Alginate hydrogel improves anti-angiogenic bevacizumab activity in cancer therapy

Alginate hydrogel improves anti-angiogenic bevacizumab activity in cancer therapyAnti-vascular endothelial growth factor (anti-VEGF) therapy applied to solid tumors is a promising strategy, yet, the challenge to deliver these agents at high drug concentrations together with the maintenance of therapeutic doses locally, at the tumor site, minimizes its benefits. To overcome these obstacles, we propose the development of a bevacizumab-loaded alginate hydrogel by electrostatic interactions to design a delivery system for controlled and anti-angiogenic therapy under tumor microenvironrnental conditions. The tridimensional hydrogel structure produced provides drug stability and a system able to be introduced as a flowable solution, stablishing a depot after local administration. Biological performance by the chick embryo chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) assay indicated a pH-independent improved anti-angiogenic activity (similar to 50%) compared to commercial available anti-VEGF drug. Moreover, there was a considerable regression in tumor size when treated with this system. Immunohistochemistry highlighted a reduced number and disorganization of microscopic blood vessels resulting from applied therapy. These results suggest that the developed hydrogel is a promising approach to create an innovative delivery system.that offers the possibility to treat different solid tumors by intratumoral administration.Brazilian Fundação de Amparo e Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP), Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) and Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq). Additionally, this article has been developed under the scope of the project NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000013, supported by the Northern Portugal Regional Operational Programme (NORTE 2020), under the Portugal 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) Project PTDC/SAU-TOX/114549/2009 – FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-016057, through the Competitiveness Factors Operational Programme (COMPETE), and by National funds, through the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), under the scope of the project POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007038info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Necessary Optimality Conditions for Higher-Order Infinite Horizon Variational Problems on Time Scales

We obtain Euler-Lagrange and transversality optimality conditions for higher-order infinite horizon variational problems on a time scale. The new necessary optimality conditions improve the classical results both in the continuous and discrete settings: our results seem new and interesting even in the particular cases when the time scale is the set of real numbers or the set of integers.Comment: This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form will appear in Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications (JOTA). Paper submitted 17-Nov-2011; revised 24-March-2012 and 10-April-2012; accepted for publication 15-April-201

Importância do Gerenciamento de Rejeitos Radioativos na Iodoterapia

Iodotherapy is one of the medicinal nuclear therapeutics that employs radioactive iodine as the radionuclide. This treatment, carried out in hospitals, requires radioprotection procedures to guard the patients, the medical team and the environment against contamination. A discussion regarding the application of this therapeutic shows the importance of implanting programs to manage radioactive residues which are generated in hospital units.Resumo: A iodoterapia é uma das terapêuticas da medicina nuclear que emprega como radionuclídeo o iodo radioativo. Esse tratamento, realizado em unidades de internação, exige procedimentos de radioproteção para prevenir contaminação de pacientes, equipe de saúde e meio ambiente. Uma discussão sobre a aplicação dessa terapêutica mostra a importância da implantação de programas de gerenciamento de resíduos radioativos, gerados em unidades hospitalares

Ética na pesquisa com crianças: ausências e desafios

Valendo-se da sociologia da infância, o texto discute as questões da infância, da pesquisa e da ética que devem enformar todos os procedimentos desencadeados no processo de pesquisa com crianças. Será inicialmente apresentado o estado da arte acerca das discussões que têm caraterizado esse debate, que, sendo recente, conta com uma significativa reflexão. Apresentamos, ainda, alguns desafios que são fundamentais serem enfrentados para que se consiga uma ética viável na investigação com crianças, que passam pela indispensabilidade de se pensar as questões de poder que se estabelecem entre adultos e crianças; que passam também pelo enfrentamento do desafio que decorre das hierarquias protocolares e a maneira como estas podem contribuir para a invisibilidade epistemológica das crianças na pesquisa; que passam, finalmente, por um questionamento crítico relativamente à forma como é salvaguardada a autoria, quer de crianças, quer de adultos, na análise, interpretação e produção dos dados.This paper discusses, from the sociology of childhood, the issues of childhood, research and ethics which must shape the methodological procedures undertaken in the research processes with children. We, firstly, will present the state-of-the-art theoretical discussions that have been characterizing this debate, which, although recent, are already very significant. We also present some challenges, which are essential to face, in order to achieve a feasible ethic in research with children, which are related to the need to think about the power issues between adults and children. We also have to consider that the challenge stems from the protocol hierarchies and how sometimes these can contribute to the epistemological invisibility of children in research. Finally, a third challenge that mobilizes a critical analysis related to the way issues of authorship of children and adult, in the analysis, interpretation and production of scientific texts, are respected.Valiéndose de la sociología en la infancia, el texto discute las cuestiones de la infancia, de la investigación y la ética que deben conformar todos los procedimientos desencadenados en el proceso de investigación con niños y niñas. En primer lugar se presenta el estado de la arte acerca de las discusiones que vienen caracterizando a tal debate, que aun siendo reciente, ya cuenta con una significativa reflexión. Presentamos también algunos de los desafíos que resulta fundamental afrontar para alcanzar una ética viable en la investigación con niños y niñas, que pasan por la obligada necesidad de pensar las cuestiones de poder que se establecen entre adultos y niños; que pasan también por el afrontamiento al desafío que resulta de las jerarquías protocolarias y la forma cómo estas pueden contribuir para la invisibilidad epistemológica de los niños y niñas en la investigación. Que pasan, por fin, por un cuestionamiento crítico en cuanto a la forma como se salvaguarda la autoría, ya sea de niños o de adultos, en el análisis, interpretación y producción de datos.CIEC - Centro de Investigação em Estudos da Criança, IE, UMinho (UI 317 da FCT), PortugalFundos Nacionais através da FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia) e cofinanciado pelo Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER) através do COMPETE 2020 – Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização (POCI) no âmbito do CIEC (Centro de Investigação em Estudos da Criança, da Universidade do Minho) com a referência POCI-01-0145-FEDER-00756

Evaluation of the genotoxic and antigenotoxic potential of Melissa officinalis in mice

Melissa officinalis (L.) (Lamiaceae), a plant known as the lemon balm, is native to the east Mediterranean region and west Asia. Also found in tropical countries, such as Brazil, where it is popularly known as “erva-cidreira” or “melissa”, it is widely used in aqueous- or alcoholic-extract form in the treatment of various disorders. The aim was to investigate in vivo its antigenotoxicity and antimutagenicity, as well as its genotoxic/mutagenic potential through comet and micronucleus assaying. CF-1 male mice were treated with ethanolic (Mo-EE) (250 or 500 mg/kg) or aqueous (Mo-AE) (100 mg/kg) solutions of an M. officinalis extract for 2 weeks, prior to treatment with saline or Methyl methanesulfonate (MMS) doses by intraperitoneal injection. Irrespective of the doses, no genotoxic or mutagenic effects were observed in blood and bone-marrow samples. Although Mo-EE exerted an antigenotoxic effect on the blood cells of mice treated with the alkylating agent (MMS) in all the doses, this was not so with Mo-AE. Micronucleus testing revealed the protector effect of Mo-EE, but only when administered at the highest dose. The implication that an ethanolic extract of M. officinalis has antigenotoxic/antimutagenic properties is an indication of its medicinal relevance

Global fine-resolution data on springtail abundance and community structure

Springtails (Collembola) inhabit soils from the Arctic to the Antarctic and comprise an estimated ~32% of all terrestrial arthropods on Earth. Here, we present a global, spatially-explicit database on springtail communities that includes 249,912 occurrences from 44,999 samples and 2,990 sites. These data are mainly raw sample-level records at the species level collected predominantly from private archives of the authors that were quality-controlled and taxonomically-standardised. Despite covering all continents, most of the sample-level data come from the European continent (82.5% of all samples) and represent four habitats: woodlands (57.4%), grasslands (14.0%), agrosystems (13.7%) and scrublands (9.0%). We included sampling by soil layers, and across seasons and years, representing temporal and spatial within-site variation in springtail communities. We also provided data use and sharing guidelines and R code to facilitate the use of the database by other researchers. This data paper describes a static version of the database at the publication date, but the database will be further expanded to include underrepresented regions and linked with trait data.</p