Carboxylic acid mediated antimicrobial activity of silicone elastomers.

Due to their high biocompatibility silicone elastomers are the material of choice in many sensitive health care applications. However, the inherent hydrophobicity of the polymer makes silicones more susceptible to spontaneous protein adsorption and subsequent biofilm formation than more hydrophilic abiotic materials. Hence, the development of antimicrobial silicone elastomers could help to reduce potential biofilm-associated infections when using silicone based medical devices.

Thrombosis, fracture, and percutaneous removal of a patent foramen ovale closure device 1 month after successful deployment.

Several different devices have been developed for the percutaneous closure of interatrial defects and patent foramen ovale. Although the implantation of these devices is both safe and effective, a number of complications, both in the early and the late follow-up, may occur. We describe a case of device fracture manifested early (1 month after implantation) with the formation of massive thrombosis on the right atrial disc.

Small Molecule Subgraph Detector (SMSD) toolkit.

Background: Finding one small molecule (query) in a large target library is a challenging task in computational chemistry. Although several heuristic approaches are available using fragment-based chemical similarity searches, they fail to identify exact atom-bond equivalence between the query and target molecules and thus cannot be applied to complex chemical similarity searches, such as searching a complete or partial metabolic pathway.In this paper we present a new Maximum Common Subgraph (MCS) tool: SMSD (Small Molecule Subgraph Detector) to overcome the issues with current heuristic approaches to small molecule similarity searches.

Recurrent events following patent foramen ovale closure in patients above 55 years of age with presumed paradoxical embolism.

Objectives: The aim of this article is to summarize our experience of patent foramen ovale (PFO) closure in patients above the age of 55 years.

Background: PFO is associated with cryptogenic thromboembolic events (TEs) in patients younger than 55 years. Little is known about the recurrence rate of TE in patients above the age of 55 years undergoing PFO closure for presumed paradoxical embolism.

Incidence of atrial fibrillation following transcatheter closure of atrial septal defects in adults.

Transcatheter closure of secundum atrial septal defect (ASD) and patent foramen ovale (PFO) has become a routine procedure. Little is known about the effect of atrial septal device implantation on the occurrence of atrial fibrillation (AF). We evaluated the frequency of AF occurring after transcatheter PFO and ASD closure in a large population.

Comparison of contemporary devices used for transcatheter patent foramen ovale closure.

Background: Transcatheter patent foramen ovale (PFO) closure can be performed with various devices. However, their handling, safety, presence of residual shunt and impact on recurrent thromboembolic events (TEs) are rarely compared with one another. Our goal was to compare the clinical performance of contemporary devices designed for PFO closure.

Outcome after percutaneous closure of a patent foramen ovale using the Intrasept device: a multi-centre study.

Objectives: This multi-centre study reports safety and efficacy of percutaneous patent foramen ovale (PFO) closure, using the fourth generation Intrasept device.

Background: PFO has been associated with paradoxical embolism and cryptogenic stroke. Percutaneous PFO closure seems to reduce the risk for recurrent paradoxical thrombo-embolism.

Identifying genes of gene regulatory networks using formal concept analysis.

In order to understand the behavior of a gene regulatory network, it is essential to know the genes that belong to it. Identifying the correct members (e.g.

Patent foramen ovale closure with the Intrasept occluder: Complete 6-56 months follow-up of 247 patients after presumed paradoxical embolism.

Objective: We report our experience of transcatheter patent foramen ovale (PFO) closure with the new Intrasept occluder.

Background: The Intrasept device is the fourth generation of the Cardia occluder family. Developed for transcatheter closure of PFO, the main difference between the Intrasept and prior generations of the Cardia occluder is its articulating center post.

Modeling feedback loops in the H-NS-mediated regulation of the Escherichia coli bgl operon.

The histone-like nucleoid-associated protein H-NS is a global transcriptional repressor that controls approximately 5% of all genes in Escherichia coli and other enterobacteria. H-NS binds to DNA with low specificity. Nonetheless, repression of some loci is exceptionally specific.

A modified Cook sheath for closure of a large secundum atrial septal defect.

Transcatheter closure of large secundum atrial septal defects with deficient rims is difficult. Several techniques have been described to improve delivery of the occluder in anatomically challenging cases. Among these is a recently described technique using a modified delivery sheath with the creation of a bevel.

Transcatheter closure of secundum atrial septal defects in adults with the Amplatzer septal occluder: intermediate and long-term results.

Aims: Transcatheter closure of secundum atrial septal defects (ASD) with the Amplatzer septal occluder (ASO) has become a standard procedure in most pediatric and adult patients. However, data addressing success rates and outcome in adults is limited. We sought to define the safety profile of the ASO in the community setting and identify the percentage of adults with ASD amenable to percutaneous closure with the ASO.

Transcatheter closure of patent foramen ovale in patients with migraine headache.

Our objective is to review the epidemiology and pathophysiology of migraine headache, its association with patent foramen ovale (PFO), and the impact of PFO closure on migraine. Upon reviewing English-language publications listed in MEDLINE relating to migraine headache, PFO, and transcatheter closure of PFO, we selected case series, retrospective and prospective studies relevant to the topic. Primarily retrospective case-control studies demonstrate a link between PFO closure and improvement of migraine headache.

Temperature-sensitive eIF5A mutant accumulates transcripts targeted to the nonsense-mediated decay pathway.

The highly conserved protein eIF5A found in Archaea and all eukaryotes uniquely contains the posttranslationally formed amino acid hypusine. Despite being essential the functions of this protein and its modification remain unclear. To gain more insight into these functions temperature-sensitive mutants of the human EIF5A1 were characterized in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

CASPAR: a hierarchical bayesian approach to predict survival times in cancer from gene expression data.

Motivation: DNA microarrays allow the simultaneous measurement of thousands of gene expression levels in any given patient sample. Gene expression data have been shown to correlate with survival in several cancers, however, analysis of the data is difficult, since typically at most a few hundred patients are available, resulting in severely underdetermined regression or classification models. Several approaches exist to classify patients in different risk classes, however, relatively little has been done with respect to the prediction of actual survival times.

Contrast material-induced renal failure: an overview.

The administration of iodinated contrast media (CM) is integral to many cardiovascular procedures. While it is clear that CM provide significant diagnostic benefit, there is some risk of contrast medium-related adverse events in a small percentage of patients. Potentially the most serious complication associated with the use of iodinated contrast agents is contrast-induced nephropathy (CIN).

A fractional programming approach to efficient DNA melting temperature calculation.

Motivation: In a wide range of experimental techniques in biology, there is a need for an efficient method to calculate the melting temperature of pairings of two single DNA strands. Avoiding cross-hybridization when choosing primers for the polymerase chain reaction or selecting probes for large-scale DNA assays are examples where the exact determination of melting temperatures is important. Beyond being exact, the method has to be efficient, as these techniques often require the simultaneous calculation of melting temperatures of up to millions of possible pairings.

Transcatheter closure of a 22 mm patent ductus arteriosus with an Amplatzer atrial septal occluder.

Transcatheter techniques for closure of patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) have been used for almost 40 years. We report a case of a 24-year-old female with a 22 mm PDA, congestive heart failure, and atrial fibrillation. She underwent transcatheter PDA closure with an Amplatzer atrial septal occluder (ASO).

Diagnosis of patent foramen ovale using contrast-enhanced dynamic MRI: a pilot study.

Objective: The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI for detection of patent foramen ovale.

Subjects And Methods: Fifteen patients with and five patients without patent foramen ovale underwent transesophageal echocardiography and MRI, which were performed during the Valsalva maneuver. Grading results (grade 0, no patent foramen ovale and grades 1-3, minor to major enhancement due to intracardiac shunt) were assessed visually.

Fast and robust registration of PET and MR images of human brain.

In recent years, mutual information has proved to be an excellent criterion for registration of intra-individual images from different modalities. Multi-resolution coarse-to-fine optimization was proposed for speeding-up of the registration process. The aim of our work was to further improve registration speed without compromising robustness or accuracy.

Indication and techniques of transcatheter closure of patent foramen ovale.

A potential causal relationship of a patent foramen ovale (PFO) and a stroke was first suggested by Cohnheim in 1877.1 Today, this correlation is generally accepted. However, there is still no "gold standard" for the treatment of patients with presumed paradoxical embolism.

Catheter closure of secundum ASD using "other" devices.

The first nonoperative ASD closure was performed by Noel L. Mills and Terry D. King in a 17-year old female patient on April 8, 1975.