Brief Note: The Effect of Alpha-Chlorohydrin on the Fertility of Male Rats

Author Institution: Center for Environmental Research and Services, Bowling Green Universit

On modeling and measuring viscoelasticity with dynamic Atomic Force Microscopy

The interaction between a rapidly oscillating atomic force microscope tip and a soft material surface is described using both elastic and viscous forces with a moving surface model. We derive the simplest form of this model, motivating it as a way to capture the impact dynamics of the tip and sample with an interaction consisting of two components: interfacial or surface force, and bulk or volumetric force. Analytic solutions to the piece-wise linear model identify characteristic time constants, providing a physical explanation of the hysteresis observed in the measured dynamic force quadrature curves. Numerical simulation is used to fit the model to experimental data and excellent agreement is found with a variety of different samples. The model parameters form a dimensionless impact-rheology factor, giving a quantitative physical number to characterize a viscoelastic surface that does not depend on the tip shape or cantilever frequency.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figure

Stable isotope metabolomics of pulmonary artery smooth muscle and endothelial cells in pulmonary hypertension and with TGF-beta treatment.

Altered metabolism in pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells (PASMCs) and endothelial cells (PAECs) contributes to the pathology of pulmonary hypertension (PH), but changes in substrate uptake and how substrates are utilized have not been fully characterized. We hypothesized stable isotope metabolomics would identify increased glucose, glutamine and fatty acid uptake and utilization in human PASMCs and PAECs from PH versus control specimens, and that TGF-β treatment would phenocopy these metabolic changes. We used 13C-labeled glucose, glutamine or a long-chain fatty acid mixture added to cell culture media, and mass spectrometry-based metabolomics to detect and quantify 13C-labeled metabolites. We found PH PASMCs had increased glucose uptake and utilization by glycolysis and the pentose shunt, but no changes in glutamine or fatty acid uptake or utilization. Diseased PAECs had increased proximate glycolysis pathway intermediates, less pentose shunt flux, increased anaplerosis from glutamine, and decreased fatty acid β-oxidation. TGF-β treatment increased glycolysis in PASMCs, but did not recapitulate the PAEC disease phenotype. In TGF-β-treated PASMCs, glucose, glutamine and fatty acids all contributed carbons to the TCA cycle. In conclusion, PASMCs and PAECs collected from PH subjects have significant changes in metabolite uptake and utilization, partially recapitulated by TGF-β treatment

A four-month gatifloxacin-containing regimen for treating tuberculosis.

BACKGROUND: Shortening the course of treatment for tuberculosis would be a major improvement for case management and disease control. This phase 3 trial assessed the efficacy and safety of a 4-month gatifloxacin-containing regimen for treating rifampin-sensitive pulmonary tuberculosis. METHODS: We conducted a noninferiority, randomized, open-label, controlled trial involving patients 18 to 65 years of age with smear-positive, rifampin-sensitive, newly diagnosed pulmonary tuberculosis in five sub-Saharan African countries. A standard 6-month regimen that included ethambutol during the 2-month intensive phase was compared with a 4-month regimen in which gatifloxacin (400 mg per day) was substituted for ethambutol during the intensive phase and was continued, along with rifampin and isoniazid, during the continuation phase. The primary efficacy end point was an unfavorable outcome (treatment failure, recurrence, or death or study dropout during treatment) measured 24 months after the end of treatment, with a noninferiority margin of 6 percentage points, adjusted for country. RESULTS: A total of 1836 patients were assigned to the 4-month regimen (experimental group) or the standard regimen (control group). Baseline characteristics were well balanced between the groups. At 24 months after the end of treatment, the adjusted difference in the risk of an unfavorable outcome (experimental group [21.0%] minus control group [17.2%]) in the modified intention-to-treat population (1356 patients) was 3.5 percentage points (95% confidence interval, -0.7 to 7.7). There was heterogeneity across countries (P=0.02 for interaction, with differences in the rate of an unfavorable outcome ranging from -5.4 percentage points in Guinea to 12.3 percentage points in Senegal) and in baseline cavitary status (P=0.04 for interaction) and body-mass index (P=0.10 for interaction). The standard regimen, as compared with the 4-month regimen, was associated with a higher dropout rate during treatment (5.0% vs. 2.7%) and more treatment failures (2.4% vs. 1.7%) but fewer recurrences (7.1% vs. 14.6%). There was no evidence of increased risks of prolongation of the QT interval or dysglycemia with the 4-month regimen. CONCLUSIONS: Noninferiority of the 4-month regimen to the standard regimen with respect to the primary efficacy end point was not shown. (Funded by the Special Program for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases and others; ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT00216385.)

You Are What You (Can) Eat: Cultivating Resistance through Food, Justice, and Gardens on the South Side of Chicago

Though food is widely recognized as a basic necessity for humanity, disparate access to it highlights whose bodies, environments, health, nutrition, and utter existence has mattered most in American society—and whose has mattered the least. Through interviews with residents of the South Side of Chicago about the alternative food pathway they’ve forged for themselves, we learn that food becomes much more than just sustenance. Interviewees describe our present day food system as undeniably rooted in a history of enslavement and exploitation of Black and Brown bodies; they regard food justice work by communities of color as an important source of empowerment as it not only is an act of survival, but also an act of reclamation of spaces they’ve long been historically denied. For them, community gardens are safe spaces for neighbors of all ages to congregate, discuss issues happening in the neighborhood, and ultimately keep the community alive and healthy; they are transformative spaces for community building, learning, and collective healing. Residents become better stewards to the earth and to each other. Ultimately, community-led urban agriculture has the power to transform urban communities and their relationship with food, land, the environment, and each other. Ineffective public health initiatives often fail to sufficiently historicize and contextualize the relationship between social factors, unhealthy urban landscapes, and poor health outcomes. By placing the agency of the affected community at the center of research, however, we might better understand the relationship between positionality, food access, adverse health outcomes and any efforts we make to improve them

MESUROL AS A BIRD REPELLENT ON GRAPES IN OHIO

Schafer and Brunton (1971) determined that methiocarb [3,5-dimethyl-4-(methylthio)phenol methylcarbamate] was efficaceous as a bird repellent, reporting low R50 and LD50 values for several bird species. Guarino (1972) suggested that bird damage to corn, soybeans, rice, sorghum, cherries, and grapes could be reduced by spraying with methiocarb. Crase and DeHaven (1976) concluded that methiocarb could be an effective broad-spectrum bird repellent and crop protectant. Bollengier et al. (1973), Stone et al. (1974), Ali (1978), Teklehaimanot (1978), and Jackson et al. (1978) reported that bird damage to blueberries was significantly lower in methiocarb-treated fields than in the untreated fields. Rogers (1974) describes Mesurol as a conditioning repellent that has post-ingestional effects. Guarino (1972) reported that house finches (Carpodacus mexicanus), and starlings (Sturnus vulgarus) constituted 51.5% and 28.8%, respectively, of the birds observed in grape fields in California. In New Hampshire, robins (Turdus migratorius), primarily, and starlings, catbirds, (Dumetella carolinensis), and scarlet tanagers (Piranga olivacea) fed heavily on grapes (Guarino 1972). The birds damaged the upper, exposed clusters more than those on lower, covered branches. Crase et al. (1976) estimated the amount of bird damage to grapes in the U.S.A. at $4.4 million. Peck damage was reported higher than pluck damage. Larger birds, such as starlings and robins, were observed taking the whole berry, while smaller birds (finches, sparrows, and bluebirds) were pecking holes in the individual berry (Crase et al., 1976). Crase (1975), while reporting a high ratio of pecked to plucked fruit in treated fields, observed a higher proportion of plucked in the untreated area; house sparrows (Passer-domesticus) were the most prevalent species. He suggested that birds may be first pecking, and, if no effect is detected, they would take the whole grape. Previous observations in California had indicated Mesurol treatments to vineyards were efficaceous (Crase 1975, 1976; Crase et al. 1976). Bailey and Smith (1979) obtained twice the yield on vines protected from blackbirds (Turdus merula) and silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis) in South Australia with this compound. While failures have been reported in protecting cherries (Stickley and Ingram 1973) and blueberries (Dolbeer et al. 1973), their experimental designs may have been deficient. The objective of the present study was to evaluate methiocarb bird repellency in five selected grape fields in Ohio. The methiocarb formulation used was 75% wettable powder (WP), which is registered as Mesurol. These experiments were conducted under an experimental use permit (#3125-EUP-140). Additional details are found in Kassa and Jackson (1978)