Mccallkenney1533
043) was higher in infected cats. This finding may suggest an association between infection by L. infantum and feline kidney disease.Provitamin A biofortified maize is promoted in developing country to curb vitamin A deficiency. To determine the provitamin A carotenoid content of fresh and stored biofortified maize requires analytical techniques that are affordable by the targeted population. In this study color parameters (L∗, a∗, b∗) individually or in combination were used to estimate carotenoid content in high carotenoid biofortified maize. There was an increase in L∗ value with storage indicating grains were becoming lighter while a∗ and b∗ values did not change significantly. Almost all storage bags induced total color change (ΔE∗) greater than 2 which is perceivable by consumers as a deviation from original quality. The coefficient of determination (R2) between carotenoid content and color parameters were high and significant for most color parameters suggesting that they could be used to estimate carotenoid content in biofortified maize. While change of color is indicative of carotenoid degradation, our study found that ΔE∗ is a poor estimator of carotenoids lost during post-harvest storage of biofortified maize. Hue (h∗), L∗ and a∗ gave consistently and significantly higher R2 (p less then 0.05) for almost all carotenoids analyzed suggesting that they could be used to generate predictive models for estimating carotenoid content in stored biofortified maize.
Advanced triple negative breast cancer (ATNBC) is defined by a lack of expression of hormones receptors as well as HER2/neu and its high probability of visceral metastasis. This pathology is associated with a poor prognosis. Previously, we found that T2, an
-arylsubstituted thiosemicarbazone (
-TSC), had cytotoxic effect on human breast cancer cells lines. Hence, in this study, we investigated the anti-metastasic action of T2 on ATNBC.
In order to deepen T2 action mode on ATNBC, we first confirmed T2 cytotoxicity on a panel of TNBC cells and then continued studying T2 effects
an
on the syngeneic 4T1 mouse model.
We found that T2 had a cytotoxic effect comparable to chemotherapeutics used in present treatment schemes for ATNBC. T2 treatment not only induced apoptosis, but it also down-modulated 4T1 invasive and metastatic-associated capacities, such as clonogenicity, migration and metallo-proteases activity. Moreover, this agent reduced the number of 4T1 cancer stem cells. Finally, T2 treatment induced a more differentiated cell phenotype and the overexpression of the metastasis suppressor gene NDRG-1.
assays showed that T2 reduced tumor burden, down modulated local tumor invasion and significantly reduced the number of lung metastases in the 4T1 advanced TNBC murine model, while the compound did not exhibit intolerable toxicity.
This study provided evidence that T2 not only exerted an anti-tumor activity but it also showed anti-invasive and anti-metastatic actions on ATNBC
and
, suggesting that T2 could be considered as a promising therapy that deserves further analysis.
This study provided evidence that T2 not only exerted an anti-tumor activity but it also showed anti-invasive and anti-metastatic actions on ATNBC in vivo and in vitro, suggesting that T2 could be considered as a promising therapy that deserves further analysis.This paper aims to provide a critical review of the studies dealing with Educational Robotics for children with Neurodevelopmental Disorders. We aimed to investigate whether in the literature there is a sound evidence that activities with robots improve the abilities and performances of children with special needs. This paper explores the methodological aspects as well as the outcomes of the selected studies to provide a clear picture of the state-of-the-art on this topic. After a systematic search in the online database via keyword searches, 15 scientific papers were included in this review. We applied strict selection criteria limiting our review only to papers reporting educational robotics activities with children (from 3 up to 19 years old) with a diagnosis of neurodevelopmental disorders, in which the children had the opportunity to somehow program the behaviours of real robots. The majority of experiences showed improvements in the participants' performance or abilities, their engagement and involvement, communication/interaction with peers, during robotics sessions. Some studies reported mixed results, calling for the need to carefully design the objective and the related activities of each experience.Our previous reports showed that 1α,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 (1α,25(OH)2D3) has antiproliferative actions in endothelial cells stably expressing viral G protein-coupled receptor (vGPCR) associated with the pathogenesis of Kaposi's sarcoma. It has been reported that COX-2 enzyme, involved in the tumorigenesis of many types of cancers, is induced by vGPCR. Therefore, we investigated whether COX-2 down-regulation is part of the growth inhibitory effects of 1α,25(OH)2D3. Proliferation was measured in presence of COX-2 inhibitor Celecoxib (10-20 μM) revealing a decreased in vGPCR cell number, displaying typically apoptotic features in a dose dependent manner similarly to 1α,25(OH)2D3. In addition, the reduced cell viability observed with 20 μM Celecoxib was enhanced in presence of 1α,25(OH)2D3. Remarkably, although COX-2 mRNA and protein levels were up-regulated after 1α,25(OH)2D3 treatment, COX-2 enzymatic activity was reduced in a VDR-dependent manner. Furthermore, an interaction between COX-2 and VDR was revealed through GST pull-down and computational analysis. Additionally, high-affinity prostanoid receptors (EP3 and EP4) were found down-regulated by 1α,25(OH)2D3. Altogether, these results suggest a down-regulation of COX-2 activity and of prostanoid receptors as part of the antineoplastic mechanism of 1α,25(OH)2D3 in endothelial cells transformed by vGPCR.Facial appearance has essential consequences in various social interactions. Previous studies have shown that although people can perceive a variety of impressions from a face, these impressions may form from a relatively small number of core dimensions in the psychological impression space (e.g., valence and dominance). However, few studies have thus far examined which facial shape features contribute to perceptions of the core trait impression dimensions for Asian female faces. selleckchem This study aimed to identify the commonalities between various facial impressions of Japanese female faces and determine the facial shape components associated with such impressions by applying geometric morphometric (GMM) analysis. In Experiment 1 (Modeling study), Japanese female faces were evaluated in terms of 18 trait adjectives that are frequently used to describe facial appearance in daily life. We found that Japanese female facial appearance is indeed evaluated mainly on the valence and dominance dimensions. In Experiment 2 (Validation study), we confirmed that all the trait impressions were quantitatively manipulated by transforming the facial shape features associated with valence and dominance.