This thesis details the design and construction of a rig for studying surface condensation and a rig for creating anodized metal oxides (AMOs). The condensation rig characterizes condensation for different surfaces; this is done with the use of known heat transfer principles to calculate characteristic heat fluxes and heat transfer coefficient values. Preliminary results have been shown to foll...

Infection of human dendritic cells (DCs) by negative-strand RNA viruses, such as Newcastle disease virus, leads to the induction of the IFNbeta gene, IFNB1, through the activation of the RNA helicase RIG-I, which is encoded by DDX58. Expression levels of IFNB1 and DDX58 in infected DCs showed positive correlations at the population and the single-cell levels. DDX58 has a common and potentially ...

The innate immune response is a host defense mechanism against infection by viruses and bacteria. Type I interferons (IFNα/β) play a crucial role in innate immunity. If not tightly regulated under normal conditions and during immune responses, IFN production can become aberrant, leading to inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. In this study, we identified TRIM11 (tripartite motif containing 11)...

Retinoic acid-inducible gene I- (RIG-I-) like receptors (RLRs) have recently been identified as cytoplasmic sensors for viral RNA. RIG-I, a member of RLRs family, plays an important role in innate immunity. Although previous investigations have proved that RIG-I is absent in chickens, it remains largely unknown whether the chicken can respond to RIG-I ligand. In this study, the eukaryotic expre...

The cellular protein retinoic acid-inducible gene I (RIG-I) senses intracellular viral infection and triggers a signal for innate antiviral responses including the production of type I IFN. RIG-I contains a domain that belongs to a DExD/H-box helicase family and exhibits an N-terminal caspase recruitment domain (CARD) homology. There are three genes encoding RIG-I-related proteins in human and ...

Helicases translocate along and unwind double-stranded nucleic acids coupled to ATP hydrolysis, which provides the required energy. They are essential to life and have important roles in, for example, DNA replication and repair, transcription and RNA interference. In 2004, an essential function of helicases was discovered in the innate immune response [1]. Retinoic acid inducible gene I (RIG-I)...

A test rig for studying the biomechanical behaviour of post-mortem human knees is built. For loading the quadriceps tendon a special clamping device is constructed, so the forces up to 3000 N could easily be transferred to the tendon. Several post-mortem human knees used in this study are tested to collect data about the general biomechanics of knee joint during squatting. The forces in the qua...

Gas turbines can be exposed to microparticle ingestion throughout their lifespan due to the harsh conditions, like deserts, in which many of them operate. Microparticles can wear out turbine blades and clog cooling holes which may result in the failure of the blade. To measure the interaction of microparticles with turbine components the Coefficient of Restitution (COR) is used. The objective o...

Previous studies showed that hepatitis B virus (HBV), as a latency invader, attenuated host anti-viral immune responses. miRNAs were shown to be involved in HBV infection and HBV-related diseases, however, the precise role of miRNAs in HBV-mediated immunosuppression remains unclear. Here, we observed that down-regulated RIG-I like receptors might be one critical mechanism of HBV-induced suppres...