Antibacterial Effects of the Essential Oils of CommonlyConsumed Medicinal Herbs Using an In Vitro Model.

The chemical composition and antibacterial activity of essential oils from 10 commonly consumed herbs: Citrus aurantium, C. limon, Lavandula angustifolia, Matricaria chamomilla, Mentha piperita, M. spicata, Ocimum basilicum, Origanum vulgare, Thymus vulgaris and Salvia officinalis have been determined. The antibacterial activity of these oils and their main components; i.e. camphor, carvacrol, 1,8-cineole, linalool, linalyl acetate, limonene, menthol, a-pinene, b-pinene, and thymol were assayed against the human pathogenic bacteria Bacillus subtilis, Enterobacter cloacae, Escherichia coli O157:H7, Micrococcus flavus, Proteus mirabilis, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Salmonella enteritidis, S. epidermidis, S. typhimurium, and Staphylococcus aureus. The highest and broadest activity was shown by O. vulgare oil. Carvacrol had the highest antibacterial activity among the tested components

The measurement of open apices of teeth to test chronological age of over 14-year-olds in living subjects

Age determination in living subjects is a problem of increasing interest in our community, due to the increasing numbers of individuals without identification papers, who have immigrated illegally or committed crimes, and for whom it is necessary to verify whether they have reached the age of 14 years in order to be charged legally. Although the most widespread methods for age estimation refer to skeletal or dental analysis, these methods do present some drawbacks for identification of the age of 14. The aim of the present study is to discriminate between children who are or are not 14 years of age or older by measuring the open apices of teeth. We evaluated the OPGs of 447 persons aged between 12 and 16 years, of Italian, Croatian and Slovenian nationality. For each individual, dental maturity was estimated using the number of the seven left permanent mandibular teeth with root development complete, and normalized measurement of the open apices of the third molar. The results revealed that an individual is considered to be 14 years of age or older if all seven left permanent mandibular teeth have closed apices and the normalized measurement of open apices of the third molar is lower than 1.1

Current research into brain barriers and the delivery of therapeutics for neurological diseases: a report on CNS barrier congress London, UK, 2017.

This is a report on the CNS barrier congress held in London, UK, March 22-23rd 2017 and sponsored by Kisaco Research Ltd. The two 1-day sessions were chaired by John Greenwood and Margareta Hammarlund-Udenaes, respectively, and each session ended with a discussion led by the chair. Speakers consisted of invited academic researchers studying the brain barriers in relation to neurological diseases and industry researchers studying new methods to deliver therapeutics to treat neurological diseases. We include here brief reports from the speakers

Early Introduction of cART Reverses Brain Aging Pattern in Well-Controlled HIV Infection: A Comparative MR Spectroscopy Study

Introduction: The aim of this study was to compare age-related changes in chronically infected, asymptomatic HIV-positive patients under combination antiretroviral therapy (cART), with age-, gender-, and educational-level-matched healthy subjects, using multi-voxel magnetic-resonance spectroscopy (MRS).Methods: There were 66 chronically infected HIV-positive subjects and 65 age-, gender-, and educational-level-matched control subjects, divided into four groups according to the age: group 1 (20–29 years old), group 2 (30–39), group 3 (40–49) and group 4 (50–59). MRS was performed and ratios of N-acetyl-aspartate (NAA)/creatine (Cr) were analyzed in ten locations of the supracallosal gray matter. For the comparison of NAA/Cr ratios in healthy and HIV-positive subjects, ANCOVA with age and education as covariates was performed. Correlations of NAA/Cr ratios with duration of cART were performed using Pearson’s correlation test. Statistical significance was set at p < 0.05.Results: The NAA/Cr ratios were decreased in the 20–29-year-old HIV-positive subjects in 8/10 locations (p < 0.005) compared to the healthy controls, while in the 50–59-year-old groups they were significiantly lower only in one location (p = 0.004). There were significant positive correlations of NAA/Cr levels with the duration of cART in the oldest group of HIV-positive subjects, while in the youngest group there were no significant correlations.Conclusion: The aging pattern in chronic HIV infection under cART is accentuated rather than accelerated. There is an initial HIV-related neuronal damage with a significant decline in NAA/Cr ratios; after the initiation of cART, however, NAA/Cr ratios increase continuously to become similar to healthy aging individuals, probably due to beneficial effect of long-standing cART.Summary: Brain aging in chronic HIV infection under cART is accentuated, with an initial HIV-related neuronal damage followed by a subtle NAA/Cr increase after the initiation of cART. Under cART, in advanced age, NAA/Cr ratios become similar to healthy aging individuals

Extracellular matrix and growth factor engineering for controlled angiogenesis in regenerative medicine

Blood vessel growth plays a key role in regenerative medicine, both to restore blood supply to ischemic tissues and to ensure rapid vascularization of clinical-size tissue-engineered grafts. For example, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is the master regulator of physiological blood vessel growth and is one of the main molecular targets of therapeutic angiogenesis approaches. However, angiogenesis is a complex process and there is a need to develop rational therapeutic strategies based on a firm understanding of basic vascular biology principles, as evidenced by the disappointing results of initial clinical trials of angiogenic factor delivery. In particular, the spatial localization of angiogenic signals in the extracellular matrix (ECM) is crucial to ensure the proper assembly and maturation of new vascular structures. Here, we discuss the therapeutic implications of matrix interactions of angiogenic factors, with a special emphasis on VEGF, as well as provide an overview of current approaches, based on protein and biomaterial engineering that mimic the regulatory functions of ECM to optimize the signaling microenvironment of vascular growth factors

Penalty-free feasibility boundary convergent multi-objective evolutionary algorithm for the optimization of water distribution systems

This paper presents a new penalty-free multi-objective evolutionary approach (PFMOEA) for the optimization of water distribution systems (WDSs). The proposed approach utilizes pressure dependent analysis (PDA) to develop a multi-objective evolutionary search. PDA is able to simulate both normal and pressure deficient networks and provides the means to accurately and rapidly identify the feasible region of the solution space, effectively locating global or near global optimal solutions along its active constraint boundary. The significant advantage of this method over previous methods is that it eliminates the need for ad-hoc penalty functions, additional “boundary search” parameters, or special constraint handling procedures. Conceptually, the approach is downright straightforward and probably the simplest hitherto. The PFMOEA has been applied to several WDS benchmarks and its performance examined. It is demonstrated that the approach is highly robust and efficient in locating optimal solutions. Superior results in terms of the initial network construction cost and number of hydraulic simulations required were obtained. The improvements are demonstrated through comparisons with previously published solutions from the literature

MxA as a clinically applicable biomarker for identifying systemic interferon type I in primary Sjögren's syndrome

Objective: To establish an easy and practical assay for identifying systemic interferon (IFN) type I bioactivity in patients with primary Sjögren's syndrome (pSS). The IFN type I signature is present in over half of the pSS patients and identifies a subgroup with a higher disease activity. This signature is currently assessed via laborious expression profiles of multiple IFN type I-inducible genes. Methods: In a cohort of 35 pSS patients, myxovirus-resistance protein A (MxA) was assessed as a potential biomarker for ty

Measurement of the diffractive structure function in deep inelastic scattering at HERA

This paper presents an analysis of the inclusive properties of diffractive deep inelastic scattering events produced in $ep$ interactions at HERA. The events are characterised by a rapidity gap between the outgoing proton system and the remaining hadronic system. Inclusive distributions are presented and compared with Monte Carlo models for diffractive processes. The data are consistent with models where the pomeron structure function has a hard and a soft contribution. The diffractive structure function is measured as a function of \xpom, the momentum fraction lost by the proton, of $\beta$, the momentum fraction of the struck quark with respect to \xpom, and of $Q^2$. The \xpom dependence is consistent with the form \xpoma where $a~=~1.30~\pm~0.08~(stat)~^{+~0.08}_{-~0.14}~(sys)$ in all bins of $\beta$ and $Q^2$. In the measured $Q^2$ range, the diffractive structure function approximately scales with $Q^2$ at fixed $\beta$. In an Ingelman-Schlein type model, where commonly used pomeron flux factor normalisations are assumed, it is found that the quarks within the pomeron do not saturate the momentum sum rule.Comment: 36 pages, latex, 11 figures appended as uuencoded fil