Vascular Malformation Involving the Brachial Plexus: A Case Report and Review of Literature.

Introduction: Vascular anomalies, comprising up to 4.5% of the general population, are aberrations occurring during vascular development. Vascular abnormalities are frequently identified in children and frequently exhibit characteristics similar to nerve sheath tumors.

Phase transition from nematic to high-density disordered phase in a system of hard rods on a lattice.

A system of hard rigid rods of length k on hypercubic lattices is known to undergo two phase transitions when chemical potential is increased: from a low density isotropic phase to an intermediate density nematic phase, and on further increase to a high-density phase with no orientational order. In this paper, we argue that, for large k, the second phase transition is a first-order transition with a discontinuity in density in all dimensions greater than 1. We show that the chemical potential at the transition is ≈kln[k/lnk] for large k, and that the density of uncovered sites drops from a value ≈(lnk)/k^{2} to a value of order exp(-ak), where a is some constant, across the transition.

Immune dysregulation and autoreactivity correlate with disease severity in SARS-CoV-2-associated multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children.

Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) is a life-threatening post-infectious complication occurring unpredictably weeks after mild or asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection. We profiled MIS-C, adult COVID-19, and healthy pediatric and adult individuals using single-cell RNA sequencing, flow cytometry, antigen receptor repertoire analysis, and unbiased serum proteomics, which collectively identified a signature in MIS-C patients that correlated with disease severity. Despite having no evidence of active infection, MIS-C patients had elevated S100A-family alarmins and decreased antigen presentation signatures, indicative of myeloid dysfunction.

Post-infectious inflammatory disease in MIS-C features elevated cytotoxicity signatures and autoreactivity that correlates with severity.

Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) is a life-threatening post-infectious complication occurring unpredictably weeks after mild or asymptomatic SARS-CoV2 infection in otherwise healthy children. Here, we define immune abnormalities in MIS-C compared to adult COVID-19 and pediatric/adult healthy controls using single-cell RNA sequencing, antigen receptor repertoire analysis, unbiased serum proteomics, and assays. Despite no evidence of active infection, we uncover elevated S100A-family alarmins in myeloid cells and marked enrichment of serum proteins that map to myeloid cells and pathways including cytokines, complement/coagulation, and fluid shear stress in MIS-C patients.

Investigating the Mechanism of Cyclodextrins in the Treatment of Niemann-Pick Disease Type C Using Crosslinked 2-Hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin.

Niemann-Pick disease type C (NPC) is a severe disorder that is characterized by intracellular transport abnormalities leading to cytoplasmic accumulation of lipids such as cholesterol and sphingolipids. The compound 2-hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin (HPβCD) has high cholesterol complexation capacity and is currently under clinical investigation for the NPC treatment. However, due to its short blood half-life, high doses are required to produce a therapeutic effect.

Non-invasive molecularly-specific millimeter-resolution manipulation of brain circuits by ultrasound-mediated aggregation and uncaging of drug carriers.

Non-invasive, molecularly-specific, focal modulation of brain circuits with low off-target effects can lead to breakthroughs in treatments of brain disorders. We systemically inject engineered ultrasound-controllable drug carriers and subsequently apply a novel two-component Aggregation and Uncaging Focused Ultrasound Sequence (AU-FUS) at the desired targets inside the brain. The first sequence aggregates drug carriers with millimeter-precision by orders of magnitude.