Editorial: High added-value nanoparticles: Rethinking and recycling cell protein waste

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Risk Factors of Multidrug-resistant Tuberculosis (MDR-TB) at Serui Regional General Hospital, Kepulauan Yapen Regency, Papua Province

Background: Tuberculosis, often known as TB, is a disease caused by an infection with the bacteria Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Patients who are not obedient and do not take their medicine on a regular basis will develop drug resistance, including Multidrug-resistant Tuberculosis (MDR-TB: resistant to INH and RIF), as well as concomitant illnesses. These variables can be modified by TB patients' characteristics like as age, gender, ethnicity, education, profession, side effects, medication supervisors, and co-morbidities. Objectives: The goal of this study is to identify the factors influencing MDR TB in Serui Regional General Hospital, Kepulauan Yapen Regency in 2022. Methods: This type of research is an observational study with a case control approach. The population consisted of 52 TB patients consisting of 26 cases and 26 controls by purposive sampling. Data were obtained from medical record data, and analyzed using chi square, odds ratio and binary logistic regression. Result: The results showed that the factors that had a significant effect on MDR-TB in Serui Regional General Hospital, Kepulauan Yapen Regency in 2022 were age (p-value = 0.002; OR = 8.8(2.336-33.152), gender (p-value = 0.049, OR = 3.701(1.156-11.861), ethnicity (p-value= 0.001 ; OR = 9.450(2.621-34.073), education (p-value= 0.002; OR = 12(2.340-61.520), occupation (p-value= 0.046; OR = 3.889 (1.178-12.841), side effects (p-value= 0.021; OR = 4.9(1.413-16.988), co-morbidity (p-value= 0.003; OR = 18.33(2.147-156.583). Factors that are not influence on MDR TB in Serui Regional General Hospital, Kepulauan Yapen Regency in 2022 was the drug taking supervisor (p-value = 0.771; OR = 0.711 (0.226-2.241). The dominant factors influencing MDR TB in Serui Regional General Hospital, Kepulauan Yapen Regency in 2022 were age, gender, education, occupation and co-morbidity, while education was the most dominant risk factors

Editorial: High added-value nanoparticles: Rethinking and recycling cell protein waste

Extracellular vesicles; Biomedicine; NanobiotechnlogyVesículas extracelulares; Biomedicina; NanobiotecnologíaVesícules extracel·lulars; Biomedicina; Nanobiotecnologi

Exploring Porcine Precision-Cut Kidney Slices as a Model for Transplant-Related Ischemia-Reperfusion Injury

Marginal donor kidneys are more likely to develop ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI), resulting in inferior long-term outcomes. Perfusion techniques are used to attenuate IRI and improve graft quality. However, machine perfusion is still in its infancy, and more research is required for optimal conditions and potential repairing therapies. Experimental machine perfusion using porcine kidneys is a great way to investigate transplant-related IRI, but these experiments are costly and time-consuming. Therefore, an intermediate model to study IRI would be of great value. We developed a precision-cut kidney slice (PCKS) model that resembles ischemia-reperfusion and provides opportunities for studying multiple interventions simultaneously. Porcine kidneys were procured from a local slaughterhouse, exposed to 30 min of warm ischemia, and cold preserved. Subsequently, PCKS were prepared and incubated under various conditions. Adenosine triphosphate (ATP) levels and histological tissue integrity were assessed for renal viability and injury. Slicing did not influence tissue viability, and PCKS remained viable up to 72 h incubation with significantly increased ATP levels. Hypothermic and normothermic incubation led to significantly higher ATP levels than baseline. William’s medium E supplemented with Ciprofloxacin (and Amphotericin-B) provided the most beneficial condition for incubation of porcine PCKS. The porcine PCKS model can be used for studying transplant IR

A new approach to obtain pure and active proteins from Lactococcus lactis protein aggregates

The production of pure and soluble proteins is a complex, protein-dependent and time-consuming process, in particular for those prone-to-aggregate and/or difficult-to-purify. Although Escherichia coli is widely used for protein production, recombinant products must be co-purified through costly processes to remove lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and minimize adverse effects in the target organism. Interestingly, Lactococcus lactis, which does not contain LPS, could be a promising alternative for the production of relevant proteins. However, to date, there is no universal strategy to produce and purify any recombinant protein, being still a protein-specific process. In this context and considering that L. lactis is also able to form functional protein aggregates under overproduction conditions, we explored the use of these aggregates as an alternative source of soluble proteins. In this study, we developed a widely applicable and economically affordable protocol to extract functional proteins from these nanoclusters. For that, two model proteins were used: mammary serum amyloid A3 (M-SAA3) and metalloproteinase 9 (MMP-9), a difficult-to-purify and a prone-to-aggregate protein, respectively. The results show that it is possible to obtain highly pure, soluble, LPS-free and active recombinant proteins from L. lactis aggregates through a cost-effective and simple protocol with special relevance for difficult-to-purify or highly aggregated proteins

Targeting antitumoral proteins to breast cancer by local administration of functional inclusion bodies

Altres ajuts de l'Instituto de Salud Carlos III: PI15/00272, PI1702242FIS i #PI16/01224Two structurally and functionally unrelated proteins, namely Omomyc and p31, are engineered as CD44-targeted inclusion bodies produced in recombinant bacteria. In this unusual particulate form, both types of protein materials selectively penetrate and kill CD44 tumor cells in culture, and upon local administration, promote destruction of tumoral tissue in orthotropic mouse models of human breast cancer. These findings support the concept of bacterial inclusion bodies as versatile protein materials suitable for application in chronic diseases that, like cancer, can benefit from a local slow release of therapeutic protein

Sterilization procedure for temperature-sensitive hydrogels loaded with silver nanoparticles for clinical applications

Hydrogels (HG) have recognized benefits as drug delivery platforms for biomedical applications. Their high sensitivity to sterilization processes is however one of the greatest challenges regarding their clinical translation. Concerning infection diseases, prevention of post-operatory related infections is crucial to ensure appropriate patient recovery and good clinical outcomes. Silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) have shown good antimicrobial properties but sustained release at the right place is required. Thus, we produced and characterized thermo-sensitive HG based on Pluronic® F127 loaded with AgNPs (HG-AgNPs) and their integrity and functionality after sterilization by dry-heat and autoclave methods were carefully assessed. The quality attributes of HG-AgNPs were seriously affected by dry-heat methods but not by autoclaving methods, which allowed to ensure the required sterility. Also, direct sterilization of the final HG-AgNPs product proved more effective than of the raw material, allowing simpler production procedures in non-sterile conditions. The mechanical properties were assessed in post mortem rat models and the HG-AgNPs were tested for its antimicrobial properties in vitro using extremely drug-resistant (XDR) clinical strains. The produced HG-AgNPs prove to be versatile, easy produced and cost-effective products, with activity against XDR strains and an adequate gelation time and spreadability features and optimal for in situ biomedical applications.This research was partially funded by the Networking Research Centre for Bioengineering, Biomaterials and Nanomedicine (CIBER-BBN), Instituto de Salud Carlos III. FA was supported by a post-doctoral grant from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal. JSR was supported by a post-doctoral grant from Asociación Española Contra el Cáncer (AECC), Spain. FMT was supported by a pre-doctoral grant from Plan Estratégico de Investigación e Innovación en Salud (PERIS), Agència de Qualitat i Avaluació Sanitàries de Catalunya (AQuAS), Spain

A new approach to obtain pure and active proteins from Lactococcus lactis protein aggregates

The production of pure and soluble proteins is a complex, protein-dependent and time-consuming process, in particular for those prone-to-aggregate and/or difcult-to-purify. Although Escherichia coli is widely used for protein production, recombinant products must be co-purifed through costly processes to remove lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and minimize adverse efects in the target organism. Interestingly, Lactococcus lactis, which does not contain LPS, could be a promising alternative for the production of relevant proteins. However, to date, there is no universal strategy to produce and purify any recombinant protein, being still a protein-specifc process. In this context and considering that L. lactis is also able to form functional protein aggregates under overproduction conditions, we explored the use of these aggregates as an alternative source of soluble proteins. In this study, we developed a widely applicable and economically afordable protocol to extract functional proteins from these nanoclusters. For that, two model proteins were used: mammary serum amyloid A3 (M-SAA3) and metalloproteinase 9 (MMP-9), a difcult-to-purify and a prone-to-aggregate protein, respectively. The results show that it is possible to obtain highly pure, soluble, LPS-free and active recombinant proteins from L. lactis aggregates through a cost-efective and simple protocol with special relevance for difcult-to-purify or highly aggregated proteins.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Characterization of adobe blocks: point-load assessment as a complementary study of damaged buildings and samples

Adobe masonry is one of the oldest construction systems still in use today, Mexico has an enormous cultural heritage with traditional adobe houses being very representative of the rural communities and their culture. The 2017 Puebla Earthquake on September 19th struck the country causing the loss, destruction, and damage of historic buildings in several Mexican states, with the traditional earthen dwellings being the most vulnerable structures to these events. The fast abandonment of the local materials and techniques entails further research regarding the characterization of these construction systems, therefore, reconstruction efforts first require the recovery of the construction technique. After the seismic events, adobe samples of the remaining adobe structures of Jojutla de Juarez were collected. This population was one of the most affected in all the country, and, because of the major losses suffered, the study was conducted to determine the material properties of the dwellings’ adobe shards and natural quarry clays of the region. The characterization included destructive and non-destructive tests, mineralogical and granulometry analyses, and composition of the adobe samples of the buildings, as well as the aggregates. As a novelty, the compressive strength of the pieces was tested by two methods: the traditional compression strength test and the point-load test, in order to obtain the indicative values and the correlation equations between both tests. From the formal analysis and the laboratory, it was observed that the adobes from Jojutla presented different compositions which combined with the building malpractices and alterations to the traditional systems caused unpredictable behavior during the earthquake. The conduction of point-load tests in situ, as a part of a complete characterization methodology, could be an alternative to study the mechanical properties of patrimonial or damaged building samples before its disappearance.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version