PURPOSE To investigate corneal healing and the factor(s) possibly responsible for refractive changes after laser in situ keratomileusis (LASIK). METHODS Twenty eyes of 10 patients who underwent LASIK for myopia were examined clinically and by real-time confocal microscopy for 6 months. Epithelial and posterior stromal thicknesses and the thickness of the keratocyte activation zone were measur...

The membrane potential and conductance of the giant muscle fiber of a barnacle (Balanus nubilus Darwin) were analyzed in relation to changes in the external (3.5-10.0) and the internal (4.7-9.6) pH, under various experimental conditions. A sharp increase in membrane conductance, associated with a large increase in conductance to Cl ions, was observed when the external pH was lowered to values b...

It has been proposed that blood coagulation factors, principally factor X (FX), enhance the uptake of human adenovirus type 5 (Ad5) into cultured epithelial cells by bridging the viral hexon capsid protein and cell-surface heparan sulphate proteoglycans (HSPGs). We studied the effects of FX on Ad transduction of lymphoid cell lines (NK92MI, a natural killer cell line; Daudi, a B-cell line and J...

This study was conducted to investigate the hair production and fleece characteristics of hairy goats according to the sex and age of animals. The material of the study consisted one total data of 73 hair goats, which were between more than one year-old and one year-old Lori goats from both sexes (26 males and 47 females). The overall fleece weight, fiber length, lock length, washing yield, hai...

Lignin is a valuable biomaterial. It is both naturally abundant and readily available as a byproduct of the pulping processes, and the proper reprocessing of lignin is an effective way to achieve waste recovery. Lignin fiber mats with web structures can be produced using electrospinning techniques. Such fiber mats are a promising material for use in the production of filter products. This study...

This is the first examination of sensory receptive properties and associated electrophysiological properties in vivo of dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons that express the TTX-resistant sodium channel Na(v)1.9 (NaN). Intracellular recordings in lumbar DRGs in Wistar rats enabled units with dorsal root C-, Adelta-, or Aalpha/beta-fibers to be classified as nociceptive, low-threshold mechanorecep...

Muscle fibers from the giant barnacle, Balanus nubilus, were placed inside the lumen of a porous glass capillary and equilibrated for 48 h in an electrolyte solution containing 2% Tween. The glass capillary prevented the chemically "skinned" fiber from swelling with a water content beyond 80%. Isotope exchange studies using 22Na, 42K, and 36Cl indicated the existence of an intermediate rate con...

Hedgehog proteins mediate many of the inductive interactions that determine cell fate during embryonic development. Hedgehog signaling has been shown to regulate slow muscle fiber type development. We report here that mutations in the zebrafish slow-muscle-omitted (smu) gene disrupt many developmental processes involving Hedgehog signaling. smu(-/-) embryos have a 99% reduction in the number of...

A fiber-optic transmission line is a nonlinear channel due to the material nonlinear effects. Fiber nonlinearity has become one of the major limiting factors in modern optical transmission systems [1, 2]. Distributed Raman amplification and various return-to-zero (RZ) modulation formats may be employed to reduce the nonlinear impairments, but merely to a limited extent. It is known that the non...