power losses. The controller is validated on an IM prototype and offers improved transient response.

Problems of Equivalent Load Amplitude in Fatigue Life Calculations

This paper presents issues of fatigue life calculations in operational load conditions. The assumed runs were so processed as to get a set of sinusoidal cycles by using the following methods: full cycles counting method and rainflow counting method. On the basis of such sets of cycles of the varying parameters Sm i and Sa i were prepared block load spectra of equivalent amplitudes Saz , obtained with the use of an original method of these authors, in which two-parameter fatigue characteristics were applied. The work resulted in comparison of fatigue life results for load spectra determined by using the assumed cycles counting methods and the assumed two-parameter fatigue characteristics: the model IM, model II, model III and model IV, respectively.