Saaty's recent visit to China

Highlights on Tom and Rozann's recent research visit to China.

Involvement of cell surface TG2 in the aggregation of K562 cells triggered by gluten

Gluten-induced aggregation of K562 cells represents an in vitro model reproducing the early steps occurring in the small bowel of celiac patients exposed to gliadin. Despite the clear involvement of TG2 in the activation of the antigen-presenting cells, it is not yet clear in which compartment it occurs. Herein we study the calcium-dependent aggregation of these cells, using either cell-permeable or cell-impermeable TG2 inhibitors. Gluten induces efficient aggregation when calcium is absent in the extracellular environment, while TG2 inhibitors do not restore the full aggregating potential of gluten in the presence of calcium. These findings suggest that TG2 activity is not essential in the cellular aggregation mechanism. We demonstrate that gluten contacts the cells and provokes their aggregation through a mechanism involving the A-gliadin peptide 31-43. This peptide also activates the cell surface associated extracellular TG2 in the absence of calcium. Using a bioinformatics approach, we identify the possible docking sites of this peptide on the open and closed TG2 structures. Peptide docks with the closed TG2 structure near to the GTP/GDP site, by establishing molecular interactions with the same amino acids involved in stabilization of GTP binding. We suggest that it may occur through the displacement of GTP, switching the TG2 structure from the closed to the active open conformation. Furthermore, docking analysis shows peptide binding with the β-sandwich domain of the closed TG2 structure, suggesting that this region could be responsible for the different aggregating effects of gluten shown in the presence or absence of calcium. We deduce from these data a possible mechanism of action by which gluten makes contact with the cell surface, which could have possible implications in the celiac disease onset.

ISAHP meeting in London, August 4 – August 7, 2016

The piece provides some highlights about the recent ISAHP which took place in London in August 2016

The empirical discovery of phylogenetic invariants

An invariant Φ of a tree T under a k-state Markov model, where the time parameter is identified with the edges of T, allows us to recognize whether data on N observed species can be associated with the N terminal vertices of T in the sense of having been generated on T rather than on any other tree with N terminals. The invariance is with respect to the (time) lengths associated with the edges of the tree. We propose a general method of finding invariants of a parametrized functional form. It involves calculating the probability f of all kN data possibilities for each of m edge-length configurations of T, then solving for the parameters using the m equations of form Φ (f) = 0. We apply this to the case of quadratic invariants for unrooted binary trees with four terminals, for all k, using the Jukes–Cantor type of Markov matrix. We report partial results on finding the smallest algebraically independent set of invariants.

Looking Forward to ISAHP2016 in London, UK!

<p><em>We are looking forward to seeing you at the </em><a href="http://www.isahp.org"><strong><em>ISAHP 2016 Symposium</em></strong><em> </em></a><em>which will take place <strong>August 4 - 7, 2016, in London, UK</strong> !</em><em></em></p>

MCDM 2015 Highlights

<p>The MCDM 2015 Conference was held from August 2-7, 2015 at the Helmut-Schmidt-University in Hamburg (Germany) and was a great success with a record-breaking attendance! This piece presents some highlights from key contributions.</p>

Outstanding Reviewer Awards

This year the IJAHP decided to thank the best reviewers by celebrating them with an award. This piece presents the outstanding reviewers for the 2014-2015 period

INFORMS 2015 Highlights

INFORMS 2015 Highlights

How to Support Strategic Decisions in Territorial Transformation Processes

Territorial transformations can be regarded as a multifaceted concept which includes socio-economic, ecological, technical, political and ethical perspectives. Decision problems in the domain of territorial transformations represent “weak” or unstructured problems since they are characterized by multiple actors, many and often conflicting values and views, a wealth of possible outcomes and high uncertainty. This paper addresses decision problems in the context of urban and territorial planning projects using the Multi Attribute Value Theory (MAVT), a particular kind of Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis method and it provides an application on a real case located in the city of Torino (Italy).

Youngstown State University Awards Professor Birsen Karpak Title of Distinguished Professor

Youngstown State University awards Professor Birsen Karpak title of Distinguished Professor

Neuronal ensembles sufficient for recovery sleep and the sedative actions of α2 adrenergic agonists

Do sedatives engage natural sleep pathways? It is usually assumed that anesthetic-induced sedation and loss-of-righting-reflex (LORR) arise by influencing the same circuitry to lesser or greater extents. For the α2 adrenergic receptor agonist dexmedetomidine, we find that sedation and LORR are in fact distinct states, requiring different brain areas, the preoptic hypothalamic area and locus coeruleus (LC) respectively. Selective knockdown of α2A adrenergic receptors from the LC abolished dexmedetomidine-induced LORR, but not sedation. Instead, we found that dexmedetomidine-induced sedation resembles the deep recovery sleep that follows sleep deprivation. We used TetTag-pharmacogenetics in mice to functionally mark neurons activated in the preoptic hypothalamus during dexmedetomidine-induced sedation or recovery sleep. The neuronal ensembles could then be selectively reactivated. In both cases NREM sleep, with the accompanying drop in body temperature, was recapitulated. Thus α2 adrenergic receptor-induced sedation and recovery sleep share hypothalamic circuitry sufficient for producing these behavioral states.

Muc5ac mucin expression during rat skin development

Some mucin genes have been detected during human embryonic and fetal organ development; however, little is known about mucin expression in epidermal development, neither in humans nor in other species. The present research was developed to explore Muc5ac skin expression during pre- and post-natal rat development. Immunohistochemistry (IHC), Western blotting (WB) and RT-PCR were employed. By IHC, Muc5ac protein was found early in embryonic epidermis from day 13 of gestation until seven days after birth when the surface epidermis became negative and the reaction was restricted to secreting sebum cells. In coincidence with IHC findings, WB analysis showed a band at approximately 200KDa at the same periods of development. Results were also confirmed by RT-PCR.

Muc5ac expression in rat embryonic epidermis suggests that Muc5ac may play a protective role in embryonic skin previous to birth which may be replaced by pile covering. To our knowledge, this is the first report that confirmed Muc5ac expression during skin development.