The impact on emergency department visits for respiratory illness during the southern california wildfires.

Introduction: In 2007 wildfires ravaged Southern California resulting in the largest evacuation due to a wildfire in American history. We report how these wildfires affected emergency department (ED) visits for respiratory illness.

Methods: We extracted data from a Kaiser Permanente database for a single metropolitan community ED.

Osteogenic differentiation of mesenchymal stem cells in defined protein beads.

There is a need to develop improved methods for directing and maintaining the differentiation of human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSC) for regenerative medicine. Here, we present a method for embedding cells in defined protein microenvironments for the directed osteogenic differentiation of hMSC. Composite matrices of collagen I and agarose were produced by emulsification and simultaneous polymerization in the presence of hMSC to produce 30-150 mum diameter hydrogel "beads.