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The article from Woman's Own explores a couple, Charlotte and Alex, who decided to swap traditional Christmas roles to challenge themselves. Charlotte struggled with shopping, food prep, cake decorating, and hosting a party, while Alex faced difficulties with present wrapping, organizing a get-together, buying matching PJs, and planning activities for Boxing Day. Through this experience, they gained a newfound appreciation for each other's skills and agreed to stick to their usual roles in the future. The article highlights the complexities and challenges involved in organizing Christmas festivities and emphasizes the importance of teamwork and understanding in a relationship. [Extracted from the article]

Soapwort (Saponaria officinalis) is a flowering plant from the Caryophyllaceae family with a long history of human use as a traditional source of soap. Its detergent properties are because of the production of polar compounds (saponins), of which the oleanane-based triterpenoid saponins, saponariosides A and B, are the major components. Soapwort saponins have anticancer properties and are also of interest as endosomal escape enhancers for targeted tumor therapies. Intriguingly, these saponins share common structural features with the vaccine adjuvant QS-21 and, thus, represent a potential alternative supply of saponin adjuvant precursors. Here, we sequence the S. officinalisgenome and, through genome mining and combinatorial expression, identify 14 enzymes that complete the biosynthetic pathway to saponarioside B. These enzymes include a noncanonical cytosolic GH1 (glycoside hydrolase family 1) transglycosidase required for the addition of d-quinovose. Our results open avenues for accessing and engineering natural and new-to-nature pharmaceuticals, drug delivery agents and potential immunostimulants.

QS-21 is a potent vaccine adjuvant currently sourced by extraction from the Chilean soapbark tree. It is a key component of human vaccines for shingles, malaria, coronavirus disease 2019 and others under development. The structure of QS-21 consists of a glycosylated triterpene scaffold coupled to a complex glycosylated 18-carbon acyl chain that is critical for immunostimulant activity. We previously identified the early pathway steps needed to make the triterpene glycoside scaffold; however, the biosynthetic route to the acyl chain, which is needed for stimulation of T cell proliferation, was unknown. Here, we report the biogenic origin of the acyl chain, characterize the series of enzymes required for its synthesis and addition and reconstitute the entire 20-step pathway in tobacco, thereby demonstrating the production of QS-21 in a heterologous expression system. This advance opens up unprecedented opportunities for bioengineering of vaccine adjuvants, investigating structure–activity relationships and understanding the mechanisms by which these compounds promote the human immune response.

This article, titled "THE BAREFACED TRUTH," features the personal experience of Charlotte Owen, a 38-year-old mother of two, who challenged herself to go a week without wearing makeup. Owen comes from a family of women who love makeup, and she has always been hooked on it since trying her mother's blusher at the age of 11. Throughout the week, Owen felt self-conscious and unsure about the bare-faced look, especially when attending social events and meeting people in a work capacity. Ultimately, she concluded that while others may not care about her appearance, she personally prefers wearing makeup. [Extracted from the article]

The article discusses the increasing number of UK residents seeking medical treatment abroad due to long waiting times for surgery within the National Health Service (NHS). The number of patients going abroad for treatment has risen by a third since lockdown, with leading clinics in countries such as Lithuania, Poland, Croatia, and France seeing a surge in British patients seeking elective surgery. However, caution is advised by experts, as the quality of care abroad may vary, and patients should consider the possible risks of complications. The article also provides examples of the price differences for surgeries in different countries. The Labour Party proposes a plan to address the issue by increasing the number of operations and appointments through additional funding and incentivizing staff to work evenings and weekends. The Department of Health and Social Care claims to have made progress in reducing waiting lists and is committed to further improvements. [Extracted from the article]

Tranexamic acid reduces surgical bleeding and reduces death due to bleeding in patients with trauma. Meta-analyses of small trials show that tranexamic acid might decrease deaths from gastrointestinal bleeding. We aimed to assess the effects of tranexamic acid in patients with gastrointestinal bleeding.

Falls are common in Parkinson’s disease (PD). Increased involvement of people with Parkinson’s (PwP) in their care has been associated with enhanced satisfaction. Self-management programmes in other long-term conditions (LTCs) have led to improvements in physical and psychological outcomes. These have been more effective when targeted toward a specific behavior. This paper aimed to identify and review falls self-management interventions for PwP. A systematic review was conducted. Electronic databases were searched in June 2018. Primary research studies (any design) reporting the delivery of falls self-management interventions to PwP were included. Data was extracted from each article and synthesised narratively. Six articles were identified, relating to five different self-management interventions. All described a self-management intervention delivered alongside physiotherapy. Intervention delivery was through either group discussion (n = 3) or falls booklets (n = 3). Interventions were often incompletely described; the most common components were information about the condition, training/ rehearsal for psychological strategies and lifestyle advice and support. Arising from the design of articles included the effects of self-management and physiotherapy could not be separated. Three articles measured falls, only one led to a reduction. Four articles measured quality of life, only one led to improvement. No articles assessed skill acquisition or adherence to the self-management intervention. Few falls self-management interventions for PwP have been evaluated and reported. The components of an effective intervention remain unclear. Given the benefits of self-management interventions in other LTCs, it is important that falls self-management interventions are developed and evaluated to support PwP.

We performed a retrospective cohort comparison study to look at the processes for concentrating geriatric resources in the acute admissions area in a general hospital in the UK and compare key outcomes.

A new family of inflationary models is introduced and analyzed. The behavior of the parameters characterizing the models suggest preferred values, which generate the most interesting testable predictions. Results are further improved if late reheating and/or a subsequent period of thermal inflation is taken into account. Specific model realizations consider a sub-Planckian inflaton variation or a potential without fine-tuning of mass scales, based on the Planck and grand unified theory scales. A toy model realization in the context of global and local supersymmetry is examined, and results fitting the Planck observations are determined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the 8th Annual Historic Interiors Conference to be hosted by Icon Historic Interiors Group of the Icon Institute of Conservation at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge in England.

The article offers the author's view on how consumers play an important role in changing the fishing industry in Great Britain. According to the author, buying Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified seafood, rewards fisheries for their sustainable practices and makes the market for certified sustainable more larger. The author mentions the importance of ramping up the Fish and Kids project of the MSC.

The article presents information on sustainable methods for increasing yield of aquaculture production including yeast based feed for salmon rearing and integrated multi trophic aquaculture which utilizes algae for rearing shellfish.

We study the formation of primordial black holes (PBHs) in the early Universe during a period of slow reheating after inflation. We demonstrate how the PBH formation mechanism may change even before the end of the matter-dominated phase and calculate the expected PBH mass function. We find that there is a threshold for the variance of the density contrast, σc≃0.05, below which the transition occurs even before reheating, with this having important consequences for the PBH mass function. We also show that there is a maximum cutoff for the PBH mass at around 100 M⊙, below which the subdominant radiation bath affects PBH production, making the scenario particularly interesting for the recent LIGO observations of black hole mergers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate a compelling model of quintessential inflation in the context of α-attractors, which naturally result in a scalar potential featuring two flat regions; the inflationary plateau and the quintessential tail. The "asymptotic freedom" of α-attractors, near the kinetic poles, suppresses radiative corrections and interactions, which would otherwise threaten to lift the flatness of the quintessential tail and cause a 5th-force problem respectively. Since this is a nonoscillatory inflation model, we reheat the Universe through instant preheating. The parameter space is constrained by both inflation and dark energy requirements. We find an excellent correlation between the inflationary observables and model predictions, in agreement with the α-attractors setup. We also obtain successful quintessence for natural values of the parameters. Our model predicts potentially sizeable tensor perturbations (at the level of 1%) and a slightly varying equation of state for dark energy, to be probed in the near future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]