Land-use change, no-net-loss policies, and effects on carbon dioxide removals.

Background: Carbon dioxide removal from the atmosphere (CDR) is a critical component of strategies for restricting global warming to 1.5°C and is expected to come largely from the sequestration of carbon in vegetation. Because CDR rates have been declining in the United States, in part due to land use changes, policy proposals are focused on altering land uses, through afforestation, avoided deforestation, and no-net-loss strategies.

A Visual Approach for Inducing Dolichoectasia in Mice to Model Large Vessel-Mediated Cerebrovascular Dysfunction.

The blood-brain (BBB) is a crucial system that regulates selective brain circulation with the periphery, as an example, allowing necessary nutrients to enter and expel excessive amino acids or toxins from the brain. To model how the BBB can be compromised in diseases like vascular dementia (VaD) or Alzheimer's disease (AD), researchers developed novel methods to model vessel dilatation. A compromised BBB in these disease states can be detrimental and result in the dysregulation of the BBB leading to untoward and pathological consequences impacting brain function.

Therapeutic coordination polymers: tailoring drug release through metal-ligand interactions.

Developing tunable materials which exhibit sustained drug release is a considerable challenge. Herein, we report the concept of Therapeutic Coordination Polymers (TCPs); non-porous coordination polymers constructed from biocompatible components which demonstrate tunable zero-order drug release kinetics upon degradation of metal-ligand bonds. TCPs were constructed from three principal components: (i) a cationic metal center (M = Mg, Mn, Zn, or Cu); (ii) an anionic drug (Diclofenac); and (iii) an alkyl bis-imidazole organic ligand which behaves as a "linker" between metal centers.

The complexity of extracellular vesicles: Bridging the gap between cellular communication and neuropathology.

Brain-derived extracellular vesicles (EVs) serve a prominent role in maintaining homeostasis and contributing to pathology in health and disease. This review establishes a crucial link between physiological processes leading to EV biogenesis and their impacts on disease. EVs are involved in the clearance and transport of proteins and nucleic acids, responding to changes in cellular processes associated with neurodegeneration, including autophagic disruption, organellar dysfunction, aging, and other cell stresses.

Autophagy Inhibition via Hydroxychloroquine or 3-Methyladenine Enhances Chemotherapy-Induced Apoptosis in Neuro-Blastoma and Glioblastoma.

Neuroblastoma is the most common tumour in children under 1 year old, accounting for 12-15% of childhood cancer deaths. Although current treatments are relatively efficacious against this cancer, associated adverse effects could be detrimental to growth and development. In contrast, glioblastoma accounts for 52% of brain tumours and has an extremely poor prognosis.

Ubisol-Q, a Nanomicellar and Water-Dispersible Formulation of Coenzyme-Q as a Potential Treatment for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's Disease.

The world continues a desperate search for therapies that could bring hope and relief to millions suffering from progressive neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's (AD) and Parkinson's (PD). With oxidative stress thought to be a core stressor, interests have long been focused on applying redox therapies including coenzyme-Q. Therapeutic use has failed to show efficacy in human clinical trials due to poor bioavailability of this lipophilic compound.

Combined Ubisol-Q and Ashwagandha Root Extract Target Multiple Biochemical Mechanisms and Reduces Neurodegeneration in a Paraquat-Induced Rat Model of Parkinson's Disease.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is characterized by progressive neurodegeneration in the substantia nigra (SN) region resulting in loss of movement coordination. Current therapies only provide symptomatic relief, and there is no agent to halt the progression of PD. Previously, Ubisol-Q, a water-soluble formulation of coenzyme-Q and ethanolic root extract of ashwagandha (ASH) have been shown to inhibit PD pathology in rodent models when used alone.

Using a hybrid demand-allocation algorithm to enable distributional analysis of land use change patterns.

Future land use projections are needed to inform long-term planning and policy. However, most projections require downscaling into spatially explicit projection rasters for ecosystem service analyses. Empirical demand-allocation algorithms input coarse-level transition quotas and convert cells across the raster, based on a modeled probability surface.

Resumption of Autophagy by Ubisol-Q in Presenilin-1 Mutated Fibroblasts and Transgenic AD Mice: Implications for Inhibition of Senescence and Neuroprotection.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most prevalent form of dementia and is associated with loss of memory, amyloid-beta plaque buildup, and neurofibrillary tangles. These features might be a result of neuronal cell death in the cerebral cortex and hippocampal regions of the brain. AD pathologies can be attributed to a variety of biochemical consequences including mitochondrial dysfunction, increased oxidative stress, and autophagy inhibition.

Spatiotemporal downscaling of global population and income scenarios for the United States.

Downscaled climate projections need to be linked to downscaled projections of population and economic growth to fully develop implications for land, natural resources, and ecosystems for future scenarios. We develop an empirical spatiotemporal approach for jointly projecting population and income at the county scale in the United States that is consistent with neoclassical economic growth theory and overlapping labor markets and that accounts for labor migration and spatial spillovers. Downscaled projections generated for the five Shared Socioeconomic Pathways used to support global scenario analysis generally show growth focused around relatively few centers especially in the southeast and western regions, with some areas in the Midwest and northeast experiencing population declines.

A Bird's-Eye View of the Multiple Biochemical Mechanisms that Propel Pathology of Alzheimer's Disease: Recent Advances and Mechanistic Perspectives on How to Halt the Disease Progression Targeting Multiple Pathways.

Neurons consume the highest amount of oxygen, depend on oxidative metabolism for energy, and survive for the lifetime of an individual. Therefore, neurons are vulnerable to death caused by oxidative-stress, accumulation of damaged and dysfunctional proteins and organelles. There is an exponential increase in the number of patients diagnosed with neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's (AD) as the number of elderly increases exponentially.

Narrative Intersectionality in Caring for Marginalized or Disadvantaged Patients: Thinking Beyond Categories in Medical Education and Care.

Categories are essential to doctors' thinking and reasoning about their patients. Much of the clinical categorization learned in medical school serves useful purposes, but an extensive literature exists on students' reliance on broad systems of social categorization. In this article, the authors challenge some of the orthodoxies of categorization by combining narrative approaches to medical practice with the theoretical term "intersectionality" to draw students' attention to the important intersecting, but often overlooked, identities of their patients.

An empirical, hierarchical typology of tree species assemblages for assessing forest dynamics under global change scenarios.

The composition of tree species occurring in a forest is important and can be affected by global change drivers such as climate change. To inform assessment and projection of global change impacts at broad extents, we used hierarchical cluster analysis and over 120,000 recent forest inventory plots to empirically define forest tree assemblages across the U.S.

The Almost Right Word: The Move From Medical to Health Humanities.

Since the emergence of the field in the 1970s, several trends have begun to challenge the original assumptions, claims, and practices of what became known as the medical humanities. In this article, the authors make the case for the health humanities as a more encompassing label because it captures recent theoretical and pedagogical developments in higher education such as the shift from rigid disciplinary boundaries to multi- and interdisciplinary inquiry, which has transformed humanities curricula in health professions. Calling the area of study health humanities also underscores the crucial distinction between medicine and health.

Remembering Freddie Gray: Medical Education for Social Justice.

Recent attention to racial disparities in law enforcement, highlighted by the death of Freddie Gray, raises questions about whether medical education adequately prepares physicians to care for persons particularly affected by societal inequities and injustice who present to clinics, hospitals, and emergency rooms. In this Perspective, the authors propose that medical school curricula should address such concerns through an explicit pedagogical orientation. The authors detail two specific approaches-antiracist pedagogy and the concept of structural competency-to construct a curriculum oriented toward appropriate care for patients who are victimized by extremely challenging social and economic disadvantages and who present with health concerns that arise from these disadvantages.

Three Things to Do With Stories: Using Literature in Medical, Health Professions, and Interprofessional Education.

It would be unusual to find a current medical school administrator or faculty member who has not heard the phrase "literature and medicine" or who does not know that literature is taught in various forms-short stories, novels, poems, essays-at many points in the curriculum at U.S. medical schools.

From sink to source: Regional variation in U.S. forest carbon futures.

The sequestration of atmospheric carbon (C) in forests has partially offset C emissions in the United States (US) and might reduce overall costs of achieving emission targets, especially while transportation and energy sectors are transitioning to lower-carbon technologies. Using detailed forest inventory data for the conterminous US, we estimate forests' current net sequestration of atmospheric C to be 173 Tg yr(-1), offsetting 9.7% of C emissions from transportation and energy sources.

Complex forest dynamics indicate potential for slowing carbon accumulation in the southeastern United States.

Over the past century forest regrowth in Europe and North America expanded forest carbon (C) sinks and offset C emissions but future C accumulation is uncertain. Policy makers need insights into forest C dynamics as they anticipate emissions futures and goals. We used land use and forest inventory data to estimate how forest C dynamics have changed in the southeastern United States and attribute changes to land use, management, and disturbance causes.

Slow medical education.

Slow medical education borrows from other "slow" movements by offering a complementary orientation to medical education that emphasizes the value of slow and thoughtful reflection and interaction in medical education and clinical care. Such slow experiences, when systematically structured throughout the curriculum, offer ways for learners to engage in thoughtful reflection, dialogue, appreciation, and human understanding, with the hope that they will incorporate these practices throughout their lives as physicians. This Perspective offers several spaces in the medical curriculum where slowing down is possible: while reading and writing at various times in the curriculum and while providing clinical care, focusing particularly on conducting the physical exam and other dimensions of patient care.

"Making strange": a role for the humanities in medical education.

Stories, film, drama, and art have been used in medical education to enhance empathy, perspective-taking, and openness to "otherness," and to stimulate reflection on self, others, and the world. Yet another, equally important function of the humanities and arts in the education of physicians is that of "making strange"-that is, portraying daily events, habits, practices, and people through literature and the arts in a way that disturbs and disrupts one's assumptions, perspectives, and ways of acting so that one sees the self, others, and the world anew. Tracing the development of this concept from Viktor Shklovsky's "enstrangement" (ostranenie) through Bertolt Brecht's "alienation effect," this essay describes the use of this technique to disrupt the "automaticity of thinking" in order to discover new ways of perceiving and being in the world.

Sequential real-time PCR assays applied to identification of genomic signatures in formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues: a case report about brucella-induced osteomyelitis.

Brucellosis is a zoonotic infection transmitted from animals to human by ingestion of infected food products, direct contact with an infected animal, or inhalation of aerosols. Brucella infection-induced osteomyelitis may present only with nonspecific clinical and radiographic findings, mild elevations in serum inflammatory markers, as well as nonspecific histological changes. We studied a case of an Iraqi war veteran with multifocal vertebral body and left iliac bone lesions on radio nucleotide scans and magnetic resonance imaging, clinically suspected osteomyelitis possibly because of Brucella.

Cultural competency 2.0: exploring the concept of "difference" in engagement with the other.

Cultural competency efforts have received much attention in medical education. Most efforts focus on the acquisition of knowledge and skills about various groups based on race and ethnic identity, national origins, religion, and the like. The authors propose an approach, "Cultural Competency 2.

Reflection in/and writing: pedagogy and practice in medical education.

During the past decade, "reflection" and "reflective writing" have become familiar terms and practices in medical education. The authors of this article argue that the use of the terms requires more thoughtfulness and precision, particularly because medical educators ask students to do so much reflection and reflective writing. First, the authors discuss John Dewey's thoughts on the elements of reflection.