Exercise and cardiovascular diseases.

Exercise is a physiologic stressor that has multiple beneficial effects on cardiovascular system. Currently exercise training is a class I intervention as part of a multifactorial long-term process that includes: clinical assistance, assessment of global cardiovascular risk, identification of specific objective for each cardiovascular risk factor, formulation of an individual treatment plan with multiple intervention aimed at reduction of the risk, educational programs, planning of long term follow-up. This paper reviews the evidences of benefit of exercise in the most common heart diseases and describes the role of exercise training in the cardiac rehabilitation programs

Cardiovascular drugs attenuated myocardial resistance against ischaemia-induced and reperfusion-induced injury in a rat model of repetitive occlusion

We investigated the impact of cardioprotective drugs on ST-elevation, arrhythmias and infarct size in a rat model of repetitive coronary artery occlusion

Leukocyte telomere length and mitochondrial DNA copy number associate with endothelial function in aging-related cardiovascular disease

BackgroundWe investigated the association between leukocyte telomere length, mitochondrial DNA copy number, and endothelial function in patients with aging-related cardiovascular disease (CVD).MethodsIn total 430 patients with CVD and healthy persons were enrolled in the current study. Peripheral blood was drawn by routine venipuncture procedure. Plasma and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were collected. Cell-free genomic DNA (cfDNA) and leukocytic genomic DNA (leuDNA) were extracted from plasma and PBMCs, respectively. Relative telomere length (TL) and mitochondrial DNA copy number (mtDNA-CN) were analyzed using quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Endothelial function was evaluated by measuring flow-mediated dilation (FMD). The correlation between TL of cfDNA (cf-TL), mtDNA-CN of cfDNA (cf-mtDNA), TL of leuDNA (leu-TL), mtDNA-CN of leuDNA (leu-mtDNA), age, and FMD were analyzed based on Spearman's rank correlation. The association between cf-TL, cf-mtDNA, leu-TL, leu-mtDNA, age, gender, and FMD were explored using multiple linear regression analysis.Resultscf-TL positively correlated with cf-mtDNA (r = 0.1834, P = 0.0273), and leu-TL positively correlated with leu-mtDNA (r = 0.1244, P = 0.0109). In addition, both leu-TL (r = 0.1489, P = 0.0022) and leu-mtDNA (r = 0.1929, P < 0.0001) positively correlated with FMD. In a multiple linear regression analysis model, both leu-TL (β = 0.229, P = 0.002) and leu-mtDNA (β = 0.198, P = 0.008) were positively associated with FMD. In contrast, age was inversely associated with FMD (β = −0.426, P < 0.0001).ConclusionTL positively correlates mtDNA-CN in both cfDNA and leuDNA. leu-TL and leu-mtDNA can be regarded as novel biomarkers of endothelial dysfunction

A Journey from Thermally Tunable Synthesis to Spectroscopy of Phenylmethanimine in Gas Phase and Solution

Phenylmethanimine is an aromatic imine with a twofold relevance in chemistry: organic synthesis and astrochemistry. To tackle both aspects, a multidisciplinary strategy has been exploited and a new, easily accessible synthetic approach to generate stable imine-intermediates in the gas phase and in solution has been introduced. The combination of this formation pathway, based on the thermal decomposition of hydrobenzamide, with a state-of-the-art computational characterization of phenylmethanimine laid the foundation for its first laboratory observation by means of rotational electric resonance spectroscopy. Both E and Z isomers have been accurately characterized, thus providing a reliable basis to guide future astronomical observations. A further characterization has been carried out by nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, showing the feasibility of this synthetic approach in solution. The temperature dependence as well as possible mechanisms of the thermolysis process have been examined

A Journey from Thermally Tunable Synthesis to Spectroscopy of Phenylmethanimine in Gas Phase and Solution

Phenylmethanimine is an aromatic imine with a twofold relevance in chemistry: organic synthesis and astrochemistry. To tackle both aspects, a multidisciplinary strategy has been exploited and a new, easily accessible synthetic approach to generate stable imine-intermediates in the gas phase and in solution has been introduced. The combination of this formation pathway, based on the thermal decomposition of hydrobenzamide, with a state-of-the-art computational characterization of phenylmethanimine laid the foundation for its first laboratory observation by means of rotational electric resonance spectroscopy. Both E and Z isomers have been accurately characterized, thus providing a reliable basis to guide future astronomical observations. A further characterization has been carried out by nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, showing the feasibility of this synthetic approach in solution. The temperature dependence as well as possible mechanisms of the thermolysis process have been examined. © 2020 The Authors. Published by Wiley-VCH Gmb

Resistance of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) Prions to Inactivation

Distinct prion strains often exhibit different incubation periods and patterns of neuropathological lesions. Strain characteristics are generally retained upon intraspecies transmission, but may change on transmission to another species. We investigated the inactivation of two related prions strains: BSE prions from cattle and mouse-passaged BSE prions, termed 301V. Inactivation was manipulated by exposure to sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS), variations in pH, and different temperatures. Infectivity was measured using transgenic mouse lines that are highly susceptible to either BSE or 301V prions. Bioassays demonstrated that BSE prions are up to 1,000-fold more resistant to inactivation than 301V prions while Western immunoblotting showed that short acidic SDS treatments reduced protease-resistant PrPSc from BSE prions and 301V prions at similar rates. Our findings argue that despite being derived from BSE prions, mouse 301V prions are not necessarily a reliable model for cattle BSE prions. Extending these comparisons to human sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease and hamster Sc237 prions, we found that BSE prions were 10- and 106-fold more resistant to inactivation, respectively. Our studies contend that any prion inactivation procedures must be validated by bioassay against the prion strain for which they are intended to be used

Planspiele im Geschichtsunterricht! Überlegungen zum fachdidaktischen Nutzen reflexiver Phasen

Buschmann C, McLean P. Planspiele im Geschichtsunterricht! Überlegungen zum fachdidaktischen Nutzen reflexiver Phasen. Zeitschrift für Didaktik der Gesellschaftswissenschaften. 2023;14(1):145-156

Extending OMNeT++ Towards a Platform for the Design of Future In-Vehicle Network Architectures.

In-vehicle communication technologies are evolving. While today's cars are equipped with fieldbusses to interconnect the various electronic control units, next generation vehicles have timing and bandwidth requirements that exceed the capacities. In particular Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) and automated driving using high bandwidth sensors such as cameras, LIDAR or radar will challenge the in-car network. Automotive Ethernet is the most promising candidate to solve the upcoming challenges. But to design and evaluate new protocols, concepts, and architectures suitable analysis tools are required. Especially in the interim period with architectures using automotive Ethernet and legacy fieldbusses together, careful planning and design is of vital importance. Simulation can provide a good understanding of the expectable network metrics in an early development phase. This paper contributes a workflow as well as the required toolchain to evaluate new real-time Ethernet communication architectures using event based simulation in OMNeT++. We introduce a domain specific language (DSL) - the Abstract Network Description Language (ANDL) - to describe and configure the simulation and present the required simulation models for real-time Ethernet and fieldbus technologies such as CAN and FlexRay. We further introduce new analysis tools for special in-vehicle network use-cases and the interaction of the simulation with third-party applications established in the automotive domain.Comment: Published in: A. Foerster, V. Vesely, A. Virdis, M. Kirsche (Eds.), Proc. of the 3rd OMNeT++ Community Summit, Brno University of Technology - Czech Republic - September 15-16, 201