bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Aquaporin 3 (AQP3) participates in the cytotoxic response to nucleoside-derived drugs
Authors: Trigueros-Motos Laia , Pérez-Torras Sandra , Casado F Javier , Molina-Arcas Míriam , Pastor-Anglada Marçal 
Published: September 2012

Abstract

Background
Nucleoside analogs used in the chemotherapy of solid tumors, such as the capecitabine catabolite 5′-deoxy-5-fluorouridine (5′-DFUR) trigger a transcriptomic response that involves the aquaglyceroporin aquaporin 3 along with other p53-dependent genes. Here, we examined whether up-regulation of aquaporin 3 (AQP3) mRNA in cancer cells treated with 5′-DFUR represents a collateral transcriptomic effect of the drug, or conversely, AQP3 participates in the activity of genotoxic agents.

Methods
The role of AQP3 in cell volume increase, cytotoxicity and cell cycle arrest was analyzed using loss-of-function approaches.

Results
5′-DFUR and gemcitabine, but not cisplatin, stimulated AQP3 expression and cell volume, which was partially and significantly blocked by knockdown of AQP3. Moreover, AQP3 siRNA significantly blocked other effects of nucleoside analogs, including G1/S cell cycle arrest, p21 and FAS up-regulation, and cell growth inhibition. Short incubations with 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) also induced AQP3 expression and increased cell volume, and the inhibition of AQP3 expression significantly blocked growth inhibition triggered by this drug. To further establish whether AQP3 induction is related to cell cycle arrest and apoptosis, cells were exposed to long incubations with escalating doses of 5-FU. AQP3 was highly up-regulated at doses associated with cell cycle arrest, whereas at doses promoting apoptosis induction of AQP3 mRNA expression was reduced.

Conclusions
Based on the results, we propose that the aquaglyceroporin AQP3 is required for cytotoxic activity of 5’-DFUR and gemcitabine in the breast cancer cell line MCF7 and the colon adenocarcinoma cell line HT29, and is implicated in cell volume increase and cell cycle arrest.
Effect of surface ligands on the optical properties of aqueous soluble CdTe quantum dots
Authors: Silva Fernanda O , Carvalho Melissa S , Mendonça Renato , Macedo Waldemar AA , Balzuweit Karla , Reiss Peter , Schiavon Marco A 
Published: September 2012

Abstract
We investigate systematically the influence of the nature of thiol-type capping ligands on the optical and structural properties of highly luminescent CdTe quantum dots synthesized in aqueous media, comparing mercaptopropionic acid (MPA), thioglycolic acid (TGA), 1-thioglycerol (TGH), and glutathione (GSH). The growth rate, size distribution, and quantum yield strongly depend on the type of surface ligand used. While TGH binds too strongly to the nanocrystal surface inhibiting growth, the use of GSH results in the fastest growth kinetics. TGA and MPA show intermediate growth kinetics, but MPA yields a much lower initial size distribution than TGA. The obtained fluorescence quantum yields range from 38% to 73%. XPS studies unambiguously put into evidence the formation of a CdS shell on the CdTe core due to the thermal decomposition of the capping ligands. This shell is thicker when GSH is used as ligand, as compared with TGA ligands.
Radiosensitization by the histone deacetylase inhibitor vorinostat under hypoxia and with capecitabine in experimental colorectal carcinoma
Authors: Saelen Marie Grøn , Ree Anne Hansen , Kristian Alexandr , Fleten Karianne Giller , Furre Torbjørn , Hektoen Helga Helseth , Flatmark Kjersti 
Published: September 2012

Abstract

Background
The histone deacetylase inhibitor vorinostat is a candidate radiosensitizer in locally advanced rectal cancer (LARC). Radiosensitivity is critically influenced by hypoxia; hence, it is important to evaluate the efficacy of potential radiosensitizers under variable tissue oxygenation. Since fluoropyrimidine-based chemoradiotherapy (CRT) is the only clinically validated regimen in LARC, efficacy in combination with this established regimen should be assessed in preclinical models before a candidate drug enters clinical trials.

Methods
Radiosensitization by vorinostat under hypoxia was studied in four colorectal carcinoma cell lines and in one colorectal carcinoma xenograft model by analysis of clonogenic survival and tumor growth delay, respectively. Radiosensitizing effects of vorinostat in combination with capecitabine were assessed by evaluation of tumor growth delay in two colorectal carcinoma xenografts models.

Results
Under hypoxia, radiosensitization by vorinostat was demonstrated in vitro in terms of decreased clonogenicity and in vivo as inhibition of tumor growth. Adding vorinostat to capecitabine-based CRT increased radiosensitivity of xenografts in terms of inhibited tumor growth.

Conclusions
Vorinostat sensitized colorectal carcinoma cells to radiation under hypoxia in vitro and in vivo and improved therapeutic efficacy in combination with capecitabine-based CRT in vivo. The results encourage implementation of vorinostat into CRT in LARC trials.
Impaired self-other differentiation in frontotemporal dementia due to the C9ORF72 expansion
Authors: Downey Laura E , Mahoney Colin J , Rossor Martin N , Crutch Sebastian J , Warren Jason D 
Published: September 2012

Abstract
Introduction
An expanded hexanucleotide repeat in the C9ORF72 gene has recently been identified as an important cause of frontotemporal dementia and motor neuron disease; however, the phenotypic spectrum of this entity and its pathophysiologic basis have yet to be fully defined. Psychiatric features may be early and prominent, although a putative cortico-thalamo-cerebellar network has been implicated in the pathogenesis of the clinical phenotype. Differentiation of self from others is a core cognitive operation that could potentially link network disintegration with neuropsychiatric symptoms in C9ORF72-associated frontotemporal dementia.

Methods
We undertook a detailed behavioral analysis of self-other attribution in a 67-year-old male patient with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) due to the C9ORF72 expansion by using a novel paradigm requiring differentiation of the effects of self- and non-self-generated actions. The patient's performance was assessed in relation to two older male patients with bvFTD not attributable to the C9ORF72 expansion and four healthy older male subjects.

Results
Compared with the healthy control group, the patient with the C9OFR72 mutation showed a deficit of self-other differentiation that was disproportionate to his otherwise relatively indolent clinical phenotype. The performance of the other patients with bvFTD was similar to that of healthy subjects.

Conclusion
We propose that impaired self-other differentiation is a candidate mechanism for neuropsychiatric decline in association with the C9ORF72 expansion. We offer this preliminary observation as a stimulus to further work.
Standard metabolic rate is associated with gestation duration, but not clutch size, in speckled cockroachesNauphoeta cinerea
Authors: Schimpf Natalie G. , Matthews Philip G. D. , White Craig R. 
Published: September 2012

SummaryMetabolic rate varies significantly between individuals, and these differences persist even when the wide range of biotic and abiotic factors that influence metabolism are accounted for. It is important to understand the life history implications of variation in metabolic rate, but they remain poorly characterised despite a growing body of work examining relationships between metabolism and a range of traits. In the present study we used laboratory-bred families (one sire to three dams) of Nauphoeta cinerea (Olivier) (speckled cockroaches) to examine the relationship between standard metabolic rate (SMR) and reproductive performance (number of offspring and gestation duration). We show that SMR is negatively associated with female gestation duration. Age at mating is negatively associated with gestation duration for females, and mass is negatively associated with the average gestation duration of the females a male was mated with. In addition to the results in the current literature, the results from the present study suggest that the association between metabolism and life history is more complex than simple relationships between metabolism and various fitness traits. Future work should consider longitudinal, ontogenetic as well as selective and quantitative genetic breeding approaches to fully examine the associations between metabolism and fitness.
A liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry assay for plasma renin activity using online solid-phase extraction
Authors: Carter S , Owen L J , Kerstens M N , Dullaart R P F , Keevil B G 
Published: September 2012

Background The plasma renin activity (PRA) assay measures the ability of renin to generate angiotensin I (AngI) from angiotensinogen. It is used to monitor mineralocorticoid therapy and to screen hypertensive individuals for primary aldosteronism (PA). Methods Samples were incubated in the presence of protease inhibitors for 6.5 and 24 h. The reaction was stopped by the addition of 2% ammonium hydroxide. AngI was then quantified by liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry using online solid-phase extraction (XLC-MS/MS). Results This method requires a sample volume of 50 μL and has an inter-assay precision <14% across the working range. A 6.5-h incubation gave a lower limit of quantification (LLOQ) of 0.3 nmol/L/h and this can be reduced to 0.08 nmol/L/h using a 24-h incubation. Comparison to a radioimmunoassay revealed excellent correlation ( r2 = 0.98), but a 37% negative bias. We also found that renin is stable in whole blood for up to 24 h at room temperature. In contrast, storage at 4°C should be avoided as prorenin cryoactivation can affect the PRA result in some patient groups. Conclusions We have developed and fully validated a semi-automated XLC-MS/MS method for the measurement of PRA. In addition, a reference range specific to this assay has been defined. We have also demonstrated that renin is stable for up to 24 h at room temperature. This will enable this assay to be extended to samples taken in primary care, potentially increasing the number of hypertensive patients who can be screened for PA.
Investigation of cholesterol bias due to a matrix effect of external quality assurance samples: how true is your cholesterol method?
Authors: Pretorius Carel J , Klingberg Sandra , Johnson Leslie , Park Rodney , Wilgen Urs , Ungerer Jacobus P J 
Published: September 2012

Background Comparability of cholesterol measurement is clinically required and external quality assurance (EQA) programmes are important to verify the trueness of routine methods. Methods We developed a gas chromatography-isotope dilution mass spectrometry (GC-IDMS) total cholesterol assay to investigate the cause of a suspected matrix-related negative bias with the Beckman Coulter enzymatic method discovered in an EQA programme. The GC-IDMS method was calibrated with certified reference material and verified against a secondary reference method. Bias between the GC-IDMS and Beckman Coulter methods was estimated according to Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) protocol EP9-A2 with 40 clinical samples. Results At clinically important decision levels, no significant bias was demonstrated on patients' samples (all results within a ±3% limit). A matrix effect confined to the EQA material that affected the Beckman Coulter total cholesterol method was confirmed. Conclusions The GC-IDMS method is suitable as a higher order total cholesterol method in a routine clinical laboratory. Matrix effects defeat the objectives of EQA schemes by preventing the verification of trueness. Given the importance of obtaining a true cholesterol result without systematic error, we recommend that EQA material without matrix effects should be used.
Relationship between GFR and Albuminuria in Stage 1 Hypertension
Authors: Palatini Paolo , Mos Lucio , Ballerini Pierferruccio , Mazzer Adriano , Saladini Francesca , Bortolazzi Alessandra , Cozzio Susanna , Casiglia Edoardo 
Published: September 2012

Summary

Background and objectives
Whether glomerular hyperfiltration is implicated in the development of microalbuminuria in hypertension is not well known. This prospective study investigated the relationship between changes in GFR and microalbuminuria in hypertension.

Design, setting, participants, & measurements
This study assessed 534 stage 1 hypertensive participants from the Hypertension and Ambulatory Recording Venetia Study (n=386 men) without microalbuminuria at baseline, who were recruited from 1990 to 1995 and followed for a median of 8.5 years. Mean age was 33.9±8.6 years and mean BP was 146.6±10.5/94.0±5.0 mmHg. Creatinine clearance and 24-hour urinary albumin were measured at study entry and end. Participants were defined as normofilterers (normo) or hyperfilterers (hyper) according to whether GFR was <150 or ≥150 ml/min per 1.73 m2, respectively. Participants were divided into four groups based on GFR changes from baseline to follow-up end: normo→normo (n=395), normo→hyper (n=31), hyper→hyper (n=61), and hyper→normo (n=47).

Results
Microalbuminuria progressively increased across the four groups and was 5.3% in normo→normo, 9.7% in normo→hyper, 16.4% in hyper→hyper, and 36.2% in hyper→normo (P<0.001). This association held true in a multivariable logistic regression in which several confounders, ambulatory BP, and other risk factors were taken into account (P<0.001). In particular, hyperfilterers whose GFR decreased to normal at study end had an adjusted odds ratio of 7.8 (95% confidence interval, 3.3–18.2) for development of microalbuminuria compared with participants with normal GFR throughout the study.

Conclusions
These data support the hypothesis for a parabolic association between GFR and urinary albumin in the early stage of hypertension.
Management of Crush Victims in Mass Disasters
Authors: Sever Mehmet Sukru , Vanholder Raymond 
Published: September 2012

Summary
Crush syndrome is the second most common cause of death after earthquakes (the first most common is direct trauma). Many logistic problems with the treatment of patients with crush syndrome are due to chaotic disaster circumstances; consequently, medical and logistic recommendations on the treatment of crush victims are needed. In a joint initiative of the Renal Disaster Relief Task Force of the International Society of Nephrology and European Renal Best Practice, a work group of nephrologists, intensivists, surgeons, and logisticians with disaster experience or experts in guideline preparation collaborated to provide comprehensive information and recommendations on the management of crush casualties considering their occurrence with “epidemic” dimensions after mass disasters. The result is the monograph “Recommendations for the Management of Crush Victims in Mass Disasters”, which may help provide effective health care to disaster victims with renal problems. This article discusses medical and logistic principles of the treatment of crush victims, both at the disaster field and on admission to hospitals, and guidance is described. The importance of early fluid administration even before extrication of the victims and avoidance of potassium-containing solutions during the treatment of crush victims is underlined. Also, the logistic problems in treating crush casualties are emphasized. The most important aspects of the recently published recommendations are highlighted.
Ibsen’sJohn Gabriel Borkmanand Time
Authors: Sørensen Eli Park 
Published: September 2012

ABSTRACT:This article discusses Henrik Ibsen’s John Gabriel Borkman and the play’s engagement with the difficulties of reconciling dramatic time and prosaic or subjective time. I argue that John Gabriel Borkman can be read as a meta-fictional text that explores the time after traditional drama has come to an end. The actual drama (or what would have been the drama had the playwright adopted a traditional dramatic form) has been displaced to the past and replaced by a present that is characterized by an undramatic, prosaic, or subjective temporality. At the same time, this is, of course, the drama of John Gabriel Borkman, and thus, the play meta-fictionally explores a split temporality. Ibsen’s penultimate play explores with painstaking insistence dramatic time’s lateness, a lateness that, on the one hand, displaces everything; while on the other hand, it renders all the unresolved issues of the past meaningless, insignificant.
The Canonization of Christopher Shinn: A Modest Proposal on Ethics
Authors: Bottoms Stephen 
Published: September 2012

ABSTRACT: This article represents the first sustained critique of the work of contemporary American dramatist, Christopher Shinn. Beginning with an anecdote about the exclusion of one of Shinn's plays from a prospective new play anthology, apparently because he is not yet ‘canonical’ enough, the article begs questions about how dramatic canons are constituted and policed. Through an analysis of three selected plays – Where Do We Live (2002), Dying City (2006) , and Now or Later (2008) – the essay then argues for the distinctive political valency of Shinn’s work, reading it in particular through the work of contemporary philosopher Alain Badiou, and his thinking on both ethics and theatre. Shinn’s work, though clearly rooted in his experience as a gay man, functions to problematize familiar categorizations such as a gay/straight, liberal/conservative, West/East. Questions of difference and sameness are explored through the quotidian lives of Shinn’s characters, but also in relation to the major public events (9/11, the invasion of Iraq, the 2008 presidential election) to which the plays respond.
“Drowned in Rabelaisian Laughter”: Germans as Grotesque Comic Figures in the Plays of Tennessee Williams
Authors: Saddik Annette J. 
Published: September 2012

ABSTRACT:By the time he wrote The Night of the Iguana, in 1961, Tennessee Williams was increasingly favouring “fantastic” modes of presenting reality, relying on the more expressionistic and “plastic” kind of theatre that he had called for, as early as 1944, in his production notes to The Glass Menagerie. Williams’s interest in the fantastic modes of representation characteristic of German expressionism, in particular, along with his exaggerated, grotesque, and dream-like portrayal of Germans as symbolic characters in Iguana and several plays that would follow, shows that he was beginning to engage more fully a German sensibility that he would continue to develop in his later work. In The Gnädiges Fräulein (1966), A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur (1979), and Kirche, Küche, Kinder (1979), for example, Germans also function as grotesque comic figures: perverse, darkly humorous, excessive, and bawdy. The German characters in Williams’s plays are inspired by an aesthetic rooted in the traditions of German expressionism and Romanticism that influenced his writing, as he fused these styles with related sensibilities – the carnivalesque, the grotesque, camp – that are associated with the resistance and rebellion typical of his late plays.
The Philadelphia Harlem Story: Langston Hughes’s Screwy Play Little Ham
Authors: Emery Sharyn 
Published: September 2012

ABSTRACT: Langston Hughes’s 1935 play Little Ham was a genre-bending moment, influenced by screwball comedies on the 1930s movie screen and by Hughes’s own love of African-American vernacular culture. By using this lens to examine the play, a rich picture of the Harlem Renaissance emerges, highlighting the difficult task of representation and engagement with cultural forms at a time when the spectre of minstrelsy still haunted the African-American stage. Hughes’s project with Little Ham was, at once, ludic and critical, creating a classic comedy that deserves a closer look.
A London Legacy of Ira Aldridge: Henry Francis Downing and the Paratheatrical Poetics of Plot and Cast(e)
Authors: Roberts Brian Russell 
Published: September 2012

ABSTRACT: Situating Henry Francis Downing as an important if traditionally overlooked black playwright of America, Britain, and the Atlantic world, this article brings focus to Downing’s 1914 drama Incentives, which evinces Downing’s indebtedness to nineteenthcentury black dramatist Ira Aldridge even as it conceives of the world (during the months immediately preceding the First World War) as interconnected by sinews of capital, empire, and transnational alliance. As Incentives weaves its settings, back-stories, and spheres of concern through Britain, the American West, New York City, continental Europe, and European empires throughout the world, the drama’s preoccupations with the theatrical conventions of plot and cast contribute to Downing’s larger legacy as a playwright attempting to use drama to alter representations of diasporic blackness within a version of the world that envisions transnational capitalism as usurping the hegemony of nation-states. Downing’s current status as a little-known playwright should cause critical reflection on the ways in which scholars have pursued questions of diaspora and the black Atlantic.
Association of High Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol with Renal Function in Type 2 Diabetic Subjects in a Bangladeshi Population
Authors: Saiedullah Muhammad , Rahman Muhammad Rezwanur , Begum Shahnaj , Hayat Shoma , Khan Md Aminul Haque 
Published: September 2012

Background: Abnormalities in lipid metabolism are associated with renal diseases. Association of serum lipid parameters with renal function is less studied in subjects with type 2 diabetes in Bangladeshi population. Objective: To assess the correlation of high density lipoprotein cholesterol with glomerular filtration rate (GFR) in type 2 diabetic subjects.Materials and Methods: One thousand three hundred thirty confirmed diabetic subjects advised for HbA1c, serum creatinine, serum total cholesterol, serum triglycerides, serum HDL cholesterol and LDL cholesterol were included in the study. Serum total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, triglyceride, serum creatinine, HbA1c were measured by standard methods and serum LDL cholesterol was calculated by Friedewalds formula. GFR was calculated by MDRD4 variables prediction equation. Total subjects were grouped according to sex; both males and females were subdivided into three subgroups depending on GFR values. Results of lipid parameters were compared by one-way ANOVA among different groups and correlation of lipid parameters with GFR were expressed by Pearson r.Results: HDL cholesterol was significantly different among different GFR groups (p<0.05) and positively correlated with GFR (r = 0.1386, p<0.001) in males. Total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol showed feeble positive correlation with GFR (r = 0.0789, p<0.05 for total cholesterol and r = 0.0768, p<0.05 for LDL cholesterol), but are not significantly different among GFR groups (p>0.05) in males. Total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, non-HDL cholesterol and LDLC/HDL-C were significantly different among three different GFR groups (p<0.01) and only HDL cholesterol and LDL-C/HDL-C showed weak correlation with GFR (r = 0.0770, p<0.05 for HDL cholesterol and r = -0.0803, p<0.05 for LDL-C/HDL-C) in females.Conclusion: The study revealed that HDL cholesterol was significantly and positively correlated with glomerular filtration rate in both male and female diabetic subjects and assessment of lipid parameters might be a helpful tool to prevent or delay the progression of renal insufficiency. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/jemc.v2i1.11916 J Enam Med Col 2012; 2(1): 15-19