Predicting subjective refraction with dynamic retinal image quality analysis

The aim of this work is to evaluate the performance of a novel algorithm that combines dynamic wavefront aberrometry data and descriptors of the retinal image quality from objective autorefractor measurements to predict subjective refraction. We conducted a retrospective study of the prediction accuracy and precision of the novel algorithm compared to standard search-based retinal image quality optimization algorithms. Dynamic measurements from 34 adult patients were taken with a handheld wavefront autorefractor and static data was obtained with a high-end desktop wavefront aberrometer. The search-based algorithms did not signifcantly improve the results of the desktop system, while the dynamic approach was able to simultaneously reduce the standard deviation (up to a 15% for reduction of spherical equivalent power) and the mean bias error of the predictions (up to 80% reduction of spherical equivalent power) for the handheld aberrometer. These results suggest that dynamic retinal image analysis can substantially improve the accuracy and precision of the portable wavefront autorefractor relative to subjective refraction.The authors thanks to Dr. David Friedman (Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine) and his team for their help with study defnition and data acquisition. Eduardo Lage is funded by the Ramon y Cajal program from the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitivity (RYC-2016-21125). Carlos S. Hernandez, and Andrea Gil are funded by the Madrid Regional Government through IND2019/TIC-17116 and IND2020/TIC-17340 grants. Research relating to the autorefractor reported in this publication was partially support by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging & Bioengineering and National Eye Institute of the National Institutes of Health under Award Numbers R43EB024299 and R44EY025452, respectivel

Fabrication and Characterization of Beam Quality Phantom for External Beam Radiotherapy

Introduction: Radiation dose measurement plays a major role in Radiation Dosimetry. Effective dose delivery to the patient is ensured with the recommendation of some protocol called Quality assurance (QA). It is necessary to confirm that the beam that is used for treatment is a good quality beam and it is given by beam quality factor TPR 20/10 which is one of the QA protocols. Material and Methods: In the present TPR20,10 phantom both depth (20 and 10 cm) doses can be measured at the same procedure without changing any setup. As the reference condition is maintained, the Gelatin-based phantom is kept for irradiation in the Siemens Linear Accelerator (LINAC) machine. Initially Source Axis Distance (SAD) of 100 cm from the surface and 10×10 cm2 of field size. The measurement is taken by ion chamber at 10 and 20 cm depth in gantry angles 90° and 270° And the ratio of these values is taken and compared with the measurements of the water-based TPR phantom. Results: The values for the TPR20,10 ratio for the Gelatin and water phantom are measured using the above method and the values are tabulated and compared. Likewise, the output measurements are done and tabulated for comparison. These measurements are carried out for several days to check the repeatability, and reproducibility of the phantom. Also, the measured set of values was analyzed using mean, median, standard deviation, etc.    Conclusion: The fabricated phantom had good outcomes in its response. And the result projects that the phantom can be a better alternative for the other phantom materials and gelatin has more advantages over water, we conclude that gel can be used for better dosimetric procedures

Gas Chromatography and Mass Spectroscopy Analysis and Phytochemical Characterization of Aegle Marmelos (Bael) Leaf, Stem and its Screening of Antimicrobial Activity

Phytochemical screening tests was conducted for five plant species and found that extract contains a variety of Phytochemical like saponins, tannins, flavonoids, terpenoids, glycosides and reducing sugars and among which there is higher level of precipitation for phenol and flavonoids. As they are essential source of antimicrobial agents against pathogen, their extract were tested for its antimicrobial activity by well diffusion method using Nutrient agar against human pathogenic bacteria like Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli. This study provided evidence to confirm the presence of various medicinally important bioactive compounds or Phytochemical that has got biological importance and it justifies their use in the traditional medicines for the treatment of different diseases and this findings suggest that the selected plant extracts possesses antimicrobial properties that could be used for biological control of bacterial cultures and this bioactive compounds serve as a source of antimicrobial agents against human pathogens. Medicinal plants have bioactive compounds which are used for curing of various human diseases and also play an important role in healing. Phytochemical have two categories i.e., primary and secondary constituent. The phytochemical analysis of the plants is very important commercially and has great interest in pharmaceutical companies for the production of the new drugs for curing of various diseases. this GC-MS has been used as standard protocol for a foreign substance identification because of its used to identify the particular specific test results which is indicates or identifies the presences of that particular substance. The aqueous leaf extract were used for to identify and the phytochemical analysis used to find out the phytochemical constituents presents at the taken plants. Plant showed that the alkaloids, trepenoids, phenol and tannins, reducing sugar, saponin, proteins, anthocyanin, coumarin and glycosides were found to be presents in the given plants. Gas chromatography with mass spectroscopy detection is the state of the art methods for detection and identification of unknown compound, it is also not infallible and many compounds are difficulty with their accuracy certaint

Sequential Targeting of Retinoblastoma and DNA Synthesis Pathways Is a Therapeutic Strategy for Sarcomas That Can Be Monitored in Real Time

Treatment strategies with a strong scientific rationale based on specific biomarkers are needed to improve outcomes in patients with advanced sarcomas. Suppression of cell-cycle progression through reactivation of the tumor suppressor retinoblastoma (Rb) using CDK4/6 inhibitors is a potential avenue for novel targeted therapies in sarcomas that harbor intact Rb signaling. Here, we evaluated combination treatment strategies (sequential and concomitant) with the CDK4/6 inhibitor abemacicib to identify optimal combination strategies. Expression of Rb was examined in 1,043 sarcoma tumor specimens, and 50% were found to be Rb-positive. Using in vitro and in vivo models, an effective two-step sequential combination strategy was developed. Abemaciclib was used first to prime Rb-positive sarcoma cells to reversibly arrest in G1 phase. Upon drug removal, cells synchronously traversed to S phase, where a second treatment with S-phase targeted agents (gemcitabine or Wee1 kinase inhibitor) mediated a synergistic response by inducing DNA damage. The response to treatment could be noninvasively monitored using real-time positron emission tomography imaging and serum thymidine kinase activity. Collectively, these results show that a novel, sequential treatment strategy with a CDK4/6 inhibitor followed by a DNA-damaging agent was effective, resulting in synergistic tumor cell killing. This approach can be readily translated into a clinical trial with noninvasive functional imaging and serum biomarkers as indicators of response and cell cycling

HIV Skews a Balanced Mtb-Specific Th17 Response in Latent Tuberculosis Subjects to a Pro-inflammatory Profile Independent of Viral Load:HIV alters the nature of the Mtb-specific Th17 response

This study provides insight on how HIV may drive tuberculosis (TB). Rakshit et al. demonstrate that HIV infection of latent TB subjects profoundly alters specific immune subsets implicated in anti-TB immunity, which is independent of cellular viral burden or secretion of antiviral chemokines.</p

SimCol3D -- 3D Reconstruction during Colonoscopy Challenge

Colorectal cancer is one of the most common cancers in the world. While colonoscopy is an effective screening technique, navigating an endoscope through the colon to detect polyps is challenging. A 3D map of the observed surfaces could enhance the identification of unscreened colon tissue and serve as a training platform. However, reconstructing the colon from video footage remains unsolved due to numerous factors such as self-occlusion, reflective surfaces, lack of texture, and tissue deformation that limit feature-based methods. Learning-based approaches hold promise as robust alternatives, but necessitate extensive datasets. By establishing a benchmark, the 2022 EndoVis sub-challenge SimCol3D aimed to facilitate data-driven depth and pose prediction during colonoscopy. The challenge was hosted as part of MICCAI 2022 in Singapore. Six teams from around the world and representatives from academia and industry participated in the three sub-challenges: synthetic depth prediction, synthetic pose prediction, and real pose prediction. This paper describes the challenge, the submitted methods, and their results. We show that depth prediction in virtual colonoscopy is robustly solvable, while pose estimation remains an open research question

Redox‐Addressable Single‐Molecule Junctions Incorporating a Persistent Organic Radical**

Integrating radical (open‐shell) species into non‐cryogenic nanodevices is key to unlocking the potential of molecular electronics. While many efforts have been devoted to this issue, in the absence of a chemical/electrochemical potential the open‐shell character is generally lost in contact with the metallic electrodes. Herein, single‐molecule devices incorporating a 6‐oxo‐verdazyl persistent radical have been fabricated using break‐junction techniques. The open‐shell character is retained at room temperature, and electrochemical gating permits in situ reduction to a closed‐shell anionic state in a single‐molecule transistor configuration. Furthermore, electronically driven rectification arises from bias‐dependent alignment of the open‐shell resonances. The integration of radical character, transistor‐like switching, and rectification in a single molecular component paves the way to further studies of the electronic, magnetic, and thermoelectric properties of open‐shell species

Inflammation in the Tumor-Adjacent Lung as a Predictor of Clinical Outcome in Lung Adenocarcinoma

Approximately 30% of early-stage lung adenocarcinoma patients present with disease progression after successful surgical resection. Despite efforts of mapping the genetic landscape, there has been limited success in discovering predictive biomarkers of disease outcomes. Here we performed a systematic multi-omic assessment of 143 tumors and matched tumor-adjacent, histologically-normal lung tissue with long-term patient follow-up. Through histologic, mutational, and transcriptomic profiling of tumor and adjacent-normal tissue, we identified an inflammatory gene signature in tumor-adjacent tissue as the strongest clinical predictor of disease progression. Single-cell transcriptomic analysis demonstrated the progression-associated inflammatory signature was expressed in both immune and non-immune cells, and cell type-specific profiling in monocytes further improved outcome predictions. Additional analyses of tumor-adjacent transcriptomic data from The Cancer Genome Atlas validated the association of the inflammatory signature with worse outcomes across cancers. Collectively, our study suggests that molecular profiling of tumor-adjacent tissue can identify patients at high risk for disease progression

Jak2V617F Reversible Activation Shows Its Essential Requirement in Myeloproliferative Neoplasms

Gain-of-function mutations activating JAK/STAT signaling are seen in the majority of patients with myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN), most commonly JAK2V617F. Although clinically approved JAK inhibitors improve symptoms and outcomes in MPNs, remissions are rare, and mutant allele burden does not substantively change with chronic therapy. We hypothesized this is due to limitations of current JAK inhibitors to potently and specifically abrogate mutant JAK2 signaling. We therefore developed a conditionally inducible mouse model allowing for sequential activation, and then inactivation, of Jak2V617F from its endogenous locus using a combined Dre-rox/Cre-lox dual-recombinase system. Jak2V617F deletion abrogates MPN features, induces depletion of mutant-specific hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells, and extends overall survival to an extent not observed with pharmacologic JAK inhibition, including when cooccurring with somatic Tet2 loss. Our data suggest JAK2V617F represents the best therapeutic target in MPNs and demonstrate the therapeutic relevance of a dual-recombinase system to assess mutant-specific oncogenic dependencies in vivo

The effect of cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption and fruit and vegetable consumption on IVF outcomes: A review and presentation of original data

Background - Lifestyle factors including cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption and nutritional habits impact on health, wellness, and the risk of chronic diseases. In the areas of in-vitro fertilization (IVF) and pregnancy, lifestyle factors influence oocyte production, fertilization rates, pregnancy and pregnancy loss, while chronic, low-grade oxidative stress may underlie poor outcomes for some IVF cases. Methods - Here, we review the current literature and present some original, previously unpublished data, obtained from couples attending the PIVET Medical Centre in Western Australia. Results - During the study, 80 % of females and 70 % of male partners completed a 1-week diary documenting their smoking, alcohol and fruit and vegetable intake. The subsequent clinical outcomes of their IVF treatment such as quantity of oocytes collected, fertilization rates, pregnancy and pregnancy loss were submitted to multiple regression analysis, in order to investigate the relationship between patients, treatment and the recorded lifestyle factors. Of significance, it was found that male smoking caused an increased risk of pregnancy loss (p = 0.029), while female smoking caused an adverse effect on ovarian reserve. Both alcohol consumption (β = 0.074, p < 0.001) and fruit and vegetable consumption (β = 0.034, p < 0.001) had positive effects on fertilization. Conclusion - Based on our results and the current literature, there is an important impact of lifestyle factors on IVF clinical outcomes. Currently, there are conflicting results regarding other lifestyle factors such as nutritional habits and alcohol consumption, but it is apparent that chronic oxidative stress induced by lifestyle factors and poor nutritional habits associate with a lower rate of IVF success