Activity

Functional visual perception significantly contributes to the child’s development and consists of much more than just visual acuity and the visual field. It includes cognitive interpretation of visual stimuli and runs along the temporal and parietal pathways of visual processing. Central visual impairment (CVI) usually affects otherwise healthy children with often good visual acuity, whereas the multiply disabled visually impaired (MDVI) have visual impairment and multiple disabilities. In MDVI patients an ocular and/or CVI can be present. The examination of MDVI patients poses a great challenge for the ophthalmologist and reflective visual test procedures should also be used. Particular attention should be paid to refraction and accommodation. The main ocular diagnosis in MDVI is optic atrophy and the general diagnoses are dominated by sequelae of premature birth, often in combination with spasticity and epilepsy. Early intervention is essential and is independent of the underlying diagnoses.With less than a million neurons, the western honeybee Apis mellifera is capable of complex olfactory behaviors and provides an ideal model for investigating the neurophysiology of the olfactory circuit and the basis of olfactory perception and learning. Here, we review the most fundamental aspects of honeybee’s olfaction first, we discuss which odorants dominate its environment, and how bees use them to communicate and regulate colony homeostasis; then, we describe the neuroanatomy and the neurophysiology of the olfactory circuit; finally, we explore the cellular and molecular mechanisms leading to olfactory memory formation. The vastity of histological, neurophysiological, and behavioral data collected during the last century, together with new technological advancements, including genetic tools, confirm the honeybee as an attractive research model for understanding olfactory coding and learning.A woman in her 30s, who was clinically diagnosed with tuberous sclerosis complex, underwent lung transplantation due to lymphangioleiomyomatosis with concomitant multifocal micronodular pneumocyte hyperplasia (MMPH). Histologically, MMPH lesions demonstrated variety in histology; some showed homogenous cells with mild nuclear atypia and elastic fibers proliferation, and the others showed enlarged nuclei without elastic fibers. Because the natural history of MMPH is not well characterized, we used next-generation sequencing to perform a comprehensive genetic analysis for the MMPH lesions to explore their malignant potential. Regardless of their histological variety, three of four lesions had BRAF missense mutations, especially the types frequently detected in atypical adenomatous hyperplasia that is considered to be benign rather than a precursor of adenocarcinoma. None of them had major driver mutations of lung adenocarcinoma, except for BRAF mutations. In conclusion, our study of the lesions from this patient indicated the benign characteristic of MMPH.In this paper, we present a plasmonic chiral metasurface absorber (CMSA), which can achieve high selective absorption for right-handed and left-handed circular polarization (RCP, “+”, and LCP, “-“) lights at optical frequency. The CMSA is composed of a dielectric substrate sandwiched with bi-layer fourfold twisted semicircle metal nanostructure. The proposed CMSA has a strong selective absorption band, where absorption peaks for LCP and RCP lights occur at different resonance frequencies, reflecting the existence of a significant circular dichroism (CD) effect. It is shown that the absorbance of the CMSA can reach to 93.2% for LCP light and 91.6% for RCP light, and the maximum CD magnitude is up to 0.85 and 0.91 around 288.5 THz and 404 THz, respectively. The mechanism of the strong chiroptical response of the CMSA is illustrated by electric fields distributions of the unit-cell nanostructure. Furthermore, the influence of the geometry of the proposed CMSA on the circular polarization selective absorption characterization is studied systematically.

Nanomedicine has evolved as precision medicine in novel therapeutic approach of cancer management. The present study investigated the efficacy of biogenic gold nanoparticles synthesized using Argemone mexicana L. aqueous extract (AM-AuNPs) against the human colon cancer cell line, HCT-15.

Biosynthesis of AM-AuNPs was determined by ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy and further characterized by transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, and Fourier transition infrared spectroscopy analysis. The cytotoxic activity of AM-AuNPs was assessed by the 3-(4, 5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2, 5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide assay, whereas genotoxicity was evaluated by the DNA fragmentation assay. The expression of apoptosis regulatory genes such as p53 and caspase-3 was explored through semi-quantitative reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and western blotting to evidence apoptotic cell death in HCT-15 cells. Biogenic AM-AuNPs inhibited cell proliferation in HCT-15 cell line with a half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC

) of 20.53 μg/mL at 24 h and 12.03 μg/mL at 48 h of exposure. The altered cell morphology and increased apoptosis due to AM-AuNPs were also evidenced through nuclear DNA fragmentation and upregulated expression of p53 and caspase-3 in HCT-15 cells.

The AM-AuNPs may exert antiproliferative and genotoxic effects on HCT-15 cells by cell growth suppression and induction of apoptosis mediated by activation of p53 and caspase-3 genes.

The AM-AuNPs may exert antiproliferative and genotoxic effects on HCT-15 cells by cell growth suppression and induction of apoptosis mediated by activation of p53 and caspase-3 genes.

Transarterial radioembolization (TARE) with yttrium-90 (

Y) microspheres is a liver-directed treatment for primary and secondary hepatic malignancies. Personalized dosimetry aims for maximum treatment effect and reduced toxicity. LW 6 concentration We aimed to compare pre-treatment voxel-based dosimetry from

Tc macroaggregated albumin (MAA) SPECT/CT with post-treatment

Y PET/CT for absorbed dose values, and to evaluate image quality of

Y SiPM-based PET/CT.

Forty-two patients (28 men, 14 women, mean age 67 ± 11 years) with advanced hepatic malignancies were prospectively enrolled. Twenty patients were treated with glass and 22 with resin microspheres. Radiation absorbed doses from planning

Tc-MAA SPECT/CT and post-therapy

Y PET/CT were assessed.

Y PET/CT images were acquired for 20 min and reconstructed to produce 5-, 10-, 15-, and 20-min datasets, then evaluated using the 5-point Likert scale.

The mean administered activity was 3.44 ± 1.5 GBq for glass and 1.62 ± 0.7 GBq for resin microspheres. The mean tumor absorbed doses calculated from

Tc-MAA SPECT/CT and

Y PET/CT were 175.