Search

Recombinant granulocyte colony–stimulating factor (G-CSF) protein produced in Escherichia coli has been widely used for the treatment of neutropenia induced by chemotherapy for decades. In E. coli cells, G-CSF is usually expressed as inactive inclusion bodies, which requires costly and inefficient denaturation and refolding steps to obtain the protein in its active form. However, following the findings of previous studies, we here successfully produced G-CSF in E. coli as non-classical inclusion bodies (ncIBs), which contained likely correctly folded protein. The ncIBs were easily dissolved in 0.2% N-lauroylsarcosine solution and then directly applied to a Ni-NTA affinity chromatography column to get G-CSF with high purity (> 90%). The obtained G-CSF was demonstrated to have a similar bioactivity with the well-known G-CSF containing product Neupogen (Amgen, Switzerland). Our finding clearly verified that the G-CSF production from ncIBs is a feasible approach to improve the yield and lower the cost of G-CSF manufacturing process.

Background: Access to medical care is strongly dependent on resource allocation, such as the geographical distribution of medical facilities. Nevertheless, this data is usually restricted to country official documentation, not available to the public. While some medical facilities' data is accessible as semantic resources on the Web, it is not consistent in its modeling and has yet to be integrated into a complete, open, and specialized repository. This work focuses on generating a comprehensive semantic dataset of medical facilities worldwide containing extensive information about such facilities' geo-location. Results: For this purpose, we collect, align, and link various open-source databases where medical facilities' information may be present. This work allows us to evaluate each data source along various dimensions, such as completeness, correctness, and interlinking with other sources, all critical aspects of current knowledge representation technologies. Conclusions: Our contributions directly benefit stakeholders in the biomedical and health domain (patients, healthcare professionals, companies, regulatory authorities, and researchers), who will now have a better overview of the access to and distribution of medical facilities., Accepted at 4th Workshop on Semantic Web solutions for large-scale biomedical data analytics (SeWeBMeDA-2020)

Water quality for the surface water along the Saigon River in Ho Chi Minh City was assessed for four groups of water samples collected at the agricultural, industrial, residential, and less impacted areas. A variety of parameters indicating water quality including physicochemical parameters, nutrients, heavy metals, and antibiotic residues were measured for both the rainy and dry seasons, two main tropical seasons in HCM City using the standard methods. The results showed that the river water in the rainy season was detected with significantly higher values of turbidity, BOD5, PO4-P, NH4-N, NO3-N; and lower values of pH, temperature, conductivity, DO, salinity, Cu, Zn, As, Ni, Hg compared to that in the dry season. Sulfamethoxazole and trimethoprim were highly detected in the industrial areas compared to the agricultural and residential areas. Multivariate analyses suggested that the industrial and residential activities were more important contributors to the pollution of the Saigon River than the agricultural activities in HCM City.

The Centre for Medical Radiation Physics introduced the concept of Silicon On Insulator (SOI) microdosimeters with 3-Dimensional (3D) cylindrical sensitive volumes (SVs) mimicking the dimensions of cells in an array. Several designs of high-definition 3D SVs fabricated using 3D MEMS technology were implemented. 3D SVs were fabricated in different sizes and configurations with diameters between 18 and 30 µm, thicknesses of 2–50 µm and at a pitch of 50 µm in matrices with volumes of 20 × 20 and 50 × 50. SVs were segmented into sub-arrays to reduce capacitance and avoid pile up in high-dose rate pencil beam scanning applications. Detailed TCAD simulations and charge collection studies in individual SVs have been performed. The microdosimetry probe (MicroPlus) is composed of the silicon microdosimeter and low-noise front–end readout electronics housed in a PMMA waterproof sheath that allows measurements of lineal energies as low as 0.4 keV/µm in water or PMMA. Microdosimetric quantities measured with SOI microdosimeters and the MicroPlus probe were used to evaluate the relative biological effectiveness (RBE) of heavy ions and protons delivered by pencil-beam scanning and passive scattering systems in different particle therapy centres. The 3D detectors and MicroPlus probe developed for microdosimetry have the potential to provide confidence in the delivery of RBE optimized particle therapy when introduced into routine clinical practice

Landfills are mostly used to manage solid waste in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Due to inappropriate administration, there have been numerous issues over the years relating to odor and leachate. The purpose of this study is to explore the impact of odor stemming from Da Phuoc landfill site on surrounding areas. A questionnaire survey was administered through face-to-face interviews with 409 residents living in the affected areas. The findings of this study indicate that the odor perception of residents significantly influences their attitudes towards waste disposal sites. The results show that odor affects not only the region around municipal solid waste (MSW) treatment facilities but regions more than 7 km away as well. The data indicates that the odor emanating from the MSW disposal site negatively affects the daily life of many residents. This study is an effort to finding a solution to reduce the impact of odor generated from the landfill site on nearby residential areas.

Objectives: Acyclovir (ACV) is an antiviral drug, which requires frequent dosing regimen because of poor oral bioavailability and short half-life. In this study, ACV nanoparticles were formulated using ammonium methacrylates copolymers such as Eudragit RS 100 (Eud RS) and Eudragit RL 100 (Eud RL) to prolong release drug, and increase bioavailability. Methods: ACV loaded nanoparticles were prepared by the solvent replacement technique and then were characterized by particle size, distribution, entrapment efficiency, differential scanning calorimeter, transmission electron microscope, and in-vitro drug release. Results: It was found that as drug:polymer ratio changed from 1:2 to1:5, particle size and drug entrapment efficiency increased significantly. ACV– Eud RS loaded nanoparticles had a larger mean diameter of 363 nm in comparison to 200 nm of ACV- Eud RL nanoparticles. DSC results showed that in the prepared ACV-Eud RS nanoparticles, the drug was presented in the amorphous phase and may have been molecularly dispersed in the polymer matrix, but in the ACV-Eud RL nanoparticles, the drug was presented in the particles and homogeneously dispersed in the polymeric matrix. The entrapment efficiency of AVC-Eud RS nanoparticles was higher than that of ACV-Eud RL nanoparticles. In vitro drug release study showed that the ratios of released drug from ACV-Eud RS nanoparticles in the range from 58±3.8 to 62.9±4.6%, which was lower than those from ACV-Eud RL nanoparticles, in the range from 73.3±4.9 to 77.9±2.9%. The release was found to follow the Weibull model with a Fickian diffusion mechanism for both ACVEud RS and ACV- Eud RL nanoparticles. Conclusion: These results suggest that ACV nanoparticles based on Eud RS100 and Eud RL100 could prolong the release of the drug.

From the PRRSV virulent strain BG8 isolated from a PRRSV-infected pig, using serial passage method in MARC-145 cell line, we have successfully obtained an attenuated strain in 95th passage, named as BG895, with high potential to be a vaccine candidate. In this study, we present the results of the safety and efficacy evaluation of BG895 against PRRSV in experimental pigs. Trial results of vaccine formula using strain BG895 have very high safety when inoculating 5 doses/animal and 10 doses/animal. Evaluation of immune response by ELISA method showed that, from 14 days post inoculation, anti-PRRSV antibodies were detected in the serum of all inoculated pigs in vaccine batches with the lowest S/P index of 1.50 ± 0.4 and the highest S/P was 2.36 ± 0.1 from 28 days post inoculation. The IPMA method showed that the antibody titer of the vaccine reached ≥ 1/160 in 100% of pigs from 21 days post inoculation andreached ≥ 1/640 in 100% of pigs from 28 days post inoculation, indicating that the vaccine was effective at protecting 100% of pigs from 28 days post inoculation. The protective effect of the vaccine was evaluated by the virulent challenge from 28 days post inoculation with 1 dose/animal compared with the control group. The results showed that compared with all pigs in the control group with typical clinical manifestations of Blue-ear disease, all inoculated pigs had normal body temperature and weight gain, besides, the S/P index increased from 1.65 ± 0.1 to the highest 2.99 ± 0.2; the average antibody titer was >1/2560, and virus wasnot detected in nasal fluid by real-time RT-PCR from 7 days post challenge. These experimental results confirmed the safety and efficacy of the attenuated PRRS vaccine based on BG895strain.

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-npx-10.1177_1934578X221138435 for Phytochemicals Derived from Goniothalamus elegans Ast Exhibit Anticancer Activity by Inhibiting Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor by Linh Thuy Thi Tran, Long-Hung Dinh Pham, Nhi Yen Thi Dang, Nguyen Thao Nguyen Le, Huu Bao Nguyen and Tan Khanh Nguyen in Natural Product Communications

In this note, we verify that the bounded shadowing property and quasi-hyperbolicity of bounded linear operators on Hilbert spaces are preserved under Aluthge transforms.

Background Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a prion disease of cervids first reported in North America in the 1960s. In Europe, CWD was first diagnosed in 2016 in a wild reindeer in Norway. Detection of two more cases in the same mountain area led to the complete culling of this partially confined reindeer population of about 2400 animals. A total of 19 CWD positive animals were identified. The affected area is extensively used for the grazing of sheep during summers. There are many mineral licks intended for sheep in the area, but these have also been used by reindeer. This overlap in area use raised concerns for cross-species prion transmission between reindeer and sheep. In this study, we have used global positioning system (GPS) data from sheep and reindeer, including tracking one of the CWD positive reindeer, to investigate spatial and time-relevant overlaps between these two species. Since prions can accumulate in lymphoid follicles following oral uptake, samples of gut-associated lymphoid tissue (GALT) from 425 lambs and 78 adult sheep, which had grazed in the region during the relevant timeframe, were analyzed for the presence of prions. The recto-anal mucosa associated lymphoid tissue (RAMALT) from all the animals were examined by histology, immunohistochemistry (IHC) and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and the ileal Peyer's patch (IPP) from a subsample of 37 lambs were examined by histology and IHC, for the detection of prions. Results GPS data showed an overlap in area use between the infected reindeer herd and the sheep. In addition, the GPS positions of an infected reindeer and some of the sampled sheep showed temporospatial overlap. No prions were detected in the GALT of the investigated sheep even though the mean lymphoid follicle number in RAMALT and IPP samples were high. Conclusion The absence of prions in the GALT of sheep that have shared pasture with CWD-infected reindeer, may suggest that transmission of this novel CWD strain to sheep does not easily occur under the conditions found in these mountains. We document that the lymphoid follicle rich RAMALT could be a useful tool to screen for prions in sheep.

A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Biology, University of Regina. x, 73 p. Dissolved organic carbon (DOC) is an important component of the global carbon cycle, acting in part as a potential source of carbon for microorganisms, support of flocculation of heavy metals and nutrients to sediments, as well as a protective barrier between ultraviolet radiation and aquatic organisms. In my thesis, chapter 1 is a literature review with general background information about the photodegradation process of DOC in Prairie Pothole Region (PPR). In chapter 2, I used an incubation experiment with light and depth as treatments to examine photodegradation impacts on the optical characterization of DOC in prairie wetland ponds at the St. Denis National Wildlife Area in central Saskatchewan, Canada. Surface water was collected from two ponds with seasonal average DOC concentrations of 71.1 mg L-1 (More-DOC Pond) and 32.7 mg L-1 (Less- DOC Pond) and filtered through 0.45μm GF/Fs into Teflon bottles that were transparent to UV light. Samples were then divided into dark and light treatments and incubated at three different depths (surface, 0.25m, and 0.5m) in situ and collected every 2 weeks for 4 months. Excitation emission matrix scans from 300nm to 800nm and absorbance at 254nm were collected on each sample. Absorbance at 254nm in More-DOC Pond and Less-DOC Pond waters decreased by 34% and 50%, respectively. We identified two fluorescence components in both ponds which corresponded to peak C and peak M in literature. Although bulk DOC concentrations did not show significant differences over time, fluorescence intensity of peak C decreased by 39% and 47%, and of peak M increased by 19% and 29%, in the More-DOC Pond and Less-DOC Pond, respectively. Increases in other fluorescence indicators such as fluorescence index (35% and 22%) and FRESH (29% and 30%) were observed in the More-DOC Pond and Less-DOC Pond, respectively. Overall, terrestrial DOC from our sampling ponds became less aromatic, more aliphatic, lower molecular weight, and lost absorptivity and fluorescence intensity after 12 weeks of incubation. Lastly, in chapter 3, I outlined the future research using absorbance and fluorescence to study DOC in multiple ponds at SDNWA seasonally as well the connection of DOC to mercury and methyl mercury in PPR. Results of this study will provide a better understanding at the optical characterizations, sources, and act as a foundation to further study on the role of DOC in methylation of mercury Student yes

This dissertation discusses the application and comparative performance of double robust estimators for estimating the intervention specific mean outcome in longitudinal settings with time-dependent confounding as well as the corresponding estimator variances. Specifically, we focus on carefully defining target causal parameters to avoid known positivity issues, estimating these parameters using the asymptotically efficient and double robust targeted minimum loss-based estimation, comparing this to other double robust estimators of the same causal parameter, and estimating the corresponding variances in a way which demonstrates valid Type I errors while retaining statistical power. Chapter 1 begins by introducing the open problem in statistics. We present the International epidemiologic Databases to Evaluate AIDS, East Africa region (IeDEA-EA) cohort and the implementation of a low risk express care program implemented between 2007-2009. We continue in Chapter 2 by presenting the targeted learning road map for causal inference. This road map is applied, as a case study, to the IeDEA-EA cohort in evaluating the impact of the low risk express care program. Targeted minimum loss-based estimation is used to estimate the intervention specific mean outcome using data adaptive machine learning candidate estimators for the nuisance parameters. Practical issues are addressed, including carefully defining the causal parameters (and the corresponding causal contrasts) and remaining within the boundaries implied by the statistical model while using the machine learning algorithms. In Chapter 3, we compare additional estimators for the intervention specific mean outcome. The iterated conditional expectation estimator, inverse probability weighted estimator, augmented inverse probability weighted estimator, double robust iterated conditional expectation estimator, and targeted minimum loss-based estimator are presented. Additionally, variations on the double robust iterated conditional expectation estimator and targeted minimum loss-based estimator are reviewed and implemented. Simulations are conducted to analyze the finite sample performance of each estimator, in both correct and mis-specified models. The estimators are also applied to estimating the impact of enrollment into the low risk express care program in the IeDEA-EA cohort. Chapter 4 studies the estimation of estimator variance for estimators solving the efficient influence function. A robust approach of estimating the efficient influence function variance is presented, followed by approaches for estimating the derived expectation of the variance. This robust approach of estimating the EIF variance can be used to raise a red flag for unreliable statistical inference due to sparsity, thereby declaring that the target parameter is practically not identifiable from the data, and that the reported variance estimates (though large) will themselves be imprecise. We additionally present a bootstrap approach based on fitting the initial density of the data once, followed by a non-parametric bootstrap of the targeting step. This bootstrap approach can be used to estimate the variance of substitution based estimators solving the efficient influence function. Simulations are conducted, demonstrating the bias, variance, coverage, and statistical power resulting from each of the variance estimators. Standard errors and confidence intervals are calculated using each of the variance estimators in estimating the impact of enrollment into the low risk express care program in the IeDEA-EA cohort. The primary appendices present relevant proofs for the analyses conducted in this dissertation, while R code for implementing the various estimators are provided in secondary appendices.