Post-Partum Pituitary Insufficiency and Livedo Reticularis Presenting a Diagnostic Challenge in a Resource Limited Setting in Tanzania: A Case Report, Clinical Discussion and Brief Review of Existing Literature.

Pituitary disorders following pregnancy are an important yet under reported clinical entity in the developing world. Conversely, post partum panhypopituitarism has a more devastating impact on women in such settings due to high fertility rates, poor obstetric care and scarcity of diagnostic and therapeutic resources available. A 37 year old African female presented ten years post partum with features of multiple endocrine deficiencies including hypothyroidism, hypoadrenalism, lactation failure and secondary amenorrhea. In addition she had clinical features of an underlying autoimmune condition. These included a history of post-partum thyroiditis, alopecia areata, livedo reticularis and deranged coagulation indices. A remarkable clinical response followed appropriate hormone replacement therapy including steroids. This constellation has never been reported before; we therefore present an interesting clinical discussion including a brief review of existing literature. Post partum pituitary insufficiency is an under-reported condition of immense clinical importance especially in the developing world. A high clinical index of suspicion is vital to ensure an early and correct diagnosis which will have a direct bearing on management and patient outcome

Architecture of Pol II(G) and molecular mechanism of transcription regulation by Gdown1.

Tight binding of Gdown1 represses RNA polymerase II (Pol II) function in a manner that is reversed by Mediator, but the structural basis of these processes is unclear. Although Gdown1 is intrinsically disordered, its Pol II interacting domains were localized and shown to occlude transcription factor IIF (TFIIF) and transcription factor IIB (TFIIB) binding by perfect positioning on their Pol II interaction sites. Robust binding of Gdown1 to Pol II is established by cooperative interactions of a strong Pol II binding region and two weaker binding modulatory regions, thus providing a mechanism both for tight Pol II binding and transcription inhibition and for its reversal. In support of a physiological function for Gdown1 in transcription repression, Gdown1 co-localizes with Pol II in transcriptionally silent nuclei of early Drosophila embryos but re-localizes to the cytoplasm during zygotic genome activation. Our study reveals a self-inactivation through Gdown1 binding as a unique mode of repression in Pol II function

Children Consuming Cassava as a Staple Food are at Risk for Inadequate Zinc, Iron, and Vitamin A Intake

Cassava contains little zinc, iron, and β-carotene, yet it is the primary staple crop of over 250 million Africans. This study used a 24-hour dietary recall to test the hypothesis that among healthy children aged 2–5 years in Nigeria and Kenya, cassava’s contribution to the childrens’ daily diets is inversely related to intakes of zinc, iron, and vitamin A. Dietary and demographic data and anthropometric measurements were collected from 449 Kenyan and 793 Nigerian children. Among Kenyan children 89% derived at least 25% of their dietary energy from cassava, while among the Nigerian children 31% derived at least 25% of energy from cassava. Spearman’s correlation coefficient between the fraction of dietary energy obtained from cassava and vitamin A intake was r = −0.15, P < 0.0001, zinc intake was r = −0.11, P < 0.0001 and iron intake was r = −0.36, P < 0.0001. In Kenya, 59% of children consumed adequate vitamin A, 22% iron, and 31% zinc. In Nigeria, 17% of children had adequate intake of vitamin A, 57% iron, and 41% zinc. Consumption of cassava is a risk factor for inadequate vitamin A, zinc and/or iron intake

Massively parallel sequencing of patients with intellectual disability, congenital anomalies and/or autism spectrum disorders with a targeted gene panel

10.1371/journal.pone.0093409PLoS ONE94-POLN

Trioctylphosphine as Both Solvent and Stabilizer to Synthesize CdS Nanorods

High quality CdS nanorods are synthesized reproducibly with cadmium acetate and sulfur as precursors in trioctylphosphine solution. The morphology, crystalline form and phase composition of CdS nanorods are characterized by transmission electron microscopy (TEM), high-resolution TEM and X-ray diffraction (XRD). CdS nanorods obtained are uniform with an aspect ratio of about 5:1 and in a wurtzite structure. The influence of reaction conditions on the growth of CdS nanorods demonstrates that low precursor concentration and high reaction temperature (260 °C) are favorable for the formation of uniform CdS nanorods with 85.3% of product yield

Investigation of the Photophysical Properties of a Eu3+ Coordination Polymer Bearing an α-Nitrile Substituted β-Diketonate Ligand via Emission and Ultrafast Transient Absorption Spectroscopy

Reaction of the β-diketone ligand, 2-cyano-1,3-phenyl-1,3-propandione (LH), with hydrated EuCl3 in the presence of 1,10-phenanthroline (Phen), results in the crystallisation of a one-dimensional Eu3+ coordination polymer of formulation [Eu(Phen)(L)3]∞, formed by coordination of the nitrile group of an O,O′-bound ligand to a neighbouring metal centre. An investigation of the metal-centred emission of the polymer, both in the solid state and solution, revealed red emission characterised by relatively long-lived excited state lifetimes and high intrinsic quantum yields. However, analysis of the overall quantum yield and sensitisation efficiency reveals that ultrafast processes in the ligand potentially inhibit Eu3+ sensitisation. Further investigations into these processes using transient absorption spectroscopy suggest that substitution at the α-C position may significantly decrease sensitisation via the antenna effect

Research on the relation of EEG signal chaos characteristics with high-level intelligence activity of human brain

Using phase space reconstruct technique from one-dimensional and multi-dimensional time series and the quantitative criterion rule of system chaos, and combining the neural network; analyses, computations and sort are conducted on electroencephalogram (EEG) signals of five kinds of human consciousness activities (relaxation, mental arithmetic of multiplication, mental composition of a letter, visualizing a 3-dimensional object being revolved about an axis, and visualizing numbers being written or erased on a blackboard). Through comparative studies on the determinacy, the phase graph, the power spectra, the approximate entropy, the correlation dimension and the Lyapunov exponent of EEG signals of 5 kinds of consciousness activities, the following conclusions are shown: (1) The statistic results of the deterministic computation indicate that chaos characteristic may lie in human consciousness activities, and central tendency measure (CTM) is consistent with phase graph, so it can be used as a division way of EEG attractor. (2) The analyses of power spectra show that ideology of single subject is almost identical but the frequency channels of different consciousness activities have slight difference. (3) The approximate entropy between different subjects exist discrepancy. Under the same conditions, the larger the approximate entropy of subject is, the better the subject's innovation is. (4) The results of the correlation dimension and the Lyapunov exponent indicate that activities of human brain exist in attractors with fractional dimensions. (5) Nonlinear quantitative criterion rule, which unites the neural network, can classify different kinds of consciousness activities well. In this paper, the results of classification indicate that the consciousness activity of arithmetic has better differentiation degree than that of abstract

Study on Growth Kinetics of CdSe Nanocrystals with a New Model

A model which involves both bulk diffusion process and surface reaction process has been developed for describing the growth behaviour of nanoparticles. When the model is employed, hypothesising that either of the processes alone dominates the overall growth process is unnecessary. Conversely, the relative magnitude of contributions from both processes could be obtained from the model. Using this model in our system, the growth process of CdSe QDs demonstrated two different growth stages. During the first stage, the growth of CdSe QDs was dominated by bulk diffusion, whereas, neither the bulk diffusion process nor the surface reaction process could be neglected during the later stage. At last, we successfully modelled the Ostwald ripening of CdSe QDs with LSW theories

Essential versus accessory aspects of cell death: recommendations of the NCCD 2015

Cells exposed to extreme physicochemical or mechanical stimuli die in an uncontrollable manner, as a result of their immediate structural breakdown. Such an unavoidable variant of cellular demise is generally referred to as ‘accidental cell death’ (ACD). In most settings, however, cell death is initiated by a genetically encoded apparatus, correlating with the fact that its course can be altered by pharmacologic or genetic interventions. ‘Regulated cell death’ (RCD) can occur as part of physiologic programs or can be activated once adaptive responses to perturbations of the extracellular or intracellular microenvironment fail. The biochemical phenomena that accompany RCD may be harnessed to classify it into a few subtypes, which often (but not always) exhibit stereotyped morphologic features. Nonetheless, efficiently inhibiting the processes that are commonly thought to cause RCD, such as the activation of executioner caspases in the course of apoptosis, does not exert true cytoprotective effects in the mammalian system, but simply alters the kinetics of cellular demise as it shifts its morphologic and biochemical correlates. Conversely, bona fide cytoprotection can be achieved by inhibiting the transduction of lethal signals in the early phases of the process, when adaptive responses are still operational. Thus, the mechanisms that truly execute RCD may be less understood, less inhibitable and perhaps more homogeneous than previously thought. Here, the Nomenclature Committee on Cell Death formulates a set of recommendations to help scientists and researchers to discriminate between essential and accessory aspects of cell death