A cost-effective enzyme kinetics and inhibition model for biochemistry education and research.

Enzyme kinetics and inhibition studies are crucial in biochemistry education and research. Conventional methods often require expensive equipment and reagents, potentially limiting their accessibility in limited resource settings. Our approach sought to develop a cost-effective experimental design for studying enzyme kinetics and inhibition.

A Rare Case of Late-Onset Ertapenem-Induced Encephalopathy.

Encephalopathy is a rare side effect associated with carbapenem antibiotics, typically presenting within one week of initiating treatment. It is almost exclusively seen in patients with poor renal function. We present a case of a middle-aged male with a history of cerebral vascular accident and normal renal function admitted for agitation, delirium, and insomnia more than two weeks after starting ertapenem to treat osteomyelitis.

Moving forward: A review of continuous kinetics and kinematics during handcycling propulsion.

Wheelchair users (WCUs) face high rates of shoulder overuse injuries. As exercise is recommended to reduce cardiovascular disease prevalent among WCUs, it is becoming increasingly important to understand the mechanisms behind shoulder soft-tissue injury in WCUs. Understanding the kinetics and kinematics during upper-limb propulsion is the first step toward evaluating soft-tissue injury risk in WCUs.

Perceptions of High-Intensity Interval Training Among People With Spinal Cord Injury: A Mixed-Methods Analysis.

This mixed-method project investigated how people with spinal cord injury perceive high-intensity interval training (HIIT). Using a recumbent hand cycle, 11 active men and 9 active women with spinal cord injury or related disease participated in a single HIIT and moderate-intensity continuous training (MICT) session. Following exercise, participants completed surveys assessing enjoyment, self-efficacy, and outcome expectations.

A polycistronic transgene design for combinatorial genetic perturbations from a single transcript in Drosophila.

Experimental models that capture the genetic complexity of human disease and allow mechanistic explorations of the underlying cell, tissue, and organ interactions are crucial to furthering our understanding of disease biology. Such models require combinatorial manipulations of multiple genes, often in more than one tissue at once. The ability to perform complex genetic manipulations in vivo is a key strength of Drosophila, where many tools for sophisticated and orthogonal genetic perturbations exist.

The influence of gender on shoulder kinematics and head-hip technique during non-level transfers in full-time wheelchair users.

Background: Non-level transfers are some of the most demanding tasks for manual wheelchair users. Safely performing these transfer tasks may be needed for maintaining long-term upper limb health. This cross-sectional study aimed to examine the influence of gender on the head-hip technique and lead arm kinematics during multi-height transfers in manual wheelchair users.

AMPK Regulates DNA Methylation of PGC-1α and Myogenic Differentiation in Human Mesenchymal Stem Cells.

Adverse intrauterine environments can cause persistent changes in epigenetic profiles of stem cells, increasing susceptibility of the offspring to developing metabolic diseases later in life. Effective approaches to restore the epigenetic landscape and function of stem cells remain to be determined. In this study, we investigated the effects of pharmaceutical activation of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK), an essential regulator of energy metabolism, on mitochondrial programming of Wharton's Jelly mesenchymal stem cells (WJ-MSCs) from women with diabetes during pregnancy.

Bone Mass Accrual in First Six Months of Life: Impact of Maternal Diabetes, Infant Adiposity, and Cord Blood Adipokines.

The perinatal period is a time of substantial bone mass accrual with many factors affecting long-term bone mineralization. Currently it is unclear what effect maternal gestational/type 2 diabetes has on infant bone mass accrual. This is a prospective study of offspring of Native American and Hispanic mothers with normoglycemia (n = 94) and gestational diabetes or type 2 diabetes (n = 64).

Chemical and Carbon Isotopic Characterization of a Karst-Dominated Urbanized Watershed: Case of the Upper San Antonio River.

Urbanization and agriculture are two key factors that place demands on water resources and serve as sources of anthropogenic pollution into inland waterways. The San Antonio River, which is sourced from a karst aquifer, plays an important recreational and scenic role, yet effective management is often hampered by the lack of understanding of the chemical characterization of the water system. The karst-dominated Edwards Aquifer watershed in south-central Texas is an ideal watershed to understand water-rock interaction (carbonate dissolution) and anthropogenic impact on our water resources.

Impact of maternal diabetes exposure on soluble adhesion molecules in the offspring.

Background And Aims: Soluble adhesion molecules are associated with cardiovascular disease and increased in individuals with diabetes. This study assesses the impact of diabetes exposure in utero on the abundance of circulating adhesion molecules in cord serum and soluble adhesion molecules released from human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) exposed to high glucose concentrations.

Methods And Results: Women with and without diabetes were recruited.

The effect of a high fat meal on heart rate variability and arterial stiffness in adolescents with or without type 1 diabetes.

Aim: Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is associated with increased arterial stiffness and cardiac autonomic neuropathy. We tested whether those variables are acutely affected by a high fat meal (HFM).

Methods: Responses to a HFM were measured in adolescents with T1D (N = 14) or without T1D (Control, N = 21).

Robotic external ventricular drain placement for acute neurosurgical care in low-resource settings: feasibility considerations and a prototype design.

Objective: Emergency neurosurgical care in lower-middle-income countries faces pronounced shortages in neurosurgical personnel and infrastructure. In instances of traumatic brain injury (TBI), hydrocephalus, and subarachnoid hemorrhage, the timely placement of external ventricular drains (EVDs) strongly dictates prognosis and can provide necessary stabilization before transfer to a higher-level center of care that has access to neurosurgery. Accordingly, the authors have developed an inexpensive and portable robotic navigation tool to allow surgeons who do not have explicit neurosurgical training to place EVDs.

Risk-Based Decision-Support Groundwater Modeling for the Lower San Antonio River Basin, Texas, USA.

A numerical surface-water/groundwater model was developed for the lower San Antonio River Basin to evaluate the responses of low base flows and groundwater levels within the basin under conditions of reduced recharge and increased groundwater withdrawals. Batch data assimilation through history matching used a simulation of historical conditions (2006-2013); this process included history-matching to groundwater levels and base-flow estimates at several gages, and was completed in a high-dimensional (highly parameterized) framework. The model was developed in an uncertainty framework such that parameters, observations, and scenarios of interest are envisioned stochastically as distributions of potential values.

A Drosophila platform identifies a novel, personalized therapy for a patient with adenoid cystic carcinoma.

Adenoid cystic carcinoma (ACC) is a rare cancer type that originates in the salivary glands. Tumors commonly invade along nerve tracks in the head and neck, making surgery challenging. Follow-up treatments for recurrence or metastasis including chemotherapy and targeted therapies have shown limited efficacy, emphasizing the need for new therapies.

Feasibility and Acceptability Findings of an Energy Balance Data Repository of Children, Adolescents, and Young Adults with Cancer.

Cancer patients suffer changes in energy balance (EB), the combination of energy intake (nutrition) and energy expenditure (physical activity (PA)), which may influence cancer-related morbidity, mortality, and quality of life. Significant gaps remain in our understanding of the frequency and magnitude of these EB changes. Herein, we report on the feasibility and acceptability of a longitudinal repository of EB outcomes in children, adolescents and young adults (AYA) with cancer along the cancer continuum to fill these gaps.

Fetal circulating human resistin increases in diabetes during pregnancy and impairs placental mitochondrial biogenesis.

Background: Diabetes during pregnancy affects placental mitochondrial content and function, which has the potential to impact fetal development and the long-term health of offspring. Resistin is a peptide hormone originally discovered in mice as an adipocyte-derived factor that induced insulin resistance. In humans, resistin is primarily secreted by monocytes or macrophages.

Maternal diabetes alters microRNA expression in fetal exosomes, human umbilical vein endothelial cells and placenta.

Background: Exposure to diabetes in utero influences future metabolic health of the offspring. MicroRNAs (miRNA) are small noncoding RNAs that may contribute mechanistically to the effects on offspring imparted by diabetes mellitus (DM) during pregnancy. We hypothesized that exposure to DM during pregnancy influences select miRNAs in fetal circulation, in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC), and placenta.

Role of metformin in epigenetic regulation of placental mitochondrial biogenesis in maternal diabetes.

Adverse maternal environments, such as diabetes and obesity, impair placental mitochondrial function, which affects fetal development and offspring long-term health. The underlying mechanisms and effective interventions to abrogate such effect remain unclear. Our previous studies demonstrated impaired mitochondrial biogenesis in male human placenta of diabetic mothers.

Phase Ib/II study combining tosedostat with capecitabine in patients with advanced pancreatic adenocarcinoma.

Background: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is an aggressive malignancy with limited therapeutic options. We evaluated the safety and efficacy of the aminopeptidase inhibitor tosedostat with capecitabine in advanced PDAC.

Methods: We conducted a phase Ib/II trial of tosedostat with capecitabine as second-line therapy for advanced PDAC.

Rey 15 item test plus recognition trial and TOMM in a community pediatric sample.

In pediatric evaluations, performance validity test (PVT) selection is often constrained by reading level, developmental appropriateness of stimuli, and administration time. The Rey 15 Item Test (FIT) addresses these constraints, and ranks among the most frequently used PVTs. Unfortunately, research indicates poor sensitivity of the FIT recall trial.

Macrophage-Derived microRNA-155 Increases in Obesity and Influences Adipocyte Metabolism by Targeting Peroxisome Proliferator-Activated Receptor Gamma.

Objective: This study aimed to investigate cellular sources of microRNAs (miRNA) within adipose tissue and the impact of obesity on miRNA expression, as well as to examine targets of miRNAs.

Methods: miRNA expression by quantitative polymerase chain reaction was examined in adipocytes, adipose tissue macrophages (ATM), and peripheral blood mononuclear cells from and individuals with normal weight and with obesity. Differentiated 3T3-L1 adipocytes were cocultured with macrophages, and 3T3-L1 and differentiated human mesenchymal stem cells were transfected with miR-155, with peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPAR-γ) and solute carrier family 2 member 4 (GLUT4) abundance measured via Western blot analysis.

Effect of Obesity and Exercise Training on Plasma Amino Acids and Amino Metabolites in American Indian Adolescents.

Context: Amino acids (AAs) and their metabolites are altered with obesity and may be predictive of future diabetes in adults, but there are fewer studies on AAs, as well as conflicting findings on how they vary with obesity, in adolescents.

Objective: To determine whether plasma AAs vary with body composition and insulin sensitivity and are altered in response to exercise training.

Design: Cross-sectional, and an exercise intervention.

A personalized platform identifies trametinib plus zoledronate for a patient with KRAS-mutant metastatic colorectal cancer.

Colorectal cancer remains a leading source of cancer mortality worldwide. Initial response is often followed by emergent resistance that is poorly responsive to targeted therapies, reflecting currently undruggable cancer drivers such as and overall genomic complexity. Here, we report a novel approach to developing a personalized therapy for a patient with treatment-resistant metastatic KRAS-mutant colorectal cancer.

Association of Full Breastfeeding Duration with Postpartum Weight Retention in a Cohort of Predominantly Breastfeeding Women.

Full breastfeeding (FBF) is promoted as effective for losing pregnancy weight during the postpartum period. This study evaluated whether longer FBF is associated with lower maternal postpartum weight retention (PPWR) as compared to a shorter FBF duration. The MILK (Mothers and Infants Linked for Healthy Growth) study is an ongoing prospective cohort of 370 mother-infant dyads, all of whom fully breastfed their infants for at least 1 month.

Relationship of Maternal Weight Status Before, During, and After Pregnancy with Breast Milk Hormone Concentrations.

Objective: The aim of this study was to test associations of prepregnancy BMI, gestational weight gain, oral glucose challenge test results, and postpartum weight loss as predictors of breast milk leptin, insulin, and adiponectin concentrations and whether these relationships vary over time.

Methods: Milk was collected at 1 and 3 months from 135 exclusively breastfeeding women from the longitudinal Mothers and Infants Linked for Healthy Growth (MILk) study. Hormones were assayed in skimmed samples using ELISA.