Dietary Strategies to Optimize Wound Healing after Periodontal and Dental Implant Surgery: An Evidence-Based Review

Methods to optimize healing through dietary strategies present an attractive option for patients, such that healing from delicate oral surgeries occurs as optimally as possible with minimal patient-meditated complications through improper food choices. This review discusses findings from studies that have investigated the role of diet, either whole foods or individual dietary components, on periodontal health and their potential role in wound healing after periodontal surgery. To date, research in this area has largely focused on foods or individual dietary components that may attenuate inflammation or oxidant stress, or foster de novo bone formation. These studies suggest that a wide variety of dietary components, including macronutrients and micronutrients, are integral for optimal periodontal health and have the potential to accelerate oral wound healing after periodontal procedures. Moreover, this review provides guidance regarding dietary considerations that may help a patient achieve the best possible outcome after a periodontal procedure

Dual Contrastive Loss and Attention for GANs

Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) produce impressive results on unconditional image generation when powered with large-scale image datasets. Yet generated images are still easy to spot especially on datasets with high variance (e.g. bedroom, church). In this paper, we propose various improvements to further push the boundaries in image generation. Specifically, we propose a novel dual contrastive loss and show that, with this loss, discriminator learns more generalized and distinguishable representations to incentivize generation. In addition, we revisit attention and extensively experiment with different attention blocks in the generator. We find attention to be still an important module for successful image generation even though it was not used in the recent state-of-the-art models. Lastly, we study different attention architectures in the discriminator, and propose a reference attention mechanism. By combining the strengths of these remedies, we improve the compelling state-of-the-art Fr\'{e}chet Inception Distance (FID) by at least 17.5% on several benchmark datasets. We obtain even more significant improvements on compositional synthetic scenes (up to 47.5% in FID)

Placing the Common Era in a Holocene context: millennial to centennial patterns and trends in the hydroclimate of North America over the past 2000 years

A synthesis of 93 hydrologic records from across North and Central America, and adjacent tropical and Arctic islands, reveals centennial to millennial trends in the regional hydroclimates of the Common Era (CE; past 2000 years). The hydrological records derive from materials stored in lakes, bogs, caves, and ice from extant glaciers, which have the continuity through time to preserve low-frequency ( \u3e 100 year) climate signals that may extend deeper into the Holocene. The most common pattern, represented in 46 (49 %) of the records, indicates that the centuries before 1000 CE were drier than the centuries since that time. Principal component analysis indicates that millennial-scale trends represent the dominant pattern of variance in the southwestern US, northeastern US, mid-continent, Pacific Northwest, Arctic, and tropics, although not all records within a region show the same direction of change. The Pacific Northwest and the southernmost tier of the tropical sites tended to dry toward present, as many other areas became wetter than before. In 22 records (24 %), the Medieval Climate Anomaly period (800–1300 CE) was drier than the Little Ice Age (1400–1900 CE), but in many cases the difference was part of the longer millennial-scale trend, and, in 25 records (27 %), the Medieval Climate Anomaly period represented a pluvial (wet) phase. Where quantitative records permitted a comparison, we found that centennial-scale fluctuations over the Common Era represented changes of 3–7% in the modern interannual range of variability in precipitation, but the accumulation of these long-term trends over the entirety of the Holocene caused recent centuries to be significantly wetter, on average, than most of the past 11 000 years

SMARCA4 regulates gene expression and higher-order chromatin structure in proliferating mammary epithelial cells

The packaging of DNA into chromatin plays an important role in transcriptional regulation and nuclear processes. Brahma-related gene-1 SMARCA4 (also known as BRG1), the essential ATPase subunit of the mammalian SWI/SNF chromatin remodeling complex, uses the energy from ATP hydrolysis to disrupt nucleosomes at target regions. Although the transcriptional role of SMARCA4 at gene promoters is well-studied, less is known about its role in higher-order genome organization. SMARCA4 knockdown in human mammary epithelial MCF-10A cells resulted in 176 up-regulated genes, including many related to lipid and calcium metabolism, and 1292 down-regulated genes, some of which encode extracellular matrix (ECM) components that can exert mechanical forces and affect nuclear structure. ChIP-seq analysis of SMARCA4 localization and SMARCA4-bound super-enhancers demonstrated extensive binding at intergenic regions. Furthermore, Hi-C analysis showed extensive SMARCA4-mediated alterations in higher-order genome organization at multiple resolutions. First, SMARCA4 knockdown resulted in clustering of intra- and inter-subtelomeric regions, demonstrating a novel role for SMARCA4 in telomere organization. SMARCA4 binding was enriched at topologically associating domain (TAD) boundaries, and SMARCA4 knockdown resulted in weakening of TAD boundary strength. Taken together, these findings provide a dynamic view of SMARCA4-dependent changes in higher-order chromatin organization and gene expression, identifying SMARCA4 as a novel component of chromatin organization

Efecto de la ingestión de Banisteriopsis caapi y Psychotria viridis ‘Binomio ayahuasca’ en el hipocampo del cerebro de ratas

Objective. To assess the effect of Banisteriopsis caapi and Psychotria viridis ‘binomio ayahuasca’ ingestion in rat hippocampus. Design. Experimental, descriptive, analytical, and cross-sectional study. Institution. Research Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Natural Resources, Faculty of Pharmacy and Biochemistry, Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Lima, Peru. Biological material. Rats. Interventions. Orogastric administration of ‘binomio ayahuasca’ in adult Rattus norvegicus albinus Holtzman strain. Seven groups of five animals with an average weight of 240 ± 30 g were administered: (GI) placebo, (GII) 2.5 mL of diazepam (GIII) 0.7 mL of Banisteriopsis caapi solution, (GIV) 0,7 mL of Psychotria viridis solution. Groups GV, GVI and GVII received 0.7 mL, 3.5 mL and 7.0 mL of binomio ayahuasca solution, respectively. Main outcome measures. Macroscopically: reflex movements and motor skills. Microscopically: amount of pyramidal and granulose cells, cell disorganization. Results. The phytochemical screening of the extract showed alkaloids, anthraquinones, triterpenoids and steroids, phenols, flavonoids and saponins. The group administered with 0.7 mL of binomio (GV) had a significant increase in the number of granule cells over pyramidal cells. The group administered with 3.5 mL of binomio (GVI) had less granule cells and large and small pyramidal cells. The group administered with 7.0 mL of binomio (CVII) had cell disorganization, large and small pyramidal cells and an increase in granule cells. Conclusions. The alcoholic extract of binomio ayahuasca showed a neuropathological effect on rat brain hippocampus.Objetivo. Evaluar el efecto de la ingestión de Banisteriopsis caapi y Psychotria viridis ‘Binomio ayahuasca’ en el hipocampo de cerebro de ratas. Diseño. Estudio experimental, descriptivo, analítico, transversal. Institución. Instituto de Investigación en Ciencias Farmacéuticas y Recursos Naturales, Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica, Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Lima, Perú. Material biológico. Ratas. Intervenciones. Administración del binomio ayahuasca por vía orogástrica a ratas albinas adultas de la especie Rattus novergicus y de cepa Holtzman. A siete grupos de cinco con un peso promedio de 240 ± 30 g se les administró: (GI) blanco, (GII) 2,5 mL diazepam, (GIII) 0,7 mL solución de Banisteriopsis caapi, (GIV) 0,7 mL Psychotria viridis, y a los grupos (GV), (GVI) y (GVII) se administró 0,7 mL, 3,5 mL y 7,0 mL de solución del binomio ayahuasca, respectivamente. Principales medidas de resultados. Macroscópicos: comportamiento de reflejos y actividad motora. Microscópicos: número de células piramidales y granulosas, y desorganización celular. Resultados. En el tamizaje fitoquímico del extracto se caracterizó presencia de alcaloides, antraquinonas, triterpenoides y esteroides, fenoles, flavonoides y saponinas. Los volúmenes de droga administradas a los grupos de intervención con el binomio en la dosis de 0,7 mL manifestaron significativo aumento en el número de células granulosas sobre las células piramidales; a dosis de 3,5 mL el número de células granulosas fue menor con presencia de células piramidales grandes y pequeñas; y a dosis de 7,0 mL se manifestó desorganización celular, presencia de células piramidales grandes y pequeñas, y aumento de células granulosas. Conclusiones. El extracto alcohólico del binomio ayahuasca presenta efecto neuropatológico en el hipocampo del cerebro de ratas

Long-term modification of cortical synapses improves sensory perception

Synapses and receptive fields of the cerebral cortex are plastic. However, changes to specific inputs must be coordinated within neural networks to ensure that excitability and feature selectivity are appropriately configured for perception of the sensory environment. Long-lasting enhancements and decrements to rat primary auditory cortical excitatory synaptic strength were induced by pairing acoustic stimuli with activation of the nucleus basalis neuromodulatory system. Here we report that these synaptic modifications were approximately balanced across individual receptive fields, conserving mean excitation while reducing overall response variability. Decreased response variability should increase detection and recognition of near-threshold or previously imperceptible stimuli, as we found in behaving animals. Thus, modification of cortical inputs leads to wide-scale synaptic changes, which are related to improved sensory perception and enhanced behavioral performance

Introduction: Toward an Engaged Feminist Heritage Praxis

We advocate a feminist approach to archaeological heritage work in order to transform heritage practice and the production of archaeological knowledge. We use an engaged feminist standpoint and situate intersubjectivity and intersectionality as critical components of this practice. An engaged feminist approach to heritage work allows the discipline to consider women’s, men’s, and gender non-conforming persons’ positions in the field, to reveal their contributions, to develop critical pedagogical approaches, and to rethink forms of representation. Throughout, we emphasize the intellectual labor of women of color, queer and gender non-conforming persons, and early white feminists in archaeology

Populations of planets in multiple star systems

Astronomers have discovered that both planets and binaries are abundant throughout the Galaxy. In combination, we know of over 100 planets in binary and higher-order multi-star systems, in both circumbinary and circumstellar configurations. In this chapter we review these findings and some of their implications for the formation of both stars and planets. Most of the planets found have been circumstellar, where there is seemingly a ruinous influence of the second star if sufficiently close (<50 AU). Hosts of hot Jupiters have been a particularly popular target for binary star studies, showing an enhanced rate of stellar multiplicity for moderately wide binaries (>100 AU). This was thought to be a sign of Kozai-Lidov migration, however recent studies have shown this mechanism to be too inefficient to account for the majority of hot Jupiters. A couple of dozen circumbinary planets have been proposed around both main sequence and evolved binaries. Around main sequence binaries there are preliminary indications that the frequency of gas giants is as high as those around single stars. There is however a conspicuous absence of circumbinary planets around the tightest main sequence binaries with periods of just a few days, suggesting a unique, more disruptive formation history of such close stellar pairs.Comment: Invited review chapter, accepted for publication in "Handbook of Exoplanets", ed. H. Deeg & J. A. Belmont