Deferral of routine percutaneous coronary intervention in patients undergoing transcatheter aortic valve implantation: Rationale and design of the PRO-TAVI trial.

Background: Concomitant coronary artery disease (CAD) is highly prevalent in patients with severe aortic stenosis undergoing transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI). The optimal treatment strategy for CAD is a topic of debate. An initial conservative strategy for CAD in patients undergoing TAVI may be favorable as multiple studies have failed to show an evident beneficial effect of percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) on mortality after TAVI.

BioRT-HBV 1.0: A Biogeochemical Reactive Transport Model at the Watershed Scale.

Reactive Transport Models (RTMs) are essential tools for understanding and predicting intertwined ecohydrological and biogeochemical processes on land and in rivers. While traditional RTMs have focused primarily on subsurface processes, recent watershed-scale RTMs have integrated ecohydrological and biogeochemical interactions between surface and subsurface. These emergent, watershed-scale RTMs are often spatially explicit and require extensive data, computational power, and computational expertise.

Population genetics of the freshwater red alga Batrachospermum gelatinosum (Rhodophyta) I: Frequent intragametophytic selfing in a monoicous, haploid-diploid species.

Life cycles with a prolonged haploid phase are thought to be correlated with greater rates of selfing and asexual reproduction. In red algae, recent population genetic studies have aimed to test this prediction but have mostly focused on marine species with separate sexes. We characterized the reproductive system of the obligately monoicous (i.

Miscibility of Non-Uniform Aliphatic Polyamide Mixtures.

Mixing different aliphatic polyamides provides opportunities to tune and optimize the properties of these semicrystalline polycondensates. Combining experiment and theory, we predict and explain the miscibility of aliphatic polyamide mixtures. Visual inspection and Raman spectroscopy of polyamide mixtures show that liquid/liquid phase demixing occurs in the melt due to limited miscibility.

Digital biomarkers for psoriatic arthritis: a qualitative focus group study on patient-perceived opportunities and barriers.

Objectives: The widespread adoption of wearables, for example, smartphones and smartwatches in the daily lives of the general population, allows passive monitoring of physiological and behavioural data in the real world. This qualitative study explores the perspective of psoriatic arthritis (PsA) patients towards these so-called digital biomarkers (dBMs).

Methods: As part of a Design Thinking approach, six focus groups were conducted involving 27 PsA patients.

Population genetics of the freshwater red alga Batrachospermum gelatinosum (Rhodophyta) II: Phylogeographic analyses reveal spatial genetic structure among and within five major drainage basins in eastern North America.

The freshwater red alga Batrachospermum gelatinosum has a well-documented distribution spanning historically glaciated and unglaciated eastern North America. This alga has no known desiccation-resistant propagule; thus, long-distance dispersal events are likely rare. We predicted strong genetic structure among drainage basins and admixture among sites within basins.

The Development and Validation of a Novel Training Infographic for the Physician Global Visual Analog Scale in Psoriatic Arthritis.

Objective: Psoriatic arthritis (PsA) is a heterogenous condition with musculoskeletal and skin manifestations. The physician global visual analog scale (VAS) is an important component of many composite scores used in clinical trials and observational studies. Currently, no training material exists to standardize this assessment.

Determinants of radiographic progression in early psoriatic arthritis: insights from a real-world cohort.

Objective: Persistent articular inflammation in psoriatic arthritis (PsA) is associated with radiographic damage. Despite advances in diagnosis and therapy, radiographic structural damage remains prevalent in PsA. To elucidate this topic, we studied which baseline clinical characteristics determine radiographic progression.

Origin of Anomalously Large Depletion Zones in Like-Charged Colloid-Polyelectrolyte Mixtures.

Depletion zones in polyelectrolyte solutions in contact with like-charged flat surfaces are investigated. Using a coupled self-consistent field and Debye-Hückel approach, an explicit expression for the thickness δ of the depletion layer is derived. It is found that δ∼δ_{n}+cκ^{-1}, where δ_{n} is the depletion thickness at a neutral surface, c is a function of the electrostatic characteristics of the system, and κ^{-1} is the Debye length.

Fine-tuning RNA extraction protocols for polysaccharide-rich freshwater red algae (Rhodophyta).

Freshwater red algae are important primary producers, widely distributed, contributing significantly to nutrient cycling in aquatic ecosystems. Recent studies have focused on identifying the effect of different environmental conditions such as light on the gene expression in photosynthesis pathways. However, obtaining the necessary RNA quantity and quality for sequencing from these algae has been challenging.

Correction: van Veelen et al. First-in-Human Drug-Eluting Balloon Treatment of Vulnerable Lipid-Rich Plaques: Rationale and Design of the DEBuT-LRP Study. 2023, , 5807.

In the original publication [...

Freezing-mediated formation of supraproteins using depletion forces.

Hypothesis Long-acting formulations such as microparticles, injectable depots and implantable devices can realize spatiotemporally controlled delivery of protein drugs to extend their therapeutic in vivo half-lives. To efficiently encapsulate the protein drugs into such drug delivery systems, (sub)micron-sized protein particles are needed. The formation of micronized supraproteins can be induced through the synergistic combination of attractive depletion forces and freezing.

Detecting aortic valve stenosis based on the non-invasive blood pressure waveform-a proof of concept study.

The incidence of aortic valve stenosis (AoS) increases with age, and once diagnosed, symptomatic severe AoS has a yearly mortality rate of 25%. AoS is diagnosed with transthoracic echocardiography (TTE), however, this gold standard is time consuming and operator and acoustic window dependent. As AoS affects the arterial blood pressure waveform, AoS-specific waveform features might serve as a diagnostic tool.

Window of opportunity in psoriatic arthritis: the earlier the better?

Objectives: To investigate whether there is a window of opportunity for psoriatic arthritis (PsA) patients and to assess which patient characteristics are associated with a longer diagnostic delay.

Methods: All newly diagnosed, disease-modifying antirheumatic drug-naïve PsA patients who participated in the Dutch southwest Early PsA cohoRt and had ≥3 years of follow-up were studied. First, total delay was calculated as the time period between symptom onset and PsA diagnosis made by a rheumatologist and then split into patient and physician delays.

Patient-reported outcomes and radiographic progression in patients with rheumatoid arthritis in sustained remission versus low disease activity.

Objective: To compare clinical and patient-reported outcomes (PROs) over 5 years between patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in sustained remission (sREM), sustained low disease activity (sLDA) or active disease (AD) in the first year after diagnosis.

Methods: All patients with RA from the treatment in the Rotterdam Early Arthritis CoHort trial, a multicentre, stratified, single-blinded trial with a treat-to-target approach, aiming for LDA (Disease Activity Score (DAS) ≤2.4), were studied.