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Serum biomarkers are an important tool in the baseline risk assessment and diagnosis of cardiovascular disease in cancer patients receiving cardiotoxic cancer treatments. Increases in cardiac biomarkers including cardiac troponin and natriuretic peptides can be used to guide initiation of cardioprotective treatments for cancer patients during treatment and to monitor the response to cardioprotective treatments, and they also offer prognostic value. This position statement examines the role of cardiac biomarkers in the management of cancer patients. The Cardio-Oncology Study Group of the Heart Failure Association (HFA) of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) in collaboration with the Cardio-Oncology Council of the ESC have evaluated the current evidence for the role of cardiovascular biomarkers in cancer patients before, during and after cardiotoxic cancer therapies. The characteristics of the main two biomarkers troponin and natriuretic peptides are discussed, the link to the mechanisms of cardiovascular toxicity, and the evidence for their clinical use in surveillance during and after anthracycline chemotherapy, trastuzumab and HER2-targeted therapies, vascular endothelial growth factor inhibitors, proteasome inhibitors, immune checkpoint inhibitors, cyclophosphamide and radiotherapy. Novel surveillance clinical pathways integrating cardiac biomarkers for cancer patients receiving anthracycline chemotherapy or trastuzumab biomarkers are presented and future direction in cardio-oncology biomarker research is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: Several biomechanical factors, such as knee joint hypermobility (KJH), are suggested to play a role in the etiology of knee joint symptoms and knee osteoarthritis. Nevertheless, the prevalence or consequences of KJH solely or included in the classification of generalized joint hypermobility (GJHk) is unknown for a general population. Therefore, the objectives were to report the prevalence of self‐reported GJHk and KJH, as well as the association of these conditions to knee joint symptoms, severity and duration of symptoms, and health‐related quality of life (HRQoL) in a Danish adult population. Method: This study is a cross‐sectional population‐based survey of 2056 Danish adults. Respondents received online questionnaires of GJHk and KJH, knee joint symptoms, the severity and duration of these, as well as HRQoL. Results: Total response rate was 49% (n = 1006). The prevalence of self‐reported GJHk and KJH was 13% and 23%, mostly representing women. More than half of the respondents with GJHk and KJH had knee joint symptoms. The odds for reporting knee joint symptoms, severity of knee joint symptoms and duration of knee joint symptoms were twice as high for respondents with GJHk and KJH. Respondents with GJHk and KJH reported lower HRQoL. Conclusion: GJHk and KJH were frequently reported in the Danish adult population, mostly in women. Respondents with GJHk and KJH were two times more likely to report knee joint‐related symptoms such as pain, reduced performance of usual activity and lower HRQoL. The impact of these conditions on HRQoL is comparable with knee osteoarthritis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The resolution of inflammation is dependent on recognition and phagocytic removal of apoptotic cells by macrophages. Receptors for apoptotic cells are sensitive to degradation by human neutrophil elastase (HNE). We show in the present study that HNE cleaves macrophage cell surface CD14 and in so doing, reduces phagocytic recognition of apoptotic lymphocytic cells (Mutu 1). Using an improved method of adenovirus-mediated transfection of macrophages with the HNE inhibitor elafin, we demonstrate that elafin overexpression prevents CD14 cleavage and restores apoptotic cell recognition by macrophages. This approach of genetic modification of macrophages could be used to restore apoptotic cell recognition in inflammatory conditions. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

We propose a new operational definition for summer phytoplankton blooms based on station-specific chlorophyll a distributions. This definition has been applied to a large monitoring data set from the Kattegat, a shallow marginal sea affected by man-induced eutrophication, in order to describe spatial and temporal variations of summer blooms as well as their underlying cause. Blooms were associated with relatively higher salinity, nutrient concentrations, and wind speed prior to observation as well as relatively lower temperature, which suggests that entrainment and the upwelling of nutrient-rich bottom water are the main causes of summer blooms. The station-specific frequency of blooms was, on average, 8.7%, with higher frequencies in the frontal area toward the Skagerrak as well as in the shallow western area. Blooms generally had a limited extent in localized regions, and we suggest that blooms could be initiated in hydrodynamically active regions and subsequently transported to other parts of the Kattegat. There were no trends in the bloom frequency over the study period (1989-1999), but interannual variations were linked to external nitrogen input, through upwelling of regenerated nutrients, which suggests that blooms are increasing in frequency over longer timescales. Summer blooms were dominated by large species (Ceratium spp. and Rhizosolenia spp.), which indicates that size-dependent grazing affects the development and probably also the fate of summer phytoplankton blooms. This bloom definition can be generally applied to other data sets to investigate the properties of high phytoplankton biomass. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investigates the isolation of two major and two minor microcystins from hepatotoxic strain of Planktothrix agardhii in Denmark. Use of spectrometry to characterized microcystins; Relation of the toxicity of microcystins to the inhibition of protein phosphatases; General structures of microcystins.

Monophyly of plastids in the morphologically diverse heterokont algae has rarely been questioned. However, HPLC analysis revealed that the pigment composition of the silicoflagellate Dictyocha speculum Ehrenberg is similar to that observed in a group of haptophytes (“type 4” sensu Jeffrey and Wright 1994. Dictyocha speculum and type 4 haptophytes possess acylfucoxanthins (19′-butanoyloxy- and 19′-hexanoyloxyfucoxanthin) in addition to fuco-, diadino-, and diatoxanthin and chl a, c, and c[sub 3]. The pigment composition of two pedinellids (Apedinella radians [Lohmann] Campbell and Mesopedinella arctica Daugbjerg), a sister group to D. speculum, deviates from D. speculum by lack of chl c [sub 3] and acylfucoxanthins. The distinct pigment composition suggested that plastid evolution in D. speculum differs from that of other heterokont algae. This prompted determination of the plastid-encoded rbcL gene from D. speculum to gain further insight into the evolutionary history of plastids in heterokont algae and haptophytes. A phylogenetic inference based on parsimony, maximum likelihood, and LogDet transformation methods included 35 heterokonts, 19 haptophytes, 8 red algae, and 1 cryptomonad. Three proteobacteria possessing type I RUBISCO were used to root the tree. In phylogenetic analyses, D. speculum was closely related to Rhizochromulina sp. and pedinellids, despite the latter possessing a different pigment composition. Surprisingly, the Dictyochophyceae clustered outside the lineage of heterokont algae but not within the haptophytes. Hence, analyses deduced from rbcL sequences indicated that the plastids in heterokont algae might have a more complex evolutionary history and that the shared pigment composition in D. speculum and type 4 haptophytes could be explained by convergent evolution or gene transfer. The pigment composition in D. speculum may have implications for pigment-based characterization of phytoplankton community stru... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Light and electron microscopy, nuclear-encoded LSU rDNA sequences, and pigment analyses were performed on five geographically separate isolates of Gymnodinium mikimotoi. The morphological variation between the isolates equals that found within the isolates. The nuclear-encoded LSU rDNA sequences were nearly identical in all isolates, and molecular analyses using maximum likelihood, parsimony, and neighbor joining showed the geographical isolates as an unresolved clade. Based on the available data it is concluded that the European isolates, formerly identified as Gyrodinium aureolum, Gyrodinium cf. aureolum, or Gymnodinium cf. nagasakiense, are conspecific with the Japanese Gymnodinium mikimotoi. An isolate from the Pettaquamscutt River, USA, is suggested to represent what Hulburt (1957) described as Gyrodinium aureolum. The LSU rDNA sequence data and ultrastructural characters in this isolate closely resemble those of Gymnodinium fuscum, the type species of Gymnodinium, and Gyrodinium aureolum Hulburt is therefore renamed Gymnodinium aureolum (Hulburt) G. Hansen, comb. nov. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A 57-year-old man developed transient global amnesia within an hour of bolus unfractionated heparin administration on day 4 post-mitral valve replacement. Both immunoglobulin G-specific enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and serotonin release assay were strongly positive for the antibodies that cause heparin-induced thrombocytopenia. The patient's cognitive functions returned to normal following discontinuation of unfractionated heparin and warfarin and commencement of lepirudin infusion. (J Card Surg 2010;25:300-302) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a definition for identification of blooms and use this definition to investigate the underlying mechanisms of summer blooms and their link to nutrient enrichment. Blooms were defined as chlorophyll a observations deviating significantly from a normal seasonal cycle; the frequency and magnitude of these deviating observations characterized bloom frequency and intensity. The definition was applied to a large monitoring data set from five estuaries in Denmark with at least biweekly sampling. Four mechanisms with links to nutrient enrichment were identified as sources of summer blooms: (1) advection from biomass-rich inner estuary, (2) resuspension of nutrients and algae from sediments, (3) nutrient releases from sediments during hypoxic conditions, and (4) decoupling of benthic grazers. Summer blooms were mostly dominated by diatoms, and in 33% of the bloom samples the dominating species was also dominant prior to the bloom. Only four species (Cerataulina pelagica, Chaetoceros socialis/radians, Prorocentrum micans, and Prorocentrum minimum) typically (>50% of blooms) increased their biomass proportion during bloom initiations. Bloom frequency and intensity decreased from 1989 to 2004, corresponding to decreases in nutrient inputs and concentrations, but only bloom frequency could be directly linked to the actual total nitrogen concentrations, whereas bloom intensities depended on site-specific features, particularly a threshold response for stations exposed to hypoxia. Bloom frequency has increased over longer timescales in response to nutrient enrichment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]