411 research outputs found
Multifocal High-Grade Pancreatic Precursor Lesions: A Case Series and Management Recommendations
Background: The risk of developing invasive cancer in the remnant pancreas after resection of multifocal high-grade pancreatic precursor lesions is not well known. We report three patients who were followed up after resection of multifocal high-grade pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PanIN)-3 or intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasia (IPMN), two of whom eventually developed invasive carcinoma. Presentation: 1) 68-year-old woman who had a laparoscopic distal pancreatectomy for multifocal mixed-type IPMN, identified as high-grade on final pathology, with negative surgical margins. During semiannual monitoring, eight years from the first surgery, the patient developed suspicious features prompting surgical resection of the body with final pathology revealing invasive ductal adenocarcinoma in the setting of IPMN. 2) 48-year-old woman who had a distal pancreatectomy for severe acute/chronic symptomatic pancreatitis, with final pathology revealing multifocal high-grade PanIN-3, with negative surgical margins. Despite semiannual monitoring, two years from the first surgery, the patient developed pancreatic adenocarcinoma with liver metastasis. 3) 55-year-old woman who had a Whipple procedure for symptomatic chronic pancreatitis, with multifocal PanIN-3 on final pathology. The patient underwent completion pancreatectomy due to symptomatology and her high-risk profile, with final pathology confirming multifocal PanIN-3. Conclusion: Multifocal high-grade dysplastic lesions of the pancreas might benefit from surgical resection
Statistical stability and limit laws for Rovella maps
We consider the family of one-dimensional maps arising from the contracting
Lorenz attractors studied by Rovella. Benedicks-Carleson techniques were used
by Rovella to prove that there is a one-parameter family of maps whose
derivatives along their critical orbits increase exponentially fast and the
critical orbits have slow recurrent to the critical point. Metzger proved that
these maps have a unique absolutely continuous ergodic invariant probability
measure (SRB measure).
Here we use the technique developed by Freitas and show that the tail set
(the set of points which at a given time have not achieved either the
exponential growth of derivative or the slow recurrence) decays exponentially
fast as time passes. As a consequence, we obtain the continuous variation of
the densities of the SRB measures and associated metric entropies with the
parameter. Our main result also implies some statistical properties for these
maps.Comment: 1 figur
MicroRNA-129-1 acts as tumour suppressor and induces cell cycle arrest of GBM cancer cells through targeting IGF2BP3 and MAPK1
Background MicroRNA-129-1 (miR-129-1) seems to behave as a tumour suppressor since its decreased expression is associated with different tumours such as glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). GBM is the most common form of brain tumours originating from glial cells. The impact of miR-129-1 downregulation on GBM pathogenesis has yet to be elucidated. Methods MiR-129-1 was overexpressed in GBM cells, and its effect on proliferation was investigated by cell cycle assay. MiR-129-1 predicted targets (CDK6, IGF1, HDAC2, IGF2BP3 and MAPK1) were also evaluated by western blot and luciferase assay. Results Restoration of miR-129-1 reduced cell proliferation and induced G1 accumulation, significantly. Several functional assays confirmed IGF2BP3, MAPK1 and CDK6 as targets of miR-129-1. Despite the fact that IGF1 expression can be suppressed by miR-129-1, through 30-untranslated region complementary sequence, we could not find any association between IGF1 expression and GBM. MiR-129-1 expression inversely correlates with CDK6, IGF2BP3 and MAPK1 in primary clinical samples. Conclusion This is the first study to propose miR129-1 as a negative regulator of IGF2BP3 and MAPK1 and also a cell cycle arrest inducer in GBM cells. Our data suggests miR-129-1 as a potential tumour suppressor and presents a rationale for the use of miR-129-1 as a novel strategy to improve treatment response in GBM
Phenolic contents and in vitro antioxidant activity of four commonly consumed nuts in Algeria
This study was carried out to determine the phenolic contents and the antioxidant activity of four nuts with different solvent extract. Total phenolic compounds, flavonoids, and proanthocyanidin were quantified. Antioxidant activity was evaluated by various in vitro tests, including ferric reducing power, phosphomolybdenum method assay, and free radical scavenging activity. The results showed that the total phenolic contents varied between 0.30 g GAE/100 g (peanuts) and 1.65 g GAE/100 g (walnuts); the flavonoid contents varied between 0.17 g QE/100 g (peanuts) and 0.41 g QE/100 g (hazelnut). The phenolic contents of four nut extracts exhibit potent antioxidant activity. Indeed, walnuts were the richest in total phenolic content and demonstrated the highest potential for overall antioxidant capacity using ferric reducing power assay (FRP), phosphomolybdenum method assay, and free radical scavenging activity (FRSA). Phenolic amounts positively correlated with antioxidant activity tested
Photophysical study of Thioflavin T as fluorescence marker of amyloid fibrils
This is the accepted manuscript of the following article: Freire, S., de Araujo, M., Al-Soufi, W., & Novo, M. (2014). Photophysical study of Thioflavin T as fluorescence marker of amyloid fibrils. Dyes And Pigments, 110, 97-105. doi: 10.1016/j.dyepig.2014.05.004.
© 2014 Elsevier B.V. This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)Thioflavin T is a highly sensitive fluorescent marker of amyloid fibrils that has been widely used for in vitro biomedical assays. However, neither its complex photophysical behavior nor its binding mode to amyloid fibrils are still well understood. We present a detailed analysis of the photophysical properties of Thioflavin T in various media, including solvents and solvent mixtures of different viscosities as well as fibrillar and globular proteins. We propose a model that explains the strong wavelength dependency of the Thioflavin T fluorescence and the large fluorescence enhancement in certain environments. We determine the binding affinities and the fluorescence properties of Thioflavin T bound to amyloid-β (1–42) fibrils and to bovine serum albumin and discuss the sensitivity and the specificity of this probe to amyloid aggregates. These results allow us to assess the suitability of Thioflavin T for quantitative determinations in biomedical studiesS.F. and M. H. A. thank the Xunta de Galicia and the Ministerio de Educación, Cultura y Deporte (Program "Ciencia sin Fronteras") for scholarship. M.N. and W.A. thank the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación and the Xunta de Galicia for their financial support (CTQ2010-21369, CN2012/314, GPC2013/052)S
Pharmacogenetic aspects in familial hypercholesterolemia with the special focus on FHMarburg (FH p.W556R)
Multiperiodicity in the large-amplitude rapidly-rotating Ceph ei star HD 203664
We perform a seismic study of the young massive Cephei star HD 203664
with the goal to constrain its interior structure. Our study is based on a time
series of 328 new Geneva 7-colour photometric data of the star spread over
496.8 days. The data confirm the frequency of the dominant mode of the star
which we refine to c d. The mode has a large amplitude of
37 mmag in V and is unambiguously identified as a dipole mode () from
its amplitude ratios and non-adiabatic computations. Besides , we discover
two additional new frequencies in the star with amplitudes above :
c d and c d or one of their daily
aliases. The amplitudes of these two modes are only between 3 and 4 mmag which
explains why they were not detected before. Their amplitude ratios are too
uncertain for mode identification. We show that the observed oscillation
spectrum of HD 203664 is compatible with standard stellar models but that we
have insufficient information for asteroseismic inferences. Among the
large-amplitude Cephei stars, HD 203664 stands out as the only one
rotating at a significant fraction of its critical rotation velocity ().Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in A&A (Astronomy &
Astrophysics
Multiperiodicity in the newly discovered mid-late Be star V2104 Cygni
We obtained the first long, homogenous time-series of V2104Cyg, consisting of
679 datapoints, with the uvbybeta photometers of Sierra Nevada and San Pedro
Martir Observatories with the aim to detect and subsequently interpret the
intrinsic frequencies of this previously unstudied variable star, which turned
out to be a Be star. We try to figure out its place among the variable B stars
on the upper Main Sequence. In order to obtain additional information on
physical parameters we collected a few spectra with the ELODIE and FIES
instruments. We searched for frequencies in the uvby passbands using 2
different frequency analysis methods and used the S/N>4 criterion to select the
significant periodicities. We obtained an estimate of the physical parameters
of the underlying B star of spectral type between B5 and B7, by correcting for
the presence of a circumstellar disk, using a formalism based on the strenght
of the Halpha line emission. We detected 3 independent frequencies with
amplitudes below 0.01mag, f1 = 4.7126 c/d, f2 = 2.2342 c/d and f3 = 4.671 c/d,
and discovered that V2104Cyg is a Be star. The fast rotation (vsini=290+/-10
km/s, and 27<i<45) hampered the investigation of the associated pulsational
parameters l. Nevertheless, the most plausible explanation for the observed
variability of this mid-late type Be star is a non-radial pulsation model. This
paper is based on observations obtained at the Observatorio Astronomico
Nacional San Pedro Martir (Mexico), Observatorio de Sierra Nevada (Spain),
Observatoire de Haute Provence (France), and on observations made with the
Nordic Optical Telescope, Observatorio Roque de los Muchachos, La Palma, Spain.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, A&A accepte
Nonlinear mode coupling in rotating stars and the r-mode instability in neutron stars
We develop the formalism required to study the nonlinear interaction of modes
in rotating Newtonian stars in the weakly nonlinear regime. The formalism
simplifies and extends previous treatments. At linear order, we elucidate and
extend slightly a formalism due to Schutz, show how to decompose a general
motion of a rotating star into a sum over modes, and obtain uncoupled equations
of motion for the mode amplitudes under the influence of an external force.
Nonlinear effects are added perturbatively via three-mode couplings. We
describe a new, efficient way to compute the coupling coefficients, to zeroth
order in the stellar rotation rate, using spin-weighted spherical harmonics.
We apply this formalism to derive some properties of the coupling
coefficients relevant to the nonlinear interactions of unstable r-modes in
neutron stars, postponing numerical integrations of the coupled equations of
motion to a later paper. From an astrophysical viewpoint, the most interesting
result of this paper is that many couplings of r-modes to other rotational
modes (modes with zero frequencies in the non-rotating limit) are small: either
they vanish altogether because of various selection rules, or they vanish to
lowest order in the angular velocity. In zero-buoyancy stars, the coupling of
three r-modes is forbidden entirely and the coupling of two r-modes to one
hybrid rotational mode vanishes to zeroth order in rotation frequency. In
incompressible stars, the coupling of any three rotational modes vanishes to
zeroth order in rotation frequency.Comment: 62 pages, no figures. Corrected error in computation of coupling
coefficients, added new selection rule and an appendix on energy and angular
momentum of mode
Effect of dry salting on flavonoid profile and antioxidant capacity of Algerian olive cultivars
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