Improving drought tolerance in maize: Tools and techniques.

Drought is an important constraint to agricultural productivity worldwide and is expected to worsen with climate change. To assist farmers, especially in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), to adapt to climate change, continuous generation of stress-tolerant and farmer-preferred crop varieties, and their adoption by farmers, is critical to curb food insecurity. Maize is the most widely grown staple crop in SSA and plays a significant role in food security.

Improving care for residents in long term care facilities experiencing an acute change in health status.

Background: Long term care (LTC) facilities provide health services and assist residents with daily care. At times residents may require transfer to emergency departments (ED), depending on the severity of their change in health status, their goals of care, and the ability of the facility to care for medically unstable residents. However, many transfers from LTC to ED are unnecessary, and expose residents to discontinuity in care and iatrogenic harms.

Pickering Bubbles as Dual-Modality Ultrasound and Photoacoustic Contrast Agents.

Microbubbles (MBs) stabilized by particle surfactants (., Pickering bubbles) have better thermodynamic stability compared to MBs stabilized by small molecules as a result of steric hindrance against coalescence, higher diffusion resistance, and higher particle desorption energy. In addition, the use of particles to stabilize MBs that are typically used as an ultrasound (US) contrast agent can also introduce photoacoustic (PA) properties, thus enabling a highly effective dual-modality US and PA contrast agent.

Agents for change: nonphysician medical providers and health care quality.

Quality medical care is a clinical and public health imperative, but defining quality and achieving improved, measureable outcomes are extremely complex challenges. Adherence to best practice invariably improves outcomes. Nonphysician medical providers (NPMPs), such as physician assistants and advanced practice nurses (eg, nurse practitioners, advanced practice registered nurses, certified registered nurse anesthetists, and certified nurse midwives), may be the first caregivers to encounter the patient and can act as agents for change for an organization's quality-improvement mandate.

Optical and magneto-optical properties of gold core cobalt shell magnetoplasmonic nanowire arrays.

In this work we present core-shell nanowire arrays of gold coated with a nanometric layer of cobalt. Despite the extremely small Co volume, these core-shell nanowires display large magneto-optical activity and plasmonic resonance determined by the geometry of the structure. Therefore, we are able to tune both the plasmonic and magneto-optical response in the visible range.

Same-day discharge after minimally invasive transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion: a series of 808 cases.

Background: The versatility of transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (TLIF) allows fusion at any level along with any necessary canal decompression. Unilateral TLIF with a single interbody device and unilateral pedicle fixation has proven effective, and minimally invasive techniques have shortened hospital stays. Reasonable questions have been raised, though, about whether same-day discharge is feasible and safe after TLIF surgery.

Maintaining quality of care 24/7 in a nontrauma surgical intensive care unit.

Background: Most surgical critical care literature reflects practices at trauma centers and tertiary hospitals. Surgical critical care needs and practices may be quite different at nontrauma center teaching hospitals. As acute care surgery develops as a component of surgical critical care and trauma, the opportunities and challenges of the nontrauma centers should be considered.

Domain wall propagation in meso- and nanoscale ferroelectrics.

As part of an ongoing programme to evaluate the extent to which external morphology alters domain wall mobility in ferroelectrics, the electrical switching characteristics of single-crystal BaTiO(3) nanorods and thin film plates have been measured and compared. It was found that ferroelectric nanorods were more readily switched than thin plates; increasing the shape constraint therefore appears to enhance switchability. This observation is broadly consistent with previous work, in which local notches patterned along the length of nanorods enhanced switching (McMillen et al 2010 Appl.

Toward self-assembled ferroelectric random access memories: hard-wired switching capacitor arrays with almost Tb/in.(2) densities.

We report on the successful fabrication of arrays of switchable nanocapacitors made by harnessing the self-assembly of materials. The structures are composed of arrays of 20-40 nm diameter Pt nanowires, spaced 50-100 nm apart, electrodeposited through nanoporous alumina onto a thin film lower electrode on a silicon wafer. A thin film ferroelectric (both barium titanate (BTO) and lead zirconium titanate (PZT)) has been deposited on top of the nanowire array, followed by the deposition of thin film upper electrodes.

Elevated immunoreactive endothelin-1 levels in newborn rabbit lungs after meconium aspiration.

OBJECTIVE: Our prime objective was to study the production of big endothelin-1 (Big ET-1) and its conversion to ET-1 in the lungs of newborn rabbits exposed to meconium. Our second objective was to study the effect of captopril on endothelin expression. DESIGN: Prospective, comparative study.

The effect of diabetes on endothelin, interleukin-8 and vascular endothelial growth factor-mediated angiogenesis in rats.

In diabetes mellitus, there is a problem of both premature atherosclerosis as well as impaired collateralization. Studies were performed using the rat corneal angiogenesis model as a surrogate for collateralization to determine the effect of diabetes mellitus on endothelin (ET)-1, ET-3, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and interleukin-8 (IL-8)-mediated angiogenesis. In an initial group of experiments, streptozotocin-induced diabetes resulted in impairment of ET-1-mediated angiogenesis from 69% to 32%, but was only impaired from 74% to 59% for ET-3.

Endothelins are angiogenic.

Endothelins-1 and 3 (ET-1 and 3) were evaluated for angiogenesis in the rat cornea. Bisected 2 mm pellets containing 20-1000 ng of ET-1 or ET-3 in Hydron were placed in corneal micro-pockets. Murine vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and human interleukin-8 (IL-8) were positive controls.

Cardiopulmonary bypass increases coronary IL-8 in diabetic patients without evidence of reperfusion injury.

Background: Endothelin-1 (ET-1) has been shown to be a potent agonist for monocyte production of the neutrophil chemotactic cytokine interleukin-8 (IL-8). We have shown that diabetic patients demonstrate elevated coronary ET-1 after coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). We hypothesized that these same diabetic patients would manifest elevated coronary IL-8 and conjugated diene concentrations (an index of reperfusion injury).

Evaluation of abdominal pain in systemic lupus erythematosus.

Background: Abdominal pain is a common finding in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), occurring in as many as half of all SLE patients in the course of their disease. The rheumatology and gastroenterology literature emphasizes etiologies of abdominal pain in patients with SLE such as peritonitis from polyserositis, dyspepsia from reflux, nausea and vomiting from bowel edema, ascites, mesenteric ischemia, pancreatitis, pneumatosis intestinalis from necrotizing enterocolitis, and hepatobiliary abnormalities. But in clinical practice, caring for SLE patients in a community teaching hospital, these seem to be rare entities.