Antimicrobial Activity of Bark from Four North American Tree Species.

Introduction: Although many backcountry first aid kits contain antibiotic ointment, the supply can be quickly exhausted if a patient has extensive wounds or if there are multiple patients.

Methods: We assessed the antibacterial properties of bark extract from four North American woody plant species known to native Missourians as medicinal plants (, , and ). We tested their antimicrobial properties, with the disc diffusion technique, against four common pathogenic bacterial species: , , , and (now known as )

Results: We report evidence of antibacterial activity of bark extract from all four plant species.

Mammalian maxilloturbinal evolution does not reflect thermal biology.

The evolution of endothermy in vertebrates is a major research topic in recent decades that has been tackled by a myriad of research disciplines including paleontology, anatomy, physiology, evolutionary and developmental biology. The ability of most mammals to maintain a relatively constant and high body temperature is considered a key adaptation, enabling them to successfully colonize new habitats and harsh environments. It has been proposed that in mammals the anterior nasal cavity, which houses the maxilloturbinal, plays a pivotal role in body temperature maintenance, via a bony system supporting an epithelium involved in heat and moisture conservation.

Multiple complications of advanced IPF in an individual patient presentation.

We report a patient with advanced idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), who in a single presentation experienced three complications of the disease: an acute exacerbation, spontaneous pneumomediastinum, and platypnoea-orthodeoxia syndrome. Despite there being no definitive evidence-based treatment for an acute exacerbation, we report a marked improvement with high-dose steroids. This case also highlights the importance in IPF patients of considering pneumomediastinum as a cause of non-cardiac chest pain, as well as platypnoea-orthodeoxia in those with positional dyspnoea.

The oncoprotective fever hypothesis: Have antibiotics, antimalarials and antipyrectics contributed to the global rise in cancer over the past century?

The adaptive and therapeutic nature of fever has been recognized for centuries and both local and systemic thermotherapy are now used to enhance the effectiveness of both chemotherapy and radiation therapy for cancer. We propose that the success of antiseptic, antibiotic, antipyretic and antimalarial strategies and medications over the past century and a half may have had the unintended effect of releasing precancerous growths and neoplastic foci from the inhibitory effects of intermittent fever. This may be a previously unrecognized factor in the overall rise in cancer rates in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Alternative Animal Models of Aging Research.

Most research on mechanisms of aging is being conducted in a very limited number of classical model species, i.e., laboratory mouse (), rat (), the common fruit fly () and roundworm ().