Publications by authors named "Heine Mueller"

Background: Persistent tachypnea of infancy (PTI)/neuroendocrine cell hyperplasia of infancy (NEHI) is a form of childhood interstitial lung disease (chILD) that predominantly affects young children. Although it is one of the most common chILDs, there is no unified diagnostic approach specific to this condition.

Research Question: Is there a difference in the clinical presentation and the diagnostic approach in PTI/NEHI patients between the European countries?

Study Design And Methods: This was a European multicenter, retrospective, observational study.

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Background: Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) for COVID-19 was thoroughly assessed during the first pandemic wave, but data on subsequent waves are limited. We aimed to investigate in-hospital and 6-month survival of patients with COVID-19 supported with ECMO from the second pandemic wave (Sept 15, 2020) until the end of the pandemic (March 21, 2023, announced by WHO).

Methods: EuroECMO-COVID is a prospective, observational study including adults (aged ≥16 years) requiring ECMO respiratory support for COVID-19 from 98 centres in 21 countries.

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KRAS-dependent acinar-to-ductal metaplasia (ADM) is a fundamental step in the development of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), but the involvement of cell death pathways remains unclear. Here, we show that key regulators of programmed cell death (PCD) become upregulated during KRAS-driven ADM, thereby priming transdifferentiated cells to death. Using transgenic mice and primary cell and organoid cultures, we show that transforming growth factor (TGF)-β-activated kinase 1 (TAK1), a kinase regulating cell survival and inflammatory pathways, prevents the elimination of transdifferentiated cells through receptor-interacting protein kinase 1 (RIPK1)-mediated apoptosis and necroptosis, enabling PDAC development.

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Anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor T cells (CAR) are a well-established treatment option for children and young adults suffering from relapsed/refractory B-lineage acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Bridging therapy is used to control disease prior to start of lymphodepletion before CAR infusion and thereby improve efficacy of CAR therapy. However, the effect of different bridging strategies on outcome, side effects and response to CAR therapy is still poorly understood.

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Objective: Treatment approaches for endometrial cancer became more personalized in the last decade, mainly due to two key advancements - sentinel lymph node (SLN) mapping and molecular classification. However, their prognostic interaction remains relatively unexplored.

Methods: This retrospective cohort study included patients with endometrial cancer, who underwent surgical treatment including SLN mapping at the Bern University Hospital, Switzerland.

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Aims: Mutations affecting exon 3 of the β-catenin () gene result in constitutive activation of WNT signalling and are a diagnostic hallmark of several tumour entities including desmoid-type fibromatosis. They also define clinically relevant tumour subtypes within certain entities, such as endometrioid carcinoma. In diagnostics, β-catenin immunohistochemistry is widely used as a surrogate for mutations.

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Movement is a key means by which animals cope with variable environments. As they move, animals construct individual niches composed of the environmental conditions they experience. Niche axes may vary over time and covary with one another as animals make tradeoffs between competing needs.

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AI image classification algorithms have shown promising results when applied to skin cancer detection. Most public skin cancer image datasets are comprised of dermoscopic photos and are limited by selection bias, lack of standardization, and lend themselves to development of algorithms that can only be used by skilled clinicians. The SLICE-3D ("Skin Lesion Image Crops Extracted from 3D TBP") dataset described here addresses those concerns and contains images of over 400,000 distinct skin lesions from seven dermatologic centers from around the world.

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Background: Therapeutic hypothermia is the standard treatment for neonates with hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy. Preclinical evidence indicates that the time to initiate therapeutic hypothermia correlates with its therapeutic success. This study aims to explore whether there is a correlation between the early initiation of therapeutic hypothermia and improved short-term neurological outcomes in cooled asphyxiated newborns.

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Article Synopsis
  • The use of living biological samples is crucial for preserving and documenting biological diversity, requiring reliable identification and data association for effective use and exchange of these materials.
  • There is currently no standardized naming system for identifying animal biological materials, which can lead to misidentification and data loss.
  • A newly proposed naming scheme aims to create unique identifiers for animal cellular materials, particularly for wildlife species, enhancing traceability and supporting long-term conservation efforts and biomedical research.
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Dystonia is a neurological movement disorder characterised by abnormal involuntary movements and postures, particularly affecting the head and neck. However, current clinical assessment methods for dystonia rely on simplified rating scales which lack the ability to capture the intricate spatiotemporal features of dystonic phenomena, hindering clinical management and limiting understanding of the underlying neurobiology. To address this, we developed a visual perceptive deep learning framework that utilizes standard clinical videos to comprehensively evaluate and quantify disease states and the impact of therapeutic interventions, specifically deep brain stimulation.

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Importance: Surgical site infections frequently occur after open abdominal surgery. Intraoperative wound irrigation as a preventive measure is a common practice worldwide, although evidence supporting this practice is lacking.

Objective: To evaluate the preventive effect of intraoperative wound irrigation with polyhexanide solution.

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Plants tightly control growth of their lateral organs, which led to the concept of apical dominance. However, outgrowth of the dormant lateral primordia is sensitive to the plant's nutritional status, resulting in an immense plasticity in plant architecture. While the impact of hormonal regulation on apical dominance is well characterized, the prime importance of sugar signaling to unleash lateral organ formation has just recently emerged.

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Background: Aside to clinical changes, behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) is characterized by progressive structural and functional alterations in frontal and temporal regions. We examined if there is a selective vulnerability of specific neurotransmitter systems in bvFTD by evaluating the link between disease-related functional alterations and the spatial distribution of specific neurotransmitter systems and their underlying gene expression levels.

Methods: Maps of fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (fALFF) were derived as a measure of local activity from resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging for 52 bvFTD patients (mean age = 61.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study compares volumetric measurements of pediatric low-grade gliomas (pLGG) to simpler 2D methods traditionally used in clinical trials, aiming to determine which is more effective for assessing tumor response.
  • An expert neuroradiologist assessed both solid and whole tumor volumes from MRI scans, finding that 3D volumetric analysis significantly outperformed 2D assessments in classifying tumor progression based on the BT-RADS criteria.
  • Results showed that using 3D volume thresholds provided strong sensitivity for detecting tumor progression, suggesting that volumetric methods could enhance clinical management of pLGG.
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Background: The phenotypes of tumor cells change during disease progression, but invasive rebiopsies of metastatic lesions are not always feasible. Here we aimed to determine whether initially HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients with HER2-positive circulating tumor cells (CTCs) benefit from a HER2-targeted therapy.

Methods: The open-label, interventional randomized phase III clinical trial (EudraCT Number 2010-024238-46, CliniclTrials.

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Metabolic engineering of filamentous fungi has received increasing attention in recent years, especially in the context of creating better industrial fungal cell factories to produce a wide range of valuable enzymes and metabolites from plant biomass. Recent studies into the pentose catabolic pathway (PCP) in have revealed functional redundancy in most of the pathway steps. In this study, a closer examination of the genome revealed five additional paralogs for the three original pentose reductases (LarA, XyrA, XyrB).

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Article Synopsis
  • The study compares unilateral and bilateral femoral cannulation strategies for peripheral venoarterial ECMO to determine which has a lower risk of limb ischemia.
  • Conducted as a retrospective cohort study using data from the Extracorporeal Life Support Organization registry, it analyzed outcomes in adult patients from 2014 to 2020.
  • Results showed no significant difference in overall limb ischemia between the two methods, but bilateral cannulation had lower rates of complications like compartment syndrome, bleeding at the cannulation site, and in-hospital mortality.
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Background: Deep brain stimulation (DBS) has been increasingly used in the management of dyskinetic cerebral palsy (DCP). Data on long-term effects and the safety profile are rare.

Objectives: We assessed the efficacy and safety of pallidal DBS in pediatric patients with DCP.

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Article Synopsis
  • - Autoimmune limbic encephalitis (ALE) is characterized by new seizures, memory issues, and changes in behavior and cognition, primarily affecting the mesial temporal lobe.
  • - CD8 T cells are important in cases without detectable autoantibodies, but identifying these patients is challenging, highlighting the need for better imaging techniques.
  • - The use of [F]DPA-714-PET-MRI to visualize microglia activation in the hippocampus and amygdala shows promise for assessing innate immunity in patients with CD8 T cell-mediated ALE, and findings were supported by results in a mouse model.
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Bacterial secondary metabolites exhibit diverse remarkable bioactivities and are thus the subject of study for different applications. Recently, the individual effectiveness of tripyrrolic prodiginines and rhamnolipids against the plant-parasitic nematode , which causes tremendous losses in crop plants, was described. Notably, rhamnolipid production in engineered strains has already reached industrial implementation.

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RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) form a large and diverse class of factors, many members of which are overexpressed in hematologic malignancies. RBPs participate in various processes of messenger RNA (mRNA) metabolism and prevent harmful DNA:RNA hybrids or R-loops. Here, we report that PIWIL4, a germ stem cell-associated RBP belonging to the RNase H-like superfamily, is overexpressed in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and is essential for leukemic stem cell function and AML growth, but dispensable for healthy human hematopoietic stem cells.

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Acrylamide (ACR) is formed during food processing by Maillard reaction between sugars and proteins at high temperatures. It is also used in many industries, from water waste treatment to manufacture of paper, fabrics, dyes and cosmetics. Unfortunately, cumulative exposure to acrylamide, either from diet or at the workplace, may result in neurotoxicity.

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