Response of Lipid Profile to Laser Acupuncture along with Diet and Pilates Exercise in Obese Women with Systemic Lupus Erythematosus: a Randomized Controlled Trial.

Background: Obesity-induced dyslipidemia is one of the main factors contributing to morbidity and mortality associated with metabolic syndrome, atherosclerosis, and coronary artery disease among patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). Objectives: This research aimed to assess the effect of adding laser acupuncture therapy (LAT) to a Pilates exercise program (PEP) and low-calorie diet protocol (LCDP) on blood lipids among 60 obese women with SLE. Methods: Study participants were women aged between 23 and 49 years, randomly assigned to one of two groups, A or B, each comprising 30 women. In addition to adherence to the LCDP, both groups were supervised five times weekly during 50-minute PEP sessions. Group A also received LAT three times weekly, with each session lasting 2 minutes on selected acupoints. After the 12-week intervention, plasma total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein, triglycerides, and low-density lipoprotein were assessed. Results: Both groups demonstrated significant improvement in the aforementioned lipids after the 12-week intervention. A comparison between the post-intervention values of the lipids in the groups revealed a significant improvement favoring group A (the group that received LAT). Conclusion: Adding a 12-week LAT regimen to PEP and LCDP significantly improved lipid profiles among 60 obese women with SLE.

Pore-Scale Study of Wettability Alteration and Fluid Flow in Propped Fractures of Ultra-Tight Carbonates.

The in situ change in oil flow behavior inside propped fractures due to wettability alteration of proppant grains and fracture surfaces was thoroughly investigated for the first time in this study. A series of microscale flow experiments were performed in mixed-wet fractured and propped miniature ultra-tight carbonate cores where the effect of wettability on oil bridging and fracture oil layer integrity was probed during oil production. During the initial production, proppant wettability changed toward an intermediate-wet state (contact angle (CA) = 96°) while that of fracture surfaces became strongly oil-wet (CA = 139°). Consequently, the fracture oil layer grew in size on both fracture surfaces and imbibed into the proppant pack through piston-like displacement and pore body filling until oil bridges were formed during oil injection. However, subsequent waterflooding induced thinning and rupturing of those bridges due to the accompanying reduction in the threshold capillary pressure of the proppant at higher aging times. The in situ chemical treatment of the proppant by a cationic surfactant (dodecyl tri-methyl ammonium bromide) could reverse its wettability toward weakly water-wet state (CA = 78°) after oil solubilization from the sand grains followed by substitutive surfactant adsorption. Surfactant injection also impacted the wettability of the fracture surface due to oil solubilization, reducing its mean contact angle down to an intermediate range (CA = 99°). As a result, the following oil production cycle yielded a smaller fracture oil layer. The surfactant effect on proppant wettability lasted for 2 weeks while its effect on fracture wettability lasted for more than 6 weeks. Similar flow cycles were performed with an anionic nanoparticle (graphene quantum dot) with hydrogen bonding ability. The nanoparticle solution yielded a quick reduction of the proppant and fracture surface contact angles to nearly 77° and 115°, respectively. Proppant wettability alteration occurred because the nanoparticles self-assembled at the three-point contact region between adsorbed oil and quartz surfaces, leading to oil solubilization in intermediate-wet regions while oil-wet regions remained unchanged. Therefore, re-introducing oil into the fracture instantaneously re-instated the initial wettability state of proppant grains (CA = 88°), deeming the nanoparticle solution ineffective. This study revealed that oil production through hydraulic fractures can be enhanced by monitoring the wettability of the proppant pack. If the production has a high water cut, it is beneficial to use chemical agents that reduce the proppant contact angles to a weakly water-wet state in order to preserve the hydraulic conductivity of the oil layer.

Autonomic functions, tinnitus annoyance and loudness, and quality of life: Randomized-controlled responses to bee-humming (vibrational) respiratory training in tinnitus elderly.

BACKGROUND: In chronic subjective tinnitus (CST) studies, the effect of bee-humming respiratory training (BHRT), a type of pranayama breathing technique, on autonomic cardiovascular/respiratory physiological functions (systolic pressure, rates of breathing and pulse, and diastolic pressure), tinnitus annoyance (TA), tinnitus loudness (TL), and quality of life measures as tinnitus handicap inventory (THI) did not receive significant attention. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the efficacy of BHRT on TL, THI, TA, and cardiovascular/respiratory autonomic functions in bilateral CST elderly (aged ≥65 years old). THE DESIGN, SETTING, PARTICIPANTS, AND INTERVENTION: The current study employs a prospective, single-blind design; it is a randomized-controlled for-tinnitus behavioral intervention. Forty-six CST elderly subjects were randomly assigned to one of two groups: the BHRT group (23 patients) or the control group (23 patients). The 4-week BHRT intervention was applied 30 min daily. OUTCOME MEASURES: TL, THI, TA, and cardiovascular/respiratory autonomic functions were evaluated. RESULTS: Significant BHRT-induced reductions of all measures were detected in the BHRT group, whereas no significant changes were observed in the controlled elderly group. CONCLUSION: The complementary choice for BHRT is considered an effective method to improve TL, TA, THI, and cardiovascular/respiratory autonomic functions in CST elderly.

The inhibitory effect of dextranases from Bacillus velezensis and Pseudomonas stutzeri on Streptococcus mutans biofilm.

Background and Objectives: Dental caries is a breakdown of the teeth enamel due to harmful bacteria, lack of oral hygiene, and sugar consumption. The acid-producing bacterium Streptococcus mutans is the leading cause of dental caries. Dextranase is an enzyme that can degrade dextran to low molecular weight fractions, which have many therapeutic and industrial applications. The purpose of the present study was to isolate a novel dextranase-producing bacteria from a source (molasses). The cell-free extracts containing dextranases were tested as antibiofilm agents. Materials and Methods: Dextranase-producing bacteria were identified using phenotypic and genotypic methods such as 16S rRNA gene sequencing and enzymatic characterization. Results: The highest six dextranase-producing bacterial isolates were Bacillus species. The best conditions for dextranase productivity were obtained after 72 hours of culture time at pH 7. The addition of glucose to the medium enhanced the production of the enzymes. The cell-free extract of the six most active isolates showed remarkable activity against biofilm formation by Streptococcus mutans ATCC 25175. The highest inhibition activities reached 60% and 80% for Bacillus velezensis and Pseudomonas stutzeri, respectively. Conclusion: Therefore, our study added to the current dextranase-producing bacteria with potential as a source of dextranases.

A glycosyltransferase gene signature to detect pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma patients with poor prognosis.

BACKGROUND: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is characterized by an important heterogeneity, reflected by different clinical outcomes and chemoresistance. During carcinogenesis, tumor cells display aberrant glycosylated structures, synthetized by deregulated glycosyltransferases, supporting the tumor progression. In this study, we aimed to determine whether PDAC could be stratified through their glycosyltransferase expression profiles better than the current binary classification (basal-like and classical) in order to improve detection of patients with poor prognosis. METHODS: Bioinformatic analysis of 169 glycosyltransferase RNA sequencing data were performed for 74 patient-derived xenografts (PDX) of resected and unresectable tumors. The Australian cohort of International Cancer Genome Consortium and the microarray dataset from Puleo patient's cohort were used as independent validation datasets. FINDINGS: New PDAC stratification based on glycosyltransferase expression profile allowed to distinguish different groups of patients with distinct clinical outcome (p-value = 0.007). A combination of 19 glycosyltransferases differentially expressed in PDX defined a glyco-signature, whose prognostic value was validated on datasets including resected whole tumor tissues. The glyco-signature was able to discriminate three clusters of PDAC patients on the validation cohorts, two clusters displaying a short overall survival compared to one cluster having a better prognosis. Both poor prognostic clusters having different glyco-profiles in Puleo patient's cohort were correlated with stroma activated or desmoplastic subtypes corresponding to distinct microenvironment features (p-value < 0.0001). Besides, differential expression and enrichment analyses revealed deregulated functional pathways specific to different clusters. INTERPRETATION: This study identifies a glyco-signature relevant for a prognostic use, potentially applicable to resected and unresectable PDAC. Furthermore, it provides new potential therapeutic targets. FUNDING: This work was supported by INCa (Grants number 2018-078 and 2018-079), Fondation ARC (Grant number ARCPJA32020070002326), Cancéropôle PACA, DGOS (labelization SIRIC, Grant number 6038), Amidex Foundation and Ligue Nationale Contre le Cancer and by institutional fundings from INSERM and the Aix-Marseille Université.

In-situ capillary pressure and wettability in natural porous media: Multi-scale experimentation and automated characterization using X-ray images.

HYPOTHESIS: Geometrical analyses of pore-scale fluid-fluid-rock interfaces have recently been used for in-situ characterization of capillary pressure and wettability in natural porous media. Nevertheless, more robust techniques and multi-scale, well-characterized experimental data are needed to rigorously validate these techniques and enhance their efficacy when applied to saturated porous media. EXPERIMENTS AND IMAGE ANALYSIS: We present two new techniques for automated measurements of in-situ capillary pressure and contact angle, which offer several advancements over previous methodologies. These approaches are methodically validated using synthetic data and X-ray images of capillary rise experiments, and subsequently, applied on pore-scale fluid occupancy maps of a miniature Berea sandstone sample obtained during steady-state drainage and imbibition flow experiments. FINDINGS: The results show encouraging agreement between the image-based capillary pressure-saturation function and its macroscopic counterpart obtained from a porous membrane experiment. However, unlike the macroscopic behavior, the micro-scale measurements demonstrate a nonmonotonic increase with saturation due to the intermittency of the pore-scale displacement events controlling the overall flow behavior. This is further explained using the pertinent micro-scale mechanisms such as Haines jumps. The new methods also enable one to generate in-situ contact angle distributions and distinguish between the advancing and receding values while automatically excluding invalid measurements.

Pore-scale experimental investigation of oil recovery enhancement in oil-wet carbonates using carbonaceous nanofluids.

This study investigates the pore-scale displacement mechanisms of crude oil in aged carbonate rocks using novel engineered carbon nanosheets (E-CNS) derived from sub-bituminous coal. The nanosheets, synthesized by a simple top-down technique, were stable in brine without any additional chemicals. Owing to their amphiphilic nature and nano-size, they exhibited dual properties of surfactants and nanoparticles and reduced the oil/brine interfacial tension (IFT) from 14.6 to 5.5 mN/m. X-ray micro-computed tomography coupled with miniature core-flooding was used to evaluate their ability to enhance oil recovery. Pore-scale displacement mechanisms were investigated using in-situ contact angle measurements, oil ganglia distribution analysis, and three-dimensional visualization of fluid occupancy maps in pores of different sizes. Analysis of these maps at the end of various flooding stages revealed that the nanofluid invaded into medium and small pores that were inaccessible to base brine. IFT reduction was identified as the main displacement mechanism responsible for oil recovery during 1 to 8 pore volumes (PVs) of nanofluid injection. Subsequently, wettability alteration was the dominant mechanism during the injection of 8 and 32 PVs, decreasing the average contact angle from 134° (oil wet) to 85° (neutral wet). In-situ saturation data reveals that flooding with only 0.1 wt% of E-CNS in brine resulted in incremental oil production of 20%, highlighting the significant potential of this nanofluid as a recovery agent.

Synergistic effects of pomegranate and rosemary extracts in combination with antibiotics against antibiotic resistance and biofilm formation of Pseudomonas aeruginosa.

The combination of plant extract and antibiotic represents a template for developing of antibiofilm drugs. This study investigated the synergistic effects of pomegranate/rosemary/antibiotic combinations against antibiotic resistance and biofilm formation of Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The results showed that 17 (85%) of total P. aeruginosa isolates were biofilm producers; however, 5 (25%) isolates were demonstrated as a strong biofilm producer. The highest MIC level (1024 µg/ml) of tested antibiotics against strong biofilm producer isolates was observed with piperacillin, however the MIC ranges of ceftazidime, gentamycin, imipenem, and levofloxacin against these isolates were reached to (256-1024 µg/ml), (32-1024 µg/ml), (8-1024 µg/ml), and (8-512 µg/ml), respectively. PS-1 was the representative isolate for strong biofilm formation and high antibiotic resistance. 16S rRNA gene analysis suggested that PS-1 (accession No. MN619678) was identified as a strain of P. aeruginosa POA1. Pomegranate and rosemary extracts were the most effective extracts in biofilm inhibition, which significantly inhibited 91.93 and 90.83% of PS-1 biofilm, respectively. Notably, the synergism between both plant extracts and antibiotics has significantly reduced the MICs of used antibiotics at the level lower than the susceptibility breakpoints. Pomegranate/rosemary/antibiotic combinations achieved the highest biofilm eradication, which ranging from 90.0 to 99.6%, followed by the eradication ranges of pomegranate/rosemary combination, rosemary, and pomegranate extracts, which reached to (76.5-85.4%), (53.1-73.7%), and (41.2-71.5%), respectively. The findings suggest that pomegranate/rosemary/antibiotic combinations may be an effective therapeutic agent for antibiotic resistance and biofilm formation of P. aeruginosa.

Screening Different Divalent and Trivalent Metals Containing Binary and Ternary Layered Double Hydroxides for Optimum Phosphate Uptake.

The elements constituting a layered double hydroxides material provide many alternatives for its optimization. Ten different layered double hydroxides materials with various combinations of Ni, Cu, Zn, Al, Cr, and Fe elements were studied as sorbent materials for phosphate ion. The type of element used in the layered double hydroxides affected the uptake capacity of phosphate. The influence of a specific element alone was not the primary role of enhancing the sorption performance of phosphate ion on the LDHs material. However, using specific two or three elements together is the key to achieve the best result due to synergistic effects. BET surface area of the sorbent showed no correlation with phosphate uptake. From the examined materials, Four layered double hydroxides of Cu-Zn-Cr, Zn-Cr, Ni-Al, and Cu-Ni-Cr showed high phosphate sorption capability. Sorption equilibrium isotherm, reaction kinetics, and desorption of phosphate from the sorbent materials were also investigated.

Enhanced sulfur removal by a tuned composite structure of Cu, Zn, Fe, and Al elements.

Several combinations of high sulfur affinity elements of Cu, Zn, Fe, and Al were used to prepare sorbent materials that remove hydrogen sulfide (H2S) from air contaminated streams. The combination of these four elements in composite crystallinity structure resembling hydrotalcite-like and aurichalcite-like compounds showed excellent H2S uptake. Further tuning of the relative ratio among these elements resulted in outstanding H2S uptake. XRD revealed that the final sorbent material was featured by crystallinity structure that had two adjacent lower reflection angles. The experimental test showed H2S uptake was around 39% of the sorbent material weight when the concentration of H2S in the outlet was less than 0.5% of its concentration in the inlet. The sorbent material showed high sulfur removal efficiency at ambient temperature without prior calcination.

Closed reduction with or without adductor tenotomy for developmental dysplasia of the hip presenting at walking age.

BACKGROUND: Many children with developmental dislocation of the hip especially in underdeveloped countries reach walking age and still remain undiagnosed, which can be detrimental to their growth and development. Because of the lack medical services often encountered in these regions, it would be attractive to find a cheap and effective treatment. Our work evaluated the results of treatment of these children by closed reduction with or without adductor tenotomy in a prospective study. METHODS: We included 20 patients in this study with 29 affected hips (15 right and 14 left). Nine patients (45%) had bilateral DDH and 11 (55%) had unilateral DDH. There were 18 girls (90%) and two boys (10%) who were followed up for a mean of 21 mo (18-24 mo). Ages ranged from 9 to 36 mo (mean age 18.3 mo). Patients were divided according to age into two groups: between 9-18 mo and from 19-36 mo. The first group included nine patients (14 hips) while the second had 11 patients (15 hips). RESULTS: In the first group, closed reduction failed in two patients (two hips) during the follow-up period (14.3%) and this necessitated shift to open reduction, while in the second group only one patient (bilateral DDH) had a similar failure (13.3%). We identified four hips with avascular necrosis. Three of them required no further treatment, the remaining hip was openly reduced. CONCLUSIONS: Closed reduction in older children offers a valid and reproducible treatment modality in the hands of an experienced pediatric orthopaedic surgeon as long as there is close follow-up and thorough knowledge of possible complications and their management including the ability to shift timely to open reduction.

Survey on medicinal plants and spices used in Beni-Sueif, Upper Egypt.

BACKGROUND: This study was conducted to identify medicinal plants and spices used for medicine by the community of Beni-Sueif, Upper Egypt. METHODS: Ethnobotanical data from local people was collected using direct interviews and a semi-structured questionnaire. RESULTS: Forty-eight plant species belonging to twenty-seven families and forty-seven genera were encountered during the study. Their botanical and vernacular names, plant parts used and medicinal uses are given. Results of the study were analyzed using two quantitative tools. The factor informant consensus indicated the agreement in the use of plants and the fidelity level indicated the ratio between the number of informants who independently suggested the use of a species for the same major purpose and the total number of informants who mentioned the plant for any use. The results of the factor informant consensus showed that the cardiovascular category has the greatest agreement, followed by the immunological, gastrointestinal and respiratory categories. The most important species according to their fidelity are: Hibiscus sabdariffa L. for the cardiovascular category; Trigonella foenum-graecum L. for the immunological category; Mentha piperita L. for the gastrointestinal category and Pimpinella anisum L. for the respiratory category. CONCLUSIONS: Medicinal plants are still used for treatment in Beni-Sueif community despite the availability of prescribed medications. Documentation of this ethnomedicinal knowledge is important. Evaluation of pharmacological activity for the promising medicinal plants is suggested.