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Polyneuropathy is a disease involving multiple peripheral nerves injuries. Axon regrowth remains the major prerequisite for plasticity, regeneration, circuit formation, and eventually functional recovery and therefore, regulation of neurite outgrowth might be a candidate for treating polyneuropathies. In a recent study, we synthesized and established the methylene-cycloalkylacetate (MCAs) pharmacophore as a lead for the development of a neurotropic drug (inducing neurite/axonal outgrowth) using the PC12 neuronal model. In the present study we extended the characterizations of the in vitro neurotropic effect of the derivative 3-(3-allyl-2-methylenecyclohexyl) propanoic acid (MCA-13) on dorsal root ganglia and spinal cord neuronal cultures and analyzed its safety properties using blood biochemistry and cell counting, acute toxicity evaluation in mice and different in vitro "off-target" pharmacological evaluations. This MCA derivative deserves further preclinical mechanistic pharmacological characterizations including therapeutic efficacy in in vivo animal models of polyneuropathies, toward development of a clinically relevant neurotropic drug.

The outcome from the research being reported in this paper is the design of an accessibility audit to evaluate Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) for accessibility and to arrive at solutions and adaptations that can meet user needs. This accessibility audit includes expert-based heuristic evaluations and user-based evaluations of the MOOC platforms and individual courses.

Cholesterol crystallization from mixtures of unesterified cholesterol with phospholipids and cholesterol esters is believed to be a key event in atherosclerosis progression. Not much is understood, however, about the influence of the lipid environment on cholesterol crystallization. Here we study cholesterol monohydrate crystal formation from mixed bilayers with palmitoyl-oleoyl-phosphatidylcholine (POPC), dipalmitoyl-phosphatidylcholine (DPPC) and sphingomyelin. We show that disordered phospholipids and sphingomyelin stabilize the formation of crystal plates of the triclinic cholesterol monohydrate polymorph, whereas saturated glycerolipids stabilize helical and tubular crystals of the metastable monoclinic polymorph. We followed the subsequent transformation of these helical crystals into the stable triclinic plates. Discovering the relations between membrane lipid composition and cholesterol crystal polymorphism may provide important clues to the understanding of cholesterol crystal formation in atherosclerosis.

Abstract A number of recent papers have established connections between reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces H of entire functions, de Branges spaces, sampling formulas and a class of symmetric operators with deficiency indices ( 1 , 1 ) . In this paper analogous connections between reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces of entire vector valued functions, de Branges spaces of entire vector valued functions, sampling formulas and symmetric operators with deficiency indices ( p , p ) are obtained. Enroute, an analog of L. de Branges' characterization of the reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces of entire functions that are now called de Branges spaces is obtained for the p × 1 vector valued case. A special class of these de Branges spaces of p × 1 vector valued entire functions is identified as a functional model for M. G. Krein's class of entire operators with deficiency indices ( p , p ) .

Abstract Background Changes in transcranial magnetic stimulation motor map parameters can be used to quantify plasticity in the human motor cortex. The golden standard uses a counting analysis of motor evoked potentials (MEPs) acquired with a predefined grid. Recently, digital reconstruction methods have been proposed, allowing MEPs to be acquired with a faster pseudorandom procedure. However, the reliability of these reconstruction methods has never been compared to the golden standard. Objective To compare the absolute reliability of the reconstruction methods with the golden standard. Methods In 21 healthy subjects, both grid and pseudorandom acquisition were performed twice on the first day and once on the second day. The standard error of measurement was calculated for the counting analysis and the digital reconstructions. Results The standard error of measurement was at least equal using digital reconstructions. Conclusion Pseudorandom acquisition and digital reconstruction can be used in intervention studies without sacrificing reliability.

Abstract Objectives It has been previously demonstrated that healthcare professionals would like additional education on medical cannabis. However, there has not yet been a review of the status of medical cannabis curriculum for medical and allied healthcare trainees worldwide, even though future healthcare workers will be placed on the forefront of patient care and must be prepared to counsel patients. This study was designed to address this gap in knowledge. Design A search syntax was generated and databases PubMed, ERIC, CINAHL, and Web of Science were searched for relevant articles. A grey literature search of Google Scholar, MedEd, Medline, and the Proquest Dissertations and Theses section was also performed. All titles and abstracts were screened. Selected articles were subsequently screened using predetermined inclusion and exclusion criteria. Results Allied healthcare trainees lacked sufficient knowledge about medical cannabis and did not feel prepared to counsel patients on this subject. Additionally, they expressed a growing interest in medical cannabis and would like more standardized education on the topic. Finally, faculty and deans in various institutions agreed on the need to educate students on the subject, and aimed to implement courses on medical cannabis or expand their existing curricula. Conclusions While the medical cannabis landscape is developing, medical and allied health students are not properly educated and knowledgeable on this emerging field of clinical care. The findings suggest that the implementation of competencies-based curricula on medical cannabis is essential for medical and allied healthcare trainees to have the appropriate level of knowledge to counsel and educate their patients.

Electrical and thermal transport on a fractional quantum Hall edge are determined by topological quantities inherited from the corresponding bulk state. While electrical transport is the standard method for studying edges, thermal transport appears more challenging. Here, we show that the shot noise generated on the edge provides a fully electrical method to probe the edge structure. In the incoherent regime, the noise falls into three topologically distinct universality classes: charge transport is always ballistic while thermal transport is either ballistic, diffusive, or "antiballistic". Correspondingly, the noise either vanishes, decays algebraically or is constant up to exponentially small corrections in the edge length. Published version: 6+7 pages, 3+3 figures

In this paper we apply estimates of the norms of Sobolev extension operators to the spectral estimates of of the first nontrivial Neumann eigenvalue of the Laplace operator in non-convex extension domains. As a consequence we obtain a connection between resonant frequencies of free membranes and the smallest-circle problem (initially proposed by J.~J.~Sylvester in 1857). 12 pages

Many accessions of the wheat wild relative Sharon goatgrass (Aegilops sharonensis Eig., AES) are resistant to African races of the stem rust pathogen (i.e., Ug99 group races), which currently threaten wheat production worldwide. A procedure was designed to introgress the respective resistances to specific bread wheat genomes by producing plants homozygous for the A and B genomes and hemizygous for the D and Ssh genomes or homozygous for the A and D genomes and hemizygous for the B and Ssh genomes. In these genotypes, which lack the Ph1 allele, homeologous pairing was expected mainly between chromosomes of the D and Ssh genomes or B and Ssh genomes, respectively. An antigametocidal (AG) wheat mutant (Gc2mut/Gc2mut) was used to overcome gametocidal effects. Wheat lines initially found resistant at the seedling stage were also highly resistant at the adult plant stage in rust nurseries established in the field. DNA of 41 selected homozygous resistant lines, analyzed by the Axiom wheat 820K SNP array, showed alien chromatin mainly in wheat chromosomes 1B, 1D, and 5B. This work suggests that, in most cases, it is possible to target introgressions into the homeologous chromosome of a selected genome of bread wheat.