It is projected that, on average, annual temperature will increase between 2 °C to 6 under high emission scenarios by the end of 21st century, with serious consequences in food and nutrition security, especially within semi-arid regions sub-Saharan Africa. This study aimed investigate impact historical long-term climate (temperature rainfall) variables yield five major crops viz., sorghum, sesa...

The roles of macrophages in type 2-driven inflammation and fibrosis remain unclear. Here, using CD11b-diphtheria toxin receptor (DTR) transgenic mice and three models of interleukin 13 (IL-13)-dependent inflammation, fibrosis, and immunity, we show that CD11b(+) F4/80(+) Ly6C(+) macrophages are required for the maintenance of type 2 immunity within affected tissues but not secondary lymphoid or...

[1] This paper analyzes and attributes spatial and temporal patterns of changes in the diurnal cycle of land surface air temperature in 20 simulations from 11 global coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation models during the 20th century and the 21st century under the SRES A1B scenario. Most of the warming in the maximum (Tmax) and minimum (Tmin) temperatures from 1900 to 2099 is attributed...

BACKGROUND Maintainance of a stable basal insulin level is important for glycemic control in treatment of diabetes mellitus. Recently introduced insulin degludec has the longest duration of action among basal insulin formulations. The purpose of this study was to assess changes in quality of life (QOL) associated with switching the basal insulin regimen to degludec in patients with type 1 and t...

Langerhans cells (LC) form a unique subset of dendritic cells (DC) in the epidermis but so far their in vivo functions in skin immunity and tolerance could not be determined, in particular in relation to dermal DC (dDC). Here, we exploit a novel diphtheria toxin (DT) receptor (DTR)/DT-based system to achieve inducible ablation of LC without affecting the skin environment. Within 24 h after intr...

[1] Pronounced changes in land use and surface properties like those that have occurred in the Sahel could lead to reduced land surface emissivity and thus might have an asymmetric impact on daytime and nighttime surface air temperature. This paper analyzes the sensitivity of simulated climate and energy balance to changes in soil emissivity over the Sahel using the recently developed Community...

While pathogenic CD4 T cells are well known mediators of autoimmune uveoretinitis, CD8 T cells can also be uveitogenic. Since preliminary studies indicated that C57BL/6 mice were minimally susceptible to autoimmune uveoretinitis induction by CD8 T cells, the basis of the retinal disease resistance was sought. Mice that express β-galactosidase (βgal) on a retina-specific promoter (arrβgal mice) ...

An optimal dynamic treatment regime (DTR) consists of a sequence decision rules in maximizing long-term benefits, which is applicable for chronic diseases such as HIV infection or cancer. In this article, we develop novel angle-based approach to search the DTR under multicategory framework survival data. The proposed method targets maximize conditional function patients following DTR. contrast ...

Although the electrophysiologic derangement responsible for atrial fibrillation (AF) has been elucidated, how AF remodels the ventricular chamber and affects diastolic function (DF) has not been fully characterized. The previously validated Parametrized Diastolic Filling (PDF) formalism models suction-initiated filling kinematically and generates error-minimized fits to E-wave contours using un...

BACKGROUND Angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors (ACEi) reduce proteinuria and preserve kidney function in proteinuric renal diseases. Their nephroprotective effect exceeds that attributable to lowering of blood pressure alone. This study examines the potential of ACEi to protect from progression of injury after a highly specific injury to podocytes in a mouse model. METHODS We created tra...