Critical Review of Theoretical Models for Anomalous Effects (Cold Fusion) in Deuterated Metals

We briefly summarize the reported anomalous effects in deuterated metals at ambient temperature, commonly known as "Cold Fusion" (CF), with an emphasis on important experiments as well as the theoretical basis for the opposition to interpreting them as cold fusion. Then we critically examine more than 25 theoretical models for CF, including unusual nuclear and exotic chemical hypotheses. We conclude that they do not explain the data.Comment: 51 pages, 4 Figure

Vitamin and mineral supplementation for maintaining cognitive function in cognitively healthy people in late life

This is the protocol for a review and there is no abstract. The objectives are as follows: To evaluate the effects of vitamin and mineral supplementation on cognitive function in cognitively healthy people in late life

Vitamin and mineral supplementation for maintaining cognitive function in cognitively healthy people in mid life

This is the protocol for a review and there is no abstract. The objectives are as follows: To evaluate the effects of vitamin and mineral supplementation on cognitive function in cognitively healthy people in mid life

Covid-19 and the quality of life of people with dementia and their carers—The TFD-C19 study

Introduction COVID-19 has placed unprecedented pressure on dementia health and social care systems worldwide. This has resulted in reduced services and support for people with dementia and their family carers. There are gaps in the evidence on the impact of the pandemic on Quality of Life (QoL). We carried out a study on the impact of the pandemic on the QoL of a group of people with dementia and their family carers who were part of a larger existing cohort study. Methods We quantitatively measured QoL, on two occasions during the two national lockdowns in 2020 and compared these data with those obtained when they entered the study (before the pandemic). Measures used included: DEMQOL-Proxy, Clinical Dementia Rating Scale and C-DEMQOL. To understand how QoL changed over time, a repeated measures ANOVA was run for each dependent variable with the following variables entered as co-variates: duration in study, baseline dementia severity, gender of the family carer, gender of the person with dementia, family carer relationship, dementia type, living status, age of the person with dementia, and age of the family carer. Results 248 participants took part in the study. QoL scores did not significantly decline between either time period for the person with dementia or their family carer. There was variation in subgroups; with co-resident status, carer relationship, gender of the person with dementia, age of the person with dementia, and baseline cognitive status influencing QoL outcomes in family carers. Discussion It is striking that people with dementia and their carers did not report a decline in QoL during the pandemic or in the months following restrictions suggesting the possibility of resilience. Variation in subgroups suggests that specific groups of family carers were more vulnerable to lower QoL; indicating the need for more tailored, nuanced support during this period. </jats:sec

Rectal Transmission of Transmitted/Founder HIV-1 Is Efficiently Prevented by Topical 1% Tenofovir in BLT Humanized Mice

Rectal microbicides are being developed to prevent new HIV infections in both men and women. We focused our in vivo preclinical efficacy study on rectally-applied tenofovir. BLT humanized mice (n = 43) were rectally inoculated with either the primary isolate HIV-1(JRCSF) or the MSM-derived transmitted/founder (T/F) virus HIV-1(THRO) within 30 minutes following treatment with topical 1% tenofovir or vehicle. Under our experimental conditions, in the absence of drug treatment we observed 50% and 60% rectal transmission by HIV-1(JRCSF) and HIV-1(THRO), respectively. Topical tenofovir reduced rectal transmission to 8% (1/12; log rank p = 0.03) for HIV-1(JRCSF) and 0% (0/6; log rank p = 0.02) for HIV-1(THRO). This is the first demonstration that any human T/F HIV-1 rectally infects humanized mice and that transmission of the T/F virus can be efficiently blocked by rectally applied 1% tenofovir. These results obtained in BLT mice, along with recent ex vivo, Phase 1 trial and non-human primate reports, provide a critically important step forward in the development of tenofovir-based rectal microbicides

HIV and Syphilis Co-Infection Increasing among Men Who Have Sex with Men in China: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

BACKGROUND: This study aims to estimate the magnitude and changing trends of HIV, syphilis and HIV-syphilis co-infections among men who have sex with men (MSM) in China during 2003-2008 through a systematic review of published literature. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Chinese and English literatures were searched for studies reporting HIV and syphilis prevalence among MSM from 2003 to 2008. The prevalence estimates were summarized and analysed by meta-analyses. Meta-regression was used to identify the potential factors that are associated with high heterogeneities in meta-analysis. Seventy-one eligible articles were selected in this review (17 in English and 54 in Chinese). Nationally, HIV prevalence among MSM increased from 1.3% during 2003-2004 to 2.4% during 2005-2006 and to 4.7% during 2007-2008. Syphilis prevalence increased from 6.8% during 2003-2004 to 10.4% during 2005-2006 and to 13.5% during 2007-2008. HIV-syphilis co-infection increased from 1.4% during 2005-2006 to 2.7% during 2007-2008. Study locations and study period are the two major contributors of heterogeneities of both HIV and syphilis prevalence among Chinese MSM. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: There have been significant increases in HIV and syphilis prevalence among MSM in China. Scale-up of HIV and syphilis screening and implementation of effective public health intervention programs should target MSM to prevent further spread of HIV and syphilis infection

Infected erythrocyte-derived extracellular vesicles alter vascular function via regulatory Ago2-miRNA complexes in malaria

Malaria remains one of the greatest public health challenges worldwide, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. The clinical outcome of individuals infected with Plasmodium falciparum parasites depends on many factors including host systemic inflammatory responses, parasite sequestration in tissues and vascular dysfunction. Production of pro-inflammatory cytokines and chemokines promotes endothelial activation as well as recruitment and infiltration of inflammatory cells, which in turn triggers further endothelial cell activation and parasite sequestration. Inflammatory responses are triggered in part by bioactive parasite products such as hemozoin and infected red blood cell-derived extracellular vesicles (iRBC-derived EVs). Here we demonstrate that such EVs contain functional miRNA-Argonaute 2 complexes that are derived from the host RBC. Moreover, we show that EVs are efficiently internalized by endothelial cells, where the miRNA-Argonaute 2 complexes modulate target gene expression and barrier properties. Altogether, these findings provide a mechanistic link between EVs and vascular dysfunction during malaria infection

Fragmentation processes of ionized 5-fluorouracil in the gas phase and within clusters

We have measured mass spectra for positive ions produced from neutral 5-fluorouracil by electron impact at energies from 0 to 100 eV. Fragment ion appearance energies of this (radio-)chemotherapy agent have been determined for the first time and we have identified several new fragment ions of low abundance. The main fragmentations are similar to uracil, involving HNCO loss and subsequent HCN loss, CO loss, or FCCO loss. The features adjacent to these prominent peaks in the mass spectra are attributed to tautomerization preceding the fragmentation and/or the loss of one or two additional hydrogen atoms. A few fragmentions are distinct for 5-fluorouracil compared to uracil, most notably the production of the reactive moiety CF+. Finally, multiphoton ionization mass spectra are compared for 5-fluorouracil from a laser thermal desorption source and from a supersonic expansion source. The detection of a new fragment ion at 114 u in the supersonic expansion experiments provides the first evidence for a clustering effect on the radiation response of 5-fluorouracil. By analogy with previous experiments and calculations on protonated uracil, this is assigned to NH3 loss from protonated 5-fluorouracil

Obesity is associated with insulin resistance and components of the metabolic syndrome in Lebanese adolescents

adolescents has been reported to range between 18–42%, depending on country of origin, thus suggesting an ethnicbased association between obesity and MS. Aim: This study aims to investigate the magnitude of the association between obesity, insulin resistance and components of MS among adolescents in Lebanon. Subjects and methods: The sample included 263 adolescents at 4 th and 5 th Tanner stages of puberty (104 obese; 78 overweight; 81 normal weight). Anthropometric, biochemical and blood pressure measurements were performed. Body fat was assessed using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry. Results: According to International Diabetes Federation criteria, MS was identified in 21.2 % of obese, 3.8 % of overweight and 1.2 % of normal weight subjects. The most common metabolic abnormalities among subjects having MS were elevated waist circumference (96.2%), low HDL (96.2%) and hypertriglyceridemia (73.1%). Insulin resistance was identified in all subjects having MS. Regression analyses showed that percentage body fat, waist circumference and BMI were similar in their ability to predict the MS in this age group. Conclusions: MSwas identified in asubstantial proportion of Lebanese obese adolescents, thus highlighting the importance of early screening for obesity-associated metabolic abnormalities and of developing successful multi-component interventions addressing adolescent obesity

[multi’vocal]: reflections on engaging everyday people in the development of a collective non-binary synthesized voice

The growing field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) takes a step out from conventional screenbased interactions, creating new scenarios, in which voice synthesis and voice recognition become important elements. Such voices are commonly created through concatenative or parametric synthesis methods, which access large voice corpora, pre-recorded by a single professional voice actor. These designed voices arguably propagate representations of gender binary identities. In this paper we present our project, [multi’vocal], which aims to challenge the current gender binary representations in synthesized voices. More specifically we explore if it is possible to create a non-binary synthesized voice through engaging everyday people of diverse backgrounds in giving voice to a collective synthesized voice of all genders, ages and accents