The Elderly Poor in the EU’s New Member States. ENEPRI Research Reports No. 60, November 2008

To what extent is the financial position of the elderly in the NMS more vulnerable than that of the old member states (or the EU-15), due to a rather unfavourable starting point and the possible impact of pension reforms? This is the main issue of the current research report. It tries to delineate the vulnerability of the income position of elderly people in the NMS, in relation to the demographic, socio-economic and institutional context of these countries. More specifically, the report focuses on: - the current level of income of the elderly in the NMS, and the degree of relative poverty; - the way this position is related to the educational and labour market status of the elderly in the NMS, their retirement behaviour, institutional arrangements (notably the pension system), and demographic developments; - specific problems regarding the income position of possibly ‘marginal’ elderly groups in the NMS (such as single elderly female pensioners)

A Roadmap to Gamify Programming Education

Learning programming relies on practicing it which is often hampered by the barrier of difficulty. The combined use of automated assessment, which provides fast feedback to the students experimenting with their code, and gamification, which provides additional motivation for the students to intensify their learning effort, can help pass the barrier of difficulty in learning programming. In such environment, students keep receiving the relevant feedback no matter how many times they try (thanks to automated assessment), and their engagement is retained (thanks to gamification). While there is a number of open software and programming exercise collections supporting automated assessment, up to this date, there are no available open collections of gamified programming exercises, no open interactive programming learning environment that would support such exercises, and even no open standard for the representation of such exercises so that they could be developed in different educational institutions and shared among them. This gap is addressed by Framework for Gamified Programming Education (FGPE), an international project whose primary objective is to provide necessary prerequisites for the application of gamification to programming education, including a dedicated gamification scheme, a gamified exercise format and exercises conforming to it, software for editing the exercises and an interactive learning environment capable of presenting them to students. This paper presents the FGPE project, its architecture and main components, as well as the results achieved so far. 2012 ACM Subject Classification Social and professional topics ! Computer science education

Effect of mebendazole on fibrosarcoma in hamsters

Purpose: To investigate the effect of mebendazole on an in vivo solid tumor model of fibrosarcoma in hamsters.Methods: 24 Syrian golden hamsters of both sexes with the approximate body  weight of 100g were randomly distributed in 2 experimental and 2 control groups, with 6 animals in each group. BHK-21/C13 cells (2 x 106) in 1 mL Glasgow Minimum Essential Medium (GMEM) were injected subcutaneously into the back of each animal in 3 groups. The experimental groups were treated with mebendazole  (460 mg/kg) via a gastric tube on a daily basis, immediately after tumor inoculation. In addition, one experimental group received deoxycholic acid 20 mg/kg once a day. After 2 weeks, when the tumors were approximately 1 - 2 cm in the control group, all the animals were sacrificed, and their blood collected for laboratory analysis. The tumors were excised, their weight and diameters measured, and the volumes  calculated. The tumor samples were histopathologically assessed and the main organs toxicologically analyzed. Images were taken and processed by an imaging software, and Ki-67-positive cells in the tumor samples were quantified.Results: Mebendazole diminished tumor mitosis from 18.5 ± 3.02 to 13.5 ± 3.45 (p < 0.05), vasculature and tissue penetration, and increased necroses in tumor  slices. Tumor volume and weight were insignificantly attenuated. Toxicity was not observed.Conclusion: Mebendazole might be an effective non-toxic agent in sarcoma therapy.Keywords: Mebendazole, Hamsters, BHK-21/C13 cells, Fibrosarcoma therapy,  Tumor mitosi

Observation of Flux Reversal in a Symmetric Optical Thermal Ratchet

We demonstrate that a cycle of three holographic optical trapping patterns can implement a thermal ratchet for diffusing colloidal spheres, and that the ratchet-driven transport displays flux reversal as a function of the cycle frequency and the inter-trap separation. Unlike previously described ratchet models, the approach we describe involves three equivalent states, each of which is locally and globally spatially symmetric, with spatiotemporal symmetry being broken by the sequence of states.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, submitted for publication in Physical Review Letter

Application of a widely-used tropical anti-worm agent, mebendazole, in modern oncology

Although clinical trials have not been completed, it has already been confirmed that mebendazole, a well-known anti-parasitic drug widely used in the tropical areas, inhibits cancer cell growth. Preclinical studies show that mebendazole notably impedes the growth of malignant and metastatic tumors such as osteosarcoma and soft tissue sarcoma, melanoma, carcinoma (lung, colorectal, breast, ovarian, hepatocellular and adrenocortical), acute myeloid leukaemia, glioblastoma multiforme and  meduloblastoma. Mebendazole can induce the depolymerization of microtubules in neoplasms and newly formed vasculature, stopping tumor growth and neoangiogenesis, along with other proposed mechanisms of action.Keywords: Anthelmintic, Mebendazole, Cancer treatment, Antimicrotubullar effect, Antineoangiogenesi

How to determine local elastic properties of lipid bilayer membranes from atomic-force-microscope measurements: A theoretical analysis

Measurements with an atomic force microscope (AFM) offer a direct way to probe elastic properties of lipid bilayer membranes locally: provided the underlying stress-strain relation is known, material parameters such as surface tension or bending rigidity may be deduced. In a recent experiment a pore-spanning membrane was poked with an AFM tip, yielding a linear behavior of the force-indentation curves. A theoretical model for this case is presented here which describes these curves in the framework of Helfrich theory. The linear behavior of the measurements is reproduced if one neglects the influence of adhesion between tip and membrane. Including it via an adhesion balance changes the situation significantly: force-distance curves cease to be linear, hysteresis and nonzero detachment forces can show up. The characteristics of this rich scenario are discussed in detail in this article.Comment: 14 pages, 9 figures, REVTeX4 style. New version corresponds to the one accepted by PRE. The result section is restructured: a comparison to experimental findings is included; the discussion on the influence of adhesion between AFM tip and membrane is extende

Klotho pathways, myelination disorders, neurodegenerative diseases, and epigenetic drugs

In this review we outline a rationale for identifying neuroprotectants aimed at inducing endogenous Klotho activity and expression, which is epigenetic action, by definition. Such an approach should promote remyelination and/or stimulate myelin repair by acting on mitochondrial function, thereby heralding a life-saving path forward for patients suffering from neuroinflammatory diseases. Disorders of myelin in the nervous system damage the transmission of signals, resulting in loss of vision, motion, sensation, and other functions depending on the affected nerves, currently with no effective treatment. Klotho genes and their single-pass transmembrane Klotho proteins are powerful governors of the threads of life and death, true to the origin of their name, Fates, in Greek mythology. Among its many important functions, Klotho is an obligatory co-receptor that binds, activates, and/or potentiates critical fibroblast growth factor activity. Since the discovery of Klotho a little over two decades ago, it has become ever more apparent that when Klotho pathways go awry, oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction take over, and age-related chronic disorders are likely to follow. The physiological consequences can be wide ranging, potentially wreaking havoc on the brain, eye, kidney, muscle, and more. Central nervous system disorders, neurodegenerative in nature, and especially those affecting the myelin sheath, represent worthy targets for advancing therapies that act upon Klotho pathways. Current drugs for these diseases, even therapeutics that are disease modifying rather than treating only the symptoms, leave much room for improvement. It is thus no wonder that this topic has caught the attention of biomedical researchers around the world.https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/biores.2020.0004Published versio