Oral History Interview: Edris H. Miller

This interview is one of series conducted concerning Oral Histories of African-American women who taught in West Virginia public schools. Edris H. Miller began teaching at Lawson Street School during her education at Bluefield State College. She gives us detailed information about her family and childhood throughout the interview, including family reunions, her childhood home and family life, family members who were slaves, childhood activities, seeing the Silas Green Variety Show, and information about her husband, marriage, and children. Her father was a minister and she tells the interviewers about church and religion. She also talks about her education and attending a one-room school (named Coopers Grade School) and Bluefield State College, as well as teachers she knew and her sorority (Delta Sigma Theta?). She provides detailed information about her employment history, and race relations is another important topic. She describes the Civil Rights Movement and desegregation, the desegregation of schools, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), interracial dating, racial divisions in Bramwell, and the burdens black men and women face and the different ways each group deals with it. There are numerous other discussion points as well, such as: her students; serving on the city council; organizations she belonged to; people she knew or heard of (such as the poet Ann Spencer); gender roles; negative changes she sees in families and American culture; welfare; her self-perceptions; people who influenced her life; life-changing decisions; her feelings on her life in general; music (mainly Blues); regrets she has about her life; what she wants for her future; and many other subjects.https://mds.marshall.edu/oral_history/1584/thumbnail.jp

Association between A59V polymorphism in exon 3 of leptin gene and reproduction traits in cows of Iranian Holstein

We used the polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) technique to screen for DNA polymorphisms of the leptin gene in 255 cows of Iranian Holstein. Amplified region is located in exon 3 of leptin gene. The genomic bovine leptin sequences, which consist of three exons, were obtained from GeneBank (Accession number U50365). Genotype frequencies in all herds were 0.588, 0.388 and 0.024 for AA, AB and BB, respectively, and allelic frequencies were 0.782 and 0.218 for A and B, respectively. We investigated effect of A59V polymorphism in the leptin gene on three reproduction traits. Significances of the genotype effects were tested using approximated F-statistic provided by SAS (v.8, GLM procedure). This study showed that genotype had no effect on open days and calving interval (NS) but had significant effect on length of pregnancy (P < 0.01). Animals with the AA genotype had higher length of pregnancy than other genotypes.Keywords: Leptin, Iranina Holstein, polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism, reproduction traitAfrican Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 9(36), pp. 5997-6000, 6 September, 201

Comparative Gene Expression Profiling of Benign and Malignant Lesions Reveals Candidate Therapeutic Compounds for Leiomyosarcoma

Leiomyosarcoma (LMS) is a malignant, soft-tissue tumor for which few effective therapies exist. Previously, we showed that there are three molecular subtypes of LMS. Here, we analyzed genes differentially expressed in each of the three LMS subtypes as compared to benign leiomyomas and then used the Connectivity Map (cmap) to calculate enrichment scores for the 1309 cmap drugs in order to identify candidate molecules with the potential to induce a benign, leiomyoma-like phenotype in LMS cells. 11 drugs were selected and tested for their ability to inhibit the growth of three human LMS cell lines. We identified two drugs with in vitro efficacy against LMS, one of which had a strongly negative enrichment score (Cantharidin) and the other of which had a strongly positive enrichment score (MG-132). Given MG-132's strong inhibitory effect on LMS cell viability, we hypothesized that LMS cells may be sensitive to treatment with other proteasome inhibitors and demonstrated that bortezomib, a clinically-approved proteasome inhibitor not included in the original cmap screen, potently inhibited the viability of the LMS cell lines. These findings suggest that systematically linking LMS subtype-specific expression signatures with drug-associated expression profiles represents a promising approach for the identification of new drugs for LMS

Discovery of molecular subtypes in leiomyosarcoma through integrative molecular profiling.

Leiomyosarcoma (LMS) is a soft tissue tumor with a significant degree of morphologic and molecular heterogeneity. We used integrative molecular profiling to discover and characterize molecular subtypes of LMS. Gene expression profiling was performed on 51 LMS samples. Unsupervised clustering showed three reproducible LMS clusters. Array comparative genomic hybridization (aCGH) was performed on 20 LMS samples and showed that the molecular subtypes defined by gene expression showed distinct genomic changes. Tumors from the muscle-enriched cluster showed significantly increased copy number changes (P=0.04). A majority of the muscle-enriched cases showed loss at 16q24, which contains Fanconi anemia, complementation group A, known to have an important role in DNA repair, and loss at 1p36, which contains PRDM16, of which loss promotes muscle differentiation. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) was performed on LMS tissue microarrays (n=377) for five markers with high levels of messenger RNA in the muscle-enriched cluster (ACTG2, CASQ2, SLMAP, CFL2 and MYLK) and showed significantly correlated expression of the five proteins (all pairwise P<0.005). Expression of the five markers was associated with improved disease-specific survival in a multivariate Cox regression analysis (P<0.04). In this analysis that combined gene expression profiling, aCGH and IHC, we characterized distinct molecular LMS subtypes, provided insight into their pathogenesis, and identified prognostic biomarkers

Preparing for the future of cardiothoracic surgery with virtual reality simulation and surgical planning:a narrative review

Background and Objective: Virtual reality (VR) technology in cardiothoracic surgery has been an area of interest for almost three decades, but computational limitations had restricted its implementation. Recent advances in computing power have facilitated the creation of high-fidelity VR simulations and anatomy visualisation tools. We undertook a non-systematic narrative review of literature on VR simulations and preoperative planning tools in cardiothoracic surgery and present the state-of-the-art, and a future outlook. Methods: A comprehensive search through MEDLINE database was performed in November 2022 for all publications that describe the use of VR in cardiothoracic surgery regarding training purposes, education, simulation, and procedural planning. We excluded papers that were not in English or Dutch, and that used two-dimensional (2D) screens, augmented, and simulated reality. Key Content and Findings: Results were categorised as simulators and preoperative planning tools. Current surgical simulators include the lobectomy module in the LapSim for video assisted thorascopic surgery which has been extensively validated, and the more recent robotic assisted lobectomy simulators from Robotix Mentor and Da Vinci SimNow, which are increasingly becoming integrated into the robotic surgery curriculum. Other perioperative simulators include the CardioPulmonary VR Resuscitation simulator for advanced life support after cardiac surgery, and the VR Extracorporeal Circulation (ECC) simulator for perfusionists to simulate the use of a heart-lung machine (HLM). For surgical planning, there are many small-scale tools available, and many case/pilot studies have been published utilising the visualisation possibilities provided by VR, including congenital cardiac, congenital thoracic, adult cardiac, and adult thoracic diseases. Conclusions: There are many promising tools becoming available to leverage the immersive power of VR in cardiothoracic surgery. The path to validate these simulators is well described, but large-scale trials producing high-level evidence for their efficacy are absent as of yet. Our view is that these tools will become increasingly integral parts of daily practice in this field in the coming decade.</p

Potentials of enhancing the physicochemical and functional characteristics of <em>Nigella sativa</em> oil by using the screw pressing technique for extraction

In the current investigation the crude oil of Nigella sativa was extracted from seeds using hydraulic and screw pressing techniques. Different parameters were evaluated in order to find out the appropriate technique to enhance the physicochemical and functional-related characteristics of the extracted crude oil. Results showed that the acid and peroxide values were significantly lower in the screw pressed oil (SPO) than in the hydraulic pressed oil (HPO). The total phenolic content of the SPO was significantly higher than that of HPO. Evaluation of the oxidative stability using the Rancimat test showed that SPO recorded a much higher oxidative stability index (40.07 h) than HPO (0.51 h). The yield of the volatile oil fraction and its contents of thymoquinone isolated from the SPO were higher than that from the HPO. Biological evaluation revealed that the SPO had significantly higher antimicrobial activity than HPO against Listeria monocytogenes and Staphylococcus aureus at 40 μL/well

Epigenome-wide association study on diffusing capacity of the lung

Background: Epigenetics may play an important role in the pathogenesis of lung diseases. However, little is known about the epigenetic factors that influence impaired gas exchange at the lung. Aim: To identify the epigenetic signatures of the diffusing capacity of the lung measured by carbon monoxide uptake (the diffusing capacity of the lung for carbon monoxide (DLCO)). Methods: An epigenome-wide association study (EWAS) was performed on diffusing capacity, measured by carbon monoxide uptake (DLCO) and per alveolar volume (VA) (as DLCO/VA), using the single-breath technique in 2674 individuals from two population-based cohort studies. These were the Rotterdam Study (RS, the "discovery panel") and the Framingham Heart Study (FHS, the "replication panel"). We assessed the clinical relevance of our findings by investigating the identified sites in whole blood and by lung tissue specific gene expression. Results: We identified and replicated two CpG sites (cg05575921 and cg05951221) that were significantly associated with DLCO/VA and one (cg05575921) suggestively associated with DLCO. Furthermore, we found a positive association between aryl hydrocarbon receptor repressor (AHRR) gene (cg05575921) hypomethylation and gene expression of exocyst complex component 3 (EXOC3) in whole blood. We confirmed that the expression of EXOC3 in lung tissue is positively associated with DLCO/VA and DLCO. Conclusions: We report on epigenome-wide associations with diffusing capacity in the general population. Our results suggest EXOC3 to be an excellent candidate, through which smoking-induced hypomethylation of AHRR might affect pulmonary gas exchange

Mejoras potenciales de las características físico-químicas y funcionales del aceite de Nigella sativa mediante extracción con prensa de tornillo

In the current investigation the crude oil of Nigella sativa was extracted from seeds using hydraulic and screw pressing techniques. Different parameters were evaluated in order to find out the appropriate technique to enhance the physicochemical and functional-related characteristics of the extracted crude oil. Results showed that the acid and peroxide values were significantly lower in the screw pressed oil (SPO) than in the hydraulic pressed oil (HPO). The total phenolic content of the SPO was significantly higher than that of HPO. Evaluation of the oxidative stability using the Rancimat test showed that SPO recorded a much higher oxidative stability index (40.07 h) than HPO (0.51 h). The yield of the volatile oil fraction and its contents of thymoquinone isolated from the SPO were higher than that from the HPO. Biological evaluation revealed that the SPO had significantly higher antimicrobial activity than HPO against Listeria monocytogenes and Staphylococcus aureus at 40 μL/well.En la presente investigación se extrajo el aceite crudo de Nigella sativa de las semillas utilizando técnicas hidráulicas y de prensado de tornillo. Se evaluaron diferentes parámetros para conocer la técnica apropiada que potencie las características fisicoquímicas y funcionales del aceite extraído. Los resultados mostraron que los valores de ácido y peróxido fueron significativamente más bajos en el aceite de presión con tornillo (SPO) que en el aceite prensado hidráulico (HPO). El contenido fenólico total del SPO fue significativamente mayor que el de HPO. La evaluación de la estabilidad oxidativa mediante Rancimat demostró que el aceite SPO tiene un índice de estabilidad oxidativa mucho más alto (40,07 h) que el HPO (0,51 h). El rendimiento de la fracción volátil y su contenido de timoquinona aislada del aceite SPO fueron superiores a los del HPO. La evaluación biológica reveló que el aceite SPO tenía una actividad antimicrobiana significativamente mayor que el HPO contra Listeria monocitogenes y Staphylococcus aureus a 40 μL/pocillo