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Background: Testicular sperm extraction followed by Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (TESE-ICSI) is the only route to genetically father a child in couples with Non-Obstructive Azoospermia (NOA).Objective: The aim was to identify the effect of severity of NOA on clinical pregnancy following ICSI.Patients and Methods: This retrospective study included 643 patients who underwent 712 ICSI cycles at a specialized In-Vitro Fertilization center between 2014 and 2019. We classified the patients into easy (445) and difficult NOA (267) based on the difficulty of microdissection TESE procedure, number of sperm retrieved, and the number of surgical attempts.Results: The clinical pregnancy rate is significantly higher in the easy NOA group [167/299 (55.8%)] as compared with the difficult NOA group [68/194 (35.1%)]. The mean age of the females and the mean follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) levels were significantly lower in the easy NOA group compared with the difficult group [27.5±4.3 vs 29.9±4.6 years, P=0.0001, and 6.8±2.1 vs 7.4±2.5 mIU/ml, P=0.004, respectively]. There were no significant differences between the 2 groups regarding the mean male age, FSH level, and testicular size. The cumulus mass and the number of mature oocytes injected correlated significantly with the clinical pregnancy (r=0.122, P=0.012 and r=0.145, P=0.003, respectively). The sperm source whether fresh or frozen, the testicular pathology, and the identification of round spermatids in the pathology specimens did not correlate with the clinical pregnancy. We used the binary logistic regression to identify the final predictors. Only the NOA severity could be used to predict ICSI outcome. Easy NOA is more likely to have positive outcomes with ICSI (Odds ratio=1.70; Confidence interval=1.069–2.71; P=0.025). The model showed that neither female age nor FSH level could predict ICSI outcome in those patients.Conclusion: Easy sperm retrieval is an independent factor that is associated with positive ICSI outcomes in couples with NOA.

Ethnopharmacological relevance Ricinus communis L., commonly known as castor oil plant, is a precious traditional medicine with a history of thousands of years in the world. Castor oil plant has high traditional and medicinal values for treating liver infections, stomach ache, flatulence, constipation, inflammation, warts, colic, enteritis, fever, headache, and as a counter irritant. Its diverse phytochemicals have a wide range of valuable medicinal activities including hepatoprotective, anti-nociceptive, antioxidant, antiulcer, anticancer, anti-inflammatory, central analgesic, antidiabetic, antimicrobial, antiviral, and wound healing activity. Aim of the work To provide a complete characterization of the composition of Ricinus communis leaves using ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled with hybrid triple time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-Triple TOF-MS/MS) and different chromatographic techniques and to evaluate its antiviral potential using three mechanisms against three common viruses. Materials and methods R. communis leaves were extracted with 70% methanol and further partitioned with solvents of increasing polarities: petroleum ether, dichloromethane (CH2Cl2), ethyl acetate, and n-butanol. The CH2Cl2 and n-butanol fractions were subjected to repeated chromatographic separation to isolate the phytochemicals, and their structures were elucidated using nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. UPLC-Triple TOF-MS/MS was performed to determine the different phytochemicals in the ethyl acetate fraction. The antiviral activity of the extracts was investigated using the maximum nontoxic concentration of each against the challenge dose of the virus (CDV) and 1/10 and 1/100 dilutions of the CDV for Coxsackie B virus type 4 (COXB4), herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV1), and hepatitis A virus (HAV) using Vero cell cultures that were treated according to three protocols to test for anti-replicative, protective, and anti-infective antiviral activity. Cell viability was evaluated using the MTT colorimetric assay and each experiment is repeated three times independently of each other. Results R. communis leaves possessed antiviral activity. Evaluation of the anti-replicative activity showed that all extracts possessed high anti-replicative activity against HAV especially methanol and methylene chloride fractions and moderate activity against COXB4; butanol > methylene chloride and ethyl acetate > methanol. All extracts showed protective activity against HAV, especially butanol extract, while methanol extracts showed higher non-significant antiviral protective activity against HSV1 vs Acyclovir. Almost no anti-infective effects were recorded for any extract against the studied viruses. Conclusion The discriminatory effect against each virus by different mechanisms suggests the presence of different chemical compounds. The alkaloid and phenolic derivatives of the extracts of R. communis leaves may help develop a drug to prevent or treat common viral infections. Further investigations are recommended to define the bioactive antiviral properties of R. communis leaves.

Background Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a frequent developmental disorder characterized by pervasive deficits in social interaction, impairment in verbal and nonverbal communication, and stereotyped patterns of interests and activities. It has been previously reported that there is vitamin D deficiency in autistic children; however, there is a lack of randomized controlled trials of vitamin D supplementation in ASD children. Methods This study is a double-blinded, randomized clinical trial (RCT) that was conducted on 109 children with ASD (85 boys and 24 girls; aged 3–10 years). The aim of this study was to assess the effects of vitamin D supplementation on the core symptoms of autism in children. ASD patients were randomized to receive vitamin D3 or placebo for 4 months. The serum levels of 25-hydroxycholecalciferol (25 (OH)D) were measured at the beginning and at the end of the study. The autism severity and social maturity of the children were assessed by the Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS), Aberrant Behavior Checklist (ABC), Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS), and the Autism Treatment Evaluation Checklist (ATEC). Trial registration number: UMIN-CTR Study Design: trial number: UMIN000020281. Results Supplementation of vitamin D was well tolerated by the ASD children. The daily doses used in the therapy group was 300 IU vitamin D3/kg/day, not to exceed 5,000 IU/day. The autism symptoms of the children improved significantly, following 4-month vitamin D3 supplementation, but not in the placebo group. This study demonstrates the efficacy and tolerability of high doses of vitamin D3 in children with ASD. Conclusions This study is the first double-blinded RCT proving the efficacy of vitamin D3 in ASD patients. Depending on the parameters measured in the study, oral vitamin D supplementation may safely improve signs and symptoms of ASD and could be recommended for children with ASD. At this stage, this study is a single RCT with a small number of patients, and a great deal of additional wide-scale studies are needed to critically validate the efficacy of vitamin D in ASD.

This study focused on kinetics of levan yield by Bacillus subtilis M, in a 150 L stirred tank bioreactor under controlled pH conditions. The optimized production medium was composed of (g/L): commercial sucrose 100.0, yeast extract 2.0, K2HPO4 3.0 and MgSO4⋅7H2O 0.2; an increase in both carbohydrates consumption and cell growth depended on increasing the size of the stirred tank bioreactor from 16 L to 150 L. The highest levansucrase production (63.4 U/mL) and levan yield of 47 g/L was obtained after 24 h. Also, the specific levan yield (Yp/x) which reflects the cell productivity increased with the size increase of the stirred tank bioreactor and reached its maximum value of about 29.4 g/g cells. These results suggested that B. subtilis M could play an important role in levan yield on a large scale in the future. Chemical modifications of B. subtilis M crude levan (CL) into sulfated (SL), phosphorylated (PL), and carboxymethylated levans (CML) were done. The difference in CL structure and its derivatives was detected by FT-IR transmission spectrum. The cytotoxicity of CL and its derivatives were evaluated by HepGII, Mcf-7 and CaCo-2. In general most tested levans forms had no significant cytotoxicity effect. In fact, the carboxymethylated and phosphrylated forms had a lower anti-cancer effect than CL. On the other hand, SL had the highest cytotoxicity showing SL had a significant anti-cancer effect. The results of cytotoxicity and cell viability were statistically analyzed using three-way ANOVA.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a developmental disorder characterized by pervasive deficits in social interaction, impairment in verbal and non-verbal communication, and stereotyped patterns of interests and activities. Vitamin-D deficiency was previously reported in autistic children. However, the data on the relationship between vitamin D deficiency and the severity of autism are limited.We performed a case-controlled cross-sectional analysis conducted on 122 ASD children, to assess their vitamin D status compared to controls and the relationship between vitamin D deficiency and the severity of autism. We also conducted an open trial of vitamin D supplementation in ASD children.Fifty-seven percent of the patients in the present study had vitamin D deficiency, and 30% had vitamin D insufficiency. The mean 25-OHD levels in patients with severe autism were significantly lower than those in patients with mild/moderate autism. Serum 25-OHD levels had significant negative correlations with Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS) scores. Of the ASD group, 106 patients with low-serum 25-OHD levels (30 ng/ml) participated in the open label trial. They received vitamin D3 (300 IU/kg/day not to exceed 5000 IU/day) for 3 months. Eighty-three subjects completed 3 months of daily vitamin D treatment. Collectively, 80.72% (67/83) of subjects who received vitamin D3 treatment had significantly improved outcome, which was mainly in the sections of the CARS and aberrant behavior checklist subscales that measure behavior, stereotypy, eye contact, and attention span.Vitamin D is inexpensive, readily available and safe. It may have beneficial effects in ASD subjects, especially when the final serum level is more than 40 ng/ml.UMIN-CTR Study Design: trial Number: R000016846.

The above article, published in print in the Jan 2018 issue of the Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry and online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com), has been retracted by the JCPP Editor-in-Chief, Edmund Sonuga-Barke, and John Wiley & Sons. Following a series of communications from readers highlighting concerns about the paper (now published on the journal website), the journal editors requested that the authors send them the raw data from the trial. In response the authors informed the editors that; (i) the electronic data base had been lost following a computer outage and (ii) that they could send only 95 out of 120 hard-copy participant data sheets as one site had closed and was no longer contactable. The substantial data loss in and of itself posed a serious difficulty in verifying the correctness of the data presented in the paper. The JCPP then analysed the data from the 95 cases itself. A number of significant discrepancies emerged between the re-analysis and the findings reported in the paper both in terms of means and standard deviations of key outcome variables across the trial. These involved very substantial differences that we judged to be extremely unlikely to have arisen due to variations in composition of the original and re-analysed samples. We also discovered previously unidentified/reported problems with missing data and recording irregularities regarding changes in treatment regimen and subject identifiers. As a result of these issues the Editors no longer have confidence in the findings reported in the original paper. Based on all these matters combined and following published guidance from the Committee on Publishing Ethics (COPE) and Wiley's Best Practice Guidelines on Publishing Ethics, we have decided that the only course of action available to us is to retract the paper.

Objective: The pathogenesis of Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) is complex and still not clear. Genetic factors contribute to the occurrence of ASD. However, the genetics of ASD is highly heterogeneous. Chromosomal aberrations have a key role to the genetic abnormalities of both syndromic and non-syndromic ASD. Methods: In our study, we conducted karyotyping analysis in a sample of 231 Egyptian children with ASD aged 3-13 years (132 males and 99 females) from five Governorates in Upper Egypt. Results: Eleven patients (4.7%) were found to have chromosomal abnormalities in this study. We found five patients having sex chromosome aneuploidy, including two patients with Turner syndrome, two with 47XYY and one with 47XXY. In addition, we detected three patients have Down syndrome, one patient has monosomy 1p36, one patient has Williams-Beuren syndrome and one patient has a deletion of the long arm of chromosome 13. Conclusions: The present study reinforces the findings of the association between some chromosomal aberrations and ASD. Further investigations into these regions may lead to discovery of new genes involved in ASD. The present study directs the attention of the clinicians about the importance of karyotyping in the evaluation of ASD patients.

Background: Bovine colostrum (BC) has direct antimicrobial and endotoxin-neutralizing effects throughout the alimentary tract, as well as other bioactivities that suppress gut inflammation and promote mucosal integrity and tissue repair under various conditions related to tissue injury. The precise role of BC in respiratory and gastrointestinal (GI) infections in children is not well defined. The aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy and tolerability of BC administration in preventing recurrent upper respiratory tract infections (URTI) and diarrhea in children. Methods: One hundred sixty children (aged 1–6 years) having recurrent episodes of URTI or diarrhea received BC for 4 weeks. The number of episodes of URTI, diarrhea, and frequency of hospitalization required for URTI and diarrhea occurring during the study period were assessed at weeks 8 and 24. Results: From a total number of 160 children, 81 patients (50.63%) were males. The mean age (± SD) was 3.65 (± 2.01) years. The mean (± SD) total number of infections was significantly decreased after BC therapy from 8.6 ± 5.1 at baseline to 5.5 ± 1.2 after 2 months (P