Cassava starch is considered as a potential source for the commercial production of bioethanol because of its availability and low market price. It can be used as a basic source to support large-scale biological production of bioethanol using microbial amylases. With the progression and advancement in enzymology, starch liquefying and saccharifying enzymes are preferred for the conversion of complex starch polymer into various valuable metabolites. These hydrolytic enzymes can selectively cleave the internal linkages of starch molecule to produce free glucose which can be utilized to produce bioethanol by microbial fermentation.Aspergillus fumigatus KIBGE-IB33 was selected based on maximum enzyme yield. Maximum α-amylase, amyloglucosidase and glucose formation was achieved after 03 days of fermentation using cassava starch. After salt precipitation, fold purification of α-amylase and amyloglucosidase increased up to 4.1 and 4.2 times with specific activity of 9.2 kUmg-1 and 393 kUmg-1, respectively. Concentrated amylolytic enzyme mixture was incorporated in cassava starch slurry to give maximum glucose formation (40.0 gL-1), which was further fermented using Saccharomyces cerevisiae into bioethanol with 84.0% yield. The distillate originated after recovery of bioethanol gave 53.0% yield.In the present study, several filamentous fungi were screened for production of amylases and among them An improved and effective dual enzymatic starch degradation method is designed for the production of bioethanol using cassava starch. The technique developed is more profitable due to its fast liquefaction and saccharification approach that was employed for the formation of glucose and ultimately resulted in higher yields of alcohol production. Emerging environmental issues raised due to combustion of petroleum-based fossil fuel and emission of toxic gases have diverted the attention of scientists and researchers towards the utilization of various renewable resources for the production of bioethanol. In addition to these global concerns, other important factors that have been kept in preference are the mounting prices of the fuels and the current political scenario among the oil producing nations. Bioprocessing of renewable resources available in a particular region can help in resolving these issues. Various renewable resources in terms of agricultural biomass have been investigated for the production of bioethanol and this development proved beneficent for the biotechnological industries. Amongst various starchy materials available throughout the world; corn, sugarcane, wheat, potato , corn stCassava is a tropical root crop which is an economically available fermentable source and is produced by numerous countries . It is iAspergillus and Rhizopus species are considered most significant sources because the enzymes from these sources are generally thermostable and are available in excessive quantities [In recent years, bioprocessing of various value-added products using microbial factories have been potentially explored with reference to extracellular enzymes. Agricultural biomass used as a substrate for the production of bioethanol has several limitations including high fiber content which requires high temperature for hydrolysis and this energy intensive procedure also does not provide desired yields of fermentable sugars. Hydrolysis of lingocellulosic mass by other expensive pre-treatment techniques is also time consuming. Industries also have concerns regarding the availability of the biomass throughout the year and most of the time its storage in bulk quantities is not possible due to space shortage. The development of an ideal pre-treatment method for hydrolyzing poly-phenolic lignin in the feedstock is expensive with several aforementioned limitations thus, enzymatic treatment is more preferable. Conventional method used for the production of bioethanol from cassava starch usually requires the basic gelatinization step followed by liquefaction and saccharification. The sugar formed during these processes is further fermented using either yeast or bacteria. Since, starch derived from any plant source is a complex molecule, it require various hydrolytic enzymes for its conversion into simple fermentable sugars. Among many extracellular hydrolases available, microbial amylases are frequently used for its conversion. For commercial production of amylases antities -14.S. cerevisiae to acquire maximum bioethanol yield.Despite several advantages of simultaneous saccharification and fermentation using multiple organisms, there are also few shortcomings. In the initial steps, the amylolytic enzymes are produced using fungi and the starch present in the medium is allowed to hydrolyze into simpler sugars and afterwards another microbial factory (yeast or bacteria) is incorporated in the same fermentation flask to produce ethanol. In this case the primary organism  along with amylolytic enzymes also excretes other toxic substances and proteases which in result inhibit the growth and performance of the second ethanol-producing microorganism. Along with this, the establishment of appropriate temperature for starch hydrolysis, enzymatic activity and ethanol production also plays an important role. Current research deals with the production of bioethanol from hydrolysis of an inexpensive renewable resource known as cassava starch, which is commonly available in Pakistan. The methodology used for the production of ethanol was based on double fermentation technique using partially purified fungal amylolytic enzymes for the liquefaction and saccharification of this starchy material. Keeping all disadvantages in view, this study was designed in two separate steps. In first step, amylolytic enzymes (α-amylase and amyloglucosidase) were produced using indigenously isolated filamentous fungi and were partially purified to hydrolyze cassava starch into simple fermentable sugars. In the next step, the sugar cocktail was fermented using Aspergillus. Microscopic morphology of A. fumigatus KIBGE-IB33 showed columnar and uniseriate conidial heads while, conidiophores are short and smooth. On the other hand, A. niger KIBGE-IB36 showed large, globose, dark brown conidial heads with hyaline and smooth conidiophores. Likewise, conidial heads of A. flavus KIBGE-IB34 are radiate and biseriate whereas, conidiophores are hyaline and coarsely roughened. A. terreus KIBGE-IB35 has biseriate and globose conidia with hyaline and smooth conidiophores. A. versicolor KIBGE-IB37 showed centrally rising, velvety floccose and slightly blue-green color colony on PDA with conidiophores borne from surface or aerial hyphae.In the present study, several different fungal isolates with amylolytic activities were purified from different soil samples and preliminary identification was based on microbiological studies including cultural and microscopic characterization followed by 18S rDNA sequence analysis. Colonial and microscopic characteristics indicate that all isolates belong to genera A. fumigatus KIBGE-IB33, A. flavus KIBGE-IB34, A. terreus KIBGE-IB35, A. niger KIBGE-IB36 and A. versicolor KIBGE-IB37showed production for amylolytic enzymes. When these isolates were cultivated in the starch containing production medium, highest titers of α-amylase (11.0 kUmg-1) and amyloglucosidase (142.0 kUmg-1) were produced by A. fumigatus KIBGE-IB33  which can be used for the production of ethanol. The fermentable sugar produced by this isolate can be easily metabolized by S. cerevisiae. However, other filamentous fungi produced lower titers of both α-amylase and amyloglucosidase along with lower concentration of glucose. Although maximum α-amylase was produced by A. flavus KIBGE-IB34 but it did not showed higher glucose formation rate as compared to A. fumigatus KIBGE-IB33 therefore, this isolate was selected for further studies.Screening of amylolytic property of the strains was based on starch hydrolysis method. Initially, 07 fungal strains were selected and among them 05 filamentous fungi including -1; amyloglucosidase: 142.0 kUmg-1) and glucose formation (81.0 gL-1) as compared to the other carbon sources tested. These results suggest that pure starch based carbon sources including sago starch, soluble starch (potato) and cassava starch are more suitable for the production of enzyme and glucose formation as compared to the different complex biomass (wheat bran and sugarcane bagasse) whereas, no enzyme production was detected when wheat starch and rice bran were used. This is because the lingocellulosic tough plant matrix was not pretreated. The cell free filtrate (CFF) collected after fermentation showed negligible titers for cellulase, pectinase and xylanase (data not shown) therefore; the starch content was not accessible for fermentation as compared to the purified starch materials. Fatima and Ali [-1 min-1) using starch in fermentation medium and the best strain they identified was A. oryzae llB-6 (12.673 ± 0.998 Uml-1 min-1). They also noticed a 30% increase in the enzyme activity when some of the process parameters were altered (pH and incubation time). Very recently, Puri et al. [A. oryzae. However, A. fumigatus NTCC 1222 exhibited 341.7 U/mL amylase activity under solid state fermentation when incubated at 35°C (pH-6.0) for 06 days in nutrient salt solution [A. niger FME under shake flask system [A. fumigatus KIBGE-IB33 for different time interval ranging from 02 to 07 days. It was observed that production of α-amylase and amyloglucosidase started after 02 days of incubation and both the hydrolases were continuously produced up to day 06 and 07, respectively with a maximum titter secreted at day 03 , 65°C, 25.0 kU ml-1 and 0.5 mg ml-1, respectively. Whereas, optimum pH, temperature, Vmax and Km values for amyloglucosidase were 5.0 , 60°C, 105.0 kU ml-1 and 2.56 mg ml-1, respectively. The optimum pH and temperature for amyloglucosidase activity isolated from A. niger FME was 5.0 and 45°C, respectively whereas, the Km and Vmax values were determined using soluble starch as substrate as 94 μg ml-1 and 39.02 Umg-1, respectively [m and Vmax values of 0.046 mg ml-1 and 769 Umg-1[A. fumigatus KIBGE-IB33 could be used for industrial starch saccharification purpose. Both partially purified enzymes were used for bioethanol production.After fermentation, α-amylase and amyloglucosidase were partially purified from the CFF. Most of the time in CFF some other constitutive enzymes may also be present including various types of proteases which could cause interference during liquefaction and saccharification process of cassava starch. Therefore, to avoid any hindrance, starch hydrolyzing enzymes from the CFF were purified using gradient precipitation in the presence of ammonium sulfate ranging from 20.0% to 80.0% and among it 40% saturation level was selected. Table ki et al. and da Ski et al. have alsectively ,32. The ectively . In anot-1) and amyloglucosidase (393.0 kUmg-1). It was observed that as the reaction time increases, the formation of glucose (40.0 gL-1) as well as percent saccharification (60.0%) also increased up to 90.0 minutes and beyond that both parameters become constant , yeast extract , ammonium sulfate  and dipotassium hydrogen phosphate  were purchased from a local vendor. Whereas, magnesium sulfate, sodium hydroxide, sodium carbonate, copper sulfate, sodium potassium tartarate, sulfuric acid and potassium dichromate were acquired from Scharlau (Spain). Other chemical used including 3′, 5′- dinitrosalicylic acid (DNS) was purchased from BDH Chemicals (USA) and anthrone from MP Biomedicals (France) while, soluble starch and folin ciocalteu reagent were purchased from Merck (Germany).-1): Boiled potato extract, 300.0 ml; dextrose, 20.0 g and agar, 16.0 g. Initially, 07 different fungal species were isolated from different samples. Among them 05 filamentous fungi were selected and characterized based on colonial morphology, 18S rDNA sequence cataloging and microscopic analysis using lactophenol blue staining method [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/BLAST/) and were submitted to NCBI GenBank database. The confirmed sequences received the following GenBank accession numbers: KF905648, KF905649, KF905650, KF905651, and KF905652 for A. fumigatus KIBGE-IB33, A. flavus KIBGE-IB34, A. terreus KIBGE-IB35, A. niger KIBGE-IB36 and A. versicolor KIBGE-IB37, respectively. All of these isolates were tested for the amylolytic enzyme production based on starch-iodine plate method. All fungal isolates were plated on starch medium plates containing (gL-1): cassava starch, 10.0; yeast extract, 10.0; peptone, 10.0; K₂HPO₄, 1.0; and MgSO4.7H2O, 1.0. The cultures were incubated at 30°C for 05 days. After incubation the plates were flooded with potassium-iodide solution for the detection of amylolytic activity. Isolates were selected based on clear halo-zone around the fungal growth. All isolates were preserved on PDA slants at 4°C for further analysis and were sub-cultured routinely. Purified Sacchromyces cerevisiae (baker’s yeast) was purchased from the local market, Karachi, Pakistan and was grown and maintained in YPD medium .The natural fungal isolates used in the current study were isolated from different soil samples that were collected aseptically from diverse vegetative fields located in Karachi, Pakistan. All the isolates were obtained after serial platting on potato dextrose agar (PDA) at 30°C for 05 days according to the standard protocols. PDA medium consist of .Total viable spores were calculated in order to prepare fungal inoculum. For this purpose spores were transferred using sterile needle from a 05 day old fungal culture grown on PDA slant and re-suspended in 10.0 ml sterile distilled water containing 0.1% Tween-20. Each suspension was serially diluted up to 10-1): Cassava starch, 20.0; yeast extract, 10.0; peptone, 10.0; K2HPO4, 1.0; and MgSO4.7H2O, 1.0. Initial pH of the medium was adjusted at 7.0 before sterilization at 121°C for 15 minutes. Fresh seed culture (10.0 ml) was inoculated in 90.0 ml production medium and incubated at 30°C for 03 days under static and anaerobic conditions. It was then further transferred into 900.0 ml medium and incubated at 30°C up to 07 days. The fungal spores were harvested by centrifuging the fermented broth at 40248 × g for 15 minutes at 4°C. The supernatant was filtered using 0.45 μ filter under vacuum. The cell free supernatant containing the amylolytic enzymes was stored at -20°C for further analysis. All the experiments were conducted in triplicates.All the selected filamentous fungi were tested for the production of α-amylase and amyloglucosidase in the presence of starch (cassava) under batch conditions using submerged fermentation technique. Production of α-amylase, amyloglucosidase and glucose was monitored at different time intervals (02 to 07 days). Basal medium used for the production of α-amylase and amyloglucosidase consists of  and fermentation time were optimized. For this purpose seven different carbon sources including sago starch, soluble starch (potato), cassava starch, wheat starch, wheat bran, rice bran and sugarcane bagasse were used in the concentration of 20.0 gLg for 10 minutes at 4°C and were dissolved in citrate buffer . In the next run, again the 20% salt saturation was performed using the same supernatant up to 80% and every time the precipitates were equilibrated for 18 hours at 4°C. During each saturation range, the precipitates were monitored and calculated for both enzymes unit in terms of kU mg-1 of protein. The saturation level at which both hydrolyase were precipitated out with maximum unit was selected (40%).The cell free supernatant containing α-amylase and amyloglucosidase was precipitated using salt precipitation method. For this purpose, salt gradient precipitation technique was employed ranging from 20.0% to 80.0% saturation using ammonium sulfate. 20% salt was incorporated gradually in CFF with continuous stirring at 4°C and was equilibrated for 18 hours. The precipitates formed were centrifuged at 40248 × -1). Total protein was calculated using Lowry’s et al. [Enzyme activity of α-amylase and amyloglucosidase was estimated using DNS  and GOD-s et al.  method w-1) which was prepared in citrate buffer . The reaction mixture was kept at 65°C for liquefaction (15.0 minutes) and at 60°C for saccharification (90.0 minutes). The reaction was terminated by boiling the reaction mixture for 10 minutes. The volume was reduced up to 2.5 folds and the liberated glucose was detected before and after concentrating the reaction mixture. However, for optimized liquefaction and saccharification condition, the reactions were monitored from 15 minutes up to 08 hours with an interval of 15 minutes. Percent saccharification of cassava starch was calculated as followed:Bioethanol was produced using glucose, which was obtained after hydrolysis of starch (cassava) using partially purified amylolytic enzymes. Partially purified α-amylase and amyloglucosidase (30.0 ml) was amalgamated in 2.5 liters of pre-gelatinized cassava starch slurry  was cultured in this medium anaerobically at 30°C up to 48 hours. After 48 hours, ethanol was collected through distillation and the distillate was analyzed for the detection of ethanol. Percent yield of bioethanol was calculated as followed:In this concentrated hydrolyzate, yeast extract and peptone were incorporated in the concentration of 3.0 gLet al. [For the determination of bioethanol concentration, the distillate was analyzed using Caputi et al.  method. -1). The temperature of the detector and the injector were kept at 200°C and 130°C, respectively. The split ratio was 100:1 and the peak area of the compound was integrated against an external standard of absolute ethanol.Bioethanol concentration was also verified using gas chromatography system  equipped with flame ionization detector (FID). Column used was TRB-5 (30 × 0.25 mm × 0.25 μm) with nitrogen as a carrier gas (20 cmsecet al. [The cassava starch used in this study was purchased from the local market in Karachi, Pakistan. For the determination of total sugar anthrone method was used  whereas,et al.  method. et al. ,63. Moiset al. .-1: Grams per liter; GOD-PAP: Glucose oxidase per oxidase method; kU mg-1: Kilo units per milligrams; mM: Milli moles; PDA: Potato dextrose agar.CFF: Cell free filtrate; DNS: 3′, 5′-dinitrosalicyclic acid; FID: Flame ionization detector; GC: Gas chromatography; gLIts publication is approved by all authors and they do not have any conflict of interest regarding any financial, personal or other relationships with any other people or organizations.SP carried out the major experimental work. AA supervised in acquisition of laboratory data and interpretation of data along with finalizing the manuscript. SI participated in the analytical analysis of bioethanol. NNS performed enzyme purification. SAQ designed the project and gave the final approval of the manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final manuscript.


In the dynamics of this world ever since centuries, one thing has always remained constant and that is ‘change’. The history of entire human race is a living example of this evolution. We, in the publication world, are no different and hence the dynamics always go on. In the dynamics of this world ever since centuries, one thing has always remained constant and that is ‘change’. The history of entire human race is a living example of this evolution. We, in the publication world, are no different and hence the dynamics always go on. As a part of this humble beginning of this new editorial board and editors, I on behalf of the entire board express my whole hearted gratitude to erstwhile editors, especially the journal's founding editor Dr Usha Mohan Das, who has done a stupendous job to initiate the journal and get it to its present status. We will carry the baton forward and hope to accomplish all our objective of academic excellence for the journal in the time to come. The new board will carry on the academic excellence initiated by this journal and also improve upon the shortcomings that were encountered in the past. As a part of our renewed approach, we would be taking out one special issue of IJCPD each year which would focus on specific areas of pediatric dentistry. We assure you a promising approach to the literature of dentistry illuminating the world of knowledge for our contributors and subscribers thus committed to produce the higher standards.Let's begin with a new motto... Amelioration of Knowledge...Nikhil MarwahEditor-in-chief


Bifidobacteria are key commensals in human gut, and their abundance is associated with the health of their hosts. Although they are dominant in infant gut, their number becomes lower in adult gut. The changes of the diet are considered to be main reason for this difference. Large amounts of whole-genomic sequence data of bifidobacteria make it possible to elucidate the genetic interpretation of their adaptation to the nutrient environment. Among the nutrients in human gut, starch is a highly fermentable substrate and can exert beneficial effects by increasing bifidobacteria and/or being fermented to short chain fatty acids.Bifidobacterium longum subsp. longum BBMN68 isolated from centenarian’s faeces was used as a model strain to further investigate the carbohydrate utilization. The pathway for degrading starch and starch hydrolysates was the only complete pathway for complex carbohydrates in human gut. It is noteworthy that all of the GH genes for degrading starch and starch hydrolysates in the BBMN68 genome were conserved in all studied bifidobacterial strains. The in silico analyses of BBMN68 were further confirmed by growth experiments, proteomic and real-time quantitative PCR (RT-PCR) analyses.In order to determine the potential substrate preference of bifidobacteria, we compared the glycoside hydrolase (GH) profiles of a pooled-bifidobacterial genome (PBG) with a representative microbiome (RM) of the human gut. In bifidobacterial genomes, only 15% of GHs contained signal peptides, suggesting their weakness in utilization of complex carbohydrate, such as plant cell wall polysaccharides. However, compared with other intestinal bacteria, bifidobacteiral genomes encoded more GH genes for degrading starch and starch hydrolysates, indicating that they have genetic advantages in utilizing these substrates. Our results demonstrated that starch and starch hydrolysates were the most universal and favorable carbon sources for bifidobacteria. The low amount of these carbon sources in adult intestine was speculated to contribute to the low relative abundance of bifidobacteria.The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12866-015-0362-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. Bifidobacteria are autochthonous inhabitants of human gut and their presence is considered as an important indicator of healthy microbiota. Bifidobacteria are dominant in the infant gut, but they only account for 3-6% of the adult fecal flora . Their aBifidobactereiu bifidum PRL2010 and Bifidobacterium longum subsp. infantis respectively targeted host-derived glycans and human milk oligosaccharides (HMO) [Bifidobacterium longum subsp. longum BBMN68 was isolated from the faeces of a centenarian [Genomics have proven to be a very powerful tool to predict carbohydrate-acquisition strategies of bifidobacteria. Genomic analysis showed that es (HMO) ,8. Kaoutes (HMO) . Bifidobtenarian . Meanwhitenarian . Therefoin vivo by proteomic and RT-PCR analysis. Our results showed that starch and starch hydrolates were the favorable carbon sources for bifidobacteria. Starch is a highly fermentable substrate and has been shown to exert beneficial effects by increasing bifidobacteria and/or being fermented to short chain fatty acids [In the present study, the carbohydrate utilization system of bifidobacteria was explored by comparing their GH profiles with that of the representative microbiome. Predicted metabolic pathways of BBMN68 were constructed and were further confirmed ty acids . Howeverty acids ,15 in thBacteroidetes and Firmicutes strains, but higher than the other strains studied . Furthermore, we found that the number of GHs for degrading starch and starch hydrolysates was higher in almost all bifidobacterial strains than in strains of other genus  and alpha-1, 6-glucosidase . It is speculated that these enzymes could completely degrade starch to glucose , 4-alpha-glucanotransferase , which produce glucose 1-phosphate from maltodextrins in starch degradation V pathway [In order to acquire comprehensive information about the carbohydrates degradation, we constructed predicted pathways of carbohydrate metabolism inBBMN68. BBMN68 genome contained 6 GH genes, which are responsible for degrading starch and starch hydrolysates. These genes encoded alpha-amylase , alpha-glucosidase  pathway . Finally pathway , were al pathway .Figure 3BBMN68_1420, BBMN68_1471, BBMN68_1471, BBMN68_1812, BBMN68_928, and BBMN68_1646  was originally isolated from centenarians at Bama County of Guangxi Province in China. The strain isolation was approved by the Human Ethics Committee of China Agricultural University and all participants gave their consent. For culture of this strain, it was grown in Man–Rogosa–Sharpe (MRS) medium  supplemented with 0.05%L-cysteine-HCl at 37°C in Hungate tubes, which were initially spared with a gas of 99.99% N2 to maintain an anaerobic environment.Semisynthetic medium , supplemThe reference genomes areacquired under the accession number and are listed in Additional file Whole bacterial protein extracts were prepared as previouslydescribed . For eleRNA isolation and cDNA synthesis were performed as described by Jin et al. . Primer


Erratum to: Neth Heart J (2016) 24:25–38DOI 10.1007/s12471-015-0769-3Figures


This objective is the reason for the changes we have made in the PJP, namely the increasing presence of the English language, in order to facilitate global access to its content. At the same time, it is our purpose to strengthen the relationship with journals published by associations with which we have closer relationships, preferably with Portuguese and Spanish language journals. Brazil has a key place here, for obvious reasons: we speak the same language; we have largely the same names and the same origins; we belong to some of the same international associations; and we cooperate closely within the Community of English Language Countries. In addition, within the respiratory community in Portugal, there is special interest in the research performed in Brazil and in Brazilian authors who stand out internationally, which translates to a significant number of Portuguese pulmonologists regularly consulting publications of Brazilian origin. Furthermore, the largest number of international articles published in the PJP is of Brazilian origin, with a total of 11 articles originating from Brazil being published in 2012-13. Although there has been a clear predominance of original articles on different topics in respiratory disease and by different Brazilian research groups, other types of articles, such as editorials, at the request of the editorial board, have been published. The highest number of logins to the PJP website also originates from Brazil.At this time when both journals-the Brazilian Journal of Pulmonology, an official publication of the Brazilian Thoracic Association, and the Portuguese Journal of Pulmonology (PJP), an official publication of the Portuguese Society of Pulmonology (PSP)-are in a phase of internationalization and growing recognition within the context of the group of publications on respiratory disease, both having been indexed and having received impact factors, we find it opportune to consider strengthening ties with those to whom we feel closer. In fact, the major objective of the PJP is to promote greater visibility and impact of the academic respiratory research performed in Portugal and to create the conditions for the PJP to be considered a relevant journal, in the sense that the various international research groups can consider it a reliable and interesting channel for publishing and disseminating their research.,2 Thiblished. The higThe history of the scientific publications on pulmonology in Portugal began in 1969, with the release of "Pulmonology-Portuguese Journal of Respiratory Diseases", edited and owned by the Lung Disease Clinic at the Lisbon School of Medicine, approximately five years before the institution of the Portuguese Society of Respiratory Diseases (PSRD), which was later designated PSP. That was a quarterly bilingual (Portuguese-English) journal run by distinguished Professor Thomé George Villar. A product of the career and international reputation of its director, the journal adopted a model inspired by the most prestigious international journals, namely including English, as well as Portuguese, as the official language of the journal, which reflects the notion that this would be essential to the visibility and impact of national publications. In 1978, the journal was replaced by one called "Thoracic Medicine", which was also issued on a quarterly basis and was under the same management. In 1980, the first issue of the official publication of the PSRD, designated "PSRD Archives", was released. The publication was run by another major figure of pulmonology in Portugal: Professor António José Robalo Cordeiro. Over more than 30 years, in the course of which the current name "Portuguese Journal of Pulmonology" was adopted, various editors and editorial boards made the decisions that allowed the PJP to attain its current leadership status among the medical publications in Portugal, which is surely a result of it being indexed for PubMed in 2003, it publishing its first issue in Portuguese and English in 2005, it being hosted onto the Elsevier platform as of 2010, and it having received its first impact factor in 2011. In fact, last July, the PJP received an impact factor from Thomson Reuters-ISI Web of Knowledge for the fourth time consecutively: more specifically, a value of 0.855. The PJP is currently published every two months, being open to the publication of original basic or clinical research articles, which will undergo rigorous assessment by the editorial board and via peer review, in accordance with the journal's regulations.After years of regular contact between the editorial boards of the Brazilian Journal of Pulmonology and the PJP, as well as of their respective associations, the current board members have decided to cooperate more closely, which will result in the contents of each journal being made more actively and readily available to the members of the two associations, in addition to encouraging the production of collaborative papers by research groups in the two countries. This strategy will surely bring greater visibility and greater impact to the contents published in each journal, in addition to fostering synergistic collaboration between researchers in the two countries. que há léguas a nos separar, tanto mar, tanto mar, sei também quanto é preciso navegar, navegar ..." , but this "abraço" ("hug") will surely be extraordinarily fruitful.Paraphrasing the great Brazilian poet and singer Chico Buarque de Holanda, in a song written in honor of the Portuguese people at the time of the revolution of April of 1974 , now in a different context, "sei


This issue of the Journal of Research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology resulted from a one-half day seminar devoted to descriptions of the current status of the metrology of radon in international laboratories specializing in that area. The seminar, held June 5, 1989, at the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB), Braunschweig, Federal Republic of Germany was co-sponsored by the Low-Level Measurement Techniques Group of the International Committee for Radionuclide Metrology (ICRM), the Commission of European Communities and the International Intercomparison and Intercalibration Program (IIIP), now part of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The IIIP has spearheaded the international effort to standardize radon measurements. It has, in particular, conducted intercomparisons between four selected laboratories that perform radon calibrations on different instruments. These four laboratories, which presently serve as primary reference laboratories for separate geographical regions, are the Australian Radiation Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy Environmental Measurements Laboratory, U.K. National Radiation Protection Board, and U.S. Department of Interior Bureau of Mines. In addition to these four laboratories, other contributors to this seminar included national standards laboratories—National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the Italian Committee for Research and Development of Nuclear and Alternative Energies (ENEA)—as well as four select laboratories that have studied important measurement techniques and calibration procedures.The seminar contributors were asked to describe their calibration measurement methods and in particular, to carefully assess and itemize their measurement uncertainties. A subsequent review, held in a workshop on the following day, established measurement needs and how present accuracies meet these needs. Often the user requires measurement accuracies in the 15–30 percent range. The quality assurance (QA) laboratories, such as the four primary IIIP laboratories, should therefore have uncertainties approximately one third of this—say 5–10 percent. The metrology laboratories of the ICRM are required to establish national and international standards of radon for the QA laboratories. One expects from this that for the national metrology laboratories to make a significant contribution to the radioactivity metrology of radon gas, their uncertainties should be significantly below 5 percent—a reasonable objective would be on the order of 2–3 percent.222Rn samples and gamma-ray measurements of the 222Rn daughters. The common standard is the NIST 226Ra standard, so that the various calibration measurements are tests of the ability of the laboratories to transfer the same calibrations (NIST standard) to an unknown using different techniques. Generally speaking, the QA laboratories have reached their goal of accuracies of 5–10 percent. There are, however, discrepancies and inconsistencies in the intercomparisons at present which may be significant. These and other related topics are discussed in these proceedings.The described methods are basically ionization chamber and scintillation cell measurements of gaseous We are grateful to Drs. Debertin and Schrader and their staff at the PTB for making their facilities available and for being exemplary hosts. We are also grateful to Drs. Robert Holub, Earl Knutson, and Wayne Lower for their efforts in preparing the format of the meeting and helping contact the participants.


Manihot esculenta, Crantz) is an important food security crop, but it is becoming an important raw material for different industrial applications. Cassava is the second most important source of starch worldwide. Novel starch properties are of interest to the starch industry, and one them is the recently identified amylose-free (waxy) cassava starch. Waxy mutants have been found in different crops and have been often associated with a yield penalty. There are ongoing efforts to develop commercial cassava varieties with amylose-free starch. However, little information is available regarding the biological and agronomic implications of starch mutations in cassava, nor in other root and tuber crops. In this study, siblings from eight full-sib families, segregating for the waxy trait, were used to determine if the mutation has implications for yield, dry matter content (DMC) and harvest index in cassava. A total of 87 waxy and 87 wild-type starch genotypes from the eight families were used in the study. The only significant effect of starch type was on DMC (p < 0.01), with waxy clones having a 0.8% lower content than their wild type counterparts. There was no effect of starch type on fresh root yield (FRY), adjusted FRY and harvest index. It is not clear if lower DMC is a pleiotropic effect of the waxy starch mutation or else the result of linked genes introgressed along with the mutation. It is expected that commercial waxy cassava varieties will have competitive FRYs but special efforts will be required to attain adequate DMCs. This study contributes to the limited knowledge available of the impact of starch mutations on the agronomic performance of root and tuber crops.Cassava ( Manihot esculenta, Crantz) is an important source of food calories in sub-Saharan Africa, fulfilling a critical role as a food security crop (Cassava (ity crop . Its rooity crop . In factity crop . The gloity crop . In Soutity crop . Applicaity crop .Amylose-free (or waxy) starch phenotype was first identified in maize germplasm from China  and few GBSSI have also been conducted  and the average amylose content is 20.7%, ranging between 15.2 and 26.5% . It was onducted .wx locus encoding granule-bound starch synthase I (GBSSI), the protein responsible for the elongation of amylose in the starch granule (GBSSI gene has been determined (wx wx) from non-waxy heterozygous (Wx wx) and non-waxy homozygous (Wx Wx) genotypes. In most cases waxy starches lack completely amylose. However, in some cases small amount of amylose (<5%) can be found in certain waxy mutations in maize  and eight elite varieties with good agronomic characteristics adapted to the main cassava growing environments in Colombia (except highlands). The F1 plants  from unrelated families were crossed to produce a pseudo-F2 generation. Table 1 describes the full-sib families from this F2 generation. Starch type was identified by screening the roots with the reliable iodine staining technique first reported by Wx Wx) and heterozygote (Wx wx) wild type plants were not distinguished in the study.This study took advantage of eight full sib families  segregating for the mutation at the Table 1). However, for each family, an equal number of waxy and wild type genotypes were chosen (87 genotypes per type of starch). As seen in Figure 1, family GM 5619 (used as an example) had 38 genotypes, with 15 of them producing waxy starch and the remaining 23 with amylose-containing starch. A total of eight genotypes among the group of the 15 producing waxy starch were randomly chosen. Similarly, eight genotypes with wild type starch out of the 23 found in this family were randomly picked. It is assumed that each of the two groups of eight genotypes are random samples of the genetic diversity of this family, with the exception that one group produced waxy starch and the other group produced wild type starch. A similar approach was taken for the seven remaining families.The number of genotypes in each family varied and, therefore, each family was represented by a different number of genotypes  under control.The effects of the waxy trait on yield and yield components were evaluated based on data from a field-trial conducted at CIAT experimental station, Palmira, Valle del Cauca, Colombia. Soils at this station are fine-silty, mixed, isohyperthermic Aquic Hapludol . StandarTable 1). Each set had a combination of about 1/3 of the genotypes from each of the eight families and were all planted simultaneously in the same field. Each set contained a total of 30 waxy and 30 wild type genotypes from the same F2 families except set 3 which only had 27 genotypes of each starch type . Therefore, three additional genotypes were added to the third set as filling . The three sets of genotypes were replicated in four blocks. In other words, the same genotype was cloned and replicated four times (one plant per genotype and block). This added up to a total of 348 waxy and 348 wildtype plants (87 × 4 = 348). In each plot with 30 plants, planting was done in five rows with six plants per row. The plants were harvested, as usual by hand, at 11 months after planting.A special field design was used for a truly randomized distribution of the plants and genotypes involved in the study. Instead of planting all genotypes from a certain family together, they were more or less equally split into three different sets (-1) was then estimated taking into account the area of each plot. Roots with symptoms of rotting were discarded and not included in the measurement. When plants were missing an adjustment for missing plants was used in the estimation of FRY , harvest index  and dry matter content (DMC). HIN is usually used as an indirect yield indicator in cassava after reports of a higher correlation between HIN in single row trials and FRY performance in replicated plots in multi-location trials than the correlation between root yields in the same type of trials . Because Ad.FRY; . HIN was Ad.FRY;  by bulkiThe main question to answer by this study is the biological impact of the waxy starch mutation in key agronomic traits. Although there is genetic variation among the 87 genotypes (within each type of starch), analysis was done on the bulked data. Individual genotypes within each starch group were randomly chosen. Genotypes representing each group are considered to be random samples of the genetic variation within each family. The only difference being the production of waxy or amylose-containing starch. Although variation among individual genotypes is relevant, the main objective of this study focused on the impact of the mutation across different genotypes. The data for each plot (bulked across rows) was used for the analysis of variance. Because of the field design the statistical analysis were conducted with the sets nested within replicate effects and starch type nested within set effects. All sources of variation in the analysis of variance were considered random, except for the type of starch. Statistical analysis was made using the SAS Software and the Proc GLM procedure .Table 2. Starch type was confirmed using the efficient and reliable iodine test .Plant germination and growth was satisfactory. Environmental conditions were drier than normal. Since irrigation was available when necessary, plants did not suffer drought stress but grew under slightly higher than normal average temperatures and lower relative moisture in the air. Averages for FRY, HIN and DMC of the waxy genotypes and their wild type sibling counterparts are presented in p ≤ 0.05). Likewise, there was no significant effect of starch type on HIN, while both replication and set within replications had highly significant (p ≤ 0.01) effects (Table 3).Starch type (waxy versus wild type) had no significant effect on FRY, with similar results when yields were adjusted to take missing plants into consideration. Only few plants were missing in the entire experiment and, therefore, an agreement between the two ways to assess FRY was expected. The only significant effect on FRY and Ad.FRY was for the replication source of variation (p ≤ 0.01), on the other hand, of starch type on DMC. In fact this is the only case where starch type had a significant effect in any variable. Average DMC in waxy starch genotypes was 32.8%, whereas in wild type starch genotypes the average was 33.6%. The difference of 0.8% is small, but nonetheless, highly significant from a statistical point of view. Replication and sets within replication also showed highly significant (p ≤ 0.01) effects on DMC (Tables 2 and 3).There was a highly significant effect  to produce roots with waxy starch. The average performance of the waxy clones compared with their wild type counterparts is useful only for understanding the biological impact of the mutation. Results from this study suggest that selected clones with waxy starch will be competitive regarding FRY. Results for DMC, on the other hand, raised some concerns since predictions indicate lower DMC on waxy genotypes. Data from individual genotypes was not taken because the main interest focused on the differences in the average performance of waxy versus wild-type genotypes. Therefore, results from this study are not able to determine if individual clone(s) producing amylose-free starch can or cannot reach competitive levels of DMC as well. This distinction is important because it is outstanding individual (waxy) cassava clones which will be grown commercially by farmers, not the entire full sib families, but the study was not designed to address this issue.Table 2), it could potentially become a quantitatively important economic loss in large scale processing of (waxy) cassava starch. However, yield penalty (through a reduced DMC) should not be as large as those reported in the first batch of waxy cassava clones reported by Rodjanaridpiched and co-workers in 2012. Results from this study suggest that the next selection cycle of breeding for waxy cassava starch should focus particularly in identifying materials with higher DMC.The most advanced program to develop waxy commercial cassava varieties (in Thailand) faced problems selecting progenies with DMC comparable with those of commercial varieties, whereas for FRY results were comparable for both types of starch . PrelimiAdira 4 was transformed using the antisense approach to generate versions of the same genotype but with amylose contents ranging from 2 to 10%. The advantage of that study is that basically the same genotype producing contrasting starch types were compared. The comparison of non-transformed versus transformed versions of the cultivar indicated that there was no major difference for FRY. This agrees with results in Thailand and Colombia to develop commercial waxy varieties based on the spontaneous mutation as well as with the results presented in this study. Unfortunately, however, the authors  with the best commercial varieties available . They are, therefore unfair comparisons which would tend to overestimate the actual effect for a cassava plant producing roots with waxy starch. Perhaps the most relevant study to assess the biological impact of waxy starch in cassava is the ongoing work to evaluate waxy transgenic cassava developed at Wageningen University . The Ind authors  did not -1) that the normal starch counterparts  and lower yields  or else if the original mutation at the GBSS locus is linked to other loci influencing DMC. If the latter hypothesis is correct, then further sexual crosses among amylose-free cassava genotypes should increase the chances of breaking the eventual linkage between waxy starch and lower-than-desirable DMC. This study provides an unbiased estimate of the biological impact of the waxy starch mutation in cassava without any previous selection: a reduction of less than 1% in DMC. The larger penalty observed in ongoing breeding work (3–4%) may be explained, as suggested above, by the size of populations used for selecting waxy starch versus wild types.As it is the case waxy maize grains and their derived starch , it can AK conducted the basic research and took field data as part of her M.Sc dissertation work. She also contributed with data handling and analysis; SS and FC are the assistants of the cassava breeding program and contributed with the original planting of the experiment and continue with further work on the subject; NM is the assistant in charge of making the crosses in the cassava breeding program. All sexual seed used to generate the materials evaluated in this study were produced by his team; DD is an expert in food technology. Many articles describing the functional properties of waxy cassava were co-authored by him; HC is the senior cassava breeder at CIAT and was involved in this project from the very beginning by asking the question that this research attempted to answer. He also contributed with the field design.The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.


Why do patients suffering from neurodegenerative diseases generate autoantibodies that selectively bind soluble aggregates of amyloidogenic proteins? Presently, molecular basis of interactions between the soluble aggregates and human immune system is unknown. By analyzing sequences of experimentally validated T-cell autoimmune epitopes, aggregating peptides, amyloidogenic proteins and randomly generated peptides, here we report overlapping regions that likely drive aggregation as well as generate autoantibodies against the aggregates. Sequence features, that make short peptides susceptible to aggregation, increase their incidence in human T-cell autoimmune epitopes by 4–6 times. Many epitopes are predicted to be significantly aggregation prone (aggregation propensities ≥10%) and the ones containing experimentally validated aggregating regions are enriched in hydrophobicity by 10–20%. Aggregate morphologies also influence Human Leukocyte Antigen (HLA) - types recognized by the aggregating regions containing epitopes. Most (88%) epitopes that contain amyloid fibril forming regions bind HLA-DR, while majority (63%) of those containing amorphous β-aggregating regions bind HLA-DQ. More than two-thirds (70%) of human amyloidogenic proteins contain overlapping regions that are simultaneously aggregation prone and auto-immunogenic. Such regions help clear soluble aggregates by generating selective autoantibodies against them. This can be harnessed for early diagnosis of proteinopathies and for drug/vaccine design against them. Millions of people suffer from neurodegenerative diseases caused by deposition of amyloid plaques in the brain. During the early stages of these diseases, soluble aggregates of the amyloidogenic proteins often generate autoimmune responses among the patients123Protein aggregation has been well studied in the literature51011In this work, amino acid sequences of the experimentally validated human T-cell autoimmune epitopes, aggregating peptides and human amyloidogenic proteins were analyzed for overlap between aggregation prone regions and T-cell autoimmune epitopes. The experimental data, collected from the literature, was supplemented with randomly generated peptide sequences and computational predictions of aggregation prone regions as well as T-cell autoimmune epitopes. Our analyses reveal that overlapping aggregation prone and T-cell autoimmune epitope regions drive aggregation of the amyloidogenic proteins as well as generation of autoantibodies that selectively bind their aggregates. Generation of selective autoantibodies against the soluble aggregates sets them up for clearance from the body and helps maintain homeostasis.http://www.iedb.org/)14Detailed descriptions of database searches, collection and classification of data are available in Methods section and Sequence features that make short peptides prone to β-strand mediated aggregation also increase their incidence in the human T-cell autoimmune epitopes as shown in Substantial proportions of the human T-cell epitopes are predicted to be aggregation prone. There is no experimental data available on aggregation behaviors of T-cell autoimmune epitopes in this study. Therefore, aggregation propensity, total aggregation score normalized by the number of residues in a sequence, of each T-cell autoimmune epitope was computed using TANGOversus amyloid fibrils, are correlated with their relative incidences in the autoimmune epitopes  of them were found to contain at least one aggregating peptide sequence region. Nineteen of these 33 epitope regions are fidel and the remaining 14 are promiscuous. 1To further probe the overlap between T-cell autoimmune epitopes and aggregation prone regions in the amyloidogenic proteins, potential aggregation prone regions were also predicted in the amyloidogenic protein sequences using TANGOvia mathematical simulations. These peptides have same amino acid composition as the dataset of 3,243 HLA-DR binding T-cell autoimmune epitopes. HLA-DR binding T-cell autoimmune epitopes are the largest set of experimentally validated autoimmune epitopes in this study and these epitopes contain aggregating peptides with the greatest frequencies  are predicted to be T-cell autoimmune epitopes. Similarly, 12,179 (12.2%) peptides are predicted to contain at least one TANGO predicted aggregation prone region and 9,582 (9.6%) peptides are predicted to contain one or more WALTZ predicted aggregation prone region . Among tThe availability of random peptides with same amino acid composition as the HLA-DR binding T-cell autoimmune epitopes allows for further probe into the enrichment of intrinsic hydrophobicity for the autoimmune epitopes that contain aggregation prone regions. The aggregation propensities for the randomly generated peptides were also evaluated and the results, shown in Finally, uniform peptide length facilitated construction of sequence logos for the randomly generated peptides and their various subsets . It is wMaintenance of homeostasis is a complex task that involves multiple cellular pathways31323332123et al.et al.We hypothesize that the overlap between aggregation prone and T-cell autoimmune epitope regions allows human immune system to selectively engage with the protein aggregates and set them up for clearance. Clearance of aggregates contributes towards maintenance of homeostasis which is an important physiological requirement, especially in the context of aging. Putatively, this is a protective feature of humoral immunity, in addition but unrelated to natural tolerance towards self-antigens. Most aggregation prone regions are solvent inaccessible in the native state of a protein, being buried in structural scaffoldings, and are therefore inactive37et al.1The mechanism that underpins selective binding of the soluble protein aggregates by autoantibodies needs to be experimentally studied in molecular details. The overall scheme may be analogous to the one that has been proposed to explain immunogenicity arising from aggregates present in the biologic drug products44The overall incidence of experimentally validated aggregating peptides in a given class of human T-cell autoimmune epitopes is low, as expected  and 4. I1819An overlap between aggregation prone and T-cell autoimmune epitope regions may be necessary but not sufficient for production of IgG autoantibodies against the aggregates. Some T-cell autoimmune epitopes may be the regulatory ones (Tregitopes) and suppress rather than enhance autoimmune responses against the aggregates38in silico improve, additional examples corroborating a role for protein aggregation in autoimmune diseases will emerge. It is anticipated that additional research will build on this foundation and facilitate early diagnosis of protein aggregation diseases. It will also contribute towards novel drug and T-cell epitope driven vaccine designIn spite of the above limitations, this analysis is a first step towards understanding molecular origins and purpose of the selective autoimmune responses against soluble aggregates of the amyloidogenic proteins. As more experimental data becomes available in the literature and our abilities to identify aggregation prone regions and immune epitopes http://www.iedb.org/), for all Homo sapiens MHC II binding T-cell immune epitopes in June 2014. The search results were clustered at 100% sequence identity and overlapping epitopes were combined into one. Only the human autoimmune epitopes with non-identical sequences were taken. This yielded 155 HLA-DP, 543 HLA-DQ and 3243 HLA-DR binding T-cell autoimmune epitope sequences. A set of peptides known to not bind human HLA14Experimentally validated sets of T-cell autoimmune epitopes that bind HLA-DP, HLA-DQ and HLA-DR were collected by searching the Immune Epitope Database, IEDBExperimentally validated datasets of 536 peptide sequences of all lengths that have been shown to form amyloid fibrils (Amyloid536) and 158 hexapeptides that form amorphous β aggregates (Amor158)et al.www.uniprot.org) annotated as amyloidogenic. Again only the proteins with non-identical sequences were retained. This dataset contains 44 human proteins including 11 amyloidogenic light chains. The amino acid sequences of some amyloidogenic light chains are highly homologous. All the homologues were retained because even a single residue mutation can potentially disrupt an aggregation prone region or a T-cell autoimmune epitope or both.All human amyloidogenic proteins including those that form the functional amyloids were included in this study. The sequences for a majority of these proteins were taken from Tsolis One hundred thousand  peptide sequences of length 15 residues were randomly generated such that they have the same amino acid composition as the 3,243 HLA-DR binding T-cell autoimmune epitopes. These peptide sequences were subjected for predictions for T-cell Immune epitopes and aggregation prone regions, as described below. This dataset supplements the datasets of experimentally validated T-cell autoimmune epitopes and aggregating peptides, and allows for further evaluation of overlap between aggregation prone regions and T-cell autoimmune epitopes, using larger numbers of sequences. Two of the 100,000 randomly generated peptide sequences contain short peptides from the experimentally validated HLA-DR binding T-cell autoimmune epitopes. None but two of the 16,384 predicted T-cell autoimmune epitopes among these randomly generated peptides overlap with experimentally validated aggregating peptide sequences.Amino acid sequences of amyloidogenic proteins and experimentally validated human T-cell autoimmune epitopes were scanned for incidence of experimentally validated aggregating peptides. The amyloidogenic protein sequences were also scanned for incidence of experimentally validated T-cell autoimmune epitopes. In all cases, only the identical matches were recorded. All the matches were consolidated into aggregating and autoimmune epitope regions and the overlaps were noted by examining individual sequences. Note that an autoimmune epitope or an amyloidogenic protein can contain several aggregating peptides. Similarly, an aggregating peptide can occur in more than one autoimmune epitope. Two or more aggregating peptides may also overlap.http://tango.crg.es/)http://waltz.switchlab.org/)via experiments1819To supplement the experimental observations, computer algorithms capable of identifying potential aggregation prone regions and MHC II binding T-cell immune epitopes were used. Total aggregation scores for each sequence belonging to experimentally validated human T-cell autoimmune epitope and amyloidogenic protein datasets were calculated using TANGO (http://tools.iedb.org/mhcii/)et al.The T-cell autoimmune epitope predictions were carried out using IEDB recommended method  is the hydrophobicity coefficient of ith residue and Nres is the number of residues in the peptide sequence.where Change in proportion tests were performed as described earlier17Sequence logos were generated for 100,000 randomly generated peptides and their various subsets using Seqlogo function in MATLAB and enoLOGOS web serverHow to cite this article: Kumar, S. et al. Autoimmune Responses to Soluble Aggregates of Amyloidogenic Proteins Involved in Neurodegenerative Diseases: Overlapping Aggregation Prone and Autoimmunogenic regions. Sci. Rep.6, 22258; doi: 10.1038/srep22258 (2016).


The concepts of -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroups over a commutative n-ary hypergroup are introduced and some related properties and characterizations are obtained. The homomorphism properties of -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroups are also derived.Maji et al. introduced the concept of fuzzy soft sets as a generalizationof the standard soft sets and presented an application of fuzzy soft sets in a decisionmaking problem. The aim of this paper is to apply the concept of fuzzy soft sets to  To solve complicated problems in economics, engineering, and environment, we cannot successfully use classical methods because of various uncertainties typical for those problems. There are three theories: theory of probability, theory of fuzzy sets, and the interval mathematics, which we can consider as mathematical tools for dealing with uncertainties. However, all of these have their advantages as well as inherent limitations in dealing with uncertainties. One major problem shared by those theories is their incompatibility with the parameterization tools. To overcome these difficulties, Molodtsov  introducd-algebras, respectively. Acar et al. r = {x ∈ H∣xr∈γ∨qδF(ε)}. The next theorem presents the relationships between -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroups over H and crisp (invertible) n-ary subhypergroups of H.For any fuzzy soft set 〈F, A〉∈FS. Then,F, A〉 is an -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup over H if and only if nonempty subset F(ε)r is an (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup of H for all ε ∈ A and r ∈ -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup over H if and only if nonempty subset 〈F(ε)〉r is an (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup of H for all ε ∈ A and r ∈ -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup over H if and only if nonempty subset [F(ε)]r is an (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup of H for all ε ∈ A and r ∈  and (3). (1) can be easily proved.δ = 1 + γ. Let 〈F, A〉 be an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H and assume that 〈F(ε)〉r ≠ ∅ for some ε ∈ A and r ∈ 〉r. Then rx1qδF(ε),…, rxnqδF(ε); that is, F(ε)(x1) + r > 2δ,…, F(ε)(xn) + r > 2δ. Since 〈F, A〉 is an -fuzzy n-ary subhypergroup over H, we have max{F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} for all x ∈ f(x1n). Hence, by r > δ,r ≤ 1 = 2δ − γ, that is, r + γ ≤ 2δ, we have F(ε)(x) + r > 2δ and so x ∈ 〈F(ε)〉r. Similarly we can show that e ∈ 〈F(ε)〉r and, for all y, y1n−1 ∈ 〈F(ε)〉r, there exists x ∈ 〈F(ε)〉r such that y ∈ f. Therefore, 〈F(ε)〉r is an n-ary hypergroup of H.(2) Assume that 2x1n ∈ H and ε ∈ A. If there exists x ∈ f(x1n) such that max{F(ε)(x), γ} < min{F(ε)x1xn, δ}, take r = 2δ − max{F(ε)(x), γ}. Then r ∈ (x) ≤ 2δ − r, F(ε)(x1) > max{G(ε)(x), γ} = 2δ − r,…, F(ε)(xn) > max{G(ε)(x), γ} = 2δ − r, that is, x1n ∈ 〈F(ε)〉r, but  x ∉ 〈F(ε)〉r, a contradiction. Hence max{F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} and so max{infx∈f(x1n)F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ}. Similarly we can show that conditions (F1a) and (F3a) hold. Therefore, 〈F, A〉 is an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H.Conversely, assume that the given condition holds. Let F, A〉 be an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H and assume that [F(ε)]r ≠ ∅ for some ε ∈ A and r ∈ ]r. Then rx1∈γ∨qδF(ε),…, rxn∈γ∨qδF(ε); that is, F(ε)(x1) ≥ r > γ or F(ε)(x1) > 2δ − r ≥ 2δ − (2δ − γ) = γ,…, F(ε)(xn) ≥ r > γ or F(ε)(xn) > 2δ − r ≥ 2δ − (2δ − γ) = γ. Since 〈F, A〉 is an -fuzzy n-ary subhypergroup over H, we have max{F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} for all x ∈ f(x1n) and so F(ε)(x) ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} since γ < min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} in any case. Now we consider the following cases.(3) Let 〈Case  1 . In this case, 2δ − r ≥ δ ≥ r. F(ε)(x1) ≥ r or ⋯ or F(ε)(xn) ≥ r, then F(ε)(x) ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} ≥ r. Hence zr∈γF(ε).If F(ε)(xi) + r > 2δ, for all 1 ≤ i ≤ n, then F(ε)(x) ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} = δ ≥ r. Hence zr∈γF(ε).If Case  2 . In this case, r > δ > 2δ − r. F(ε)(xi) ≥ r, for all 1 ≤ i ≤ n, then F(ε)(x) ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} = δ > 2δ − r. Hence zrqδF(ε).If F(ε)(x1) + r > 2δ or ⋯ or F(ε)(xn) + r > 2δ, then F(ε)(x) ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} > 2δ − r. Hence zrqδF(ε).If xr∈γ∨qδF(ε); that is, x ∈ [F(ε)]r. Similarly, we can show that e ∈ [F(ε)]r and, for all y, y1n−1 ∈ [F(ε)]r, there exists x ∈ [F(ε)]r such that y ∈ f. Therefore, [F(ε)]r is an n-ary hypergroup of H.Thus, in any case, x1n ∈ H and ε ∈ A. If there exists x ∈ f(x1n) such that max{F(ε)(x), γ} < r = min{F(ε)x1xn, δ}, then F(ε)(x1) ≥ r > γ,…, F(ε)(xn) ≥ r > γ, F(ε)(x) < r, and F(ε)(x) + r < 2r ≤ 2δ, that is, (x1)r∈γF(ε),…, (xn)r∈γF(ε), but x1n ∈ [F(ε)]r, but x ∉ [F(ε)]r, a contradiction. Hence max{F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ} and so max{infx∈f(x1n)F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)x1xn, δ}. Similarly, we can show that conditions (F1a) and (F3a) hold. Therefore, 〈F, A〉 is an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H.Conversely, assume that the given condition holds. Let As a direct consequence of γ, γ′, δ, δ′ ∈  be such that γ < δ, γ′ < δ′, γ < γ′, and  δ′ < δ. Then every -fuzzy (invertible) n-ary soft subhypergroup over H is an -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup over H.Let P ∈ P*(H). Then P is an (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup of H if and only if Σ is an -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup over H for any A⊆E and r ≥ δ.Let F, A〉 ∈ FS. Theni ≤ n.Let 〈It is straightforward.F, A〉 be an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H. Theni ≤ n;x ∈ H and 1 ≤ i ≤ n.Let 〈F, A〉 be an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H, ε ∈ A, and 1 ≤ i ≤ n. Since max{F(ε)(e), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)(x), δ}, for all x ∈ H, we have(1) Let 〈x ∈ H and 1 ≤ i ≤ n. By (1), we have(2) Let F, A〉 be an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H. Then 〈F, A〉 is invertible if and only ifx, y ∈ H, ε ∈ A, and 1 ≤ i ≤ n. ProofLet 〈It is straightforward by Lemmas F, A〉,〈F1, A〉,…, 〈Fi, A〉  (2 ≤ i ≤ n) be -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroups over H. ThenF, e∗)(y), δ}, γ} = max{min{F, e∗)(x),δ},γ}, for all x, y ∈ H and ε ∈ A;max{min{x, y, y1n−1 ∈ H such that y ∈ f and ε ∈ A, one has max{F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)y1yn−1, F(ε)(y), δ}.for all  Let 〈x, y ∈ H and ε ∈ A. Then, by F, e∗)(y), δ}, γ} ≥ max{min{F, e∗)(x), δ}, γ}. In a similar way, we have max{min{F, e∗)(x), δ}, γ} ≥ max{min{F, e∗)(y), δ}, γ}. Hence max{min{F, e∗)(y), δ}, γ} = max{min{F1i, e∗)(x), δ}, γ}.(1) Let x, y, y1n−1 ∈ H be such that y ∈ f and ε ∈ A. Then (2) Let Fk, A〉 be -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over H for all 1 ≤ k ≤ n and 2 ≤ i ≤ n. Then γ, ∈γ∨qδ)-fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over H.Let 〈Fk, A〉 is an -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over H for all  1 ≤ k ≤ n, let ε ∈ A. It is clear that max{F(F1i(ε),e∗)(e),γ} ≥ min{F(F1i(ε),e∗)(x),δ} for all x ∈ H. From j ≤ n, we havex, y ∈ H; that is, F(F1i(ε), e∗) is invertible. In fact, by Lemmas Since each 〈x, y, y1n−1 ∈ H be such that y ∈ f. Then by F(F1i(ε), e∗)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(F1i(ε),e∗)y1yn−1, F(F1i(ε), e∗)(y), δ}.Next, let γ, ∈γ∨qδ)-fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over H.Summing up the above arguments, F, A〉 and 〈G, B〉 be two -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroups over H. Then both F, A〉⋒〈G, B〉 are -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroups over H.Let 〈F, A〉 and 〈G, B〉 be -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroups over H and ε ∈ A ∪ B, we consider the following cases.Let 〈Case  1 (ε ∈ A − B). In this case, L(ε) = F(ε). It follows that L(ε) satisfies conditions (F1a), (F2a), and (F3a) since 〈F, A〉 is an -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over S. Case  2 (ε ∈ B − A). In this case, L(ε) = G(ε). It follows that L(ε) satisfies conditions (F1a), (F2a), and (F3a) since 〈G, B〉 is an -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over S. Case  3 (ε ∈ A∩B). In this case, L(ε) = F(ε)∩G(ε). Now we show that F(ε)∩G(ε) satisfies conditions (F1a), (F2a), and (F3a). (1)x ∈ H, we haveFor any (2)x, x1n ∈ H be such that x ∈ f(x1n). ThenLet It follows that max{infx∈f(x1n)(F(ε)∩G(ε))(x), γ} ≥ min{(F(ε)∩G(ε))x1xn, δ}.(3)x, y, y1n−1 ∈ H be such that y ∈ f. Analogous to (2), we haveLet γ, ∈γ∨qδ)-fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H. The case for 〈F, A〉⋒〈G, B〉 can be similarly proved.Therefore, γ, ∈γ∨qδ)-fuzzy soft (invertible) subhypergroups. Let us first introduce the following definition.In this section, we consider the homomorphism properties of  and FS be two fuzzy soft classes, and let φ : U → U′ and ϕ : E → E′ be mappings. Define a mapping  : FS → FS by the following: for 〈F, A〉 ∈ FS, the image of 〈F, A〉 under , denoted by 〈F, A〉 = 〈φ(F), ϕ(A)〉, is a fuzzy soft set in FS given byε′ ∈ ϕ(A) and x′ ∈ U′. For 〈F′, A′〉 ∈ FS, the inverse image of 〈F′, A′〉 under , denoted by −1〈F′, A′〉 = 〈φ−1(F′), ϕ−1(A′)〉, is a fuzzy soft set in FS given byε ∈ ϕ−1(B) and x ∈ U.Let The following results can be easily deduced.F, A〉, 〈G, B〉∈FS and φ : U → U′ and ϕ : E → E′ be two mappings. ThenF, A〉⋐−1〈F, A〉) and 〈F, A〉 = −1〈F, A〉) if both φ and ϕ are injective;〈φ, ϕ)⋐〈F, A〉⋒〈G, B〉;〈F, A〉⋐γ,δ)〈G, B〉.if 〈Let 〈F′, A′〉, 〈G′, B′〉 ∈ FS and φ : U → U′ and ϕ : E → E′ be two mappings. Thenφ, ϕ)−1〈F′, A′〉)⋐〈F′, A′〉 and −1〈F′, A′〉) = 〈F′, A′〉 if both φ and ϕ are surjective;−1 = −1〈F′, A′〉⋒−1〈G′, B′〉;−1〈F′, A′〉⋐γ,δ)−1〈G′, B′〉.if 〈Let 〈H, f) and  be two n-ary hypergroups with identities e and e′, respectively, and φ a mapping from H to H′. Then, φ is called a homomorphism if φ(e) = e′ and φ(f(x1n)) = f′(φ(x1),…, φ(xn)) for all x1n ∈ H. If such a homomorphism is surjective, injective, or bijective, it is called an epimorphism, a monomorphism, or an isomorphism.Let  and  be two n-ary hypergroups with identities e and e′, respectively, φ : H → H′ a homomorphism, and ϕ : E → E′ a mapping. Then )⋐F′〈F1, A1〉,…, 〈Fn, An〉) for all 〈F,A〉1n ∈ FS such that ⋂i=1nAi ≠ ∅ and ) = F′〈F1, A1〉,…, 〈Fn, An〉) if ϕ is injective.Let , ε′ ∈ ϕ(⋂i=1nAi)⊆⋂i=1nϕ(Ai), and x′ ∈ H′. If φ−1(x′) = ∅, then F′(φ(F1),…, φ(Fn))(ε′)(x′) = 0 = φ(F(F1n)(ε′))(x′). Otherwise, we haveφ, ϕ))⋐F′〈F1, A1〉,…, 〈Fn, An〉). If ϕ is injective, then the symbol “≥” in the above proof can be replaced with “=”; hence ) = F′〈F1, A1〉,…, 〈Fn, An〉).Let 〈H, f) and  be two commutative n-ary hypergroups with identities e and e′, respectively, φ : H → H′ a homomorphism, and ϕ : E → E′ an injective mapping. Let 〈F, A〉 be an -fuzzy n-ary soft subhypergroup over H which has the sup-property. Then, 〈F, A〉 is an -fuzzy n-ary subhypergroup over H′. If φ is an epimorphism from H onto H′ and 〈F, A〉 is invertible, then 〈F, A〉 is also invertible.Let -fuzzy n-ary soft subhypergroup over H which has the sup-property and ε′ ∈ ϕ(A). Then there exists a unique ε ∈ A such that ϕ(ε) = ε′ and we have the following.(1)φ(F)(ε′)(e′), γ} ≥ min{φ(F)(ε′)(x′), δ} for all x′ ∈ H.It is clear that max{(2)By (3)y′, y1′,…, yn−1′ ∈ H′. If φ−1(yj′) = ∅  (1 ≤ j ≤ n − 1) or φ−1(y′) = ∅, thenLet for y′ ∈ f′. Otherwise, there exist y, y1n−1 ∈ H such that φ(y) = y′, φ(yi) = yi′, φ(F)(ε′)(y′) = F(ε)(y), and φ(F)(ε′)(yi′) = F(ε)(yi) for all 1 ≤ i ≤ n − 1 since 〈F, A〉 has the sup-property. Now, for y, y1n−1 ∈ H, since 〈F, A〉 is an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H, there exists x ∈ H such that y ∈ f and max{F(ε)(x), γ} ≥ min{F(ε)y1yn−1, F(ε)(y), δ}. Hence we haveφ, ϕ) is an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H′.Assume that 〈φ is an epimorphism from H onto H′ and that 〈F, A〉 is an invertible -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H. Then, for any x′, y′ ∈ H′, we haveNext assume that φ, ϕ)〈F, A〉 is invertible.Therefore,  and  be two commutative n-ary hypergroups with identities e and e′, respectively, φ : H → H′ a homomorphism, and  ϕ : E → E′ a mapping. Let 〈F′, A′〉 be an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H′. Then −1〈F′, A′〉 is an -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H. If both φ and ϕ are injective and 〈F′, A′〉 is an -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup over H′, then −1〈F′, A′〉 is an -fuzzy soft (invertible) n-ary subhypergroup over H.Let -fuzzy soft n-ary subhypergroup over H′. Let ε ∈ ϕ−1(A′). Then we have the following.(1)x ∈ H, max{φ−1(F′)(ε)(e), γ} = max{F′(ϕ(ε))(φ(e)), γ} ≥ min{F′(ϕ(ε))(φ(x)), δ} = min{φ−1(F′)(ε)(x), δ}.For any (2)x, x1n ∈ H be such that x ∈ f(x1n). Then φ(x) ∈ φ(f(x1n)) = f′(φ(x)1n) and soLet It follows that max{infx∈f(x1n)φ−1(F′)(ε)(z), γ} ≥ min{φ−1(F′)(ε)x1xn, δ}.(3)x, y, y1n−1 ∈ H be such that y ∈ f. Then φ(y) ∈ f′(φ(x), φ(y1),…, φ(yn−1)). Since 〈F′, A′〉 is invertible, by Let Summing up the above analysis, −1〈F′, A′〉 is an -fuzzy n-ary soft subhypergroup over H. If both φ and ϕ are injective and 〈F′, A′〉 is an -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over H′, it is easy to check that −1〈F′, A′〉 is an -fuzzy soft invertible n-ary subhypergroup over H.Assume that 〈n-ary hypergroups which generalize some algebra structures: soft groups, fuzzy n-ary hypergroups, fuzzy hypergroups, and so on. The goal is to explain new methodological development in n-ary hypergroups which will also be of growing importance in the future. The results presented in this paper can hopefully provide more insight into and a full understanding of fuzzy soft set theory and algebraic hyperstructures. Our future work on this topic will focus on studying some other classes of fuzzy soft n-ary hypergroups.In this paper, our aim is to promote the research and development of fuzzy soft technology by studying fuzzy soft


Student participation in research has become an important practice for medical students to address the growing emphasis on evidence-based medicine . StudentOver the past few years, there has been a rapid increase in the number of these journals, which include the Journal of Young Investigators, International Journal of Medical Students, Res Medica Journal, McGill Journal of Medicine, and Asian Students’ Medical Journal. In addition, some major journals have dedicated special forums for student participation such as Lancet Student and Student BMJ. Despite this rise in numbers, accessibility and citations, only a few of them manage to meet the quality standards for indexing in well-known academic databases, such as PubMed/Medline .The impact and quality of these journals remains a source of debate. Student journals can help to improve undergraduate training by providing high-quality educational experience. Additionally, they can helpto motivate students to participate in research and to express their opinions and perspectives. The student-friendly peer-review system encourages students to publish their own research, promoting students with inexperience in publishing research to develop their style of writing. They also provide an opportunity for students to become accustomed to the submission and peer-review process. Moreover, exceptional editorial opportunities are offered for interested students to learn about medical journalism and to develop their critical appraisal skills providing trained editors for the future .Notwithstanding these merits, student journals face major critiques and challenges. The peer-review system, which is managed mainly by undergraduates as editors and reviewers who lack enough clinical and critical appraisal skills to provide constructive reviews, may allow low-quality studies to reach publication resulting in a culture of weak studies. In addition, the lack of indexing and readability of these journals may deprive good articles from reaching their targeted audience and subsequent citations. Furthermore, the issues of sustainability in securing good-quality submissions, funds and dedicated editorial teams are other major concerns for the future of these journals .To tackle these issues, it is important that these journals adopt a strict peer-review system in accordance with international editing guidelines, with experts leading the process. Additionally, funding agencies, academic institutions and professional publishing groups should collaborate with these journals to make sure that these efforts of future researchers are directed along the right way.Omar Aboshady is an associate editor of International Journal of Medical Students.None.


Miranda OlffRegarding the Editorial ‘Psychotrauma update’ by European Journal of Psychotraumatology 2015. Citation: European Journal of Psychotraumatology 2015, 6: 27625 - http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v6.27625Published in Not all authors were listed for this Editorial. The correct authors are displayed below.Robbert-Jan Verkes, PhDDepartment of Psychiatry RadboudumcLaw School Radboud UniversityForensic Psychiatric Centre PompestichtingNijmegen, The NetherlandsAnton van Balkom, MD, PhDDepartment of PsychiatryVU-University Medical Centre and GGZ inGeestAmsterdam, The NetherlandsMiranda OlffEditor-in-ChiefDepartment of PsychiatryAcademic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam andArq Psychotrauma Expert GroupDiemen, The Netherlands


Journal of Experimental Botany Vol 65 (2); 2014 pp. 683–696.10.1093/jxb/ert442doi: The Editor-in-Chief and Publisher have retracted this article due to concerns relating to the validity of several figures:Figure 2A and B. The two bands used to represent TaVP expression in 0hr & 12hr high salinity and 0hr & 12hr drought treatments in root tissue appear to be duplicates, as are the three tubulin bands used as controls for root tissue and leaf tissueFigure 3A. TaVP expression. The same control band has been used nine different times to represent all eight lines and the WT control.Additionally both figures mentioned above have been individually constructed from different gels/blots. Journal policy requires this should have been made explicit in the construction of the figure (i.e. by using dividing lines or spaces) and in the figure legend.Journal applied forensic image analysis to verify the above irregularities, and also obtained advice from experts in the field. It is felt that the falsification of these images raises sufficient doubt over subsequent interpretations of data reported in the paper and as such the decision has been taken to retract.The


Sometimes the most treasured gift is usually the fruit of the most laborious efforts. Ever since we became eligible to apply for PubMed, in the beginning of 2011, we were steadfast in moving toward the indexing goal. Sometimes the most treasured gift is usually the fruit of the most laborious efforts. Ever since we became eligible to apply for PubMed, in the beginning of 2011, we were steadfast in moving toward the indexing goal. There were times during this entire tenure when our efforts did not bear the desired results and the target seemed a long way off. But kudos the entire team of IJCPD who withstood the text of time and finally got the journal its well-earned recognition. It gives me immense pride and pleasure to inform all the readers that International Journal of Clinical Pediatric Dentistry is now listed with PubMed.I whole heartedly express my gratitude to the technical team of IJCPD led by Ms. Chetna Malhotra without whom this would have never been possible. I would also like to place my appreciation for the erstwhile editors, editorial board members and reviewers whose efforts have made the academic content of this journal up to international standards.Yes, we have reached our aim but the destination is still to come and the real work has just begun. The journal would now strive hard to maintain the standards of PubMed and provide all the readers with new, informative, and original Scientific content. I, on behalf of IJCPD, thank all the subscribers and authors for believing in us and look forward for your continued patronage and support.… Next Aim … Impact Factor …                                           Nikhil MarwahEditor-in-chief


International Journal of Molecular Sciences [The authors wish to change the first author’s name “Guoling Li” to “Guoliang Li” on the Page of their paper published in the Sciences . The aut


International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and Well-being (IJQHW) in 2006 it has developed immensely, not least after 2010 when it became Open Access. With unhindered access to all content, readers in 172 countries have since then accessed the journal's website in their thousands, and more than 290,000 full-text articles have been downloaded – and most likely read, shared, cited and applied. The number of submissions has constantly increased over the years; today the rejection rate is over 50%. IJQHW is now indexed in PubMed/MEDLINE; CINAHL, Scopus, and PSYC-info to name a few of the most prestigious index providers. In addition it is stored in PubMed Central, the free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature at the U.S. National Institutes of Health's National Library of Medicine (NIH/NLM). For three years in a row (2011–2013) the impact factor has steadily increased and is now 0.926; soon the 2014 impact factor will be here.Since Professor Lillemor Hallberg and Professor Karin Dahlberg started the primus motor in developing IJQHW into the authoritative source of knowledge, data and information on qualitative studies that it is today. I want to thank both Lillemor Hallberg and Karin Dahlberg for their brilliant initiative to start IJQHW, and especially Lillemor Hallberg for all her hard work and professionalism to maintain the high standards that are so significant of the journal.This is an incredible development! And so now that I have taken over as Editor-in-Chief I am both awed and excited. Some time ago, Lillemor Hallberg retired as Editor-in-Chief because of other priorities in life. After Karin Dahlberg left the Editorial team a couple of years ago, Lillemor Hallberg has been IJQHW.A few years back, due to the high inflow of manuscripts and the resulting increased work load, the editorial team was expanded with two Co-Editors, Professor Soly Erlandsson and myself. I am very pleased that Soly Erlandsson will continue to support me and the journal; with her professional integrity she is a true asset to the journal. To replace me as Co-Editor, I have appointed Associate Professor Ptlene Minick for her deep insight into qualitative research and long experience with various methods and theory building. I welcome her as a competent colleague and as my new collaborator in the development of The early recognition of patient problems in critical care. Her work, using an interpretive methodology based on human experiences, resulted in theory generation. Throughout the years, she has had the opportunity to gain further expertise in qualitative methods focusing on patients in acute care and improving outcomes. Working to link nursing expertise with patient outcomes she extended her work to quantitative methods and used her early qualitative work as a framework for instrument development.Ptlene Minick, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Byrdine F. Lewis School of Nursing and Health Professions at Georgia State University, Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States. Dr. Minick began her program of research using qualitative methods during her doctoral studies. Graduating in 1992, her dissertation was entitled IJQHW in particular, we are aiming for a truly international board but also one which better reflects all the various disciplines that are represented in the journal. We will soon present the new board on the journal's website.We are now in the process of renewing and revitalizing the Editorial Board. In view of the gradual internationalization of scientific publishing in general and of International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and Well-being.To sum up, I extend my sincere thanks to Lillemor Hallberg and Karin Dahlberg for having created a lasting forum for the exchange of facts, knowledge and ideas on qualitative research in relation to health and well-being; and especially to Lillemor Hallberg for her persistent work throughout the years. And I warmly welcome my colleague Ptlene Minick as new Co-Editor of the Carina BerteröEditor-in-Chief


Subjects with a history of documented penicillin allergy but with negative skin test results for cephalosporins, can tolerate subsequent challenge doses of cephalosporin without an allergic reaction. [1]. In immediate reactions to betalactams (BL), in some instances, specificity was mainly directed to the BL inducing the reaction, but in other cases specificity was mainly directed to another structure, probably related with previous BL exposure [2].Between November 2011 and October 2013, we prospectively recruited a total population of 100  patients from the outpatients of the Clinical Immunology Unit . Patients had a history of immediate reactions to at least one penicillin (Tab. 1) and positive results on skin tests for one or more penicillin reagents , one or more semi-synthetic penicillins , or both [3]. We also evaluated sensitization to cephalosporins by using skin tests [4] with second-generation (cefuroxime), and third-generation  cephalosporins. In cases of negative results for all of these cefalosporins, cefuroxime and ceftriaxone were administered to consenting patients [1].74 of the 100 patients underwent challenges with oral cefuroxime axetil and intramuscular ceftriaxone: all tolerated the challenge. After about a month we repeated the skin tests with PPL, MDM, and the two cephalosporins administered (cefuroxime and ceftriaxone). 8 patients (10.8%) presented new sensitizations: 2 for MDM, 2 for PPL and MDM, 1 for cefuroxime, 1 for ceftriaxone, 1 for PPL and ceftriaxone, 1 for PPL, MDM, cefuroxime and ceftriaxone. 26 patients refused the double challenge and only underwent a tolerance to cefuroxime axetil test. In one of these the challenge was positive. The skin tests after a month with PPL, MDM, and the cephalosporin administered (cefuroxime) presented new sensitizations in only one patient (4.0%), for PPL.One month after the challenge, the percentage of sensitization seems to be higher in patients who underwent tolerance tests with two cephalosporins. It would be useful to have more data available to confirm the above mentioned assumptions, but above all it would be useful to know if we can recommend the cephalosporins tolerated with negative skin tests after a month, even if associated with positive PPL and/or MDM and/or other cephalosporin administered with the tolerance test.


Foot abnormality has become a public health concern. Early detection of pathological soft tissue is hence an important preventive measure, especially to the elderly who generally have a higher risk of foot pathology (i.e. ulceration). However, the management of plantar tissue stiffness data is questionable.The objective of this study is to assess the influence of gender and physical attributes such as height, weight and BMI on plantar soft tissue stiffness. It is also to evaluate whether it is necessary to isolate the differences in gender, age, bodyweight, height and body mass index in the data analysis procedure.100 healthy subjects were recruited from National Seoul University (SNU) hospital for the experiment. During stiffness measurement .Tissue behavior was characterized via K, stiffness constant.T-tests were used to identify significant stiffness differences between left and right foot, as well as between male and female subjects on hallux and heel pad. Two-way ANOVA was used to analyze the data obtained from sub-MTH pad as the stiffness of the forefoot region. The level of significance was set at p<0.05. Pearson correlation was used to assess the relationship between bodyweight and BMI with plantar soft tissue stiffness.The male and female participants were significantly varied in weight, height and BMI, but similar in age. There was a weak correlation for both the BW and BMI with plantar tissue stiffness Table a and 1b.From the experimental results, it can be deduced that BW and BMI are weakly associated with plantar tissue stiffness and there was no significant difference in stiffness between male and female participants. No difference is found between left and right feet measurement. This suggests that normalizing of plantar tissue stiffness by either variable is not necessary. The data can be pooled and treated equally regardless of gender.


Pan African Medical Journal[We read with great interest the paper by Yadav and Gupta on bilateral synchronous spermatocytic seminoma (SS) in the recent issue of the  Journal. While w Journal, 3. As K Journal, only 10 Journal. The fir Journal in 2011  Journal. From thAlthough the possibility of underreporting cannot be ruled out, it is evident that bilateral SS is rare, and the synchronous presentation even rarer. Though not appropriately stated, Yadav and Gupta  supposed


In this paper, a new micromachined tuning fork gyroscope (TFG) with an anchored diamond coupling mechanism is proposed while the mode ordering and the vibration sensitivity are also investigated. The sense-mode of the proposed TFG was optimized through use of an anchored diamond coupling spring, which enables the in-phase mode frequency to be 108.3% higher than the anti-phase one. The frequencies of the in- and anti-phase modes in the sense direction are 9799.6 Hz and 4705.3 Hz, respectively. The analytical solutions illustrate that the stiffness difference ratio of the in- and anti-phase modes is inversely proportional to the output induced by the vibration from the sense direction. Additionally, FEM simulations demonstrate that the stiffness difference ratio of the anchored diamond coupling TFG is 16.08 times larger than the direct coupling one while the vibration output is reduced by 94.1%. Consequently, the proposed new anchored diamond coupling TFG can structurally increase the stiffness difference ratio to improve the mode ordering and considerably reduce the vibration sensitivity without sacrificing the scale factor. The operational principle of MEMS vibrating gyroscopes actually relies on the Coriolis effect with an energy transfer between two vibration modes . TypicalA dual-mass tuning fork gyro is a very common type of vibrating gyroscope used to cancel linear vibrations by using two identical tines, which operate in anti-phase mode ,8,9,10. In our previous work , we desiThis paper proposes a new micromachined TFG with an anchored diamond coupling beam to analyze the mode ordering and the vibration sensitivity. For comparison with this novel structure, a traditional one with a direct diamond coupling beam was designed at the same time. Two kinds of TFGs are designed in this paper according to the previous work . The typEvery tine includes a Coriolis mass and two frames, supported by symmetrical springs. The springs, except the supporting lever springs and the anchored coupling ones, are the same to increase the robustness of the mode-match between drive and sense modes and to resist any temperature shifts of the resonance frequencies. The electrodes are variable-area capacitances to guarantee the linearity of the capacitance change with the displacement in the motion direction parallel to the plates. The mode analysis of two types in the in- and anti-phase modes in the sense direction is carried out and shown in First, the non-ideal TFG model is shown in Left mass:Right mass:Subtracting Equation (2) from Equation (1), one obtains:Adding Equations (1) and (2), one obtains:m and c are the mass and damping of each tine respectively, k1 and k2 denote the stiffness and k’ is the coupling stiffness in the anti-phase mode, x1 and x2 are the displacement, asinwt is the external acceleration acting on the whole TFG, in which a denotes the amplitude and w is the angular frequency.Here, Since the vibration output of in- and anti-phase modes needs to be analyzed, a coordinate transformation is made as follows:Substituting Equation (5) into Equations (3) and (4), one obtains:The Equation (6) can be expressed as a matrix representation:The natural frequency can be obtained by using the characteristic equation:The modal superposition technique is used to acquire the steady-state response through solving Equation (7):When Considering the actual fabrication defects, When Considering that The traditional direct coupling beam has no deformation in the in-phase mode, so Since the in-phase stiffness is different between the direct coupling and anchored coupling TFGs, the vibration output in the anchored coupling structure should be recalculated. Considering the actual fabrication defects, Equation (12) can be rewritten as:Here, the dimensionless parameters Then, Equations (11) and (14) can be expressed as:Equations (13) and (15) can be expressed as:From Equations (16) and (17), it is figured out that the anti-phase vibration output is proportional to First, the SDR of Type A and Type B TFGs, which are represented by k = F/x, the stiffness k can be obtained:From Equation (18), the stiffness difference is dependent on the in- and anti-phase coupling stiffness, so simulations are carried out on the stiffness of the coupling spring by applying a 1 μN force in the sense direction, shown in Substituting Equation (19) into Equation (18), we can obtain:The anti-phase coupling stiffness of the direct diamond coupling structure is shown in Substituting Equation (21) into Equation (18), we can obtain:Therefore, the ratio of SDR of the anchored and direct diamond coupling structures can be computed from Equations (20) and (22):Similarly, the SDR of the anchored ring coupling structure in our previous study  is studiTo analyze the vibration output, three architectures are designed. One is the completely symmetrical structure, and the stiffness imbalance of another two are 0.97% and 1.83%, respectively, which can be achieved by intentionally increasing the spring width of the left tine in the sense direction.2) and Q-factor of 100 which is just an assumption. This assumption is within a reasonable range from a hundred or so at atmospheric pressure to hundreds of thousands under vacuum. The model parameters and the modal frequencies are listed in In this simulation, the simulation software, the element type and the mesh division are the same as in our previous study . The totHowever, a vibrational output would be produced by the linear vibration because the stiffness is imbalanced due to the practical process imperfections. Then, the harmonic responses of these two types are analyzed, in which ε is 0.97% and 1.83%.As depicted in The simulation with 1.83% stiffness imbalance is also carried out to analyze the impact of ε on the output. From The displacement difference between two masses is computed through the analytical expressions Equations (10) and (13). The theoretical and numerical values of Type A and Type B are then compared and the error rates are obtained, as indicated in From From the theoretical analysis of the anchored coupling tuning fork gyroscopes, it is concluded that the anti-phase vibration output is proportional to Actually, the deformation styles of the anchored coupling beam are different in the in- and anti-phase modes. In the anti-phase mode, the beam is bent under a lateral load while the beam is tensile (compressed) under an axial load in the in-phase described in The analytical model we propose can be used for both anchored coupling TFGs and direct coupling TFGs. In our previous study , the anaIf someone proposes a cross structure, or anything similar, our modeling as presented in this paper will also be effective. Perhaps, some new structures will be designed to provide a higher stiffness difference ratio in the future. We believe that our theoretical model can be valid still.In this paper, a new micromachined TFG with an anchored diamond coupling is proposed to investigate the corresponding mode ordering and the vibration sensitivity. The proposed TFG optimizes the sense-mode through use of an anchored diamond coupling beam, enabling the in-phase mode frequency to be 108.3% larger than the anti-phase one. A new theoretical model is established to investigate the vibration sensitivity of micromachied TFGs with anchored coupling. The coordinate transformation method is used to compute the dynamic response caused by the common-mode vibration, which coincides with the FEM simulations. The analytical solutions show that the anti-phase vibration output is inversely proportional to the stiffness difference ratio and proportional to the stiffness imbalance. Additionally, the stiffness difference ratio of the two types of TFGs is obtained by the FEM simulations. The simulations demonstrate that the stiffness difference ratio of the anchored diamond coupling structure is much larger than the direct coupling one and the SDR of the anchored diamond coupling structure is 16.08 times larger than the direct coupling one while the vibration output is reduced by 94.1% in the anti-phase sense mode frequency. In comparison with the anchored ring coupling structure, the SDR of the anchored diamond coupling one is 5.46 times larger than the anchored ring coupling one, while the vibration output is reduced by 82.6%. Consequently, the anchored diamond coupling TFG is able to structurally offer a higher stiffness difference ratio to improve the mode ordering and tremendously reject the vibration output without sacrificing any sensitivity.