Assessment Of An Acrylic Polymer On The Properties Of Soil-Cement

The aim of this study is to compare the performance of Soil Cement with a manufactured polymer in order to examine the physical properties of the stabilized materiaL The study determine strength, durability, chemical analysis, mineralogical study, microstructural investigation and, computer modeling, CHEVPC. The laterite soil named Serdang series was used as a fundamental control material for this study. Normal Portland cement and polymer were used as stabilizing agents. Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) design and Tukey test were used for the unconfined compression strength data between the curing periods and between cement and polymer content. The study showed significant difference (p < 0.05) in the amount for 8% cement with 1 0% polymer (SCP8 1 0) between the curing periods, between cement content; and between polymer content

Efficacy of Multifunctionalized Saccharide Constructs for the Attenuation of Amyloid-beta Toxicity

There is evidence that amyloid-beta (Aβ) toxicity is mediated through interactions and binding with neuronal surface sialic acids in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The binding affinity is higher if the sialic acids are clustered and toxicity of Aβ was attenuated by removal of neuronal sialic acids. Thus, interfering with cell membrane-Aβ binding using biomimetics that could reproduce the clustered sialic acid structure could present us with a potential target for therapeutic intervention in AD. Based on this hypothesis, we developed several multifunctionalized sialic acid labeled chitosan compounds of different valency, or number of sialic acid per chitosan molecule, to attenuate Aβ toxicity. A cross-linker, 1-Ethyl-3-(3-dimethylaminopropyl) carbodiimide hydrochloride (EDC) was used, which provided control over the degree of labeling of chitosan. After characterization, the ability of the complexes to attenuate toxicity of Aβ(1-40) was investigated in vitro. We found that all linear polysialylated complexes showed significant ability to attenuate Aβ toxicity, with optimum balance between intrinsic toxicity and protection around 37% labeling of chitosan. Moreover, unlabeled chitosan also showed some level of protective properties to the labeled compounds. Then, four biological sugars that are structural analogs of sialic acid (N-Acetylneuraminic acid) were used to decorate approximately 35% of the chitosan backbone using EDC chemistry. After characterization, the ability of these sugar complexes to attenuate toxicity of Aβ was investigated in vitro. We investigated whether sugars other than sialic acid provided better toxicity attenuation and attempted to understand the impact of sub-structures or unique –R groups of sialic acid and its analogs in Aβ toxicity attenuation. Our results show that oxygen substitution in the ring structure contributes to the intrinsic toxicity but also plays a role in Aβ toxicity attenuation. Similarly, the multi –OH tail present in sialic acid plays an important role in Aβ toxicity attenuation. This approach of designing effective biomimetics and of determining the structure-activity relationship has relevance with respect to the development of new intelligent class of therapeutic agents for AD. Although this work focuses on AD, this approach can be extended to other diseases involving misfolded proteins

INFLUENCE OF THERMAL MODIFICATION ON THE PHYSICAL AND MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF Eucalyptus badjensis MIXED PARTICLEBOARD / OSB PANELS

The objective of this research was to evaluate the effects of thermal modifications, at different temperatures and exposure times, on the technological properties of mixed particleboard / OSB panels made out of Eucalyptus badjensis. Using the wood of Eucalyptus badjensis, Particleboard, OSB and mixed Particleboard/OSB panels (control and thermally modified) were manufactured. The mixed panels’ thermal modification was carried out under three temperatures (180ºC, 200ºC and 220ºC) and two exposure times (10 minutes and 12 minutes). For the panels’ manufacturing, 6% of phenol-formaldehyde adhesive and 1% of paraffin were employed, which was calculated based on the particles’ dry mass. The water absorption and thickness swelling properties were evaluated after 2 and 24 hours of immersion, in addition to the panels’ modulus of elasticity, modulus of rupture and internal bond. Based on the results, we were able to conclude that the thermal modification affected most of the physical properties positively. From the different exposure times studied, the most effective one was the period of 12 minutes, especially for water absorption after 2 hours, which caused a reduction of 11.27%. In turn, the most effective temperature was of 220ºC, highlighting the thickness swelling after 24 hours, which caused a swelling decrease of 23.76% in comparison with the control panels. Regarding the mechanical properties, the thermal modification, in terms of the studied exposure times and temperatures, did not affect the results of the mixed particleboard /OSB panels.

Effect of antioxidants on the oxidation of low density lipoprotein at lysosomal pH

Oxidised forms of low-densitylipoprotein (LDL) are widely belived to beinvolved in the pathogenesis of atherogenesis,but large clinical trials have not shown protectionof cardiovascular diseaseby antioxidants. Recently, it has been shownthat LDL can be oxidised by iron in the lysosomes of macrophages. We hypothesised that antioxidants would protect LDL against oxidation less well at lysosomal pH than at pH 7.4.LDL was enriched with α-tocopherol by incubating plasma with α-tocopherol and isolating the LDL. This enrichment inhibited LDL oxidation by copper ions (Cu2+) at pH 7.4,but not at pH4.5, as shown by spectrophotometry at 234 nm to measure conjugated dienes and by HPLC to measure individual oxidised lipids. α-Tocopherol enrichment did not inhibit LDL oxidation by Fe3+ (2, 5 or 20 μM) at pH4.5 ,but inhibiteitby 5 or 20 μM Fe2+,but not 2 μM Fe2+. This might help to explain whyα-tocopherol did not inhibit cardiovascular diseases inthe large clinical trials. The antioxidant tempol and probucol inhibited the late phase of LDL oxidation by Fe2+and Cu2+at pH 4.5 more than the early phase, possibly because they were located mainly in the phospholipid monolayer of LDL, rather than in the cholesteryl ester of the LDL particle. There is a suggestion that lysosomal dysfunction plays an important role in atherosclerosis. Thelysosomal oxidation of LDL aggregated by sphingomelinaseresulted in the production of the advanced lipid peroxidation product (ceroid).α-Tocopherol enrichment of macrophagesdid notprotectthem against apoptosis induced by H2O2.The work presented here also demonstrated LDL oxidisedFe2+at pH 4.5, decreasedendothelium-dependent vasodilatationof rat aortic rings. This suggests that VIlysosomallyoxidised LDL released from dead cells in atherosclerotic lesionsmight damage the endothelium.Takentogather,these results suggest that inhibiting the oxidation of LDLin lysosomes might be a therapy of atherosclerosis

MEDICATION CHANGES & RECOMMENDATIONS IN A CLINICAL GERONTOLOGY SERVICE

The purpose of this prospective study was to assess medication changes instituted during geriatric assessment and to determine compliance with medication recommendations three months post-discharge. Additional information to be studied included physicians' opinions of a Clinical Gerontology Service (CGS) discharge summary and the impact of the addition of a pharmacist-prepared medication discharge summary. Patients who underwent geriatric assessment had their medication regimens assessed on admission, discharge, and three months post-discharge. As an intervention, a pharmacist-prepared medication discharge section was added to the multidisciplinary discharge summary. A questionnaire was used to determine referring and primary care physicians' opinions of the CGS discharge summary. A total of 104 patients (two patients with readmissions, therefore 106 study cases) participated. The mean age of the study population was 80.6 (SD=6.8) years. Patients were admitted on an average of 5.5 (SD=3.3) total medications. They were discharged on an average of 4.3 (SD=2.3) and were again on an average of 5.5 (SD=2.9) total medications by three months post-discharge. There were no significant differences in scheduled medication costs between admission, discharge, and follow-up. Numerous drug additions, discontinuations, dose and administration interval changes occurred during and after assessment. There were also many changes in the choice of therapeutic agents prescribed. A number of variables were identified which were significantly correlated with the number of medication changes which occurred. The overall response rate for the questionnaires was 67.5%. For two of the three CGS study sites, physicians reported that discharge summaries were not received within a desirable time period. The overall quality of the discharge summary and the quality of the medication information provided received median rank scores of 4 (on a five point Likert scale labelled as 1=poor and 5=excellent). Physicians rated as "very important" the inclusion of information in discharge summaries about discharge medications along with their therapeutic rationale, changes in dose and reasons for this change, medications discontinued and reasons for the discontinuations, and medications added and reasons for the additions. The pharmacy discharge summary had no significant impact on decreasing medication numbers, costs, or changes between discharge and follow-up. Because the control group may have been sicker (possible selection bias), it was not possible to determine if polypharmacy occurred less frequently in intervention patients, or whether the more favorable questionnaire responses from physicians of these patients were actually due to the presence of the pharmacy discharge summary

The Performance of Bootstrap Confidence Intervals of Cрк Index Based on Mm-Estimator

A Cрк index is used to measure whether a production process is capable of producing items that satisfy a customer requirements(i.e specification limits). The c' index is based on the sample mean, x and sample standard deviation, s which are known to be very sensitive to the presence of outliers. As an alternative, we may turn to the robust location and scale estimate based on a robust MM estimates which are Jess affected by outliers. A major step toward the correct understanding and interpretation of Cрк index is by constructing it's confidence interval. The construction of such intervals assume that the measurement process having a normal distribution. However, many process are not nomlal and have a rat-tailed distribution which are prone to produce outliers. An allemative approach is to use bootstrap method such as the Percentile (P) and Bias Corrected and Acceleration (Bca) for calculating approximates confidence intervals of Cрк index. It is computer intensive based method that can be utilized without relying any assumption on the underlying distribution. The results of the studies reveal that the Bca method seems to perfonn better than the Percentile method for both nonnal and skewed process. The performance of the Cрк-MM estimates were investigated for further by comparing the bootstrap confidence interval for Cрк index MM estimates and the wellknown classical Cрк estimates. Based on simulation studies, show that the MM estimates produced more reliable confidence interval compared to the classical Cрк estimates

Performance Of Bootstrap Confidence Intervals Of Cpk Index Based On Mm•Estimator

C,pk indeks digunakan untuk mengukur samada proses pengeluaran sesuatu barangan berupaya memenuhi kehendak pelanggan ( had spesifikasi ). Pengiraan indeks Cpk adalah berasaskan min sampel, x dan sisihan piawai sampel. s yang mana ukuran ini sangat sensitif terhadap kewujudan titik terpencil. Sebagai pilihan alternatif, lokasi teguh dan anggaran skala berasaskan kepada anggaran MM dipilih kerana ia kurang sensilif kepada titik terpencil. Langkah utama untuk mendapatkan kefahaman dan pentafsiran yang betul bagi indeks Cpk ialah dengan membina selang keyakinan baginya. Pembinaan selang ini berdasarkan anggapan pengukuran proses mempunyai taburan normal. Bagaimanapun banyak proses adalah tidak normal dan mempunyai taburan yang berhujung tebal yang menghasilkan titik terpencil. Pendekatan altematif ialah dengan menggunakan kaedah bootstrap seperti Persentil (P) dan Bca untuk mengira selang keyakinan bagi indeks C,k. Kaedah ini berasaskan penggunaan komputer secara intensif dan boleh digunakan tanpa bergantung kepada sebarang taburan sesuatu proses. Keputusan kajian menunjukkan bahawa kaedah Bea mempunyai prestasi yang lebih baik daripada kaedah Persentil untuk kedua-dua proses normal dan pencong. Prestasi bagi penganggar Cpk -MM seterusnya dikaji lagi dengan membandingkan selang keyakinan bootstrap bagi indeks Cpk anggaran MM dan anggaran klasik. Kajian simulasi menunjukkan bahawa anggaran MM menghasilkan selang keyakinan yang mempunyai kebolehpercayaan yang lebih tinggi berbanding dengan anggaran Cpk klasik

Comparative analysis of Bausch and Lomb\u27s IVEX refraction system and a traditional refraction

Bausch and Lomb\u27s IVEX system, a computerized subjective refractor, was evaluated, A modified Optometric Extension Program (OEP) twenty-one point examination was performed three times on each of forty-nine subjects, Two examinations were performed on the IVEX system, one utilizing a monocular method and one a binocular method of distance refraction. The third examination was performed using a traditional refracting lane and refractor. Individual findings and OEP distance and near prescriptions obtained by the IVEX methods were compared to those obtained by the traditional refraction. A statistically significant difference was found for distance subjective to best visual acuity findings for both monocular and binocular IVEX methods, When comparing the monocular IVEX to the traditional method the distance and near OEP prescriptions were not significantly different. Distance and near OEP prescriptions from the binocular IVEX were significantly different, although the target used may be at least partially responsible for this difference, As a rule, distance sphere findings tended to be slightly more minus with the IVEX examinations, However, these differences may not be clinically significant. Individual test findings were also compared, Many of the IVEX findings compared quite favorably with the traditional refraction findings. However, some individual findings showed differences which warrant further study

Memories for sexual encounters: Sexual attitudes, personality, gender, and evidence for personal flashbulb effects

Recollections of first and most recent sex experiences were examined as personal flashbulb memories (FBM) using open narrative and probed recall estimates over the course of two studies. Furthermore, dimensions of gender, personality, and sexual attitudes were analyzed for their effects on sexual memory. Although both experiences were rated as equally arousing, the first sexual experience occurred with a longer delay to test and was talked about more than three times as much as the most recent experience. However, memories for most recent sexual experiences were rated as more vivid in study II. Yet, first sexual memories contained more narrative memory features than most recent memories. Personality and sexual attitudes did correlate with aspects of behavior and gender, but did not display an effect on memory. Finally, only minor effects of gender were found concerning memory. These results are discussed within the framework ofFBM and human sexuality research