A prospective study on the role of neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy on surgical outcome in resectable oesophageal carcinoma

Background: Initial results of the chemo-radiotherapy for oesophageal cancer followed by surgery study (CROSS) comparing neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (NACRT) plus surgery versus surgery alone in patients with squamous cell carcinoma and adenocarcinoma of the oesophagus or oesophagogastric junction showed a significant increase in 5-year overall survival in favour of the NACRT plus surgery group after a median of 45 months' follow-up. In this study we will interpret the short-term results of NACRT on resectable, locally advanced oesophageal carcinoma.Methods: Patients with clinically resectable, locally advanced cancer of the oesophagus or oesophagogastric junction (clinical stage T1N1M0 or T2-3N0-1M0, according to the AJCC, 8th  edition) were assigned to receive weekly administration of four cycles of NACRT (intravenous carboplatin [AUC 2 mg/mL per min] and intravenous paclitaxel [50 mg/m 2 of body-surface area] for 23 days) with concurrent radiotherapy (41·4 Gy, given in 23 fractions of 1·8 Gy on 5 days per week) followed by McKeown’s oesophagectomy from 01 January, 2020 to 31 May, 2021.Results: It was observed in our study that 38.46% patients had achieved a CPR after the administration of NACRT as per the CROSS-trial protocol which is comparable to PCR achieved in CROSS trial (29%). All the patients underwent an R0 resection during surgery (100%) which is comparable to CROSS trial (92%).12Conclusions: In our study which had collected data over a period of 17 months we learnt that the administration of NACRT in locally advanced oesophageal cancer was effective in reducing the tumor burden and achieving a satisfactory CPR of 38.46%

LDL levels and ejection fraction in ischemic stroke patients: a hospital based cross-sectional study

Background: Ischemic stroke is a top contributor to mortality amongst non-infectious diseases. Atherosclerosis is a major risk factor. This study aims to assess LDL levels and ejection fraction in ischemic stroke patients. Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted in Government Thoothukudi Medical College from November, 2022 to April, 2023. 35 patients admitted in the neuromedicine ward and diagnosed as acute ischemic stroke were included in the study after informed consent and ethical clearance. Patients with acute neurological deficit and evidence of infarct on diffusion-weighted MRI were included. Patients with no evidence of infarct on DWI, those already on lipid lowering therapy, patients with a history of cerebrovascular disease or transient ischemic attacks were excluded. Blood for lipid profile taken after 8 hours of overnight fasting. Echocardiography done for all patients. Results: Of the 35 patients, 26 (74.28%) were men, mean age was 62.4. 57.14%  ischemic stroke patients had their LDL levels elevated, 28.57% had decreased HDL, 28.57% had total cholesterol levels elevated, and in 14.28% triglycerides was elevated. This study also observed the cardiac status of the patients which showed 29% patients had decreased ejection fraction. Conclusions: This study concluded that most patients had elevated LDL levels which is an independent risk factor of ischemic cerebrovascular disease. LDL levels were also associated with decreased ejection fraction in a significant number of patients. Thereby it can be concluded that elevated LDL cholesterol levels can add to the cardiac risk, potentially contributing to stroke morbidity and mortality

A bispecific monomeric nanobody induces spike trimer dimers and neutralizes SARS-CoV-2 in vivo

Experiments with replication-competent SARS-CoV-2 were performed in the Biomedicum BSL3 core facility, Karolinska Institutet. We thank Jonas Klingström for providing Calu-3 cells and sharing the Swedish SARS-CoV-2 isolate, and Alex Sigal from the Africa Health Research Institute for providing the beta variant (B.1.351/501Y.V2) isolate. We thank Penny Moore and the NICD (South Africa) for providing the B.1.351/beta variant spike plasmid, which was generated using funding from the South African Medical Research Council. We gratefully acknowledge the G2P-UK National Virology consortium funded by MRC/UKRI (grant ref: MR/W005611/1.) and the Barclay Lab at Imperial College for providing the B.1.617.2 spike plasmid. All cryo-EM data were collected in the Karolinska Institutet’s 3D-EM facility. We thank Agustin Ure for assistance with figure generation and Tomas Nyman (Protein Science Facility at KI) for providing access to SPR instruments. L.H. was supported by the David och Astrid Hageléns stiftelse, the Clas Groschinskys Minnesfond and a Jonas Söderquist’s scholarship. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No. 101003653 (CoroNAb), to B.M. and G.M.M. B.M.H. is supported by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation (KAW 2017.0080 and KAW 2018.0080). The work was supported by project grants from the Swedish Research Council to E.S. (2020-02682), B.M.H. (2017-6702 and 2018-3808), B.M. (2018-02381) and to G.M.M. (2018-03914 and 2018-03843). E.S. is supported by Karolinska Institutet Foundation Grants, National Molecular Medicine Program Grants, and the grants from the SciLifeLab National COVID-19 Research Program, financed by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation. We thank National Microscopy Infrastructure, NMI (VR-RFI 2016-00968).N

The Creation of Boron Deep Levels by High Temperature Annealing of 4H-SIC

Creation of semi-insulating layers in SiC is highly desirable for high voltage device fabrication. Specifically PiN diodes can be fabricated with a compensated semi-insulating layer that would be capable of blocking a large reverse voltage. Semi-insulating (SI) behavior in SiC has been traditionally achieved via passivation of shallow dopants with vanadium-related deep levels. Degraded electrical properties of SiC devices result from the use of vanadium compensated SiC because unintentional formation of additional defects due to vanadium segregation and stress generation in the material occur. In this work, the possibility of low doped or SI epilayers via engineering of the boron related defects in SiC is investigated. High temperature treatment (up to 2000°C) of boron doped samples is used to stimulate boron diffusion and formation of deep boron centers in concentration sufficient for compensation of shallow dopants, without simultaneous formation of undesirable shallow boron levels. High temperature annealing of both epitaxial layers in-situ doped with boron and boron implanted 4H-SiC is investigated. The possibility of diffusion from highly boron doped substrate is also investigated. The diffusion profiles are modeled and the diffusion coefficients extracted to give information about diffusion mechanisms. The boron D-center was observed using photoluminescence (PL) after high temperature annealing of the implanted samples. Clear temperature dependence of the creation of the D-center was observed. Compensated material was revealed after an Inductively Coupled Plasma (ICP) etch on an epi-over grown sample

Statistical Paradigm for Organic Optoelectronic Devices : Normal Force Testing for Adhesion of Organic Photovoltaics and Organic Light-Emitting Diodes

In this study, we assess the utility of a normal force (pull-test) approach to measuring adhesion in organic solar cells and organic light-emitting diodes. This approach is a simple and practical method of monitoring the impact of systematic changes in materials, processing conditions, or environmental exposure on interfacial strength and electrode delamination. The ease of measurement enables a statistical description with numerous samples, variant geometry, and minimal preparation. After examining over 70 samples, using the Weibull modulus and the characteristic breaking strength as metrics, we were able to successfully differentiate the adhesion values between 8-tris(hydroxyquinoline aluminum) (Alq3) and poly(3-hexyl-thiophene) and [6,6]-phenyl C61-butyric acid methyl ester (P3HT:PCBM) interfaces with Al and between two annealing times for the bulk heterojunction polymer blends. Additionally, the Weibull modulus, a relative measure of the range of flaw sizes at the fracture plane, can be correlated with the roughness of the organic surface. Finite element modeling of the delamination process suggests that the out-of-plane elastic modulus for Alq3 is lower than the reported in-plane elastic values. We suggest a statistical treatment of a large volume of tests be part of the standard protocol for investigating adhesion to accommodate the unavoidable variability in morphology and interfacial structure found in most organic devices