Lipid and carotenoid production by a Rhodosporidium toruloides and Tetradesmus obliquus mixed culture using primary brewery wastewater supplemented with sugarcane molasses and urea

ABSTRACT: In this study, Rhodosporidium toruloides and Tetradesmus obliquus were used for lipid and carotenoid production in mixed cultures using primary brewery wastewater (PBWW) as a culture medium, supplemented with sugarcane molasses (SCM) as a carbon source and urea as a nitrogen source. To improve biomass, lipid, and carotenoid production by R. toruloides and T obliquus mixed cultures, initial SCM concentrations ranging from 10 to 280 g L-1 were tested. The medium that allowed higher lipid content (26.2% w/w dry cell weight (DCW)) and higher carotenoid productivity (10.47 mu g L-1 h(-1)) was the PBWW medium supplemented with 100 g L-1 of SCM and 2 g L-1 of urea, which was further used in the fed-batch mixed cultivation performed in a 7-L bioreactor. A maximum biomass concentration of 58.6 g L-1 and maximum lipid content of 31.2% w/w DCW were obtained in the fed-batch cultivation. PBWW supplemented with SCM was successfully used as a low-cost medium to produce lipids and carotenoids in a R. toruloides and T obliquus mixed culture, with higher productivities than in pure cultures, which can significantly reduce the cost of the biofuels obtained.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Hipertensão arterial sistêmica primária

Hipertensão Arterial Sistêmica (HAS) é doença de alta prevalência e determinante de alta morbidade e mortalidade senão adequadamente diagnosticada e apropriadamente tratada.O diagnóstico depende da medida correta da pressão arterial (PA), utlizando-se atualmente métodos alternativos à medida convencional de consultório como a Monitorização Ambulatorial da Pressão Arterial (MAPA) ou a Monitorização Residencial da Pressão Arterial (MRPA).Uma adequada estratificação do risco adicional ao valor da PA obtido é indispensável para uma planificação do tratamento e o alcance das metas desejadas para cada grupo de indivíduos.Manter os pacientes sob o tratamento é necessário e desejável para que os benefícios auferidos com o tratamento, medicamentoso e não medicamentoso, sejam obtidos.Systemic Arterial Hypertension (SAH) is a highly prevalent disease causing high morbidity and mortality if not adequately diagnosed and properly treated.The diagnosis depends on a correct measurement of arterial blood pressure (ABP), with alternative methods to the conventional office measurement being currently used, such as Ambulatory Blood Pressure Monitoring (ABPM) or Home Blood Pressure Monitoring (HBPM).An appropriate stratification of the additional risk besides the ABP value is essential for treatment planning and for archieving the desired goals for each group of individuals. It is necessary and desirable to maintain the patients under treatment in order to obtain the benefits derived from pharmacological or non-pharmacological treatment

Clear-PEM: A PET imaging system dedicated to breast cancer diagnostics

The Clear-PEM scanner for positron emission mammography under development is described. The detector is based on pixelized LYSO crystals optically coupled to avalanche photodiodes and readout by a fast low-noise electronic system. A dedicated digital trigger (TGR) and data acquisition (DAQ) system is used for on-line selection of coincidence events with high efficiency, large bandwidth and small dead-time. A specialized gantry allows to perform exams of the breast and of the axilla. In this paper we present results of the measurement of detector modules that integrate the system under construction as well as the imaging performance estimated from Monte Carlo simulated data.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6TJM-4M942B5-D/1/e8aea93baa1aeae3538ea200a5a5466

The basal epithelial marker P-cadherin associates with breast cancer cell populations harboring a glycolytic and acid-resistant phenotype

"BMC Cancer 2014 14:734"BACKGROUND: Cancer stem cells are hypoxia-resistant and present a preponderant glycolytic metabolism. These characteristics are also found in basal-like breast carcinomas (BLBC), which show increased expression of cancer stem cell markers.Recently, we demonstrated that P-cadherin, a biomarker of BLBC and a poor prognostic factor in this disease, mediates stem-like properties and resistance to radiation therapy. Thus, the aim of the present study was to evaluate if P-cadherin expression was associated to breast cancer cell populations with an adapted phenotype to hypoxia. METHODS: Immunohistochemistry was performed to address the expression of P-cadherin, hypoxic, glycolytic and acid-resistance biomarkers in primary human breast carcinomas. In vitro studies were performed using basal-like breast cancer cell lines. qRT-PCR, FACS analysis, western blotting and confocal microscopy were used to assess the expression of P-cadherin after HIF-1a stabilization, achieved by CoCl2 treatment. siRNA-mediated knockdown was used to silence the expression of several targets and qRT-PCR was employed to evaluate the effects of P-cadherin on HIF-1a signaling. P-cadherin high and low breast cancer cell populations were sorted by FACS and levels of GLUT1 and CAIX were assessed by FACS and western blotting. Mammosphere forming efficiency was used to determine the stem cell activity after specific siRNA-mediated knockdown, further confirmed by western blotting. RESULTS: We demonstrated that P-cadherin overexpression was significantly associated with the expression of HIF-1a, GLUT1, CAIX, MCT1 and CD147 in human breast carcinomas. In vitro, we showed that HIF-1a stabilization was accompanied by increased membrane expression of P-cadherin and that P-cadherin silencing led to a decrease of the mRNA levels of GLUT1 and CAIX. We also found that the cell fractions harboring high levels of P-cadherin were the same exhibiting more GLUT1 and CAIX expression. Finally, we showed that P-cadherin silencing significantly decreases the mammosphere forming efficiency in the same range as the silencing of HIF-1a, CAIX or GLUT1, validating that all these markers are being expressed by the same breast cancer stem cell population. CONCLUSIONS: Our results establish a link between aberrant P-cadherin expression and hypoxic, glycolytic and acid-resistant breast cancer cells, suggesting a possible role for this marker in cancer cell metabolismo.This work was funded by FEDER funds through the COMPETE Program (Programa Operacional Factores de Competitividade) and by national funds through FCT (Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology, Portugal), mainly in the context of the scientific project PTDC/SAU-GMG/120049/2010-FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-021209, and partially by PTDC/SAU-FCF/104347/2008. FCT funded the research grants of BS (SFRH/BD/69353/2010), ASR (SFRH/BPD/75705/2011), ARN (grant from the project PTDC/SAU-GMG/120049/2010), CP (SFRH/BPD/69479/2010), AV (SFRH/BPD/90303/2012), as well as JP, with Programa Ciencia 2007 (Contratacao de Doutorados para o SCTN - financiamento pelo POPH - QREN - Tipologia 4.2 - Promocao do Emprego Cientifico, comparticipado pelo Fundo Social Europeu e por fundos nacionais do MCTES) and Programa IFCT (FCT Investigator). IPATIMUP is an Associate Laboratory of the Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education and is partially supported by FCT