| 1. |
- Klionsky, Daniel J., et al.
(författare)
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Guidelines for the use and interpretation of assays for monitoring autophagy
- 2012
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Ingår i: Autophagy. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1554-8635 .- 1554-8627. ; 8:4, s. 445-544
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- In 2008 we published the first set of guidelines for standardizing research in autophagy. Since then, research on this topic has continued to accelerate, and many new scientists have entered the field. Our knowledge base and relevant new technologies have also been expanding. Accordingly, it is important to update these guidelines for monitoring autophagy in different organisms. Various reviews have described the range of assays that have been used for this purpose. Nevertheless, there continues to be confusion regarding acceptable methods to measure autophagy, especially in multicellular eukaryotes. A key point that needs to be emphasized is that there is a difference between measurements that monitor the numbers or volume of autophagic elements (e.g., autophagosomes or autolysosomes) at any stage of the autophagic process vs. those that measure flux through the autophagy pathway (i.e., the complete process); thus, a block in macroautophagy that results in autophagosome accumulation needs to be differentiated from stimuli that result in increased autophagic activity, defined as increased autophagy induction coupled with increased delivery to, and degradation within, lysosomes (in most higher eukaryotes and some protists such as Dictyostelium) or the vacuole (in plants and fungi). In other words, it is especially important that investigators new to the field understand that the appearance of more autophagosomes does not necessarily equate with more autophagy. In fact, in many cases, autophagosomes accumulate because of a block in trafficking to lysosomes without a concomitant change in autophagosome biogenesis, whereas an increase in autolysosomes may reflect a reduction in degradative activity. Here, we present a set of guidelines for the selection and interpretation of methods for use by investigators who aim to examine macroautophagy and related processes, as well as for reviewers who need to provide realistic and reasonable critiques of papers that are focused on these processes. These guidelines are not meant to be a formulaic set of rules, because the appropriate assays depend in part on the question being asked and the system being used. In addition, we emphasize that no individual assay is guaranteed to be the most appropriate one in every situation, and we strongly recommend the use of multiple assays to monitor autophagy. In these guidelines, we consider these various methods of assessing autophagy and what information can, or cannot, be obtained from them. Finally, by discussing the merits and limits of particular autophagy assays, we hope to encourage technical innovation in the field.
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| 2. |
- An, Junghwa, et al.
(författare)
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Permanent Genetic Resources added to Molecular Ecology Resources Database 1 October 2009-30 November 2009
- 2010
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Ingår i: Molecular Ecology Resources. - : Wiley. - 1755-098X .- 1755-0998. ; 10:2, s. 404-408
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This article documents the addition of 411 microsatellite marker loci and 15 pairs of Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) sequencing primers to the Molecular Ecology Resources Database. Loci were developed for the following species: Acanthopagrus schlegeli, Anopheles lesteri, Aspergillus clavatus, Aspergillus flavus, Aspergillus fumigatus, Aspergillus oryzae, Aspergillus terreus, Branchiostoma japonicum, Branchiostoma belcheri, Colias behrii, Coryphopterus personatus, Cynogolssus semilaevis, Cynoglossus semilaevis, Dendrobium officinale, Dendrobium officinale, Dysoxylum malabaricum, Metrioptera roeselii, Myrmeciza exsul, Ochotona thibetana, Neosartorya fischeri, Nothofagus pumilio, Onychodactylus fischeri, Phoenicopterus roseus, Salvia officinalis L., Scylla paramamosain, Silene latifo, Sula sula, and Vulpes vulpes. These loci were cross-tested on the following species: Aspergillus giganteus, Colias pelidne, Colias interior, Colias meadii, Colias eurytheme, Coryphopterus lipernes, Coryphopterus glaucofrenum, Coryphopterus eidolon, Gnatholepis thompsoni, Elacatinus evelynae, Dendrobium loddigesii Dendrobium devonianum, Dysoxylum binectariferum, Nothofagus antarctica, Nothofagus dombeyii, Nothofagus nervosa, Nothofagus obliqua, Sula nebouxii, and Sula variegata. This article also documents the addition of 39 sequencing primer pairs and 15 allele specific primers or probes for Paralithodes camtschaticus.
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| 3. |
- Billade, Bhushan, 1982, et al.
(författare)
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Performance of the first ALMA Band 5 production cartridge
- 2011
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Ingår i: Proceedings of the 22nd International Symposium on Space Terahertz Technology, April 26-28th, 2011 - Tucson, Arizona, USA. ; , s. 56-56
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- We present performance of the first ALMA Band 5 production cartridge, covering RF frequencies from 163 GHz to 211 GHz. ALMA Band 5 is a dual polarization, sideband separation (2SB) receiver based on all Niobium (Nb) SuperconductorInsulator-Superconductor (SIS) tunnel junction mixer, providing 16 GHz of instantaneous RF bandwidth for the astronomy observations. The 2SB mixer for each polarization employs a quadrature layout. The sideband separation occurs at the output of the IF hybrid that has integrated bias-T for biasing the mixers, and is produced using superconducting thin film technology. Experimental verification of the Band 5 cold cartridge performed together with warm cartridge assembly, confirms the system noise temperature below 45 K, less than five quantum noise (5 hf/k) over most of the RF band, which is to our knowledge, the best results at these frequencies. The measurement of the sideband rejection indicates that the sideband rejection better than 10 dB over 90% of the observational band.
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| 4. |
- Xu, Guangwei, et al.
(författare)
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Synthesis, properties, and top-gated metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors of p-type GaSb nanowires
- 2013
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Ingår i: RSC Advances. - : Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC). - 2046-2069. ; 3:43, s. 19834-19839
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- High-quality GaSb nanowires (NWs) have been synthesized via chemical vapor deposition. The as-synthesized NWs have a zinc-blende structure with growth direction along a < 011 > direction. Raman spectrum of the GaSb NWs consists of two peaks, corresponding to the LO and TO phonon modes, respectively. The temperature dependence of the photoluminescence spectra shows a blue-shift as the temperature decreases from 300 to 13 K. The electrical properties of the GaSb NWs are investigated over a wide range of temperatures from 25 mK to 291 K. The results show that the GaSb NWs exhibit excellent p-type transistor performance at low temperatures (<40 K). The room-temperature hole density and mobility were found to be similar to 2.2 x 10(18) cm(-3) and similar to 14.2 cm(2) V-1 s(-1), respectively. The Schottky contact characteristics were observed and the barrier height was found to be similar to 14 meV. Our results show that the GaSb NWs could be used as building blocks for emerging p-type nanoelectronic devices in extremely low temperature environments.
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| 5. |
- Xu, Weili, et al.
(författare)
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Detection of Prediabetes and Undiagnosed Type 2 Diabetes : A Large Population-Based Study
- 2012
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Ingår i: Canadian Journal of Diabetes. - : Elsevier BV. - 1499-2671. ; 36:3, s. 108-113
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Objective: Prediabetes and undiagnosed diabetes have been commonly ignored. We aimed to investigate the prevalence of prediabetes and undiagnosed type 2 diabetes mellitus, and to verify the hypothesis that vascular risk factors (VRFs) may indicate prediabetes and undiagnosed type 2 diabetes.Methods: A total of 7567 adults, who were 20 to 79 years of age, and living in Tianjin, China, participated in this study. Type 2 diabetes was assessed based on medical history, hypoglycemic drugs use, fasting plasma glucose level >= 7.0 mmol/L, or postprandial 2-hour plasma glucose level >= 11.1 mmol/L. Undiagnosed type 2 diabetes was defined among subjects with type 2 diabetes when neither a medical history of diabetes nor hypoglycemic drugs use was present. Prediabetes was ascertained as fasting plasma glucose level of 6.1 to 6.9 mmol/L, or postprandial 2-hour plasma glucose level of 7.8 to 11.0 mmol/L (WHO 1999) among diabetes-free participants. Data were analyzed using multinomial logistic regression with adjustment for potential confounders.Results: Of all participants, 655 (8.7%) had prediabetes, and 721 (9.5%) were patients with type 2 diabetes, including 321 (4.2%) undiagnosed type 2 diabetes accounting for 44.5% patients with diabetes. The prevalence of prediabetes and undiagnosed type 2 diabetes increased with age, and was higher in women than in men. In a fully adjusted multinomial logistic regression model, hypertension, overweight, obesity, central obesity, and family history of diabetes were significantly associated with prediabetes and undiagnosed diabetes, whereas physical inactivity was independently related to undiagnosed diabetes.Conclusion: The prevalence of prediabetes and undiagnosed diabetes is approximately 13%, and almost 45% of patients with diabetes are undiagnosed. VRFs, such as hypertension, high adiposity, and family history of diabetes can be indicators for detecting prediabetes and undiagnosed diabetes.
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| 6. |
- Chen, Xin, 1980, et al.
(författare)
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Optimal and Efficient Power Allocation for OFDM Non-Coherent Cooperative Transmission
- 2012
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Ingår i: IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference, WCNC. - 1525-3511. - 9781467304375 ; , s. 1584-1589
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- In this paper, we study the subchannel (SC) power allocation for orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) multiple access points (APs) systems with non-coherent cooperative transmission. The objective is to maximize the total capacity under per-AP power constraints. It can be proved that the optimal solution can be obtained by the combination of an optimal SC partition search and the power allocation across SCs for each feasible partition. Existing work exhaustively searched the optimal SC partition and used Lagrange dual method to compute the power allocation across SCs. Since the entire complexity increases exponentially with the number of SCs, the existing method is unsuitable for practical implementation. In this paper, we propose a novel optimal power allocation algorithm for non-coherent cooperative transmission with a much lower complexity. Firstly, a concept of “cut-off SC” is proposed for searching the optimal SC partition. Then, an efficient optimal power allocation algorithm across SCs is proposed for any given cut-off SC. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm is optimal with a polynomial complexity, and ends within an acceptable number of iterations.
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| 7. |
- Ferrari, Camilla, et al.
(författare)
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How can elderly apolipoprotein E epsilon 4 carriers remain free from dementia?
- 2013
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Ingår i: Neurobiology of Aging. - : Elsevier BV. - 0197-4580 .- 1558-1497. ; 34:1, s. 13-21
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Apolipoprotein E (APOE) epsilon 4 is a major risk factor for Alzheimer's disease (AD) and dementia, but not all epsilon 4 carriers develop dementia. We sought to identify factors that may play a role in modifying the risk of dementia due to epsilon 4. A cognitively intact cohort (n = 932, age >= 75) was followed for 9 years to detect incident dementia cases. At baseline, information on education, leisure activities, and vascular risk factors was collected, and APOE was genotyped. During the follow-up, 324 subjects developed dementia, including 247 AD cases. The hazard ratio (HR, 95% confidence interval [95% CI]) of dementia related to the epsilon 4 was 1.39 (1.11-1.76), while the risk was reduced when epsilon 4 carriers had high education, no vascular risk factors, or high score of leisure activities. Among epsilon 4 carriers, the multiadjusted HRs of dementia that were associated with high education, high level of leisure activities, and absence of vascular risk factors were 0.59 (0.40-0.87), 0.49 (0.29-0.85), and 0.61 (0.41-0.90), respectively. The epsilon 4 carriers with these factors had about 1.2 years delayed time to dementia onset compared with those without these factors. High education, active leisure activities, or maintaining vascular health seems to reduce the risk of dementia related to APOE epsilon 4. The epsilon 4 carriers with these characteristics appear to have similar dementia-free survival time to non-epsilon 4 carriers.
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| 8. |
- Keller, Lina, et al.
(författare)
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The Obesity Related Gene, FTO, Interacts with APOE and is Associated with Alzheimer's Disease Risk : A Prospective Cohort Study
- 2011
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Ingår i: Journal of Alzheimer's Disease. - 1387-2877 .- 1875-8908. ; 23:3, s. 461-469
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The FTO gene has been shown to have a small but robust effect on body mass index (BMI) and to increase the risk for diabetes. Both high BMI and diabetes are vascular risk factors that might play a role in the development of Alzheimer's disease (AD) and dementia. Thus, our aim was to explore the impact of FTO on AD and dementia risk. Nine years of follow-up data was gathered from the Kungsholmen project, a prospective population-based study on 1,003 persons without dementia. Cox-regression models were used to assess the relative risks of developing AD and dementia (DSM-III-R criteria) according to FTO genotypes (rs9939609), taking into account APOE, physical inactivity, BMI, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease (CVD). Compared to carriers of the FTO TT-genotype, AA-carriers had a higher risk for AD (RR 1.58, 95% CI: 1.11-2.24) and for dementia (RR 1.48, 95% CI: 1.09-2.02) after adjustment for age, gender, education, and APOE genotype. This effect remained after additional adjustment for physical inactivity, BMI, diabetes, and CVD. An interaction between FTO and APOE was found, with increased risk for dementia for those carrying both FTO AA and APOE epsilon 4. Importantly, the effect of the AA-genotype on dementia/AD risk seems to act mostly through the interaction with APOE epsilon 4. Our findings suggest that the FTO AA-genotype increases the risk for dementia, and in particular AD, independently of physical inactivity, BMI, diabetes, and CVD measured at baseline. Our results are in line with the recently reported association between FTO and reduced brain volume in cognitively healthy subjects.
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| 9. |
- Lango Allen, Hana, et al.
(författare)
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Hundreds of variants clustered in genomic loci and biological pathways affect human height.
- 2010
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Ingår i: Nature. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1476-4687 .- 0028-0836. ; 467:7317, s. 832-8
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Most common human traits and diseases have a polygenic pattern of inheritance: DNA sequence variants at many genetic loci influence the phenotype. Genome-wide association (GWA) studies have identified more than 600 variants associated with human traits, but these typically explain small fractions of phenotypic variation, raising questions about the use of further studies. Here, using 183,727 individuals, we show that hundreds of genetic variants, in at least 180 loci, influence adult height, a highly heritable and classic polygenic trait. The large number of loci reveals patterns with important implications for genetic studies of common human diseases and traits. First, the 180 loci are not random, but instead are enriched for genes that are connected in biological pathways (P = 0.016) and that underlie skeletal growth defects (P < 0.001). Second, the likely causal gene is often located near the most strongly associated variant: in 13 of 21 loci containing a known skeletal growth gene, that gene was closest to the associated variant. Third, at least 19 loci have multiple independently associated variants, suggesting that allelic heterogeneity is a frequent feature of polygenic traits, that comprehensive explorations of already-discovered loci should discover additional variants and that an appreciable fraction of associated loci may have been identified. Fourth, associated variants are enriched for likely functional effects on genes, being over-represented among variants that alter amino-acid structure of proteins and expression levels of nearby genes. Our data explain approximately 10% of the phenotypic variation in height, and we estimate that unidentified common variants of similar effect sizes would increase this figure to approximately 16% of phenotypic variation (approximately 20% of heritable variation). Although additional approaches are needed to dissect the genetic architecture of polygenic human traits fully, our findings indicate that GWA studies can identify large numbers of loci that implicate biologically relevant genes and pathways.
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| 10. |
- Lövdén, Martin, et al.
(författare)
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Lifestyle change and the prevention of cognitive decline and dementia : what is the evidence?
- 2013
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Ingår i: Current Opinion in Psychiatry. - 0951-7367 .- 1473-6578. ; 26:3, s. 239-243
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Purpose of review Effective pharmaceutical treatment of dementia is currently unavailable. Epidemiological work has, however, identified modifiable lifestyle factors, such as poor diet and physical and cognitive inactivity, that are associated with the risk of dementia. These factors may be useful targets for the prevention of cognitive impairment and dementia. Much recent research has, therefore, adopted an interventional focus. We review this work, highlight some methodological limitations, and provide recommendations for future research. Recent findings Change from a sedentary lifestyle to moderate physical activity has beneficial effects on cognitive functioning, and preliminary evidence suggests that such change may reduce the incidence of dementia. The evidence on cognitive benefits of lifestyle changes towards more intellectual engagement is insufficient. Nutritional supplements to treat deficiency may improve cognitive performance, but supplements on top of a healthy diet cannot be recommended. Summary Introduction of physical activity can reduce the risk of cognitive impairment in old age. Future research on nutritional supplements must consider the principle of an inverted U-shaped association between nutritional level and cognitive function. Work on the effects of cognitive training must use transfer tasks as primary outcome measures, and investigate whether effects of cognitive training generalize beyond the trained cognitive tasks.
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