18 research outputs found
Integrating aphasia into stroke best practices: A Canadian KTE strategy
This poster reports on the activities to date of the Stroke and Aphasia Canada team including results of a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Knowledge Translation (KT) planning grant (grant #290592, 2013)
The Hot and Energetic Universe: The close environments of supermassive black holes
Most of the action in Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) occurs within a few tens
of gravitational radii from the supermassive black hole, where matter in the
accretion disk may lose up to almost half of its energy with a copious
production of X-rays, emitted via Comptonization of the disk photons by hot
electrons in a corona and partly reflected by the accretion disk. Thanks to its
large effective area and excellent energy resolution, Athena+ contributions in
the understanding of the physics of accretion in AGN will be fundamental - and
unique - in many respects. It will allow us to map the disk-corona system -
which is crucial to understand the mechanism of energy extraction and the
relation of the corona with winds and jets - by studying the time lags between
reflected and primary photons. These lags have been recently discovered by
XMM-Newton, but only Athena+ will have the sensitivity required to fully
exploit this technique. Athena+ will also be able e.g. to determine robustly
the spin of the black hole in nearby sources (and to extend these measurements
beyond the local Universe), to establish the nature of the soft X-ray
components, and to map the circumnuclear matter within the AGN inner parsec
with unprecedented details.Comment: Supporting paper for the science theme "The Hot and Energetic
Universe" to be implemented by the Athena+ X-ray observatory
(http://www.the-athena-x-ray-observatory.eu). 9 pages, 8 figure
The New Equal Protection- Substantive Due Process Resurrected Under a New Name
This Note analyzes the Fifth Circuit\u27s recent decision in David v. Weir, in which a tenant whose water supply was terminated without notice by the City of Atlanta Department of Public Works because of his landlord\u27s failure to pay an outstanding bill, alleged that the Department\u27s termination policy, authorized by city ordinances, and its refusal to contract with the plaintiff until the landlord\u27s debts were paid, violated the equal protection and due process clauses of the United States Constitution. The Fifth Circuit found that the Department\u27s action violated equal protection because it divided applicants for service into two classes: those whose service address is burdened with a preexisting debt for which the applicant is not liable and those whose residence is free from such debt. The court found that the Department\u27s differential treatment of the first group failed to pass equal protection standards under the rational basis test and was thus unconstitutional. The Note argues that Davis was correctly decided and is representative of a current trend in which courts use equal protection and due process analysis as a means of allocating roles among the various elements of government and society in accord with the constitution
In Vitro and In Vivo Differences in Murine Third Complement Component (C3) Opsonization and Macrophage/Leukocyte Responses to Antibody-Functionalized Iron Oxide Nanoworms
Balancing surface functionalization and low immune recognition of nanomedicines is a major challenge. Opsonization with the third component of the complement protein (C3) plays a major role in immune cell recognition of nanomedicines. We used dextran-coated superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoworms (SPIO NWs) to study the effect of surface functionalization on C3 opsonization in mouse serum and subsequent macrophage/leukocyte recognition in vitro as well as on intravenous injection into mice. Previously, we found that in mouse serum, SPIO NWs became opsonized with C3 via complement lectin pathway. Crosslinking the dextran shell with epichlorohydrin significantly decreased C3 opsonization and uptake by mouse peritoneal macrophages. Crosslinked nanoworms (NWs) further functionalized with polyethylene glycol (PEG) or with PEG-antibody (Ab) (~160 IgG molecules/particle) did not show an increase in C3 opsonization and peritoneal macrophage uptake in vitro. Following tail vein injection into mice, plain crosslinked NWs and PEGylated crosslinked NWs showed very low C3 opsonization and mouse leukocyte uptake. However, Ab-decorated crosslinked NWs showed significant C3 opsonization and high level of complement-dependent uptake by leukocytes in mice. Decreasing the number of conjugated Abs to 46 IgG molecules/particle significantly reduced C3 opsonization and leukocyte uptake. Using fresh mouse lepirudin plasma rather than serum showed better correlation with C3 opsonization in vivo. The reason for this difference could be related to the known instability of complement classical pathway in mouse sera. Our data illustrate that fine-tuning in nanoparticle surface functionalization with Abs is required to avoid excessive complement activation and complement-mediated immune uptake in mice, and raise issues with in vitro immunological assays of nanomedicines intended to mimic in vivo conditions