Complementary and alternative medicine for patients with chronic fatigue syndrome: A systematic review

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Throughout the world, patients with chronic diseases/illnesses use complementary and alternative medicines (CAM). The use of CAM is also substantial among patients with diseases/illnesses of unknown aetiology. Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), also termed myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), is no exception. Hence, a systematic review of randomised controlled trials of CAM treatments in patients with CFS/ME was undertaken to summarise the existing evidence from RCTs of CAM treatments in this patient population.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Seventeen data sources were searched up to 13th August 2011. All randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of any type of CAM therapy used for treating CFS were included, with the exception of acupuncture and complex herbal medicines; studies were included regardless of blinding. Controlled clinical trials, uncontrolled observational studies, and case studies were excluded.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A total of 26 RCTs, which included 3,273 participants, met our inclusion criteria. The CAM therapy from the RCTs included the following: mind-body medicine, distant healing, massage, tuina and tai chi, homeopathy, ginseng, and dietary supplementation. Studies of qigong, massage and tuina were demonstrated to have positive effects, whereas distant healing failed to do so. Compared with placebo, homeopathy also had insufficient evidence of symptom improvement in CFS. Seventeen studies tested supplements for CFS. Most of the supplements failed to show beneficial effects for CFS, with the exception of NADH and magnesium.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The results of our systematic review provide limited evidence for the effectiveness of CAM therapy in relieving symptoms of CFS. However, we are not able to draw firm conclusions concerning CAM therapy for CFS due to the limited number of RCTs for each therapy, the small sample size of each study and the high risk of bias in these trials. Further rigorous RCTs that focus on promising CAM therapies are warranted.</p

Sensitivity of the Cherenkov Telescope Array to a dark matter signal from the Galactic centre

We provide an updated assessment of the power of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) to search for thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale, via the associated gamma-ray signal from pair-annihilating dark matter particles in the region around the Galactic centre. We find that CTA will open a new window of discovery potential, significantly extending the range of robustly testable models given a standard cuspy profile of the dark matter density distribution. Importantly, even for a cored profile, the projected sensitivity of CTA will be sufficient to probe various well-motivated models of thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale. This is due to CTA's unprecedented sensitivity, angular and energy resolutions, and the planned observational strategy. The survey of the inner Galaxy will cover a much larger region than corresponding previous observational campaigns with imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes. CTA will map with unprecedented precision the large-scale diffuse emission in high-energy gamma rays, constituting a background for dark matter searches for which we adopt state-of-the-art models based on current data. Throughout our analysis, we use up-to-date event reconstruction Monte Carlo tools developed by the CTA consortium, and pay special attention to quantifying the level of instrumental systematic uncertainties, as well as background template systematic errors, required to probe thermally produced dark matter at these energies

Exploitation of Rhizosphere Microbiome Services

The rhizosphere is a soil hot spot where, due to a tight plant-bacteria interaction, plants recruit a beneficial microbiome, enhancing its density and activity. Rhizosphere microbial communities have the potential to provide several services, and their management and \u201cengineering\u201d can be exploited to set up agro-environmental biotechnologies. In this chapter, after a brief overview of the array of services that we can obtain from rhizosphere beneficial microbiome, two case studies are presented: i) the exploitation of plant growth promoting bacteria to increase plant tolerance to drought, potentially able to improve crop plants yields in arid and semi-arid lands, ii) the exploitation of plant biostimulation effect over degrading microbial populations in the rhizosphere, sustaining phyto-rhyzo-remediation approaches in PCB contaminated soils. In each case study the experimental settings, the in vitro and in vivo tests, the result evaluation and modelling are reported, together with a discussion of the critical issues

Stem cells and the ocular lens : implications for cataract research and therapy

The transparent, avascular and non-innervated ocular lens is suspended in the light path between the cornea and retina by the zonular fibres within the zonula ciliaris (also called the Zonule of Zinn; Fig. 9.1). The lens provides approximately 30% of the eye’s focussing power and, through the combined action of the ciliary muscle and zonular fibres, the lens provides all the accommodating ability of the eye, that is, the ability to change focus between near and far objects. These dual properties of transparency and accommodation cause the lens to play a vital role in the development of key motor and social functions that require good vision