RMS

Despite the wide use of surface electromyography (EMG) recorded during dynamic exercises, the reproducibility of EMG variables has not been fully established in a course of a dynamic leg exercise. The aim of this study was to investigate the reproducibility of eight lower limb muscles activity level during a pedaling exercise performed until exhaustion.Eight male were tested on two days held three days apart. Surface EMG was recorded from vastus lateralis, rectus femoris (RF), vastus medialis, semimembranosus, biceps femoris, gastrocnemius lateral, gastrocnemius medianus and tibialis anterior during incremental exercise test. The root mean square, an index of global EMG activity, was averaged every five crank revolutions (corresponding to about 3 s at 85 rpm) throughout the tests.Despite inter-subjects variations, we showed a high reproducibility of the activity level of lower limb muscles during a progressive pedaling exercise performed until exhaustion. However, RF muscle seemed to be the less reproducible of the eight muscles investigated during incremental pedaling exercise. These results suggest that each subject adopt a personal muscle activation strategy in a course of an incremental cycling exercise but fatigue phenomenon can induce some variations in the most fatigable muscles (RF).

Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs) are commonly deployed in various environments. The WLAN data packets are not transmitted continuously but often worst-case exposure of WLAN is assessed, assuming 100% activity and leading to huge overestimations. Actual duty cycles of WLAN are thus of importance for time-averaging of exposure when checking compliance with international guidelines on limiting adverse health effects. In this paper, duty cycles of WLAN using Wi-Fi technology are determined for exposure assessment on large scale at 179 locations for different environments and activities (file transfer, video streaming, audio, surfing on the internet, etc.). The median duty cycle equals 1.4% and the 95th percentile is 10.4% (standard deviation SD = 6.4%). Largest duty cycles are observed in urban and industrial environments. For actual applications, the theoretical upper limit for the WLAN duty cycle is 69.8% and 94.7% for maximum and minimum physical data rate, respectively. For lowe...

A better understanding of pediatric tumor biology is needed to allow the development of less toxic and more efficient therapies, as well as to provide novel reliable biomarkers for diagnosis and risk stratification. The emerging role of microRNAs in controlling key pathways implicated in tumorigenesis makes their use in diagnostics a powerful novel tool for the early detection, risk assessment and prognosis, as well as for the development of innovative anticancer therapies. This perspective would be more urgent for the clinical management of pediatric cancer. In this review, we focus on the involvement of microRNAs in the biology of the main childhood tumors, describe their clinical significance and discuss their potential use as novel therapeutic tools and targets.

The goal of this work is to predict the daily performance (COP) of a ground-source heat pump (GSHP) system with the minimum data set based on an adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) with a fuzzy weighted pre-processing (FWP) method. To evaluate the effectiveness of our proposal (FWP–ANFIS), a computer simulation is developed on MATLAB environment. The comparison of the proposed hybridized system's results with the standard ANFIS results is carried out and the results are given in the tables. The efficiency of the proposed method was demonstrated by using the 3-fold cross-validation test. The statistical methods, such as the root-mean squared (RMS), the coefficient of multiple determinations (R2) and the coefficient of variation (cov), are given to compare the predicted and actual values for model validation. The average R2 values is 0.9998, the average RMS value is 0.0272 and the average cov value is 0.7733, which can be considered as very promising. The data set for the COP of GSHP system available included 38 data patterns. The simulation results show that the FWP-based ANFIS can be used in an alternative way in these systems. The prediction results of the proposed structure were much better than the standard ANFIS results. Therefore, instead of limited experimental data found in the literature, faster and simpler solutions are obtained using hybridized structures such as FWP-based ANFIS.

Shc(s) family of adaptor molecules has been implicated in several physiological functions. In particular, our previous studies have shown major roles in the mechanisms that control the transition from proliferating neural stem cells (NSCs) to postmitotic neurons in the mammalian brain. In the adult brain, ShcA expression is mainly restricted to a subpopulation of cells in the subventricular zone (SVZ) neurogenic area, enlightening a potential role for this molecule in the establishment/maintenance of this adult NSC niche. In order to investigate this matter, here we took advantage of Cre/lox technology with the purpose of interfering with (or delete) ShcA function in nestin-expressing neural progenitors in vivo. Our analyses revealed signs of anatomical disorganization in the adult brain at the boundary between the striatum and the corpus callosum and reduced thickness both at the ventricular level and through the rostral migratory stream. Analysis of cell proliferation and cell death unveiled a prominent reduction of the former and no substantial alterations of the latter. Ultrastructural studies showed SVZ anatomical disarray and manifest variation in the SVZ cell type composition. In conclusion, these results provide evidence for a role of ShcA in the assembly and/or maintenance of the SVZ NSC niche in the adult brain.