Notes

Paper-based analytic units with regard to point-of-care blood vessels tests.
Background The first step in understanding ecological community diversity and dynamics is quantifying community membership. An increasingly common method for doing so is through metagenomics. Because of the rapidly increasing popularity of this approach, a large number of computational tools and pipelines are available for analysing metagenomic data. However, the majority of these tools have been designed and benchmarked using highly accurate short read data (i.e. Illumina), with few studies benchmarking classification accuracy for long error-prone reads (PacBio or Oxford Nanopore). In addition, few tools have been benchmarked for non-microbial communities. Results Here we compare simulated long reads from Oxford Nanopore and Pacific Biosciences (PacBio) with high accuracy Illumina read sets to systematically investigate the effects of sequence length and taxon type on classification accuracy for metagenomic data from both microbial and non-microbial communities. We show that very generally, classification accuracy is far lower for non-microbial communities, even at low taxonomic resolution (e.g. family rather than genus). We then show that for two popular taxonomic classifiers, long reads can significantly increase classification accuracy, and this is most pronounced for non-microbial communities. Conclusions This work provides insight on the expected accuracy for metagenomic analyses for different taxonomic groups, and establishes the point at which read length becomes more important than error rate for assigning the correct taxon.Background DNA methylation is a major epigenetic modification involved in regulating gene expression. The effects of DNA methylation on gene expression differ by genomic location and vary across kingdoms, species and environmental conditions. To identify the functional regulatory roles of DNA methylation, the correlation between DNA methylation changes and alterations in gene expression is crucial. With the advance of next-generation sequencing, genome-wide methylation and gene expression profiling have become feasible. Current bioinformatics tools for investigating such correlation are designed to the assessment of DNA methylation at CG sites. PF-02341066 inhibitor The correlation of non-CG methylation and gene expression is very limited. Some bioinformatics databases allow correlation analysis, but they are limited to specific genomes such as that of humans and do not allow user-provided data. Results Here, we developed a bioinformatics web tool, MethGET (Methylation and Gene Expression Teller), that is specialized to analyse tha and discovered that CHH methylation in the gene body region may play a role in the tissue culture process, which demonstrates the capability of MethGET for use in epigenomic research. Conclusions MethGET is a Python software that correlates DNA methylation and gene expression. Its web interface is publicly available at https//paoyang.ipmb.sinica.edu.tw/Software.html. The stand-alone version and source codes are available on GitHub at https//github.com/Jason-Teng/MethGET.Background Cerebral stroke occurs following ischemic and hemorrhagic lesions in the brain. Survival and recovery of stroke patients depend on the severity of the initial injury but also the therapeutic approaches applied for emergent lifesaving and continuing post-stroke management. Dl-3-n-Butylphthalide (NBP), an active compound derived from Chinese celery seeds, has shown clinical efficacy in the treatment of ischemic cerebral stroke. Results In the present study we explored the therapeutic effect of NBP in a rat model of intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), focusing on its potential role in promoting neovascularization in the perihemorrhagic zone. ICH was induced in male Sprague-Dawley rats by unilateral injection of autologous blood into the globus pallidus, with sham-operated (Sham group), vehicle-treated (ICH) and NBP-treated (at 10 and 25 mg/kg/Bid, p.o., ICH + NBP10 and ICH + NBP25, respectively) groups examined behaviorally, macroscopically, histologically and biochemically at 1, 3, 7 and 15 days (d) post operation. Rats in the ICH + NBP10 and ICH + NBP25 groups showed reduced Longa's motor scores relative to the ICH groups at the 3 and 7d time points, while the hematoma volume was comparable in the two NBP relative to the ICH groups as measured at 7d and 15d. In the perihemorrhagic zone, the numeric density of blood vessels immunolabeled by CD34, an angiogenic marker, was greater in the ICH + NBP10 and ICH + NBP25 than ICH groups, more so in the higher dosage group, at 1, 3, 7 and 15d. Levels of the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and angiopoietins-2 (Ang-2) proteins were elevated in the NBP groups relative to the sham and vehicle controls in immunoblotting of tissue lysates from the injection region. Conclusion These results suggest that NBP can alleviate neurological defects following experimentally induced local brain hemorrhage, which is associated with a potential role of this drug in promoting neovascularization surrounding the bleeding loci.Although separate collection systems for portable batteries (PBs) have been installed years ago, high amounts of batteries still do not enter the collection systems of the member states of the European Union (EU). In Austria, the collection rate has recently dropped to the EU target value of 45%. For the purposes of this study, a comprehensive survey was conducted to identify the destinations of the other end-of-life batteries. A literature survey and an assessment of different waste streams (WSs) were followed by sampling and sorting campaigns for highly relevant WSs (residual waste, lightweight packaging waste, metal packaging waste, and small waste electrical and electronic equipment). The results underwent material flow analysis, showing that more than 800 metric tonnes of portable batteries are misplaced into non-battery-specific collection systems, 718 metric tonnes of them entering residual waste collection. Considerable amounts of batteries are stockpiled, stored or hoarded in Austrian households. Lithium-based batteries, representing a serious risk of fire to the waste industry and making up for 30% of the marketed amount, are still scarcely arriving in waste management systems.
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