BACKGROUND Gilbert syndrome is a clinically inconsequential entity of mild unconjugated hyperbilirubinemia caused by an A(TA)(n)TAA insertion polymorphism (UGT1A1*28) in the promoter region of the gene coding for the enzyme UDP-glucuronosyltransferase 1 (EC 2.4.1. 17; UGT1A1). Present methods for genotyping this polymorphism are laborious. METHODS Hybridization probes were designed complement...

OBJECTIVE To study the validity of quantitative cultures of tracheal aspirate (TA) in comparison with the plugged telescoping catheter (PTC) for the diagnosis of mechanical ventilator-associated pneumonia. METHOD Prospective multicenter study enrolling patients undergoing mechanical ventilation for longer than 72 hours. TA samples were collected from patients with suspected ventilator-associa...

BACKGROUND Adjunctive thrombus aspiration (TA) during primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) was reported to promote better coronary and myocardial reperfusion. However, long-term mortality benefit of TA remains controversial. The objective of this study is to investigate the clinical impact of TA on long-term clinical outcomes in patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarcti...

The biogenic amines octopamine (OA) and tyramine (TA) modulate insect motor behavior in an antagonistic manner. OA generally enhances locomotor behaviors such as Drosophila larval crawling and flight, whereas TA decreases locomotor activity. However, the mechanisms and cellular targets of TA modulation of locomotor activity are incompletely understood. This study combines immunocytochemistry, g...

BACKGROUND Studies looking at air temperature (Ta) and birth outcomes are rare. OBJECTIVES We investigated the association between birth outcomes and daily Ta during various prenatal exposure periods in Massachusetts (USA) using both traditional Ta stations and modeled addresses. METHODS We evaluated birth outcomes and average daily Ta during various prenatal exposure periods in Massachuset...

Real time and spatially distributed Ta (air temperature) data are desired for many applications. Ts (land surface temperature) derived from remote sensors has been used to estimate Ta in previous studies. Exploring MODIS Aqua Ts and station measured daily maximum and minimum Ta over east Africa, we found that Ts did not agree well with Ta during the day (MAE (Mean Absolute Error) = 6.9 ± 5.0 ◦C...

The association between the Serine/threonine kinase 15 (STK15) F31I polymorphism (rs2273535) and cancer susceptibility remains controversial. To further investigate this potential relationship, we conducted a comprehensive meta-analysis of 27 published studies involving a total of 19,267 multiple cancer cases and 24,359 controls. Our results indicate statistical evidence of an association betwe...

In this paper we consider the model of Time Petri Nets (TPN) “à la Merlin” where a time interval is associated with the firing of a transition, but we extend it with open intervals. We also consider Timed Automata (TA) as defined by Alur & Dill. We investigate some questions related to expressiveness for these models : we study the impact of slight variations of semantics for TPN and we compare...

Hydrogenated tetrahedral amorphous carbon (ta-C:H) is advantageous as coating material for high-density magnetic and optical storage devices, due to its favorable combination of density and smoothness. An advantage of ta-C:H over tetrahedral amorphous carbon (ta-C) is the absence of macroparticles, often found in cathodic arc deposition of ta-C, and the hydrogen rich surface, compatible with th...

Recent studies demonstrate that tolfenamic acid (TA) induces apoptosis and suppresses the development and progression of several types of cancers. However, the underlying mechanisms are complex and remain to be fully elucidated. Nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-κB) plays a critical role in inflammation, cancer development and progression. Although non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs modulate NF-κB s...