Search

Background Hypersensitivity reactions (HSRs) to platinum are an important issue in the treatment of patients (pts) with ovarian cancer (OC). Germline BRCA mutations have been proposed as a risk factor. We aimed at evaluating the incidence and severity of HSRs to platinum in OC pts. with known BRCA status. Patients and methods We retrospectively analyzed 432 pts. from 5 Italian Centers. In addition, we performed a systematic review and meta-analysis of published series. Results Four hundred nine pts. received at least one prior platinum-based treatment line: 314 were BRCA wild type (77%) and 95 were BRCA mutated (23%). There was no statistical difference in exposure to platinum. Incidence of any grade HSRs was higher among BRCA mutated pts. [9% vs 18%, p = 0.019] and the time-to-HSRs curves show that the risk increases with the duration of platinum exposure, in BRCA mutated pts. more than in BRCA wild type. A multivariable analysis showed that harboring a germline BRCA mutation was related to a higher incidence of HSRs (HR: 1.84, 95% CI 1.00–3.99, p = 0.05) while having received pegylated liposomal doxorubicin (PLD) was related to a lower incidence of HSRs (HR: 0.03 95% CI 0.004–0.22, p = 0.001). The systematic review confirmed the higher incidence of HSRs in BRCA mutated pts., though heterogeneity among series was significant. Conclusions In OC pts. with BRCA mutations, there is a significantly higher incidence of HSRs to carboplatin, not justified by longer drug exposure. On the other hand, PLD exerted a protective role in our series.

BACKGROUND In closed-loop on-demand control (ODC) of deep brain stimulation (DBS), stimulation is applied only when symptoms appear. Following stimulation of a fixed duration, DBS is switched off until the symptoms reappear. By repeating these demand-driven cycles, the amount of stimulation delivered can be decreased, thereby reducing DBS side-effects and improving battery-life of the pulse-generator. This article introduces Ro metric for quantification of degree of benefit of ODC and explores candidate selection in tremor-dominant Parkinson's disease (PD). METHOD The study was performed on nine PD patients previously implanted with Medtronic DBS systems. Accelerometer sensor was placed on the tremor-dominant hand to detect onset of tremor. Fixed duration of stimulation (DS) of 20-80 sec was applied. Once the tremor was observed, stimulation was switched on. These trials were repeated during resting, postural, and kinetic conditions. Ro metric was calculated as the ratio of stimulation-off tremor-free period to the DS. Ro calculated at different DS were compared for each patient. RESULTS We found that for each patient, Ro varied with DS and an optimal DS* gave a higher percentage of stimulation-off time. Average Ro at DS* varied from 0.554 to 4.24 for eight patients giving 35%-80% stimulation-off time. CONCLUSIONS Ro values can be used for selection of optimal DS* in ODC. Three of nine patients were found to be tremor-free without stimulation for >50% of total time with even up to 80% in one patient. Patients with low Ro may not benefit from ODC in DBS, where the trade-off between having side-effects and using ODC system will need to be assessed.

Nickel-based alloys are often selected for manufacturing components operating in extreme conditions such as high-temperature thermo-mechanical cyclic loadings because of their good corrosion and high temperature resistance. This is, for instance, the case for solar receivers where the material undergoes daily cycles going from ambient temperature to approximately 700 °C. To predict the material behavior under this type of complex loadings, advanced numerical models – such as Chaboche-type models – are required. In addition to the model, a complete representation of the temperature dependency of the material is essential for both numerical stability and physical accuracy of the model, which is obtained with parameters assuring a certain continuity over the studied range of temperature. To this end, a new formulation for the temperature dependency of material parameters in Chaboche-type models is proposed for the Alloy 230 under both anisothermal and isothermal cyclic loadings.

BSA-capped gold nanoclusters are promising theragnostic systems that can be excited to render both fluorescence emission and reactive oxygen species. Although their synthesis and photoluminescence properties are already well described, more accurate information about their use as photosensitizers is required in order to advance towards health applications. In this work, we have obtained BSA-capped gold nanoclusters and characterized their photophysics by different techniques. Singlet oxygen production was detected upon irradiation, which was enough to produce toxicity on two cell lines. Remarkably, an internal energy transfer, probably due to the presence of smaller nanoclusters and the contribution of oxidized residues of BSA in the system, caused fluorescence emission near 640 nm after excitation in the UV range. Additionally, the system was capable of penetrating human skin beyond the stratum corneum, which enhances the potential of these nanoclusters as bifunctional photodynamic therapy effectors and biomarkers with application in a diversity of skin diseases. In the absence of radiation, BSA-capped gold nanoclusters did not cause toxicity in vitro, while their toxic effect on an in vivo model as zebrafish was determined. Fil: Lillo, Rolando Cristian Rodrigo. Universidad Nacional de San Martin. Instituto de Nanosistemas; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas; Argentina Fil: Calienni, Maria Natalia. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y Tecnología; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Provincia de Buenos Aires. Gobernación. Comisión de Investigaciones Científicas. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB; Argentina Fil: Rivas Aiello, Maria Belen. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas; Argentina Fil: Prieto, Maria Jimena. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y Tecnología; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Provincia de Buenos Aires. Gobernación. Comisión de Investigaciones Científicas. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB; Argentina Fil: Rodriguez, Damian. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas; Argentina Fil: Tuninetti, Jimena Soledad. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas; Argentina Fil: Toledo, Pamela Ludmila. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Provincia de Buenos Aires. Gobernación. Comisión de Investigaciones Científicas. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB; Argentina Fil: Alonso, Silvia del Valle. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y Tecnología; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Provincia de Buenos Aires. Gobernación. Comisión de Investigaciones Científicas. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB; Argentina Fil: Moya, Sergio Enrique. Centro de Investigación Cooperativa en Biomateriales; España. Centro de Investigación Cooperativa en Biomateriales; España Fil: Gonzalez, Monica Cristina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas; Argentina Fil: Martinetti Montanari, Jorge Anibal. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y Tecnología; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Provincia de Buenos Aires. Gobernación. Comisión de Investigaciones Científicas. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB | Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Instituto Multidisciplinario de Biología Celular. Grupo Vinculado al IMBICE - Grupo de Biología Estructural y Biotecnología - Universidad Nacional de Quilmes - GBEyB; Argentina Fil: Soler Illia, Galo Juan de Avila Arturo. Universidad Nacional de San Martin. Instituto de Nanosistemas; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina

This paper compares the predictions of an isotropic thermo-elasto-viscoplastic approach and of an anisotropic thermo-elastoplastic one with experimental results representative of the mechanical behavior of Ti–6Al–4V at moderate temperatures and low strain rates. The first model is the well known Norton–Hoff viscoplastic constitutive law with isotropic von Mises yield locus identified by using monotonic tension tests performed at strain rates from 10 −3 s −1 to 10 −1 s −1 and at temperatures up to 400 °C. The second model is a thermo-elasto-plastic one defined by the orthotropic yield criterion CPB06. It takes into account the anisotropy and the strength differential (SD) effect in tension–compression of Ti–6Al–4V at RT, 150 °C and 400 °C. The identification of the SD effect is done by using tension and compression tests and the anisotropy behavior is identified by using shear, plane strain, tension and compression tests performed in three orthogonal material directions. The accuracy of the load and displacement predictions of the two macroscopic constitutive models are compared to experimental results obtained from tests performed on specimens with multiaxial loadings and large strain at several temperatures.

The advances achieved in phenomenological constitutive laws and their implementation in finite element codes for predicting material behavior during forming processes have motivated the research on material identification parameters in order to ensure prediction accuracy. New models require experimental points describing a bi-axial stress state for proper calibration, and the features of the plane strain tensile test have made it one of the most used. The test's principal inconvenience is the influence of the free edges on strain field homogeneity and stress computation. Experimental measurements of the strain field over the gauge zone on a plane strain tensile test specimen during deformation reveals the evolution of the size of the specimen area that represents a plane strain state. This article proposes a methodology, based on a numerical analysis of a plane strain tensile test for different materials and specimen geometry, to experimentally identify the evolution of the homogeneous strain field zone during deformation. This research defines an expression for computation of the actual stress in the specimen's plane strain state zone along the loading direction using experimental data and including the edge effect evolution in terms of plastic strain. The influence of the specimen's geometry and material anisotropy over the stress computation error is discussed and quantified. The stress computation expression proposed here can be adapted to other specimen geometries.