Advice on assistance and protection provided by the Scientific Advisory Board of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons: Part 3. On medical care and treatment of injuries from sulfur mustard.

Blister agents damage the skin, eyes, mucous membranes and subcutaneous tissues. Other toxic effects may occur after absorption. The response of the Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to a request from the OPCW Director-General in 2013 on the status of medical countermeasures and treatments to blister agents is updated through the incorporation of the latest information. The physical and toxicological properties of sulfur mustard and clinical effects and treatments are summarised. The information should assist medics and emergency responders who may be unfamiliar with the toxidrome of sulfur mustard and its treatment.

Advice on assistance and protection provided by the Scientific Advisory Board of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons: Part 1. On medical care and treatment of injuries from nerve agents.

The Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has provided advice on assistance and protection in relation to the Chemical Weapons Convention. In this, the first of several papers describing the SAB's work on this topic, we describe advice given in response to questions from the OPCW Director-General in 2013 and 2014 on the status of available medical countermeasures and treatments to organophosphorus nerve agents. This paper provides the evidence base for this advice which recommended to the OPCW pretreatments, emergency care, and long-term treatments that were available at the time of the request for this class of chemical warfare agent (CWA). It includes a bibliography of over 140 scientific references, which can be used as a platform for watching future medical countermeasure developments. The information provided in this paper should serve as a valuable reference for medical professionals and emergency responders who may have no knowledge of the symptoms and treatment options of exposure to nerve agents.

Advice on assistance and protection from the Scientific Advisory Board of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons: Part 2. On preventing and treating health effects from acute, prolonged, and repeated nerve agent exposure, and the identification of medical countermeasures able to reduce or eliminate the longer term health effects of nerve agents.

The Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has provided advice in relation to the Chemical Weapons Convention on assistance and protection. We present the SAB's response to a request from the OPCW Director-General in 2014 for information on the best practices for preventing and treating the health effects from acute, prolonged, and repeated organophosphorus nerve agent (NA) exposure. The report summarises pre- and post-exposure treatments, and developments in decontaminants and adsorbing materials, that at the time of the advice, were available for NAs. The updated information provided could assist medics and emergency responders unfamiliar with treatment and decontamination options related to exposure to NAs. The SAB recommended that developments in research on medical countermeasures and decontaminants for NAs should be monitored by the OPCW, and used in assistance and protection training courses and workshops organised through its capacity building programmes.

Advice from the Scientific Advisory Board of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons on riot control agents in connection to the Chemical Weapons Convention.

Compounds that cause powerful sensory irritation to humans were reviewed by the Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in response to requests in 2014 and 2017 by the OPCW Director-General to advise which riot control agents (RCAs) might be subject to declaration under the Chemical Weapons Convention (the "Convention"). The chemical and toxicological properties of 60 chemicals identified from a survey by the OPCW of RCAs that had been researched or were available for purchase, and additional chemicals recognised by the SAB as having potential RCA applications, were considered. Only 17 of the 60 chemicals met the definition of a RCA under the Convention. These findings were provided to the States Parties of the Convention to inform the implementation of obligations pertaining to RCAs under this international chemical disarmament and non-proliferation treaty.

Physicochemical properties and biological activities of novel blend films using oxidized pectin/chitosan.

Pectin has been widely used in a variety of biomedical applications. In this study, it was modified with sodium periodate as an oxidant and characterized by physicochemical methods Periodate oxidation increased the contents of dialdehyde units and carboxyl groups in pectin, and a decrease in pectin viscosity was measured. The oxidization reaction led to a significant decrease in all values of molecular weight and size (Mn, Mw, [η] and Rh) as determined by size exclusion chromatography (SEC), which allowed the selection of the oxidized pectin to be added to chitosan. Chitosan-based films were characterized by infra-red spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffractometry (XRD), and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) measurements. Thermal behaviour studies demonstrated that interactions existed between chitosan and oxidized pectin. The haemolysis percentages of films were found to be less than 5%, which indicated their good blood compatibility. Finally, the antibacterial activity was clearly improved. Cross-linking reactions between pectin and chitosan through ionic bonds and amide bonds and between chitosan and oxidized pectin through Schiff base formation were evidenced, which opens the way to extend applications of these polysaccharides; notably, the biocompatibility and biodegradability of these new networks is convenient for pharmaceutical, biomedical or cosmetic applications.