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Purpose: This study aims to investigate the feasibility of the home-based parent- mediated intervention Naturalistic developmental behavioral intervention (HB-NDBI) in underserved Taiwanese families of children with Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and explore its effects on children's developmental skills and parents' parenting stress., Method: 24 underserved Taiwanese families of children with ASD (mean age = 46.5 months) received 12-week HB-NDBI programs. Social Responsiveness Scale, Second Edition (SRS-2), Mullen Scales of Early Learning (MSEL), Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL/1.5-5), and Parenting Stress Index (PSI) were administered before and after the HB-NDBI programs., Results: Following the HB-NDBI programs, significant improvements in social cognition, social communication subscales, receptive language subscale, internalizing, externalizing, and total behavioral problems scales of children, and release of parenting stress were observed., Conclusion: This study demonstrated the feasibility of home-based parent-mediated intervention for underserved families in Taiwan. These promising results might facilitate the development of such interventions for underserved families., Competing Interests: The authors have no financial relationships relevant to this article to disclose. The authors do not have any potential conflict of interest, real or perceived., (Copyright © 2025 Academy of Pediatric Physical Therapy of the American Physical Therapy Association.)

Previous studies have shown that aerobic exercise has beneficial effects on executive function in adolescents with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The underlying mechanisms could be partially due to aerobic exercise-induced cortical excitability modulation. The aim of this study was to explore the effects of acute aerobic exercise on executive functions and cortical excitability and the association between these phenomena in adolescents with ADHD. The study was conducted using a complete crossover design. Executive functions (inhibitory control, working memory, and planning) and cortical excitability were assessed in twenty-four drug-naïve adolescents with ADHD before and after acute aerobic exercise or a control intervention. Inhibitory control, working memory, and planning improved after acute aerobic exercise in adolescents with ADHD. Moreover, cortical excitability monitored by transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) decreased after intervention in this population. Additionally, improvements in inhibitory control and working memory performance were associated with enhanced cortical inhibition. The findings provide indirect preliminary evidence for the assumption that changes in cortical excitability induced by aerobic exercise partially contribute to improvements in executive function in adolescents with ADHD., Competing Interests: Declarations. Conflict of interest: The authors declare that there are no competing financial interests., (© 2024. Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Evidence suggests aerobic exercise has beneficial effects on cognitive performance in adults with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The underlying mechanisms might depend on mechanisms of exercise-mediated brain physiology. The study aims to investigate the effects of acute aerobic exercise on cortical excitability and cognitive performance, and the correlation between these phenomena in adults with ADHD. Twenty-six drug-naïve ADHD adults, and twenty-six age-, and gender-matched healthy controls were assessed with respect to cortical excitability and cognitive performance before and after acute aerobic exercise (a single session for 30 min) or a control intervention. The results show significantly enhanced intracortical facilitation (ICF) and decreased short intracortical inhibition (SICI) after aerobic exercise in healthy subjects. In contrast, SICI was significantly enhanced following acute aerobic exercise in ADHD. In ADHD, furthermore inhibitory control and motor learning were significantly improved after the acute aerobic exercise intervention. Alterations of SICI induced by aerobic exercise, and inhibitory control and motor learning improvement were significantly positively correlated in the ADHD group. Aerobic exercise had partially antagonistic effects in healthy controls, and ADHD patients. Furthermore, aerobic exercise-induced cognition-enhancing effects in ADHD depend on specific alterations of brain physiology, which differ from healthy humans., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare no competing financial interests., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Background: This study aimed to investigate the effects of different aerobic exercise intensities on inhibitory control and cortical excitability in adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)., Methods: The study was conducted in a within-subject design. Twenty-four adults with ADHD completed a stop signal task and received cortical excitability assessment by transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) before and after a single session of low-, moderate-, high-intensity aerobic exercise or a control intervention., Results: Acute moderate-, and high-intensity aerobic exercise improved inhibitory control in adults with ADHD. Moreover, the improving effect was similar between moderate-, and high-intensity aerobic exercise conditions. As shown by the brain physiology results, short interval intracortical inhibition was significantly increased following both, moderate- and high-intensity aerobic exercise intervention conditions. Additionally, the alteration of short interval intracortical inhibition and inhibitory control improvement were positively correlated., Conclusions: The moderate-, and high-intensity aerobic exercise-dependent alterations of cortical excitability in adults with ADHD might partially explain the inhibitory control-improving effects of aerobic exercise in this population., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare no competing financial interests., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Mucin-1 is a multi-functional glycoprotein expressed by type II alveolocytes and may be detectable in the circulation following pulmonary fibrosis. The prognostic utility of baseline pre-treatment blood levels of mucin-1 in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) receiving antifibrotics has not yet been fully established. We retrospectively studied a cohort of patients (from two hospitals) with IPF who were receiving pirfenidone for >12 weeks. Baseline blood mucin-1 levels were measured via sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays. We investigated the performance of mucin-1 levels in longitudinally predicting the risks of acute exacerbation of IPF (AE-IPF) and severe adverse outcomes (SAO), including lung transplantation and death. Seventy patients were included; 20 developed AE-IPF; and 31 had SAO during the follow-up period. Patients with baseline mucin-1 levels ≥2.5 ng/mL had enhanced risks of AE-IPF (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR], 14.07; 95% confidence interval [CI], 4.26-46.49) and SAO within 2 years (aHR, 7.87; 95% CI, 2.86-21.70) and anytime during the follow-up (aHR, 4.68; 95% CI, 2.11-10.39). The risks increased across subgroups with increasing mucin-1 levels. Patients in the "mucin-1 ≥ 2.5" group also exhibited an accelerated decline in D LCO . This study supports baseline blood mucin-1 levels as a biomarker for IPF that predicts adverse outcomes during pirfenidone treatment.

Converging evidence indicates the beneficial effects of aerobic exercise on motor learning performance. Underlying mechanisms might be an impact of aerobic exercise on neuroplasticity and cortical excitability. Evidence suggests that motor learning and cortical excitability alterations correlate with the intensity of aerobic exercise and the activity level of participants. Thus, this study aims to investigate the effects of different aerobic exercise intensities on motor learning and cortical excitability in sedentary individuals. The study was conducted in a crossover and double-blind design. Twenty-six healthy sedentary individuals (13 women and 13 men) performed a motor learning task and received a cortical excitability assessment before and after a single session of low-, moderate-, and high-intensity aerobic exercise or a control intervention. The study revealed that motor learning performance and cortical excitability were significantly enhanced in the moderate-intensity aerobic exercise, compared with the other conditions. These findings suggest aerobic exercise intensity-dependent effects on motor learning in sedentary adults. The underlying mechanism might be an exercised-induced alteration of cortical excitability, specifically a reduction of GABA activity., Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing financial interests., (Copyright © 2023 Kuo et al.)

Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Background: Evidence indicates beneficial effects of aerobic exercise on motor learning performance, which might be caused by the impact of aerobic exercise on cortical excitability. It is thus suggested that physiological effects of aerobic exercise on cortical excitability determine the effects of aerobic exercise on motor learning. Nevertheless, respective results usually come from independent studies, and a prove of the causal relationship between neurophysiological and motor learning effects is still missing. This study aims to explore the impact of a single bout of aerobic exercise on brain physiology and motor learning, and the association between these phenomena in humans., Method: The study was conducted in a cross-over design. In twenty healthy subjects, cortical excitability and motor learning were assessed before and after a single bout of aerobic exercise or a control intervention., Results: The results show that aerobic exercise improved motor sequence learning and enhanced cortical excitability in humans. Furthermore, a correlation between the exercise-dependent alteration of cortical excitability (short intracortical inhibition, which is determined primarily by the GABAergic system) and improvement of motor learning has been found., Discussion: The study found motor learning performance-improving effects of aerobic exercise, and these results might be explained by an exercised-caused alteration of cortical excitability, especially a reduction of GABA activity., Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing financial interests., (© 2022 The Author(s).)

The cultivated peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.) is an important oil crop but has a narrow genetic diversity. Molecular markers can be used to probe the genetic diversity of various germplasm. In this study, the restriction site associated DNA (RAD) approach was utilized to sequence 31 accessions of Taiwanese peanut germplasm, leading to the identification of a total of 17,610 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). When we grouped these 31 accessions into two subsets according to origin, we found that the "global" subset (n = 17) was more genetically diverse than the "local" subset (n = 14). Concerning botanical varieties, the var. fastigiata subset had greater genetic diversity than the other two subsets of var. vulgaris and var. hypogaea, suggesting that novel genetic resources should be introduced into breeding programs to enhance genetic diversity. Principal component analysis (PCA) of genotyping data separated the 31 accessions into three clusters largely according to the botanical varieties, consistent with the PCA result for 282 accessions genotyped by 14 kompetitive allele-specific PCR (KASP) markers developed in this study. The SNP markers identified in this work not only revealed the genetic relationship and population structure of current germplasm in Taiwan, but also offer an efficient tool for breeding and further genetic applications., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Rice ( Oryza sativa L.) is an important crop worldwide. Functional rice has exhibited health benefits. The aim of this study was to use marker-assisted selection (MAS) to introgress two genes, GE (giant embryo) and OsALDH7 (aldehyde dehydrogenase, golden-like endosperm) into colored rice and obtain high yield functional rice. CNY103108 and CNY103107 are two rice lines with golden-like endosperms and giant embryos. They were used as the donor parents. CNY922401, an elite purple waxy rice line, and TNGSW26, an indica red waxy rice cultivar were used as the recurrent parents. Foreground selection of the progenies was completed using functional markers for GE and OsALDH7 , and background selection was completed using molecular markers to recover the background of the recurrent parents. MAS results showed a purple functional rice population (PFR) (CNY922401/CNY103108), with the recovery rate of the recurrent parental genome as 91.3%, and a red functional rice population (RFR) (TNGSW26/CNY103107) with the recovery as 89.8%. After five-season yield trials and several antioxidant activities analyses, PFR32 and RFR13 lines, which have similar yields and antioxidant activities, were selected as the recurrent parents with a golden-like endosperm and a giant embryo. For a biofortification purpose, they can become valuable products and be adapted to the current agricultural community.

Background: Noradrenaline has an important role as a neuromodulator of the central nervous system. Noradrenergic enhancement was recently shown to enhance glutamate-dependent cortical facilitation and long term potentiation-like plasticity. As cortical excitability and plasticity are closely linked to various cognitive processes, here we aimed to explore whether these alterations are associated with respective cognitive performance changes. Specifically, we assessed the impact of noradrenergic enhancement on motor learning (serial reaction time task), attentional processes (Stroop interference task), and working memory performance (n-back letter task)., Methods: The study was conducted in a cross-over design. Twenty-five healthy humans performed the respective cognitive tasks after a single dose of the noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor reboxetine or placebo administration., Results: The results show that motor learning, attentional processes, and working memory performance in healthy participants were improved by reboxetine application compared with placebo., Conclusions: The results of the present study thus suggest that noradrenergic enhancement can improve memory formation and executive functions in healthy humans. The respective changes are in line with related effects of noradrenaline on cortical excitability and plasticity., (© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of CINP.)

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) induces polarity- and dose-dependent neuroplastic aftereffects on cortical excitability and cortical activity, as demonstrated by transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) and functional imaging (fMRI) studies. However, lacking systematic comparative studies between stimulation-induced changes in cortical excitability obtained from TMS, and cortical neurovascular activity obtained from fMRI, prevent the extrapolation of respective physiological and mechanistic bases. We investigated polarity- and intensity-dependent effects of tDCS on cerebral blood flow (CBF) using resting-state arterial spin labeling (ASL-MRI), and compared the respective changes to TMS-induced cortical excitability (amplitudes of motor evoked potentials, MEP) in separate sessions within the same subjects (n = 29). Fifteen minutes of sham, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0-mA anodal or cathodal tDCS was applied over the left primary motor cortex (M1) in a randomized repeated-measure design. Time-course changes were measured before, during and intermittently up to 120-min after stimulation. ROI analyses indicated linear intensity- and polarity-dependent tDCS after-effects: all anodal-M1 intensities increased CBF under the M1 electrode, with 2.0-mA increasing CBF the greatest (15.3%) compared to sham, while all cathodal-M1 intensities decreased left M1 CBF from baseline, with 2.0-mA decreasing the greatest (-9.3%) from sham after 120-min. The spatial distribution of perfusion changes correlated with the predicted electric field, as simulated with finite element modeling. Moreover, tDCS-induced excitability changes correlated more strongly with perfusion changes in the left sensorimotor region compared to the targeted hand-knob region. Our findings reveal lasting tDCS-induced alterations in cerebral perfusion, which are dose-dependent with tDCS parameters, but only partially account for excitability changes., (© 2019 The Authors. Human Brain Mapping published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.)

This study tests our hypothesis that patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have an increased risk of traumatic brain injury (TBI).In this nationwide retrospective cohort study, we used a subset of Taiwan's National Health Insurance Research Database, involving 1 million randomly selected beneficiaries. Patients with newly diagnosed COPD between 2000 and 2008 were identified. They were subgrouped as 'COPD AE+ ' (if they had severe acute exacerbation of COPD during the follow-ups) or 'COPD AE- ' (if they had no acute exacerbation), and were frequency matched with randomly selected subjects without COPD (the 'non-COPD' group). Baseline differences were balanced by the inverse probability of treatment weighting based on the propensity score. For each patient, the risk of TBI during the subsequent 5 years was determined. The competing risk of death was controlled.We identified 3734 patients in 'COPD AE+ ', and frequency matched them with 11,202 patients in 'COPD AE- ' and 11,202 subjects in 'non-COPD'. Compared with those in 'non-COPD', patients in 'COPD AE+ ' and 'COPD AE- ' had an increased risk of TBI: the adjusted HR for 'COPD AE+ ' was 1.50, 95% CI 1.31 to 1.73, and that for 'COPD AE- ' was 1.21, 95% CI 1.09 to 1.34. The highest risk was observed in the 'COPD AE+ ' group that aged <65 (the adjusted HR was 1.92; 95% CI 1.39 to 2.64).COPD has been linked to complications beyond the respiratory system. In this study we showed that COPD is associated with an increased risk of TBI., Competing Interests: Competing interests: None declared., (© American Federation for Medical Research 2020. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. Published by BMJ.)

Background: Noradrenaline is a major neuromodulator in the central nervous system, and it is involved in the pathophysiology of diverse neuropsychiatric diseases. Previous transcranial magnetic stimulation studies suggested that acute application of selective noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors enhances cortical excitability in the human brain. However, other, such like clinical effects, usually require prolonged noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor treatment, which might go along with different physiological effects., Methods: The purpose of this study was to investigate the acute and chronic effects of the selective noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor reboxetine on cortical excitability in healthy humans in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomized crossover study. Sixteen subjects were assessed with different transcranial magnetic stimulation measurements: motor thresholds, input-output curve, short-latency intracortical inhibition and intracortical facilitation, I-wave facilitation, and short-interval afferent inhibition before and after placebo or reboxetine (8 mg) single-dose administration. Afterwards, the same subjects took reboxetine (8 mg/d) consecutively for 21 days. During this period (subjects underwent 2 experimental sessions with identical transcranial magnetic stimulation measures under placebo or reboxetine), transcranial magnetic stimulation measurements were assessed before and after drug intake., Results: Both single-dose and chronic administration of reboxetine increased cortical excitability; increased the slope of the input-output curve, intracortical facilitation, and I-wave facilitation; but decreased short-latency intracortical inhibition and short-interval afferent inhibition. Moreover, chronic reboxetine showed a larger enhancement of intracortical facilitation and I-wave facilitation compared with single-dose application., Conclusions: The results show physiological mechanisms of noradrenergic enhancement possibly underlying the functional effects of reboxetine regarding acute and chronic application., (© The Author 2017. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of CINP.)

Key Points: Chronic administration of the selective noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor (NRI) reboxetine (RBX) increased and prolonged the long-term potentiation-like plasticity induced by anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) for over 24 h. Chronic administration of RBX converted cathodal tDCS-induced long-term depression-like plasticity into facilitation for 120 min. Chronic noradrenergic activity enhancement on plasticity of the human brain might partially explain the delayed therapeutic impact of selective NRIs in depression and other neuropsychiatric diseases., Abstract: Noradrenaline affects cognition and motor learning processes via its impact on long-term potentiation (LTP) and depression (LTD). We aimed to explore the impact of single dose and chronic administration of the selective noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor (NRI) reboxetine (RBX) on plasticity induced by transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) in healthy humans via a double-blinded, placebo-controlled, randomized crossover study. Sixteen healthy volunteers received placebo or single dose RBX (8 mg) before anodal or cathodal tDCS of the primary motor cortex. Afterwards, the same subjects took RBX (8 mg day -1 ) consecutively for 21 days. During this period, two additional interventions were performed (RBX with anodal or cathodal tDCS), to explore the impact of chronic RBX treatment on plasticity. Plasticity was monitored by motor-evoked potential amplitudes elicited by transcranial magnetic stimulation. Chronic administration of RBX increased and prolonged the LTP-like plasticity induced by anodal tDCS for over 24 h. Chronic RBX significantly converted cathodal tDCS-induced LTD-like plasticity into facilitation, as compared to the single dose condition, for 120 min after stimulation. The results show a prominent impact of chronic noradrenergic enhancement on plasticity of the human brain that might partially explain the delayed therapeutic impact of selective NRIs in depression and other neuropsychiatric diseases., (© 2016 The Authors. The Journal of Physiology © 2016 The Physiological Society.)

Key Points: Applications of transcranial direct current stimulation to modulate human neuroplasticity have increased in research and clinical settings. However, the need for longer-lasting effects, combined with marked inter-individual variability, necessitates a deeper understanding of the relationship between stimulation parameters and physiological effects. We systematically investigated the full DC intensity range (0.5-2.0 mA) for both anodal and cathodal tDCS in a sham-controlled repeated measures design, monitoring changes in motor-cortical excitability via transcranial magnetic stimulation up to 2 h after stimulation. For both tDCS polarities, the excitability after-effects did not linearly correlate with increasing DC intensity; effects of lower intensities (0.5, 1.0 mA) showed equal, if not greater effects in motor-cortical excitability. Further, while intra-individual responses showed good reliability, inter-individual sensitivity to TMS accounted for a modest percentage of the variance in the early after-effects of 1.0 mA anodal tDCS, which may be of practical relevance for future optimizations., Abstract: Contemporary non-invasive neuromodulatory techniques, such as transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), have shown promising potential in both restituting impairments in cortical physiology in clinical settings, as well as modulating cognitive abilities in the healthy population. However, neuroplastic after-effects of tDCS are highly dependent on stimulation parameters, relatively short lasting, and not expectedly uniform between individuals. The present study systematically investigates the full range of current intensity between 0.5 and 2.0 mA on left primary motor cortex (M1) plasticity, as well as the impact of individual-level covariates on explaining inter-individual variability. Thirty-eight healthy subjects were divided into groups of anodal and cathodal tDCS. Five DC intensities (sham, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 mA) were investigated in separate sessions. Using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), 25 motor-evoked potentials (MEPs) were recorded before, and 10 time points up to 2 h following 15 min of tDCS. Repeated-measures ANOVAs indicated a main effect of intensity for both anodal and cathodal tDCS. With anodal tDCS, all active intensities resulted in equivalent facilitatory effects relative to sham while for cathodal tDCS, only 1.0 mA resulted in sustained excitability diminution. An additional experiment conducted to assess intra-individual variability revealed generally good reliability of 1.0 mA anodal tDCS (ICC(2,1) = 0.74 over the first 30 min). A post hoc analysis to discern sources of inter-individual variability confirmed a previous finding in which individual TMS SI 1mV (stimulus intensity for 1 mV MEP amplitude) sensitivity correlated negatively with 1.0 mA anodal tDCS effects on excitability. Our study thus provides further insights on the extent of non-linear intensity-dependent neuroplastic after-effects of anodal and cathodal tDCS., (© 2016 The Authors. The Journal of Physiology © 2016 The Physiological Society.)

Serotonin affects memory formation via modulating long-term potentiation (LTP) and depression (LTD). Accordingly, acute selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) administration enhanced LTP-like plasticity induced by transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) in humans. However, it usually takes some time for SSRI to reduce clinical symptoms such as anxiety, negative mood, and related symptoms of depression and anxiety disorders. This might be related to an at least partially different effect of chronic serotonergic enhancement on plasticity, as compared with single-dose medication. Here we explored the impact of chronic application of the SSRI citalopram (CIT) on plasticity induced by tDCS in healthy humans in a partially double-blinded, placebo (PLC)-controlled, randomized crossover study. Furthermore, we explored the dependency of plasticity induction from the glutamatergic system via N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor antagonism. Twelve healthy subjects received PLC medication, combined with anodal or cathodal tDCS of the primary motor cortex. Afterwards, the same subjects took CIT (20 mg/day) consecutively for 35 days. During this period, four additional interventions were performed (CIT and PLC medication with anodal/cathodal tDCS, CIT and dextromethorphan (150 mg) with anodal/cathodal tDCS). Plasticity was monitored by motor-evoked potential amplitudes elicited by transcranial magnetic stimulation. Chronic application of CIT increased and prolonged the LTP-like plasticity induced by anodal tDCS for over 24 h, and converted cathodal tDCS-induced LTD-like plasticity into facilitation. These effects were abolished by dextromethorphan. Chronic serotonergic enhancement results in a strengthening of LTP-like glutamatergic plasticity, which might partially explain the therapeutic impact of SSRIs in depression and other neuropsychiatric diseases.

Background: Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) induces long-lasting NMDA receptor-dependent cortical plasticity via persistent subthreshold polarization of neuronal membranes. Conventional bipolar tDCS is applied with two large (35 cm(2)) rectangular electrodes, resulting in directional modulation of neuronal excitability. Recently a newly designed 4 × 1 high-definition (HD) tDCS protocol was proposed for more focal stimulation according to the results of computational modeling. HD tDCS utilizes small disc electrodes deployed in 4 × 1 ring configuration whereby the physiological effects of the induced electric field are thought to be grossly constrained to the cortical area circumscribed by the ring., Objective: We aim to compare the physiological effects of both tDCS electrode arrangements on motor cortex excitability., Methods: tDCS was applied with 2 mA for 10 min. Fourteen healthy subjects participated, and motor cortex excitability was monitored by transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) before and after tDCS., Results: Excitability enhancement following anodal and a respective reduction after cathodal stimulation occurred in both, conventional and HD tDCS. However, the plastic changes showed a more delayed peak at 30 min and longer lasting after-effects for more than 2 h after HD tDCS for both polarities, as compared to conventional tDCS., Conclusion: The results show that this new electrode arrangement is efficient for the induction of neuroplasticity in the primary motor cortex. The pattern of aftereffects might be compatible with the concept of GABA-mediated surround inhibition, which should be explored in future studies directly., (Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

The objectives of this study were to investigate the antiproliferation and apoptosis mechanism of saponin and flavonoid fractions from Gynostemma pentaphyllum (Thunb.) Makino on prostate cancer cell PC-3. Both flavonoid and saponin fractions were isolated by a column chromatographic method with Cosmosil 75C(18)-OPN as adsorbent and elution solvents of ethanol-water (30:70, v/v) for the former and 100% ethanol for the latter, followed by high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry analysis. On the basis of the MTT assay, the saponin and flavonoid fraction were comparably effective in inhibiting the growth of PC-3 cells, with the IC(50) being 39.3 and 33.3 μg/mL, respectively. Additionally, both fractions induced an arrest of PC-3 cell cycle at both S and G2/M phases, with both early and late apoptotic cell populations showing a dose-dependent rise. The Western blot assay indicated that the incorporation of flavonoid or saponin fraction could modulate the expression of G2 and M checkpoint regulators, cyclins A and B, and the antiapoptotic proteins Bcl-2 and Bcl-xl and pro-apoptotic proteins Bad and Bax. The expression of the caspase-3 and its activated downstream substrate effectors, DFF45 and poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase-1 (PARP-1), was also increased and followed a dose-dependent manner. All of these findings suggest that the apoptosis of PC-3 cells may proceed through the intrinsic mitochondria pathway.

This paper compares the impacts of SARS and human deaths arising from Avian Flu on international tourist arrivals to Asia. The effects of SARS and human deaths from Avian Flu are compared directly according to the number of human deaths. The nature of the short run and long run relationship is examined empirically by estimating a static line fixed effect model and a difference transformation dynamic model, respectively. Empirical results from the static fixed effect and difference transformation dynamic models are consistent, and indicate that both the short run and long run SARS effect have a more significant impact on international tourist arrivals than does Avian Flu. In addition, the effects of deaths arising from both SARS and Avian Flu suggest that SARS is more important to international tourist arrivals than is Avian Flu. Thus, while Avian Flu is here to stay, its effect is currently not as significant as that of SARS., (Copyright © 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Objectives: This article aims to quantify the risk factors associated with the human cases of H5N1 avian influenza in South-east Asian countries and China; a dangerous region for this disease that has the potential for a pandemic outbreak., Study Design: A statistical model with time and spatial dimensions was built to capture the international spread patterns of this disease., Methods: The grid search method was used to fit the model with 2004-2006 data. The grid search approach is a simple procedure that allows the fit of any function to data., Results: This study found that: (1) when the number of domestic H5N1 human cases increases by one person in a certain time period, the chance that the country will have a human case in the next period increases by 22.10%; (2) when the number of human cases in a neighbouring country increases by one person in a certain time period, the chance that the country will have a human case in the next period increases by 1.62%; (3) when the number of avian cases in a neighbouring country increases by one, the chance that the country will have a human case increases by 0.02%; (4) as the human population increases by one unit, the chance that the country will have a human case increases by 0.10%; (5) when the quantity of imported poultry increases by 1000 metric tons, the chance that the country will have a human case increases by 0.03%; (6) when the outbreak of the disease among domestic birds increases by one, the chance that the country will have a human case increases by 0.19%; and finally (7) when the number of birds destroyed increases by 1000, the chance that the country will have a human case decreases by 0.30%., Conclusions: These findings shed new light on the spatiotemporal characteristics of the epidemic, and thus need to be taken into consideration in interdisciplinary and scientific discussion of the disease.

Package is a critical part in biomedical implantable systems. Many factors affecting the host body and the life time of implantable systems need to be considered. Package becomes more critical for microfabricated systems with wireless charging and communication. This paper presents the first phase study on micro package techniques for short term (30 to 90 days) implantable systems. A MEMS implantable telemetry model system was designed for packaging evaluation. The transmitter was custom designed and fabricated using MOSIS processes and an external receiver was designed and built for data collection. For short term implantable systems, medical grade silicone outer coating is used for "tissue compatibility"; while multilayer polymeric and nanometer-thin metal or ceramic films were used for inner coatings to provide mechanical strength and to block vapor and moisture penetration. The total coating thickness is less than 0.6 mm. The electrical performances (leakage resistance) of test board and model devices coated with various package materials and processes are evaluated in 40 degrees C saline. This paper presents: the model system; the evaluation methods and analysis of failure modes of polymeric coating on test boards; the solution to the failures and suggested coating techniques of polymeric materials; and the evaluation of model systems packaged with multi-layer coatings in 40 degrees C saline. The expected performance of developed packaging method was verified by experiments. Implantable wireless MEMS system can be packaged with thin multilayer materials to have an expected life time greater than 30 days.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impacts of infectious diseases including Avian Flu and severe acute respiratory syndrome (hereafter SARS) on international tourist arrivals in Asian countries using both single datasets and panel data procedures. An autoregressive moving average model together with an exogenous variables (ARMAX) model are used to estimate the effects of these diseases in each SARS- and Avian Flu-infected country, while a dynamic panel model is adopted to estimate the overall impact on the region of these two diseases. The empirical results from both approaches are consistent and indicate that the numbers of affected cases have a significant impact on SARS-affected countries but not on Avian Flu-affected countries. However, since the potential damage arising from the Avian Flu and subsequent pandemic influenza is much greater than that resulting from the SARS, the need to take the necessary precautions in the event of an outbreak of Avian Flu and pandemic influenza warrants further attention and action. Therefore, the empirical findings of this study could add to the knowledge regarding the relationship between tourism and crisis management, especially in so far as the management of transmissible diseases is concerned., (Copyright © 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Supercritical CO(2)-based fluid is not only being considered as environmentally benign medium for photoresist (PR) removal in electronic device manufacture, but also capable of challenging feature dimensions. Despite many attractive properties, clear supercritical CO(2) has little solvating power for PR. Here, two acetate modifiers were selective to add in the CO(2) and evaluated individual contribution to the overall stripping rate by factorial experiment design, which included four other factors with four level ranges for each one and concluded the best 90% extraction efficiency would be obtained under the optimized parameters: 2.5min static time, 35min dynamic time, 1.25ml ethylacetate spiked, 125 degrees C oven temperature and 480atm CO(2) pressure. As analyzing the variances of these contributors to this system, it disclosed that dynamics controlled the stripping mechanism before near 35min purging but thermodynamics took over after then; and that increasing pressure was more competent for removing PR than increasing temperature. All supercritical extracts were from two commercial PR coated on two substrates and analyzed by UV absorption spectrometry. Removing PR coated on silicon oxide layer was easier than that on Al-Cu alloy one.

Inflammatory pseudotumour is an uncommon mass forming lesion, representing the histological expression of an infective or reactive/reparative process (pseudotumour) in most cases, and a bona fide neoplasm (for example, inflammatory myofibroblastic tumour) in a minority of cases. This report describes the case of an inflammatory pseudotumour with a pathology that unveiled proliferative CD68 positive and actin negative spindle shaped cells, with a mild mixed inflammatory infiltrate, and a culture that yielded an uncommon fastidious bacillus, Eikenella corrodens. The clinical course was indolent but protracted, with insidious progression to multifocal non-contiguous lesions, involving the lungs, liver, spleen, left kidney, and deep neck tissue, all of which responded to medical treatment with appropriate antibiotics. It is of paramount importance that clinicians search for an infective cause of an inflammatory pseudotumour, to ensure appropriate treatment.