Protocol update and baseline characteristics for the TRIal to slow the Progression of Diabetes (TRIPOD) randomized controlled trial.

Background: Type 2 diabetes (T2D), a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease and other adverse health conditions, is on the rise in Singapore. TRIPOD is a randomized controlled trial aimed to determine whether complementing usual care with an evidence-based diabetes management package (DMP) -comprising access to an evidence-based app, health coaching, pedometer, glucometer and weighing scale, with or without a financial rewards scheme (M-POWER rewards), can improve mean HbA levels at months 6 and 12.

Methods: The protocol was published in Trials, accessible via https://trialsjournal.

Rare diseases and space health: optimizing synergies from scientific questions to care.

Knowledge transfer among research disciplines can lead to substantial research progress. At first glance, astronaut health and rare diseases may be seen as having little common ground for such an exchange. However, deleterious health conditions linked to human space exploration may well be considered as a narrow sub-category of rare diseases.

Leveraging family dynamics to increase the effectiveness of incentives for physical activity: the FIT-FAM randomized controlled trial.

Background: Insufficient physical activity is a global public health concern. Research indicates incentives can increase physical activity levels of children but has not tested whether incentives targeted at children can be leveraged to increase physical activity levels of their parents. This study evaluates whether a novel incentive design linking children's incentives to both their and their parent's physical activity levels can increase parent's physical activity.

SJS/TEN 2019: From science to translation.

Stevens-Johnson syndrome and toxic epidermal necrolysis (SJS/TEN) are potentially life-threatening, immune-mediated adverse reactions characterized by widespread erythema, epidermal necrosis, and detachment of skin and mucosa. Efforts to grow and develop functional international collaborations and a multidisciplinary interactive network focusing on SJS/TEN as an uncommon but high burden disease will be necessary to improve efforts in prevention, early diagnosis and improved acute and long-term management. SJS/TEN 2019: From Science to Translation was a 1.

TRIal to slow the Progression Of Diabetes (TRIPOD): study protocol for a randomized controlled trial using wireless technology and incentives.

Background: The outcomes for those with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) in Singapore are poor. In this TRIal to slow the Progression Of Diabetes (TRIPOD), we will evaluate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a comprehensive diabetes management package (DMP), with or without a financial incentives program, M-POWER Rewards, in efforts to improve HbA levels for individuals with T2DM.

Methods/design: TRIPOD is a randomized, open-label, controlled, multi-center, superiority trial with three parallel arms: (1) usual care only, (2) usual care with DMP, and (3) usual care with DMP plus M-POWER Rewards.

A Mobile Lifestyle Management Program (GlycoLeap) for People With Type 2 Diabetes: Single-Arm Feasibility Study.

Background: Singapore's current prevalence of diabetes exceeds 13.6%. Although lifestyle modification can be effective for reducing the risks for complications of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), traditional lifestyle interventions are often difficult to administer in the primary care setting due to limited resources.

Molecular mechanisms of azole resistance in Candida bloodstream isolates.

Background: Antifungal resistance rates are increasing. We investigated the mechanisms of azole resistance of Candida spp. bloodstream isolates obtained from a surveillance study conducted between 2012 and 2015.

Recognizing that Evidence is Made, not Born.

Therapeutic product development, licensing and reimbursement may seem a well-oiled machine, but continuing high attrition rates, regulatory refusals, and patients' access issues suggest otherwise; despite serious efforts, gaps persist between stakeholders' stated evidence requirements and actual evidence supplied. Evidentiary deficiencies and/or human tendencies resulting in avoidable inefficiencies might be further reduced with fresh institutional cultures/mindsets, combined with a context-adaptable practices framework that integrates emerging innovations. Here, Structured Evidence Planning, Production, and Evaluation (SEPPE) posits that evidence be treated as something produced, much like other manufactured goods, for which "built-in quality" (i.

Novel pitcher plant-spider mutualism is dependent upon environmental resource abundance.

Positive species interactions are ubiquitous and crucial components of communities, but they are still not well incorporated into established ecological theories. The definitions of facilitation and mutualism overlap, and both are often context dependent. Many interactions that are facilitative under stressful conditions become competitive under more benign ones.

Predatory dipteran larva contributes to nutrient sequestration in a carnivorous pitcher plant.

The fluids of pitcher plants are habitats to many specialized animals known as inquilines, which facilitate the conversion of prey protein into pitcher-absorbable nitrogen forms such as ammonium. (Diptera: Mycetophilidae) is a predatory dipteran inquiline that inhabits the pitchers of Larvae of construct sticky webs over the fluid surface of to ensnare emerging adult dipteran inquilines. However, the interaction between and its host has never been examined before, and it is not known if can contribute to nutrient sequestration in individuals were reared in artificial pitchers in the laboratory on a diet of emergent mosquitoes, and the ammonium concentration of the pitcher fluids was measured over time.

Regulatory Decision Making in Canada-Exploring New Frontiers in Patient Involvement.

Recent legislative amendments aim to enhance the transparency of the regulatory review processes about drugs, and provide public information about Health Canada's review decisions. There is also growing recognition of the value, with respect to regulatory benefit-risk assessment, of information that could be gathered from patients-the direct users of these products. Patients can provide unique insights into practical aspects of living with their disease and its treatments-as well as gaps in treatment needs.

A piece of the pi(e): The diverse roles of animal piRNAs and their PIWI partners.

Small non-coding RNAs are indispensable to many biological processes. A class of endogenous small RNAs, termed PIWI-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) because of their association with PIWI proteins, has known roles in safeguarding the genome against inordinate transposon mobilization, embryonic development, and stem cell regulation, among others. This review discusses the biogenesis of animal piRNAs and their diverse functions together with their PIWI protein partners, both in the germline and in somatic cells, and highlights the evolutionarily conserved aspects of these molecular players in animal biology.

Isolation of Undifferentiated Female Germline Cells from Adult Drosophila Ovaries.

This unit describes a method for isolating undifferentiated, stem cell-like germline cells from adult Drosophila ovaries. Here, we demonstrate that this population of cells can be effectively purified from hand-dissected ovaries in considerably large quantities. Tumor ovaries with expanded populations of undifferentiated germline cells are first removed from fly abdomens and dissociated into a cell suspension with the aid of protease treatment.

Analysis of Hydra PIWI proteins and piRNAs uncover early evolutionary origins of the piRNA pathway.

To preserve genome integrity, an evolutionarily conserved small RNA-based silencing mechanism involving PIWI proteins and PIWI-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) represses potentially deleterious transposons in animals. Although there has been extensive research into PIWI proteins in bilaterians, these proteins remain to be examined in ancient phyla. Here, we investigated the PIWI proteins Hywi and Hyli in the cnidarian Hydra, and found that both PIWI proteins are enriched in multipotent stem cells, germline stem cells, and in the female germline.

Isolation of undifferentiated female germline cells from adult Drosophila ovaries.

This unit describes a method for isolating undifferentiated, stem cell-like germline cells from adult Drosophila ovaries. Here, we demonstrate that this population of cells can be effectively purified from hand-dissected ovaries in considerably large quantities. Tumor ovaries with expanded populations of undifferentiated germline cells are first removed from fly abdomens and dissociated into a cell suspension with the aid of protease treatment.

Model competencies in regulatory therapeutic product assessment: Health Canada's good review guiding principles as a reviewing community's code of intellectual conduct.

Purpose: This article describes some work from the Therapeutic Products Directorate of Health Canada regarding Good Review Practices (GRP).

Methods And Results: Background information is provided on the Therapeutic Products Directorate (TPD) and its regulatory activities regarding drug and medical device assessment in both the pre- and post-market setting. The TPD Good Review Guiding Principles (GRGP) are described which include a Definition of a Good Therapeutic Product Regulatory Review, Ten Hallmarks of a Good Therapeutic Product Regulatory Review and Ten Precepts.