Tuning Dunaliella tertiolecta for Enhanced Antioxidant Production by Modification of Culture Conditions.

Microalgae, a popular source of food and bioactive compounds, accumulate antioxidants in response to culture condition stresses. Using a factorial design (3 × 3), the effect of light, temperature, and nitrogen level on chlorophyll and carotenoids, total protein, total phenolic, ascorbate and glutathione content, and enzyme (catalase (CAT), superoxide dismutase (SOD), and peroxidase (POD)) activities in Dunaliella tertiolecta was studied. Data were analysed using Design of Experiments (DoE), and recommendations are made for optimum cultivation conditions to achieve the highest antioxidant content (phenolics, ascorbate and glutathione) or enzyme (CAT, SOD, and POD) activities.

UIAA Medical Commission Recommendations for Mountaineers, Hillwalkers, Trekkers, and Rock and Ice Climbers with Diabetes.

Hillebrandt, David, Anil Gurtoo, Thomas Kupper, Paul Richards, Volker Schöffl, Pankaj Shah, Rianne van der Spek, Nikki Wallis, and Jim Milledge. UIAA Medical Commission recommendations for mountaineers, hillwalkers, trekkers, and rock and ice climbers with diabetes. .

Potential process 'hurdles' in the use of macroalgae as feedstock for biofuel production in the British Isles.

This review examines the potential technical and energy balance hurdles in the production of seaweed biofuel, and in particular for the MacroBioCrude processing pipeline for the sustainable manufacture of liquid hydrocarbon fuels from seaweed in the UK. The production of biofuel from seaweed is economically, energetically and technically challenging at scale. Any successful process appears to require both a method of preserving the seaweed for continuous feedstock availability and a method exploiting the entire biomass.

Stanhope Speer, Physician and Alpinist: In 1853, First to Describe Mountain Sickness?

In 1853, Stanhope Templeman Speer published a two-part paper in The Association Medical Journal on Mountain Sickness. Speer was a physician who had worked at the Brompton Hospital for Chest Diseases in London and had been Professor of Medicine in Dublin. He was also an Alpine climber and had made the first ascent of one of the Wetterhorn peaks.

King of the mountains: Tibetan and Sherpa physiological adaptations for life at high altitude.

Anecdotal evidence surrounding Tibetans' and Sherpas' exceptional tolerance to hypobaric hypoxia has been recorded since the beginning of high-altitude exploration. These populations have successfully lived and reproduced at high altitude for hundreds of generations with hypoxia as a constant evolutionary pressure. Consequently, they are likely to have undergone natural selection toward a genotype (and phenotype) tending to offer beneficial adaptation to sustained hypoxia.

Workload during cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

Objectives: Lay resuscitation is crucial for the survival of the patients with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. Therefore, lay CPR should be a basic skill for everyone. With the growing proportion of retired people in the Western societies, CPR performed by people with preexisting diseases and at risk of cardiac events is expected to grow.

Work in hypoxic conditions--consensus statement of the Medical Commission of the Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme (UIAA MedCom).

Objectives: The Commission gives recommendations on how to provide health and safety for employees in different kinds of low oxygen atmospheres. So far, no recommendations exist that take into account the several factors we have outlined in this report.

Methods: The health and safety recommendations of several countries were analysed for their strength and deficiencies.

Comments on 'Anaerobic digestion of microalgae as a necessary step to make microalgal biodiesel sustainable'.

A recent review paper considers the potential of algal biomass as a source of liquid and gaseous biofuels, but there are a number of issues concerning the results and conclusions presented. These include the biomass energy values, which in some cases are unusually high; and the apparent production of more energy from processed biomass than is present in the original material. The main causes for these discrepancies include the choice of empirical formula for protein; confusion between values calculated on a total or volatile solids basis; and the lack of a mass balance approach.

The Silver Hut expedition, 1960-1961.

The 1960-1961 Himalayan Scientific and Mountaineering Expedition, commonly known as the Silver Hut Expedition, was a unique project to study the physiology of acclimatization in human lowlander subjects at extreme altitude over a prolonged period and also to make an attempt on Makalu, an 8470-m peak. The leader was Sir Edmund Hillary, and Dr. Griffith Pugh was the scientific leader.

The Snow Snorkel: a proof of concept study.

Objective: To demonstrate that the Snow Snorkel can be used safely by healthy volunteers buried in snow for up to 1 hour.

Methods: Nine healthy male volunteers were placed in a shoulder-width trench and buried with snow to a depth of 30 to 40 cm. The study was divided into 2 stages.

Water disinfection in the mountains - state of the art recommendation paper of the Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme Medical Commission.

This paper provides the official recommendation of the Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme (UIAA) Medical Commission to manage the problem of safe drinking water. The recommendation was accepted and authorized for publication by the Medical Commission during their annual meeting at Treplice, Tzechia, 2008. Safe water is essential for mountaineers worldwide in order to balance challenges associated with high altitude dehydration.

Direct measurement of intracranial pressure at high altitude and correlation of ventricular size with acute mountain sickness: Brian Cummins' results from the 1985 Kishtwar expedition.

Objective And Importance: The "tight-fit" hypothesis and subsequent current understanding of acute mountain sickness (AMS) is that individuals with less compliant cerebrospinal fluid systems (smaller ventricles and cerebrospinal fluid spaces) have a greater increase in intracranial pressure (ICP) for a given increase in brain volume as a result of hypoxic cerebral edema. There has only been 1 study of direct (telemetric) ICP measurement at high altitude. This was performed in 1985 on 3 subjects by Brian Cummins up to a maximum height of 16,500 ft (5030 m).

In vitro staining of resin composites by liquids ingested by children.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to compare the influence of various children's drinks on the discoloration of dental resin composites.

Methods: Ninety-six disks (3-mm thick, 10 mm in diameter) were prepared from 3 types of composite: (1) submicron; (2) nono; and (3) microhybrid. After polishing and obtaining baseline data, they were equally divided into 4 groups and immersed into 1 of 4 liquids at 37 degrees C: (1) distilled water; (2) Kool-Aid Jammers (grape flavor); (3) Coca-Cola; or (4) snow cone syrup (banana flavor).

Alveolar PCO2 oscillations and ventilation at sea level and at high altitude.

This study examines the potential for a ventilatory drive, independent of mean PCO2, but depending instead on changes in PCO2 that occur during the respiratory cycle. This responsiveness is referred to here as "dynamic ventilatory sensitivity." The normal, spontaneous, respiratory oscillations in alveolar PCO2 have been modified with inspiratory pulses approximating alveolar PCO2 concentrations, both at sea level and at high altitude (5,000 m, 16,400 ft.

Oxygen delivery at sea level and altitude (after slow ascent to 5000 meters), at rest and in mild exercise.

Oxygen delivery (DO2) calculated from cardiac output, haematocrit (Hct) and arterial oxygen saturation (SaO2), has been obtained on six subjects at sea level (London) and after slow ascent to 5000 meters (Chamlang base camp) at rest and during mild exercise (25 watts and 50 watts). Haematocrit was increased in all six subjects at 5000 m and expressed as haemoglobin (Hb) rose from a mean (+/- standard error; SEM) of 13.8 +/- 0.

Temazepam at high altitude reduces periodic breathing without impairing next-day performance: a randomized cross-over double-blind study.

The aim of the study was to examine the efficacy and safety of temazepam on nocturnal oxygenation and next-day performance at altitude. A double-blind, randomized, cross-over trial was performed in Thirty-three healthy volunteers. Volunteers took 10 mg of temazepam and placebo in random order on two successive nights soon after arrival at 5000 m, following a 17-day trek from 410 m.

A tribute to John Burnard West.

John West is well known to the "Hypoxia" community for his many contributions to the physiology and Pathophysiology of high altitude and for his leadership of the 1981 American Medical Research Expedition to Everest. He is known to the wider medical world for his researches into respiratory physiology especially gas exchange in the lung and perhaps even more for his numerous books on these topics. His publication list numbers over 400 original papers.