There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one. I remember first hearing about it at school. It seemed an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality.

Usually familiarity dulls this sense of the bizarre, but in the case of i it was the reverse: over the years the sense of its surreal nature intensified. It seemed that it was impossible to write mathematics that described the real world in …

I and i

Pathogen Recognition and Innate Immunity

Co-Planar Stereotaxic Atlas of the Human Brain—3-Dimensional Proportional System: An Approach to Cerebral Imaging, J. Talairach, P. Tournoux. Georg Thieme Verlag, New York (1988), 122 pp., 130 figs. DM 268

One of the mechanisms by which the innate immune system senses the invasion of pathogenic microorganisms is through the Toll-like receptors (TLRs), which recognize specific molecular patterns that are present in microbial components. Stimulation of different TLRs induces distinct patterns of gene expression, which not only leads to the activation of innate immunity but also instructs the development of antigen-specific acquired immunity. Here, we review the rapid progress that has recently improved our understanding of the molecular mechanisms that mediate TLR signalling.

Toll-like receptor signalling

The discovery of Toll-like receptors (TLRs) as components that recognize conserved structures in pathogens has greatly advanced understanding of how the body senses pathogen invasion, triggers innate immune responses and primes antigen-specific adaptive immunity. Although TLRs are critical for host defense, it has become apparent that loss of negative regulation of TLR signaling, as well as recognition of self molecules by TLRs, are strongly associated with the pathogenesis of inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. Furthermore, it is now clear that the interaction between TLRs and recently identified cytosolic innate immune sensors is crucial for mounting effective immune responses. Here we describe the recent advances that have been made by research into the role of TLR biology in host defense and disease.

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The role of pattern-recognition receptors in innate immunity: update on Toll-like receptors

SUMMARY In this paper, we propose a fully automatic method forextracting carotid artery contours from ultrasound images based on an ac-tive contour approach Several contour extraction techniques have beenproposed to measure carotid artery walls for early detection of atheroscle-rotic disease However, the majority of these techniques require a certaindegree of user interaction that demands time and eﬀort Our proposal au-tomatically detects the position of the carotid artery by identifying bloodﬂow information related to the carotid artery, and an active contour modelis employed that uses initial contours placed in the detected position Ourmethodalsoappliesaglobalenergyminimizationschemetotheactivecon-tour model Experiments on clinical cases show that the proposed methodautomatically extracts the carotid artery contours at an accuracy close tothat achieved by manual extraction key words: active contour model, ultrasound, carotid artery, plaque 1 Introduction According to data from the World Health Organization(WHO), cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the global numberone cause of death[1] The WHO reports that an estimated173 million people died of CVDs in 2008, accounting for30% of all global deaths, and predicts that the number ofdeaths from CVDs will rise to 233 million by 2030 Theearliest manifestation of the CVDs is atherosclerosis, whichcauses carotid arterial wall thickening and atheroscleroticplaques Early detection of atherosclerotic disease is thusvery important Several imaging modalities are currentlyused for assessing the health of arteries, including magneticresonance imaging (MRI), computed tomography (CT), andultrasound Ultrasound is favored as a non-invasive and in-expensive modality, and is widely used for screening androutine examinations in clinical practiceThe most widely used indicator of atherosclerotic dis-ease is the intima-media thickness (IMT) of the carotidartery walls[2],[3] Using ultrasound, IMT can be mea-sured by sonographers on longitudinal B-mode images Ingeneral, sonographers manually trace the lumen-intima (LI)interface and media-adventitia (MA) interface IMT is thenrecorded as the distance between the traced lines

Fully Automatic Extraction of Carotid Artery Contours from Ultrasound Images

https://www.gastrojournal.org/article/S0016-5085(12)63471-4/pdf

Tu1984 Hydroxy a-Sanshool, a Major Ingredient of TU-100 (Daikenchuto), Augments Migrating Motor Complex of Proximal Colon Triggered by Other Prokinetic Stimuli

Jeyaseelan, S., S. K. Young, M. Yamamoto, P. G. Arndt, S. Akira, J. K. Kolls, and G. S. Worthen. 2006. Toll/IL-1R domain-containing adaptor protein (TIRAP) is a critical mediator of antibacterial defense in the lung against Klebsiella pneumoniae but not Pseudomonas aeruginosa . J. Immunol. 177: [538 

Correction: Toll/IL-1R Domain-Containing Adaptor Protein (TIRAP) Is a Critical Mediator of Antibacterial Defense in the Lung against Klebsiella pneumoniae but Not Pseudomonas aeruginosa

The upregulation of interferon (IFN)-inducible GTPases in response to pathogenic insults is vital to host defense against many bacterial, fungal, and viral pathogens. Several IFN-inducible GTPases play key roles in mediating inflammasome activation and providing host protection after bacterial or fungal infections, though their role in inflammasome activation after viral infection is less clear. Among the IFN-inducible GTPases, the expression of immunity-related GTPases (IRGs) varies widely across species for unknown reasons. Here, we report that IRGB10, but not IRGM1, IRGM2, or IRGM3, is required for NLRP3 inflammasome activation in response to influenza A virus (IAV) infection. While IRGB10 functions to release inflammasome ligands in the context of bacterial and fungal infections, we found that IRGB10 facilitates endosomal maturation and nuclear translocation and viral replication of IAV. Corresponding with our in vitro results, we found that Irgb10-/- mice were more resistant to IAV-induced mortality than wild-type mice. The results of our study demonstrate a detrimental role of IRGB10 in host immunity in response to IAV and a novel function of IRGB10, but not IRGMs, in promoting viral translocation into the nucleus. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Masahiro Yamamoto

Papers

Fully Automatic Extraction of Carotid Artery Contours from Ultrasound Images

Tu1984 Hydroxy a-Sanshool, a Major Ingredient of TU-100 (Daikenchuto), Augments Migrating Motor Complex of Proximal Colon Triggered by Other Prokinetic Stimuli

Correction: Toll/IL-1R Domain-Containing Adaptor Protein (TIRAP) Is a Critical Mediator of Antibacterial Defense in the Lung against Klebsiella pneumoniae but Not Pseudomonas aeruginosa

The IFN-inducible GTPase IRGB10 regulates viral replication and inflammasome activation during influenza A virus infection in mice.

Reactive Ion Beam Etching and Overgrowth Process for Fabrication of InGaN Inner Stripe Laser Diodes