| 1. |
- Elsik, Christine G., et al.
(författare)
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The Genome Sequence of Taurine Cattle : A Window to Ruminant Biology and Evolution
- 2009
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Ingår i: Science. - : American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). - 0036-8075 .- 1095-9203. ; 324:5926, s. 522-528
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- To understand the biology and evolution of ruminants, the cattle genome was sequenced to about sevenfold coverage. The cattle genome contains a minimum of 22,000 genes, with a core set of 14,345 orthologs shared among seven mammalian species of which 1217 are absent or undetected in noneutherian (marsupial or monotreme) genomes. Cattle-specific evolutionary breakpoint regions in chromosomes have a higher density of segmental duplications, enrichment of repetitive elements, and species-specific variations in genes associated with lactation and immune responsiveness. Genes involved in metabolism are generally highly conserved, although five metabolic genes are deleted or extensively diverged from their human orthologs. The cattle genome sequence thus provides a resource for understanding mammalian evolution and accelerating livestock genetic improvement for milk and meat production.
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| 2. |
- Axfors, Cathrine, et al.
(författare)
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Association between convalescent plasma treatment and mortality in COVID-19 : a collaborative systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized clinical trials
- 2021
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Ingår i: BMC Infectious Diseases. - : BioMed Central (BMC). - 1471-2334. ; 21:1
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Convalescent plasma has been widely used to treat COVID-19 and is under investigation in numerous randomized clinical trials, but results are publicly available only for a small number of trials. The objective of this study was to assess the benefits of convalescent plasma treatment compared to placebo or no treatment and all-cause mortality in patients with COVID-19, using data from all available randomized clinical trials, including unpublished and ongoing trials (Open Science Framework, ). Methods: In this collaborative systematic review and meta-analysis, clinical trial registries (ClinicalTrials.gov, WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform), the Cochrane COVID-19 register, the LOVE database, and PubMed were searched until April 8, 2021. Investigators of trials registered by March 1, 2021, without published results were contacted via email. Eligible were ongoing, discontinued and completed randomized clinical trials that compared convalescent plasma with placebo or no treatment in COVID-19 patients, regardless of setting or treatment schedule. Aggregated mortality data were extracted from publications or provided by investigators of unpublished trials and combined using the Hartung-Knapp-Sidik-Jonkman random effects model. We investigated the contribution of unpublished trials to the overall evidence. Results: A total of 16,477 patients were included in 33 trials (20 unpublished with 3190 patients, 13 published with 13,287 patients). 32 trials enrolled only hospitalized patients (including 3 with only intensive care unit patients). Risk of bias was low for 29/33 trials. Of 8495 patients who received convalescent plasma, 1997 died (23%), and of 7982 control patients, 1952 died (24%). The combined risk ratio for all-cause mortality was 0.97 (95% confidence interval: 0.92; 1.02) with between-study heterogeneity not beyond chance (I-2 = 0%). The RECOVERY trial had 69.8% and the unpublished evidence 25.3% of the weight in the meta-analysis. Conclusions: Convalescent plasma treatment of patients with COVID-19 did not reduce all-cause mortality. These results provide strong evidence that convalescent plasma treatment for patients with COVID-19 should not be used outside of randomized trials. Evidence synthesis from collaborations among trial investigators can inform both evidence generation and evidence application in patient care.
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| 3. |
- Marzolla, M., et al.
(författare)
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Open standards-based interoperability of job submission and management interfaces across the grid middleware platforms gLite and UNICORE
- 2007
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Ingår i: Proceedings - e-Science 2007, 3rd IEEE International Conference on e-Science and Grid Computing. - : IEEE Computer Society. - 0769530648 - 9780769530642 ; , s. 592-599
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- In a distributed Grid environment with ambitious service demands the job submission and management interfaces provide functionality of major importance. Emerging e-Science and Grid infrastructures such as EGEE and DEISA rely on highly available services that are capable of managing scientific jobs. It is the adoption of emerging open standard interfaces which allows the distribution of Grid resources in such a way that their actual service implementation or Grid technologies are not isolated from each other, especially when these resources are deployed in different e-Science infrastructures that consist of different types of computational resources. This paper motivates the interoperability of these infrastructures and discusses solutions. We describe the adoption of various open standards that recently emerged from the Open Grid Forum (OGF) in the field of job submission and management by well-known Grid technologies, respectively gLite and UNICORE. This has a fundamental impact on the interoperability between these technologies and thus within the next generation e-Science infrastructures that rely on these technologies.
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| 4. |
- Moncrieff, Marc D, et al.
(författare)
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Clinical Outcomes and Risk Stratification of Early-Stage Melanoma Micrometastases From an International Multicenter Study: Implications for the Management of American Joint Committee on Cancer IIIA Disease.
- 2022
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Ingår i: Journal of clinical oncology : official journal of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. - 1527-7755. ; 40:34, s. 3940-3951
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Indications for offering adjuvant systemic therapy for patients with early-stage melanomas with low disease burden sentinel node (SN) micrometastases, namely, American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC; eighth edition) stage IIIA disease, are presently controversial. The current study sought to identify high-risk SN-positive AJCC stage IIIA patients who are more likely to derive benefit from adjuvant systemic therapy.Patients were recruited from an intercontinental (Australia/Europe/North America) consortium of nine high-volume cancer centers. All were adult patients with pathologic stage pT1b/pT2a primary cutaneous melanomas who underwent SN biopsy between 2005 and 2020. Patient data, primary tumor and SN characteristics, and survival outcomes were analyzed.Three thousand six hundred seven patients were included. The median follow-up was 34 months. Pairwise disease comparison demonstrated no significant survival difference between N1a and N2a subgroups. Survival analysis identified a SN tumor deposit maximum dimension of 0.3 mm as the optimal cut point for stratifying survival. Five-year disease-specific survival rates were 80.3% and 94.1% for patients with SN metastatic tumor deposits ≥ 0.3 mm and < 0.3 mm, respectively (hazard ratio, 1.26 [1.11 to 1.44]; P < .0001). Similar findings were seen for overall disease-free and distant metastasis-free survival. There were no survival differences between the AJCC IB patients and low-risk (< 0.3 mm) AJCC IIIA patients. The newly identified high-risk (≥ 0.3 mm) subgroup comprised 271 (66.4%) of the AJCC IIIA cohort, whereas only 142 (34.8%) patients had SN tumor deposits > 1 mm in maximum dimension.Patients with AJCC IIIA melanoma with SN tumor deposits ≥ 0.3 mm in maximum dimension are at higher risk of disease progression and may benefit from adjuvant systemic therapy or enrollment into a clinical trial. Patients with SN deposits < 0.3 mm in maximum dimension can be managed similar to their SN-negative, AJCC IB counterparts, thereby avoiding regular radiological surveillance and more intensive follow-up.
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| 5. |
- Riedel, M., et al.
(författare)
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Improving e-Science with Interoperability of the e-Infrastructures EGEE and DEISA
- 2008
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Ingår i: MIPRO 2008 - 31st International Convention Proceedings. - 9789532330366 ; , s. 225-231
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- In the last couple of years, many e-Science infrastructures have begun to offer production services to e- Scientists with an increasing number of applications that require access to different kinds of computational resources. Within Europe two rather different multi-national e-Science infrastructures evolved over time namely Distributed European Infrastructure for Supercomputing Applications (DEISA) and Enabling Grids for E-SciencE (EGEE). DEISA provides access to massively parallel systems such as supercomputers that are well suited for scientific applications that require many interactions between their typically high numbers of CPUs. EGEE on the other hand provides access to a world-wide Grid of university clusters and PC pools that are well suited for farming applications that require less or even no interactions between the distributed CPUs. While DEISA uses the HPC-driven Grid technology UNICORE, EGEE is based on the gLite Grid middleware optimized for farming jobs. Both have less adoption of open standards and therefore both systems are technically non-interoperable, which means that no e-Scientist can easily leverage the DEISA and EGEE infrastructure with one suitable client environment for scientific applications. This paper argues that future interoperability of such large e-Science infrastructures is required to improve e-Science in general and to increase the real scientific impact of world-wide Grids in particular. We discuss the interoperability achieved by the OMII-Europe project that fundamentally improved the interoperability between UNICORE and gLite by using open standards. We also outline one specific scientific scenario of the WISDOM initiative that actually benefits from the recently established interoperability.
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| 6. |
- Smallwood, Gregory J., et al.
(författare)
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Concurrent quantitative laser-induced incandescence and SMPS measurements of EGR effects on particulate emissions from a TDI Diesel engine
- 2002
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Ingår i: SAE Technical Papers. - 0148-7191.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A comparison of scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS) and laser-induced incandescence (LII) measurements of diesel particulate matter (PM) was performed. The results reveal the significance of the aggregate nature of diesel PM on interpretation of size and volume fraction measurements obtained with an SMPS, and the accuracy of primary particle size measurements by LII. Volume fraction calculations based on the mobility diameter measured by the SMPS substantially over-predict the space-filling volume fraction of the PM. Correction algorithms for the SMPS measurements, to account for the fractal nature of the aggregate morphology, result in a substantial reduction in the reported volume. The behavior of the particulate volume fraction, mean and standard deviation of the mobility diameter, and primary particle size are studied as a function of the EGR for a range of steady-state engine speeds and loads for a turbocharged direct-injection diesel engine. Both the SMPS and LII techniques demonstrate good repeatability and consistency with each other. Increasing the EGR results in a sharp rise in the volume fraction of particulates for all engine speeds and loads. At all speed and load conditions the primary particle size decreases with increasing EGR.
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| 7. |
- Vargas, J. E., et al.
(författare)
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Dietary supplemental plant oils reduce methanogenesis from anaerobic microbial fermentation in the rumen
- 2020
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Ingår i: Scientific Reports. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2045-2322. ; 10:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Ruminants contribute to the emissions of greenhouse gases, in particular methane, due to the microbial anaerobic fermentation of feed in the rumen. The rumen simulation technique was used to investigate the effects of the addition of different supplemental plant oils to a high concentrate diet on ruminal fermentation and microbial community composition. The control (CTR) diet was a high-concentrate total mixed ration with no supplemental oil. The other experimental diets were supplemented with olive (OLV), sunflower (SFL) or linseed (LNS) oils at 6%. Rumen digesta was used to inoculate the fermenters, and four fermentation units were used per treatment. Fermentation end-products, extent of feed degradation and composition of the microbial community (qPCR) in digesta were determined. Compared with the CTR diet, the addition of plant oils had no significant (P>0.05) effect on ruminal pH, substrate degradation, total volatile fatty acids or microbial protein synthesis. Gas production from the fermentation of starch or cellulose were decreased by oil supplementation. Methane production was reduced by 21-28% (P<0.001), propionate production was increased (P<0.01), and butyrate and ammonia outputs and the acetate to propionate ratio were decreased (P<0.001) with oil-supplemented diets. Addition of 6% OLV and LNS reduced (P<0.05) copy numbers of total bacteria relative to the control. In conclusion, the supplementation of ruminant diets with plant oils, in particular from sunflower or linseed, causes some favorable effects on the fermentation processes. The addition of vegetable oils to ruminant mixed rations will reduce methane production increasing the formation of propionic acid without affecting the digestion of feed in the rumen. Adding vegetable fats to ruminant diets seems to be a suitable approach to decrease methane emissions, a relevant cleaner effect that may contribute to alleviate the environmental impact of ruminant production.
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| 8. |
- Vargas, J. E., et al.
(författare)
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Effect of Sunflower and Marine Oils on Ruminal Microbiota, In vitro Fermentation and Digesta Fatty Acid Profile
- 2017
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Ingår i: Frontiers in Microbiology. - : Frontiers Media SA. - 1664-302X. ; 8
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study using the rumen simulation technique (RUSITEC) investigated the changes in the ruminal microbiota and anaerobic fermentation in response to the addition of different lipid supplements to a ruminant diet. A basal diet with no oil added was the control, and the treatment diets were supplemented with sunflower oil (2%) only, or sunflower oil (2%) in combination with fish oil (1%) or algae oil (1%). Four fermentation units were used per treatment. RUSITEC fermenters were inoculated with rumen digesta. Substrate degradation, fermentation end-products (volatile fatty acids, lactate, gas, methane, and ammonia), and microbial protein synthesis were determined. Fatty acid profiles and microbial community composition were evaluated in digesta samples. Numbers of representative bacterial species and microbial groups were determined using qPCR. Microbial composition and diversity were based on T-RFLP spectra. The addition of oils had no effect on substrate degradation or microbial protein synthesis. Differences among diets in neutral detergent fiber degradation were not significant (P = 0.132), but the contrast comparing oil-supplemented diets with the control was significant (P = 0.039). Methane production was reduced (P < 0.05) with all oil supplements. Propionate production was increased when diets containing oil were fermented. Compared with the control, the addition of algae oil decreased the percentage C18: 3 c9c12c15 in rumen digesta, and that of C18: 2 c9t11 was increased when the control diet was supplemented with any oil. Marine oils decreased the hydrogenation of C18 unsaturated fatty acids. Microbial diversity was not affected by oil supplementation. Cluster analysis showed that diets with additional fish or algae oils formed a group separated from the sunflower oil diet. Supplementation with marine oils decreased the numbers of Butyrivibrio producers of stearic acid, and affected the numbers of protozoa, methanogens, Selenomonas ruminantium and Streptococcus bovis, but not total bacteria. In conclusion, there is a potential to manipulate the rumen fermentation and microbiota with the addition of sunflower, fish or algae oils to ruminant diets at appropriate concentrations. Specifically, supplementation of ruminant mixed rations with marine oils will reduce methane production, the acetate to propionate ratio and the fatty acid hydrogenation in the rumen.
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