Today, we can see a growing concern among governments, policy makers, donors and other stakeholders, that there is a mismatch between research (R&D) input and its results. Substantial amounts of money are spent on research facilities without a commensurate return on investment. For developed countries, it can be frustrating not getting the sought-after mileage of an investment in knowledge pro

Police crash reports are often the main source for official data in many countries. However, police sampling and data are known to be subject to bias, making the countermeasures adopted according to them possibly inefficient. In the case of bicycle crashes, this bias is most acute and it probably varies across countries, with some of them being more prone to reporting accidents to police than othe

Improved understanding of the impact of the operating conditions on the heat transfer and fluid flow behaviors of an outlet guide vane (OGV) is essential for accurate prediction of the lifetime of jet engines. In this article, the heat transfer characteristics of an OGV at various Reynolds numbers (Re), free stream turbulence levels, Mach number (Ma), and surface roughness are studied numerically.

Water-related impacts due to change in climatic conditions ranging from water scarcity to intense floods and storms are increasing in developing countries like Pakistan. Water quality and waterborne diseases like hepatitis, cholera, typhoid, malaria and dengue fever are increasing due to chaotic urbanization, industrialization, poor hygienic conditions, and inappropriate water management. The morb

In terrestrial ecosystems, a large portion (20-80%) of the dissolved Si (DSi) in soil solution has passed through vegetation. While the importance of this terrestrial Si filter is generally accepted, few data exist on the pools and fluxes of Si in forest vegetation and the rate of release of Si from decomposing plant tissues. We quantified the pools and fluxes of Si through vegetation and coarse w

Finite element modelling (FEM) is used to show that the addition of Au contacts to a single horizontal InAs/InP heterostructure nanowire substantially alters the nanowire's optical properties in comparison to the uncontacted case. It is found that the addition of contacts can increase absorption efficiency, decrease scattering efficiency and shift the location of absorption within the nanowire. Lo

Mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) harbor great therapeutic potential for numerous diseases. From early clinical trials, success and failure analysis, bench-to-bedside and back-to-bench approaches, there has been a great gain in knowledge, still leaving a number of questions to be answered regarding optimal manufacturing and quality of MSCs for clinical application. For treatment of many acute indic

ConspectusThe photophysics and photochemistry of transition metal complexes (TMCs) has long been a hot field of interdisciplinary research. Rich metal-based redox processes, together with a high variety in electronic configurations and excited-state dynamics, have rendered TMCs excellent candidates for interconversion between light, chemical, and electrical energies in intramolecular, supramolecul

Purpose – Evasive entrepreneurs innovate by circumventing or disrupting existing formal institutional frameworks. Since such evasions rarely go unnoticed, they usually lead to responses from lawmakers and regulators. The paper aims to discuss this issue. Design/methodology/approach – The authors introduce a conceptual model to illustrate and map the interdependencey between evasive entrepreneurshi

The use of this material under current use conditions is supported by the existing information. This material was evaluated for genotoxicity, repeated dose toxicity, developmental toxicity, reproductive toxicity, local respiratory toxicity, phototoxicity, skin sensitization potential, as well as, environmental safety. Developmental toxicity was determined to have the most conservative systemic exp

The technique of stray field diffusion NMR is adapted to study the diffusion properties of water in monodisperse wet foams. We show for the first time, that the technique is capable of observing q-space diffusion diffraction peaks in monodisperse aqueous foams with initial bubble sizes in the range of 50-85 μm. The position of the peak maximum can be correlated simply to the bubble size in the foa

In Vehicular Ad hoc NETworks (VANETs) where safety applications rely on broadcast communications, the hidden terminal problem can severely impact the reliability of these applications. Particularly, in forced flow traffic scenarios as the primary case of safety-critical situations, reliability is paramount for inter-vehicle communications to be useful. Not surprising, in these scenarios, the hidde

Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) interact with tumour cells and promote growth and metastasis. Here, we show that CAF activation is reversible: chronic hypoxia deactivates CAFs, resulting in the loss of contractile force, reduced remodelling of the surrounding extracellular matrix and, ultimately, impaired CAF-mediated cancer cell invasion. Hypoxia inhibits prolyl hydroxylase domain protein 2

Hyperinsulinemia is an adaptive mechanism that enables the maintenance of normoglycemia in the presence of insulin resistance. We assessed whether glucagon is also involved in the adaptation to insulin resistance. A total of 1,437 individuals underwent an oral glucose tolerance test with measurements of circulating glucose, insulin, and glucagon concentrations at 0, 30 and 120 min. Early glucagon

The contractile actomyosin cytoskeleton and its connection to the plasma membrane are critical for control of cell shape and migration. We identify three STRIPAK complex components, FAM40A, FAM40B and STRN3, as regulators of the actomyosin cortex. We show that FAM40A negatively regulates the MST3 and MST4 kinases, which promote the co-localization of the contractile actomyosin machinery with the E

The aggregating proteoglycans of the lectican family are important components of extracellular matrices. Aggrecan is the most well studied of these and is central to cartilage biomechanical properties and skeletal development. Key to its biological function is the fixed charge of the many glycosaminoglycan chains, that provide the basis for the viscoelastic properties necessary for load distributi

Background/Aims: Altered expression of the integrin family of cell adhesion receptors has been associated with initiation, progression, and metastasis of solid tumors as well as in the development of chemoresistance. Here, we investigated the role of integrins, in particular integrin β1, in cell volume regulation and drug-induced apoptosis in adherent and non-adherent Ehrlich ascites cell lines. M

The urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor (uPAR) is a non-integrin vitronectin (VN) cell adhesion receptor linked to the plasma membrane by a glycolipid anchor. Through structure-function analyses of uPAR, VN and integrins, we document that uPAR-mediated cell adhesion to VN triggers a novel type of integrin signalling that is independent of integrin-matrix engagement. The signalling is ful