The meniscus, calcification and osteoarthritis: a pathologic team.

Articular calcification correlates with osteoarthritis (OA) severity but its exact role in the disease process is unclear. In examining OA meniscal cell function, Sun and colleagues have shown recently that meniscal cells from end-stage OA subjects can generate calcium crystals and that genes involved in calcification are upregulated in OA meniscal cells. Also, this in vitro calcium deposition by OA menisci is inhibited by phosphocitrate. This study should catalyse further work examining the pathological contribution or otherwise of calcium crystals in OA. This would significantly aid the development of potential disease modifying agents in OA, which are currently unavailable

The Ursinus Weekly, May 1, 1950

Frosh, sophs, and Y offer varied weekend activities • General Synod to meet at Ursinus this summer • Expert to lecture here on Tuesday for IRC discussion • Curtain Club gives play this Tuesday; authored by Swan • Schmidt is chosen new Lantern editor • Women elect WAA and WSGA leaders • Eleven Y posts filled by YW-YM presidents • May Day play gets finishing touches • WSGA completes year with important activity • Y panel censures both scientist and layman • Dreschler elected pre-legal head • Gross chosen moderator • Tait to address pre-med society • Files reveal origin of May Day fetes • Y committee directs campus tours for visitors to Ursinus • Bomberger and Baxter are named head waiters • Future lawyers warned of poor job prospects • Munson speaks on law to pre-legal members • Alumni group to feast seniors at May dinner • Theater: Margetson in Clutterbuck • Six Ursinus track men compete in Penn relays • Tennis elucidated by Weekly writer; emphasizes scoring • Linksmen lose 9-0 to Blue Hen squad • Injury-riddled cindermen fall to diplomats 88-38 • Bears bow to Garnet 8-6 in eleven inning contest • \u27Ruby\u27 arrives this week; deficit faces senior class • Mattern to speak at vespershttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/1591/thumbnail.jp

The Ursinus Weekly, October 16, 1950

Ruby to give original show November 10 • Doctor to present pre-med program • Chi Alpha to discuss revision of pre-theo studies Tuesday • Lantern staff announced • Frosh present talent and variety show as highlight of new customs system • Sixty attend retreat at Camp Fernbrook • Men\u27s Student Council revises customs, punishes offenders • College to confer degrees at annual Founders Day • Reception in gym to be inaugurated Old Timers Day • WAA organizes sales, discusses constitution • Czech exile to talk at Forum Tuesday • Gottshall named president of Beardwood Chemical Society • Dolman to present reading • Editorial: To be, or not to be - exemplary • Dr. Garrett relates experiences of trip • Lukens works on antique cars • What is your opinion of customs? • Flickingers confuse Ursinus students, but twins, unperplexed, see eye to eye • Twenty-three attend meeting of political action commission • Kershner writes treatise on Hodgson, world-famous poet recluse of Ohio • Saturday\u27s game gives fans opportunity to observe old time college football • Ashenfelter trains with Bruin runners • Booters suffer 3-1 loss to Muhlenberg; Light scores lone tally for Bears • Keyser elected captain of 1950 hockey squad • Dickinson hands Bruins third straight loss, 39-6 • Debaters schedule public engagementshttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/1548/thumbnail.jp

The Ursinus Weekly, April 17, 1950

Junior prom to highlight week\u27s social calendar • Forum to present prominent explorer for monthly event • Students select leaders for WSGA, WAA, and Y • Senator to address PAC Wednesday • IRC group attends model UN assembly • French club plans April piano recital • ICG members help draft constitution • Scientists to participate in Y-sponsored panel • Practices continue for spring comedy • Board names six to Weekly editorial staff • Commission to discuss admittance of Negroes • \u27Waltz dream\u27 scores hit with Ursinus audiences • P.A.C. visits Washington on annually planned trip • Swedish books add variety to library language shelves • Alumnus suggests constitution change for alumni group • Three men and a rebel tour southland as vacation interrupts semester work • Ursinus welcomes new dance band • Grizzly nine tours south; trip is judged successful • Rampaging grizzlies open season with pair of wins • Tennis belles open against Bryn Mawr • Nine veterans back for softball season • Stine and Shreiner win men\u27s, girls\u27 intramurals • Gurzynski is named head football coach for 1950 • Annex wins honors on intramural night • Garris\u27 pageant selected for \u2750 May Day themehttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/1589/thumbnail.jp

The Ursinus Weekly, December 4, 1950

Gillespie to play at Friday night senior formal • Men students cast 107-71 vote against dorm amendment • Music organizations to present Messiah in Bomberger chapel Thursday night • Y Commissions to meet; PAC plans Xmas party • Response to WSSF is disappointing; Receipts total $350 • Critic hails Angel Street as vehicle for superb thespian dramatic acting • Hungarian to address Tuesday night Forum • Twelve to become Rosicrucians • Yule traditions dominate ensuing campus activities • Bloodmobile to be at Trinity church Thursday morning • 26 are accepted by local chapter of Pi Gamma Mu • Cafe Pigalle to return to gym Saturday night • Mary MacPherson chosen May Queen; Marge Paynter named pageant manager • Editorial: Dynamic force • WSGA notes • Delta Pi Sigma welcomes ten off-campus men • English Club admits members • Revived rec center attracts many • 45 future teachers approach termination of tribulation • IRC hears attorney speak on problems of western nations • Ruby schedules photos, pushes subscriptions • Pigskin parade • Bears top textile 64-50 in court season inaugural • Six close careers on soccer squad • Derr deadlocks Albright 6-6 • Four senior girls play hockey finale • Grid player scans all-state selections • Ursinus grid aggregation suffers loss of twelve graduating upper classmen • Penn triumphs 3-1 over Ursinus girls • Reid Watson became football manager when injury benched former grid star • Messiah reputation stems from mastery of simple techniques • Eight teams compete in debate tournament • Chess team loses • Kershner does dialect in fourth lit readinghttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/1554/thumbnail.jp

Balancing the benefits and risks of public–private partnerships to address the global double burden of malnutrition

Objective: Transnational food, beverage and restaurant companies, and their corporate foundations, may be potential collaborators to help address complex public health nutrition challenges. While UN system guidelines are available for private-sector engagement, non-governmental organizations (NGO) have limited guidelines to navigate diverse opportunities and challenges presented by partnering with these companies through public&ndash;private partnerships (PPP) to address the global double burden of malnutrition.Design: We conducted a search of electronic databases, UN system websites and grey literature to identify resources about partnerships used to address the global double burden of malnutrition. A narrative summary provides a synthesis of the interdisciplinary literature identified.Results: We describe partnership opportunities, benefits and challenges; and tools and approaches to help NGO engage with the private sector to address global public health nutrition challenges. PPP benefits include: raising the visibility of nutrition and health on policy agendas; mobilizing funds and advocating for research; strengthening food-system processes and delivery systems; facilitating technology transfer; and expanding access to medications, vaccines, healthy food and beverage products, and nutrition assistance during humanitarian crises. PPP challenges include: balancing private commercial interests with public health interests; managing conflicts of interest; ensuring that co-branded activities support healthy products and healthy eating environments; complying with ethical codes of conduct; assessing partnership compatibility; and evaluating partnership outcomes.Conclusions: NGO should adopt a systematic and transparent approach using available tools and processes to maximize benefits and minimize risks of partnering with transnational food, beverage and restaurant companies to effectively target the global double burden of malnutrition.<br /

Rheumatology training experience across Europe : Analysis of core competences

Publisher Copyright: © 2016 The Author(s). Copyright: Copyright 2019 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.Background: The aim of this project was to analyze and compare the educational experience in rheumatology specialty training programs across European countries, with a focus on self-reported ability. Method: An electronic survey was designed to assess the training experience in terms of self-reported ability, existence of formal education, number of patients managed and assessments performed during rheumatology training in 21 core competences including managing specific diseases, generic competences and procedures. The target population consisted of rheumatology trainees and recently certified rheumatologists across Europe. The relationship between the country of training and the self-reported ability or training methods for each competence was analyzed through linear or logistic regression, as appropriate. Results: In total 1079 questionnaires from 41 countries were gathered. Self-reported ability was high for most competences, range 7.5-9.4 (0-10 scale) for clinical competences, 5.8-9.0 for technical procedures and 7.8-8.9 for generic competences. Competences with lower self-reported ability included managing patients with vasculitis, identifying crystals and performing an ultrasound. Between 53 and 91 % of the trainees received formal education and between 7 and 61 % of the trainees reported limited practical experience (managing ≤10 patients) in each competence. Evaluation of each competence was reported by 29-60 % of the respondents. In adjusted multivariable analysis, the country of training was associated with significant differences in self-reported ability for all individual competences. Conclusion: Even though self-reported ability is generally high, there are significant differences amongst European countries, including differences in the learning structure and assessment of competences. This suggests that educational outcomes may also differ. Efforts to promote European harmonization in rheumatology training should be encouraged and supported.publishersversionPeer reviewe

A benzimidazole-based new fluorogenic differential/sequential chemosensor for Cu2+, Zn2+, CN-, P2O74-, DNA, its live-cell imaging and pyrosequencing applications

Differential chemosensors have emerged as next-generation systems due to their simplicity and favourable responsive properties to produce different signals upon selective binding of various analytes simultaneously. Nevertheless, given their inadequate fluorescence response and laborious synthetic procedures, only a few differential chemosensors have been developed so far. In this work, we have employed a single pot synthesis strategy to establish a new benzimidazole-based Schiff base type fluorogenic chemosensor (DFB) which differentially detects Cu2+ (detection limit (LOD) = 24.4 ± 0.5 nM) and Zn2+ (LOD = 2.18 ± 0.1 nM) through fluorescence “off-on” manner over the library of other metal cations in an aqueous medium. The DFB-derived ‘in situ’ complexes DFB-Cu2+ and DFB-Zn2+ showed fluorescence revival “on-off” responses toward cyanide (CN−) and bio-relevant pyrophosphate (P2O7 4--PPi) ions with a significantly low LOD of 9.43 ± 0.2 and 2.9 ± 0.1 nM, respectively, in water. We have demonstrated the phosphate group-specific binding capability of DFB-Zn2+ , by testing it with both ssDNA and dsDNA samples which displayed fluorescence “turn-off” response (LOD ∼10-7 M), similar to the PPi binding in an aqueous medium, indicating that it interacts explicitly with the phosphate backbone of DNA. We have also harnessed the DFB as a sequential fluorescent probe to detect Cu2+, Zn2+, CN− and P2O7 4- ions in human cervical (HeLa) and breast (MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231 (aggressive and invasive)) cancer cell lines. Moreover, we have explored the PPi recognition capability of DFB-Zn2+ in the polymerase-chain-reaction (PCR) products where PPi is one of the primary by-products during amplification of DNA

Platelet Function in Inflammatory Arthritis

Patients with inflammatory arthritis (IA) are at increased risk of adverse cardiovascular events. While traditional risk factors are important, recent evidence highlights the key role of inflammation in cardiovascular disease (CVD). Platelets play a key patho-physiological role in the complex chain of events leading to the occlusion of a coronary artery. To date, platelet function in the IA population has been poorly investigated. We examined platelet function in patients with IA and assessed the influence of disease activity on platelet reactivity. Our data demonstrate an enhanced platelet response, unique to ADP stimulation, in patients with inflammatory arthritis whose disease is poorly controlled. Remarkably there was no difference in platelet reactivity noted in response to any of the other agonists tested (arachidonic acid, collagen, epinephrine, and TRAP). Using both ex vivo measures of platelet function and in vitro assays we then investigated the amplifying effect of several pro-inflammatory cytokines (IL-1b, IL-6, anti-TNFaand IL17a) on the platelet ADP pathway and also found a decreased platelet ADP response in patients with previously refractory disease who were treated with the IL-6 inhibitor tocilizumab. Following our observation of an, heretofore unknown, inhibitory effect of sulfasalazine therapy on platelet aggregation, we subsequently demonstrate that this is due to both the parent compound and its metabolites, and confined to the arachidonic acid pathway. Finally, we prospectively assessed the impact of improved disease control with anti-TNFaagents on platelet function, insulin metabolism, and cholesterol levels in patients with IA. We found patients who respond to anti-TNFatherapy also achievea normalization of platelet function and decreased insulin resistance, with no change in lipid profile. Taken together, these findings offer novel mechanistic insights into how inflammation and its treatment influences platelet function and CVD risk in this vulnerable patient population, for whom anti-platelet guidelines are currently lacking.</p

EDITORIAL The

meniscus, calcification and osteoarthritis: a pathologic tea