Metabolic rate assays are critical tools for assessing organismal stress and resilience, yet their widespread application in aquaculture and ecological monitoring is limited. Improving these assays is essential for hatchery managers, farmers, and scientists seeking to identify resilient stocks and monitor stress in shellfish populations. Resazurin, a redox-sensitive dye commonly used in cell viability assays, […]
Epithelial convergent extension as a tuning process
Self-tuning, the ability of disordered systems to develop desired collective behaviors by tuning internal couplings in response to feedback, has recently emerged as a powerful framework for understanding adaptation in amorphous solids, mechanical metamaterials, and electrical networks. These systems can learn desired responses, encode memory, and robustly reorganize under repeated stimuli, much like artificial neural […]
RiboZAP: Custom Probe Design for rRNA Depletion in complex Metatranscriptomes
Metatranscriptomic (MetaT) sequencing provides critical insights into the gene expression and functional activity of microbial communities. However, its utility is limited by the overwhelming abundance of ribosomal RNA (rRNA), which typically represents [≥]90% of total RNA [1-2]. A major obstacle to efficient MetaT analysis is the removal of highly abundant rRNA transcripts present in complex […]
Active geometrodynamics predicts the emergence of cytokinesis
Cell division accomplishes the segregation of genetic material and involves remarkable changes in the cellular geometry culminating in cytokinesis: the cleavage of a mother cell giving rise to two daughter cells. Cytokinesis in animal cells is driven by flows resulting from cortical tension gradients in the actomyosin cortex. Here, we combine a theory for the […]
Dici: a novel DNA transposon reshaping the genome of the opportunistic yeast Diutina catenulata
Diutina catenulata is an ascomycetous yeast of both environmental and emerging clinical relevance. However, genetic and genomic information on this species remains limited. In this study, we present a series of genomic analyses of selected D. catenulata strains, encompassing the full spectrum of their phylogenetic diversity. The species exhibits pronounced genetic structuring, with distinct clades […]
A modelling approach for the analysis of decisions in Home Health Care at multiple planning levels
The sustainable delivery of Home Health Care (HHC) is increasingly critical as ageing populations and rising service demands place pressure on health and social care systems. HHC involves complex decision-making across strategic, tactical, and operational levels, often constrained by limited resources such as workforce availability. While Operational Research (OR) has been widely applied to support […]
Disruption in Patterning in the Whisker-to-Barrel Cortex Pathway Alters Behavior
Mice use their whiskers to convey sensory information, navigate and explore their environment. We investigated the behavioral impact of the disruption of somatotopic patterning along the whisker-to-barrel pathway utilizing two mouse models: Barrelless (BRL) mice, an adenylyl cyclase 1 variation, in which somatotopic patterning is absent in the barrel cortex and Prrxl1-/- mice, a genetic […]
The predictive value of socioeconomic status and migration background for complicated lower respiratory tract infections in primary care
While socioeconomic status (SES) and migration background have been linked to complicated lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs) in population-based studies, their predictive value in primary care remains unclear. Using routine care data from Dutch general practices (Leiden-The Hague-Zoetermeer region, n approx 750,000 adult patients, 2014 to 2023, excluding COVID-19 years), linked to sociodemographic and hospital […]
Cell state plasticity emerging from co-regulated, competitive, and configurable interactions within the AP-1 network
Cell state plasticity drives metastasis and therapy resistance in cancers. In melanoma, these behaviors map onto a melanocytic-to-mesenchymal-like continuum regulated by AP-1 transcription factors. However, how the AP-1 network encodes a limited set of discrete states, why their distributions vary across tumors, and what drives phenotypically consequential AP-1 state transitions remain unclear. We develop a […]
Substituting Blood-Based Biomarkers for Imaging Measures in Alzheimer’s Disease Studies: Implications for Sample Size and Bias
Background: Blood-based biomarkers for Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathology are appealing options in large population-based studies due to their low cost, minimal invasiveness, and feasibility of collection in non-clinical settings. Despite these benefits, blood-based biomarkers have lower test-retest reliability than neuroimaging measures like amyloid positron emission tomography (amyloid-PET) Centiloids; trade-offs in power and bias remain unexplored. […]