Suchergebnisse

Recently, researchers have focussed on the development of self-healing strategies in order to guarantee high performance regarding the durability of concrete structures. Exposing self-healing concrete to extreme conditions and evaluating its behaviour is the first step in understanding how the self-healing mechanism performs under these conditions. Nevertheless, there are limited studies subjecting self-healing concretes to harsh conditions combining extreme low temperatures and salt attacks. Therefore, we concentrate in this study on freezing and thawing conditions with de-icing salts, specifically with sodium chloride. It is an innovative assessment of self-healing concrete including commercially manufactured bacteria as healing agent. The objective is to ensure that autonomous crack healing occurs, restricting chloride ingress, extending the service life, and reducing the effect of degradation. The study presents the influence of the exposure conditions through permeability tests, microscopic investigations, scaling analyses, and chloride penetration. The permeability tests showed complete sealing after freezing and thawing cycles. Nevertheless, the healing products were removed together with material that was scaled off the surface due to cyclic freezing and thawing. The bacteria enhanced the properties of the concrete, resulting in less scaling and chloride penetration. However, chloride penetration through the crack cannot be prevented. ; This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 860006. The healing agent was provided by Basilisk and TU Delft, the latter being a beneficiary of SMARTINCS. T. Van Mullem and N. De Belie acknowledge the support of the grant (21SCIP C158977-02) from the Construction Technology Research Program funded by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport of the Korean government.

Recently, researchers have focussed on the development of self-healing strategies in order to guarantee high performance regarding the durability of concrete structures. Exposing self-healing concrete to extreme conditions and evaluating its behaviour is the first step in understanding how the self-healing mechanism performs under these conditions. Nevertheless, there are limited studies subjecting self-healing concretes to harsh conditions combining extreme low temperatures and salt attacks. Therefore, we concentrate in this study on freezing and thawing conditions with de-icing salts, specifically with sodium chloride. It is an innovative assessment of self-healing concrete including commercially manufactured bacteria as healing agent. The objective is to ensure that autonomous crack healing occurs, restricting chloride ingress, extending the service life, and reducing the effect of degradation. The study presents the influence of the exposure conditions through permeability tests, microscopic investigations, scaling analyses, and chloride penetration. The permeability tests showed complete sealing after freezing and thawing cycles. Nevertheless, the healing products were removed together with material that was scaled off the surface due to cyclic freezing and thawing. The bacteria enhanced the properties of the concrete, resulting in less scaling and chloride penetration. However, chloride penetration through the crack cannot be prevented. ; This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 860006. The healing agent was provided by Basilisk and TU Delft, the latter being a beneficiary of SMARTINCS. T. Van Mullem and N. De Belie acknowledge the support of the grant (21SCIP C158977-02) from the Construction Technology Research Program funded by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport of the Korean government.

© 2021 Solé-Jiménez, Naya-Català, Piazzon, Estensoro, Calduch-Giner, Sitjà-Bobadilla, Van Mullem and Pérez-Sánchez. ; The present study aimed to unravel the effects of partial (50%; 50LSAqua) and total (100%; 100LSAqua) replacement of fish meal (FM) by a commercial protein source (LSAqua SusPro) made of bacterial and processed animal proteins (PAP) in farmed juveniles of gilthead sea bream (Sparus aurata). The trial lasted 8 weeks, and the feasibility of replacement was assessed in terms of growth performance, histopathological scoring and composition of mucosal adherent microbiota from anterior intestine (AI). Specific growth rates (SGR) of 50LSAqua fish were undistinguishable from the CTRL group, whereas a slight but significant growth impairment was found with the total replacement. Histological signs of inflammation across the intestine were more evident at the highest level of FM replacement, and the total concentration of short chain fatty acids (SCFA) in stripped feces decreased in a dose dependent manner. Illumina sequencing of gut mucosal microbiota yielded a mean of 130,439 reads per sample assigned to 1,567 OTUs at 97% identity threshold. The bacterial richness was similar in all groups, but a significantly higher Simpson diversity index was found in 100LSAqua fish. At the phylum level, Proteobacteria were the most abundant in all groups, whereas Firmicutes decreased and Actinobacteria increased with the FM replacement. At a closer look, pro-inflammatory Gammaproteobacteria of the genus Psychrobacter, and Acinetobacter decreased with FM replacement, whereas the anti-inflammatory Paracoccus, Arthrobacter, and Actinomycetales increased, with a remarkable presence of the Propioniciclava genus in LSAqua groups. The inferred metagenome analysis suggested that these discriminant bacteria could be implicated in a counter-regulatory anti-inflammatory response. It also pointed to an over-representation of mucosal microbes that can potentially be involved in the natural production of antimicrobials in fish fed the experimental diets. ; This work was supported by the EU H2020 Research Innovation Program under the TNA Program (project AE170009) at IATS-CSIC Research Infrastructure within AQUAEXCEL2020 Project (652831). This output reflects only the author's view and the European Union cannot be held responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained herein. Additional funding was obtained by a Spanish MICINN project (Bream-AquaINTECH, RTI2018–094128-B-I00). MCP was funded by a Ramón y Cajal Postdoctoral Research Fellowship [RYC2018-024049-I/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 co-funded by the European Social Fund (ESF) & ACOND/2020 Generalitat Valenciana].

Published ; Journal Article ; Meta-Analysis ; Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural ; Research Support, N.I.H., Intramural ; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't ; Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S. ; Thyroid hormone is essential for normal metabolism and development, and overt abnormalities in thyroid function lead to common endocrine disorders affecting approximately 10% of individuals over their life span. In addition, even mild alterations in thyroid function are associated with weight changes, atrial fibrillation, osteoporosis, and psychiatric disorders. To identify novel variants underlying thyroid function, we performed a large meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies for serum levels of the highly heritable thyroid function markers TSH and FT4, in up to 26,420 and 17,520 euthyroid subjects, respectively. Here we report 26 independent associations, including several novel loci for TSH (PDE10A, VEGFA, IGFBP5, NFIA, SOX9, PRDM11, FGF7, INSR, ABO, MIR1179, NRG1, MBIP, ITPK1, SASH1, GLIS3) and FT4 (LHX3, FOXE1, AADAT, NETO1/FBXO15, LPCAT2/CAPNS2). Notably, only limited overlap was detected between TSH and FT4 associated signals, in spite of the feedback regulation of their circulating levels by the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid axis. Five of the reported loci (PDE8B, PDE10A, MAF/LOC440389, NETO1/FBXO15, and LPCAT2/CAPNS2) show strong gender-specific differences, which offer clues for the known sexual dimorphism in thyroid function and related pathologies. Importantly, the TSH-associated loci contribute not only to variation within the normal range, but also to TSH values outside the reference range, suggesting that they may be involved in thyroid dysfunction. Overall, our findings explain, respectively, 5.64% and 2.30% of total TSH and FT4 trait variance, and they improve the current knowledge of the regulation of hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid axis function and the consequences of genetic variation for hypo- or hyperthyroidism. ; Intramural Research Program of the NIH ; NCRR ; NHLBI ; MedStar Research Institute ; NINDS ; National Center of Advancing Translational Technologies CTSI ; National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases ; Robert Dawson Evans Endowment ; Italian Ministry of Health ; University and Research of the Autonomous Province of Bolzano ; European Union's Seventh Framework Programme ; ENGAGE project ; EPIGENESYS ; BLUEPRINT ; Dutch Innovation-Oriented Research Program on Genomics ; Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) ; South Tyrolean Sparkasse Foundation ; Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre ; University of Maryland General Clinical Research Center ; Johns Hopkins University General Clinical Research Center ; Baltimore Veterans Administration Geriatric Research and Education Clinical Center (GRECC) ; Netherlands Research Institute for Diseases in the Elderly ; Erasmus Medical Center and Erasmus University, Rotterdam ; Netherlands Organization for the Health Research and Development (ZonMw) ; Dutch Ministry for Health, Welfare and Sports ; European Commission ; Municipality of Rotterdam ; German Bundesministerium fuer Forschung und Technology ; Wellcome Trust ; English Department of Health, National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Comprehensive Biomedical Research Centre ; Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Canadian Foundation for Innovation ; Fonds de la Recherche en Santé Québec, Ministère du Développement Économique, de l'Innovation et de l'Exportation ; Lady Davis Institute of the Jewish General Hospital (JBR) ; Australian National Health and Medical Research Council ; Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital Research Fund ; Italian "Compagnia di San Paolo" ; Italian "Fondazione Cariplo" ; Leiden University Medical Centre ; Dutch Arthritis Association ; Pfizer, Groton, CT, USA ; Dutch Centre of Medical System Biology ; Netherlands Genomics Initiative (NGI), Netherlands Consortium of Healthy Aging ; Academy of Finland ; Finnish Diabetes Research Society ; Folkhälsan Research Foundation ; Novo Nordisk Foundation ; Finska Läkaresällskapet, Signe and Ane Gyllenberg Foundation ; University of Helsinki ; European Science Foundation (EUROSTRESS) ; Finnish Ministry of Education ; Ahokas Foundation ; Emil Aaltonen Foundation ; Juho Vainio Foundation ; BBSRC ; EPSRC ; ESRC ; MRC ; AXA Research Fund ; Help the Aged/Research Into Ageing (Disconnected Mind) ; Economic Structure Enhancing Fund (FES) of the Dutch government ; Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs ; Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science ; Northern Netherlands Collaboration of Provinces (SNN) ; Province of Groningen ; University of Groningen ; Dutch Kidney Foundation ; Dutch Diabetes Research Foundation ; Bristol-Myers Squibb ; Netherlands Heart Foundation ; National Computing Facilities Foundation (NCF), Netherlands ; Endocrine Research Fund