The Role Of The Cholesterol Metabolite, 27-Hydroxycholesterol, In Colon Cancer Cells

Colorectal Cancer (CRC) is a major health concern with more than 600,000 deaths worldwide each year. Several risk factors for CRC exist including a diet rich in fat and cholesterol. However, the link between cholesterol and CRC is controversial. It is possible that oxysterols, which are active cholesterol metabolites, may correlate better with CRC than cholesterol itself. The most abundant oxysterol in the plasma is 27-hydroxycholesterol (27-OHC), which is a ligand for the nuclear receptors estrogen receptor (ER) and liver-x-receptor (LXR). 27-OHC has been shown to be involved in breast and prostate cancers, but its role in colon cancer remains unexplored. Therefore, we sought to determine the role of 27-OHC in colon cancer cell lines. We also determined the impact of 27-OHC on cellular differentiation through measurement of the protein SLFN12. Using two colon cancer cell lines (Caco2 and SW620), an MTT assay and CyQUANT® proliferation assays, an LDH cytotoxicity assay, a TUNEL assay, western blotting, immunofluorescence, and a scratch assay, we determined 27-OHCâs effects on cellular proliferation, migration, cytotoxicity, and apoptosis. We also determined the role of ER and LXR in cellular proliferation. We found that treatment of Caco2 and SW620 cells with 27-OHC induced a decrease in cell proliferation without a detectable amount of cellular cytotoxicity or apoptosis. Additionally, we found that the observed decrease in cell proliferation is independent of ER and LXR, as 27-OHC did not activate the LXR target genes ABCG1 and ABCA1 nor lead to the nuclear localization of ER. Additionally, we found that 27-OHC leads to a decrease in the phosphorylated and activated form of AKT, a molecule involved in cell cycle progression, protein synthesis, and cellular survival. We also found that 27-OHC increased cellular migration through a scratch assay. 27-OHC decreased the epithelial marker E-cadherin without changes to the mesenchymal markers N-cadherin. In order for cells to migrate, they need to stop proliferating. In conclusion, our data shows that 27-OHC treatment leads to an increase in cellular migration through a loss of proliferation

Stress Management for Healthcare Providers in the Emergency Department During Covid-19 Pandemic

The challenges healthcare providers face during the COVID-19 pandemic are unprecedented, leading to work-related stress and burnout symptoms. Stress management for health care providers is crucial during the COVID-19 pandemic. Healthcare providers must find effective modalities during this time. Animal Assist therapy is a stress management modality that evidence-based research has proven to be effective. A comprehensive literature review of the importance of stress reduction for health care providers and the effectiveness of Animal Assist Therapy will help support this project. Jean Watson\u27s human caring theory will serve as a model for this project. The implementation of the scholarly project of providing AAT to health care providers in the ED methodology and evaluation was described. The significance and implication of the scholarly project were highlighted. The DNP essentials are identified as a guide to exemplify this scholarly project as fulfilling requirements for the advanced practice nurse. This scholarly project supports the need for AAT to be integrated into the future of clinical practice for the improved well-being of patients and health care providers

Semi-relativistic charge-current density operator

The charge-current density and two-photon operators consistent with a single-particle semi-relativistic Hamiltonian are derived within a suitable functional derivative formalism which preserves gauge invariance. An application to electron scattering is presented and results are compared with a fully relativistic case and the non-relativistic cases corrected through fourth order in M^{-1}.Comment: 20 pages, 3 postscript figures, typos correcte

Photocouplings of nucleon resonances with gluon and pion exchange currents

Photocouplings for the nucleon resonances most relevant to total photoabsorption are calculated in a constituent quark model including gluon and pion exchange. The sensitivity of the results to the different ingredients of the model is discussed.Comment: 23 pages including 9 tables, LaTe

The role of the pion cloud in electroproduction of the Δ\Delta(1232)

We calculate the ratios $E2/M1$ and $C2/M1$ of the multipole amplitudes for electroproduction of the $\Delta$(1232) in the range of photon virtuality $0<-K^2<1$~GeV$^2$ in a chiral chromodielectric model and a linear $\sigma$-model. We find that relatively large experimental values can be explained in terms of the pion contribution alone; the contribution arising from d-state quark admixture remains below 10\%. We describe the pion cloud as a coherent state and use spin and isospin projection to obtain the physical nucleon and the $\Delta$. The $A_{1/2}$ and $A_{3/2}$ amplitudes are reasonably well reproduced in the $\sigma$-model; in the chromodielectric model, however, they are a factor of two too small.Comment: 10 pages LaTeX2e, 3 LaTeX figures within the text; Requires elsart.cls (included in the self-unpacking uuencoded gzipped file). (Accepted for publication in Phys. Lett. B

Q2Q^2--Dependence of the Gerasimov-Drell-Hearn Sum Rule

We test the Gerasimov-Drell-Hearn (GDH) sum rule numerically by calculating the total photon absorption cross sections $\sigma_{1/2}$ and $\sigma_{3/2}$ on the nucleon via photon excitation of baryon resonances in the constituent quark model. A total of seventeen, low-lying, non-strange baryon resonances are included in this calculation. The transverse and longitudinal interference cross section, $\sigma_{1/2}^{TL}$, is found to play an important role in the study of the $Q^2$ variation of the sum rule. The results show that the GDH sum rule is saturated by these resonances at a confidence level of 94%. In particular, the $P_{33}(1232)$ excitation largely saturates the sum rule at $Q^2 = 0$, and dominates at small $Q^2$. The GDH integral has a strong $Q^2$-dependence below $Q^2= 1.0 {GeV}^2$ and changes its sign around $Q^2= 0.3 {GeV}^2$. It becomes weakly $Q^2$-dependent for $Q^2 > 1.0 {GeV}^2$ because of the quick decline of the resonance contributions. We point out that the $Q^2$ variation of the GDH sum rule is very important for understanding the nucleon spin structure in the non-perturbative QCD region.Comment: revtex, 17 pages, 3 ps figs include