Solubility of iron, nickel, and cobalt in liquid potassium and effect of oxygen gettering agents on iron solubility

Iron, nickel, and cobalt solubility in liquid potassium, and effect of oxygen gettering agents on iron solubilit

Immunotherapy of lung cancer: An update

In Germany lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-associated death in men. Surgery, chemotherapy and radiation may enhance survival of patients suffering from lung cancer but the enhancement is typically transient and mostly absent with advanced disease; eventually more than 90% of lung cancer patients will die of disease. New approaches to the treatment of lung cancer are urgently needed. Immunotherapy may represent one new approach with low toxicity and high specificity but implementation has been a challenge because of the poor antigenic characterization of these tumors and their ability to escape immune responses. Several different immunotherapeutic treatment strategies have been developed. This review examines the current state of development and recent advances with respect to non-specific immune stimulation, cellular immunotherapy ( specific and non-specific), therapeutic cancer vaccines and gene therapy for lung cancer. The focus is primarily placed on immunotherapeutic cancer treatments that are already in clinical trial or well progressed in preclinical studies. Although there seems to be a promising future for immunotherapy in lung cancer, presently there is not standard immunotherapy available for clinical routine

Secondary somatic mutations restoring RAD51C and RAD51D associated with acquired resistance to the PARP inhibitor rucaparib in high-grade ovarian carcinoma

High-grade epithelial ovarian carcinomas (OC) containing mutated BRCA1 or BRCA2 (BRCA1/2) homologous recombination (HR) genes are sensitive to platinum-based chemotherapy and poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitors (PARPi), while restoration of HR function due to secondary mutations in BRCA1/2 has been recognized as an important resistance mechanism. We sequenced core HR pathway genes in 12 pairs of pre-treatment and post-progression tumor biopsy samples collected from patients in ARIEL2 Part 1, a phase 2 study of the PARPi rucaparib as treatment for platinum-sensitive, relapsed OC. In six of 12 pre-treatment biopsies, a truncation mutation in BRCA1, RAD51C or RAD51D was identified. In five of six paired post-progression biopsies, one or more secondary mutations restored the open reading frame. Four distinct secondary mutations and spatial heterogeneity were observed for RAD51C. In vitro complementation assays and a patient-derived xenograft (PDX), as well as predictive molecular modeling, confirmed that resistance to rucaparib was associated with secondary mutations

Mapping of Functional Groups in Metal-Organic Frameworks

We determined the heterogeneous mesoscale spatial apportionment of functional groups in a series of multivariate metal-organic frameworks (MTV-MOF-5) containing BDC (1,4-benzenedicarboxylate) linkers with different functional groups - B (BDC-NH2), E (BDC-NO2), F [(BDC-(CH3)2], H [BDC-(OC3H5) 2], and I [BDC-(OC7H7)2] - using solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance measurements combined with molecular simulations. Our analysis reveals that these methods discern between random (EF), alternating (EI and EHI), and various cluster (BF) forms of functional group apportionments. This combined synthetic, characterization, and computational approach predicts the adsorptive properties of crystalline MTV-MOF systems. This methodology, developed in the context of ordered frameworks, is a first step in resolving the more general problem of spatial disorder in other ordered materials, including mesoporous materials, functionalized polymers, and defect distributions within crystalline solids

Modeling Methane Adsorption in Interpenetrating Porous Polymer Networks

Porous polymer networks (PPNs) are a class of porous materials of particular interest in a variety of energy-related applications because of their stability, high surface areas, and gas uptake capacities. Computationally derived structures for five recently synthesized PPN frameworks, PPN-2, -3, -4, -5, and -6, were generated for various topologies, optimized using semiempirical electronic structure methods, and evaluated using classical grand-canonical Monte Carlo simulations. We show that a key factor in modeling the methane uptake performance of these materials is whether, and how, these material frameworks interpenetrate and demonstrate a computational approach for predicting the presence, degree, and nature of interpenetration in PPNs that enables the reproduction of experimental adsorption data. © 2013 American Chemical Society

A Discrete Event Simulation model to evaluate the treatment pathways of patients with Cataract in the United Kingdom

Background The number of people affected by cataract in the United Kingdom (UK) is growing rapidly due to ageing population. As the only way to treat cataract is through surgery, there is a high demand for this type of surgery and figures indicate that it is the most performed type of surgery in the UK. The National Health Service (NHS), which provides free of charge care in the UK, is under huge financial pressure due to budget austerity in the last decade. As the number of people affected by the disease is expected to grow significantly in coming years, the aim of this study is to evaluate whether the introduction of new processes and medical technologies will enable cataract services to cope with the demand within the NHS funding constraints. Methods We developed a Discrete Event Simulation model representing the cataract services pathways at Leicester Royal Infirmary Hospital. The model was inputted with data from national and local sources as well as from a surgery demand forecasting model developed in the study. The model was verified and validated with the participation of the cataract services clinical and management teams. Results Four scenarios involving increased number of surgeries per half-day surgery theatre slot were simulated. Results indicate that the total number of surgeries per year could be increased by 40% at no extra cost. However, the rate of improvement decreases for increased number of surgeries per half-day surgery theatre slot due to a higher number of cancelled surgeries. Productivity is expected to improve as the total number of doctors and nurses hours will increase by 5 and 12% respectively. However, non-human resources such as pre-surgery rooms and post-surgery recovery chairs are under-utilized across all scenarios. Conclusions Using new processes and medical technologies for cataract surgery is a promising way to deal with the expected higher demand especially as this could be achieved with limited impact on costs. Non-human resources capacity need to be evenly levelled across the surgery pathway to improve their utilisation. The performance of cataract services could be improved by better communication with and proactive management of patients.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Acute pancreatitis following medical abortion: Case report

BACKGROUND: Acute pancreatitis rarely complicates pregnancy. Although most pregnant women with acute pancreatitis have associated gallstones, less common causes such as drugs have been reported. CASE PRESENTATION: We report the case of a 34-year-old woman who underwent medical abortion with mifepristone and gemeprost and received codeine as pain-relief during the induction of abortion. She developed a severe acute necrotizing pancreatitis which required 14 days of intensive care. Other possible etiological factors, i.e. gallstone, alcohol intake and hyperlipidemia, were excluded. CONCLUSIONS: The reported case of acute pancreatitis was most likely drug-induced