BACKGROUND Gremlin, a bone morphogenetic protein antagonist, plays an important role in the pathogenesis of diabetic nephropathy (DN). However, the specific molecular mechanism underlying Gremlin's involvement in DN has not been fully elucidated. In the present study, we investigated the role of Gremlin on cell proliferation and accumulation of extracellular matrix (ECM) in mouse mesangial cell...

The prevalence of food allergy (FA) has increased in developed countries over the past few decades. However, no effective drug therapies are currently available. Therefore, we investigated cholinergic anti-inflammatory pathway as a regulatory system to ameliorate disrupted mucosal immune homeostasis in the gut based on the pathophysiological elucidation of mucosal mast cells (MMCs) in a murine ...

OBJECTIVES To compare neglect defined by Child Protective Services official codes with neglect defined by a review of CPS narrative data, and to examine the validity of the different neglect measures using children's functioning at age 8 years. METHODS Data are from 740 children participating in a consortium of longitudinal studies on child abuse and neglect; 481 had at least one CPS report p...

BACKGROUND Increasingly, medical disciplines have used morbidity and mortality conferences (MMCs) to address quality improvement and patient safety (QI/PS), as well as teach systems-based improvement to graduate trainees. The goal of this educational intervention was to establish a pediatric resident physician–led MMC that not only focused on QI/PS principles but also engaged resident physician...

Metal Matrix Composites (MMCs) are present engineering materials which have more advantages when compare to conventional materials. Magnesium based MMCs among the MMCs have become an important research subject because of their low density and high strength/weight ratio in recent years. The aim of this study is to find out the most influence factors of the electro-discharge machining (EDM) proce...

The principal advantage of metal matrix composites (MMCs) over unreinforced monolithic alloys is that their physical and mechanical properties can be enhanced by tailoring both their microstructure and the 3D spatial arrangement of reinforcement. The former has been realised by adjusting volume fraction, size and aspect ratio of the reinforcing phases in the conventional approach to MMCs proces...

Modular multilevel converters (MMCs) have become one of the most attractive topologies for high-voltage and high-power applications. A double-carrier phase disposition pulse width modulation (DCPDPWM) method for MMCs is proposed in this paper. Only double triangular carriers with displacement angle are needed for DCPDPWM, one carrier for the upper arm and the other for the lower arm. Then, the ...

Clustering moving objects is a challenging task, especially when space consumption must be flexibly and efficiently adjusted for adapting to dynamic object movements. In this paper we develop an efficient approach for managing moving objects and predicting the essential time when moving clusters may need to be updated. Under our approach, moving objects are first inserted into a moving clusteri...

The application of Multimedia Communication Systems (MMCS) in a distance learning environment could provide the optortunity to improve flexibility with regard to the site of learning (at home, at work, in the classroom), the time (each person can learn following his/her own rhythms), the learning way (each person can select his/her way starting from his/her own needs and exigencies). However, t...

Multiple myeloma (MM) is a currently incurable malignancy of plasma cells. Malignant myeloma cells (MMCs) are heavily dependent upon the bone marrow (BM) microenvironment for their survival. One component of this tumor microenvironment, B-Cell Activating Factor (BAFF), has been implicated as a key player in this interaction. This review discusses the role of BAFF in the pathophysiology of MM, a...