“COVID-19” and its Cardiovascular Complications – Review

By the end of December in 2019, the world got trapped under the dark shadow of the deadly novel virus that was given the name as “Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome‐coronaVirus 2 (SARS‐CoV‐2)”. Due to its rapid spread in all the continents, “Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)” was announced as the pandemic due to its high potential of infecting the human beings. This viral infection not only become the reason of mortality, but it also lethally effected the the infrastructure of public health care system and the global economic situation. “COVID-19” generally maifestated as the “viral pneumonia”, sporadically leading to “acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS)” and death. Frequent clinical studies have depicted an interrelation between this deadly virus and cardiovascular diseases. Precedent cardiovascular disease in a person seems to be linked with adverse consequences and high chances of mortality in patients with (COVID-19 infection), whereas this virus itself has a potential of inducing the arrhythmia, acute coronary syndrome, myocardial injury and venous thromboembolism. One of the most significant point of concern is the drug & disease interactions that affect the patients with viral infection and comorbid cardiovascular diseases. By integrating the data and information regarding the biological features of this contagious novel virus, this review has summarized the pivotal cardiac manifestations, their management, and future implications. By correlating the facts and figures related to the biological conditions of this lethal virus with the reported clinical findings, we can ameliorate our conceptions regarding the significant mechanisms underlying (COVID-19), ultimately leading towards the control of this viral infection by the progressive development in preventions and treatments

Omnibus modeling of listeria monocytogenes growth rates at low temperatures

Listeria monocytogenes is a pathogen of considerable public health importance with a high case fatality. L. monocytogenes can grow at refrigeration temperatures and is of particular concern for ready-to-eat foods that require refrigeration. There is substantial interest in conducting and modeling shelf-life studies on L. monocytogenes, especially relating to storage temperature. Growth model parameters are generally estimated from constant-temperature growth experiments. Traditionally, first-order and second-order modeling (or primary and secondary) of growth data has been done sequentially. However, omnibus modeling, using a mixed-effects nonlinear regression approach, can model a full dataset covering all experimental conditions in one step. This study compared omnibus modeling to conventional sequential first-order/second-order modeling of growth data for five strains of L. monocytogenes. The omnibus model coupled a Huang primary model for growth with secondary models for growth rate and lag phase duration. First-order modeling indicated there were small significant differences in growth rate depending on the strain at all temperatures. Omnibus modeling indicated smaller differences. Overall, there was broad agreement between the estimates of growth rate obtained by the first-order and omnibus modeling. Through an appropriate choice of fixed and random effects incorporated in the omnibus model, potential errors in a dataset from one environmental condition can be identified and explored.This research was part funded by the Irish Department of Agriculture, Food, and Marine Research Funding Program, Project Reference 17/F/244, “Understanding Listeria monocytogrenes growth in food”. U. Gonzales-Barron and V. Cadavez are grateful to the EU PRIMA program and the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) for funding the ArtiSaneFood project (PRIMA/0001/2018) and to FCT for financial support through national funds FCT/MCTES to CIMO (UIDB/00690/2020). U. Gonzales-Barron acknowledges the national funding by FCT, P.I., through the Institutional Scientific Employment Program contract.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Chemotherapeutic properties and side-effects associated with the clinical practice of terpene alkaloids: paclitaxel, docetaxel, and cabazitaxel

Over the years, many biological and synthetic agents have been explored and tested in attempts to halt the spread of cancer and/or cure it. Currently, several natural compounds have and are being considered in this regard. For example, paclitaxel is a potent anticancer drug that originates from the tree Taxus brevifolia. Paclitaxel has several derivatives, namely, docetaxel and cabazitaxel. These agents work by disrupting microtubule assembling dynamics and inducing cell cycle arrest at the G2/M phase of the cell cycle, ultimately triggering apoptosis. Such features have helped to establish paclitaxel as an authoritative therapeutic compound against neoplastic disorders. After the completion of compound (hemi) synthesis, this drug received approval for the treatment of solid tumors either alone or in combination with other agents. In this review, we explore the mechanisms of action of paclitaxel and its derivatives, the different formulations available, as well as the molecular pathways of cancer resistance, potential risks, and other therapeutic applications. In addition, the role of paclitaxel in hematological malignancies is explored, and potential limitations in the therapeutic use of paclitaxel at the clinical level are examined. Furthermore, paclitaxel is known to cause increased antigen presentation. The immunomodulatory potential of taxanes, alone or in combination with other pharmacologic agents, is explored. Despite terpene-alkaloids derivatives’ anti-mitotic potential, the impact of this class of drugs on other oncogenic pathways, such as epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition and the epigenetic modulation of the transcription profile of cancer cells, is also analyzed, shedding light on potential future chemotherapeutic approaches to cancer