BACKGROUND Rho and its effector Rho-kinase/ROCK mediate cytoskeletal reorganization as well as smooth muscle contraction. Recent studies indicate that Rho and ROCK are critically involved in vascular remodeling. Here, we tested the hypothesis that Rho/ROCK are critically involved in angiotensin II (Ang II)-induced migration of vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) by mediating a specific signal ...

As known, most important, and the hard part of pattern recognition for rock particles, is image segmentation. Segmentation can be divided into two steps, one is segmentation based on gray levels (called image binarization, sometimes) in which a gray level image is processed and converted into a binary image. Another is segmentation based on rock particle shapes in a binary image, in which overl...

The selectivity of different Rho kinase (ROCK) inhibitors in the spontaneously tonic smooth muscle has not been investigated. We examined this issue using Y-27632 [(R)-(+)-trans-N-(4-pyridyl)-4-(1-aminoethyl)-cyclohexanecarbox anecarboxamide, 2HCl], H-1152 [(S)-(+)-(2-methyl-5-isoquinolinyl) sulfonylhomopiperazine, 2HCl], HA-1077 [(5 isoquinolinesulfonyl) homopiperazine, 2HCl], and ROCK inhibit...

The paper presents a new microplane constitutive model for the inelastic behavior of jointed rock masses that takes into account the mechanical behavior and geometric characteristics of cracks and joints. The basic idea is that the microplane modeling of rock masses under general triaxial loading, including compression, requires the isotropic rock matrix and the joints to be considered as two d...

Rho-associated coiled coil containing protein kinase (Rho-kinase or Rock) is a well-defined determinant of actin organization and dynamics in most animal cells characterized to date. One of the primary effectors of Rock is non-muscle myosin II. Activation of Rock results in increased contractility of myosin II and subsequent changes in actin architecture and cell morphology. The regulation of R...

This study investigated the effect of the Rho kinase inhibitor Y-27632 and fasudil on the development of human mesangial cell (HMC) inflammation and fibrosis induced by high glucose and to clarify the contribution of the Rho/ROCK signaling pathway in the pathogenesis of diabetic kidney disease (DKD). High glucose (30 mmol/l) induced the Rho/ROCK signaling pathway. Western blotting was used to d...

Original scientific paper Aiming at answering the questions of wear and failure of hob in the rock breaking process, the rock breaking process was simulated in different broken rock conditions by using finite element method. The relationship between normal force, lateral force, rolling force and time was obtained by rock breaking simulation analysis on the single edge disc cutter. The rock stre...

We describe the design of an acoustic emission (AE) measurement assembly for reliable acquisition of a multi-year timeseries in steep alpine rock-walls. The motivation for collection of these data is to enhance understanding of freezinginduced rock damage. Because measurements in natural rock slopes are challenging, this study investigates technical options suitable to capture AE signals from d...

Copyright and Moral Rights for the articles on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. For more information on Open Research Online's data policy on reuse of materials please consult the policies page. Introduction: We present preliminary work to characterize surface rock abundance at ExoMars Rover landing site candidates. A challenge in quantifying the a...

We have performed preliminary mapping of the manganese and iron present in a cross-section of a rock varnish from the Cima volcanic flows in the Mojave Desert, California. Rock varnish is a nanostratigraphic deposit found on typically fine-grained rocks in hyper-arid to semi-arid deserts (Figure 1a) [1]. Rock varnish is defined as consisting of about 70% clay particles held together by about 30...