Plasma pharmacokinetics, faecal excretion and efficacy of pyrantel pamoate paste and granule formulations following per os administration in donkeys naturally infected with intestinal strongylidae

The plasma disposition, faecal excretion and efficacy of two formulations of pyrantel pamoate in donkeys were examined in a controlled trial. Three groups of seven donkeys received either no medication (control) or pyrantel paste or granule formulations at horse dosage of 20mg/kg B.W. (equals 6.94 mg/kg PYR base) of body weight. Heparinized blood and faecal samples were collected at various times between 1 and 144 h after treatment. The samples were analysed by high-performance liquid chromatography. The last detectable plasma concentration (tmax) of paste formulation was significantly earlier (36.00 h) compared with granule formulation (46.29 h). Although, there was no significant difference on terminal half lives (t1/2: 12.39 h vs. 14.86 h), tmax (14.86 h vs. 14.00) and MRT (24.80 h vs. 25.44 h) values; the Cmax (0.09 ??g/ml) AUC (2.65 ??gh/ml) values of paste formulation were significantly lower and smaller compared with those of granule formulation (0.21 ??g/ml and 5.60 ??gh/ml), respectively. The highest dry faecal concentrations were 710.46 ??g/g and 537.21 ??g/g and were determined at 48 h for both paste and granule formulation of PYR in donkeys, respectively. Pre-treatment EPG of 1104, 1061 and 1139 were observed for the control, PYR paste and PYR granule groups, respectively. Pre-treatment EPG were not significantly different (P>0.1) between groups. Post-treatment EPG for both PYR treatment groups were significantly different (P95% efficacy) until day 28. In all studied donkeys, coprocultures performed at day-3 revealed the presence of Cyathostomes, S. vulgaris. Faecal cultures performed on different days from C-group confirmed the presence of the same genera. Coprocultures from treated animals revealed the presence of few larvae of Cyathostomes

Optimizing vision and visuals: lectures on cameras, displays and perception

The evolution of the internet is underway, where immersive virtual 3D environments (commonly known as metaverse or telelife) will replace flat 2D interfaces. Crucial ingredients in this transformation are next-generation displays and cameras representing genuinely 3D visuals while meeting the human visual system's perceptual requirements. This course will provide a fast-paced introduction to optimization methods for next-generation interfaces geared towards immersive virtual 3D environments. Firstly, we will introduce lensless cameras for high dimensional compressive sensing (e.g., single exposure capture to a video or one-shot 3D). Our audience will learn to process images from a lensless camera at the end. Secondly, we introduce holographic displays as a potential candidate for next-generation displays. By the end of this course, you will learn to create your 3D images that can be viewed using a standard holographic display. Lastly, we will introduce perceptual guidance that could be an integral part of the optimization routines of displays and cameras. Our audience will gather experience in integrating perception to display and camera optimizations. This course targets a wide range of audiences, from domain experts to newcomers. To do so, examples from this course will be based on our in-house toolkit to be replicable for future use. The course material will provide example codes and a broad survey with crucial information on cameras, displays and perception

Metameric Inpainting for Image Warping

Image-warping , a per-pixel deformation of one image into another, is an essential component in immersive visual experiences such as virtual reality or augmented reality. The primary issue with image warping is disocclusions, where occluded (and hence unknown) parts of the input image would be required to compose the output image. We introduce a new image warping method, Metameric image inpainting - an approach for hole-filling in real-time with foundations in human visual perception. Our method estimates image feature statistics of disoccluded regions from their neighbours. These statistics are inpainted and used to synthesise visuals in real-time that are less noticeable to study participants, particularly in peripheral vision. Our method offers speed improvements over the standard structured image inpainting methods while improving realism over colour-based inpainting such as push-pull. Hence, our work paves the way towards future applications such as depth image-based rendering, 6-DoF 360 rendering, and remote render-streaming

Perceptually guided computer-generated holography

Computer-Generated Holography (CGH) promises to deliver genuine, high-quality visuals at any depth. We argue that combining CGH and perceptually guided graphics can soon lead to practical holographic display systems that deliver perceptually realistic images. We propose a new CGH method called metameric varifocal holograms. Our CGH method generates images only at a user’s focus plane while displayed images are statistically correct and indistinguishable from actual targets across peripheral vision (metamers). Thus, a user observing our holograms is set to perceive a high quality visual at their gaze location. At the same time, the integrity of the image follows a statistically correct trend in the remaining peripheral parts. We demonstrate our differentiable CGH optimization pipeline on modern GPUs, and we support our findings with a display prototype. Our method will pave the way towards realistic visuals free from classical CGH problems, such as speckle noise or poor visual quality

Vaccination coverage and reasons for non-vaccination in a district of Istanbul

BACKGROUND: In order to control and eliminate the vaccine preventable diseases it is important to know the vaccination coverage and reasons for non-vaccination. The primary objective of this study was to determine the complete vaccination rate; the reasons for non-vaccination and the predictors that influence vaccination of children. The other objective was to determine coverage of measles vaccination of the Measles Immunization Days (MID) 2005 for children aged 9 month to 6 years in a region of Umraniye, Istanbul, Turkey. METHODS: A '30 × 7' cluster sampling design was used as the sampling method. Thirty streets were selected at random from study area. Survey data were collected by a questionnaire which was applied face to face to parents of 221 children. A Chi-square test and logistic regression was used for the statistical analyses. Content analysis method was used to evaluate the open-ended questions. RESULTS: The complete vaccination rate for study population was 84.5% and 3.2% of all children were totally non-vaccinated. The siblings of non-vaccinated children were also non-vaccinated. Reasons for non-vaccination were as follows: being in the village and couldn't reach to health care services; having no knowledge about vaccination; the father of child didn't allow vaccination; intercurrent illness of child during vaccination time; missed opportunities like not to shave off a vial for only one child. In logistic regression analysis, paternal and maternal levels of education and immigration time of both parents to Istanbul were found to influence whether children were completely vaccinated or non-vaccinated. Measles vaccination coverage during MID was 79.3%. CONCLUSION: Efforts to increase vaccination coverage should take reasons for non-vaccination into account

Effects of selenium on ischaemia-reperfusion injury in a rat testis model

Selenium is shown to have beneficial effects on ischaemia-reperfusion (IR) injury. Our aim was to assess the effects of selenium on IR-induced testicular damage in terms of biochemical and histopathological evaluation. A total of 32 rats were randomised into four groups: control, IR, IR + selenium (IR + S) and S. Detorsion was applied after 3 h of torsion. Testicular tissue superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione (GSH), malondialdehyde (MDA), total antioxidant capacity (TAC) and DNA fragmentation levels were determined. Testicular tissue samples were examined by histopathological examination and terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick end-labelling staining. The control, IR and IR + S groups had higher SOD values compared with the S group; SOD levels of the control and IR + S groups were higher than those of the IR group (P < 0.05). Further, MDA levels of the IR group were higher than those in the other three groups (P < 0.05). The IR group revealed lower TAC levels than the three groups (P < 0.05 for all). GSH levels of the IR group were significantly lower than those in the other three groups (P < 0.05 for all). In contrast, GSH levels of the IR + S group increased compared with those of the S group. The IR group had more DNA fragmentation than the control and S groups (P < 0.05). It is concluded that selenium possibly reduces oxidative stress and apoptosis caused by testicular IR injury in rats. The testicular protective effect of selenium appears to be mediated through its anti-apoptotic and antioxidative effects. However, selenium does not affect DNA fragmentation