Evaluation of the morphometric characteristics of ewe milk fat globules, cheese yield and ripening in the intermediate lactation phase

The study was carried out on twenty ewes kept indoors at 25 days post partum. The experiment lasted 60 days, from 40 to 100 days post partum. The animals were homogeneous in terms of parity, lactation phase and feed. The results show that, as the lactation phase progresses, there is a gradual increase in the percentage of fat and a decrease in the average diameter of the fat globules. In particular, before the 55 days of lactation the milk quality and the cheese yield are lower and the weight loss at 10 days of ripening is higher

Oral Health and Dental Anxiety in a German Practice-based Sample

Objective Does dental anxiety have an effect on dental and periodontal health? Methods Survey data was collected from n = 200 adults (53 % females, average age 49 years) in a cross-sectional study. Dental anxiety was measured with the modified dental anxiety scale (MDAS, score 1–5, the greater the score, the greater the anxiety). Clinical parameters including probing depth (PD), clinical attachment level (CAL), plaque index (SLI), and bleeding on probing (BoP) as well as the DMFT index were recorded and statistically analyzed. Results Rating of dental anxiety was higher in women than in men (65 vs 35 %). Subjects with higher MDAS values visited the dentist less frequently (p = 0.001) and had more decay (DT 6.7 ± 4.2 vs 1.7 ± 2.4; p \u3c 0.001) but fewer filled teeth than subjects with lower ratings of dental anxiety (FT 7.1 ± 4.5 vs 9.8 ± 5.7; p = 0.042). There were no differences in PD or CAL between subjects with or without dental anxiety, while patients with higher MDAS value showed significantly more BoP (50 ± 19 vs 34 ± 20 %; p = 0.002) than patients with low MDAS scores (no or low dental anxiety). Conclusions Patients with higher ratings of dental anxiety had significantly more caries experience and gingivitis. Therefore, dental anxiety is associated with negative effect on dental and periodontal health. Clinical relevance Identifying patients with high dental anxiety and helping to manage this anxiety has important implications to improve oral health in adults. The MDAS appears to be an easy and efficient tool that can be used to identify patients with dental anxiety in dental practices

Therapeutic monoclonal antibodies and antibody products: Current practices and development in multiple myeloma

Immunotherapy is the latest innovation for the treatment of multiple myeloma (MM). Monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) entered the clinical practice and are under evaluation in clinical trials. MAbs can target highly selective and specific antigens on the cell surface of MM cells causing cell death (CD38 and CS1), convey specific cytotoxic drugs (antibody-drug conjugates), remove the breaks of the immune system (programmed death 1 (PD-1) and PD-ligand 1/2 (L1/L2) axis), or boost it against myeloma cells (bi-specific mAbs and T cell engagers). Two mAbs have been approved for the treatment of MM: the anti-CD38 daratumumab for newly-diagnosed and relapsed/refractory patients and the anti-CS1 elotuzumab in the relapse setting. These compounds are under investigation in clinical trials to explore their synergy with other anti-MM regimens, both in the front-line and relapse settings. Other antibodies targeting various antigens are under evaluation. B cell maturation antigens (BCMAs), selectively expressed on plasma cells, emerged as a promising target and several compounds targeting it have been developed. Encouraging results have been reported with antibody drug conjugates (e.g., GSK2857916) and bispecific T cell engagers (BiTEs®), including AMG420, which re-directs T cell-mediated cytotoxicity against MM cells. Here, we present an overview on mAbs currently approved for the treatment of MM and promising compounds under investigation

SCALAR: an AMR code to simulate axion-like dark matter models

We present a new code, SCALAR, based on the high-resolution hydrodynamics and N-body code RAMSES, to solve the Schr\"odinger equation on adaptive refined meshes. The code is intended to be used to simulate axion or fuzzy dark matter models where the evolution of the dark matter component is determined by a coupled Schr\"odinger-Poisson equation, but it can also be used as a standalone solver for both linear and non-linear Schr\"odinger equations with any given external potential. This paper describes the numerical implementation of our solver and presents tests to demonstrate how accurately it operates.Comment: 17 pages, 11 figure