On cheating immune secret sharing

The paper addresses the cheating prevention in secret sharing. We consider secret sharing with binary shares. The secret also is binary. This model allows us to use results and constructions from the well developed theory of cryptographically strong boolean functions. In particular, we prove that for given secret sharing, the average cheating probability over all cheating vectors and all original vectors, i.e., 1/n 2n ∑c=1...n ∑α∈V n ρc,α , denoted by ρ, satisfies ρ ≥ ½, and the equality holds if and only if ρc,α satisfies ρc,α= ½ for every cheating vector δc and every original vector α. In this case the secret sharing is said to be cheating immune. We further establish a relationship between cheating-immune secret sharing and cryptographic criteria of boolean functions.This enables us to construct cheating-immune secret sharing.

Mathematical Models of Tumor-Immune System Dynamics

"This collection of papers offers a broad synopsis of state-of-the-art mathematical methods used in modeling the interaction between tumors and the immune system. These papers were presented at the four-day workshop on Mathematical Models of Tumor-Immune System Dynamics held in Sydney, Australia from January 7th to January 10th, 2013. The workshop brought together applied mathematicians, biologists, and clinicians actively working in the field of cancer immunology to share their current research and to increase awareness of the innovative mathematical tools that are applicable to the growing field of cancer immunology. Recent progress in cancer immunology and advances in immunotherapy suggest that the immune system plays a fundamental role in host defense against tumors and could be utilized to prevent or cure cancer. Although theoretical and experimental studies of tumor-immune system dynamics have a long history, there are still many unanswered questions about the mechanisms that govern the interaction between the immune system and a growing tumor. The multidimensional nature of these complex interactions requires a cross-disciplinary approach to capture more realistic dynamics of the essential biology. The papers presented in this volume explore these issues and the results will be of interest to graduate students and researchers in a variety of fields within mathematical and biological sciences."--Publisher website

Uropathogenic Escherichia coli virulence and innate immune responses during urinary tract infection

Urinary tract infections (UTI) are among the most common infectious diseases of humans and are the most common nosocomial infections in the developed world. It is estimated that 40–50% of women and 5% of men will develop a UTI in their lifetime, and UTI accounts for more than 1 million hospitalizations and $1.6 billion in medical expenses each year in the USA. Uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) is the primary cause of UTI. This review presents an overview of recent discoveries related to the primary virulence factors of UPEC and major innate immune responses to infection of the lower urinary tract. New and emerging themes in UPEC research are discussed in the context of the interface between host and pathogen.

Effects of HNO3 molecular doping in graphene/Si Schottky barrier solar cells

Schottky barrier solar cells based on graphene/n-silicon heterojunction have been fabricated and characterized and the effect of graphene molecular doping by HNO3 on the solar cells performances have been analyzed. Different doping conditions and thermal annealing processes have been tested to asses and optimize the stability of the devices. The PCE of the cells increases after the treatment by HNO3 and reaches 5% in devices treated at 200 °C immediately before the exposition to the oxidant. Up to now our devices retain about 80% of efficiency over a period of two weeks, which represents a good stability result for similar devices.

Conceptual and statistical framework for a water quality component of the integrated report card for the Great Barrier Reef catchments

This report presents the final deliverable from the project titled Conceptual and statistical framework for a water quality component of an integrated report card’ funded by the Marine and Tropical Sciences Research Facility (MTSRF; Project 3.7.7). The key management driver of this, and a number of other MTSRF projects concerned with indicator development, is the requirement for state and federal government authorities and other stakeholders to provide robust assessments of the present ‘state’ or ‘health’ of regional ecosystems in the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) catchments and adjacent marine waters. An integrated report card format, that encompasses both biophysical and socioeconomic factors, is an appropriate framework through which to deliver these assessments and meet a variety of reporting requirements. It is now well recognised that a ‘report card’ format for environmental reporting is very effective for community and stakeholder communication and engagement, and can be a key driver in galvanising community and political commitment and action. Although a report card it needs to be understandable by all levels of the community, it also needs to be underpinned by sound, quality-assured science. In this regard this project was to develop approaches to address the statistical issues that arise from amalgamation or integration of sets of discrete indicators into a final score or assessment of the state of the system. In brief, the two main issues are (1) selecting, measuring and interpreting specific indicators that vary both in space and time, and (2) integrating a range of indicators in such a way as to provide a succinct but robust overview of the state of the system. Although there is considerable research and knowledge of the use of indicators to inform the management of ecological, social and economic systems, methods on how to best to integrate multiple disparate indicators remain poorly developed. Therefore the objective of this project was to (i) focus on statistical approaches aimed at ensuring that estimates of individual indicators are as robust as possible, and (ii) present methods that can be used to report on the overall state of the system by integrating estimates of individual indicators. It was agreed at the outset, that this project was to focus on developing methods for a water quality report card. This was driven largely by the requirements of Reef Water Quality Protection Plan (RWQPP) and led to strong partner engagement with the Reef Water Quality Partnership.

A young immunocompetent patient with bilateral immune stromal keratitis due to varicella zoster and herpes simplex

This report describes the diagnostic features, clinical management and the issues associated with management of a young immunocompetent male who presented with a presumed left Herpes simplex immune stromal keratitis, and ten months later, a right immune stromal keratitis associated with Herpes zoster ophthalmicus.

Resistance to amoebic gill disease (AGD) is characterised by the transcriptional dysregulation of immune and cell cycle pathways

Amoebic gill disease (AGD) is a parasite-mediated proliferative gill disease capable of affecting a range of teleost hosts. While a moderate heritability for AGD resistance in Atlantic salmon has been reported previously, the mechanisms by which individuals resist the proliferative effects remain poorly understood. To gain more knowledge of this commercially important trait, we compared gill transcriptomes of two groups of Atlantic salmon, one designated putatively resistant, and one designated putatively susceptible to AGD. Utilising a 17k Atlantic salmon cDNA microarray we identified 196 transcripts that were differentially expressed between the two groups. Expression of 11 transcripts were further examined with real-time quantitative RT-PCR (qPCR) in the AGD-resistant and AGD-susceptible animals, as well as non-infected naïve fish. Gene expression determined by qPCR was in strong agreement with the microarray analysis. A large number of differentially expressed genes were involved in immune and cell cycle responses. Resistant individuals displayed significantly higher expression of genes involved in adaptive immunity and negative regulation of the cell cycle. In contrast, AGD-susceptible individuals showed higher expression of acute phase proteins and positive regulators of the cell cycle. Combined with the gill histopathology, our results suggest AGD resistance is acquired rather than innately present, and that this resistance is for the most part associated with the dysregulation of immune and cell cycle pathways. © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Altered Immune Responses and Transplantation

Lewis’s Medical-Surgical Nursing: Assessment and Management of Clinical Problems, 4th Edition is the most comprehensive go-to reference for essential information about all aspects of professional nursing care of patients. Using the nursing process as a framework for practice, the fourth edition has been extensively revised to reflect the rapid changing nature of nursing practice and the increasing focus on key nursing care priorities. Building on the strengths of the third Australian and New Zealand edition and incorporating relevant global nursing research and practice from the prominent US title Medical-Surgical Nursing, 9Th Edition, Lewis’s Medical-Surgical Nursing, 4th Edition is an essential resource for students seeking to understand the role of the professional nurse in the contemporary health environment.

Néstor-Guillermo Progeria Syndrome: a biochemical insight into Barrier-to-Autointegration Factor 1, alanine 12 threonine mutation

Background Premature aging syndromes recapitulate many aspects of natural aging and provide an insight into this phenomenon at a molecular and cellular level. The progeria syndromes appear to cause rapid aging through disruption of normal nuclear structure. Recently, a coding mutation (c.34G > A [p.A12T]) in the Barrier to Autointegration Factor 1 (BANF1) gene was identified as the genetic basis of Néstor-Guillermo Progeria syndrome (NGPS). This mutation was described to cause instability in the BANF1 protein, causing a disruption of the nuclear envelope structure. Results Here we demonstrate that the BANF1 A12T protein is indeed correctly folded, stable and that the observed phenotype, is likely due to the disruption of the DNA binding surface of the A12T mutant. We demonstrate, using biochemical assays, that the BANF1 A12T protein is impaired in its ability to bind DNA while its interaction with nuclear envelope proteins is unperturbed. Consistent with this, we demonstrate that ectopic expression of the mutant protein induces the NGPS cellular phenotype, while the protein localizes normally to the nuclear envelope. Conclusions Our study clarifies the role of the A12T mutation in NGPS patients, which will be of importance for understanding the development of the disease.

Planning and governance approaches for protecting World Heritage Areas: A comparison of the Great Barrier Reef and the Florida Everglades

The focus of this paper is on two World Heritage Areas: the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland, Australia and the Everglades in Florida. While both are World Heritage listed by the UNESCO, the Everglades is on the "World Heritage in Danger" list and the Great Barrier Reef could be on this list within the next year if present pressures continue. This paper examines the planning approaches and governance structures used in these two areas (Queensland and Florida) to manage the growth and development pressures. To make the analysis manageable, given the scale of these World Heritage areas, case studies at the local government level will be used: the Cairns Regional Council in Queensland and Monroe County in Florida. The case study analysis will involve three steps: (1) examination of the various plans at the federal, state, local levels that impact upon environmental quality in the Great Barrier Reef and Everglades; (2) assessing the degree to which these plans have been implemented; and (3) determine if (and how) the plans have improved environmental quality. In addition to the planning analysis we will also examine the governance structures (Lebel et al. 2006) within which planning operates. In any comparative analysis context is important (Hantrais 2009). Contextual differences between Queensland and Florida have previously been examined by Sipe, et al. (2007) and will be used as the starting point for this analysis. Our operating hypothesis and preliminary analysis suggests that the planning approaches and governance structures used in Florida and Queensland are considerably different, but the environmental outcomes may be similar. This is based, in part, on Vella (2004) who did a comparative analysis of environmental practices in the sugar industry in Florida and Queensland. This research re-examines this hypothesis and broadens the focus beyond the sugar industry to growth and development more broadly.

An agent-based approach to immune modelling

This study focuses on trying to understand why the range of experience with respect to HIV infection is so diverse, especially as regards to the latency period. The challenge is to determine what assumptions can be made about the nature of the experience of antigenic invasion and diversity that can be modelled, tested and argued plausibly. To investigate this, an agent-based approach is used to extract high-level behaviour which cannot be described analytically from the set of interaction rules at the cellular level. A prototype model encompasses local variation in baseline properties contributing to the individual disease experience and is included in a network which mimics the chain of lymphatic nodes. Dealing with massively multi-agent systems requires major computational efforts. However, parallelisation methods are a natural consequence and advantage of the multi-agent approach. These are implemented using the MPI library.

Visualization of complex biological systems: An immune response model using OpenGL

In this paper we present an update on our novel visualization technologies based on cellular immune interaction from both large-scale spatial and temporal perspectives. We do so with a primary motive: to present a visually and behaviourally realistic environment to the community of experimental biologists and physicians such that their knowledge and expertise may be more readily integrated into the model creation and calibration process. Visualization aids understanding as we rely on visual perception to make crucial decisions. For example, with our initial model, we can visualize the dynamics of an idealized lymphatic compartment, with antigen presenting cells (APC) and cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) cells. The visualization technology presented here offers the researcher the ability to start, pause, zoom-in, zoom-out and navigate in 3-dimensions through an idealised lymphatic compartment.

A cellular automata model to investigate immune cell–tumor cell interactions in growing tumors in two spatial dimensions

We develop a hybrid cellular automata model to describe the effect of the immune system and chemokines on a growing tumor. The hybrid cellular automata model consists of partial differential equations to model chemokine concentrations, and discrete cellular automata to model cell–cell interactions and changes. The computational implementation overlays these two components on the same spatial region. We present representative simulations of the model and show that increasing the number of immature dendritic cells (DCs) in the domain causes a decrease in the number of tumor cells. This result strongly supports the hypothesis that DCs can be used as a cancer treatment. Furthermore, we also use the hybrid cellular automata model to investigate the growth of a tumor in a number of computational “cancer patients.” Using these virtual patients, the model can explain that increasing the number of DCs in the domain causes longer “survival.” Not surprisingly, the model also reflects the fact that the parameter related to tumor division rate plays an important role in tumor metastasis.