Kinetics of Electron Transfer between Azurin and Cytochrome 551 from Pseudomonas

Abstract The kinetics of electron transfer between the copper-containing protein azurin (Cu++/Cu+) and cytochrome 551 (Fe+++/Fe++) from Pseudomonas has been studied by rapid mixing methods. The reaction in both directions is fast; at low reagent concentrations (∼10-6 m) the apparent second order rate constant, at 20°, is about 3 x 106 m-1 sec-1 for the reaction Fe++ + Cu++ and 1.4 x 106 m-1 sec-1 for the reaction Fe+++ + Cu+. At high reagent concentrations the rates tend to reach a limiting value indicating that the reaction is not a simple second order process. The kinetics of the reactions of the reduced and oxidized forms of azurin and Pseudomonas cytochrome 551 with ferricyanide and dithionite has also been investigated. The rates of these reactions, at comparable reagent concentrations, are orders of magnitude lower than that between azurin and cytochrome 551

Thoracic Unilateral Spinal Cord Injury After Spinal Anaesthesia for Total Hip Replacement: Fate or Mistake?

Spinal anaesthesia is the most preferred anesthesia technique for total hip replacement, and its complications range from low entity (insignificant) to life threatening. The incidence of neurologic complications after neuraxial anaesthesia is not perfectly clear, although there are several described cases of spinal cord ischaemia. We present a case of unilateral T8–T11 spinal cord ischaemia following L2–L3 spinal anaesthesia for total hip replacement. Magnetic resonance imaging showed a hyperintense T8–T11 signal alteration on the leftside of paramedian spinal cord. A temporal epidemiologic linkage between the damage and the surgery seems to be present. The injury occurred without anatomical proximity between the injury site and the spinal needle entry site. This may be due to multiple contributing factors, each of them is probably not enough to determine the damage by itself; however, acting simultaneously, they could have been responsible for the complication. The result was unpredictable and unavoidable and was caused by unforeseeable circumstances and not by inadequate medical practice

Autism spectrum disorder in Italy: demand for an integrated epidemiological surveillance system.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a complex neurodevelopmental syndrome of emerging public health concern, according to a documented significant increase of diagnosed cases of ASD in Europe and USA. In Italy, actually, it is not possible to estimate at national level a reliable ASD occurrence by using existing health and scholastic data flows. The lack of information has implications on social and healthcare services dedicated to subjects affected by ADS. The database of the Italian institute in charge of social and security assistance was accessed at the provincial level to investigate the ASD cases occurred in the Palermo province. The official reports of all subjects visited in 2013 by INPS physicians were analyzed by using an automatic software and diagnosis consistent with ASD were ex- tracted and flagged. Our findings support the choice of alternative use of INPS administrative database in order to define a reliable ASD occurrence estimate as first step to develop an integrated epidemiological surveillance system on AS

T1 bladder cancer: comparison of the prognostic impact of two substaging systems on disease recurrence and progression and suggestion of a novel nomogram

Background: The T1 substaging of bladder cancer (BCa) potentially impacts disease progression. The objective of the study was to compare the prognostic accuracy of two substaging systems on the recurrence and progression of primary pathologic T1 (pT1) BCa and to test a nomogram based on pT1 substaging for predicting recurrence-free survival (RFS) and progression-free survival (PFS). Methods: The medical records of 204 patients affected by pT1 BCa were retrospectively reviewed. Substaging was defined according to the depth of lamina propria invasion in T1a-c and the extension of the lamina propria invasion to T1-microinvasive (T1m) or T1-extensive (T1e). Uni- and multivariable Cox regression models evaluated the independent variables correlated with recurrence and progression. The predictive accuracies of the two substaging systems were compared by Harrell's C index. Multivariate Cox regression models for the RFS and PFS were also depicted by a nomogram. Results: The 5-year RFS was 47.5% with a significant difference between T1c and T1a (p = 0.02) and between T1e and T1m (p < 0.001). The 5-year PFS was 75.9% with a significant difference between T1c and T1a (p = 0.011) and between T1e and T1m (p < 0.001). Model T1m-e showed a higher predictive power than T1a-c for predicting RFS and PFS. In the univariate and multivariate model subcategory T1e, the diameter, location, and number of tumors were confirmed as factors influencing recurrence and progression after adjusting for the other variables. The nomogram incorporating the T1m-e model showed a satisfactory agreement between model predictions at 5 years and actual observations. Conclusions: Substaging is significantly associated with RFS and PFS for patients affected by T1 BCa and should be included in innovative prognostic nomograms

Postictal Psychosis in Epilepsy: A Clinicogenetic Study

OBJECTIVE: Psychoses affecting people with epilepsy increase disease burden and diminish quality of life. We characterised post-ictal psychosis, which comprises about one-quarter of epilepsy-related psychoses, and has unknown causation. METHODS: We conducted a case-control cohort study including patients diagnosed with post-ictal psychosis, confirmed by psychiatric assessment, with available data regarding epilepsy, treatment, psychiatric history, psychosis profile and outcomes. After screening 3,288 epilepsy patients, we identified 83 with psychosis: 49 had post-ictal psychosis. Controls were 98 adults, matched by age and epilepsy type, with no history of psychosis. Logistic regression was used to investigate clinical factors associated with post-ictal psychosis; univariate associations with a P-value<0.20 were used to build a multivariate model. Polygenic risk scores for schizophrenia were calculated. RESULTS: Cases were more likely to have seizure clustering (OR 7.59, P<0.001), seizures with a recollected aura (OR 2.49, P=0.013) and a family history of psychiatric disease (OR 5.17, P=0.022). Cases showed predominance of right temporal epileptiform discharges (OR 4.87, P=0.007). There was no difference in epilepsy duration, neuroimaging findings or anti-seizure treatment between cases and controls. Polygenic risk scores for schizophrenia in an extended cohort of post-ictal psychosis cases (58) were significantly higher than in 1,366 epilepsy controls (R2 =3%, P=6x10-3 ), but not significantly different from 945 independent patients with schizophrenia (R2 =0.1%, P=0.775). INTERPRETATION: Post-ictal psychosis occurs under particular circumstances in people with epilepsy with a heightened genetic predisposition to schizophrenia, illustrating how disease biology (seizures) and trait susceptibility (schizophrenia) may interact to produce particular outcomes (post-ictal psychosis) in a common disease

Clinical and urodynamic findings in women affected by mixed urinary incontinence

The definition of mixed urinary incontinence (MUI) of the International Continence Society exclusively assesses patient-reported symptoms without consideration of physical and urodynamic results, what is inadequate to reliably predict the pathophysiology of the underlying pathology. We investigated and compared clinical and urodynamic findings in women with MUI and assessed predictive variables for the different MUI clinical presentations

Detection of damage in civil engineering structures by PCA on enviromental vibration data

The dynamic behavior of civil engineering structures are usually studied by means of ambient vibration observations and their performance is analyzed by Peak Picking and/or Operational Modal Analysis methods. This paper reports the first results of a statistical multivariate approach, specifically Principal Component Analysis, to detect a suspected structural damage on a sicilian highway bridge. Furthermore, the damage simulated in a simple structural model made it possible to understand the characteristics of the method consisting in comparing the observed data on an undamaged structure with those coming from a damaged one

Il monastero dei Frati Minori Riformati e la chiesa di Santa Maria delle Grazie. In: GABRIELLA COSTANTINO, BERNARDO AGRO' (a cura di), MUCEB. Museo della ceramica di Burgio. Contributi di storia dell'arte, archeologia ed etnoantropologia. vol. 1, p. 87-103, PALERMO: EDIZIONIDIPASSAGGIO, 2008 ISBN/ISSN: 978-88-6164-091-7

Il monastero dei Frati Minori Riformati e la chiesa di Santa Maria delle Grazie. In: GABRIELLA COSTANTINO, BERNARDO AGRO' (a cura di), MUCEB. Museo della ceramica di Burgio. Contributi di storia dell'arte, archeologia ed etnoantropologia. vol. 1, p. 87-103, PALERMO: EDIZIONIDIPASSAGGIO, 200