Nanotoxicology: characterizing the scientific literature, 2000–2007

Understanding the toxicity of nanomaterials and nano-enabled products is important for human and environmental health and safety as well as public acceptance. Assessing the state of knowledge about nanotoxicology is an important step in promoting comprehensive understanding of the health and environmental implications of these new materials. To this end, we employed bibliometric techniques to characterize the prevalence and distribution of the current scientific literature. We found that the nano-toxicological literature is dispersed across a range of disciplines and sub-fields; focused on in vitro testing; often does not specify an exposure pathway; and tends to emphasize acute toxicity and mortality rather than chronic exposure and morbidity. Finally, there is very little research on consumer products, particularly on their environmental fate, and most research is on the toxicity of basic nanomaterials. The implications for toxicologists, regulators and social scientists studying nanotechnology and society are discussed

Evaluating access to health and care services during lockdown by the COVID-19 survey in five UK national longitudinal studies.

OBJECTIVE: Access to health services and adequate care is influenced by sex, ethnicity, socioeconomic position (SEP) and the burden of comorbidities. Our study aimed to assess whether the COVID-19 pandemic further deepened these already existing health inequalities. DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. SETTING: Data were collected from five longitudinal age-homogenous British cohorts (born in 2000-2002, 1989-1990, 1970, 1958 and 1946). PARTICIPANTS: A web survey was sent to the cohorts. Anybody who responded to the survey was included, resulting in 14 891 eligible participants. MAIN OUTCOMES MEASURED: The survey provided data on cancelled surgical or medical appointments, and the number of care hours received in a week during the first UK COVID-19 national lockdown. INTERVENTIONS: Using binary or ordered logistic regression, we evaluated whether these outcomes differed by sex, ethnicity, SEP and having a chronic illness. Adjustment was made for study design, non-response weights, psychological distress, presence of children or adolescents in the household, COVID-19 infection, key worker status, and whether participants had received a shielding letter. Meta-analyses were performed across the cohorts, and meta-regression was used to evaluate the effect of age as a moderator. RESULTS: Women (OR 1.40, 95% CI 1.27 to 1.55) and those with a chronic illness (OR 1.84, 95% CI 1.65 to 2.05) experienced significantly more cancellations during lockdown (all p<0.0001). Ethnic minorities and those with a chronic illness required a higher number of care hours during the lockdown (both OR≈2.00, all p<0.002). SEP was not associated with cancellation or care hours. Age was not independently associated with either outcome in the meta-regression. CONCLUSION: The UK government's lockdown approach during the COVID-19 pandemic appears to have deepened existing health inequalities, impacting predominantly women, ethnic minorities and those with chronic illnesses. Public health authorities need to implement urgent policies to ensure equitable access to health and care for all in preparation for a fourthwave

A new concurrent chemotherapy with vinorelbine and mitomycin C in combination with radiotherapy in patients with locally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck

Objective: The purpose of this pilot study was to evaluate the feasibility and toxicity of concurrent chemotherapy with vinorelbine and mitomycin C in combination with accelerated radiotherapy (RT) in patients with locally advanced cancer of the head and neck. Patients and Methods: Between January 2003 and March 2004, 15 patients with T4/N2-3 squamous cell carcinoma (12/15) and with N3 cervical lymph node metastases of carcinoma of unknown primary (3/15) were treated with chemotherapy and simultaneous accelerated RT. Results: 11 patients completed therapy without interruption or dose reduction. Grade 3 - 4 acute mucosal toxicity was observed in 9/15 patients, grade 4 hematologic toxicity in 6/15 patients. At a median follow-up of 7.5 months, 2 patients have died of intercurrent disease, 2 patients have experienced local relapse; 5 patients are alive with no evidence of disease at the primary tumor site. Discussion: The described regimen is highly effective, but led to remarkable side effects

Comprehensive analyses of DNA repair pathways, smoking and bladder cancer risk in Los Angeles and Shanghai

Tobacco smoking is a bladder cancer risk factor and a source of carcinogens that induce DNA damage to urothelial cells. Using data and samples from 988 cases and 1,004 controls enrolled in the Los Angeles County Bladder Cancer Study and the Shanghai Bladder Cancer Study, we investigated associations between bladder cancer risk and 632 tagSNPs that comprehensively capture genetic variation in 28 DNA repair genes from four DNA repair pathways: base excision repair (BER), nucleotide excision repair (NER), non-homologous end-joining (NHEJ) and homologous recombination repair (HHR). Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for each tagSNP were corrected for multiple testing for all SNPs within each gene using pACT and for genes within each pathway and across pathways with Bonferroni. Gene and pathway summary estimates were obtained using ARTP. We observed an association between bladder cancer and POLB rs7832529 (BER) (pACT = 0.003; ppathway = 0.021) among all, and SNPs in XPC (NER) and OGG1 (BER) among Chinese men and women, respectively. The NER pathway showed an overall association with risk among Chinese males (ARTP NER p = 0.034). The XRCC6 SNP rs2284082 (NHEJ), also in LD with SREBF2, showed an interaction with smoking (smoking status interaction pgene = 0.001, ppathway = 0.008, poverall = 0.034). Our findings support a role in bladder carcinogenesis for regions that map close to or within BER (POLB, OGG1) and NER genes (XPC). A SNP that tags both the XRCC6 and SREBF2 genes strongly modifies the association between bladder cancer risk and smoking

Subwavelength anti-diffracting beams propagating over more than 1,000 Rayleigh lengths

Propagating light beams with widths down to and below the optical wavelength require bulky large-aperture lenses and remain focused only for micrometric distances. Here, we report the observation of light beams that violate this localization/depth- of-focus law by shrinking as they propagate, allowing resolution to be maintained and increased over macroscopic propagation lengths. In nanodisordered ferroelectrics we observe a non-paraxial propagation of a sub-micrometre-sized beam for over 1,000 diffraction lengths, the narrowest visible beam reported to date. This unprecedented effect is caused by the nonlinear response of a dipolar glass, which transforms the leading opticalwave equation into a Klein-Gordon-type equation that describes a massive particle field. Our findings open the way to high-resolution optics over large depths of focus, and a route to merging bulk optics into nanodevices

Future therapeutic targets in rheumatoid arthritis?

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic inflammatory disease characterized by persistent joint inflammation. Without adequate treatment, patients with RA will develop joint deformity and progressive functional impairment. With the implementation of treat-to-target strategies and availability of biologic therapies, the outcomes for patients with RA have significantly improved. However, the unmet need in the treatment of RA remains high as some patients do not respond sufficiently to the currently available agents, remission is not always achieved and refractory disease is not uncommon. With better understanding of the pathophysiology of RA, new therapeutic approaches are emerging. Apart from more selective Janus kinase inhibition, there is a great interest in the granulocyte macrophage-colony stimulating factor pathway, Bruton's tyrosine kinase pathway, phosphoinositide-3-kinase pathway, neural stimulation and dendritic cell-based therapeutics. In this review, we will discuss the therapeutic potential of these novel approaches

TRY plant trait database - enhanced coverage and open access

Plant traits-the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants-determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait-based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits-almost complete coverage for 'plant growth form'. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait-environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects. We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives

Observation of associated near-side and away-side long-range correlations in √sNN=5.02 TeV proton-lead collisions with the ATLAS detector

Two-particle correlations in relative azimuthal angle (Δϕ) and pseudorapidity (Δη) are measured in √sNN=5.02  TeV p+Pb collisions using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements are performed using approximately 1  μb-1 of data as a function of transverse momentum (pT) and the transverse energy (ΣETPb) summed over 3.1<η<4.9 in the direction of the Pb beam. The correlation function, constructed from charged particles, exhibits a long-range (2<|Δη|<5) “near-side” (Δϕ∼0) correlation that grows rapidly with increasing ΣETPb. A long-range “away-side” (Δϕ∼π) correlation, obtained by subtracting the expected contributions from recoiling dijets and other sources estimated using events with small ΣETPb, is found to match the near-side correlation in magnitude, shape (in Δη and Δϕ) and ΣETPb dependence. The resultant Δϕ correlation is approximately symmetric about π/2, and is consistent with a dominant cos⁡2Δϕ modulation for all ΣETPb ranges and particle pT

Search for R-parity-violating supersymmetry in events with four or more leptons in sqrt(s) =7 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for new phenomena in final states with four or more leptons (electrons or muons) is presented. The analysis is based on 4.7 fb−1 of $\sqrt{s}=7\;\mathrm{TeV}$ proton-proton collisions delivered by the Large Hadron Collider and recorded with the ATLAS detector. Observations are consistent with Standard Model expectations in two signal regions: one that requires moderate values of missing transverse momentum and another that requires large effective mass. The results are interpreted in a simplified model of R-parity-violating supersymmetry in which a 95% CL exclusion region is set for charged wino masses up to 540 GeV. In an R-parity-violating MSUGRA/CMSSM model, values of m 1/2 up to 820 GeV are excluded for 10 < tan β < 40

Search for high-mass resonances decaying to dilepton final states in pp collisions at s√=7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider is used to search for high-mass resonances decaying to an electron-positron pair or a muon-antimuon pair. The search is sensitive to heavy neutral Z′ gauge bosons, Randall-Sundrum gravitons, Z * bosons, techni-mesons, Kaluza-Klein Z/γ bosons, and bosons predicted by Torsion models. Results are presented based on an analysis of pp collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 7 TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.9 fb−1 in the e + e − channel and 5.0 fb−1 in the μ + μ −channel. A Z ′ boson with Standard Model-like couplings is excluded at 95 % confidence level for masses below 2.22 TeV. A Randall-Sundrum graviton with coupling k/MPl=0.1 is excluded at 95 % confidence level for masses below 2.16 TeV. Limits on the other models are also presented, including Technicolor and Minimal Z′ Models