PURPOSE To evaluate the in vivo and in vitro properties of collagen-coated acrylic microspheres and to compare them with polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) particles. METHODS Samples of 100- to 300-microns, 300- to 500-microns, 500- to 700-microns, and 700- to 900-microns collagen-coated acrylic microspheres and 200- to 300-microns PVA particles were suspended in solutions of 50% saline and 50% contrast...

BACKGROUND Recently, several indexes such as tension-time index (TTI), tension-time or force-time integral (FTI), rate-pressure product (RPP), pressure-work index (PWI), and systolic pressure-volume area (PVA) have been developed as predictors of myocardial oxygen consumption in experimental and clinical studies. However, it is still unclear whether these indexes are reliable predictors of myoc...

BACKGROUND Left ventricular mechanical efficiency is one of the most important measures of left ventricular pump performance. Several clinical studies, however, have shown that mechanical efficiency does not fall substantially as the heart fails. To clarify the insensitivity of mechanical efficiency to the change in pump performance, we analyzed human left ventricular mechanical efficiency, app...

The aim of this review was to analyze/investigate the synthesis, properties, and applications of polyvinyl alcohol-halloysite nanotubes (PVA-HNT), and their nanocomposites. Different polymers with versatile properties are attractive because of their introduction and potential uses in many fields. Synthetic polymers, such as PVA, natural polymers like alginate, starch, chitosan, or any material ...

Wound dressing is an artificial skin that can meet the requirements such as higher vapor or gas permeation and protection of wound from infection and dehydration. Poly (vinyl alcohol) (PVA) hydrogel is one of the well-known polymer gel that due to its good biocompatibility, hydrophilicity and capability of swell in water or biological fluids has been used in several biomedical and pharmaceutica...

Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) / starch (S) /Carboxy methyl cellulose (CMC) composite films were prepared from PVA, three different loading of CMC and soluble starch aqueous suspensions by casting method in the presence of plasticize containing glycerol. The effects of the CMC addition on the some physical properties of the resulted blend films were investigated. Tensile tests demonstrated positive re...

AIMS Andersen-Tawil syndrome (ATS1)-associated ventricular arrhythmias are initiated by premature ventricular activity (PVA) resulting from diastolic Ca(2+) (Ca(D)) accumulation. We hypothesized that relatively high Na(+)-Ca(2+) exchanger (NCX) expression coupled with slower Ca(2+) uptake may constitute an arrhythmogenic substrate during drug-induced ATS1 (DI-ATS1). METHODS AND RESULTS DI-ATS...

Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) of various molecular weight (MW=10,560-116,600) was successfully labeled with fluorescein isothiocyanate isomer I (FITC) according to the method of de Belder and Granath. A high-performance size-exclusion chromatographic procedure was developed for the quantitative analysis of FITC-labeled poly(vinyl alcohol) (F-PVA) in biological samples. F-PVA (80 K) disappeared slow...

Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)-montmorillonite (MMT) clay nanocomposite films up to 10 wt% clay concentration were synthesized by aqueous solution grown technique. The relative complex dielectric function, alternating current electrical conductivity, electric modulus and impedance properties of these organic-inorganic nanocomposites were investigated in the frequency range from 20 Hz to 1 MHz at amb...

Almost general poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) films were prepared by the processing of a PVA solution. For the first time, a novel poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) film was prepared by the saponification of a poly(vinyl acetate) (PVAc) film in a heterogenous medium. Under the same saponification conditions, the influence of saponification time on the degree of saponification (DS) was studied for the prepar...