Cracked Tooth Syndrome (CTS) - A Review and Updates

Till date, in the current dental practices, dentists often come across with few critical dental situations that remain undiagnosed or not managed properly. They should be careful about such conditions. Cracked tooth syndrome (CTS) may be one of those conditions. The diagnosis of CTS at an early stage may lead to successful restorative management and good outcomes. Purpose of this article is to provide an overview of the clinical features, diagnosis, classification, and management of cracked teeth which may be a diagnostic challenge in clinical practice

Synergistic drug combinations from electronic health records and gene expression.

ObjectiveUsing electronic health records (EHRs) and biomolecular data, we sought to discover drug pairs with synergistic repurposing potential. EHRs provide real-world treatment and outcome patterns, while complementary biomolecular data, including disease-specific gene expression and drug-protein interactions, provide mechanistic understanding.MethodWe applied Group Lasso INTERaction NETwork (glinternet), an overlap group lasso penalty on a logistic regression model, with pairwise interactions to identify variables and interacting drug pairs associated with reduced 5-year mortality using EHRs of 9945 breast cancer patients. We identified differentially expressed genes from 14 case-control human breast cancer gene expression datasets and integrated them with drug-protein networks. Drugs in the network were scored according to their association with breast cancer individually or in pairs. Lastly, we determined whether synergistic drug pairs found in the EHRs were enriched among synergistic drug pairs from gene-expression data using a method similar to gene set enrichment analysis.ResultsFrom EHRs, we discovered 3 drug-class pairs associated with lower mortality: anti-inflammatories and hormone antagonists, anti-inflammatories and lipid modifiers, and lipid modifiers and obstructive airway drugs. The first 2 pairs were also enriched among pairs discovered using gene expression data and are supported by molecular interactions in drug-protein networks and preclinical and epidemiologic evidence.ConclusionsThis is a proof-of-concept study demonstrating that a combination of complementary data sources, such as EHRs and gene expression, can corroborate discoveries and provide mechanistic insight into drug synergism for repurposing

Highly time-resolved chemical speciation and source apportionment of organic aerosol components in Delhi, India, using extractive electrospray ionization mass spectrometry

In recent years, the Indian capital city of Delhi has been impacted by very high levels of air pollution, especially during winter. Comprehensive knowledge of the composition and sources of the organic aerosol (OA), which constitutes a substantial fraction of total particulate mass (PM) in Delhi, is central to formulating effective public health policies. Previous source apportionment studies in Delhi identified key sources of primary OA (POA) and showed that secondary OA (SOA) played a major role but were unable to resolve specific SOA sources. We address the latter through the first field deployment of an extractive electrospray ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometer (EESI-TOF) in Delhi, together with a high-resolution aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS). Measurements were conducted during the winter of 2018/19, and positive matrix factorization (PMF) was used separately on AMS and EESI-TOF datasets to apportion the sources of OA. AMS PMF analysis yielded three primary and two secondary factors which were attributed to hydrocarbon-like OA (HOA), biomass burning OA (BBOA-1 and BBOA-2), more oxidized oxygenated OA (MO-OOA), and less oxidized oxygenated OA (LO-OOA). On average, 40 % of the total OA mass was apportioned to the secondary factors. The SOA contribution to total OA mass varied greatly between the daytime (76.8 %, 10:00–16:00 local time (LT)) and nighttime (31.0 %, 21:00–04:00 LT). The higher chemical resolution of EESI-TOF data allowed identification of individual SOA sources. The EESI-TOF PMF analysis in total yielded six factors, two of which were primary factors (primary biomass burning and cooking-related OA). The remaining four factors were predominantly of secondary origin: aromatic SOA, biogenic SOA, aged biomass burning SOA, and mixed urban SOA. Due to the uncertainties in the EESI-TOF ion sensitivities, mass concentrations of EESI-TOF SOA-dominated factors were related to the total AMS SOA (i.e. MO-OOA + LO-OOA) by multiple linear regression (MLR). Aromatic SOA was the major SOA component during the daytime, with a 55.2 % contribution to total SOA mass (42.4 % contribution to total OA). Its contribution to total SOA, however, decreased to 25.4 % (7.9 % of total OA) during the nighttime. This factor was attributed to the oxidation of light aromatic compounds emitted mostly from traffic. Biogenic SOA accounted for 18.4 % of total SOA mass (14.2 % of total OA) during the daytime and 36.1 % of total SOA mass (11.2 % of total OA) during the nighttime. Aged biomass burning and mixed urban SOA accounted for 15.2 % and 11.0 % of total SOA mass (11.7 % and 8.5 % of total OA mass), respectively, during the daytime and 15.4 % and 22.9 % of total SOA mass (4.8 % and 7.1 % of total OA mass), respectively, during the nighttime. A simple dilution–partitioning model was applied on all EESI-TOF factors to estimate the fraction of observed daytime concentrations resulting from local photochemical production (SOA) or emissions (POA). Aromatic SOA, aged biomass burning, and mixed urban SOA were all found to be dominated by local photochemical production, likely from the oxidation of locally emitted volatile organic compounds (VOCs). In contrast, biogenic SOA was related to the oxidation of diffuse regional emissions of isoprene and monoterpenes. The findings of this study show that in Delhi, the nighttime high concentrations are caused by POA emissions led by traffic and biomass burning and the daytime OA is dominated by SOA, with aromatic SOA accounting for the largest fraction. Because aromatic SOA is possibly more toxic than biogenic SOA and primary OA, its dominance during the daytime suggests an increased OA toxicity and health-related consequences for the general public.</p

Equal abundance of summertime natural and wintertime anthropogenic Arctic organic aerosols

Organic aerosols in the Arctic are predominantly fuelled by anthropogenic sources in winter and natural sources in summer, according to observations from eight sites across the Arctic Aerosols play an important yet uncertain role in modulating the radiation balance of the sensitive Arctic atmosphere. Organic aerosol is one of the most abundant, yet least understood, fractions of the Arctic aerosol mass. Here we use data from eight observatories that represent the entire Arctic to reveal the annual cycles in anthropogenic and biogenic sources of organic aerosol. We show that during winter, the organic aerosol in the Arctic is dominated by anthropogenic emissions, mainly from Eurasia, which consist of both direct combustion emissions and long-range transported, aged pollution. In summer, the decreasing anthropogenic pollution is replaced by natural emissions. These include marine secondary, biogenic secondary and primary biological emissions, which have the potential to be important to Arctic climate by modifying the cloud condensation nuclei properties and acting as ice-nucleating particles. Their source strength or atmospheric processing is sensitive to nutrient availability, solar radiation, temperature and snow cover. Our results provide a comprehensive understanding of the current pan-Arctic organic aerosol, which can be used to support modelling efforts that aim to quantify the climate impacts of emissions in this sensitive region.Peer reviewe

The role and uses of antibodies in COVID-19 infections: a living review

Coronavirus disease 2019 has generated a rapidly evolving field of research, with the global scientific community striving for solutions to the current pandemic. Characterizing humoral responses towards SARS-CoV-2, as well as closely related strains, will help determine whether antibodies are central to infection control, and aid the design of therapeutics and vaccine candidates. This review outlines the major aspects of SARS-CoV-2-specific antibody research to date, with a focus on the various prophylactic and therapeutic uses of antibodies to alleviate disease in addition to the potential of cross-reactive therapies and the implications of long-term immunity

T cell phenotypes in COVID-19 - a living review

COVID-19 is characterized by profound lymphopenia in the peripheral blood, and the remaining T cells display altered phenotypes, characterized by a spectrum of activation and exhaustion. However, antigen-specific T cell responses are emerging as a crucial mechanism for both clearance of the virus and as the most likely route to long-lasting immune memory that would protect against re-infection. Therefore, T cell responses are also of considerable interest in vaccine development. Furthermore, persistent alterations in T cell subset composition and function post-infection have important implications for patients’ long-term immune function. In this review, we examine T cell phenotypes, including those of innate T cells, in both peripheral blood and lungs, and consider how key markers of activation and exhaustion correlate with, and may be able to predict, disease severity. We focus on SARS-CoV-2-specific T cells to elucidate markers that may indicate formation of antigen-specific T cell memory. We also examine peripheral T cell phenotypes in recovery and the likelihood of long-lasting immune disruption. Finally, we discuss T cell phenotypes in the lung as important drivers of both virus clearance and tissue damage. As our knowledge of the adaptive immune response to COVID-19 rapidly evolves, it has become clear that while some areas of the T cell response have been investigated in some detail, others, such as the T cell response in children remain largely unexplored. Therefore, this review will also highlight areas where T cell phenotypes require urgent characterisation

Centrality evolution of the charged-particle pseudorapidity density over a broad pseudorapidity range in Pb-Pb collisions at root s(NN)=2.76TeV

Peer reviewe