Airborne Pollen, Allergens, and Proteins: A Comparative Study of Three Sampling Methods

Nowadays, there is a wide range of different methods available for the monitoring of pollen and allergens, but their relative efficiency is sometimes unclear, as conventional pollen monitoring does not thoroughly describe pollen allergenicity. This study aims to evaluate airborne pollen, allergen, and protein levels, associating them with meteorological and chemical parameters. The sampling was performed in Bologna (Italy) during the grass flowering period, with three different devices: a Cyclone sampler (CS), a Dicothomous sampler (DS), and a Berner impactor (BI). Total proteins were extracted from aerosol samples, and grass allergens Phl p 1 and Phl p 5 were quantified by ELISA. Airborne Poaceae pollen concentrations were also evaluated, using a Hirst-type trap. Proteins and allergens collected by CS resulted about ten times higher than those collected by the other two instruments, possibly due to their different cut-offs, while DS and BI results appeared consistent only for the total proteins collected in the fine fraction (1.3 vs. 1.6 mu g/m(3)). Airborne proteins correlated neither with Poaceae pollen nor with its aeroallergens, while aeroallergens correlated with pollen only in the coarse particulate, indicating the presence of pollen-independent aeroallergens in the fine particulate, promoted by high wind speed

TRANSCRANIAL DIRECT CURRENT STIMULATION ENHANCES SUCKING OF A LIQUID BOLUS IN HEALTHY HUMANS

BACKGROUND: Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a non-invasive technique used for modulating cortical excitability in vivo in humans. Here we evaluated the effect of tDCS on behavioral and electrophysiological aspects of physiological sucking and swallowing. METHODS: Twelve healthy subjects underwent three tDCS sessions (anodal, cathodal and sham stimulation) on separate days in a double-blind randomized order. The active electrode was placed over the right swallowing motor cortex. Repeated sucking and swallowing acts were performed at baseline and at 15 and 60 min after each tDCS session and the mean liquid bolus volume ingested at each time point was measured. We also calculated average values of the following electrophysiological parameters: 1) area and 2) duration of the rectified EMG signal from the suprahyoid/submental muscles related to the sucking and swallowing phases; 3) EMG peak amplitude for the sucking and swallowing phases; 4) area and peak amplitude of the laryngeal-pharyngeal mechanogram; 5) oropharyngeal delay. RESULTS: The volume of the ingested bolus significantly increased (by an average of about 30% compared with the baseline value) both at 15 and at 60 min after the end of anodal tDCS. The electrophysiological evaluation after anodal tDCS showed a significant increase in area and duration of the sucking phase-related EMG signal. CONCLUSIONS: Anodal tDCS leads to stronger sucking of a liquid bolus in healthy subjects, likely by increasing recruitment of cortical areas of the swallowing network. This finding might open up interesting perspectives for the treatment of patients suffering from dysphagia due to various pathological conditions

Avaliação da qualidade física e da matéria orgânica de um argissolo vermelho derivado de arenito da fronteira Oeste do Rio Grande do Sul.

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Pain and agitation treatment in severe dementia patients: The need for Italian Mobilization-Observation-Behavior-Intensity-Dementia (I-MOBID2) pain scale translation, adaptation and validation with psychometric testing

The 97% of dementia patients develops fluctuant neuropsychiatric symptoms often related to under-diagnosed and unrelieved pain. Up to 80% severe demented nursing home residents experiences chronic pain due to age-related comorbidities. Patients lacking self-report skills risk not to be appropriately treated for pain. Mobilization-Observation-Behavior-Intensity-Dementia (MOBID2) is the sole pain scale to consider the frequent co-occurrence of musculoskeletal and visceral pain and to unravel concealed pain through active guided movements. Accordingly, the Italian real-world setting can benefit from its translation and validation. This clinical study provides a translated, adapted and validated version of the MOBID2, the Italian I-MOBID2. The translation, adaptation and validation of the scale for non-verbal, severe demented patients was conducted according to current guidelines in a cohort of 11 patients over 65 with mini-mental state examination ≤ 12. The I-MOBID2 proves: good face and scale content validity index (0.89); reliable internal consistency (Cronbach's α = 0.751); good to excellent inter-rater (Intraclass correlation coefficient, and test-retest (ICC = 0.902) reliability. The construct validity is high (Rho = 0.748 p < 0.05 for 11 patients, Spearman rank order correlation of the overall pain intensity score with the maximum item score of I-MOBID2 Part 1; rho=0.895 p < 0.01 for 11 patients, for the overall pain intensity score with the maximum item score of I-MOBID2 Part 2) and a good rate of inter-rater and test-retest agreement was demonstrated by Cohen's K = 0.744. The average execution time is of 5.8 min, thus making I-MOBID2 a useful tool suitable also for future development in community setting with administration by caregivers

Kidney, kidney-pancreas and liver-kidney transplantation in HIV infected individuals: the Italian experience

Until a few years ago, HIV infection was considered an exclusion criteria for organ transplantation. However, more recently, because of the significant increase in life expectancy of HIV-infected persons with highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), kidney, kidney-pancreas, heart, lung and liver transplantation have been introduced in this patients population in several centers around the world. To evaluate the possible extension of the indications of kidney transplantation to HIV-infected individuals, the Italian National Centre for Transplantation has designed a protocol to be applied on a national basis. Inclusion criteria required a CD4 count ≥200/mm3 and undetectable HIV viral load for at least 3 months for patients on HAART.The program was voluntarily adopted by 4 transplant centres. From January 2006 through November 2007 a total of 13 HIV infected patients (9 male and 4 female, mean age 46.4 years, range 35-56) underwent cadaveric kidney transplantation (including two kidney-pancreas and two liver-kidney) after a median waiting time of 142 days (range 58-650). Median CD4 cells count at the time of transplantation was 449 (range 210-782) and the HIV-RNA was undetectable in all recipients. HAART was started in all recipients after transplantation and HIV-RNA remain undetectable in all patients. Five patients (38.4%) experienced an episode of biopsy proven acute rejection (steroid resistant in one). Drug-drug interactions between antiretrovirals and immunosuppressive agents required frequent dosage modifications. Graft and patient survival was 100% at a median follow-up of 161 days after transplantation (range 8-669). Despite the limited number of patients and the shortness of the follow-up, our study confirms excellent short term results of kidney transplantation in HIV-infected individuals

Size-resolved aerosol composition at an urban and a rural site in the Po Valley in summertime: implications for secondary aerosol formation

The aerosol size-segregated chemical composition was analyzed at an urban (Bologna) and a rural (San Pietro Capofiume) site in the Po Valley, Italy, during June and July 2012, by ion-chromatography (major water-soluble ions and organic acids) and evolved gas analysis (total and water-soluble carbon), to investigate sources and mechanisms of secondary aerosol formation during the summer. A significant enhancement of secondary organic and inorganic aerosol mass was observed under anticyclonic conditions with recirculation of planetary boundary layer air but with substantial differences between the urban and the rural site. The data analysis, including a principal component analysis (PCA) on the size-resolved dataset of chemical concentrations, indicated that the photochemical oxidation of inorganic and organic gaseous precursors was an important mechanism of secondary aerosol formation at both sites. In addition, at the rural site a second formation process, explaining the largest fraction (22 %) of the total variance, was active at nighttime, especially under stagnant conditions. Nocturnal chemistry in the rural Po Valley was associated with the formation of ammonium nitrate in large accumulation-mode (0.42–1.2 µm) aerosols favored by local thermodynamic conditions (higher relative humidity and lower temperature compared to the urban site). Nocturnal concentrations of fine nitrate were, in fact, on average 5 times higher at the rural site than in Bologna. The water uptake by this highly hygroscopic compound under high RH conditions provided the medium for increased nocturnal aerosol uptake of water-soluble organic gases and possibly also for aqueous chemistry, as revealed by the shifting of peak concentrations of secondary compounds (water-soluble organic carbon (WSOC) and sulfate) toward the large accumulation mode (0.42–1.2 µm). Contrarily, the diurnal production of WSOC (proxy for secondary organic aerosol) by photochemistry was similar at the two sites but mostly affected the small accumulation mode of particles (0.14–0.42 µm) in Bologna, while a shift to larger accumulation mode was observed at the rural site. A significant increment in carbonaceous aerosol concentration (for both WSOC and water-insoluble carbon) at the urban site was recorded mainly in the quasi-ultrafine fraction (size range 0.05–0.14 µm), indicating a direct influence of traffic emissions on the mass concentrations of this range of particles

Plasma exosome profile in st-elevation myocardial infarction patients with and without out-of-hospital cardiac arrest

The identification of new biomarkers allowing an early and more accurate characterization of patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) is still needed, and exosomes represent an attractive diagnostic tool in this context. However, the characterization of their protein cargo in relation to cardiovascular clinical manifestation is still lacking. To this end, 35 STEMI patients (17 experiencing resuscitated out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA-STEMI) and 18 uncomplicated) and 32 patients with chronic coronary syndrome (CCS) were enrolled. Plasma exosomes were characterized by the nanoparticle tracking analysis and Western blotting. Exosomes from STEMI patients displayed a higher concentration and size and a greater expression of platelet (GPIIb) and vascular endothelial (VE-cadherin) markers, but a similar amount of cardiac troponin compared to CCS. In addition, a difference in exosome expression of acute-phase proteins (ceruloplasmin, transthyretin and fibronectin) between STEMI and CCS patients was found. GPIIb and brain-associated marker PLP1 accurately discriminated between OHCA and uncomplicated STEMI. In conclusion, the exosome profile of STEMI patients has peculiar features that differentiate it from that of CCS patients, reflecting the pathophysiological mechanisms involved in STEMI. Additionally, the exosome expression of brain-and platelet-specific markers might allow the identification of patients experiencing ischemic brain injury in STEMI

Circulating extracellular vesicles release oncogenic miR-424 in experimental models and patients with aggressive prostate cancer

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are relevant means for transferring signals across cells and facilitate propagation of oncogenic stimuli promoting disease evolution and metastatic spread in cancer patients. Here, we investigated the release of miR-424 in circulating small EVs or exosomes from prostate cancer patients and assessed the functional implications in multiple experimental models. We found higher frequency of circulating miR-424 positive EVs in patients with metastatic prostate cancer compared to patients with primary tumors and BPH. Release of miR-424 in small EVs was enhanced in cell lines (LNCaPabl), transgenic mice (Pb-Cre4;Ptenflox/flox;Rosa26ERG/ERG) and patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models of aggressive disease. EVs containing miR-424 promoted stem-like traits and tumor-initiating properties in normal prostate epithelial cells while enhanced tumorigenesis in transformed prostate epithelial cells. Intravenous administration of miR-424 positive EVs to mice, mimicking blood circulation, promoted miR-424 transfer and tumor growth in xenograft models. Circulating miR-424 positive EVs from patients with aggressive primary and metastatic tumors induced stem-like features when supplemented to prostate epithelial cells. This study establishes that EVs-mediated transfer of miR-424 across heterogeneous cell populations is an important mechanism of tumor self-sustenance, disease recurrence and progression. These findings might indicate novel approaches for the management and therapy of prostate cancer

Mycophenolate mofetil versus azathioprine for prevention of acute rejection in renal transplantation (MYSS): a randomised trial.

BACKGROUND: Mycophenolate mofetil has replaced azathioprine in immunosuppression regimens worldwide to prevent graft rejection. However, evidence that its antirejection activity is better than that of azathioprine has been provided only by registration trials with an old formulation of ciclosporin and steroid. We aimed to compare the antirejection activity of these two drugs with a new formulation of ciclosporin. METHODS: The mycophenolate steroids sparing multicentre, prospective, randomised, parallel-group trial compared acute rejections and adverse events in recipients of cadaver-kidney transplants over 6-month treatment with mycophenolate mofetil or azathioprine along with ciclosporin microemulsion (Neoral) and steroids (phase A), and over 15 more months without steroids (phase B). The primary endpoint was occurrence of acute rejection episodes. Analysis was by intention to treat. FINDINGS: 168 patients per group entered phase A. 56 (34%) assigned mycophenolate mofetil and 58 (35%) assigned azathioprine had clinical rejections (risk reduction [RR] on mycophenolate mofetil compared with azathioprine 13.7% [95% CI -25.7% to 40.7%], p=0.44). 88 patients in the mycophenolate mofetil group and 89 in the azathioprine group entered phase B. 14 (16%) taking mycophenolate mofetil and 11 (12%) taking azathioprine had clinical rejections (RR -16.2%, [-157.5% to 47.5%], p=0.71). Average per-patient costs of mycophenolate mofetil treatment greatly exceeded those of azathioprine (phase A 2665 Euros [SD 586] vs Euros 184 [62]; phase B 5095 Euros [2658] vs 322 Euros [170], p<0.0001 for both). INTERPRETATION: In recipients of cadaver kidney-transplants given ciclosporin microemulsion, mycophenolate mofetil offers no advantages over azathioprine in preventing acute rejections and is about 15 times more expensive. Standard immunosuppression regimens for transplantation should perhaps include azathioprine rather than mycophenolate mofetil, at least for kidney graft