Background The aim of the present theoretical essay is to evaluate evidence published on the characteristics of the transcription of SARS-CoV-2 and explain the mechanism of action of ivermectin that may justify its therapeutic use in clinical practice for the treatment of COVID-19. Methods Laboratory studies, narratives, editorials and expert opinions on the subject were identified through a systematic search of the literature in the Medline/PubMed, Cochrane Library, Web of Science and Embase databases. Two blinded, independent reviewers selected studies published up to May 17, 2020 based on the eligibility criteria. Results The search of the databases led to the retrieval of 25 articles. After the different phases of the selection process, eight articles were included in the present review for the extraction of relevant data. The results suggest that ivermectin inhibits the viral replication of SARS-CoV-2 through the action of the hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF-1α) and consequent destabilization of importin α/β1 proteins. Conclusions Ivermectin inhibits the viral replication of SARS-CoV-2. Laboratory and clinical studies are needed to provide more evidence in terms of the best posology and possible associations with other drugs for combatting COVID-19.

Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma is the most common type of Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. The disease exhibits significant clinical and biologic heterogeneity. Treatment with standard first line therapy results in cure in about 60% of patients while 30-40%of patients either are refractory to therapy or relapse. Current prognostic scores and biomarkers are unable to accurately predict patients who would relapse or would have refractory disease. A part of the heterogeneity in the behavior of DLBCL is explained by the cell of origin of the tumor. Germinal center type (GCB) DLBCL which is derived from centroblasts are associated with better prognosis compared with activated B-cell type (ABC), which is derived from a B-cell committed to secretory differentiation. While the gold standard for cell of origin determination is gene expression profiling, immunohistochemical methods are routinely used because of more readily available fixed tissue and expertise. Immunohistochemical methods are however associated with a significant degree of discordance with GEP. Within the ABC and GCB types of DLBCL, subgroups of prognostic significance have been identified using various multiple approaches which do not inure themselves to routine practice partly because of limitation of diagnostic material or expertise. Exosomes are a class of membrane bound extracellular vesicles of endosomal origin, produced by multiple cell types. They are involved in intercellular communication and present in abundance in various bodily fluids. Exosomal cargo which includes nucleic acids and proteins can be analyzed, yielding diagnostic and prognostic information in management of DLBCL.

COVID-19 has been the biggest global health threat since world war II. Up to now, the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic has resulted in over 300 thousand deaths. Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), the receptor of SARS-CoV-2, is also the key modulator of renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system (RAAS) axes, which regulates the inflammatory response to maintain internal environment balance. On the contrary, RAAS axes can also regulate the expression of ACE2 which may influence on the susceptibility of SARS-CoV-2. Furthermore, SARS-CoV-2 binds with ACE2 and subsequently down-regulates ACE2 expression, which may exacerbate the inflammatory response due to RAAS imbalance. In this review, we summarized pathogenesis and clinical characteristics of COVID-19 patients, and discussed the potential link between the RAAS axes imbalance and the susceptibility/progression of organ injury in COVID-19. Therefore, we speculate that rebalance of the RAAS axes is the preventive and therapeutic strategy of COVID-19.

COVID-19 pandemic caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has overwhelmed Healthcare Systems requiring the rapid development of treatments, at least, to reduce COVID-19 severity. Drug repurposing offers a fast track. Here, we discuss the potential beneficial effects of statins in COVID-19 patients based on evidence that they may target virus receptors, replication, degradation and downstream responses in infected cells, addressing both basic research and epidemiological information. Briefly, statins could act modulating virus entry, acting on the SARS-CoV-2 receptors, ACE2 and CD147, and/or lipid rafts engagement. Statins, by inducing autophagy activation, could regulate virus replication or degradation, exerting protective effects. The well-known anti-inflammatory properties of statins, by blocking several molecular mechanisms, including NF-κB and NLRP3 inflammasome, could limit the “cytokine storm” in severe COVID-19 patients which is linked to fatal outcome. Finally, statin moderation of coagulation response activation may also contribute to improve COVID-19 outcomes.

We analyzed the nationwide hospital discharge records of adolescent inpatients in Italy to map where adolescents with melanoma are treated and identify expert centers. We identified 137 hospitals pointing out a dispersion of these patients that must be addressed to ensure to all adolescents with melanoma adequate treatment and enrolment in clinical studies.

In this blog-post, we present our path and thoughts towards using ultra-cold atom experiments for quantum computation. They are the result of a two month internship where we studied the feasibility of such an undertaking in our group. Many associate only universal devices, especially qubit devices, to be valid quantum computers. We show how we think of our ultra-cold atoms in terms of quantum circuits and implement first steps in the software framework PennyLane.

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We report a case of successful management of short bowel syndrome in a young patient with gangrene of most of intestine following ileocecal knotting. Aggressive resuscitations, timely surgical intervention and use of parenteral nutrition have a good outcome. Key words: knotting, intestinal obstruction, shock, short bowel syndrome

Objectives This review provides an assessment of recent published or presented trends of perioperative healthcare of COVID-19 which is hitting the world, to provide refer for the frontline medical staff during the outbreak of epidemic, especially for surgeons and anesthesiologists. Methods Searching and reviewing recent published or presented articles about the COVID-19 from PubMed, COVID-19 center of ScienceDirect, Medline, JAMA, The LANCET, MedRxiv, some main Chinese journals and so on. Results The coronavirus disease 2019 has heightened infectious probability and has caused hundreds of thousands death. How to recognize, treat, and overcome this disease is a problem that all medical staff and all humans need to face. First, we should correctly identify suspicious and diagnosed patients and take protection levels according to the type of patients. Surgery and endoscopy are a serious issue during the epidemic, unless emergency condition. Once COVID-19 patients have to accept surgery, more detailed issues should be considered. Besides, special management methods should be implemented for special COVID-19 patients. Conclusion Safety for patients and healthcare providers is very important, we should do what we can do to cut off the spread of the virus in hospital and reduce the risk of infection.

The patient was a 78 year old man who had undergone thrombolysis and angioplasty LAD.. After 45 days, he returned to the clinic with icterus, after detailed work up,suspecting clopidogrel induced liver injury, the clopidogrel was substituted with ticagrelor. icterus and laboratory abnormality was relieved in 2 weeks.

Hybridization between species is likely to be associated with a new ecological impact. However, in termites, reports of hybridization mostly focus on hybrid zones caused by species invasion or the development of initial-stage colonies. In this study, we combined microsatellite genotyping with mitochondrial DNA sequencing to investigate the hybridization and adaptive introgression between two sympatric, long-differentiated related termite species, Reticulitermes flaviceps and R. chinensis, in nature. Similar levels of mitochondrial and nuclear genetic diversity were found in R. flaviceps and R. chinensis. Asymmetric interspecific genetic differentiation was observed between mitochondrial and nuclear genes, with high genetic divergence found in mitochondrial DNA but low genetic divergence in nuclear genes. Our results indicated a lack of mitochondrial gene exchange in R. flaviceps and R. chinensis but unconstrained nuclear introgression between them. This asymmetric genetic differentiation between nuclear and cytoplasmic material strongly suggests that there is interspecific hybridization between R. flaviceps and R. chinensis in nature, which provides new insight into the dynamics of hybridization and its potential consequences for speciation in termites.

Centrifugal fan blades of high-speed train ventilation and cooling system are subjected to cyclic loading which will shorten the life of fan blades. It could cause an accident of high-speed-train in service. In this study, a modified method based on nominal stress method was proposed and developed for the fatigue life prediction of centrifugal fan blades. The finite element model was firstly introduced to analyze the mode and stress of fan blades based on physical material property. The fatigue life was predicted based on S-N curve, using the Miner's cumulative damage rule to calculate total damage. In order to verify the effectiveness of this method, the experimental tests based on fatigue bench system were conducted on fan blades, which were typical structure of the ventilation cooling system of high-speed-train. The damage mechanism of blades was deduced from the fracture fractographs. Relatively good correlation was achieved between the prediction model and actual experimental results, testifying the practicability and effectiveness of this proposed method. Thus, the research result could reduce the probability of accidents caused by fan blade damage and improve the reliability of ventilation cooling system of high-speed train.

Fatigue tests with solid round bar specimens were carried out to investigate the effect of stress amplitude ratio on the axial-torsion fatigue failure of low carbon steel under a certain equivalent stress. The processing of surface short cracks initiation and propagation were recorded by replica technology. It is observed that all the crack propagation curves based on the criterion of dominant effective short fatigue crack (DESFC) clearly exhibits a similar oscillations tendency caused by the microstructure. In addition, the fatigue life, fracture angle and crack source vary with the value of stress amplitude ratio. Hence, a short crack model incorporating the effects of stress amplitude ratio was used to simulate the short crack growth rate, and the model can directly estimate the biaxial short cracks growth rate under different stress amplitude ratios according to the experimental data of uniaxial short cracks. A good agreement is achieved between simulation results and experimental data.

An extended computational approach has been utilized to explore the reactions of acids with carbonyl oxide, also known as Criegee intermediate (CI). The reactions were explored inside water cluster containing 50 water molecules. All possibilities of product formation were considered. Among the considered acids, the rate of 1,4-insertion follows the order - HCOO < HCl < HNO3. The most stable products of the reactions between the considered acids and CI have been identified.

In this work, we are concerned with a sequential nonlinear random differential equation of fractional order with nonlocal conditions. This is the first time in the literature where sequential problems and random ones are combined and considered. An existence and uniqueness of solutions for the problem is obtained by means of an appropriate random fixed point theorem. Then, new concepts on the sequential continuous and fractional derivative dependence are introduced. At the end, some results of stability on random, as well for deterministic, data dependence are discussed.

In our recent work, we study a few nonlinear time evolution equations by the sine-cosine method and obtained a variety of generalized solitary and periodic solutions with distinct physical structures. The solutions include periodic solutions, soliton solutions, symmetric periodic soliton solutions, double periodic solutions, multiple soliton solutions, breather solutions, and kink type solutions.

We recently demonstrated that HepaRG cells encapsulated into 1.5% alginate beads are capable of self-assembling into spheroids. They adequately differentiate into hepatocyte-like cells, with hepatic features observed at day 14 post-encapsulation required for external bioartificial liver applications. Preliminary investigations performed within a bioreactor under shear stress conditions and using a culture medium mimicking acute liver failure (ALF) highlighted the need to reinforce beads with a polymer coating. We demonstrated in a first step that a Poly-L-Lysine coating improved the mechanical stability, without altering the metabolic activities necessary for bioartificial liver applications (such as ammonia and lactate elimination). In a second step, we tested the optimized biomass in a newly-designed perfused dynamic bioreactor (PDB), in the presence of the medium model for pathological plasma for 6 hours. Performances of the biomass were enhanced as compared to the steady configuration, demonstrating its efficacy in decreasing the typical toxins of ALF. This type of bioreactor is easy to scale up as it relies on the number of micro-encapsulated cells, and could provide an adequate hepatic biomass for liver supply. Its design allows it to be integrated into a hybrid artificial/bioartificial liver setup for further clinical studies regarding its impact on ALF animal models.

Coronary artery aneurysms are exceedingly rare and tend to be found incidentally on angiography. We present the case of a 6cm giant coronary artery aneurysm discovered in a 25 year old man. Subsequent workup included cardiac gated MRI, CT angiography and left heart catheterization. Imaging revealed a 6.7 x 6.2 x 6.0 cm aneurysm involving the mid LAD subsequent to the takeoff of a large septal perforator. He was taken electively for operative repair during which the aneurysm was opened, unroofed and ligated at the ostium while taking care to ensuring normal flow in the septal perforator that supplied multiple small collaterals. In this unique case, a coronary artery aneurysm of considerable size was encountered in the LAD of a healthy young adult in which the size of the aneurysm precluded distal revascularization via bypass grafting. Multiple imaging modalities were used to characterize this finding and aid in surgical planning.

Probability distributions have great use in reliability engineering where the researchers try to find the distribution of the different processes. To meet the needs of the reliability engineers, we have proposed a simple probability distribution named as Beta Lehman-2 which may be proved more useful as compare to already existing models of the probability distributions. The aim of the study is to show the performance of the proposed distribution over already existing distributions. In this study, a new Beta Lehmann-2 Power function distribution (BL2PFD) is proposed. We suggest a new generator that will modify the Power function distribution called Beta Lehmann-2 generator (BL2-G). The various properties of the new distribution have been discussed in detail such as moments, vitality function, conditional moments and order statistics etc. We have also characterized the BL2PFD based on conditional variance. This distribution can be used for approximately symmetric data (normal data), positive and negative skewed data. The application of this distribution is illustrated by using data sets from medical and engineering sources. The shape of the new distribution has been studied for applied sciences. After analyzing data, we conclude that the proposed model BL2PFD perform better in all the data sets while compared to different competitor models.

The paper deals with the asymptotical mean-square stability of the linear θ-methods under variable stepsize and transformation approach for stochastic pantograph differential equations. A limiting equation for the analysis of numerical stability is introduced by Kronecker products. Under the condition which guarantee the stability of exact solutions, the optimal stability region of the linear θ-methods under variable stepsize is given by using the limiting equation, i.e., θ ∈ (1/ 2,1], which is the same to the deterministic problems. Moreover the linear θ-methods under the transformation approach are also considered and the result of the stability is improved for θ = 1 /2. Finally, numerical examples are given to illustrate the asymptotical meansquare stability under variable stepsize and transformation approach.

Post appendicectomy abscess formation is uncommon in patients with non-perforated appendicitis. Diagnosis via imaging is essential to provide swift treatment and resolution of underlying infection, which we demonstrate in our case.

We report here the case of a 51-year-old man presented with inflammatory neck pain and fever. Inflammatory biomarkers were increased. The magnetic resonance imaging showed synovitis of atlanto-odontoid joint, anterior epidural collection, and cerebral vein thrombosis affecting sigmoid sinus and internal jugular venous.

In this paper we consider a class of second-order impulsive stochastic functional differential equations driven simultaneously by a Rosenblatt process and standard Brownian motion in a Hilbert space. We prove an existence and uniqueness result under non-Lipschitz condition which is weaker than Lipschitz one and we establish some conditions ensuring the controllability for the mild solution by means of the Banach fixed point principle. At the end we provide a practical example in order to illustrate the viability of our result.\end{abstract}

Introduction: The number of disabilities due to age is expected to double by 2060. In this scenario, the development of sarcopenia is an important risk factor for the development of frailty, loss of independence and physical disability in the elderly and is associated with lower survival in critically ill patients. In this sense, the decline in fat-free mass correlates with the decline associated with the age of growth hormone (GH) secretion. Thus, GH secretagogue (MK-677) as the first orally active ghrelin mimetic may increase pulsatile GH secretion in the elderly. Objective: The main objectives were to determine whether oral MK-677 in healthy elderly would increase GH and IGF-I levels, prevent the decline of FFM and decrease abdominal visceral fat (AVF) with acceptable tolerability. Methods: A total of 18 articles were found involving MK-677, GH secretagogue, sarcopenia, insulin-like growth factor-1, safety, and efficacy. Initially, it was held the existing exclusion title and duplications following the interest described in this work. After this process, 5 articles were included and discussed in this study. The present study was elaborated according to the rules of systematic review- PRISMA (Transparent reporting of systematic reviews and meta-analysis- http://www.prisma-statement.org/). Results: In a clinical study, MK-677 neutralized three important factors contributing to the development of sarcopenia, which is reduced GH secretion, fat-free mass loss, and inadequate food intake. A recent study looked at the safety and efficacy of the oral GH secretagogue (MK-677) in humans, showing that MK-677 promotes pulsatile GH release that is subject to negative feedback and may prevent supra-therapeutic levels. of GH and its sequelae. Available studies indicate that MK-677 is well tolerated, however, there is a bias in decreased insulin sensitivity. There were no adverse effects attributable to MK-677. However, MK-677 had an unfavorable safety profile in individuals with congestive heart failure. Conclusion: The most confirmed sarcopenia treatment methods are nutritional overfeeding and resistance training, but studies have shown that supplementation with MK-677 can significantly reduce three important factors contributing to the development of sarcopenia, which is reduced secretion. GH loss, fat-free mass loss, and inadequate food intake, safely and effectively. However, it is imperative to increase randomized clinical trials to establish a consensus treatment. Keywords: MK-677. Ibutamoren. GH secretagogue. Sarcopenia. Elderly.