Comprehensive Analysis of Spatial Architecture in Primary Liver Cancer

Heterogeneity is the major challenge for cancer prevention and therapy. Here, we firstly constructed high-resolution spatial transcriptomes of primary liver cancers (PLCs) containing 84,823 spots within 21 tissues from 7 patients. The sequential comparison of spatial tumor microenvironment (TME) characteristics from non-tumor to leading-edge to tumor regions revealed that the tumor capsule potentially affects intratumor spatial cluster continuity, transcriptome diversity and immune cell infiltration. Locally, we found that the bidirectional ligand-receptor interactions at the 100 μm wide cluster-cluster boundary contribute to maintaining intratumor architecture. Our study provides novel insights for diverse tumor ecosystem of PLCs and has potential benefits for cancer intervention.

Sequential Comparisons and the Comparative Imagination

This chapter outlines three basic modes of comparison ethnographers wield: shadow comparisons to other cases that inform observations, internal comparisons among observations and other units of analysis within the case, and varieties of external comparison among different field sites. The authors then make two complementary arguments. First, the chapter widens ethnographers’ comparative imagination by arguing that ethnographers need to pay more careful attention to the interplay among different kinds of comparisons. And, second, the case is made that a preferred strategy for external comparison is sequential comparison, in which the ethnographer first abductively finds important puzzles in one field, and only then chooses a second field according to emerging theoretical themes.

Identification and Analysis of Multi-tasking Product Information Search Sessions with Query Logs

PurposeThis research aims to identify product search tasks in online shopping and analyze the characteristics of consumer multi-tasking search sessions.Design/methodology/approachThe experimental dataset contains 8,949 queries of 582 users from 3,483 search sessions. A sequential comparison of the Jaccard similarity coefficient between two adjacent search queries and hierarchical clustering of queries is used to identify search tasks.Findings(1) Users issued a similar number of queries (1.43 to 1.47) with similar lengths (7.3–7.6 characters) per task in mono-tasking and multi-tasking sessions, and (2) Users spent more time on average in sessions with more tasks, but spent less time for each task when the number of tasks increased in a session.Research limitationsThe task identification method that relies only on query terms does not completely reflect the complex nature of consumer shopping behavior.Practical implicationsThese results provide an exploratory understanding of the relationships among multiple shopping tasks, and can be useful for product recommendation and shopping task prediction.Originality/valueThe originality of this research is its use of query clustering with online shopping task identification and analysis, and the analysis of product search session characteristics.

Adiposity QTL Adip20 decomposes into at least four loci when dissected using congenic strains

An average mouse in midlife weighs between 25 and 30 g, with about a gram of tissue in the largest adipose depot (gonadal), and the weight of this depot differs between inbred strains. Specifically, C57BL/6ByJ mice have heavier gonadal depots on average than do 129P3/J mice. To understand the genetic contributions to this trait, we mapped several quantitative trait loci (QTLs) for gonadal depot weight in an F2 intercross population. Our goal here was to fine-map one of these QTLs, Adip20 (formerly Adip5), on mouse chromosome 9. To that end, we analyzed the weight of the gonadal adipose depot from newly created congenic strains. Results from the sequential comparison method indicated at least four rather than one QTL; two of the QTLs were less than 0.5 Mb apart, with opposing directions of allelic effect. Different types of evidence (missense and regulatory genetic variation, human adiposity/body mass index orthologues, and differential gene expression) implicated numerous candidate genes from the four QTL regions. These results highlight the value of mouse congenic strains and the value of this sequential method to dissect challenging genetic architecture.

A sequential comparison of postoperative voiding function between two different transobturator sling procedures

Introduction: We evaluated sequential postoperative voiding function of two types of sling procedures (Monarc® and ALIGN®) in patients with stress urinary incontinence.Methods: Ninety-one women diagnosed with urodynamic stress incontinence were randomly assigned to the study. All enrolled patients underwent Monarc or ALIGN procedure. They were postoperatively evaluated at one day, one week, one month, three months, 12 months, and 24 months. The voiding function was evaluated with uroflowmetry and post-void residual urine. Patients were asked if voiding had changed after surgery and had to complete the incontinence quality of life scale (I-QoL) questionnaire at 12 months.Results: The Monarc (n=47) and ALIGN (n=44) groups had similar demographic characteristics. The maximal flow rate (Qmax) was significantly decreased on the first day after surgery and gradually increased during the following weeks. Comparing the two groups at one week, the ALIGN group had a significantly decreased Qmax than the Monarc group (17.6 ± 5.2 vs. 20.7 ± 5.0; p=0.004). However, at one, three, 12, and 24 months, there were no significant differences between the two groups.Conclusions: This study demonstrated that an absorbable tensioning suture in the Monarc mesh could increase Qmax compared to ALIGN at one week after surgery. An absorbable tensioning suture may reduce the risk of an early postoperative voiding dysfunction compared to other meshes that do not have this.

Organizing Powers in Eventful Times

Historical and social scientific explanations often rely on major happenings and crises to define the topics of our inquiries or to delineate historical periods. But these models often prove limited and problematic. The challenge is to understand how action unfolds in a crisis and, in the process, reconfigures resources, opportunities, and horizons of possibility for new lines of strategic response. These questions are addressed through a comparison of Herbert Hoover and Harry Hopkins as they dealt with the onset of the Great Depression. Both men had the skills, network ties, and reputational resources that figure centrally in models of effective agency, but the contemporary assessments of their efforts differed dramatically. This pair of lives—Hoover and Hopkins—permits a cross-sectional comparison as both men wrestled with the onset of economic collapse and a sequential comparison as Hopkins inherited responsibility for relieving a crisis that had been shaped and reshaped by Hoover's actions.