Am J Physiol Renal Physiol
November 2024
Viper bites pose a significant public health issue in Armenia, even within urban areas, often resulting in clotting disorders, hypofibrinogenemia, and tissue necrosis in humans. This study investigates histopathological changes in various tissues during mice envenomation by West-Asian blunt-nosed viper (Macrovipera lebetina obtusa) venom, as well as the recovery process aided by experimental antivenom derived from sheep. The high venom dose caused substantial damage to the heart, lungs, liver, and kidneys in mice, indicating systemic harm.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBiotechnol Appl Biochem
October 2024
Purpose of this article is to study the possible direct antiviral effect of "Armenikum" on SARS-CoV-2, conduct an in vitro study on the SARS-CoV-2 encephalomocarditis virus, and an in vivo study on the Syrian hamster model. Human coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (delta strain) was used as the virus. Two groups of four-specimen hamsters were used to study the therapeutic activity of the drug during 48 h after infecting.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnnu Rev Anal Chem (Palo Alto Calif)
July 2024
Nucleic acid testing is the cornerstone of modern molecular diagnostics. This review describes the current status and future directions of molecular diagnostics, focusing on four major techniques: polymerase chain reaction (PCR), next-generation sequencing (NGS), isothermal amplification methods such as recombinase polymerase amplification (RPA) and loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP), and clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)-based detection methods. We explore the advantages and limitations of each technique, describe how each overlaps with or complements other techniques, and examine current clinical offerings.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAlcohol use disorder (AUD) has well-known negative effects on romantic relationship functioning, including the occurrence of intimate partner violence (IPV). A separate literature focused on community couples indicates that relationship functioning is more likely to suffer when partners report greater discrepancies in alcohol consumption. It is important to expand this literature to couples with AUD and to examine the role of impactful AUD domains in dyadic functioning.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHistory of childhood maltreatment is common among military veterans, particularly those with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol use disorder (AUD). Childhood maltreatment is associated with negative psychosocial outcomes, including use of aggression during adulthood. Prior research has identified maladaptive cognitions as a key mediating variable in the association between early life trauma and aggression.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRecent developments in single-molecule enzymology (SME) have allowed for the observation of subpopulations present in enzyme ensembles. Tissue-nonspecific alkaline phosphatase (TNSALP), a homodimeric monophosphate esterase central to bone metabolism, has become a model enzyme for SME studies. TNSALP contains two internal disulfide bonds that are critical for its effective dimerization; mutations in its disulfide bonding framework have been reported in patients with hypophosphatasia, a rare disease characterized by impaired bone and tooth mineralization.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPresents a clinician's commentary to accompany the article "Clinical, operational, and financial practices in integrated behavioral health care" by A. R. Muse et al (see record 2022-60013-001).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSexual trauma is common and increases risk for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance use disorders (SUD), and depression among veterans. Limited research has examined the impact of sexual harassment and assault during deployment on treatment outcomes among veterans with co-occurring PTSD and SUD. The current study examined frequency of exposure to sexual harassment and assault during deployment as a predictor of treatment outcomes among a primarily male sample of U.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Alcohol intoxication is associated with significant negative social consequences. Social information processing theory provides a framework for understanding how the accurate decoding and interpretation of social cues are critical for effective social responding. Acute intoxication has the potential to disrupt facial emotion recognition.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTransglutaminase 2 (TG2) is a highly expressed mammalian enzyme whose biological function is unclear, although its catalytic activity in the small intestine appears necessary for celiac disease (CeD) pathogenesis. While TG2 activity is reversibly regulated by multiple allosteric mechanisms, their roles under fluctuating physiological conditions are not well understood. Here, we demonstrate that extracellular TG2 activity is competitively controlled by the mutually exclusive binding of a high-affinity Ca ion or the formation of a strained disulfide bond.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose/background: Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol use disorder (AUD) commonly co-occur among US military veterans. Oxytocin may have therapeutic value in treating both conditions. The potential for oxytocin to augment affective features common to PTSD and AUD, such as anger, is relevant to inform emerging treatments.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBacteriophages (phages) are the most abundant biological entity in the human body, but until recently the role that phages play in human health was not well characterized. Although phages do not cause infections in human cells, phages can alter the severity of bacterial infections by the dissemination of virulence factors amongst bacterial hosts. Recent studies, made possible with advances in genome engineering and microscopy, have uncovered a novel role for phages in the human body - the ability to modulate the physiology of the mammalian cells that can harbor intracellular bacteria.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: High rates of alcohol-related sexual assault among young adults represent a significant public health problem. Bystander intervention programs are a promising strategy to reduce sexual assault incidence. However, little is known about how bystander intoxication may modify bystander intervention effectiveness.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe gut microbiome is dominated by lysogens, bacteria that carry bacterial viruses (phages). Uncovering the function of phages in the microbiome and observing interactions between phages, bacteria, and mammalian cells in real time in specific cell types are limited by the difficulty of engineering fluorescent markers into large, lysogenic phage genomes. Here, we present a method to multiplex the engineering of life-cycle reporters into lysogenic phages and how to infect macrophages with engineered lysogens to study these interactions at the single-cell level.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHalf of the bacteria in the human gut microbiome are lysogens containing integrated prophages, which may activate in stressful immune environments. Although lysogens are likely to be phagocytosed by macrophages, whether prophage activation occurs or influences the outcome of bacterial infection remains unexplored. To study the dynamics of bacteria-phage interactions in living cells-in particular, the macrophage-triggered induction and lysis of dormant prophages in the phagosome-we adopted a tripartite system where murine macrophages engulf E.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFModerating effects of alcohol outcome expectancies (AOE) on the social anxiety (SA)-alcohol misuse relationship are mixed. This may be explained by differential relationships between SA and context-specific AOE. Gender may further moderate these associations, as it influences SA, AOE, and drinking behaviors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMayo Clin Proc Innov Qual Outcomes
September 2019
Objective: To determine if a hospital-wide symptom-based alcohol withdrawal protocol may result in significant clinical improvements to patient outcomes, safety, and hospital efficiency.
Methods: Retrospective/prospective cohort study between January 1, 2016 and December 31, 2016 (pre-protocol), and between March 1, 2017 and August 7, July 2017 (post-protocol). Pre-protocol patients were identified retrospectively using International Classification of Diseases, 10 revision codes (F10.
Purpose: To determine the views and current practice preferences of interventional radiologists and allied healthcare providers regarding management of preprocedural anxiety.
Materials And Methods: From March to April 2018, members of the Society of Interventional Radiology were surveyed regarding their opinions in the assessment and management of patient anxiety. Degree of responsibility for the management of anxiety was also queried through the use of a scale (1 = no responsibility; 2 = some responsibility; 3 = major responsibility).
Transglutaminase 2 (TG2) is a ubiquitous mammalian enzyme that is implicated in a variety of physiological processes and human diseases. Normally, extracellular TG2 is catalytically dormant due to formation of an allosteric disulphide bond between Cys370 and 371 of the enzyme. In this protocol, we describe a method to reduce this disulphide bond in living mice and to monitor the resulting in vivo TG2 activity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Alcohol-related sexual violence remains a public health problem. Despite the popularity of sexual assault bystander intervention programs, these may be limited in addressing bystander intoxication because the effects of intoxication on intervening in a sexual assault are unknown. Therefore, we tested the effects of alcohol intoxication on the five steps of bystander intervention in a sexual assault vignette.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFStudy Design: This is a cross-sectional study.
Objective: To investigate spine surgeons' attitudes regarding preoperative anxiety measurement, management, and responsibility.
Summary Of Background Data: The vast majority of patients scheduled for spine surgery experience preoperative anxiety.
ACS Appl Mater Interfaces
July 2018
Aptamers are chemically synthesized oligonucleotides or peptides with molecular recognition capabilities. We investigated recognition of substrate-tethered small-molecule targets, using neurotransmitters as examples, and fluorescently labeled DNA aptamers. Substrate regions patterned via microfluidic channels with dopamine or l-tryptophan were selectively recognized by previously identified dopamine or l-tryptophan aptamers, respectively.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAlcohol-related sexual assault among young adult women continues to present a public health concern. Social information-processing theory provides an organizing framework for understanding how alcohol intoxication can impair the processing of sexual assault risk cues and behavioral responding in sexual assault scenarios. The aim of the present article was to systematically review the extant research on the effects of alcohol intoxication on sexual assault risk information processing among young adult women.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTransglutaminase 2 (TG2) is a ubiquitously expressed, intracellular as well as extracellular protein with multiple modes of post-translational regulation, including an allosteric disulfide bond between Cys-370-Cys-371 that renders the enzyme inactive in the extracellular matrix. Although recent studies have established that extracellular TG2 is switched "on" by the redox cofactor protein thioredoxin-1 (TRX), it is unclear how TG2 is switched "off." Here, we demonstrate that TG2 oxidation by small-molecule biological oxidants, including glutathione, cystine, and hydrogen peroxide, is unlikely to be the inactivation mechanism.
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