Improving medical machine learning models with generative balancing for equity and excellence.

Applying machine learning to clinical outcome prediction is challenging due to imbalanced datasets and sensitive tasks that contain rare yet critical outcomes and where equitable treatment across diverse patient groups is essential. Despite attempts, biases in predictions persist, driven by disparities in representation and exacerbated by the scarcity of positive labels, perpetuating health inequities. This paper introduces FairPlay, a synthetic data generation approach leveraging large language models, to address these issues.

A New Model of Chronic Kidney Disease, Metabolic Derangements, and Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction in Aging Swine.

Introduction: Chronic kidney disease (CKD) and heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) are more prevalent in the elderly. There is a lack of large animal models that allow the study of the impact of age on CKD and HFpEF in a translational fashion. This manuscript reports the first large preclinical model of CKD-HFpEF and metabolic derangements in naturally aged swine.

Oxidative pyrolysis of alkali lignin using nitrogen functionalized graphene oxide-cerium oxide nanocatalysts: Mechanistic insights thorough density functional theory.

In this study, a functionalized graphene oxide-cerium oxide nanocatalysts (FGCe) with varying graphene oxide (GO) contents were prepared using an in-situ reflux method. The prepared nanocatalysts showcased improvement in the crystallinity and BET surface area values with increasing GO contents. The efficacies of prepared catalysts were investigated towards oxidative pyrolysis of alkali lignin in an ethanol-water system.

Deciphering the mechanisms and effects of hyperglycemia on skeletal muscle atrophy.

Hyperglycemia, a hallmark of diabetes mellitus, significantly contributes to skeletal muscle atrophy, characterized by progressive muscle mass and strength loss. This review summarizes the mechanisms of hyperglycemia-induced muscle atrophy, examines clinical evidence, and discusses preventive and therapeutic strategies. A systematic search of electronic databases, including PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science, was conducted to identify relevant papers on hyperglycemic skeletal muscle atrophy.

HistoSPACE: Histology-inspired spatial transcriptome prediction and characterization engine.

Spatial transcriptomics (ST) enables the visualization of gene expression within the context of tissue morphology. This emerging discipline has the potential to serve as a foundation for developing tools to design precision medicines. However, due to the higher costs and expertise required for such experiments, its translation into a regular clinical practice might be challenging.

Gold-catalyzed fluorination of alkynes/allenes: mechanistic explanations and reaction scope.

Since the beginning of this century, there has been a great deal of research on homogeneous gold-catalyzed alkyne fluorination due to the precious values of fluorinated scaffolds in many bioactive natural products, drugs, and agrochemicals. This area of research, which originally took advantage of gold's mild Lewis acidity and tendency to form π-complexes with alkynes, has gained new momentum after Sadighi's discovery in 2007 of Au-catalyzed hydrofluorination of internal alkynes. The methods have enabled direct access to valuable fluoroalkanes, fluoroalkenes, α-fluorocarbonyls, and fluorinated carbo- and hetero-cycles in one pot from readily available alkyne precursors.

An Overview of the Anticancer Potential of Silver Nanostructures against Cervical Cancer.

Women are impacted by the extremely common cancer known as cervical cancer worldwide. Although preventive vaccines for cervical cancer are successful, treatment of cervical cancer is far less satisfactory because of multidrug resistance and side effects. There is an increasing need for alternative treatment modalities due to the rather aggressive and non-specific nature of conventional chemotherapeutics.

A cub and sushi domain-containing protein with esterase-like activity confers insecticide resistance in the Indian malaria vector Anopheles stephensi.

Chemical insecticides (organophosphates and pyrethroids) in the form of IRS (Indoor Residual Sprays) and LLINs (Long Lasting Insecticidal Nets) are the cornerstone for vector control, globally. However, their incessant use has resulted in widespread development of resistance in mosquito vectors, warranting continuous monitoring and investigation of the underlying mechanisms of resistance. Here, we identified a previously uncharacterized- Cub and Sushi Domain containing Insecticide Resistance (CSDIR) protein and generated evidence for its role in mediating insecticide resistance in the Anopheles stephensi.

Caspase inhibitors: a review on recently patented compounds (2016-2023).

Introduction: Caspases are a family of protease enzymes that play a crucial role in apoptosis. Dysregulation of caspase activity has been implicated in various pathological conditions, making caspases an important focus of research in understanding cell death mechanisms and developing therapeutic strategies for diseases associated with abnormal apoptosis.

Areas Covered: It is a comprehensive review of caspase inhibitors that have been comprising recently granted patents from 2016 to 2023.

A Comprehensive Review: Pharmacogenomics and Personalized Medicine Customizing Drug Therapy Based on Individual Genetics Profiles.

Numerous factors, such as genetics, environmental factors, and illness determinants, might contribute to an unpleasant pharmaceutical response. In an effort to increase efficacy and safety, as well as to gain a better understanding of drug disposition and clinical consequences, researchers in the two quickly emerging fields of pharmacogenetics (which focuses on single genes) and pharmacogenomics (which focuses on many genes) have studied the genetic personalization of drug response. This is due to the fact that a large number of pharmacological responses seem to be genetically based, and the relationship between medication response and genotype may be important for diagnosis.

Expanding the Role of Chiral Drugs and Chiral Nanomaterials as a Potential Therapeutic Tool.

Chirality, the property of molecules having mirror-image forms, plays a crucial role in pharmaceutical and biomedical research. This review highlights its growing importance, emphasizing how chiral drugs and nanomaterials impact drug effectiveness, safety, and diagnostics. Chiral molecules serve as precise diagnostic tools, aiding in accurate disease detection through unique biomolecule interactions.

Exploration of functional relations among differentially co-expressed genes identifies regulators in glioblastoma.

The conventional computational approaches to investigating a disease confront inherent constraints as they often need to improve in delving beyond protein functional associations and grasping their deeper contextual significance within the disease framework. Such context-specificity can be explored using clinical data by evaluating the change in interaction between the biological entities in different conditions by investigating the differential co-expression relationships. We believe that the integration and analysis of differential co-expression and the functional relationships, primarily focusing on the source nodes, will open novel insights about disease progression as the source proteins could trigger signaling cascades, mostly because they are transcription factors, cell surface receptors, or enzymes that respond instantly to a particular stimulus.

Geometric Shape Recognition with an Ultra-High Density Perovskite Nanowire Array-Based Artificial Vision System.

Artificial vision systems (AVS) have potential applications in visual prosthetics and artificially intelligent robotics, and they require a preprocessor and a processor to mimic human vision. Halide perovskite (HP) is a promising preprocessor and processor due to its excellent photoresponse, ubiquitous charge migration pathways, and innate hysteresis. However, the material instability associated with HP thin films hinders their utilization in physical AVSs.

Recent developments in photodynamic therapy and its application against multidrug resistant cancers.

Recently, photodynamic therapy (PDT) has received a lot of attention for its potential use in cancer treatment. It enables the therapy of a multifocal disease with the least amount of tissue damage. The most widely used prodrug is 5-aminolevulinic acid, which undergoes heme pathway conversion to protoporphyrin IX, which acts as a photosensitizer (PS).

L-theanine attenuates LPS-induced motor deficit in experimental rat model of Parkinson's disease: emphasis on mitochondrial activity, neuroinflammation, and neurotransmitters.

Rationale: Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by loss of dopaminergic neurons. The pathogenesis of PD includes oxidative stress, mitochondrial dysfunction, neuroinflammation, and neurotransmitter dysregulation. L-theanine is found in green tea and has antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and neuroprotective effects with a high blood brain barrier permeability.

Graphene quantum dots-hybrid hydrogel as an avant-garde biomimetic scaffold for diabetic wound healing.

In the age of fathoming biomedical predicaments, ardently emerged the field of materiobiology to effectively counter the archetypal and outdated therapies. Correspondingly, the subpar activity of the over-the-counter wound dressing pharmaceuticals have been dominated with the implementation of biocompatible, water-retaining exotic hydrogels to facilitate accelerated diabetic wound healing. Considering a strategy to develop a pragmatic biomimetic scaffold having the ability of dynamic wound healing with diminutive inflammation, we investigated the creation of graphene quantum dot (GQD)-polyacrylic acid (PAA) hybrid hydrogel.

Emerging Targets for Modulation of Immune Response and Inflammation in Stroke.

The inflammatory and immunological responses play a significant role after stroke. The innate immune activation stimulated by microglia during stroke results in the migration of macrophages and lymphocytes into the brain and are responsible for tissue damage. The immune response and inflammation following stroke have no defined targets, and the intricacies of the immunological and inflammatory processes are only partially understood.

konnect2prot: a web application to explore the protein properties in a functional protein-protein interaction network.

Motivation: The regulation of proteins governs the biological processes and functions and, therefore, the organisms' phenotype. So there is an unmet need for a systematic tool for identifying the proteins that play a crucial role in information processing in a protein-protein interaction (PPI) network. However, the current protein databases and web servers still lag behind to provide an end-to-end pipeline that can leverage the topological understanding of a context-specific PPI network to identify the influential spreaders.

Role of vitamin D in targeting cancer and cancer stem cell populations and its therapeutic implications.

Cancer is recognized globally as the second-most dominating and leading cause of morbidities. Fighting the global health epidemic threat posed by cancer requires progress and improvements in imaging techniques, surgical techniques, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy. The existence of a small subpopulation of undifferentiated cells known as cancer stem cells has been supported by accumulating evidence and ongoing research.

Electrochemical, Photophysical, Morphological and DFT Study of Polymorphic Sn(IV)-Porphyrins Containing Fluorinated Axial Ligand.

In this study, we report the polymorphism of six coordinated Sn(IV)- tetrabromophenyl porphyrins axially armed with fluorine-substituted phenolate ligands (structural formula [Sn(TBrPP) (A ) ], where A is the axial ligand=3,5-difluoro phenol, compound 1). One form stabilizes in triclinic system (namely, 1α), and the other stabilizes in monoclinic system (namely, 1β). The two 1α and 1β polymorphs display distinct photophysical and morphological properties in the solid state.

Halogen Bond Mediated Self-Assembly of Mononuclear Lanthanide Complexes: Perception of Supramolecular Interactions, Slow Magnetic Relaxation, and Photoluminescence Properties.

Five new mononuclear lanthanide complexes, [LnL][EtNH]·THF/HO (Ln = Nd, Tb, Dy) (HL = 2-bis(2-hydroxy-3,5-dichloro benzyl)aminomethyl]pyridine), Ln = Nd (), Tb (), and Dy (), and (HL = 2-bis(2-hydroxy-3,5-dibromo benzyl)aminomethyl]pyridine), Ln = Nd (, HO) and Tb (), were synthesized and structurally characterized by single-crystal X-ray diffraction analyses. Being isostructural in all the five cases, the metal center is octa-coordinated with a triangular dodecahedron ( symmetry) geometry, and it is independent of the halogen substitution (Cl/Br). This close similarity is due to the composite interplay of hydrogen/halogen bond interactions that control the overall crystal packing, yet notable differences in association patterns among the individual ones arise from the subtle stereo-electronic requirement of individual molecules in the three-dimensional (3D) architecture.

Tremor and Rigidity in Patients with Parkinson's Disease: Emphasis on Epidemiology, Pathophysiology and Contributing Factors.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is the second most prominent neurodegenerative movement disorder after Alzheimer's disease, involving 2-3% of the population aged above 65 years. This is mainly triggered by the depletion of dopaminergic neurons located in substantia nigra pars compacta (SNpc) in the region of basal ganglia. At present, diagnosis for symptoms of PD is clinical, contextual, unspecified and therapeutically incomprehensive.