Increased Serum Levels of Activated Caspases in Murine and Human Biliary Atresia.

In biliary atresia (BA), apoptosis is part of the pathomechanism, which results in progressive liver fibrosis. There is increasing evidence suggesting that apoptotic liver injury can be non-invasively detected by measuring the caspase activity in the serum. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether serological detection of caspase activation mirrors apoptotic liver injury in the infective murine BA-model and represents a suitable biomarker for BA in humans.

The effect of hydroxychloroquine on platelet activation in model experiments.

Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) is an antimalarial agent with pleiotropic effects and now represents a cornerstone in the management of patients with autoimmune conditions. While clinical series suggest anti-thrombotic properties, the way in which HCQ exerts this effect remains to be fully explained. Following a 24-h incubation of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) and human umbilical arterial endothelial cells (HUAEC) with HCQ (concentration 500, 1000 and 2000 ng/ml), these cells were then stimulated for an hour with tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) and were subsequently incubated in direct contact with thrombin-activated platelets.

Excitation of Whispering Gallery Magnons in a Magnetic Vortex.

We present the generation of whispering gallery magnons with unprecedented high wave vectors via nonlinear 3-magnon scattering in a μm-sized magnetic Ni_{81}Fe_{19} disc which is in the vortex state. These modes exhibit a strong localization at the perimeter of the disc and practically zero amplitude in an extended area around the vortex core. They originate from the splitting of the fundamental radial magnon modes, which can be resonantly excited in a vortex texture by an out-of-plane microwave field.