The invertebrate blood-brain barrier (BBB) field is growing at a rapid pace and, in recent years, studies have shown a physiologic and molecular complexity that has begun to rival its vertebrate counterpart. Novel mechanisms of paracellular barrier maintenance through G-protein coupled receptor signaling were the first demonstrations of the complex adaptive mechanisms of barrier physiology. Bui...

Barrier synchronization is commonly and widely used to synchronize the execution of parallel processor cores on multi-core Network-on-Chips (NoCs). Since its global nature may cause heavy serialization resulting in large performance penalty, barrier synchronization should be carefully designed to have low latency communication and to minimize overall completion time. Therefore, in the paper, we...

During the process of speciation, populations may diverge for traits and at their underlying loci that contribute barriers to gene flow. These barrier traits and barrier loci underlie individual barrier effects, by which we mean the contribution that a barrier locus or trait-or some combination of barrier loci or traits-makes to overall isolation. The evolution of strong reproductive isolation ...

For terrestrial creatures, the water-impermeable barrier function of the skin is essential to maintain life in the face of environmental dryness. Stratum corneum, which plays a crucial role in the barrier function, is composed of two components, i.e., protein-rich nonviable cells and intercellular lipid domains. When the barrier function is damaged by a surfactant, organic solvent or tape strip...

Atopic dermatitis (AD) is characterized by skin inflammation, barrier dysfunction and chronic pruritus. In this review, recent advances in the pathogenesis of AD are summarized. Clinical efficacy of the anti-IL-4 receptor antibody dupilumab implies that type 2 cytokines IL-4 and IL-13 have pivotal roles in atopic inflammation. The expression of IL-4 and IL-13 as well as type 2 chemokines such a...