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Volume homeostasis is essential for the preservation of lens transparency and this is of particular significance to anadromous fish species where migration from freshwater to seawater presents severe osmotic challenges. In Atlantic salmon ( Salmo salar L.), aqueous humor (AH) osmolality is greater in fish acclimated to seawater compared with young freshwater fish, and levels of lens N-acetylhistidine (NAH) are much higher in seawater fish. Here we investigate NAH as an osmolyte in the lenses of salmon receiving diets either with or without histidine supplementation. In the histidine-supplemented diet (HD) histidine content was 14.2 g/kg, and in the control diet (CD) histidine content was 8.9 g/kg. A transient increase in AH osmolality of 20 mmol/kg was observed in fish transferred from freshwater to seawater. In a lens culture model, temporary decreases in volume and transparency were observed when lenses were exposed to hyperosmotic conditions. A positive linear relationship between extracellular osmolality and lens NAH content was also observed, whereas there was no change in lens histidine content. Hypoosmotic exposure stimulated [14C]-histidine efflux by 9.2- and 2.6-fold in CD and HD lenses, respectively. NAH efflux, measured by HPLC, was stimulated by hypoosmotic exposure to a much greater extent in HD lenses. In vivo, lens NAH increased in response to elevated AH osmolality in HD but not CD fish. In conclusion, NAH has an important and novel role as a compatible osmolyte in salmon lens. Furthermore, it is the major osmolyte that balances increases in AH osmolality when fish move from freshwater to seawater. A deficiency in NAH would lead to a dysfunction of the normal osmoregulatory processes in the lens, and we propose that this would contribute to cataract formation in fish deficient in histidine.

Aim To examine associations of pre-diabetes and well-controlled diabetes with periodontitis. Materials and Methods The Study of Health in Pomerania (SHIP)-Trend is a cross-sectional survey in North-Eastern Germany including 3086 participants (49.4% men; age 20–82 years). Clinical attachment loss (CAL) and periodontal probing depth (PPD) were assessed applying a random half-mouth protocol. The number of teeth was determined. Pre-diabetes comprised impaired fasting glucose and impaired glucose tolerance. Previously known diabetes was defined as well controlled if glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c) was <7.0%. Participants were categorized as follows: normal glucose tolerance (NGT), pre-diabetes, newly detected type 2 diabetes (T2DM), known T2DM with HbA1c<7.0% and known T2DM with HbA1c≥7.0%. Results Pre-diabetes was neither associated with mean CAL and PPD in multivariable adjusted linear regression models nor with edentulism (OR = 1.09 (95%-CI: 0.69-1.71)) and number of teeth (OR = 0.96 (95%-CI: 0.75–1.22), lowest quartile versus higher quartiles) in logistic regression models. Associations with mean CAL and edentulism were stronger in poorly controlled previously known diabetes than in well-controlled previously known diabetes (for edentulism: OR = 2.19 (95%-CI: 1.18–4.05), and OR = 1.40 (95%-CI: 0.82–2.38), respectively, for comparison with NGT). Conclusions Periodontitis and edentulism were associated with poorly controlled T2DM, but not with pre-diabetes and well-controlled diabetes.

Background Tumor biopsy is not essential for the diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC); however, grading remains important for the prognosis. Purpose To investigate whether combined Gd-EOB-DTPA and gadobutrol liver magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can predict HCC grading. Material and Methods Thirty patients (66.6 ± 7.3 years) with histologically confirmed HCC (grade 1, n = 5; grade 1–2, n = 6; grade 2, n = 13; grade 2–3, n = 2; grade 3, n = 4) underwent two liver MRIs, one with gadobutrol and one with Gd-EOB-DTPA, on consecutive days. Blinded to grading, two radiologists reviewed the gadobutrol and Gd-EOB-DTPA images in consensus with respect to: (i) HCC hyper-/iso-/hypointensity in the arterial, portal-venous/delayed, and Gd-EOB-DTPA hepatocellular phase; and (ii) morphologic tumor features (encapsulated growth, vessel invasion, heterogeneity, liver capsule infiltration, satellite metastases). Results A significant correlation with grading was not found for either the combined dynamic information of all gadobutrol phases (r = −0.187, P = 0.331) or all the Gd-EOB-DTPA phases (r = 0.052, P = 0.802). No correlation with grading was found for a combination of arterial and hepatocellular phase in Gd-EOB-DTPA MRI (r = 0.209, P = 0.305), a combination of both arterial phases (gadobutrol and Gd-EOB-DTPA) with the Gd-EOB-DTPA hepatocellular phase (r = 0.240, P = 0.248), or a combination of all available gadobutrol and Gd-EOB-DTPA phases (r = 0.086, P = 0.691). For all gadobutrol information (dynamic phases and morphology; r = 0.049, P = 0.801) and for all Gd-EOB-DTPA information (r = 0.040, P = 0.845), no correlation with grading was found. Hepatocellular Gd-EOB-DTPA phase iso-/hyperintensity never occurred in grade 3 HCCs. Conclusion Histological HCC grading cannot be predicted by combined Gd-EOB-DTPA/gadobutrol MRI. However, Gd-EOB-DTPA hepatocellular phase iso-/hyperintensity was never detected in grade 3 HCCs.

This paper investigates how local and global self-evaluations of capabilities can be used to predict pupils' problem-solving behaviour in the domain of fraction learning. To answer this question we analyzed logfiles of pupils who worked on multi-trial fraction tasks. Logistic regression analyses revealed that local confidence judgements assessed online improve the prediction of post-error solving, as well as skipping behaviour significantly, while pre-assessed global perception of competence failed to do so. Yet, for all computed models, the impact of our prediction is rather small. Further research is necessary to enrich these models with other relevant user- as well as task-characteristics to make them usable for adaptation.

Abstract Background Beer is the most popular alcoholic beverage worldwide. In the manufacture of beer, various by-products and residues are generated, and the most abundant (85% of total by-products) are spent grains. Thanks to its high (hemi)cellulose content (about 50% w/w dry weight), this secondary raw material is attractive for the production of second-generation biofuels as butanol through fermentation processes. Results This study reports the ability of two laccase preparations from Pleurotus ostreatus to delignify and detoxify milled brewer’s spent grains (BSG). Up to 94% of phenols reduction was achieved. Moreover, thanks to the mild conditions of enzymatic pretreatment, the formation of other inhibitory compounds was avoided allowing to apply the sequential enzymatic pretreatment and hydrolysis process (no filtration and washing steps between the two phases). As expected, the high detoxification and delignification yields achieved by laccase pretreatment resulted in great saccharification. As a fact, no loss of carbohydrates was observed thanks to the novel sequential strategy, and thus the totality of polysaccharides was hydrolysed into fermentable sugars. The enzymatic hydrolysate was fermented to acetone-butanol-ethanol (ABE) by Clostridium acetobutilycum obtaining about 12.6 g/L ABE and 7.83 g/L butanol within 190 h. Conclusions The applied sequential pretreatment and hydrolysis process resulted to be very effective for the milled BSG, allowing reduction of inhibitory compounds and lignin content with a consequent efficient saccharification. C. acetobutilycum was able to ferment the BSG hydrolysate with ABE yields similar to those obtained by using synthetic media. The proposed strategy reduces the amount of wastewater and the cost of the overall process. Based on the reported results, the potential production of butanol from the fermentation of BSG hydrolysate can be envisaged.

International audience; We show the benefit of considering periodic dilution rates in the chemostat model for discriminating between a growth function which does not depend on the density of the microorganisms population (such as the Monod law) and another one which does depend (such as the Contois law). This goal is achieved thanks to the measurement of the abiotic resource only. We then present a simple procedure for a robust discrimination between the two types of kinetics using a single experiment in three phases. Finally, the shape of the best periodic excitation is discussed and the method is illustrated on numerical simulations.

Additional file 6: Figure S1. Thresholds used for the dichotomization of cognitive domains and division of participants across cognitive profiles. Within the AD subsample (n=1,071), we dichotomized each cognitive domain score (i.e. memory, attention/executive functions, language and visuospatial functions), based on whether or not a domain’s W-score was considerably lower compared to an individual’s global cognition score. We used an optimal threshold between .250 and .500 for this dichotomization, and defined “optimality” in two different ways: 1) the lowest number of participants in the multi-domain profile and the lowest sum of squared group sizes (threshold=.255), 2) the highest number of atypical variant AD cases (n=85) categorized into the language (i.e. for logopenic aphasia) or visuospatial cognitive profile (i.e. for PCA; n=.442). Note that neither thresholds (i.e. .255 or .442) resulted in all atypical variants being categorized into these two cognitive profiles, presumably because in advanced disease stages, several cognitive domains become affected. For many participants with an initial logopenic aphasia or PCA diagnosis, visuospatial/language may no longer have been predominant at study inclusion, causing them to be assigned to the multi-domain instead.

The holographic configurations dual to Wilson loops in higher rank representations in the ABJM theory are described by branes with electric flux along their world volumes. In particular, D2 and D6 branes with electric flux play a central role as potential dual to totally symmetric and totally antisymmetric representations, respectively. We compute the spectra of excitations of these brane configurations in both, the bosonic and fermionic sectors. We highlight a number of aspects that distinguish these configurations from their D3 and D5 cousins including new peculiar mixing terms in the fluctuations. We neatly organize the spectrum of fluctuations into the corresponding supermultiplets. Comment: 42 pages

case–control studies have further qualitatively established nonfasting TAG as a CVD risk factor [16,17], with information on the quantitative relationship limited to a small number of studies [6,8,9,18,19]. In the Copenhagen Heart Study, nonfasting TAG levels of more than or equal to 5, 4–4.99, 3–3.99, 2–2.99 and 1–1.99 mmol/l versus less than 1 mmol/l were shown to predict a 16.8-, 5.1-, 3.9-, 4.4and 2.2-fold increase in risk of myocardial infarction in females, respectively, with equivalent values in males of 4.6-, 3.3-, 3.6-, 2.3and 1.6-fold, respectively [8]. This greater ‘penetrance’ in females is consistent with an earlier meta-ana lysis that considered fasting TAG data [4].

Many manufacturing organisations rely on continuous improvement (CI) activities to maintain their competitive position. Here, effective communication is seen as critical in facilitating the alignment of corporate strategy and CI efforts. As many firms increasingly struggle to ensure effective internal communication due to time pressures and the need to continuously adapt strategic information, visual management (VM) can provide a means to support effective information transfer. Therefore, this paper explores the impact of VM on CI within a manufacturing context by first systematically reviewing and summarising the extant literature. A bibliometric analysis reveals that while VM offers great potential to support CI efforts, the field lacks systematic and holistic scholarly examination in a number of areas. For example, the association of CI as a dynamic capability and the impact of digitalisation in connecting VM and CI.