Long-term treatment with cinacalcet and conventional therapy reduces parathyroid hyperplasia in severe secondary hyperparathyroidism

Background. The effect of cinacalcet on the structural pattern of hyperplastic parathyroid glands was evaluated, using high-resolution colour Doppler (CD) sonography, in haemodialysis patients with severe, inadequately controlled, secondary hyperparathyroidism (sHPT)

A Bioinformatics Filtering Strategy for Identifying Radiation Response Biomarker Candidates

The number of biomarker candidates is often much larger than the number of clinical patient data points available, which motivates the use of a rational candidate variable filtering methodology. The goal of this paper is to apply such a bioinformatics filtering process to isolate a modest number (<10) of key interacting genes and their associated single nucleotide polymorphisms involved in radiation response, and to ultimately serve as a basis for using clinical datasets to identify new biomarkers. In step 1, we surveyed the literature on genetic and protein correlates to radiation response, in vivo or in vitro, across cellular, animal, and human studies. In step 2, we analyzed two publicly available microarray datasets and identified genes in which mRNA expression changed in response to radiation. Combining results from Step 1 and Step 2, we identified 20 genes that were common to all three sources. As a final step, a curated database of protein interactions was used to generate the most statistically reliable protein interaction network among any subset of the 20 genes resulting from Steps 1 and 2, resulting in identification of a small, tightly interacting network with 7 out of 20 input genes. We further ranked the genes in terms of likely importance, based on their location within the network using a graph-based scoring function. The resulting core interacting network provides an attractive set of genes likely to be important to radiation response

Developing a Crime Mapping GIS System For Law Enforcement: A Case Study of Owerri Metropolis, Nigeria

Abstract: This paper examines the use of GIS in the development of a crime analysis information system for the Nigeria police. In recent times, criminality has been on the increase with criminals using new and more sophisticated ways to commit crime; resulting to fear and restlessness among the citizens. They police have found it difficult to manage and control these crimes largely due to the obsolete methods and resources they employ in doing so. The purpose of this study is to see how the Nigerian Police Force can adopt the use of crime maps in its operations and reap the benefits. The system will help the police in the analysis of crimes which will lead to crime hotspots identification. Using ArcGIS Software 10.0, we created a digital land use map of crime hotspots in the area and a crime-geospatial database. The results of the spatial analysis and a 500m buffering done on the data shows that areas that are more vulnerable to crime, have no police stations situated around them. This study shows that a GIS based Information system will give the police better insights into crime mapping and analysis which will be a tool to help them effectively manage and combat crime. This study recommends full government involvement in the area of human personnel and infrastructure development for the police to effectively change from the traditional to GIS based ways of combating crime