Intranasal midazolam for the emergency management of hypercyanotic spells in tetralogy of Fallot.

The case of a 2-month-old boy with previously diagnosed tetralogy of Fallot who was brought to the emergency department with a hypercyanotic spell is described. Because partly of the difficulty of intravenous placement, especially in an infant crying with marked hypernea and deeply cyanotic, intranasal midazolam was administered. Before 3 minutes of hypernea terminated increasing the oxygen saturation successfully and intravenous line was easily placed with the baby remaining in calm. Sedation is an important step in the management of patients with cyanotic spells. Intranasal midazolam offers an alternative use as an initial method of calming the child that was effective in a patient with a severe cyanotic spell because of tetralogy of Fallot in the emergency department.

Proteomic analysis of phytopathogenic fungus Botrytis cinerea as a potential tool for identifying pathogenicity factors, therapeutic targets and for basic research.

Botrytis cinerea is a phytopathogenic fungus causing disease in a substantial number of economically important crops. In an attempt to identify putative fungal virulence factors, the two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2-DE) protein profile from two B. cinerea strains differing in virulence and toxin production were compared. Protein extracts from fungal mycelium obtained by tissue homogenization were analyzed. The mycelial 2-DE protein profile revealed the existence of qualitative and quantitative differences between the analyzed strains. The lack of genomic data from B. cinerea required the use of peptide fragmentation data from MALDI-TOF/TOF and ESI ion trap for protein identification, resulting in the identification of 27 protein spots. A significant number of spots were identified as malate dehydrogenase (MDH) and glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH). The different expression patterns revealed by some of the identified proteins could be ascribed to differences in virulence between strains. Our results indicate that proteomic analysis are becoming an important tool to be used as a starting point for identifying new pathogenicity factors, therapeutic targets and for basic research on this plant pathogen in the postgenomic era.

Two-dimensional electrophoresis protein profile of the phytopathogenic fungus Botrytis cinerea.

Botrytis cinerea is a phytopathogenic fungi causing disease in a number of important crops. It is considered a very complex species in which different populations seem to be adapted to different hosts. In order to characterize fungal virulence factors, a proteomic research was started. A protocol for protein extraction from mycelium tissue, with protein separation by 2-DE and MS analysis, was optimised as a first approach to defining the B. cinerea proteome. Around 400 spots were detected in 2-DE CBB-stained gels, covering the 5.4-7.7 pH and 14-85 kDa ranges. The averages of analytical and biological coefficients of variance for 64 independent spots were 16.1% and 37.5%, respectively. Twenty-two protein spots were identified by MALDI-TOF or ESI IT MS/MS, with some of them corresponding to forms of malate dehydrogenase and glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase. Two more spots matched a cyclophilin and a protein with an unknown function.

Pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide induces astrocyte differentiation of precursor cells from developing cerebral cortex.

Ciliary neurotrophic factor and bone morphogenetic proteins induce astrocytogenesis in the developing rat brain by stimulating STAT- and Smad-dependent signaling, respectively. We previously found that stimulation of the cAMP-dependent signaling pathway also triggers differentiation of cerebral cortical precursor cells into astrocytes, providing an additional mechanism to promote astrocyte differentiation. In this study, we show that pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide (PACAP), but not the related vasoactive intestinal peptide, induces astrocyte differentiation of cortical precursor cells, even after a transient exposure. Cortical precursors were found to express predominantly the short isoform of the PACAP-specific PAC1 receptor, which couples to adenylate cyclase. Consistent with this notion, we determined that exposure of cortical precursors to PACAP resulted in a dose-dependent increase in cAMP production. Pretreatment of cells with the cAMP antagonist Rp-cAMPS prevented astrocyte differentiation. Thus, PACAP acts as an extracellular signal to trigger cortical precursor cell differentiation into astrocytes via stimulation of intracellular cAMP production.