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Int J Equity Health 2022 Aug 17;21(1):111. Epub 2022 Aug 17.

Health Systems and Research Ethics Department, KEMRI Wellcome Trust Research Programme, Kilifi, Kenya.

Background: Global health research partnerships have been scrutinised for how they operate and criticised for perpetuating inequities. Guidance to inform fair partnership practice has proliferated and the movement to decolonise global health has added momentum for change. In light of this evolving context, we sought in this study to document contemporary experiences of partnership from the perspective of stakeholders in four sub-Saharan African research institutions. Read More

JAMA Health Forum 2022 Jan 21;3(1):e214599. Epub 2022 Jan 21.

ICES, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Importance: Persons with dementia and Parkinson disease (PD) are vulnerable to disruptions in health care and services.

Objective: To examine changes in health service use among community-dwelling persons with dementia, persons with PD, and older adults without neurodegenerative disease during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Design Setting And Participants: Repeated cross-sectional analysis using population-based administrative data among community-dwelling persons with dementia, persons with PD, and adults 65 years and older at the start of each week from March 1 through the week of September 20, 2020 (pandemic period), and March 3 through the week of September 22, 2019 (historical period), in Ontario, Canada. Read More

Top Curr Chem (Cham) 2022 Aug 17;380(6):46. Epub 2022 Aug 17.

School of Molecular and Life Sciences, Curtin University, Perth, WA, 6845, Australia.

Fluorescence microscopy is a key tool in the biological sciences, which finds use as a routine laboratory technique (e.g., epifluorescence microscope) or more advanced confocal, two-photon, and super-resolution applications. Read More

Langmuir 2022 Aug 17. Epub 2022 Aug 17.

Material Science, BASF SE, RGA/BM - B007, Carl-Bosch-Str. 38, D-67056 Ludwigshafen, Germany.

Chemical gardens are self-assembled structures with intricate plant-like morphologies and consist of mineralized membranes, which form spontaneously at interfaces between compartments with dissimilar chemical composition, most typically acidic metal salt and alkaline sodium silicate solutions. While this phenomenon is thought to occur in a number of practical settings, it has also proven to be valuable for investigating transport characteristics in distinct applied systems. For example, coupled diffusion and precipitation processes were monitored in silica gardens based on calcium and iron salts, considered to be models for cement hydration and steel corrosion, respectively. Read More

J Exp Med 2022 Sep 16;219(9). Epub 2022 Aug 16.

Computational Oncology, Department of Epidemiology & Biostatistics, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY.

Advances in genomics and precision measurement have continued to demonstrate the importance of the immune system across many disease types. At the heart of many emerging approaches to leverage these insights for precision immunotherapies is the computational antigen prediction problem. We propose a threefold approach to improving antigen predictions: further defining the geometry of the antigen landscape, incorporating the coupling of antigen recognition to other cellular processes, and diversifying the training sets used for models that predict immunogenicity. Read More

CA Cancer J Clin 2022 Aug 15. Epub 2022 Aug 15.

Division of Surgical Oncology, Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey.

Peritoneal metastasis (PM) is often regarded as a less frequent pattern of spread; however, collectively across all spectra of primary tumors, the consequences of PM impact a large population of patients annually. Unlike other modes of metastasis, symptoms at presentation or during the treatment course are common, representing an additional challenge in the management of PM. Early efforts with chemotherapy and incomplete surgical interventions transiently improved symptoms, but durable symptom control and survival extension were rare, which established a perspective of treatment futility for PM through most of the 20th century. Read More

Front Med (Lausanne) 2022 29;9:888050. Epub 2022 Jul 29.

Department of Infectious Diseases and Virology, Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Bucharest, Romania.

Background: The risk of liver fibrosis increases over time in HIV and HIV-HBV individuals even under antiretroviral treatment (ART), warranting a rigorous and periodic monitorization. Given the lower availability of transient elastography, we aimed to assess the longitudinal variation of two non-invasive liver fibrosis scores, APRI and Fib-4, in cases with HIV monoinfection, HIV-HBV co-infection and individuals with HBsAg-seroclearance.

Methods: We performed an observational retrospective study between 2013 and 2019 on 212 HIV patients including 111 individuals with HIV mono-infection, 62 individuals with HIV-HBV co-infection and positive HBsAg and 39 cases with HIV-HBV infection and HBsAg-loss. Read More

Mikrobiyol Bul 2022 Jul;56(3):416-431

Sakarya University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Medical Microbiology, Sakarya, Türkiye.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) turned into a pandemic shortly after emerging in December 2019, in the city of Wuhan, China. In this study, it was aimed to investigate the presence of severe acute respiratory system coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) RNA in various clinical samples and the scattering profile of the virus and the variation of anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG and neutralizing antibody levels over time in infected patients during and after the period of COVID-19 disease. The study included COVID-19 patients from the community (CCP) (n= 47) (May-June 2020) and healthcare workers (HCWP) (n= 30) (November-December 2020). Read More

East Mediterr Health J 2022 Jul 31;28(7):515-520. Epub 2022 Jul 31.

Department of Infectious Diseases, Rawalpindi Medical University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

Background: The Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) promised to eradicate polio by 2000, yet the disease remains endemic in 2 countries. The current threat of resurgence in countries with low vaccine coverage and circulating vaccinederived poliovirus (cVDPV) outbreaks due to oral polio vaccine warrants a strategy review.

Aims: To review the performance of the GPEI from a context based in Pakistan, identifying threats to success and suggesting strategy modifications to help achieve eradication. Read More

Animals (Basel) 2022 Jul 29;12(15). Epub 2022 Jul 29.

Mystic Aquarium, Division of Sea Research Inc., Mystic, CT 06355, USA.

Among emerging threats to the Arctic is the introduction, spread, or resurgence of disease. Marine brucellosis is an emerging disease concern among free-ranging cetaceans and is less well-studied than terrestrial forms. To investigate marine-origin sp. Read More

AJNR Am J Neuroradiol 2022 Aug 11. Epub 2022 Aug 11.

Departments of Radiology (C.T.W.).

Monoclonal antibodies are emerging disease-modifying therapies for Alzheimer disease that require brain MR imaging for eligibility assessment as well as for monitoring for amyloid-related imaging abnormalities. Amyloid-related imaging abnormalities result from treatment-related loss of vascular integrity and may occur in 2 forms. Amyloid-related imaging abnormalities with edema or effusion are transient, treatment-induced edema or sulcal effusion, identified on T2-FLAIR. Read More

PLoS Comput Biol 2022 Aug 11;18(8):e1010317. Epub 2022 Aug 11.

WorldWide Antimalarial Resistance Network (WWARN), Oxford, United Kingdom.

Background: Sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (SP) is recommended in Africa in several antimalarial preventive regimens including Intermittent Preventive Treatment in pregnant women (IPTp), Intermittent Preventive Treatment in infants (IPTi) and Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention (SMC). The effectiveness of SP-based preventive treatments are threatened in areas where Plasmodium falciparum resistance to SP is high. The prevalence of mutations in the dihydropteroate synthase gene (pfdhps) can be used to monitor SP effectiveness. Read More

Comput Struct Biotechnol J 2022 15;20:3946-3954. Epub 2022 Jul 15.

Center for Discovery and Innovation, Hackensack Meridian Health, Nutley, NJ, USA.

The combination of carbapenem resistance and hypervirulence in is an emerging and urgent threat due to its potential to resist common antibiotics and cause life-threatening infections in healthy hosts. This study aimed to evaluate the activity of clinically relevant antibiotic regimens against carbapenem-resistant with hypervirulence plasmids and to identify pathways associated with antibiotic tolerance using transcriptomics. We studied two carbapenem-resistant isolates, CDI694 and CDI231, both harboring hypervirulence plasmids. Read More

Ann Emerg Med 2022 Aug 5. Epub 2022 Aug 5.

Department of Psychiatry, Vancouver General Hospital and University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Buprenorphine induction for treating opioid use disorder is being implemented in emergency care. During this era of high-potency synthetic opioid use, novel and divergent algorithms for buprenorphine induction are emerging to optimize induction experience, facilitating continued treatment. Specifically, in patients with chronic fentanyl or other drug exposures, some clinicians are using alternative buprenorphine induction strategies, such as quickly maximizing buprenorphine agonist effects (eg, macrodosing) or, conversely, giving smaller initial doses and slowing the rate of buprenorphine dosing to avoid antagonist/withdrawal effects (eg, microdosing). Read More

Continuum (Minneap Minn) 2022 08;28(4):1171-1193

Purpose Of Review: Anti-myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG) autoantibodies have become a recognized cause of a pathophysiologically distinct group of central nervous system (CNS) autoimmune diseases. MOG-associated disorders can easily be confused with other CNS diseases such as multiple sclerosis or neuromyelitis optica, but they have a distinct clinical phenotype and prognosis.

Recent Findings: Most patients with MOG-associated disorders exhibit optic neuritis, myelitis, or acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) alone, sequentially, or in combination; the disease may be either monophasic or relapsing. Read More

Int J Educ Technol High Educ 2022 3;19(1):40. Epub 2022 Aug 3.

Faculty of Architecture, Near East University, Nicosia, TRNC Turkey.

Physical design studio has been the mainstream method of architectural pedagogy for more than a century. Although the past two decades have brought forth emerging possibilities via advancements in digital communication, Virtual Design Studio (VDS) remained an experimental novelty until 2020. The interruption of face-to-face educational activities saw architecture schools facing a rapid paradigm shift because their studio-centred pedagogy retains intrinsic spatial qualities that are often attributed as critical dimensions of the learning process. Read More

Comput Struct Biotechnol J 2022 30;20:4052-4059. Epub 2022 Jul 30.

JC School of Public Health and Primary Care, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Special administrative regions, China.

Introduction: Two years into the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, populations with less built-up immunity continued to devise ways to optimize social distancing measures (SDMs) relaxation levels for outbreaks triggered by SARS-CoV-2 and its variants to resume minimal economics activities while avoiding hospital system collapse.

Method: An age-stratified compartmental model featuring social mixing patterns was first fitted the incidence data in second wave in Hong Kong. Hypothetical scenario analysis was conducted by varying population mobility and vaccination coverages (VCs) to predict the number of hospital and intensive-care unit admissions in outbreaks initiated by ancestral strain and its variants (Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Omicron). Read More

Psychol Health Med 2022 Aug 8:1-17. Epub 2022 Aug 8.

Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.

Interrupted education of adolescent mothers remains a major concern, but limited evidence-based programming exists to support postpartum schooling of this group. This study aimed to better understand the factors that render some adolescent mothers vulnerable to school non-enrollment, and how to reduce these risks. Data from 1,046 adolescent and young mothers (10-24 years) from rural and urban communities in South Africa's Eastern Cape was obtained through a questionnaire containing validated and study-specific measures relating to sociodemographic characteristics, schooling, relationships, violence exposure, and health. Read More

Cell 2022 Aug;185(16):2853-2878

Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. Electronic address:

The surprising discovery that the diatomic gas nitric oxide (NO) is generated by mammalian cells and serves to regulate a multitude of physiological processes has continued to fascinate biologists for almost four decades. The biochemistry of NO is complex, and novel insights into the control of NO biosynthesis and mechanisms of signal transduction are continuously emerging. NO is a key regulator of cardiovascular function, metabolism, neurotransmission, immunity, and more, and aberrant NO signaling is a central feature of many major disorders including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer. Read More

Neurosurg Focus 2022 06;52(6):E4

1Department of Neurological Surgery, NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, New York.

Objective: Telemedicine technology has been developed to allow surgeons in countries with limited resources to access expert technical guidance during surgical procedures. The authors report their initial experience using state-of-the-art wearable smart glasses with wireless capability to transmit intraoperative video content during spine surgery from sub-Saharan Africa to experts in the US.

Methods: A novel smart glasses system with integrated camera and microphone was worn by a spine surgeon in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, during 3 scoliosis correction surgeries. Read More

Natl Sci Rev 2022 Jul 13;9(7):nwac065. Epub 2022 Apr 13.

Ling Xin is a science writer based in Beijing.

China continued to gather momentum in space in 2021. With a record-breaking 55 orbital launches, the country made it again to the top of the list, ahead of the USA's 51 and Russia's 25 launches. However, nearly 90% of the Chinese launches were carried out by the state-owned Long March rocket family. Read More

Water Environ Res 2022 Aug;94(8):e10768

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, Piscataway, New Jersey, USA.

COVID-19 wastewater-based epidemiology has been performed in catchments of various sizes and sewer types with many short-term studies available and multi-seasonal studies emerging. The objective of this study was to compare weekly observations of SARS-CoV-2 genes in municipal wastewater across multiple seasons for different systems as a factor of sewer type (combined, separate sanitary) and system size. Sampling occurred following the first wave of SARS-CoV-2 cases in the study region (June 2020) and continued through the third wave (May 2021), the period during which clinical testing was widely available and different variants dominated clinical cases. Read More

Mol Inform 2022 Aug 2. Epub 2022 Aug 2.

UNAM, MEXICO.

Technological advances and practical applications of the chemical space concept in drug discovery, natural product research, and other research areas have attracted the scientific community's attention. The large- and ultra-large chemical spaces are associated with the significant increase in the number of compounds that can potentially be made and exist and the increasing number of experimental and calculated descriptors, that are emerging that encode the molecular structure and/or property aspects of the molecules. Due to the importance and continued evolution of compound libraries, herein, we discuss definitions proposed in the literature for chemical space and emphasize the convenience, discussed in the literature to use complementary descriptors to obtain a comprehensive view of the chemical space of compound data sets. Read More

Cureus 2022 Jun 25;14(6):e26325. Epub 2022 Jun 25.

Neurology, California Institute of Behavioral Neurosciences & Psychology, Fairfield, USA.

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM), polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS), obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), and obesity represent four large and growing patient populations. A great deal of scientific and clinical knowledge has been developed for them individually, and significant advancements made. Taken as a group, however, the interrelationships are not as well understood. Read More

Front Public Health 2022 13;10:902253. Epub 2022 Jul 13.

Navajo Nation Breast and Cervical Cancer Prevention Program, Navajo Nation Department of Health, Window Rock, AZ, United States.

To inform women of the Navajo Nation of safety measures implemented to minimize COVID-19 virus exposure during screening and treatment procedures at Navajo Nation based health care facilities, the Navajo Nation Breast and Cervical Cancer Prevention Program (NNBCCPP) and the University-based Partnership for Native American Cancer Prevention Program (NACP) collaborated to develop a podcast to describe the continued availability of services. During the COVID-19 pandemic, women of all ages and ethnicities in the US needing breast and cervical cancer prevention screenings and treatment, have been hesitant to seek services given the advice to avoid crowded spaces and maintain physical distancing. Epidemiological trends indicate that proactive, intensive strategies are needed in Native American communities for early detection and treatment to support early cancer diagnosis and improve cancer survival. Read More

Am J Infect Control 2022 May 25. Epub 2022 May 25.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, GA; Commissioned Corps, U.S. Public Health Service, Rockville, MD.

Background: Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales (CRE) are usually healthcare-associated but are also emerging in the community.

Methods: Active, population-based surveillance was conducted to identify case-patients with cultures positive for Enterobacterales not susceptible to a carbapenem (excluding ertapenem) and resistant to all third-generation cephalosporins tested at 8 US sites from January 2012 to December 2015. Medical records were used to classify cases as health care-associated, or as community-associated (CA) if a patient had no known health care risk factors and a culture was collected <3 days after hospital admission. Read More

Cell Res 2022 Jul 29. Epub 2022 Jul 29.

Department of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, China.

SARS-CoV-2 variants with adaptive mutations have continued to emerge, causing fresh waves of infection even amongst vaccinated population. The development of broad-spectrum antivirals is thus urgently needed. We previously developed two hetero-bivalent nanobodies (Nbs), aRBD-2-5 and aRBD-2-7, with potent neutralization activity against the wild-type (WT) Wuhan isolated SARS-CoV-2, by fusing aRBD-2 with aRBD-5 and aRBD-7, respectively. Read More

Viruses 2022 06 23;14(7). Epub 2022 Jun 23.

Department of Medical Biotechnologies, University of Siena, 53100 Siena, Italy.

Newly emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants may escape monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and antiviral drugs. By using live virus assays, we assessed the ex vivo inhibition of the B.1 wild-type (WT), delta and omicron BA. Read More

Pathogens 2022 Jul 8;11(7). Epub 2022 Jul 8.

Office of Blood Research and Review, Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, Food and Drug Administration, Silver Spring, MD 20993, USA.

Despite significant advances in ensuring the safety of the blood supply, there is continued risk of transfusion transmitted infections (TTIs) from newly emerging or re-emerging infections. Globally, several pathogen reduction technologies (PRTs) for blood safety have been in development as an alternative to traditional treatment methods. Despite broad spectrum antimicrobial efficacy, some of the approved ultraviolet (UV) light-based PRTs, understandably due to UV light-associated toxicities, fall short in preserving the full functional spectrum of the treated blood components. Read More