We read the paper “Chronic non-freezing cold injury results in neuropathic pain due to a sensory neuropathy” by Vale and colleagues recently published in Brain with great interest. Despite the impact non-freezing cold injury (NFCI) can have on an individual’s quality of life, little research has been conducted on this condition. Indeed, in the last 10 years only 16 full papers have been publish...

To determine whether overexpression of Fe-superoxide (SOD) dismutase would increase superoxide-scavenging capacity and thereby improve the winter survival of transgenic alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) plants, two genotypes were transformed with the vector pEXSOD10, which contains a cDNA for Arabidopsis Fe-SOD with a chloroplast transit peptide and cauliflower mosaic virus 35S promoter. A novel Fe-...

PURPOSE To examine the effects of transcorneal freezing using a new cryoprobe designed for corneal endothelial surgery. METHODS A freezing console employing nitrous oxide as a cryogen was used to cool a series of different cryoprobe tip designs made of silver for high thermal conductivity. In vitro studies were conducted on 426 porcine corneas, followed by preliminary in vivo investigations o...

The freezing behaviour studies of dormant buds, were examined, employing scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and light microscopy. The differences and effect of freezing behaviour on dormant buds were observed. The dormant bud primordia of several woody plant species avoid freezing injury by deep supercooling. By slow cooling (5C/day) of dormant buds to –30C, all living cells in bud tissues exhi...

The movement of water and small solutes is integral to the survival of freezing and desiccation in insects, yet the underlying mechanisms of these processes are not fully known. Recent evidence suggests that aquaporin (AQP) water channels play critical roles in protecting cells from osmotic damage during freezing and desiccation. Our study sequenced, functionally characterized and measured the ...

Ectothermic vertebrates have colonized regions that are seasonally or perpetually cold, and some species, particularly terrestrial hibernators, must cope with temperatures that fall substantially below 0°C. Survival of such excursions depends on either freeze avoidance through supercooling or freeze tolerance. Supercooling, a metastable state in which body fluids remain liquid below the equilib...

A simple method to cryogenically preserve hepatocyte monolayers is currently not available but such a technique would facilitate numerous applications in the field of biomedical engineering, cell line development, and drug screening. We investigated the effect of trehalose and dimethyl sulfoxide (Me2SO) in cryopreservation of human hepatocellular carcinoma (HepG2) cells in suspension and monola...

Citrus leaves exposed to subfreezing temperatures evolved ethylene at rates between 0.1 and 38.3 microliters per kilogram fresh weight per hour whereas untreated leaves evolved between 0.01 and 0.50 microliter per kilogram fresh weight per hour. Leaves not injured by freezing temperatures did not abscise, and ethylene evolution was near normal after 2 days. Freeze-injured leaves continued evolv...