Lack of influence of the COX inhibitors metamizol and diclofenac on platelet GPIIb/IIIa and P-selectin expression in vitro

BACKGROUND: The effect of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) for reduced platelet aggregation and thromboxane A(2 )synthesis has been well documented. However, the influence on platelet function is not fully explained. Aim of this study was to examine the influence of the COX-1 inhibiting NSAIDs, diclofenac and metamizol on platelet activation and leukocyte-platelet complexes, in vitro. Surface expression of GPIIb/IIIa and P-selectin on platelets, and the percentage of platelet-leukocyte complexes were investigated. METHODS: Whole blood was incubated with three different concentrations of diclofenac and metamizol for 5 and 30 minutes, followed by activation with TRAP-6 and ADP. Rates of GPIIb/IIIa and P-selectin expression, and the percentage of platelet-leukocyte complexes were analyzed by a flow-cytometric assay. RESULTS: There were no significant differences in the expression of GPIIb/IIIa and P-selectin, and in the formation of platelet-leukocyte complexes after activation with ADP and TRAP-6, regarding both the time of incubation and the concentrations of diclofenac and metamizol. CONCLUSIONS: Accordingly, the inhibitory effect of diclofenac and metamizol on platelet aggregation is not related to a reduced surface expression of P-selectin and GPIIb/IIIa on platelets

Soul's Tools

This paper explores the various ways Aristotle refers to and employs “heat and cold” in his embryology. In my view, scholars are too quick to assume that references to heat and cold are references to matter or an animal’s material nature. More commonly, I argue, Aristotle refers to heat and cold as the “tools” of soul. As I understand it, Aristotle is thinking of heat and cold in many contexts as auxiliary causes by which soul activities (primarily “concoction”) are carried out. This, as I argue, is what it means to call them “tools” of soul. An upshot of this investigation is the fuller picture of Aristotle’s conception of efficient causation it provides in general, and the better understanding of the efficient causal operation of an organism’s nature or soul it provides in particular

A multi-country test of brief reappraisal interventions on emotions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic has increased negative emotions and decreased positive emotions globally. Left unchecked, these emotional changes might have a wide array of adverse impacts. To reduce negative emotions and increase positive emotions, we tested the effectiveness of reappraisal, an emotion-regulation strategy that modifies how one thinks about a situation. Participants from 87 countries and regions (n = 21,644) were randomly assigned to one of two brief reappraisal interventions (reconstrual or repurposing) or one of two control conditions (active or passive). Results revealed that both reappraisal interventions (vesus both control conditions) consistently reduced negative emotions and increased positive emotions across different measures. Reconstrual and repurposing interventions had similar effects. Importantly, planned exploratory analyses indicated that reappraisal interventions did not reduce intentions to practice preventive health behaviours. The findings demonstrate the viability of creating scalable, low-cost interventions for use around the world

Systematic analysis, aggregation and visualisation of interaction fingerprints for molecular dynamics simulation data

Computational methods such as molecular docking or molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have been developed to simulate and explore the interactions between biomolecules. However, the interactions obtained using these methods are difficult to analyse and evaluate. Interaction fingerprints (IFPs) have been proposed to derive interactions from static 3D coordinates and transform them into 1D bit vectors. More recently, the concept has been applied to derive IFPs from MD simulations, which adds a layer of complexity by adding the temporal motion and dynamics of a system. As a result, many IFPs are obtained from one MD simulation, resulting in a large number of individual IFPs that are difficult to analyse compared to IFPs derived from static 3D structures. Scientific contribution : We introduce a new method to systematically aggregate IFPs derived from MD simulation data. In addition, we propose visualisations to effectively analyse and compare IFPs derived from MD simulation data to account for the temporal evolution of interactions and to compare IFPs across different MD simulations. This has been implemented as a freely available Python library and can therefore be easily adopted by other researchers and to different MD simulation datasets.publishe

Visual Comparison of Networks in VR

Networks are an important means for the representation and analysis of data in a variety of research and application areas. While there are many efficient methods to create layouts for networks to support their visual analysis, approaches for the comparison of networks are still underexplored. Especially when it comes to the comparison of weighted networks, which is an important task in several areas, such as biology and biomedicine, there is a lack of efficient visualization approaches. With the availability of affordable high-quality virtual reality (VR) devices, such as head-mounted displays (HMDs), the research field of immersive analytics emerged and showed great potential for using the new technology for visual data exploration. However, the use of immersive technology for the comparison of networks is still underexplored. With this work, we explore how weighted networks can be visually compared in an immersive VR environment and investigate how visual representations can benefit from the extended 3D design space. For this purpose, we develop different encodings for 3D node-link diagrams supporting the visualization of two networks within a single representation and evaluate them in a pilot user study. We incorporate the results into a more extensive user study comparing node-link representations with matrix representations encoding two networks simultaneously. The data and tasks designed for our experiments are similar to those occurring in real-world scenarios. Our evaluation shows significantly better results for the node-link representations, which is contrary to comparable 2D experiments and indicates a high potential for using VR for the visual comparison of networks.publishe

Molecularly imprinted polymer films for reflectometric interference spectroscopic sensors

Reflectometric interference spectroscopic measurements were performed on molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) films with the herbicide atrazine as the template molecule. A conventional imprinting protocol was used relying on non-covalent interactions between the functional monomers and the template. The MIPs were deposited on glass transducers by two different methods: spin-coating followed by in situ polymerization of thin films of monomers containing a sacrificial polymeric porogen, and autoassembly of MIP nanoparticles with the aid of an associative linear polymer. Reproducible results were obtained upon measurements of atrazine solutions in toluene with both films. Atrazine concentrations as low as 1.7 pprn could be detected with the autoassembled particle film. No or very little analyte adsorption was observed onto non-imprinted control films made by spin-coating and by particle assembly, respectively. We believe that these MIP layers in combination with the general reflectrometric transduction scheme could be a versatile sensing tool for the detection of environmentally important and other analytes. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

Noticia de las sesenta y cinco proposiciones nuevamente condenadas por ... Innocencio XI mediante su decreto de 2 de mayo del año 1679

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