Use of an electronic documentation module to improve surgical debriefing effectiveness.

Background: Effective communication in the operating room is crucial for patient safety and optimal outcomes. Structured debriefing communication tools can improve team coordination and address recurring safety concerns. During the unique circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, this study evaluated an approach to documentation and loop closure that functioned under constrained hospital resources, a loss of capacity for face-to-face provider training and loop closure, and periods of performing only urgent and emergent surgery for which some debriefing elements, like patient disposition and equipment needs, are more dynamic.

Epigenetic insights to pediatric uropathology: Celebrating the fundamental biology vision of Tony Khoury.

Introduction: Many pediatric urology conditions affect putatively normal tissues or appear too commonly to be based solely on specific DNA mutations. Understanding epigenetic mechanisms in pediatric urology, therefore, has many implications that can impact cell and tissue responses to settings, such as environmental and hormonal influences on urethral development, uropathogenic infections, obstructive stimuli, all of which originate externally or extracellularly. Indeed, the cell's response to external stimuli is often mediated epigenetically.

Simple synaptic modulations implement diverse novelty computations.

Detecting novelty is ethologically useful for an organism's survival. Recent experiments characterize how different types of novelty over timescales from seconds to weeks are reflected in the activity of excitatory and inhibitory neuron types. Here, we introduce a learning mechanism, familiarity-modulated synapses (FMSs), consisting of multiplicative modulations dependent on presynaptic or pre/postsynaptic neuron activity.

The complex polyploid genome architecture of sugarcane.

Sugarcane, the world's most harvested crop by tonnage, has shaped global history, trade and geopolitics, and is currently responsible for 80% of sugar production worldwide. While traditional sugarcane breeding methods have effectively generated cultivars adapted to new environments and pathogens, sugar yield improvements have recently plateaued. The cessation of yield gains may be due to limited genetic diversity within breeding populations, long breeding cycles and the complexity of its genome, the latter preventing breeders from taking advantage of the recent explosion of whole-genome sequencing that has benefited many other crops.

Complete Primary Pathological Response Following Neoadjuvant Treatment and Radical Resection for Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma.

Introduction: Neoadjuvant treatment (NAT) for borderline (BD) or locally advanced (LA) primary pancreatic cancer (PDAC) is now a widely adopted approach. We present a case series of patients who have achieved a complete pathological response of the primary tumour on final histology following neoadjuvant chemotherapy +/- chemoradiation and radical surgery.

Methods: Patients who underwent radical pancreatic resection following neoadjuvant treatment between March 2006 and March 2023 at a single institution were identified by retrospective case note review of a prospectively maintained database.

Optimising clonal performance in sugarcane: leveraging non-additive effects via mate-allocation strategies.

Mate-allocation strategies in breeding programs can improve progeny performance by harnessing non-additive genetic effects. These approaches prioritise predicted progeny merit over parental breeding value, making them particularly appealing for clonally propagated crops such as sugarcane. We conducted a comparative analysis of mate-allocation strategies, exploring utilising non-additive and heterozygosity effects to maximise clonal performance with schemes that solely consider additive effects to optimise breeding value.

Six-Month Survivorship Prediction in Spinal Metastatic Patients by Oncologists Shows Reliable Prognostication.

Study Design: A retrospective analysis of oncologist-provided prognoses vs actual survival outcomes of patients referred with Metastatic spinal cord compression (MSCC) to a supra-regional multidisciplinary team (MDT).

Objectives: Prognostic scoring systems, such as the revised Tokuhashi, are commonly used to help guide the treatment of MSCC. However, scoring systems do not accommodate for the improved outcomes of contemporary cancer therapy.

Simple synaptic modulations implement diverse novelty computations.

Since environments are constantly in flux, the brain's ability to identify novel stimuli that fall outside its own internal representation of the world is crucial for an organism's survival. Within the mammalian neocortex, inhibitory microcircuits are proposed to regulate activity in an experience-dependent manner and different inhibitory neuron subtypes exhibit distinct novelty responses. Discerning the function of diverse neural circuits and their modulation by experience can be daunting unless one has a biologically plausible mechanism to detect and learn from novel experiences that is both understandable and flexible.

EZH2 and matrix co-regulate phenotype and KCNB2 expression in bladder smooth muscle cells.

Background: Partial bladder outlet obstruction (PBO) is a widespread cause of urinary dysfunction and patient discomfort, resulting in immense health care costs. Previously, we found that obstruction is associated with altered regulation of epigenetic machinery and altered function. Here we examined if PBO and chronic bladder obstructive disease (COBD) affect epigenetic marks in a proof of principle gene and explored mechanisms of its epigenetic regulation using models.

Neural population dynamics of computing with synaptic modulations.

In addition to long-timescale rewiring, synapses in the brain are subject to significant modulation that occurs at faster timescales that endow the brain with additional means of processing information. Despite this, models of the brain like recurrent neural networks (RNNs) often have their weights frozen after training, relying on an internal state stored in neuronal activity to hold task-relevant information. In this work, we study the computational potential and resulting dynamics of a network that relies solely on synapse modulation during inference to process task-relevant information, the multi-plasticity network (MPN).

The geometry of representational drift in natural and artificial neural networks.

Neurons in sensory areas encode/represent stimuli. Surprisingly, recent studies have suggested that, even during persistent performance, these representations are not stable and change over the course of days and weeks. We examine stimulus representations from fluorescence recordings across hundreds of neurons in the visual cortex using in vivo two-photon calcium imaging and we corroborate previous studies finding that such representations change as experimental trials are repeated across days.

Combining genomic selection with genome-wide association analysis identified a large-effect QTL and improved selection for red rot resistance in sugarcane.

Red rot caused by the fungus is the main disease limiting sugarcane productivity in several countries including the major producer India. The genetic basis for red rot resistance is unclear. We studied a panel of 305 sugarcane clones from the Australian breeding program for disease response phenotype and genotype using an Affymetrix Axiom array, to better understand the genetic basis of red rot resistance.

First multicentre experience of SABR for lymph node and liver oligometastatic disease on the unity MR-Linac.

The treatment of oligometastatic disease using MR guidance is an evolving field. Since August 2018 patients are treated on a 1.5 Tesla MR-Linac (MRL).

Potential for Isotoxic Re-irradiation Stereotactic Ablative Body Radiotherapy in Locally Recurrent Rectal Cancer.

Aims: The non-surgical management of locally recurrent rectal cancer (LRRC) is an area of unmet need, with no defined standard treatment and extremely poor outcomes. Patients typically receive radiotherapy during initial multimodality treatment and historically re-irradiation has been limited to conservative doses with subsequent short-term symptom control. Recently, stereotactic ablative body radiotherapy (SABR) has shown promise in re-irradiation of LRRC in England, but is limited to a relatively modest dose prescription of 30Gy in five fractions.

Technical Radiotherapy Advances - The Role of Magnetic Resonance Imaging-Guided Radiation in the Delivery of Hypofractionation.

Safe delivery of hypofractionated radiotherapy requires high levels of accuracy due to the high doses of radiation delivered per fraction. Magnetic resonance guided radiotherapy (MRgRT) represents a new treatment paradigm which allows improved visualisation of targets and organs at risk, alongside the capability to adapt the treatment plan in real time prior to treatment delivery. There are challenges to delivering hypofractionated radiotherapy with conventional image-guided radiotherapy (IGRT) techniques and MRgRT may help to improve accuracy in radiation delivery in a number of clinical and anatomical scenarios.

Isolation and sequencing of a single copy of an introgressed chromosome from a complex genome for gene and SNP identification.

This manuscript describes the identification, isolation and sequencing of a single chromosome containing high value resistance genes from a complex polyploid where sequencing the whole genome is too costly. The large complex genomes of many crops constrain the use of new technologies for genome-assisted selection and genetic improvement. One method to simplify a genome is to break it into individual chromosomes by flow cytometry; however, in many crop species most chromosomes cannot be isolated individually.

UK 2022 Consensus on Normal Tissue Dose-Volume Constraints for Oligometastatic, Primary Lung and Hepatocellular Carcinoma Stereotactic Ablative Radiotherapy.

The use of stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR) in the UK has expanded over the past decade, in part as the result of several UK clinical trials and a recent NHS England Commissioning through Evaluation programme. A UK SABR Consortium consensus for normal tissue constraints for SABR was published in 2017, based on the existing literature at the time. The published literature regarding SABR has increased in volume over the past 5 years and multiple UK centres are currently working to develop new SABR services.

Resistance mechanisms and expression of disease resistance-related genes in sugarcane (Sacchrum officinarum) to Sporisorium scitamineum infection.

Resistance of sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) to smut disease (caused by Sporisorium scitamineum) is driven by two separate mechanisms, external and internal resistance. Two progenies generated from an introgression cross, with contrasting responses to smut infection were used to investigate this interaction.

A linkage disequilibrium-based approach to position unmapped SNPs in crop species.

Background: High-density SNP arrays are now available for a wide range of crop species. Despite the development of many tools for generating genetic maps, the genome position of many SNPs from these arrays is unknown. Here we propose a linkage disequilibrium (LD)-based algorithm to allocate unassigned SNPs to chromosome regions from sparse genetic maps.

Genomic Selection in Sugarcane: Current Status and Future Prospects.

Sugarcane is a C4 and agro-industry-based crop with a high potential for biomass production. It serves as raw material for the production of sugar, ethanol, and electricity. Modern sugarcane varieties are derived from the interspecific and intergeneric hybridization between , and other wild relatives.

An international Delphi consensus for pelvic stereotactic ablative radiotherapy re-irradiation.

Introduction: Stereotactic Ablative Radiotherapy (SABR) is increasingly used to treat metastatic oligorecurrence and locoregional recurrences but limited evidence/guidance exists in the setting of pelvic re-irradiation. An international Delphi study was performed to develop statements to guide practice regarding patient selection, pre-treatment investigations, treatment planning, delivery and cumulative organs at risk (OARs) constraints.

Materials And Methods: Forty-one radiation oncologists were invited to participate in three online surveys.

Inhibition of DNA methylation during chronic obstructive bladder disease (COBD) improves function, pathology and expression.

Partial bladder outlet obstruction due to prostate hyperplasia or posterior urethral valves, is a widespread cause of urinary dysfunction, patient discomfort and also responsible for immense health care costs. Even after removal or relief of obstruction, the functional and pathologic aspects of obstruction remain as a chronic obstructive bladder disease (COBD). Epigenetic changes, such as DNA methylation, contribute to the persistent character of many chronic diseases, and may be altered in COBD.