Publications by authors named "R F O'Connell"

Introduction: Minimally invasive surgery may confer perioperative benefit to patients with resectable Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC) but published data are limited. Robotic resection for HCC has recently been introduced in our institution, and the goal of this study is to benchmark patient outcomes against open and laparoscopic surgery.

Methods: A retrospective evaluation was performed of all patients undergoing liver resection for HCC in our institution between September 2012 and November 2022 using a prospectively maintained database.

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Microbiota composition regulates colitis severity, yet the innate immune mechanisms that control commensal communities and prevent disease remain unclear. We show that the innate immune receptor, Clec12a, impacts colitis severity by regulating microbiota composition. Transplantation of microbiota from a Clec12a animal is sufficient to worsen colitis in wild-type mice.

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The recovery from muscle atrophy is impaired with aging as characterized by improper muscle remodeling and sustained functional deficits. Age-related deficits in muscle regrowth are tightly linked with the loss of early pro-inflammatory macrophage responses and subsequent cellular dysregulation within the skeletal muscle niche. Macrophage inflammatory phenotype is regulated at the metabolic level, highlighting immunometabolism as an emerging strategy to enhance macrophage responses and restore functional muscle regrowth.

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Background: Women with ovarian cancer (OC) and a pathogenic variant in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes are at increased risk of developing breast cancer (BC). Evidence for long term outcomes in these patients who undergo bilateral risk reduction mastectomy (RRM) after ovarian cancer is sparse. The aim of this study was to analyse the long-term breast cancer-related outcomes of patients who have been diagnosed with ovarian cancer and found to have BRCA1 or 2 pathogenic variants.

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The synthesis of photocaged substrates of the biologically important enzyme HMG-CoA reductase is reported. HMG-CoA bearing a -hydroxyphenacyl (pHP) photocage moiety was synthesized in an overall yield of 14% over seven steps in addition to caged forms of mevalonate and mevaldehyde. The absorption maximum and quantum yield for the decaging of the photocaged compounds are dependent on pH with a λ of 330 nm and a ϕ of 5%, respectively, at pH 9.

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