Introduction. Recent work revealed the development of marked muscle fiber weakness in the diaphragm, but not in the non-respiratory latissimus dorsi, during thoracic surgery. To disentangle the molecular processes that underlie the development of diaphragm muscle fiber weakness during thoracic surgery, we studied changes in the gene expression profile. Methods. Serial biopsies from the diaphrag...

Diaphragm muscle weakness in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is associated with increased morbidity and mortality. Recent studies indicate that increased contractile protein degradation by the proteasome contributes to diaphragm weakness in patients with COPD. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of proteasome inhibition on diaphragm function and...

Esophageal distension and transient lower esophageal sphincter (LES) relaxation (TLESR) are accompanied by simultaneous relaxation of the LES and inhibition of crural diaphragm. Recent studies indicate that baclofen decreases the frequency of TLESR; however, its effect on the crural diaphragm is not known. We evaluated the effects of baclofen on LES relaxation and crural diaphragm inhibition in...

Rat diaphragm muscle has been used almost exclusively for the investigation in vitro of skeletal muscle metabolism. However, the diaphragm is a specialized muscle adapted to constant activity and, with respect to oxygen consumption (1) and oxidative metabolism, seems to occupy an intermediate position between constantly active heart muscle and intermittently active skeletal muscle (2, 3). Histo...

Mechanical ventilation (MV) is a life-saving intervention for patients in respiratory failure. However, prolonged MV causes the rapid development of diaphragm muscle atrophy, and diaphragmatic weakness may contribute to difficult weaning from MV. Therefore, developing a therapeutic countermeasure to protect against MV-induced diaphragmatic atrophy is important. MV-induced diaphragm atrophy is d...

In this paper, we present a label-based approach for implementing deflection in a photonic packet network, and we introduce an algorithm for determining deflection options in a manner which eliminates looping. A general analytical model is developed to evaluate packet loss probabilities in networks with deflection. The analysis may be applied to a wide class of deflection schemes and may be app...

This paper presents an ultra-small absolute pressure sensor with a silicon-micromachined TSV backside interconnection for high-performance, high spatial resolution contact sensing, including flexible-substrate applications. By exploiting TSVs that are compatibly fabricated the sensor, sensing signals emitted from chip backside, thereby eliminating fragile leads on front-side. Such design achiev...

Inspiratory muscle weakness in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is of major clinical relevance; maximum inspiratory pressure generation is an independent determinant of survival in severe COPD. Traditionally, inspiratory muscle weakness has been ascribed to hyperinflation-induced diaphragm shortening. However, more recently, invasive evaluation of diaphragm contractile...

Studies on brainstem respiratory neurons suggest that eupnea consists of three phases; inspiration, post-inspiration and expiration. However it is not well understood how post-inspiration is organized in the diaphragm, i.e. whether post-inspiration differs in the crural and costal segments of the diaphragm and what the influence is of post-inspiratory neurons on diaphragm function during eupnea...