Immune Cell Activation: Stimulation, Costimulation, and Regulation of Cellular Activation

Opiate receptor (uOR) is expressed in central nervous system, gastrointestinal tract, male and female reproductive tissues, and immune cells. Morphine, a ligand for opioid receptor family, is known to activate the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and release immunosuppressive glucocorticoids. Herein we present that minor changes, in the form of nonsynonymous single nucleotide polymorphisms, in μOR have cumulative impact on receptor-mediated signaling and functions of specific cell type(s). Significant reduction was seen in cells in M and S phases with coactivation of immune receptors with μOR. Flow cytometry-based experiments established a reduction in B and T lymphocytes, NK cells, and macrophages. Differences in types of immune cells were found to be significant to reduce immune response(s) mounted by GG(mutant allele)-bearing individuals. This is the first report on cross-talk between LPS-binding and μOR, explaining the reduction in the number of T and B cells after chronic opiate use and also the association of this impact on immunocytes with functional SNP, rs1799972/118G allele of OPRM1 gene as an explanation for the immune suppression in opiate users. Initially present lower cell titers can be further lowered by exogenous opiates and account for immunosuppression seen in chronic opiate users or after long-term treatment with opiate drugs for chronic pain

Successful laparoscopic assisted myomectomy of a gigantic 9.4 kg uterine parasitic myoma: a case report and review of literature

Uterine leiomyomas are the most common benign tumours of the female pelvis affecting around 25-30% women of reproductive age. A case of successful laparoscopic assisted myomectomy in a giant uterine parasitic myoma is presented. A 42-year nulliparous morbidly obese lady presented with an Ultrasound diagnosis of a large uterine mass, detected during routine health check-up. MRI revealed a giant uterine pedunculated myoma of size 35 × 28 × 18 cm arising from the fundus and a 6 × 7 cm posterior wall myoma. After counselling the patient regarding surgical and anaesthesia risk, need of hysterectomy and laparotomy, laparoscopic myomectomy was planned. Laparoscopic findings revealed an exceptionally large parasitic fundal myoma filling the whole abdominal cavity and another 7 × 6 cm subserous myoma. main technical challenge was to tackle the big feeding vessels from the omentum providing massive blood supply to the gigantic tumor. Laparoscopic myomectomy was completed successfully using harmonic ace for coagulating the giant feeding vessels from the omentum. As the size of myoma was too big to put in the morcellation bag, so specimen retrieval was done through small incision and manual morcellation. The weight of the specimen was 9.4 Kg. This case emphasizes that size does not pose a limit to removing these gigantic myomas laparoscopically when surgical expertise and good anaesthesia facility is available. This is the case of largest myoma managed laparoscopically

Giant degenerative subserous leiomyoma simulating an ovarian cyst, a diagnostic conundrum: a case report

Leiomyomas are benign tumours of uterus and classified by their location in the uterus- submucosal, intramural, subserous. Uterine leiomyoma can have variable presentations. Pedunculated big subserous fibroids may outgrow their blood supply, undergo degenerative changes and may present as an ovarian mass. We would like to present a case of such variant which presented as a huge ovarian multiloculated cyst on MRI, but final diagnosis after histopathological examination concluded it to be leiomyoma with secondary degenerative changes. Giant degenerative fibroid might present as an ovarian mass which poses challenge in diagnostic course. This may confound with complex ovarian cyst on radiological modalities. Diagnostic certainty can be achieved only by skilful intraoperative examination and histopathology

An unusual case of hypothermia associated with therapeutic doses of olanzapine: a case report

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Introduction</p> <p>We report a case of a 42-year-old man who had symptomatic hypothermia as a result of taking olanzapine for paranoid schizophrenia. According to published data, only a few cases of hypothermia associated with olanzapine have been reported since its introduction into clinical use.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>A 42-year-old Sri Lankan man with schizophrenia who was being treated with a therapeutic dose of olanzapine presented with reduced level of consciousness. He had a core temperature of 32°C and was bradycardic. At the time of admission, the electrocardiogram showed sinus bradycardia with J waves. He did not have any risk factors for developing hypothermia except the use of olanzapine. There was improvement in his clinical condition with reversal of electrocardiogram changes following gradual rewarming and the omission of olanzapine.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Hypothermia induced by antipsychotic medications is not uncommon, but olanzapine-induced hypothermia is rare and occurrence has been reported during initiation or increasing the dose. But here the patient developed hypothermia without dose adjustment.</p

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

ReTAGS Public Lecture | Prof. Anuradha Kapur

ReTAGS Public Lecture: “Dark Things: Working with Material” delivered by Prof. Anuradha Kapur on the 4 November 2022, at 17h00, at the UCT Little Theatre, Hiddingh Campus. This lecture attempts to reflect on the process of making Dark Things, Ari Sitas’s oratorio on the Silk Road that was performed at the Ambedkar University Campus in April 2018 as part of an elective teaching module. The performance was a collaboration between Ari Sitas, Deepan Sivaraman, Sumangala Damodaran, Purav Goswami, and Anuradha Kapur: all of those collaborating at that time were connected to the AUD in different capacities. Sitas’ oratorio is about the Silk Route and how labour practices that lie in its sub-terrain are topographically sensed in the 21st century. The text talks about the histories of materials: from the miniature screw in the iPhone, a citation from the poems of Xu Lizhi, the Foxconn worker who jumped to death from a Beijing factory building in 2014; to the hangman's rope crafted in a particular region of India; to the bones excavated in war zones; to the harvest of body parts used as visa and ticket to enter a dinghy of migrants; to sewers full of excreta that crisscross the underbelly of Delhi and are cleaned manually, by hand. Their concerns as theatre-makers were to materialize these histories for and in performance. Various registers of labour are part of the process of theatre-making. There is the emotional labour of actors, performers and spectators; there is also the labour of all theatre-makers of crafting and handling objects, scenery, and machinery. This is the very prescript of performance, it's nuts and bolts. Sivaraman, Goswami and Kapur devised improvisations that were often instigated by material. ‘Found’ ditches were experimented with; ‘found’ oil drums were brought in and a gigantic skeletal iron hammer was welded. Being attentive to the social histories of material brought the theatre-makers to plastic, ubiquitous in India even when understood to be toxic - used as rain cover, sack, tent, and precarious shelter in the slums. It was the main material to virtually house thousands of farmers who camped at the Delhi borders for more than a year protesting the corporatization of Indian agriculture. Scenographic decisions by Deepan Sivaraman drew attention to material again; factory-like structures of brick and tin that edged a car park on the campus of Ambedkar University were chosen as the performance site. The dishevelled buildings brought to mind the histories of manufacture in India and the effects and affects of large-scale economic migration that neoliberalism has caused within India itself. Production diaries, notes, drawings; lists of materials that instigated improvisations; the process and record of handcrafting tents and other props; interviews with sanitation workers in Delhi and the ways these entered and contextualized Sitas’s text will be part of this reflection on the material residue of the Silk Road as it subsists in our lives today, as Dark Things. Please note the video presentation has been edited to remove the public response section. ------------------------------------------  Anuradha Kapur is a theatre-maker and teacher. Her theatre work has travelled nationally and internationally, and she has taught in theatre schools and universities in India and abroad. She is a founding member of Vivadi, a working group of theatre practitioners, visual artists, film-makers, musicians and writers. Her writings on performance have been widely anthologized and her book, Actors Pilgrims Kings and Gods: the Ramlila at Ramnagar, was published by Seagull Books, Calcutta (1993, 2004). Anuradha Kapur taught at the National School of Drama for over three decades and was Director of the School between 2007 and 2013. She is presently Visiting Professor at Ambedkar University, Delhi.  </p

Vision, Viability and Value: Three perspectives on the performing arts across cultures, context and nations

How can we reach out to institutions, artists and audiences with sometimes radically different agendas to encourage them to see, participate in and support the development of new practices and programs in the performing arts? In this paper, based on a plenary panel at PSi#18 Performance Culture Industry at the University of Leeds, Clarissa Ruiz (Columbia), AnuradhaKapur (India) and Sheena Wrigley (England) together with interloctorBree Hadley (Australia) speak about their work in as policy-makers, managers and producers in the performing arts in Europe, Asia and America over the past several decades. Acknowledged trailblazers in their fields, Ruiz, Kapur and Wrigley all have a commitment to creating a vital, viable and sustainable performing arts ecologies. Each has extensive experience in performance, politics, and the challenging process of managing histories, visions, stakeholders, and sometimes scarce resources to generate lasting benefits for the various communities have worked for, with and within. Their work, cultivating new initiatives, programs or policy has made them expert at brokering relationships in and in between private, public and political spheres to elevate the status of and support for performing arts as a socially and economically beneficial activity everyone can participate in. Each gives examples from their own practice to provide insight into how to negotiate the interests of artistic, government, corporate, community and education partners, and the interests of audiences, to create aesthetic, cultural and / or economic value. Together, their views offer a compelling set of perspectives on the changing meanings of the ‘value of the arts’ and the effects this has had for the artists that make and arts organisations that produce and present work in a range of different regional, national and cross-national contexts