Concrete substrate moisture requirements for durable concrete repairs – a field study

peer reviewedIn concrete repair specifications, the required moisture condition of the substrate, which can play an important role for bond development, and, ultimately, on the long-term repair / overlay durability, is generally ill-defined and addressed without due consideration to the given substrate characteristics. The standard specification, if any, is to require saturated surface dry (SSD) condition of the substrate prior to application of cementitious repair materials, which is theoretically achieved after saturating the substrate and then letting the surface just start to dry out. This does provide an intuitive solution founded on rational considerations, but it has never really been precisely defined, measured, nor validated. The influence of substrate surface moisture on the bond between the existing concrete and the new repair material is an issue of significant importance. This paper revisits the question, in light of results from a project designed to develop guidelines for moisture conditioning of a concrete substrate prior to a cementitious repair, which was part of a larger effort to develop guidelines for surface preparation of concrete prior to repair. Over the course of the project, multiple series of test slabs were repaired after being subjected to different surface moisture conditioning and then tested for bond strength tests at different ages. The findings are discussed, together with those from previous studies, and recommendations are issued.9. Industry, innovation and infrastructur

Centerscope

Centerscope, formerly Scope, was published by the Boston University Medical Center "to communicate the concern of the Medical Center for the development and maintenance of improved health care in contemporary society.

Exploring the components, asymmetry and distribution of relationship quality in wild Barbary macaques (Macaca sylvanus)

Social relationships between group members are a key feature of many animal societies. The quality of social relationships has been described by three main components: value, compatibility and security, based on the benefits, tenure and stability of social exchanges. We aimed to analyse whether this three component structure could be used to describe the quality of social relationships in wild Barbary macaques (Macaca sylvanus). Moreover, we examined whether relationship quality was affected by the sex, age and rank differences between social partners, and investigated the asymmetric nature of social relationships. We collected over 1,900 hours of focal data on seven behavioural variables measuring relationship quality, and used principal component analysis to investigate how these variables clustered together. We found that relationship quality in wild Barbary macaques can be described by a three component structure that represents the value, compatibility and security of a relationship. Female-female dyads had more valuable relationships and same-age dyads more compatible relationships than any other dyad. Rank difference had no effect on the quality of a social relationship. Finally, we found a high degree of asymmetry in how members of a dyad exchange social behaviour. We argue that the asymmetry of social relationships should be taken into account when exploring the pattern and function of social behaviour in animal societies

Tips for profitable small grain production

1 online resource (PDF, 4 pages)This archival publication may not reflect current scientific knowledge or recommendations. Current information available from the University of Minnesota Extension: https://www.extension.umn.edu

World Workshop on Oral Medicine VIII: Development of a core outcome set for oral lichen planus: a systematic review of outcome domains

Objective: There is a lack of consensus regarding clinician- and patient-reported oral lichen planus (OLP) outcomes. The World Workshop on Oral Medicine Outcomes Initiative for the Direction of Research (WONDER) Project aims to develop a core outcome set (COS) for OLP, which would inform the design of clinical trials and, importantly, facilitate meta-analysis, leading to the establishment of more robust evidence for the management of this condition and hence improved patient care. Study Design: Ovid MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, CENTRAL, and Clinicaltrials.gov were searched for interventional studies (randomized controlled trials, controlled clinical trials, and case series including ≥5 participants) on OLP and oral lichenoid reactions published between January 2001 and March 2022 without language restriction. All reported primary and secondary outcomes were extracted. Results: The searches yielded 9,135 records, and 291 studies were included after applying the inclusion criteria. A total of 422 outcomes were identified. These were then grouped based on semantic similarity, condensing the list to 69 outcomes. The most frequently measured outcomes were pain (51.9%), clinical grading of the lesions (29.6%), lesion size/extension/area (27.5%), and adverse events (17.5%). Conclusion: As a first step in developing a COS for OLP, we summarized the outcomes that have been used in interventional studies over the past 2 decades, which are numerous and heterogeneous.S

World Workshop on Oral Medicine VIII: Development of a core outcome set for oral lichen planus: the patient perspective

Objective: This study aimed to explore the lived experience of patients with oral lichen planus (OLP) and investigate what treatment-related outcomes are the most important to them and should be included in a core outcome set (COS) for OLP. Study Design: A qualitative study involving focus group work with 10 participants was conducted. Interviews with each focus group were held twice: session 1 explored the lived experience of patients with OLP, and session 2 allowed patients to review a summary of the outcome domains used in the OLP literature to date. The discussions were recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using framework analysis. Results: In session 1, 4 themes and 8 sub-themes emerged from the data analysis. An additional outcome, ‘knowledge of family and friends,’ was suggested in session 2. Conclusions: We have gained valuable insight into the lived experience of patients with OLP via this qualitative study. To our knowledge, this study is the first to explore the patient perspective on what should be measured in clinical trials on OLP, highlighting an important additional suggested outcome. This additional outcome will be voted upon in a consensus process to determine a minimum COS for OLPS

Sodium/myo-Inositol Transporters: Substrate Transport Requirements and Regional Brain Expression in the TgCRND8 Mouse Model of Amyloid Pathology

Inositol stereoisomers, myo- and scyllo-inositol, are known to enter the brain and are significantly elevated following oral administration. Elevations in brain inositol levels occur across a concentration gradient as a result of active transport from the periphery. There are two sodium/myo-inositol transporters (SMIT1, SMIT2) that may be responsible for regulating brain inositol levels. The goals of this study were to determine the effects of aging and Alzheimer's disease (AD)-like amyloid pathology on transporter expression, to compare regional expression and to analyze substrate requirements of the inositol transporters. QPCR was used to examine expression of the two transporters in the cortex, hippocampus and cerebellum of TgCRND8 mice, a mouse model of amyloid pathology, in comparison to non-transgenic littermates. In addition, we examined the structural features of inositol required for active transport, utilizing a cell-based competitive uptake assay. Disease pathology did not alter transporter expression in the cortex or hippocampus (p>0.005), with only minimal effects of aging observed in the cerebellum (SMIT1: F2,26 = 12.62; p = 0.0002; SMIT2: F2,26 = 8.71; p = 0.0015). Overall, brain SMIT1 levels were higher than SMIT2, however, regional differences were observed. For SMIT1, at 4 and 6 months cerebellar SMIT1 levels were significantly higher than cortical and hippocampal levels (p<0.05). For SMIT2, at all three ages both cortical and cerebellar SMIT2 levels were significantly higher than hippocampal levels (p<0.05) and at 4 and 6 months of age, cerebellar SMIT2 levels were also significantly higher than cortical levels (p<0.05). Inositol transporter levels are stably expressed as a function of age, and expression is unaltered with disease pathology in the TgCRND8 mouse. Given the fact that scyllo-inositol is currently in clinical trials for the treatment of AD, the stable expression of inositol transporters regardless of disease pathology is an important finding

The role of pro- and anti-inflammatory responses in silica-induced lung fibrosis

BACKGROUND: It has been generally well accepted that chronic inflammation is a necessary component of lung fibrosis but this concept has recently been challenged. METHODS: Using biochemical, histological, immunohistochemistry, and cellular analyses, we compared the lung responses (inflammation and fibrosis) to fibrogenic silica particles (2.5 and 25 mg/g lung) in Sprague-Dawley rats and NMRI mice. RESULTS: Rats treated with silica particles developed chronic and progressive inflammation accompanied by an overproduction of TNF-α as well as an intense lung fibrosis. Dexamethasone or pioglitazone limited the amplitude of the lung fibrotic reaction to silica in rats, supporting the paradigm that inflammation drives lung fibrosis. In striking contrast, in mice, silica induced only a limited and transient inflammation without TNF-α overproduction. However, mice developed lung fibrosis of a similar intensity than rats. The fibrotic response in mice was accompanied by a high expression of the anti-inflammatory and fibrotic cytokine IL-10 by silica-activated lung macrophages. In mice, IL-10 was induced only by fibrotic particles and significantly expressed in the lung of silica-sensitive but not silica-resistant strains of mice. Anti-inflammatory treatments did not control lung fibrosis in mice. CONCLUSION: These results indicate that, beside chronic lung inflammation, a pronounced anti-inflammatory reaction may also contribute to the extension of silica-induced lung fibrosis and represents an alternative pathway leading to lung fibrosis

Neither loss of Bik alone, nor combined loss of Bik and Noxa, accelerate murine lymphoma development or render lymphoma cells resistant to DNA damaging drugs

The pro-apoptotic BH3-only protein, BIK, is widely expressed and although many critical functions in developmental or stress-induced death have been ascribed to this protein, mice lacking Bik display no overt abnormalities. It has been postulated that Bik can serve as a tumour suppressor, on the basis that its deficiency and loss of apoptotic function have been reported in many human cancers, including lymphoid malignancies. Evasion of apoptosis is a major factor contributing to c-Myc-induced tumour development, but despite this, we found that Bik deficiency did not accelerate Eμ-Myc-induced lymphomagenesis. Co-operation between BIK and NOXA, another BH3-only protein, has been previously described, and was attributed to their complementary binding specificities to distinct subsets of pro-survival BCL-2 family proteins. Nevertheless, combined deficiency of Bik and Noxa did not alter the onset of Eμ-Myc transgene induced lymphoma development. Moreover, although p53-mediated induction of Bik has been reported, neither Eμ-Myc/Bik−/− nor Eμ-Myc/Bik−/−Noxa−/− lymphomas were more resistant than control Eμ-Myc lymphomas to killing by DNA damaging drugs, either in vitro or in vivo. These results suggest that Bik, even in combination with Noxa, is not a potent suppressor of c-Myc-driven tumourigenesis or critical for chemotherapeutic drug-induced killing of Myc-driven tumours