Invisible Facial Flushing in COVID-19 Patient Rapidly Detected by Smartphone Application: Subclinical Discovery with a Novel Method

No studies of COVID-19 patients mentioned that facial flushing was a clinical feature that could be found. The invisible facial flushing in COVID-19 patient, unrecognized clinical sign with the naked eye could be detected by the smartphone application and probably was the most common clinical features of Coronavirus disease 2019 as seen in dengue infection and influenza. We discovered the innovative method which can detect invisible facial flushing in dengue infection and influenza by using image enhancement with decorrelation combined image segmentation with K-means clustering. We expect to be able to apply to the COVID-19 patient too, because the clinical signs and symptoms, including the immunopathogenesis of dengue infection and influenza are similar to COVID-19. This is the first case of the COVID-19 patient with the appearance of invisible facial flushing detected by the smartphone application. The innovative application may be useful as a rapid screening tool for diagnosis of COVID-19 patients in the future. This novel screening tool for diagnosis of COVID-19 patients will help all medical service providers the effective screening tool for the recognition and early diagnosis before performing CT scans and real-time RT PCR (rRT-PCR) assays, especially in some health care facilities where could not be performed due to lack of laboratory support. Furthermore, application in active case finding for COVID-19, the key actions to stop transmission is challenging in countries with community transmission

Invisible Facial Flushing in Two Cases of Dengue Infection and Influenza Detected by PC Program and Smartphone App: Decorrelation Stretching and K-Means Clustering

We report the two cases of dengue infection and influenza with invisible facial flushing. The invisible facial flushing can be detected and visible by the Manote and Matinun (M&M) technique using PC program and smartphone app (decorrelation stretching and K-Means clustering). The unique patterns of facial flushing in the patients with high fever provide a clue to the diagnosis of dengue infection and influenza. This new innovative method could detect dengue infection and influenza earlier in the patients with high fever

Pyruvate carboxylase : a structure and function study using monoclonal antibodies and mutagenesis / Teerakul Arpornsuwan.

"June, 2003"Includes bibliographical references (leaves 169-200)viii, 215 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, School of Molecular and Biomedical Science, Discipline of Biochemistry, 200

Localization of inhibitory antibodies to the biotin domain of human pyruvate carboxylase

Pyruvate carboxylase [EC 6.4.1.1] plays an important anaplerotic role in many species by catalyzing the carboxylation of pyruvate to oxaloacetate. To extend our understanding about the structure and function of pyruvate carboxylase (PC), a series of monoclonal antibodies were raised against sheep liver PC and those displaying inhibitory activity were further characterized. The binding epitopes of two monoclonal antibodies that displayed strong inhibitory activity were mapped. Six overlapping fragments of the human enzyme were expressed as thioredoxin fusion proteins in Escherichia coli and subjected to Western blot analysis. Both monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) recognized fragments encompassing the enzyme's C-terminal region, known to contain the structured biotin domain. Through deletion analysis, this domain was determined to be a minimal size of 80 amino acids. Further deletions that disrupted the conformation of the domain abolished antibody binding, indicating these antibodies recognized discontinuous epitopes. To further define the critical residues required for antibody recognition, a model of the domain was produced and an alanine scan performed on selected surface-exposed residues. Our results show that residues encompassing the biotin attachment site, but not biotin itself, are critical for the binding of both antibodies. These data provide a mechanism to explain the inhibitory activity of the antibodies.Teerakul Arpornsuwan, Karen J. Carey, Grant W. Booker, Steven W. Polyak, and John C. Wallac

The effects of the extracts from Carthamus tinctorius L. on gene expression related to cholesterol metabolism in rats

Carthamus tinctorius L. (safflower) is in Thailand traditionally used for a herbal tea for health to reduce cholesteroland prevent atherosclerosis. The present study was aimed to investigate the effect of the crude extracts from safflower oncholesterol metabolism in high cholesterol fed rats. The crude extract was fractionated in hexane, dichloromethane, andmethanol. To evaluate the hypolipidemic effect, the safflower extracts were daily fed to normal and hyperlipidemic ratsinduced by 2%-cholesterol diet (W/W) supplementation, at dose of 250 mg/kg body wt. During the 4-week study, bodyweight, food intake, organ weight, and plasma cholesterol levels were evaluated. Animals treated with 2%-cholesterol dietand dichloromethane fraction for a week exhibited decreased body weight. After treatment for 14 and 30 days, a significantreduction in total cholesterol and total cholesterol/HDL-cholesterol and a significant induction in HDL-cholesterol wereobserved in the hypercholesterolemic rats treated with the dichloromethane extract. Higher expression of SRBI and ABCA1in the liver of the control group was observed after 4 weeks whereas no significant difference in the expression level of SRBIand ABCA1 was found in groups treated with extract after 2 and 4 weeks. The results of this study suggested that thedichloromethane extract can reduce the total cholesterol/HDL-cholesterol of hyperlipidemic rats. The expression of SRBIand ABCA1 mRNA may not be regulated by the crude extract of safflower, which may not in part explain the decrease inHDL-cholesterol and gene encoding enzymes of the cholesterol biosynthetic pathway