A beautiful project by Elvis Morelli.
Category: futurism
The BZR1-interacting WD repeat protein participates in brassinosteroid-dependent growth and stress response in tomato
Liu et al. reveal that BIW negatively regulates BR signaling by promoting BZR1 ubiquitination and degradation, while BIN2 enhances BIW’s stability and activity. Through the BZR1-dependent pathway, BIW inhibits lateral root development and chilling tolerance in tomato, providing a strategy for developing elite crop germplasm by targeted manipulation of BIW.
Microsoft rolls out native Sysmon monitoring in Windows 11
Microsoft has started rolling out built-in Sysmon functionality to some Windows 11 systems enrolled in the Windows Insider program.
Microsoft first revealed plans to integrate Sysmon natively into Windows 11 and Windows Server in November, when it also confirmed that it will soon release detailed documentation.
Sysmon (short for System Monitor) is a free Microsoft Sysinternals tool (and a Windows system service and device driver) that monitors for and blocks malicious/suspicious activity, logging it to the Windows Event Log.
Community Series in Vaccines and approaches that target trained immunity in COVID-19: Immunological mechanisms of action and delivery: Volume II
2024 This is a first of its kind univversal covid 19 vaccine that would allow for a one time shot that is good for current versions of the virus and future versions aswell.
A universal recombinant adenovirus type-5 (Ad5) vaccine against COVID19 (Ad-US) was constructed, and immunogenicity and broad-spectrum of Ad5-US were evaluated with both intranasal and intramuscular immunization routes. The humoral immune response of Ad5-US in serum and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid were evaluated by the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), recombinant vesicular stomatitis virus based pseudovirus neutralization assay, and angiotensin-converting enzyme-2 (ACE2)-binding inhibition assay. The cellular immune response and Th1/Th2 biased immune response of Ad5-US were evaluated by the IFN-γ ELISpot assay, intracellular cytokine staining, and Meso Scale Discovery (MSD) profiling of Th1/Th2 cytokines. Intramuscular priming followed by an intranasal booster with Ad5-US elicited the broad-spectrum and high levels of IgG, IgA, pseudovirus neutralizing antibody (PNAb), and Th1-skewing of the T-cell response. Overall, the adenovirus type-5 vectored universal SARS-CoV-2 vaccine Ad5-US was successfully constructed, and Ad5-US was highly immunogenic and broad spectrum. Intramuscular priming followed by an intranasal booster with Ad5-US induced the high and broad spectrum systemic immune responses and local mucosal immune responses.
According to the World Health Organization, as of March 15, 2024, over 774 million COVID-19 cases and almost 7 million related deaths had been reported globally. A total of 13.59 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been reportedly administered globally, leading to a vaccination rate of 69.7%. At present, at least 24 types of COVID-19 vaccines have been authorized for emergency use in various countries. According to the list of global COVID-19 candidate vaccines published on the WHO website, a total of 183 candidate vaccines are in clinical development and 199 candidate vaccines are in the preclinical evaluation stage as of April 8, 2023. Recombinant protein subunit vaccines account for the greatest proportion of vaccines in clinical development (59 vaccines, 32%), followed by RNA vaccines (43 vaccines, 24%).
The fetal trophoblast cell marker HLA-G activates a type I interferon response in primary NK cells through the receptor KIR2DL4
Scientists have discovered how cells from the fetus could activate maternal natural killer cells during early pregnancy, helping to demystify the poorly understood mechanisms that govern immune cells at the maternal-fetal interface.
Learn more in Science Signaling.
A fetal cell antigen interacts with a natural killer cell receptor to induce antiviral gene expression.
Angstrom-scale plasmonic gap boosts nonlinear light output by 2,000% per volt
Researchers at the Institute for Molecular Science (NINS, Japan) and SOKENDAI have demonstrated a more than 2000% voltage-induced enhancement of near-field nonlinear optical responses. To achieve this giant modulation, they focused on an angstrom-scale gap formed between a metallic tip and substrate in a scanning tunneling microscope (STM), which can strongly confine and enhance light intensity through plasmon excitation. The paper is published in the journal Nature Communications.
The researchers discovered that when the voltage across the junction was varied within ±1 V, the intensity of second-harmonic generation (SHG) changed quadratically with voltage and exhibited giant modulation with a depth of ~2000%/V. This represents a more than two-orders-of-magnitude improvement over previous electroplasmonic systems.
Moreover, similar giant electrical modulation was also observed for sum-frequency generation, a nonlinear optical process that upconverts mid-infrared light into visible or near-infrared light. This demonstrates that the newly discovered electrical modulation mechanism is applicable to the broad spectral range, not limited to a specific optical wavelength or nonlinear optical process.