'Kaimana', an improved new lychee cultivar for Hawaii

Lychee (Litchi chinensis L.) 'Kaimana' was named in 1982 to commemorate the 75th ("diamond") anniversary of the establishment of the Hawaii Agricultural Experiment Station. 'Kaimana' means "diamond" in the Hawaiian language. The original seedling tree of 'Kaimana' grown at the Poamoho experimental farm on Oahu first produced fruit in 1965 at 10 years of age. This is truly a jewel of a lychee, producing excellent quality fruit. In addition, it has a more consistent bearing habit than any of the 14 Chinese lychee cultivars imported and tested in Hawaii during the past 110 years

Evaluation with in vivo optical coherence tomography and histology of the vascular effects of the everolimus-eluting bioresorbable vascular scaffold at two years following implantation in a healthy porcine coronary artery model: implications of pilot results for future pre-clinical studies

To quantify with in vivo OCT and histology, the device/vessel interaction after implantation of the bioresorbable vascular scaffold (BVS). We evaluated the area and thickness of the strut voids previously occupied by the polymeric struts, and the neointimal hyperplasia (NIH) area covering the endoluminal surface of the strut voids (NIHEV), as well as the NIH area occupying the space between the strut voids (NIHBV), in healthy porcine coronary arteries at 2, 3 and 4 years after implantation of the device. Twenty-two polymeric BVS were implanted in the coronary arteries of 11 healthy Yucatan minipigs that underwent OCT at 2, 3 and 4 years after implantation, immediately followed by euthanasia. The areas and thicknesses of 60 corresponding strut voids previously occupied by the polymeric struts and the size of 60 corresponding NIHEV and 49 NIHBV were evaluated with both OCT and histology by 2 independent observers, using a single quantitative analysis software for both techniques. At 3 and 4 years after implantation, the strut voids were no longer detectable by OCT or histology due to complete polymer resorption. However, analysis performed at 2 years still provided clear delineation of these structures, by both techniques. The median [ranges] areas of these strut voids were 0.04 [0.03–0.16] and 0.02 [0.01–0.07] mm2 by histology and OCT, respectively. The mean (±SD) thickness by histology and OCT was 220 ± 40 and 120 ± 20 μm, respectively. The median [ranges] NIHEV by histology and OCT was 0.07 [0.04–0.20] and 0.03 [0.01–0.08] mm2, while the mean (±SD) NIHBV by histology and OCT was 0.13 ± 0.07 and 0.10 ± 0.06 mm2. Our study indicates that in vivo OCT of the BVS provides correlated measurements of the same order of magnitude as histomorphometry, and is reproducible for the evaluation of certain vascular and device-related characteristics. However, histology systematically gives larger values for all the measured structures compared to OCT, at 2 years post implantation

Randomized Comparison Between Everolimus-Eluting Bioresorbable Scaffold and Metallic Stent: Multimodality Imaging Through 3 Years

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the vascular responses and fates of the scaffold after bioresorbable vascular scaffold (BVS) implantation using multimodality imaging. Background: Serial comprehen

'Exel', A High Quality Dessert Mango

'Exel' is a new, high quality mango (Mangifera indica L.) cultivar developed by the Department of Horticulture, University of Hawaii. It was named for its excellent quality, texture, and flavor

The BVS concept. From the chemical structure to the vascular biology: the bases for a change in interventional cardiology

Bioresorbable vascular scaffolds (BVS), the fourth generation of percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), aim to improve the long-term outcomes of PCI facilitating the restoration of the physiology of the treated vessels when the scaffold dismantling process is completed. In this paper we will review all the technical aspects as well as the potential clinical indications of this technology