Investigations on improvement of functionality of silicone ectoprostheses

Silikonowe protezy twarzy (epitezy, ektoprotezy, protezy zewnętrzne) stosowane są u pacjentów, którzy w wyniku zabiegu chirurgicznego, w ramach leczenia chorób nowotworowych, wad wrodzonych, urazu utracili tkanki miękkie i twarde w zakresie twarzoczaszki np. oko, ucho, nos. Rekonstrukcje protetyczne wykorzystuje się w przypadku, gdy metody chirurgii plastycznej są nieskuteczne lub nie mogą być zastosowane. Istnieją różne metody umocowania ektoprotez. Badania kliniczne i ankietowe wykazały, iż większość pacjentów w pierwszej kolejności wybierała kleje medyczne. Niestety kleje te charakteryzują się krótkim czasem trwałego przytwierdzenia protezy do miejsca ubytku. W pracy zbadano przyczepności trzech rodzajów materiałów silikonowych przytwierdzanych do skóry pacjentów za pomocą klejów i taśm komercyjnych. W celu poprawy adhezji tworzywa zastosowano dwa rodzaje modyfikacji powierzchni. Zbadano wpływ obróbki mechanicznej na powierzchnie silikonów (gwarantujący wzrost chropowatości powierzchni). Zbadano także skuteczność chemicznej metody obróbki powierzchni (trawienie tworzywa w roztworach kwasów nieorganicznych). Celem weryfikacji skuteczności zastosowanych metod modyfikujących powierzchnię opracowano metodę pomiaru adhezji pomiędzy materiałem polimerowym a badanym środkiem klejącym (taśma, klej) wykorzystując w tym celu układ uchwytów uniwersalnej maszyny wytrzymałościowej.Silicone facial prostheses (epitheses, ecto-prostheses, external prostheses) are applied for patients who lost soft and hard tissues in craniofacial area, e. g. eye, ear, nose, due to a surgical treatment; tumour diseases treatment; birth defects or injuries. Prosthetic reconstructions are used when plastic surgery methods are ineffective, or cannot be applied. There are various methods of the ecto-prostheses fastening. Clinical tests and surveys revealed that the first choice for the majority of patients is medical glues. However, such glues can provide only short-time fastening of prosthesis to the damaged area. The work presents results of investigations on adhesion of three kinds of silicone materials fastened to patients' skin with the use of commercial glues and adhesive tapes. In order to improve the materials' adhesion two methods of their surface modification were applied. Influence of a mechanical treatment on the materials' surface was investigated. Effectiveness of the surface chemical treatment i.e. etching of the materials with inorganic acids solutions was investigated. In order to verify effectiveness of the applied surface modification methods a testing method of adhesion between the material and the adhesive agent i.e. adhesive tape or glue was developed. The testing method utilised a universal testing machine

The effect of the carbon fibres diameter on cell response

W ramach pracy otrzymano włókninę zbudowaną z włókien o różnych średnicach i wielkości, której mikrostruktura posiada biomimetyczny charakter, tzn. składa się z włókien o średnicach zbliżonych do średnic włókien występujących w tkankach. Badania biologiczne wykazały, że włókna o niskich średnicach są gorzej tolerowane przez tkanki.A three dimensional fibrous material, made from fibres differing in diameters and porosity, has been designed and prepared. These materials will constitute a 3D scaffold containing fibrous components mimicking the structure of natural tissue. The biological studies indicate that the fibres with bigger diameter allow for more intense and quick regeneration of surrounding tissue

Diversity of Tanaidacea (Crustacea: Peracarida) in the World's Oceans – How Far Have We Come?

Tanaidaceans are small peracarid crustaceans which occur in all marine habitats, over the full range of depths, and rarely into fresh waters. Yet they have no obligate dispersive phase in their life-cycle. Populations are thus inevitably isolated, and allopatric speciation and high regional diversity are inevitable; cosmopolitan distributions are considered to be unlikely or non-existent. Options for passive dispersion are discussed. Tanaidaceans appear to have first evolved in shallow waters, the region of greatest diversification of the Apseudomorpha and some tanaidomorph families, while in deeper waters the apseudomorphs have subsequently evolved two or three distinct phyletic lines. The Neotanaidomorpha has evolved separately and diversified globally in deep waters, and the Tanaidomorpha has undergone the greatest evolution, diversification and adaptation, to the point where some of the deep-water taxa are recolonizing shallow waters. Analysis of their geographic distribution shows some level of regional isolation, but suffers from inclusion of polyphyletic taxa and a general lack of data, particularly for deep waters. It is concluded that the diversity of the tanaidomorphs in deeper waters and in certain ocean regions remains to be discovered; that the smaller taxa are largely understudied; and that numerous cryptic species remain to be distinguished. Thus the number of species currently recognized is likely to be an order of magnitude too low, and globally the Tanaidacea potentially rival the Amphipoda and Isopoda in diversity

Composition and distribution of the peracarid crustacean fauna along a latitudinal transect off Victoria Land (Ross Sea, Antarctica) with special emphasis on the Cumacea

The following study was the first to describe composition and structure of the peracarid fauna systematically along a latitudinal transect off Victoria Land (Ross Sea, Antarctica). During the 19th Antarctic expedition of the Italian research vessel “Italica” in February 2004, macrobenthic samples were collected by means of a Rauschert dredge with a mesh size of 500 m at depths between 85 and 515 m. The composition of peracarid crustaceans, especially Cumacea was investigated. Peracarida contributed 63% to the total abundance of the fauna. The peracarid samples were dominated by amphipods (66%), whereas cumaceans were represented with 7%. Previously, only 13 cumacean species were known, now the number of species recorded from the Ross Sea increased to 34. Thus, the cumacean fauna of the Ross Sea, which was regarded as the poorest in terms of species richness, has to be considered as equivalent to that of other high Antarctic areas. Most important cumacean families concerning abundance and species richness were Leuconidae, Nannastacidae, and Diastylidae. Cumacean diversity was lowest at the northernmost area (Cape Adare). At the area off Coulman Island, which is characterized by muddy sediment, diversity was highest. Diversity and species number were higher at the deeper stations and abundance increased with latitude. A review of the bathymetric distribution of the Cumacea from the Ross Sea reveals that most species distribute across the Antarctic continental shelf and slope. So far, only few deep-sea records justify the assumption of a shallow-water–deep-sea relationship in some species of Ross Sea Cumacea, which is discussed from an evolutionary point of view

The London Workshop on the Biogeography and Connectivity of the Clarion-Clipperton Zone

Recent years have seen a rapid increase in survey and sampling expeditions to the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) abyssal plain, a vast area of the central Pacific that is currently being actively explored for deep-sea minerals (ISA, 2016). Critical to the development of evidence-based environmental policy in the CCZ are data on the biogeography and connectivity of species at a CCZ-regional level. The London Workshop on the Biogeography and Connectivity of the CCZ was convened to support the integration and synthesis of data from European Union (EU) CCZ projects, supported by the EU Managing Impacts of Deep-Sea Resource Exploitation (MIDAS) and EU Joint Programming Initiative Healthy and Productive Seas and Oceans (JPI Oceans) projects. The London Workshop had three clear goals: (1) To explore, review and synthesise the latest molecular biogeography and connectivity data from across recent CCZ cruises from both contractor and academia-funded projects; (2) To develop complementary and collaborative institutional and program-based academic publication plans to avoid duplication of effort and ensure maximum collaborative impact; (3) To plan a joint synthetic data publication highlighting key results from a range of planned molecular biogeography/connectivity publications. 32 participants attended the workshop at the Natural History Museum in London from 10-12 May 2016. Presentations and discussions are summarised in this report covering (1) overviews of current CCZ environmental projects, (2) policy and industry perspectives, (3) synthesis of DNA taxonomy and biogeography studies, (4) summaries of the latest population genetic studies, (5) summaries of the latest broader morphological context, (6) an overview of publication and proposal plans to maximise collaborative opportunities and finally a series of workshop recommendations

BioTIME: A database of biodiversity time series for the Anthropocene.

MotivationThe BioTIME database contains raw data on species identities and abundances in ecological assemblages through time. These data enable users to calculate temporal trends in biodiversity within and amongst assemblages using a broad range of metrics. BioTIME is being developed as a community-led open-source database of biodiversity time series. Our goal is to accelerate and facilitate quantitative analysis of temporal patterns of biodiversity in the Anthropocene.Main types of variables includedThe database contains 8,777,413 species abundance records, from assemblages consistently sampled for a minimum of 2 years, which need not necessarily be consecutive. In addition, the database contains metadata relating to sampling methodology and contextual information about each record.Spatial location and grainBioTIME is a global database of 547,161 unique sampling locations spanning the marine, freshwater and terrestrial realms. Grain size varies across datasets from 0.0000000158 km2 (158 cm2) to 100 km2 (1,000,000,000,000 cm2).Time period and grainBioTIME records span from 1874 to 2016. The minimal temporal grain across all datasets in BioTIME is a year.Major taxa and level of measurementBioTIME includes data from 44,440 species across the plant and animal kingdoms, ranging from plants, plankton and terrestrial invertebrates to small and large vertebrates.Software format.csv and .SQL

Hepatitis C virus quasispecies in chronically infected children subjected to interferon–ribavirin therapy

Accumulating evidence suggests that certain features of hepatitis C virus (HCV), especially its high genetic variability, might be responsible for the low efficiency of anti-HCV treatment. Here, we present a bioinformatic analysis of HCV-1a populations isolated from 23 children with chronic hepatitis C (CHC) subjected to interferon–ribavirin therapy. The structures of the viral quasispecies were established based on a 132-amino-acid sequence derived from E1/E2 protein, including hypervariable region 1 (HVR1). Two types of HCV populations were identified. The first type, found in non-responders, contained a small number of closely related variants. The second type, characteristic for sustained responders, was composed of a large number of distantly associated equal-rank variants. Comparison of 445 HVR1 sequences showed that a significant number of variants present in non-responding patients are closely related, suggesting that certain, still unidentified properties of the pathogen may be key factors determining the result of CHC treatment