Clear Partition Research Articles

Ghost crab (Ocypode quadrata) modify their behavior during mirror exposure

Recently, ghost crabs (Ocypode quadrata) were shown to exhibit behavior consistent with passing the mark test, which implies the capacity for self-recognition. Considering this, it seems reasonable to suggest these animals can also distinguish their mirror image from different social stimuli, such as live conspecifics. In the current research, ghost crabs were placed in an experimental tank bisected by a mirror, clear partition separating a conspecific, and non-reflective partition on separate trials. Aggressive threat displays, time spent near partitions, eye cleaning, and partition contact were recorded during each condition. Results showed more aggression in trials with a conspecific present (i.e. clear partition), though this effect was only marginally significant. In addition, eye cleaning was significantly lower in the clear, compared to mirror and non-reflective treatments. Significantly more contact occurred with non-reflective partitions and time near each barrier was similar. These findings might suggest the capacity to distinguish mirror reflections from conspecifics, and mirror self-recognition could promote such ability. This, and other alternatives, are discussed as potential explanations for the observed effects.

Screening of Triploid Banana Population Under Natural and Controlled Black Sigatoka Disease for Genomic Selection.

Black sigatoka disease (BSD) is the most important foliar threat in banana production, and breeding efforts against it should take advantage of genomic selection (GS), which has become one of the most explored tools to increase genetic gain, save time, and reduce selection costs. To evaluate the potential of GS in banana for BSD, 210 triploid accessions were obtained from the African Banana and Plantain Research Center to constitute a training population. The variability in the population was assessed at the phenotypic level using BSD- and agronomic-related traits and at the molecular level using single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). The analysis of variance showed a significant difference between accessions for almost all traits measured, although at the genomic group level, there was no significant difference for BSD-related traits. The index of non-spotted leaves among accessions ranged from 0.11 to 0.8. The accessions screening in controlled conditions confirmed the susceptibility of all genomic groups to BSD. The principal components analysis with phenotypic data revealed no clear diversity partition of the population. However, the structure analysis and the hierarchical clustering analysis with SNPs grouped the population into four clusters and two subpopulations, respectively. The field and laboratory screening of the banana GS training population confirmed that all genomic groups are susceptible to BSD but did not reveal any genetic structure, whereas SNP markers exhibited clear genetic structure and provided useful information in the perspective of applying GS.

First-Hit SETBP1 Mutations Cause a Myeloproliferative Disorder with Bone Marrow Fibrosis

Somatic SETBP1 mutations are found in various myeloid disorders covering both myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN) and myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS). To characterize the early steps of SETBP1-mediated leukemogenesis, we generated a conditional mouse model expressing SETBP1 G870S mutant in the entire hematopoietic tissue through Cre-mediated recombination driven by the Vav1 promoter. In all mice signs of a hematological disease appeared between 30 and 90 days: longitudinal analysis revealed accumulation of white blood cells (WBC) in virtually all heterozygous SETBP1 G870S mice, with a marked imbalance between the lymphoid and myeloid lineages in favor of the latter, and an increase in mature myeloid cells in absence of circulating blasts or non-segmented myeloid precursors. Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed a dramatic decrease in event-free survival in SETBP1 G870S mice. BM histology showed overt myeloid hyperplasia with fibrosis and no evidence of dysplasia except for the megakaryocytic lineage. Exploration of visceral organs highlighted the presence of severe hepatosplenomegaly with massive infiltration by myeloid elements, disruption of normal tissue architecture, and signs of extramedullary hematopoiesis. Single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA) on BM Lin - cells identified Mecom, Setbp1 and Hoxa9 among the top upregulated genes in SETBP1 G870S precursors. Pseudotime analysis of scRNA data revealed the presence of 261 spatially autocorrelated genes. Of them 158 were also differentially expressed in SETBP1 G870Svs control mice. Spi1, encoding for the master regulator of hematopoietic differentiation PU.1, was significantly upregulated in SETBP1 G870S precursors. PU.1 promotes the maturation of bone marrow early precursors towards the granulocytic/monocytic lineages by directly impairing the transcription of Gata2 and Gata1. In line with these data, Gata2 and Gata1 expression was profoundly suppressed in the early myeloid precursors of SETBP1 G870S mice, which associated with the down-modulation of markers of the erythroid lineage, such as the Carbonic Anhydrase 1, in the MEP differentiation branch. Ourmouse model recapitulates many clinical features of primary myelofibrosis (PMF). As up to 10% of PMF are triple-negative for the classical JAK2, CALR, and MPL mutations (TN-PMF), we set out to assess SETBP1 mutations in this context. We analyzed 36 TN-PMF patients by exome sequencing. In 29 we did not find any evidence of somatic mutations; in the remaining 7 (7/36; 19.4%) high VAF SETBP1 degron mutations were identified. In two patients SETBP1 was found as a single somatic variant, while in the others it coexisted with ASXL1, NRAS TET2 SRSF2, RIT1 CBL or CSF3R mutations. Notably, SETBP1 mutations were the only shared alterations among all seven patients. A markedly reduced overall survival was observed for SETBP1 positive patients, with a median survival time of 24 months (median survival not reached at 60 months for SETBP1 negative patients). To dissect the clonal architecture of SETBP1 positive TN-PMF at single-cell resolution, we applied single-cell targeted DNA sequencing on 3 SETBP1-mutated TN-PMF samples using the Tapestri technology, showing that, as opposite to MDS/MPN, in all TN-PMF cases SETBP1 is a very early clonal event. Therefore, our study suggests a clear partition of TN-PMF into two groups, the first one characterized by oncogenic, high VAF SETBP1 mutations accompanied by other oncogenic variants and poor prognosis and the other one characterized by no evidence of an active clonal process or of driver oncogenic events and much lower aggressiveness. SETBP1 positive TN-PMF disorders lie in a gray zone comprised between the MPN and MPN/MDS boundary. In MDS/MPN, SETBP1 mutations are often found as mid or late events. In contrast, we show here that in TN-PMF SETBP1 appears to be one of the earliest hits, therefore highlighting a potentially relevant biological difference occurring in the two subsets. In this context the presence of early SETBP1 mutations seems to promote the occurrence of a myeloid disorder characterized by the triad: leukocytosis without differentiation block or dysplasia, BM fibrosis and progressive splenomegaly, hence recapitulating many clinical features of overt or prefibrotic/early PMF and resembling the SETBP1 mouse model.

Collective infectivity of the pandemic over time and association with vaccine coverage and economic development

This paper uses new and existing methods to study collective trends across countries throughout the pandemic, with a focus on the multivariate time series of reproduction numbers and vaccine proliferation. We begin with a time-varying analysis of the collective nature of infectivity, where we evaluate the eigenspectrum and collective magnitude of reproduction number time series on a country-by-country basis. Next, we study the topology of this eigenspectrum, measuring the deviation between all points in time, and introduce a graph-theoretic methodology to reveal a clear partition in global infectivity dynamics. Then, we compare countries’ vaccine rollouts with economic indicators such as their GDP and HDI in a collective fashion. We investigate time-varying consistency and determine points in time where there is the greatest discrepancy between these indicators as a whole. Our two primary findings are a considerable increase in collective infectivity in the latter half of the period, and a concave-up (“down then up”) pattern in the collective consistency between vaccine coverage and economic/development indicators across countries.

Influence of sanitation facilities on diarrhea prevalence among children aged below 5 years in flood-prone areas of Bangladesh: a multilevel analysis.

Although the improvement of sanitation facilities has been a major contributor to improving public health, it is not guaranteed to prevent negative health outcomes. This is especially true in areas affected by severe natural disasters, such as flooding or extreme rainfall. Previous studies have examined the association between catastrophic natural disasters and negative health outcomes. However, studies on disaster-prone areas are limited. This study focused on the impact of flood risks and examined whether the improvement of sanitation facilities would be sufficient to suppress the prevalence of diarrhea in flood-prone areas. Two secondary datasets including geodata on flood-prone areas were used for the analysis: one each was obtained from the Bangladesh Demographic and Health Survey and Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council. Two models with categorizations of sanitation facilities based on containment type and excreta flow were applied for analysis. Results showed that the severe flood-prone areas and "diffused" type of sanitation, where the feces are diffused without any containment, had significant positive associations with diarrhea prevalence; however, the interaction between them was negative. Moderate flood-prone areas had a significant positive association with diarrhea prevalence; however, the interaction with unimproved sanitation, which includes containment without clear partition from feces, was significantly negative. These findings indicate that improved sanitation or containment type of sanitation may not positively contribute to the prevention of diarrhea in these severe- and moderate-flood prone areas. The urgent need for alternative sanitation technologies should be addressed in flood-prone regions.

Electrotaxis evokes directional separation of co-cultured keratinocytes and fibroblasts

Bioelectric communication plays a significant role in several cellular processes and biological mechanisms, such as division, differentiation, migration, cancer metastasis, and wound healing. Ion flow across cellular walls leads to potential gradients and subsequent formation of constant or time-varying electric fields(EFs), which regulate cellular processes. An EF is natively generated towards the wound center during epithelial wound healing, aiming to align and guide cell migration, particularly of macrophages, fibroblasts, and keratinocytes. While this phenomenon, known as electrotaxis or galvanotaxis, has been extensively investigated across many cell types, it is typically explored one cell type at a time, which does not accurately represent cellular interactions during complex biological processes. Here we show the co-cultured electrotaxis of epidermal keratinocytes and dermal fibroblasts with a salt-bridgeless microfluidic approach for the first time. The electrotactic response of these cells was first assessed in mono-culture to establish a baseline, resulting in the characteristic cathodic migration for keratinocytes and anodic for fibroblasts. Both cell types retained their electrotactic properties in co-culture leading to clear cellular partition even in the presence of cellular collisions. The methods leveraged here pave the way for future co-culture electrotaxis experiments where the concurrent influence of cell types can be thoroughly investigated.

Double Thionated Pyrimidine Nucleobases: Molecular Tools with Tunable Photoproperties.

Sulfur-substituted nucleobases are DNA and RNA base derivatives that exhibit extremely efficient photoinduced intersystem crossing (ISC) dynamics into the lowest-energy triplet state. The long-lived and reactive triplet states of sulfur-substituted nucleobases are crucial due to their wide range of potential applications in medicine, structural biology, and the development of organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and other emerging technologies. However, a comprehensive understanding of non-negligible wavelength-dependent changes in the internal conversion (IC) and ISC events is still lacking. Here, we study the underlying mechanism using joint experimental gas-phase time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (TRPES) and theoretical quantum chemistry methods. We combine 2,4-dithiouracil (2,4-DTU) TRPES experimental data with computational analysis of the different photodecay processes, which are induced by increasing excitation energies along the entire linear absorption (LA) ultraviolet (UV) spectrum. Our results show how the double-thionated uracil (U), i.e., 2,4-DTU, appears as a versatile photoactivatable instrument. Multiple decay processes can be initiated with different ISC rates or triplet-state lifetimes that resemble the distinctive behavior of the singly substituted 2- or 4-thiouracil (2-TU or 4-TU). We obtained a clear partition of the LA spectrum based on the dominant photoinduced process. Our work clarifies the reasons behind the wavelength-dependent changes in the IC, ISC, and triplet-state lifetimes in doubly thionated U, becoming a biological system of utmost importance for wavelength-controlled applications. These mechanistic details and photoproperties are transferable to closely related molecular systems such as thionated thymines.

Abstract 4055: CD40L stimulates melanoma infiltrating B cells and enhances ex vivo TIL expansion

Abstract Adoptive transfer of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) is a feasible and effective therapy for melanoma and lung cancer[1,2]. Multiple factors may determine the quality of the TIL product including components of the tumor microenvironment. In this work, we analyzed the role of melanoma infiltrating B cells in the context of TIL expansion based on their documented association with response to other types of immunotherapies[3]. We stimulated melanoma infiltrating B cells using human recombinant CD40L on the first day of ex-vivo TIL expansion. Samples were expanded from cryopreserved melanoma tumor single cell suspensions, in high dose IL-2 alone (standard protocol), or in high dose IL-2 plus CD40L. After 48h, analysis of activation markers on the CD40-expressing cells by flow cytometry was performed. For further investigation of the changes induced by CD40L stimulation, TIL expansion cultures (+/- CD40L) were analyzed using scRNA-seq (10X Genomics Chromium NextGEM Single Cell 5’ v2 and V(D)J Reagent kits; Illumina NovaSeq 6000 instrument with S4 sequencing flow cell) at 48h of culture (n=7 patients). The TIL expansion success rate was 68% with the CD40L treatment condition compared to 36% with the standard protocol. TILs cultured in the presence of CD40L expanded to on average three times more than with the standard protocol (P ≤ 0.01). Treatment with CD40L increased the percentage of CD39- CD69- T cells (P ≤ 0.05). Within the tumor digests, a higher percentage of B cells, including switched memory B cells (CD27+ IgD− ), was associated with successful TIL expansion (P=0.04). scRNA-seq analysis demonstrated different clustering patterns within the B cell compartment based on culture conditions. No clear partition was observed for other cell types, including the myeloid compartment. B cells displayed 126 DEGs associated to CD40L addition, CCL22, CD83, EBI3 and CD58 were among the upregulated genes in the CD40L-treated B cells. Other cell types experienced minimal to no change in transcriptomic profiles. B cell clusters were sub-classified based on CD27 and IgD expression[4], showing a predominance of naïve and switched memory B cells. Our results show that higher presence of B cells within tumors is associated with better TIL expansion, suggesting an interplay between T and B cells, and providing rationale for the design of improved TIL expansion protocols based on B cell stimulation with CD40L. This work has been supported in part by the Flow Cytometry, Genomics and Biostatistics and Bioinformatics Core Facilities at Moffitt Cancer Center, an NCI designated Comprehensive Cancer Center (P30-CA076292). We acknowledge Moffitt’s Melanoma Center of Excellence and the Mark Foundation for the financial support. [1] Sarnaik, A.A. et al. JCO 39, 2656-2666 (2021). [2] Creelan, B. et al. Nat Med 27, 1410-1418 (2021). [3] Cabrita, R. et al. Nature 577, 561-565 (2020). [4] Sanz, I. et al. Front Immunol 10, 2458 (2019). Citation Format: Renata Ariza Marques Rossetti, Leticia Tordesillas, Matthew Beatty, Dongliang Du, Yian Ann Chen, Amod Sarnaik, Shari Pilon-Thomas, Daniel Abate-Daga. CD40L stimulates melanoma infiltrating B cells and enhances ex vivo TIL expansion. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2023; Part 1 (Regular and Invited Abstracts); 2023 Apr 14-19; Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2023;83(7_Suppl):Abstract nr 4055.

DNA Damage Response (DDR) Is Associated With Treatment-free Remission in Chronic Myeloid Leukemia Patients.

DNA Damage Response (DDR) Is Associated With Treatment-free Remission in Chronic Myeloid Leukemia Patients.

A Modeling Approach for the VIRT and Other Coupled Electronic and Magnetic Systems

Recently, a new class of magnetic component has emerged in which the electronics that connect to these components are fundamental to defining the conductive loops that comprise them. In these “coupled electronic and magnetic systems” (CEMSs), a clear partition cannot be made between the electrical and magnetic domains and this prevents the application of established modeling techniques for deriving their circuit representation. One such CEMS is the variable inverter/rectifier transformer (VIRT), which enables a transformer with fractional effective turns and a variable effective turns ratio. Previous investigations into the VIRT have invoked simplifying assumptions to synthesize a circuit representation, omitting the full details of operation such as the possibility and implications of ac currents induced on conductors that encircle the VIRT. Other fractional-turn transformers have simply assumed a circuit representation without undertaking modeling. In this work, a modeling approach is proposed which enables the circuit representation of a CEMS to be extracted directly from first principles. Two case studies are explored and the derived models are shown to match well with experiment. The proposed approach is suitable both for assessing the finer details of the VIRT, and other fractional-turn transformers, and as a framework for deriving and understanding new CEMS implementations.

Women’s Quarters, an Influential and Political Pole: A Study of the Frankish Inner-Court (Sixth–Seventh Century)

The question of women exercising power and influence appears to be central, if not fundamental, to gender studies, as it allows an in-depth reflection on both societal norms and the way we perceive them today. The historian’s vision has been biased for a long time by a dichotomic consideration of society, with a clear gendered partition where women would have been confined to the private, domestic sphere. Their actions were thus perceived as inconsequential at best, invisible at worst, for they were perpetually limited to private quarters and familial intimacy, while men’s authority and actions supposedly influenced the public sphere and politics in a larger measure. It would be a mistake, however, to keep considering that politics and familial intimacy should be studied separately. The palace environment in particular proves to be especially favorable to women’s authority, for they often benefit from a specific access to the sovereign that even major dignitaries can be deprived of, seeing as they are generally not received privately by the ruling dynasty. Studying women’s quarters thus brings to light a mosaic of interdependent relationships, of intercessors, factional processes, and intricate political networks. Although women can be, and often are, limited in some specific ways, such as their physical presence within the public space, they can still achieve political relevance and play a key role within the palace hierarchy and court mechanics. In other words, women are not only instrumental in displaying royal authority but can, at times, fully embody it without specifically causing a break with tradition. Merovingian private quarters in particular offer a very meaningful example, in that they are a reflection of the Merovingian matrimonial practice—polygyny. By multiplying the female pole within the palatial structure, power and authority come into play, taking various shapes and influencing many areas of the political and private life of the sovereign.

Systemic exposure following intravitreal administration of therapeutic agents: an integrated pharmacokinetic approach. 2. THR-687

Intravitreal (IVT) injection remains the preferred administration route of pharmacological agents intended for the treatment of back of the eye diseases such as diabetic macular edema (DME) and neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nvAMD). The procedure enables drugs to be delivered locally at high concentrations whilst limiting whole body exposure and associated risk of systemic adverse events. Nevertheless, intravitreally-delivered drugs do enter the general circulation and achieving an accurate understanding of systemic exposure is pivotal for the evaluation and development of drugs administered in the eye. We report here the full pharmacokinetic properties of THR-687, a pan RGD integrin antagonist currently in clinical development for the treatment of DME, in both rabbit and minipig. Pharmacokinetic characterization included description of vitreal elimination, of systemic pharmacokinetics, and of systemic exposure following IVT administration. For the latter, we present a novel pharmacokinetic model that assumes clear partition between the vitreous humor compartment itself where the drug is administered and the central systemic compartment. We also propose an analytical solution to the system of differential equations that represent the pharmacokinetic model, thereby allowing data analysis with standard nonlinear regression analysis. The model accurately describes circulating levels of THR-687 following IVT administration in relevant animal models, and we suggest that this approach is relevant to a range of drugs and analysis of subsequent systemic exposure.

Microglial regulation of social stress susceptibility in Female Rats

There is a significant link between stress and the development of psychiatric diseases such as depression and anxiety. In addition, females exhibit increased susceptibility for the development of depression and anxiety; however, the reasons for this are unclear. The locus coeruleus (LC) is known to regulate the stress response, in part, through its projections to the central amygdala (CeA). All LC neurons contain norepinephrine (NE) and thus project NE to the CeA, which in turn activates the stress-sensitive corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF), which can mediate the anxiety-like response to stress. Importantly, social stress elicits robust activation of the brain's resident immune cells (microglia) and overactivation of these microglia are implicated in stress-related disorders. These studies seek to understand the molecular cascade between the stress sensitive LC-NE system and the CeA. Therefore, here we test the hypothesis that microglia within the LC may be regulating, in part, the stress-evoked LC to CeA projections. Our lab has identified that a witness-stress (WS) paradigm is capable of producing stress related behavioral dysfunction in female rats including anxiety-like behaviors. In this WS paradigm, a female rat is placed behind a clear partition in a dominant and territorial male's cage (termed the “resident”) and observes social defeat between the resident and a smaller male “intruder”. The female “witness” responds to this exposure with increased stress-evoked burying behavior, stress hormone release and increased heart rate and blood pressure. Our previous work identified a method that was capable of reducing the inflammatory cells in the LC by administering mannosylated liposomal clodronate (Encapsula NanoSciences). We identified that 25 μg of clodronate (CLD) administered directly into the LC via the mannosylated lipid-based nanoparticle was selectively toxic to microglia of the LC. When administered intra-LC, this dose of CLD decreased microglial expression by approximately 50%. (LC microglial number ±SEM; vehicle: 55.3 ± 5.3, 25 μg CLD: 27.4±2.6). In the current study, rats received an empty liposome (vehicle) or 25 μg CLD three days before repeated WS or control (Con) exposure (5 daily exposures, 15 mins/day). 5 days after WS/Con, rats in all stress/treatment conditions were either euthanized under resting conditions or 1 hour following a WS exposure. Blood and brain tissue were collected. Preliminary results demonstrate elevated IL-1B assessed in the LC 5 days after stress in vehicle-treated witness stressed rats, an effect that was absent in CLD-treated rats. We also identified that the WS-induced anxiety-like response (burying) was reduced in the rats that were treated with intra-LC CLD. Ongoing studies are assessing NE and CRF expression in the CeA in these studies. These data lay the foundation to begin to explain the underlying causes of stress susceptibility in females. By understanding neuroinflammation's role in susceptibility in regions such as the LC and it's stress sensitive projections, this project could have implications to improve treatments of psychiatric disorders in females.

Tracing Water Sources and Fluxes in a Dynamic Tropical Environment: From Observations to Modeling

Codigo de proyecto: Isotope Network for Tropical Ecosystem Studies (ISONet). Produccion relacionada con el Observatorio del Agua y Cambio Global (OACG).

Benefits of Collisional Cross Section Assisted Precursor Selection (caps-PASEF) for Cross-linking Mass Spectrometry

Ion mobility separates molecules in the gas-phase based on their physico-chemical properties, providing information about their size as collisional cross-sections. The timsTOF Pro combines trapped ion mobility with a quadrupole, collision cell and a TOF mass analyzer, to probe ions at high speeds with on-the-fly fragmentation. Here, we show that on this platform ion mobility is beneficial for cross-linking MS (XL-MS). Cross-linking reagents covalently link amino acids in proximity, resulting in peptide pairs after proteolytic digestion. These cross-linked peptides are typically present at low abundance in the background of normal peptides, which can partially be resolved by using enrichable cross-linking reagents. Even with a very efficient enrichable cross-linking reagent, like PhoX, the analysis of cross-linked peptides is still hampered by the co-enrichment of peptides connected to a partially hydrolyzed reagent - termed mono-linked peptides. For experiments aiming to uncover protein-protein interactions these are unwanted byproducts. Here, we demonstrate that gas-phase separation by ion mobility enables the separation of mono-linked peptides from cross-linked peptide pairs. A clear partition between these two classes is observed at a CCS of 500 Å2 and a monoisotopic mass of 2 kDa, which can be used for targeted precursor selection. A total of 50-70% of the mono-linked peptides are prevented from sequencing, allowing the analysis to focus on sequencing the relevant cross-linked peptide pairs. In applications to both simple proteins and protein mixtures and a complete highly complex lysate this approach provides a substantial increase in detected cross-linked peptides.

Changes in Health Care Following COVID-19

Changes in Health Care Following COVID-19

Wasps Use Social Eavesdropping to Learn about Individual Rivals

Many animals minimize the costs of conflict by using social eavesdropping to learn about the fighting ability of potential rivals before they interact. Learning about individual conspecifics via social eavesdropping allows individuals to assess potential opponents without personal risk. However, keeping track of a network of individually differentiated social relationships is thought to be cognitively challenging. Here, we test how Polistes fuscatus nest-founding queens use social eavesdropping to assess individual rivals. Bystanders watched conspecifics fight through a clear partition. Then, bystanders were allowed to interact with fighters. Bystander behavior toward fighters was strongly influenced by the observed fight; bystanders were less aggressive toward fighters that were seen to initiate more and receive less aggression. Control trials allow us to reject alternative explanations for the link between observed aggression and bystander behavior, including priming or winner/loser effects. Therefore, P.fuscatus wasps observe and remember a complex network of social interactions between individual conspecifics rather than only paying attention to individuals they interact with directly. Wasps have an impressive capacity to learn, remember, and make social deductions about individuals. These results indicate that insects can have surprisingly complex social lives involving a network of individually differentiated social relationships.

Partition dependence in financial aid distribution to income categories.

When allocating resources, people often diversify across categories even when those categories are arbitrary, such that allocations differ when identical sets of options are partitioned differently (“partition dependence”). The first goal of the present work (Experiment 1) was to replicate an experiment by Fox and colleagues in which graduate students exhibited partition dependence when asked how university financial aid should be allocated across arbitrarily partitioned income brackets. Our sample consisted of community members at a liberal arts college where financial aid practices have been recent topics of debate. Because stronger intrinsic preferences can reduce partition dependence, these participants might display little partition dependence with financial aid allocations. Alternatively, a demonstration of strong partition dependence in this population would emphasize the robustness of the effect. The second goal was to extend a “high transparency” modification to the present task context (Experiment 2) in which participants were shown both possible income partitions and randomly assigned themselves to one, to determine whether partition dependence in this paradigm would be reduced by revealing the study design (and the arbitrariness of income categories). Participants demonstrated clear partition dependence in both experiments. Results demonstrate the robustness of partition dependence in this context.

Achieving Super-Linear Speedup across Multi-FPGA for Real-Time DNN Inference

Real-time Deep Neural Network (DNN) inference with low-latency requirement has become increasingly important for numerous applications in both cloud computing (e.g., Apple’s Siri) and edge computing (e.g., Google/Waymo’s driverless car). FPGA-based DNN accelerators have demonstrated both superior flexibility and performance; in addition, for real-time inference with low batch size, FPGA is expected to achieve further performance improvement. However, the performance gain from the single-FPGA design is obstructed by the limited on-chip resource. In this paper, we employ multiple FPGAs to cooperatively run DNNs with the objective of achieving super-linear speed-up against single-FPGA design. In implementing such systems, we found two barriers that hinder us from achieving the design goal: (1) the lack of a clear partition scheme for each DNN layer to fully exploit parallelism, and (2) the insufficient bandwidth between the off-chip memory and the accelerator due to the growing size of DNNs. To tackle these issues, we propose a general framework, “Super-LIP”, which can support different kinds of DNNs. In this paper, we take Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) as a vehicle to illustrate Super-LIP. We first formulate an accurate system-level model to support the exploration of best partition schemes. Then, we develop a novel design methodology to effectively alleviate the heavy loads on memory bandwidth by moving traffic from memory bus to inter-FPGA links. We implement Super-LIP based on ZCU102 FPGA boards. Results demonstrate that Super-LIP with 2 FPGAs can achieve 3.48× speedup, compared to the state-of-the-art single-FPGA design. What is more, as the number of FPGAs scales up, the system latency can be further reduced while maintaining high energy efficiency.

Stratification of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Patients Into Three Groups of Disease Activity Progression According to Longitudinal Gene Expression.

The highly heterogeneous clinical presentation of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is characterized by the unpredictable occurrence of disease flares and organ damage. Attempts to stratify lupus patients have been limited to classification based on clinical information, leading to unsuccessful clinical trials and controversial research results. This study was undertaken to develop and validate a robust method to stratify patients with lupus according tolongitudinal disease activity and whole-genome gene expression data in order to establish subgroups of patients who share disease progression mechanisms. We used a cluster-based approach to stratify SLE patients based on the correlation between disease activity scores and longitudinal gene expression information. Clustering robustness was evaluated by the bootstrap method, and the clusters were characterized in terms of clinical and functional features. We observed a clear partition into 3 different disease clusters in 2 independent sets of patients, one pediatric and one adult, which was not influenced by treatment, race, or other source of bias. Two of the clusters differentiated into a group showing a correlation between the percentage of neutrophils and disease activity progression and a group showing a correlation between the percentage of lymphocytes and disease activity progression. The third cluster, in which the percentage of neutrophils correlated to a lesser degree with disease activity, was functionally more heterogeneous. Patients in the neutrophil-driven clusters had an increased risk of developing proliferative nephritis. Our findings indicate that SLE patients can be stratified into 3 subgroups of patients who show different mechanisms of disease progression and are clinically differentiated. Our results have important implications for treatment options, the design of clinical trials, our understanding of the etiology of the disease, and the prediction of severe glomerulonephritis.