Ultrasonic Deposition of Cellulose Nanocrystals on Substrates for Enhanced Eradication Activity on Multidrug-Resistant Pathogens.

Amidst the pervasive threat of bacterial afflictions, the imperative for advanced antibiofilm surfaces with robust antimicrobial efficacy looms large. This study unveils a sophisticated ultrasonic synthesis method for cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs, 10-20 nm in diameter and 300-900 nm in length) and their subsequent application as coatings on flexible substrates, namely cotton (CC-1) and membrane (CM-1). The cellulose nanocrystals showed excellent water repellency with a water contact angle as high as 148° on the membrane.

Virtual Home Care for Patients With Acute Illness.

Importance: Recent evolutions in clinical care and remote monitoring suggest that some acute illnesses no longer require intravenous therapy and inpatient hospitalization.

Objective: To describe outcomes of patients receiving care in a new, outpatient, virtual, home-based acute care model called Safer@Home.

Design, Setting, And Participants: This retrospective cohort analysis, conducted from September 1, 2022, through August 31, 2023, included 2466 patients treated at a safety net hospital in Los Angeles County for 10 core illnesses and 24 other acute illnesses for which patients are commonly hospitalized.

Hepatitis C Virus Testing Among Perinatally Exposed Children: 2018 to 2020.

Objective: To assess the frequency of hepatitis C virus (HCV) testing among a population-based cohort of perinatally exposed children and identify factors associated with testing.

Methods: Using a population-based surveillance cohort of perinatally exposed children born from 2018 to 2020 from 4 US jurisdictions (Georgia; Massachusetts; Allegheny County, Pennsylvania; and Los Angeles County, California), we describe the frequency, timing, and type of HCV testing among children and identify characteristics associated with having an HCV test result by the age of 2 to 3 years. Data were obtained from electronic laboratory reporting, vital records, and medical records.

Rapid shifts in grassland communities driven by climate change.

Many terrestrial plant communities, especially forests, have been shown to lag in response to rapid climate change. Grassland communities may respond more quickly to novel climates, as they consist mostly of short-lived species, which are directly exposed to macroclimate change. Here we report the rapid response of grassland communities to climate change in the California Floristic Province.

Stem cell-specific ecdysone signaling regulates the development of dorsal fan-shaped body neurons and sleep homeostasis.

Complex behaviors arise from neural circuits that assemble from diverse cell types. Sleep is a conserved behavior essential for survival, yet little is known about how the nervous system generates neuron types of a sleep-wake circuit. Here, we focus on the specification of Drosophila 23E10-labeled dorsal fan-shaped body (dFB) long-field tangential input neurons that project to the dorsal layers of the fan-shaped body neuropil in the central complex.

Functional Biomaterials and Biomaterial Composites with Antimicrobial Properties.

AMR occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites no longer respond to antimicrobial medicines, including antibiotics, antivirals, antifungals, and antiparasitics [...

Global Challenges After a Global Challenge: Lessons Learned from the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has affected not only individual lives but also the world and global systems, both natural and human-made. Besides millions of deaths and environmental challenges, the rapid spread of the infection and its very high socioeconomic impact have affected healthcare, economic status and wealth, and mental health across the globe. To better appreciate the pandemic's influence, multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches are needed.

Measuring Vesicle Loading with Holographic Microscopy and Bulk Light Scattering.

We report efforts to quantify the loading of cell-sized lipid vesicles using in-line digital holographic microscopy. This method does not require fluorescent reporters, fluorescent tracers, or radioactive tracers. A single-color LED light source takes the place of conventional illumination to generate holograms rather than bright field images.

First Phase Development of a Patient-reported Outcome Measure for Midface Oncology.

Background: Facial cancer surgery involving the midface (comprising the lower eyelids, nose, cheeks, and upper lip) can have debilitating life-changing functional, social, and psychological impacts on the patient. Midface symptoms are inadequately captured by existing patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs). PROMs are increasingly used for individual patient care, quality improvement, and standardized reporting of treatment outcomes.

Spiced RCT: Success and Pain Associated with Intravenous Cannulation in the Emergency Department Randomized Controlled Trial.

Background: Peripheral venous cannulation is one of the most common procedures in medicine. A larger cannula allows higher rates of fluid to be provided if needed in a deteriorating patient; however, it is also perceived that larger-gauge cannula placement is associated with increased pain and procedural difficulty.

Objective: This study aimed to compare the pain and procedural difficulty experienced during insertion between 18-gauge (18G) and 20-gauge (20G) cannulas.

Improving the Safety of Computed Tomography Through Automated Quality Measurement: A Radiologist Reader Study of Radiation Dose, Image Noise, and Image Quality.

Objectives: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services funded the development of a computed tomography (CT) quality measure for use in pay-for-performance programs, which balances automated assessments of radiation dose with image quality to incentivize dose reduction without compromising the diagnostic utility of the tests. However, no existing quantitative method for assessing CT image quality has been validated against radiologists' image quality assessments on a large number of CT examinations. Thus to develop an automated measure of image quality, we tested the relationship between radiologists' subjective ratings of image quality with measurements of radiation dose and image noise.

TDP-43 impairs sleep in through -dependent metabolic disturbance.

Neurodegenerative diseases such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal dementia are associated with substantial sleep disruption, which may accelerate cognitive decline and brain degeneration. Here, we define a role for trans-activation response element (TAR) DNA binding protein 43 (TDP-43), a protein associated with human neurodegenerative disease, in regulating sleep using . Expression of TDP-43 severely disrupts sleep, and the sleep deficit is rescued by knockdown.

Zirconium-Coated β-Cyclodextrin Nanomaterials for Biofilm Eradication.

Under alkaline treatment, zirconyl chloride (ZrOCl.8HO) became a zirconia gel and formed a stable complex with beta-cyclodextrin (βCD). This complex was highly active in reactive oxygen species (ROS) formation via HO decomposition.

Stem cell-specific ecdysone signaling regulates the development and function of a sleep homeostat.

Complex behaviors arise from neural circuits that are assembled from diverse cell types. Sleep is a conserved and essential behavior, yet little is known regarding how the nervous system generates neuron types of the sleep-wake circuit. Here, we focus on the specification of sleep-promoting neurons-long-field tangential input neurons that project to the dorsal layers of the fan-shaped body neuropil in the central complex (CX).

Ultrasound-Guided Peripheral Nerve Blocks for Shoulder Dislocation in the Emergency Department: A Systemic Review.

Background: Shoulder dislocations are among the most common orthopedic emergencies encountered in the emergency department (ED). Ultrasound-guided peripheral nerve blocks (USG-PNBs) are increasingly being used for acute pain management in the ED, but clinical evidence supporting their utility for shoulder dislocation is limited and often conflicting.

Objective: The aim of this review was to summarize and evaluate the utility of USG-PNB for analgesia during closed reduction of dislocated shoulders in the ED.

Molecular epidemiology of rotavirus among children in Western Canada: Dynamic changes in genotype prevalence in four consecutive seasons.

Rotavirus molecular surveillance remains important in the postvaccine era to monitor the changes in transmission patterns, identify vaccine-induced antigenic changes and discover potentially pathogenic vaccine-related strains. The Canadian province of Alberta introduced rotavirus vaccination into its provincial vaccination schedule in June 2015. To evaluate the impact of this program on stool rotavirus positivity rate, strain diversity, and seasonal trends, we analyzed a prospective cohort of children with acute gastroenteritis recruited between December 2014 and August 2018.

Analysis and electroanalysis of perchlorate in water and food samples: a critical review.

Perchlorate, ClO, with diverse applications, has become one of the major contaminants in surface and groundwater sources. This highly soluble and stable anion poses a considerable threat to human health given that it contaminates drinking water, vegetables, milk, and other contaminated food products. ClO can impair the thyroid function; thus, drinking water with high levels of this anion is a severe problem worldwide.

Using Holographic Microscopy To Measure the Effect of Confinement on Crowding Agents in Lipid Vesicles.

The hydrodynamic effects of macromolecular crowding inside cells are often studied in vitro by using polymers as crowding agents. Confinement of polymers inside cell-sized droplets has been shown to affect the diffusion of small molecules. Here we develop a method, based on digital holographic microscopy, to measure the diffusion of polystyrene microspheres that are confined within lipid vesicles containing a high concentration of solute.

Nanoscale Iron Redistribution during Thermochemical Decomposition of CaTi Fe O Alters the Electrical Transport Pathway: Implications for Oxygen-Transport Membranes, Electrocatalysis, and Photocatalysis.

Potential applications of the earth-abundant, low-cost, and non-critical perovskite CaTi Fe O in electrocatalysis, photocatalysis, and oxygen-transport membranes have motivated research to tune its chemical composition and morphology. However, investigations on the decomposition mechanism(s) of CaTi Fe O under thermochemically reducing conditions are limited, and direct evidence of the nano- and atomic-level decomposition process is not available in the literature. In this work, the phase evolution of CaTi Fe O ( = 0-0.

Alcohol Use, Screening, and Brief Intervention Among Pregnant Persons - 24 U.S. Jurisdictions, 2017 and 2019.

Alcohol use during pregnancy is a major preventable cause of adverse alcohol-related outcomes, including birth defects and developmental disabilities.* Alcohol screening and brief intervention (ASBI) is an evidence-based primary care tool that has been shown to prevent or reduce alcohol consumption during pregnancy; interventions have resulted in an increase in the proportion of pregnant women reporting abstinence (odds ratio = 2.26; 95% CI = 1.

Ultrasonic-assisted synthesis of lignin-capped CuO nanocomposite with antibiofilm properties.

Under ultrasonication, cuprous oxide (CuO) microparticles (<5 µm) were fragmented into nanoparticles (NPs, ranging from 10 to 30 nm in diameter), and interacted strongly with alkali lignin (Mw = 10 kDa) to form a nanocomposite. The ultrasonic wave generates strong binding interaction between lignin and CuO. The L-Cu nanocomposite exhibited synergistic effects with enhanced antibiofilm activities against E.

Enhanced UV Protection, Heavy Metal Detection, and Antibacterial Properties of Biomass-Derived Carbon Dots Coated on Protective Fabrics.

Carbon dots (CDs) were simply prepared from charcoal by hydrothermal processing at 180 °C for 15 h without any chemicals. The as-prepared CDs with an average diameter of 5 ± 6 nm exhibited a predominant absorption peak at 290 nm, corresponding to the n to π* transition of the oxygen functional groups (C═O) and the free amine functional groups (-NH). The resulting CDs were then incorporated into cotton and polyester by facile ultrasonication for 1 h.

Fingerprinting and identification of isolated plastic polymers with pyrolysis comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography and flame ionization detection.

An approach using pyrolysis with comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography with flame ionization detection is introduced for identifying common isolated plastic polymers. A quadrupole mass spectrometer is employed as a parallel detector to aid method development and improve polymer identification in complex matrices. Common plastic polymers including polyethylene, polypropylene, polystyrene, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide, poly(methyl methacrylate), styrene-butadiene rubber, and polyethylene terephthalate are accurately identified within a total analysis time of 45 min.

Important Roles and Potential Uses of Natural and Synthetic Antimicrobial Peptides (AMPs) in Oral Diseases: Cavity, Periodontal Disease, and Thrush.

Numerous epithelial cells and sometimes leukocytes release AMPs as their first line of defense. AMPs encompass cationic histatins, defensins, and cathelicidin to encounter oral pathogens with minimal resistance. However, their concentrations are significantly below the effective levels and AMPs are unstable under physiological conditions due to proteolysis, acid hydrolysis, and salt effects.