25 research outputs found
PrevalĂȘncia do uso e conhecimento de esteroides anabolizantes androgĂȘnicos por estudantes e professores de educação fĂsica que atuam em academias de ginĂĄstica
Heavy episodic drinking and soccer practice among high school students in Brazil: the contextual aspects of this relationship
Photoluminescence properties of AlN homoepilayers with different orientations
AlN homoepilayers and heteroepilayers were grown on polar c-plane and nonpolar a-plane and
m-plane orientations of AlN bulk and sapphire substrates by metal organic chemical vapor
deposition. A systematic comparative study of photoluminescence properties of these samples
revealed that all AlN homoepilayers c, a and m planes were strain free with an identical band gap
of about 6.099 (6.035) eV at 10 (300) K, which is about 42 meV below the band gap of c-plane AlN
heteroepilayers grown on sapphire. Also, nonpolar a-plane homoepilayers have the highest emission
intensity over all other types of epilayers. We believe that a-plane AlN homoepilayers have the
potential to provide orders of magnitude improvement in the performance of new generation deep
UV photonic devices
Experimental evidences for reducing Mg activation energy in high Al-content AlGaN alloy by MgGa ÎŽ doping in (AlN)m/(GaN)n superlattice
Alu-repeat Polymorphism in the Tissue Plasminogen Activator (T-PA) Gene, Seminal T-PA Concentration, and Male Fertility Impairment: A Case-control Study
Background: Tissue plasminogen activator (t-PA) is a protein involved in the fibrinolytic system that catalyzes the conversion of plasminogen into the active plasmin. The activity of t-PA is controlled by plasminogen activator inhibitor-1. t-PA has crucial functions during spermatogenesis. One polymorphism was reported for t-PA gene, either the presence of a 300-bp Alu-repeat (Alu+) or its absence (Aluâ).
Objective: The current work aimed at studying the association between Alu polymorphism in the t-PA gene and male infertility.
Materials and Methods: Using polymerase chain reaction on genomic DNA isolated from the blood of 79 participants, a region polymorphic for Alu element insertion in t-PA gene was amplified. In addition, total t-PA concentration, plasminogen activator inhibitor-1/t-PA complex concentration, and t-PA activity in seminal plasma were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay.
Results: The results indicate that the percentage of infertile participants (n = 50) who were homozygous for t-PA Alu insertion (Alu+/+), heterozygous Alu+/â or homozygous for t-PA Alu deletion (Aluâ/â) did not change significantly (p = 0.43, 0.81, and 0.85, respectively) when compared with the control participants (n = 29). On the other hand, a significant decrease (p = 0.0001) of t-PA total concentration in seminal plasma was observed in the infertile group in comparison with the control group. However, the results indicate that there is no association between the t-PA Alu different genotypes and the total t-PA seminal concentration in the infertile group when compared to the control group (p = 0.63).
Conclusion: Data obtained from the current study does not support an association between t-PA Alu polymorphism and t-PA seminal concentration or male infertility.
Key words: Alu element, Male infertility, Semen, Spermatogenesis, t-PA