Eosinophilic Otitis Media: CT and MRI Findings and Literature Review

Eosinophilic otitis media (EOM) is a relatively rare, intractable, middle ear disease with extremely viscous mucoid effusion containing eosinophils. EOM is associated with adult bronchial asthma and nasal allergies. Conventional treatments for otitis media with effusion (OME) or for chronic otitis media (COM), like tympanoplasty or mastoidectomy, when performed for the treatment of EOM, can induce severe complications such as deafness. Therefore, it should be differentiated from the usual type of OME or COM. To our knowledge, the clinical and imaging findings of EOM of temporal bone are not well-known to radiologists. We report here the CT and MRI findings of two EOM cases and review the clinical and histopathologic findings of this recently described disease entity

Benign Aspirates on Follow-Up FNA May Be Enough in Patients with Initial Atypia of Undetermined Significance/Follicular Lesion of Undetermined Significance

Background. Management of thyroid nodules with benign aspirates following atypia of undetermined significance/follicular lesion of undetermined significance (AUS/FLUS) is not well established. We reviewed the risk of malignancy and the role of ultrasound (US) features among thyroid nodules with benign results following initial AUS/FLUS diagnoses. Methods. From December 2009 to February 2011, a total of 114 nodules in 114 patients diagnosed as benign on follow-up fine-needle aspiration (FNA) after AUS/FLUS results were included in our study. Eight among 114 nodules were confirmed pathologically and 106 were clinically observed by a follow-up FNA or US. Suspicious US features were defined as markedly hypoechogenicity, irregular or microlobulated margin, presence of microcalcifications, and taller than wide shape. Results. There were 110 (96.5%) benign nodules and 4 (3.5%) malignant nodules. Two (4.8%) among 42 nodules without suspicious US features and 2 (2.8%) out of 72 nodules with suspicious US features were confirmed as malignancy, but there were no significant associations between the malignancy rate and US features (P=0.625). Conclusion. Clinical follow-up instead of surgical excision or continuous repeat FNA may be enough for benign thyroid nodules after AUS/FLUS. The role of US features might be insignificant in the management of these nodules

Titanium dioxide induces apoptotic cell death through reactive oxygen species-mediated Fas upregulation and Bax activation

Background: Titanium dioxide (TiO2) has been widely used in many areas, including biomedicine, cosmetics, and environmental engineering. Recently, it has become evident that some TiO2 particles have a considerable cytotoxic effect in normal human cells. However, the molecular basis for the cytotoxicity of TiO2 has yet to be defined.Methods and results: In this study, we demonstrated that combined treatment with TiO2 nanoparticles sized less than 100 nm and ultraviolet A irradiation induces apoptotic cell death through reactive oxygen species-dependent upregulation of Fas and conformational activation of Bax in normal human cells. Treatment with P25 TiO2 nanoparticles with a hydrodynamic size distribution centered around 70 nm (TiO2P25-70) together with ultraviolet A irradiation-induced caspase-dependent apoptotic cell death, accompanied by transcriptional upregulation of the death receptor, Fas, and conformational activation of Bax. In line with these results, knockdown of either Fas or Bax with specific siRNA significantly inhibited TiO2-induced apoptotic cell death. Moreover, inhibition of reactive oxygen species with an antioxidant, N-acetyl-L-cysteine, clearly suppressed upregulation of Fas, conformational activation of Bax, and subsequent apoptotic cell death in response to combination treatment using TiO2P25-70 and ultraviolet A irradiation.Conclusion: These results indicate that sub-100 nm sized TiO2 treatment under ultraviolet A irradiation induces apoptotic cell death through reactive oxygen species-mediated upregulation of the death receptor, Fas, and activation of the preapoptotic protein, Bax. Elucidating the molecular mechanisms by which nanosized particles induce activation of cell death signaling pathways would be critical for the development of prevention strategies to minimize the cytotoxicity of nanomaterials.This work was supported by the Korea Ministry of Environment and The Eco-Technopia 21 Project (091-091-081)

Bell-Evans model and steered molecular dynamics in uncovering the dissociation kinetics of ligands targeting G-protein-coupled receptors

Recently, academic and industrial scientific communities involved in kinetics-based drug development have become immensely interested in predicting the drug target residence time. Screening drug candidates in terms of their computationally predicted residence times, which is a measure of drug efficacy in vivo, and simultaneously assessing computational binding affinities are becoming inevitable. Non-equilibrium molecular simulation approaches are proven to be useful in this purpose. Here, we have implemented an optimized approach of combining the data derived from steered molecular dynamics simulations and the Bell-Evans model to predict the absolute residence times of the antagonist ZMA241385 and agonist NECA that target the A2A adenosine receptor of the G-protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) protein family. We have predicted the absolute ligand residence times on the timescale of seconds. However, our predictions were many folds shorter than those determined experimentally. Additionally, we calculated the thermodynamics of ligand binding in terms of ligand binding energies and the per-residue contribution of the receptor. Subsequently, binding pocket hotspot residues that would be important for further computational mutagenesis studies were identified. In the experiment, similar sets of residues were found to be in significant contact with both ligands under study. Our results build a strong foundation for further improvement of our approach by rationalizing the kinetics of ligand unbinding with the thermodynamics of ligand binding

Care practice and product-service system: Design thinking towards user detachment from hibernating or accumulated clothing at end of use

The Carative Factors Inspirational Toolkit has been designed to provide a better understanding of the user’s relationship with hibernating or accumulated objects at end of use, and their responsible and decisive disposal, for designers, in order to create products, services and an environment that will influence users’ possession and sustainable disposal behaviour. This paper explores the potential feasibility of adapting and applying the Toolkit to the clothing design process and its implication for a product-service system (PSS). Through exploratory online workshops, in which participants used the Toolkit to generate concepts, and in the subsequent PSS design process, several concepts were developed to inform different users’ decision-making process. This paper concludes that Toolkit has the potential to be applied to the brainstorming process in the clothing design sector to influence their design thinking towards enabling user detachment from hibernation or accumulated knitwear at end of use, and contributed to a PSS model by providing an opportunity to generate business and economic opportunities

Construction cost estimation using a case-based reasoning hybrid genetic algorithm based on local search method

Estimates of project costs in the early stages of a construction project have a significant impact on the operator\u27s decision-making in essential matters, such as the site\u27s decision or the construction period. However, it is not easy to carry out the initial stage with confidence, because information such as design books and specifications is not available. In previous studies, case-based reasoning (CBR) is used to estimate initial construction costs, and genetic algorithms are used to calculate the weight of the retrieve phase in CBR\u27s process. However, it is difficult to draw a better solution than the current one, because existing genetic algorithms use random numbers. To overcome these limitations, we reflect correlation numbers in the genetic algorithms by using the method of local search. Then, we determine the weights using a hybrid genetic algorithm that combines local search and genetic algorithms. A case-based reasoning model was developed using a hybrid genetic algorithm. Then, the model was verified with construction cost data that were not used for the development of the model. As a result, it was found that the hybrid genetic algorithm and case-based reasoning applied with the local search performed better than the existing solution. The detail mean error value was found to be 3.52%, 6.15%, and 0.33% higher for each case than the previous one

Lotus leaf-inspired CVD grown graphene for a water repellant flexible transparent electrode

By simply heating commercial copper foil under an oxygen atmosphere and subsequently annealing CuO under a hydrogen atmosphere, the 3D Cu structures in the form of double hierarchical bumps are generated. The contact angle of a lotus leaf-inspired graphene grown on the reconstructed 3D Cu structures is 154.2 degrees.close2