Analytical and Clinical Validation of an Automated Microfluidic Interleukin-6 Immunoassay.

Objective: We validated an automated microfluidic interleukin-6 (IL-6) immunoassay on the Ella platform for clinical use.

Methods: The assay was validated for precision, lower limit of quantification, analytical measurement range, accuracy, specificity, interference of biotin, tocilizumab, GP130, IL-6R, hemolysis, icterus, and lipemia, and establishing the reference value. The clinical performance was evaluated in 96 COVID-19 patients.

Higher-order nonequilibrium term: Effective power density quantifying evolution towards or away from local thermodynamic equilibrium.

A common approach to assess the nature of energy conversion in a classical fluid or plasma is to compare power densities of the various possible energy conversion mechanisms. A leading research area is quantifying energy conversion for systems that are not in local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE), as is common in a number of fluid and plasma systems. Here we introduce the "higher-order nonequilibrium term" (HORNET) effective power density, which quantifies the rate of change of departure of a phase space density from LTE.

Using Direct Laboratory Measurements of Electron Temperature Anisotropy to Identify the Heating Mechanism in Electron-Only Guide Field Magnetic Reconnection.

Anisotropic electron heating during electron-only magnetic reconnection with a large guide magnetic field is directly measured in a laboratory plasma through in situ measurements of electron velocity distribution functions. Electron heating preferentially parallel to the magnetic field is localized to one separatrix, and anisotropies of 1.5 are measured.

Comparative analysis of platelet depleted plasma prepared on the Roche 8100 automation line and manually centrifuged platelet poor plasma for routine coagulation assays.

Objectives: To evaluate whether the routine coagulation tests can be performed using platelet depleted plasma (PDP, residual platelet count <40000/μL) to achieve maximum efficiency of the automated workflow and compare results of these tests performed with platelet poor plasma (PPP residual platelet count <10,000/μL) prepared manually 'offline'.

Design And Methods: The PDP was obtained first following 'on line' centrifugation at 4150 RPM (3000) for 7 min. The routine coagulation tests, Prothrombin Time (PT), Activated Partial Thromboplastin Clotting Time (aPTT), D-dimer (DD), Antithrombin III (AT3) and Fibrinogen (FBG) were performed.

Analytical and Clinical Performance of Two Point of Care Rapid Antibody Assays for SARS-CoV-2.

Objective: The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has reached to a state where populations across the world should ad-just to live with it like many other diseases. Regular serosurveys are essential for disease surveil-lance and policy decisions. In this study, we evaluated the analytical and clinical performance of two commercially available rapid antibody assays.

Post-pandemic tourism strategies: A case of Himachal Pradesh.

Tourism has always been a vulnerable industry. Minimal disturbances can halt or even destroy tourism and its associated economy. There is no dearth of research on vulnerability and resilience of the tourism industry for various tourism destinations,, and on post-disaster studies, but mainly these were limited to a city or tourist destination and focused on the destination image recovery.

Quantifying Energy Conversion in Higher-Order Phase Space Density Moments in Plasmas.

Weakly collisional and collisionless plasmas are typically far from local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE), and understanding energy conversion in such systems is a forefront research problem. The standard approach is to investigate changes in internal (thermal) energy and density, but this omits energy conversion that changes any higher-order moments of the phase space density. In this Letter, we calculate from first principles the energy conversion associated with all higher moments of the phase space density for systems not in LTE.

Comparison of Performance between the Elecsys 4 and 5 Generation STAT Cardiac Troponin T Immunoassays.

Objective: To evaluate the analytical and clinical performance of the 5 GEN cTnT assay by comparing it with the 4 GEN assay.

Methods: Imprecision, analytical measurement range (AMR), reference interval, and quantitative comparison were studied. Qualitative comparisons of the two assays for randomly selected patients with the cTnT test orders and patients with elevated N-terminal proB-type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP), decreased estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), and increased procalcitonin were performed.

Laboratory Observations of Electron Heating and Non-Maxwellian Distributions at the Kinetic Scale during Electron-Only Magnetic Reconnection.

Non-Maxwellian electron velocity distribution functions composed of a warm bulk population and a cold beam are directly measured during electron-only reconnection with a strong out-of-plane (guide) magnetic field in a laboratory plasma. Electron heating is localized to the separatrix, and the electron temperature increases continuously along the separatrix. The measured gain in enthalpy flux is 70% of the incoming Poynting flux.

Reliability of mobile application-based cephalometric analysis for chair side evaluation of orthodontic patient in clinical practice.

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the accuracy and reliability of Mobile Application-Based Software for chair side cephalometric analysis.

Materials And Method: Pretreatment lateral cephalograms of 20 patients (10 males and 10 females) were selected randomly and were traced manually and also using Application-based software (One Ceph). 20 angular and three linear parameters were measured both manually and with the software in all the patients.

Integrated genomic analysis reveals mutated ELF3 as a potential gallbladder cancer vaccine candidate.

Gallbladder cancer (GBC) is an aggressive gastrointestinal malignancy with no approved targeted therapy. Here, we analyze exomes (n = 160), transcriptomes (n = 115), and low pass whole genomes (n = 146) from 167 gallbladder cancers (GBCs) from patients in Korea, India and Chile. In addition, we also sequence samples from 39 GBC high-risk patients and detect evidence of early cancer-related genomic lesions.

Epigenetic downregulation of desmin in gall bladder cancer reveals its potential role in disease progression.

Background & Objectives: Gall bladder cancer (GBC) is a fatal neoplasm, with a globally variable incidence rates. To improve the survival rate of patients, a newer set of biomarkers needs to be discovered for its early detection and better prognosis. Our earlier studies on GBC proteomics and whole-genome methylome data revealed expression of desmin to be significantly downregulated with correlated promoter hypermethylation during gall bladder carcinogenesis.

and cooperate to drive metastasis by eliciting crosstalk between cancer and innate immunity.

Metastasis is a major cause of cancer mortality. We generated an autochthonous transgenic mouse model whereby conditional expression of and enables hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) to metastasize in >90% of mice. and cooperate and their sustained expression is required to elicit a transcriptional program associated with the activation of innate immunity, through secretion of a cytokinome that elicits recruitment and polarization of tumor associated macrophages (TAMs).

PIM1 kinase promotes gallbladder cancer cell proliferation via inhibition of proline-rich Akt substrate of 40 kDa (PRAS40).

Gallbladder cancer (GBC) is a rare malignancy, associated with poor disease prognosis with a 5-year survival of only 20%. This has been attributed to late presentation of the disease, lack of early diagnostic markers and limited efficacy of therapeutic interventions. Elucidation of molecular events in GBC can contribute to better management of the disease by aiding in the identification of therapeutic targets.

A cross-talk on compositional dynamics and codon usage patterns of mitochondrial CYB gene in Echinodermata.

Codon usage bias (CUB) refers to a phenomenon in which some synonymous codons are used in mature mRNA at a higher frequency than other members codifying the same amino acid. CUB is mainly determined by mutation pressure and natural selection. We used bioinformatic tools to analyze the protein coding sequences of mitochondrial CYB gene in different classes of Echinodermata to understand the patterns of codon usage.

Identification of spleen tyrosine kinase as a potential therapeutic target for esophageal squamous cell carcinoma using reverse phase protein arrays.

The vast majority of esophageal cancers in China, India and Iran are esophageal squamous cell carcinomas (ESCC). A timely diagnosis provides surgical removal as the main therapeutic option for patients with ESCC. Currently, there are no targeted therapies available for ESCC.

Therapeutic potential of an anti-angiogenic multimodal biomimetic peptide in hepatocellular carcinoma.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a major cause of cancer-related death worldwide. Due to inadequate screening methods and the common coexistence of limited functional liver reserves, curative treatment options are limited. Liver transplantation is the only curative treatment modality for early HCC.

Discovery of noncanonical translation initiation sites through mass spectrometric analysis of protein N termini.

Translation initiation generally occurs at AUG codons in eukaryotes, although it has been shown that non-AUG or noncanonical translation initiation can also occur. However, the evidence for noncanonical translation initiation sites (TISs) is largely indirect and based on ribosome profiling (Ribo-seq) studies. Here, using a strategy specifically designed to enrich N termini of proteins, we demonstrate that many human proteins are translated at noncanonical TISs.

The non-receptor tyrosine kinase TNK2/ACK1 is a novel therapeutic target in triple negative breast cancer.

Breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer in women worldwide. About 15-20% of all breast cancers do not express estrogen receptor, progesterone receptor or HER2 receptor and hence are collectively classified as triple negative breast cancer (TNBC). These tumors are often relatively aggressive when compared to other types of breast cancer, and this issue is compounded by the lack of effective targeted therapy.