Effects of blood transfusion on exercise capacity in thalassemia major patients

Anemia has an important role in exercise performance. However, the direct link between rapid changes of hemoglobin and exercise performance is still unknown.To find out more on this topic, we studied 18 beta-thalassemia major patients free of relevant cardiac dysfunction (age 33.5±7.2 years,males = 10). Patients performed a maximal cardiopulmolmonary exercise test (cycloergometer, personalized ramp protocol, breath-by-breath measurements of expired gases) before and the day after blood transfusion (500 cc of red cell concentrates). After blood transfusion, hemoglobin increased from 10.5±0.8 g/dL to 12.1±1.2 (p<0.001), peak VO2 from 1408 to 1546mL/min (p<0.05), and VO2 at anaerobic threshold from 965 to 1024mL/min (p<0.05). No major changes were observed as regards heart and respiratory rates either at peak exercise or at anaerobic threshold. Similarly, no relevant changes were observed in ventilation efficiency, as evaluated by the ventilation vs. carbon dioxide production relationship, or in O2 delivery to the periphery as analyzed by the VO2 vs. workload relationship. The relationship between hemoglobin and VO2 changes showed, for each g/dL of hemoglobin increase, a VO2 increase = 82.5 mL/min and 35 mL/min, at peak exercise and at anaerobic threshold, respectively. In beta-thalassemia major patients, an acute albeit partial anemia correction by blood transfusion determinates a relevant increase of exercise performance, observed both at peak exercise and at anaerobic threshold

Relative entropy via non-sequential recursive pair substitutions

The entropy of an ergodic source is the limit of properly rescaled 1-block entropies of sources obtained applying successive non-sequential recursive pairs substitutions (see P. Grassberger 2002 ArXiv:physics/0207023 and D. Benedetto, E. Caglioti and D. Gabrielli 2006 Jour. Stat. Mech. Theo. Exp. 09 doi:10.1088/1742.-5468/2006/09/P09011). In this paper we prove that the cross entropy and the Kullback-Leibler divergence can be obtained in a similar way.Comment: 13 pages , 2 figure

Promotion of proliferation and metastasis of hepatocellular carcinoma by LncRNA00673 based on the targeted-regulation of notch signaling pathway

we read with great interest the paper by Dr. Chen et al1, recently published in European Review for Medical and Pharmacological Sciences and titled ‘‘Promotion of proliferation and metastasis of hepatocellular carcinoma by LncRNA00673 based on the targeted-regulation of notch signaling pathway’’. Authors concluded that lncRNA00673 is highly expressed and may be a potential target for the treatment of Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC). Moreover, according to authors, it can promote the proliferation and metastasis of HCC by the regulation of Notch signaling pathway. We congratulate the authors for their interesting work

Oxidative Stress in the Pathogenesis of Aorta Diseases as a Source of Potential Biomarkers and Therapeutic Targets, with a Particular Focus on Ascending Aorta Aneurysms

: Aorta diseases, such as ascending aorta aneurysm (AsAA), are complex pathologies, currently defined as inflammatory diseases with a strong genetic susceptibility. They are difficult to manage, being insidious and silent pathologies whose diagnosis is based only on imaging data. No diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers or markers of outcome have been known until now. Thus, their identification is imperative. Certainly, a deep understanding of the mechanisms and pathways involved in their pathogenesis might help in such research. Recently, the key role of oxidative stress (OS) on the pathophysiology of aorta disease has emerged. Here, we describe and discuss these aspects by revealing some OS pathways as potential biomarkers, their underlying limitations, and potential solutions and approaches, as well as some potential treatments

Studies on the hyperplasia ('regeneration') of the rat liver following partial hepatectomy. Changes in lipid peroxidation and general biochemical aspects

Using the experimental model of partial hepatectomy in the rat, we have examined the relationship between cell division and lipid peroxidation activity. In rats entrained to a regime of 12 h light/12 h dark and with a fixed 8 h feeding period in the dark phase, partial hepatectomy is followed by a rapid regeneration of liver mass with cycles of synchronized cell division at 24 h intervals. The latter phenomenon is indicated in this study by pulses of thymidine kinase activity having maxima at 24 h, 48 h and 72 h after partial hepatectomy. Microsomes prepared from regenerating livers show changes in lipid peroxidation activity (induced by NADPH/ADP/iron or by ascorbate/iron), which is significantly decreased relative to that in microsomes from sham-operated controls, again at 24 h, 48 h and 72 h after the operation. This phenomenon has been investigated with regard to possible underlying changes in the content of microsomal fatty acids, the microsomal enzymes NADPH:cytochrome c reductase and cytochrome P-450, and the physiological microsomal antioxidant alpha-tocopherol. The cycles of decreased lipid peroxidation activity are apparently due, at least in part, to changes in microsomal alpha-tocopherol content that are closely associated in time with thymidine kinase activity

Superoptimal Preconditioned Conjugate Gradient Iteration for Image Deblurring

We study the superoptimal Frobenius operators in the two-level circulant algebra. We consider two specific viewpoints: ( 1) the regularizing properties in imaging and ( 2) the computational effort in connection with the preconditioned conjugate gradient method. Some numerical experiments illustrating the effectiveness of the proposed technique are given and discussed