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Hemicelluloses are effective renewable biopolymers that can be used in many different industrial processes and preparations. In plants, the content of hemicellulose might change with different developmental stages and/or tissues. Thus, in here chemical and structural differences in hemicellulose isolated from the apical, middle and basal segments of sugarcane stem were characterized using chemical techniques. Further, difference in expression levels of genes related to synthesis of hemicelluloses from these three segments were studied by RNA-seq and qRT-PCR etc. The sugarcane hemicellulose backbone was xylose residues connected via β-1,4 glycosidic linkages which was further substituted with arabinose, acetyl and glucuronic acid side chains. Hemicellulose content was higher in the middle and basal segments with less backbone substitutions compared to apical segments. In terms of gene expression, hemicellulose synthesis and modification genes were intensely expressed in middle and basal segments. Taken together, our research describes differences in hemicellulose content and substitutions in sugarcane during xylogenesis, which will increase our knowledge for finding more refined use of sugarcane bagasse.

Description The American College of Physicians (ACP) and American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) developed this guideline to provide clinical recommendations on nonpharmacologic and pharmacologic management of acute pain from non-low back, musculoskeletal injuries in adults in the outpatient setting. The guidance is based on current best available evidence about benefits and harms, taken in the context of costs and patient values and preferences. This guideline does not address noninvasive treatment of low back pain, which is covered by a separate ACP guideline that has also been endorsed by AAFP. Methods This guideline is based on a systematic evidence review on the comparative efficacy and safety of nonpharmacologic and pharmacologic management of acute pain from non-low back, musculoskeletal injuries in adults in the outpatient setting and a systematic review on the predictors of prolonged opioid use. We evaluated the following clinical outcomes using the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) system: pain (at ≤2 hours and at 1 to 7 days), physical function, symptom relief, treatment satisfaction, and adverse events. Target audience and patient population The target audience is all clinicians, and the target patient population is adults with acute pain from non-low back, musculoskeletal injuries. Recommendation 1 ACP and AAFP recommend that clinicians treat patients with acute pain from non-low back, musculoskeletal injuries with topical nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) with or without menthol gel as first-line therapy to reduce or relieve symptoms, including pain; improve physical function; and improve the patient's treatment satisfaction (Grade: strong recommendation; moderate-certainty evidence). Recommendation 2a ACP and AAFP suggest that clinicians treat patients with acute pain from non-low back, musculoskeletal injuries with oral NSAIDs to reduce or relieve symptoms, including pain, and to improve physical function, or with oral acetaminophen to reduce pain (Grade: conditional recommendation; moderate-certainty evidence). Recommendation 2b ACP and AAFP suggest that clinicians treat patients with acute pain from non-low back, musculoskeletal injuries with specific acupressure to reduce pain and improve physical function, or with transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation to reduce pain (Grade: conditional recommendation; low-certainty evidence). Recommendation 3 ACP and AAFP suggest against clinicians treating patients with acute pain from non-low back, musculoskeletal injuries with opioids, including tramadol (Grade: conditional recommendation; low-certainty evidence).

Controversy exists around the appropriate types of masks and the situations in which they should be used in community and health care settings for the prevention of SARS-CoV-2 infection. In this ar...

Antimicrobial resistance is an emerging global health threat necessitating the rapid development of novel antimicrobials. Remarkably, the vast majority of currently available antibiotics are natural products (NPs) isolated from streptomycetes, soil-dwelling bacteria of the genus Streptomyces. However, there is still a huge reservoir of streptomycetes NPs which remains pharmaceutically untapped and a compendium thereof could serve as a source of inspiration for the rational design of novel antibiotics. Initially released in 2012, StreptomeDB (http://www.pharmbioinf.uni-freiburg.de/streptomedb) is the first and only public online database that enables the interactive phylogenetic exploration of streptomycetes and their isolated or mutasynthesized NPs. In this third release, there are substantial improvements over its forerunners, especially in terms of data content. For instance, about 2500 unique NPs were newly annotated through manual curation of about 1300 PubMed-indexed articles, published in the last five years since the second release. To increase interoperability, StreptomeDB entries were hyperlinked to several spectral, (bio)chemical and chemical vendor databases, and also to a genome-based NP prediction server. Moreover, predicted pharmacokinetic and toxicity profiles were added. Lastly, some recent real-world use cases of StreptomeDB are highlighted, to illustrate its applicability in life sciences.

Background Diabetic retinopathy (DR) may be asymptomatic in both mild and advanced stages. A patient's accurate perception of their DR severity may therefore be critical for effective self-management behaviors and understanding the need for timely intervention and follow-up. Purpose To evaluate the relationship between self-reported and actual retinopathy severity in diabetic patients. Methods This study was a single-center cross-sectional survey. Diabetic patients identified by enterprise data warehouse were sent an online questionnaire where they were asked to self-assess for presence of DR and grade their severity. Actual DR grading was determined via chart review. The primary outcome measures were patient-assessed DR severity and agreement with actual DR severity. Results Of 3208 invitations sent, 324 (10%) patients responded and 319 responses were analyzed. The data showed that 39 of 253 (15%) with no DR, 26 of 40 (65%) with mild/moderate DR, and 24 of 26 (92%) with severe DR believed they had DR (p

Objective: To explore the in vitro pharmacological activities of fruit of Diospyros malabarica. Method: 70% ethanolic extracts of Diospyros malabarica was screened against ten pathogenic bacteria, five strains of gram +ve, five strains of gram –ve bacteria and fungi by using disc diffusion method. Moreover, to study the toxicity of this fruit, we conducted a saltwater shrimp lethality bioassay based on the ability to kill laboratory cultured brine shrimps (Artemiasalina). Results: Fruits extracts were found to exhibit antimicrobial activity against bacterial pathogens with the zone of inhibition ranges between 13mm to 19mm. Fruit Extracts was also tested for its antifungal activity against fungal strains exhibiting zone of inhibition ranges from 14 mm to 19 mm. The fruit extract of Diospyros malabarica shows significant lethality towards brine shrimps at LD50 value of 93.55 ppm. Conclusion: Plant extracts is potentially effective in suppressing microbial and fungal growth. As fruit extracts has significant LD50 value thus it can be further used for cancer cell line studies.

Should clinicians use chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine alone or in combination with azithromycin for prophylaxis against and treatment of COVID-19?

The purpose of this study was batch scale elimination of Cosmos Red dye from aqueous medium by low cost and environmentally friendly adsorbents. To study the dye removing capacity, leaves of Raphinus sativus (radish) and peels of Citrus sinensis (orange) were utilized. Two adsorption isotherms were studied to explain adsorption equilibrium. The Langmuir isotherm is compatible to adsorption data. Best adsorption capacities for Raphinus sativus and Citrus sinensis were: 3.437 mg/g and 5.844 mg/g correspondingly. Citrus sinensis peels showed more adsorption. The negative values of thermodynamic parameters ∆Go for both adsorbents have shown the feasibility of this process. The results had shown that for removal of Cosmos Red dye, Citrus sinensis (orange) peels are more efficient adsorbent as compared to Raphinus sativus leaves.

With reference to the newly released microgrid standards, design and real-time implementation of a centralized microgrid control system is presented in this article. In the grid-connected mode, the utility grid will provide the voltage and frequency reference at the point of connection. The assets within the microgrid will follow power command references provided by the control system. In the islanded mode, the energy storage system (ESS) can provide the voltage and frequency reference to all other generators. Based on the state-of-charge of the ESS, a rule-based dispatch is proposed, with priority given to diesel generator and then the storage in the middle state of charge range. To alleviate power fluctuations, meet smooth planned islanding requirement, and compensate for the feeder losses ignored in dispatch algorithm, a supplementary slack-bus power control based on closed-loop feedback and first-order filter is proposed. The potential of the storage system in firming short-time power fluctuation and providing long-term load shifting capabilities is exploited. An emergency dispatch function for unplanned islanding considering the speed of response limitation of a diesel generator is also proposed. The proposed control strategy is implemented and tested on a controller hardware-in-the-loop test bench. It demonstrates the capability of the control system to reduce load shedding and renewable curtailment, and to implement power management at the point of interconnection.

The American College of Physicians (ACP) developed this guideline to provide clinical recommendations based on the current evidence of the benefits and harms of testosterone treatment in adult men with age-related low testosterone. This guideline is endorsed by the American Academy of Family Physicians.The ACP Clinical Guidelines Committee based these recommendations on a systematic review on the efficacy and safety of testosterone treatment in adult men with age-related low testosterone. Clinical outcomes were evaluated by using the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) system and included sexual function, physical function, quality of life, energy and vitality, depression, cognition, serious adverse events, major adverse cardiovascular events, and other adverse events.The target audience includes all clinicians, and the target patient population includes adult men with age-related low testosterone.ACP suggests that clinicians discuss whether to initiate testosterone treatment in men with age-related low testosterone with sexual dysfunction who want to improve sexual function (conditional recommendation; low-certainty evidence). The discussion should include the potential benefits, harms, costs, and patient's preferences.ACP suggests that clinicians should reevaluate symptoms within 12 months and periodically thereafter. Clinicians should discontinue testosterone treatment in men with age-related low testosterone with sexual dysfunction in whom there is no improvement in sexual function (conditional recommendation; low-certainty evidence).ACP suggests that clinicians consider intramuscular rather than transdermal formulations when initiating testosterone treatment to improve sexual function in men with age-related low testosterone, as costs are considerably lower for the intramuscular formulation and clinical effectiveness and harms are similar.ACP suggests that clinicians not initiate testosterone treatment in men with age-related low testosterone to improve energy, vitality, physical function, or cognition (conditional recommendation; low-certainty evidence).

Summary Newly discovered functional relationships of (bio-)molecules are a key component in molecular biology and life science research. Especially in the drug discovery field, knowledge of how small molecules associated with proteins plays a fundamental role in understanding how drugs or metabolites can affect cells, tissues and human metabolism. Finding relevant information about these relationships among the huge number of published articles is becoming increasingly challenging and time-consuming. On average, more than 25 000 new (bio-)medical articles are added to the literature database PubMed weekly. In this article, we present a new web server [compound–protein relationships in literature (CPRiL)] that provides information on functional relationships between small molecules and proteins in literature. Currently, CPRiL contains ∼465 000 unique names and synonyms of small molecules, ∼100 000 unique proteins and more than 9 million described functional relationships between these entities. The applied BioBERT machine learning model for the determination of functional relationships between small molecules and proteins in texts was extensively trained and tested. On a related benchmark, CPRiL yielded a high performance, with an F1 score of 84.3%, precision of 82.9% and recall of 85.7%. Availability and implementation CPRiL is freely available at https://www.pharmbioinf.uni-freiburg.de/cpril. Supplementary information Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Abstract Like many solid organs, the kidneys are susceptible to a wide variety of systemic vascular diseases. Comprising a significant subset of these diseases are the vasculitides, broadly encompassing numerous inflammatory conditions of the blood vessels. However, many of these conditions are non-vasculitic and non-inflammatory, and differentiation of these entities is crucial to guide the initiation of proper therapy. These non-vasculitic diseases include coagulopathic conditions leading to vascular complications, hemolysis, and hematogenous processes that can affect multiple organ systems. These systemic diseases can result in both macrovascular and microvascular pathology, involving the arteries, veins, and smaller vessels, and management of these conditions can differ significantly depending upon the underlying pathophysiology. Because the clinical manifestations of these disease processes can be heterogeneous, ranging from renal dysfunction to life-threatening hemorrhage, proper recognition of these entities is essential to help guide clinicians to the correct diagnosis and prevent potentially disastrous complications. Many of these systemic vascular processes can be detected by non-invasive imaging, including computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and identification of their characteristic renal manifestations by radiologists is a critical component of patient care. This review covers a variety of these diseases and their imaging manifestations, to aid in their recognition and better equip radiologists to provide vital diagnostic information that can optimize patient care. Graphical abstract

The American College of Physicians (ACP) developed this guideline to provide clinical recommendations on the role of colonoscopy for diagnostic evaluation of colorectal cancer (CRC) after a presumed diagnosis of acute left-sided colonic diverticulitis and on the role of pharmacologic, nonpharmacologic, and elective surgical interventions to prevent recurrence after initial treatment of acute complicated and uncomplicated left-sided colonic diverticulitis. This guideline is based on the current best available evidence about benefits and harms, taken in the context of costs and patient values and preferences.The ACP Clinical Guidelines Committee (CGC) based these recommendations on a systematic review on the role of colonoscopy after acute left-sided colonic diverticulitis and pharmacologic, nonpharmacologic, and elective surgical interventions after initial treatment. The systematic review evaluated outcomes rated by the CGC as critical or important. This guideline was developed using the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) method.The target audience is all clinicians, and the target patient population is adults with recent episodes of acute left-sided colonic diverticulitis.

The American College of Physicians (ACP) developed this guideline to provide clinical recommendations on the diagnosis and management of acute left-sided colonic diverticulitis in adults. This guideline is based on current best available evidence about benefits and harms, taken in the context of costs and patient values and preferences.The ACP Clinical Guidelines Committee (CGC) developed this guideline based on a systematic review on the use of computed tomography (CT) for the diagnosis of acute left-sided colonic diverticulitis and on management via hospitalization, antibiotic use, and interventional percutaneous abscess drainage. The systematic review evaluated outcomes that the CGC rated as critical or important. This guideline was developed using the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) methodology.The target audience is all clinicians, and the target patient population is adults with suspected or known acute left-sided colonic diverticulitis.

Integrated battery chargers (IBCs) have been proposed as a low-weight, low-volume, and high-power solution to conventional conductive chargers. However, the design of such chargers is complicated, requiring special components or control techniques to solve inherent issues (such as galvanic isolation, torque generation, and system reconfiguration) associated with their design. Solutions vary based on charging power, drive topology, and motor technology. This chapter introduces designs for IBCs, including solutions as proposed in the literature. It also presents challenges in their industrial adoption. Finally, the chapter presents opportunities for fleet charging applications using IBCs.

This article examines viability of track II and III initiatives between India and Pakistan and their contribution in creating a cordial environment for track I diplomacy. The objective is the probe whether informal dialogues pave the way for states to communicate formally or their presence is cosmetic in nature. Pakistan and India share a belligerent history of bilateral relationships. Despite four wars, diplomacy has somehow remained at work between the two. Although the two countries have been engaged in official and backdoor dialogues periodically, however, this diplomatic contact appeared fragile and felt prey of severity many times. Track II and Track III diplomacy initiatives were launched and sought as means to reach the end of cordiality in bilateral relationships. The methodology used in this article is qualitative with primary and secondary sources. Through analysis of semi-governmental and people to people initiative, it is found that unofficial contact (track II and III) between the two states has not contributed toward paving the way for track I diplomacy. Such initiatives enjoy at length in good times more, rather than converting hostility into harmony in tense times. From Neemrana Dialogue to Ashoka Theater, track II and track III were unable to substitute track I.