Randomized trials of artemisinin-piperaquine, dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine phosphate and artemether-lumefantrine for the treatment of multi-drug resistant falciparum malaria in Cambodia-Thailand border area

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Drug resistance of falciparum malaria is a global problem. Sulphadoxine/pyrimethamine-resistant and mefloquine-resistant strains of falciparum malaria have spread in Southeast Asia at lightning speed in 1980s-1990s, and the Cambodia-Thailand border is one of the malaria epidemic areas with the most severe forms of multi-drug resistant falciparum malaria.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Artemisinin-piperaquine (AP), dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine phosphate (DHP) and artemether-lumefantrine (AL) were used to treat 110, 55 and 55 uncomplicated malaria patients, respectively. The total dosage for adults is 1,750 mg (four tablets, twice over 24 hours) of AP, 2,880 mg (eight tablets, four times over two days) of DHP, and 3,360 mg (24 tablets, six times over three days) of AL. The 28-day cure rate, parasite clearance time, fever clearance time, and drug tolerance of patients to the three drugs were compared. All of the above methods were consistent with the current national guidelines.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The mean parasite clearance time was similar in all three groups (66.7 ± 21.9 hrs, 65.6 ± 27.3 hrs, 65.3 ± 22.5 hrs in AP, DHP and AL groups, respectively), and there was no remarkable difference between them; the fever clearance time was also similar (31.6 ± 17.7 hrs, 34.6 ± 21.8 hrs and 36.9 ± 15.4 hrs, respectively). After following up for 28-days, the cure rate was 95.1%(97/102), 98.2%(54/55) and 82.4%(42/51); and the recrudescence cases was 4.9%(5/102), 1.8%(1/55) and 17.6%(9/51), respectively. Therefore, the statistical data showed that 28-day cure rate in AP and DHP groups was superior to AL group obviously.</p> <p>The patients had good tolerance to all the three drugs, and some side effects (anoxia, nausea, vomiting, headache and dizziness) could be found in every group and they were self-limited; patients in control groups also had good tolerance to DHP and AL, there was no remarkable difference in the three groups.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>AP, DHP and AL all remained efficacious treatments for the treatment of falciparum malaria in Cambodia-Thailand border area. However, in this particular setting, the AP regimen turned out to be favourable in terms of efficacy and effectiveness, simplicity of administration, cost and compliance.</p> <p>Trial Registration</p> <p>The trial was registered at <it>Chinese Clinical Trial Register </it>under identifier 2005L01041.</p

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

A facile route to synthesize transition metal oxide/reduced graphene oxide composites and their lithium storage performance

Transition metal oxide (Mn3O4, Fe2O3, Co3O4, and ZnO) and reduced graphene oxide (RGO) composites were successfully synthesized via a hydrothermal method using the direct reaction between the corresponding metal powder and graphene oxide (GO). In this process, the GO can be reduced by transition metal powder in water, and the nanosized metal oxide can be obtained, and homogeneously mixed with and wrapped by RGO to form a metal oxide/RGO composite at the same time. X-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and scanning and transmission electron microscopy were used to characterize the as-prepared materials. The different experimental parameters, including reactants, solvents, atmosphere inside the autoclave, temperature, and reaction time, were investigated for their effects on the phase of the products. Furthermore, as an example, the lithium storage properties of Fe2O3/RGO and Co3O4/RGO composites were also investigated. The electrochemical performance shows both good cycling stability (852 mA h g−1 up to 200 cycles) and high rate capability (425 mA h g−1 at the 4 C rate). This can be attributed to the novel RGO-wrapped composite structure, which can buffer the volume changes and maintain good electrical conductivity

Experimental Investigation Of The Real Contact Arc Length Measurement In The Cylindrical Plunge Grinding

The real contact arc length in grinding is one of the most important indicators in investigating of the material removal mechanism for precision machining. It is generally affected by a combination of plastic and thermal deformations in the machining process. This paper will provide a systematic investigation of the contact arc length in the cylindrical grinding of titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V. A series of single grit experiments and grinding temperature measurements, together with FEM simulation, will be utilized to determine the real contact arc length. The contact behavior between a grinding wheel and the workpiece was investigated by the contact time in the workpice surface temperature curves. It was found that in FEM simulation, the real contact length was about 2 times of the geometric length. With the experimental results of the different grinding parameters, the real contact lengths calculated by temperature curves were about 1.5 - 2 times of the geometric length

Experimental Investigation Of The Real Contact Arc Length Measurement In The Cylindrical Plunge Grinding

The real contact arc length in grinding is one of the most important indicators in investigating of the material removal mechanism for precision machining. It is generally affected by a combination of plastic and thermal deformations in the machining process. This paper will provide a systematic investigation of the contact arc length in the cylindrical grinding of titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V. A series of single grit experiments and grinding temperature measurements, together with FEM simulation, will be utilized to determine the real contact arc length. The contact behavior between a grinding wheel and the workpiece was investigated by the contact time in the workpice surface temperature curves. It was found that in FEM simulation, the real contact length was about 2 times of the geometric length. With the experimental results of the different grinding parameters, the real contact lengths calculated by temperature curves were about 1.5 - 2 times of the geometric length

Formation Mechanism of CaTiO₃ Hollow Crystals with Different Microstructures

The crystal growth of CaTiO3 hollow crystals with different microstructures has been investigated. In a water-free poly(ethylene glycol) 200 (PEG-200) solution, CaTiO3 nanocubes formed first. The nanocubes underwent an oriented self-assembly into spherical particles, enhanced by the surface-adsorbed polymer molecules. Since the growth of nanocubes and their aggregation took place simultaneously, the nanocubes in the outer shells were larger than those in the cores. Disappearance of the small nanocubes in the cores of the spheres during an Ostwald ripening process led to spherical hollow crystals. Addition of a small amount of water (1.25 vol %) in the polymer solution enhanced surface recrystallization of the aggregated spheres, forming a cubic morphology. The orthorhombic distortion of the perovskite CaTiO3 structure did not have a significant effect on the nanocube aggregation, resulting in a domain structure in the shells. Single-crystalline hollow cubes were produced with a slightly higher water content, e.g., 5 vol %. This process of (1) aggregation of nanocubes and (2) surface crystallization followed by (3) surface-to-core extension of recrystallization gives a good example of the reversed crystal growth route in ceramic materials. The proposed formation mechanism of the hollow CaTiO3 crystals would enable us to control the microstructures of these materials and to explain the formation of many other hollow crystals.</p

Influence and Interaction of Iron and Cadmium on Photosynthesis and Antioxidative Enzymes in Two Rice Cultivars

In this study, a soil pot experiment was conducted to investigate the changes in photosynthesis and antioxidative enzymes in two rice varieties (Shendao 6 and Shennong 265) supplied with iron (Fe), cadmium (Cd), and Fe and Cd together. The concentrations of Fe and Cd in the soil were 0, 1.0 g Fe·kg−1and 0, 2.0 mg Cd·kg−1, respectively. Photosynthetic indices and antioxidative enzyme activities were recorded at different rice growth stages. At the early stage, Cd showed a transient stimulatory effect on the photosynthetic rate of Shennong 265. For Shendao 6, however, Cd showed a transient stimulatory effect on photosynthetic rate, intercellular CO2concentration, stomatal conductance and transpiration efficiency. In addition, the results show that Cd can also enhance the superoxide dismutase (SOD) and peroxidase (POD) activities, but reduce the malondialdehyde (MDA) and soluble protein contents in the two rice cultivars. Subsequently, Cd starts to inhibit photosynthesis and SOD activity until the ripening stage, causing the lowest photosynthetic rate and SOD activity at this stage. In contrast, Fe alleviates the Cd-induced changes at earlier or later growth stage. Notably at the later growth stage, the results show that the interaction between Fe and Cd increases the SOD and catalase (CAT) activities, while decreasing the lipid peroxidation and promoting photosynthesis. As a result, it ultimately increases the biomass. The results from this study suggest that Fe (as Fe fertilizer) is a promising alternative for agricultural use to enhance the plant development and, simultaneously, to reduce Cd toxicity in extensively polluted soils