Introducing "DoPP": A Graphical User-Friendly Application for the Rapid Species Identification of Psychoactive Plant Materials and Quantification of Psychoactive Small Molecules Using DART-MS Data.

The widespread abuse of "legal high" psychoactive plants continues to be of global concern because of their negative impacts on public health and safety. In forensic science, a major challenge in controlling these substances is the paucity of methods to rapidly identify them. We report the development of the atabase f sychoactive lants (DoPP), a new user-friendly tool featuring an architecture for the identification of plant unknowns, and the necessary regression statistics for the development and validation of psychoactive compound quantification.

Revealing the presence of tryptamine new psychoactive substances using fused "neutral loss" spectra derived from DART high-resolution mass spectra.

A data fusion approach for the rapid extraction of core scaffold information that can be used to facilitate structure determination for new psychoactive substance (NPS) tryptamines is described. The method involves the screening of DART-HRMS data of new tryptamines against a partial least squares-discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) model that predicts the core tryptamine structure class into which the compound can be grouped. The PLS-DA prediction model was created and trained using neutral loss spectra derived from collision-induced dissociation (CID) DART mass spectral analysis of 50 tryptamine structures acquired at 60 V and 90 V, in which the sample groups were revealed by hierarchical clustering analysis (HCA).

Identification of the Species Constituents of Maggot Populations Feeding on Decomposing Remains-Facilitation of the Determination of Post Mortem Interval and Time Since Tissue Infestation through Application of Machine Learning and Direct Analysis in Real Time-Mass Spectrometry.

The utilization of entomological specimens such as larvae (maggots) for the estimation of time since oviposition (i.e., egg laying) for post mortem interval determination, or for estimation of time since tissue infestation (in investigations of elder or child care neglect and animal abuse cases), requires accurate determination of insect species identity.

BRCA1/2 genetic background-based therapeutic tailoring of human ovarian cancer: hope or reality?

Ovarian epithelial tumors are an hallmark of hereditary cancer syndromes which are related to the germ-line inheritance of cancer predisposing mutations in BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. Although these genes have been associated with multiple different physiologic functions, they share an important role in DNA repair mechanisms and therefore in the whole genomic integrity control. These findings have risen a variety of issues in terms of treatment and prevention of breast and ovarian tumors arising in this context.

Loss of BRCA1 function increases the antitumor activity of cisplatin against human breast cancer xenografts in vivo.

Background: Previous reports suggested a central role of BRCA1 in DNA-damage repair mechanisms elicited by cell exposure to anti-tumor agents. Here we studied if BRCA1-defective HCC1937 or BRCA1-reconstituted HCC1937/(WT)BRCA1 human breast cancer xenografts (HBCXs) generated in SCID mice were differentially sensitive to cisplatin (CDDP) in vivo and we investigated potential molecular correlates of this effect.

Results: CDDP induced almost complete growth inhibition of BRCA1-defective HBCXs, while BRCA1-reconstituted HBCXs were only partially inhibited.

In vivo activity of gemcitabine-loaded PEGylated small unilamellar liposomes against pancreatic cancer.

Gemcitabine (GEM) is presently the standard option for the treatment of advanced pancreatic cancer (PC). We investigated the in vitro and in vivo antitumor potential of GEM-loaded PEGylated liposomes (L-GEM) as a novel agent for the treatment of PC. In vitro analysis of antitumor activity against human PC cell lines, BXPC-3 and PSN-1, showed a significant time- and dose-dependent reduction of cell viability following exposure to L-GEM as compared to free GEM [at 72 h, IC(50): 0.

In vivo anti-myeloma activity and modulation of gene expression profile induced by valproic acid, a histone deacetylase inhibitor.

Valproic acid (VPA) is a well-tolerated anticonvulsant that exerts anti-tumour activity as a histone deacetylase inhibitor. This study investigated the in vitro and in vivo activity of VPA against multiple myeloma (MM) cells. In vitro exposure of interleukin-6-dependent or -independent MM cells to VPA inhibited cell proliferation in a time- and dose-dependent manner and induced apoptosis.