Nd:YAG laser scribed zinc oxide on semi-flexible copper foils

In this work, a novel approach to synthesise zinc oxide (ZnO) directly on flexible copper substrates is proposed. The produced samples show a foam-like morphology made of agglomerates of small ZnO particles when processed at laser energy density of 18.0 J/cm2. On the other hand, the samples processed at higher beam energy density, i.e. 33.2 J/cm2, resulted in a more granular morphology, with some ZnO particles dispersed over the sample’s surface. Raman spectroscopy measurements demonstrated that this method resulted in the formation of wurtzite-ZnO crystalline phase in all samples. Room temperature photoluminescence spectroscopy analysis revealed the presence of a broad visible band in the orange-red region dominating the spectra, with a small contribution from the near band edge emission in the UV spectral region. Decreasing the beam energy fluence from 33.2 to 18.0 J/cm2 resulted in samples with higher overall visible band intensity, in line with what was observed for their crystalline quality. Moreover, the shift of the broad band maxima towards longer wavelengths could be an indication of the possibility of tuning the visible emission according to the chosen laser processing conditions.publishe

Percutaneous ethanol injection for treatment of solid, cystic and autonomous thyroid nodules

Percutaneous ethanol injection (PEI) guided by ultrasound has been used for the treatment of cystic, solid and autonomous thyroid nodules. We present our experience in the treatment of 50 patients with thyroid nodules: 26 solid, 17 cystic and 7 autonomous (AN). Patients were evaluated 1 week, 1, 3, and 6 months and 1 year after PEI. After one year, solid nodules showed a mean 74% volume reduction, and cysts a volume reduction of 92%, with no recurrences. After one year, 5 patients with AN reached clinical and laboratory euthyroidism; the other 2 also became euthyroid, but with subnormal TSH. Recurrence of thyrotoxicosis was not observed and mean nodular reduction was 66%. The procedure was well tolerated by all patients. The results confirm that PEI is a good therapeutic alternative for reduction of solid and cystic thyroid nodules and for the treatment of autonomous nodules.A injeção percutânea de etanol (IPE) guiada por ultra-som tem sido utilizada para o tratamento de nódulos tiroidianos autônomos, sólidos e císticos. Apresentamos nossa experiência em 50 pacientes tratados, sendo 26 portadores de nódulos sólidos, 17 de nódulos císticos e 7 de nódulos autônomos (NA). Avaliamos os pacientes 1 semana, 1 mês, 3 meses, 6 meses e 1 ano após a IPE. Após 1 ano, os nódulos sólidos reduziram a 74% do volume inicial, os císticos diminuíram 92% sem apresentar recidivas. Um ano após o tratamento dos nódulos autônomos, 5 pacientes estavam em eutiroidismo clínico e laboratorial e 2 em eutiroidismo mas com TSH subnormal. Não houve recorrência da tirotoxicose e a redução nodular foi de 66%. O procedimento foi bem tolerado por todos. Os resultados confirmam que a IPE é uma boa alternativa terapêutica para redução dos nódulos tiroidianos císticos e sólidos e no tratamento dos nódulos autônomos.Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP) Escola Paulista de Medicina Departamento de MedicinaUNIFESP, EPM, Depto. de MedicinaSciEL

T-box transcription factor Brachyury is associated with prostate cancer progression and aggressiveness

Purpose: Successful therapy of patients with prostate cancer is highly dependent on reliable diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers. Brachyury is considered a negative prognostic factor in colon and lung cancer; however, there are no reports on Brachyury’s expression in prostate cancer. Experimental Design: In this study, we aimed to assess the impact of Brachyury expression in prostate tumorigenesis using a large series of human prostate samples comprising benign tissue, prostate intraepithelial neoplasia (PIN) lesions, localized tumor, and metastatic tissues. The results obtained were compared with what can be inferred from the Oncomine database. In addition, multiple in vitro models of prostate cancer were used to dissect the biologic role of Brachyury in prostate cancer progression. Results: We found that Brachyury is significantly overexpressed in prostate cancer and metastatic tumors when compared with normal tissues, both at protein and at mRNA levels. Brachyury expression in the cytoplasm correlates with highly aggressive tumors, whereas the presence of Brachyury in the nucleus is correlated with tumor invasion. We found that Brachyury-positive cells present higher viability, proliferation, migration, and invasion rates than Brachyury-negative cells. Microarray analysis further showed that genes co-expressed with Brachyury are clustered in oncogenic-related pathways, namely cell motility, cellcycle regulation, and cell metabolism. Conclusions: Collectively, the present study suggests that Brachyury plays an important role in prostate cancer aggressiveness and points, for the first time, to Brachyury as a significant predictor of poor prostate cancer prognosis. Our work paves the way for future studies assessing Brachyury as a possible prostate cancer therapeutic target.This study was supported by the ICVS internal research funds of participating authors and by the FCT project, ref. PTDC/SAU-MET113415/2009. F. Pinto and N. Pertega-Gomes received fellowships from the FCT, ref. SFRH/BD/81369/2011 and SFRH/BD/61027/2009, respectively. R. P. Andrade was funded by Ciencia2007 Program Contract and Programa Operacional Regional do Norte (ON. 2) - NORTE-07-0124-FEDER-000017

Impact of atomic layer deposited TiO2 on the photocatalytic efficiency of TiO2/w-VA-CNT nanocomposite materials

Titanium oxide (TiO2) has been widely investigated as a photocatalytic material, and the fact that its performance depends on its crystalline structure motivates further research on the relationship between preparation methods and material properties. In this work, TiO2 thin films were grown on non- functionalized wave-like patterned vertically aligned carbon nanotubes (w-VA-CNTs) via the atomic layer deposition (ALD) technique. Grazing incidence X-ray diffraction (GIXRD) analysis revealed that the structure of the TiO2/VA-CNT nanocomposites varied from amorphous to a crystalline phase with increasing deposition temperature, suggesting a “critical deposition temperature” for the anatase crystalline phase formation. On the other hand, scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) studies revealed that the non-functionalized carbon nanotubes were conformally and homogeneously coated with TiO2, forming a nanocomposite while preserving the morphology of the nanotubes. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) provided information about the surface chemistry and stoichiometry of TiO2. The photodegradation experiments under ultraviolet (UV) light on a model pollutant (Rhodamine B, RhB) revealed that the nanocomposite comprised of anatase crystalline TiO2 grown at 200 ?C (11.2 nm thickness) presented the highest degradation efficiency viz 55% with an illumination time of 240 min. Furthermore, its recyclability was also demonstrated for multiple cycles, showing good recovery and potential for practical applications.publishe

Secreted extracellular vesicle molecular cargo as a novel liquid biopsy diagnostics of central nervous system diseases

Secreted extracellular vesicles (EVs) are heterogeneous cell-derived membranous granules which carry a large diversity of molecules and participate in intercellular communication by transferring these molecules to target cells by endocytosis. In the last decade, EVs role in several pathological conditions, from etiology to disease progression or therapy evasion, has been consolidated, including in central nervous system (CNS)-related disorders. For this review, we performed a systematic search of original works published, reporting the presence of molecular components expressed in the CNS via EVs, which have been purified from plasma, serum or cerebrospinal fluid. Our aim is to provide a list of molecular EV components that have been identified from both nonpathological conditions and the most common CNS-related disorders. We discuss the methods used to isolate and enrich EVs from specific CNS-cells and the relevance of its components in each disease context.This research was funded by the MindGaP-H2020-FETOPEN-2018-2020, Grant agreement ID: 829040. S.M.-R., C.C.-M., and J.P. hold a fellowship from MindGaP.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Writing 3D In vitro models of human tendon within a biomimetic fibrillar support platform

Tendinopathies are poorly understood diseases for which treatment remains challenging. Relevant in vitro models to study human tendon physiology and pathophysiology are therefore highly needed. Here we propose the automated 3D writing of tendon microphysiological systems (MPSs) embedded in a biomimetic fibrillar support platform based on cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) self-assembly. Tendon decellularized extracellular matrix (dECM) was used to formulate bioinks that closely recapitulate the biochemical signature of tendon niche. A monoculture system recreating the cellular patterns and phenotype of the tendon core was first developed and characterized. This system was then incorporated with a vascular compartment to study the crosstalk between the two cell populations. The combined biophysical and biochemical cues of the printed pattern and dECM hydrogel were revealed to be effective in inducing human-adipose-derived stem cells (hASCs) differentiation toward the tenogenic lineage. In the multicellular system, chemotactic effects promoted endothelial cells migration toward the direction of the tendon core compartment, while the established cellular crosstalk boosted hASCs tenogenesis, emulating the tendon development stages. Overall, the proposed concept is a promising strategy for the automated fabrication of humanized organotypic tendon-on-chip models that will be a valuable new tool for the study of tendon physiology and pathogenesis mechanisms and for testing new tendinopathy treatments.The authors thank Hospital da Prelada (Porto, Portugal) for providing adipose tissue samples. The authors acknowledge the financial support from Project NORTE-01-0145-FEDER 000021 supported by Norte Portugal Regional Operational Program (NORTE 2020), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the European Union Framework Program for Research and Innovation HORIZON 2020, under the Twinning Grant Agreement 810850-Achilles, and European Research Council Grant Agreement 772817 and 101069302, Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia for the Ph.D. grant PD/BD/129403/2017 (to S.M.B.) financed through the doctoral program in Tissue Engineering, Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cells (TERM&SC), for Contract 2020.03410.CEECIND and 2022.05526.PTDC (to R.M.A.D.). The authors acknowledge Doctor Alberto Pardo for performing the rheology measurements of the PL bioink. The schematics in Figures 1, 2A, 4A, and 6A and Table of Contents graphic were created with BioRender.com

A Novel TGFβ Modulator that Uncouples R-Smad/I-Smad-Mediated Negative Feedback from R-Smad/Ligand-Driven Positive Feedback

As some of the most widely utilised intercellular signalling molecules, transforming growth factor β (TGFβ) superfamily members play critical roles in normal development and become disrupted in human disease. Establishing appropriate levels of TGFβ signalling involves positive and negative feedback, which are coupled and driven by the same signal transduction components (R-Smad transcription factor complexes), but whether and how the regulation of the two can be distinguished are unknown. Genome-wide comparison of published ChIP-seq datasets suggests that LIM dom

Canalopatias em endocrinologia: achados genéticos recentes e fisiopatologia

Ion channels serve diverse cellular functions, mainly in cell signal transduction. In endocrine cells, these channels play a major role in hormonal secretion, Ca2+-mediated cell signaling, transepithelial transport, cell motility and growth, volume regulation and cellular ionic content and acidification of lysosomal compartments. Ion channel dysfunction can cause endocrine disorders or endocrine-related manifestations, such as pseudohypoaldosteronism type 1, Liddle syndrome, Bartter syndrome, persistent hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia of infancy, neonatal diabetes mellitus, cystic fibrosis, Dent's disease, hypomagnesemia with secondary hipocalcemia, nephrogenic diabetes insipidus and, the most recently genetically identified channelopathy, thyrotoxic hypokalemic periodic paralysis. This review briefly recapitulates the membrane action potential in endocrine cells and offers a short overview of known endocrine channelopathies with focus on recent progress regarding the pathophysiological mechanisms and functional genetic defects.Canais iônicos auxiliam diferentes funções celulares, principalmente na transdução de sinal. Nas células endócrinas, esses canais têm funções importantes na secreção hormonal, sinalização do Ca2+, transporte transepitelial, regulação da motilidade, volume e conteúdo iônico celular e da acidificação do compartimento lisossomal (pH). Como esperado, as alterações nos canais iônicos podem causar distúrbios endocrinológicos, como pseudo-hipoaldosteronismo tipo 1, síndrome de Liddle, síndrome de Bartter, hipoglicemia hiperinsulinêmica da infância, diabetes melito neonatal, fibrose cística, doença de Dent, hipomagnesemia com hipocalcemia secundária, diabetes insípido nefrogênico e paralisia periódica tirotóxica hipocalêmica. Este artigo propõe uma breve revisão das canalopatias endócrinas conhecidas, com foco particular nos recentes progressos no conhecimento dos mecanismos fisiopatológicos adquirido a partir das alterações funcionais encontradas.Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP) Escola Paulista de Medicina Departamento de MedicinaUNIFESP-EPM Departamento de BioquímicaUNIFESP, EPM, Depto. de MedicinaUNIFESP, EPM Depto. de BioquímicaSciEL