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Zebrafish have been found to be the premier model organism in biological and biomedical research, specifically offering many advantages in developmental biology and genetics. The zebrafish (Danio rerio) has the ability to regenerate its spinal cord after injury. However, the complete molecular and cellular mechanisms behind glial bridge formation in zebrafish remains unclear. In our review paper, we examine the extracellular and intracellular molecular signaling factors that control zebrafish glial cell bridging and glial cell development in the forebrain. The interplay between initiating and terminating molecular feedback cycles deserve future investigations during glial cell growth, movement, and differentiation.

The QCD axion is a leading dark matter candidate that emerges as part of the solution to the strong CP problem in the Standard Model. The coupling of the axion to photons is the most common experimental probe, but much parameter space remains unexplored. The coupling of the QCD axion to the Standard Model scales linearly with the axion mass; therefore, the highly motivated region 0.4-120 neV, corresponding to a GUT-scale axion, is particularly difficult to reach. This paper presents the design requirements for a definitive search for GUT-scale axions and reviews the technological advances needed to enable this program.

School-university partnerships are widely promoted yet little is known about what contributes to their effectiveness. This paper presents a participatory formative evaluation of a state-funded school-university partnership. The study employed an empirically derived systems model--the Bergen Model of Collaborative Functioning (BMCF)--as the analytical frame. Twenty-one semi-structured interviews with a range of participants were conducted, transcribed, and then analyzed according to the BMCF. Participants described the foundation of partnership work between schools and universities as requiring the cultivation of humility in order to overcome hierarchical barriers for students, parents, and staff within schools. The central findings include a practice model for changing organizational structures to institutionalize protected collaborative space, a theoretical model providing a framework for better understanding the process of partnership, and a policy model which indicates the importance of significant funding to surmount organizational barriers and provide incentives for the intensive, long-term work required.

High-energy-density laser facilities and advances in dynamic compression techniques have expanded access to material states in the Terapascal regime relevant to inertial confinement fusion, planetary science, and geophysics. However, experimentally determining the material temperature in these extreme conditions has remained a difficult challenge. Extended X-ray Absorption Fine Structure (EXAFS), referring to the modulations in x-ray absorption above an absorption edge from photoelectrons' interactions with neighboring atoms, has proven to be a versatile and robust technique for probing material temperature and density for mid-to-high Z elements under dynamic compression. The current platform at the National Ignition Facility has developed six configurations for EXAFS measurements between 7 and 18 keV for different absorption edges (Fe K, Co K, Cu K, Ta L3, Pb L3, and Zr K) using a curved-crystal spectrometer and a bright, continuum foil x-ray source. In this work, we describe the platform geometry, x-ray source performance, spectrometer resolution and throughput, design considerations, and data in ambient and dynamic-compression conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zebrafish (Danio rerio) is now the second most used animal model in biomedical research. As with other vertebrate models, underlying diseases and infections often impact research. Beyond mortality and morbidity, these conditions can compromise research end points by producing nonprotocol induced variation within experiments. Pseudoloma neurophilia, a microsporidium that targets the central nervous system, is the most frequently diagnosed pathogen in zebrafish facilities. The parasite undergoes direct, horizontal transmission within populations, and is also maternally transmitted with spores in ovarian fluid and occasionally within eggs. This transmission explains the wide distribution among research laboratories as new lines are generally introduced as embryos. The infection is chronic, and fish apparently never recover following the initial infection. However, most fish do not exhibit outward clinical signs. Histologically, the parasite occurs as aggregates of spores throughout the midbrain and spinal cord and extends to nerve roots. It often elicits meninxitis, myositis, and myodegeneration when it infects the muscle. There are currently no described therapies for the parasite, thus the infection is best avoided by screening with PCR‐based tests and removal of infected fish from a facility. Examples of research impacts include reduced fecundity, behavioral changes, transcriptome alterations, and autofluorescent lesions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: Despite the increased risk of developing renal cell carcinoma (RCC) in patients with advanced chronic kidney disease (ACKD), little is known about the patient clinical characteristics and genetic mutations found in these RCC tumors. Using a multi-institutional research network, this study compiled clinical records and somatic tumor whole exome sequencing data of 296 adult patients with RCC, 61 of whom had ACKD. Patients with RCC and ACKD were more likely to be male, present with earlier stage RCC at diagnosis, and have lower rates of BAP1 mutations. Median overall survival was not reached in either group over a median follow-up of 31.3 months. These findings suggest RCC in patients with ACKD develops via a BAP1-independent mutational driver and further support BAP1 loss as a marker of disease aggressiveness. Background: Patients with advanced chronic kidney disease (ACKD) are at an increased risk of developing renal cell carcinoma (RCC), but molecular alterations in RCC specimens arising from ACKD and overall survival (OS) in affected patients are not well defined. Patients and Methods: Using the Oncology Research Information Exchange Network (ORIEN) Total Cancer Care® protocol, 296 consented adult patients with RCC and somatic tumor whole exome sequencing were included. Patients with ACKD were defined as those with serum creatinine ≥1.5 mg/dL prior to RCC diagnosis. Results: Of 296 patients with RCC, 61 met the criteria for ACKD. The most common somatic mutations in the overall cohort were in VHL (126, 42.6%), PBRM1 (102, 34.5%), and SETD2 (54, 18.2%). BAP1 had a decreased mutational frequency in RCC specimens from patients without ACKD as compared to those with ACKD (10.6% versus 1.6%), but this was not statistically significant in univariable (OR 0.14, p = 0.056) or multivariable (OR 0.15, p = 0.067) analysis. Median OS was not reached in either cohort. Conclusions: Using the clinicogenomic ORIEN database, our study found lower rates of BAP1 mutations in RCC specimens from patients with ACKD, which may reflect a BAP1-independent mutational driver of RCC in patients with ACKD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In conventional time-resolved laser-induced incandescence (TiRe-LII) measurements, a laser pulse heats the nanoparticles within a probe volume of aerosol, and the particle size distribution and other characteristics are inferred from the observed incandescence decay rate, which is connected to the change in sensible energy through a spectroscopic model. There is strong evidence, however, that for some aerosol systems, the incandescence signal is contaminated with other non-incandescent emission sources. Recent TiRe-LII measurements on polydisperse aerosolized silver and gold nanoparticles energized with a 1064 nm laser pulse exhibit broadband emission that is temporally aligned with the temporal profile of the laser pulse, suggesting that the signal is due to non-thermal emission. One candidate for this emission phenomenon is multiphoton-induced upconversion luminescence, in which the conduction-band electron gas is heated up to an effective lattice temperature, resulting in luminescence due to high-energy intraband transitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]