1,178 research outputs found
Xenogeneic, extracorporeal liver perfusion in primates improves the ratio of branched-chain amino acids to aromatic amino acids (Fischer's ratio)
In fulminant hepatic failure (FHF), the development of hepatic encephalopathy is associated with grossly abnormal concentrations of plasma amino acids (PAA). Normalization of the ratio of branched-chain amino acids to aromatic amino acids (Fischer's ratio) correlates with clinical improvement. This study evaluated changes in PAA metabolism during 4 h of isolated, normothermic extracorporeal liver perfusion using a newly designed system containing human blood and a rhesus monkey liver. Bile and urea production were within the physiological range. Release of the transaminases AST, ALT and LDH were minimal. The ratio of branched (valine, leucine, isoleucine) to aromatic (tyrosine, phenylalanine) amino acids increased significantly. These results indicate that a xenogeneic extracorporeal liver perfusion system is capable of significantly increasing Fischer's ratio and may play a role in treating and bridging patients in FHF in the future
Generic Fibrational Induction
This paper provides an induction rule that can be used to prove properties of
data structures whose types are inductive, i.e., are carriers of initial
algebras of functors. Our results are semantic in nature and are inspired by
Hermida and Jacobs' elegant algebraic formulation of induction for polynomial
data types. Our contribution is to derive, under slightly different
assumptions, a sound induction rule that is generic over all inductive types,
polynomial or not. Our induction rule is generic over the kinds of properties
to be proved as well: like Hermida and Jacobs, we work in a general fibrational
setting and so can accommodate very general notions of properties on inductive
types rather than just those of a particular syntactic form. We establish the
soundness of our generic induction rule by reducing induction to iteration. We
then show how our generic induction rule can be instantiated to give induction
rules for the data types of rose trees, finite hereditary sets, and
hyperfunctions. The first of these lies outside the scope of Hermida and
Jacobs' work because it is not polynomial, and as far as we are aware, no
induction rules have been known to exist for the second and third in a general
fibrational framework. Our instantiation for hyperfunctions underscores the
value of working in the general fibrational setting since this data type cannot
be interpreted as a set.Comment: For Special Issue from CSL 201
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Treatment of Candida albicans biofilms with low-temperature plasma induced by dielectric barrier discharge and atmospheric pressure plasma jet
Because of some disadvantages of chemical disinfection in dental practice (especially denture cleaning), we investigated the effects of physical methods on Candida albicans biofilms. For this purpose, the antifungal efficacy of three different low-temperature plasma devices (an atmospheric pressure plasma jet and two different dielectric barrier discharges (DBDs)) on Candida albicans biofilms grown on titanium discs in vitro was investigated. As positive treatment controls, we used 0.1% Chlorhexidine digluconate (CHX) and 0.6% sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl). The corresponding gas streams without plasma ignition served as negative treatment controls. The efficacy of the plasma treatment was determined evaluating the number of colony-forming units (CFU) recovered from titanium discs. The plasma treatment reduced the CFU significantly compared to chemical disinfectants. While 10 min CHX or NaOCl exposure led to a CFU log 10 reduction factor of 1.5, the log10 reduction factor of DBD plasma was up to 5. In conclusion, the use of low-temperature plasma is a promising physical alternative to chemical antiseptics for dental practice. © IOP Publishing Ltd and Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
Conditional Intensity and Gibbsianness of Determinantal Point Processes
The Papangelou intensities of determinantal (or fermion) point processes are
investigated. These exhibit a monotonicity property expressing the repulsive
nature of the interaction, and satisfy a bound implying stochastic domination
by a Poisson point process. We also show that determinantal point processes
satisfy the so-called condition which is a general form of
Gibbsianness. Under a continuity assumption, the Gibbsian conditional
probabilities can be identified explicitly.Comment: revised and extende
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