Effect of treatment with 13-cis-retinoic acid and ara-C on the hematopoietic stem cells of patients with myelodysplastic syndromes

PURPOSE: To assess the "in vivo" effect of 13-cis-retinoic acid and low dose Ara-C in MDS as well as to establish "in vitro" advantage of retinoid dose-related growth pattern on bone marrow cultures as defined by culture timing and CFU-GM proliferative response. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We evaluated 28 patients diagnosed of MDS according to FAB classification, of whom 4 cases had RA, 8 cases SRA, 14 cases RAEB and 2 cases RAEB-T. Patients who had RA and SRA were treated with oral 13-cis-retinoic acid at doses of 20-40 mg daily for 4 months and those cases with RAEB and RAEB-T had subcutaneous Ara-C at doses of 3 mg/m2 twice a day for 21 days. The "in vivo" and "in vitro" effect of retinoic acid on the haemopoietic differentiation was evaluated by the growth CFU-GM in semisolid cell culture methods. RESULTS: Increasing in vitro concentrations of 13-cis retinoic acid did not enhance the growth of myelodysplastic progenitors. Nevertheless, our study did not find any beneficial therapeutic effect of retinoic compounds in MDS patients. In this study, low-dose Ara-C (3 mg/m2) showed similar effects when compared with higher doses reported by others. Furthermore, in terms of CFU-GM proliferation the concentration of colonies before and after treatment were fairly similar in all but two patients. CONCLUSIONS: The results drawn from our study demonstrated that there is no beneficial advantage of 13-cis-retinoic acid as a differentiation inducing agent on myelodysplastic patients. In contrast, lower doses of Ara-C showed similar effects on haemopoiesis of MDS patients than standard doses of 10-20 mg/m2 but with less side effects.     

Modelling Industrial Wastewater Ozonation In Bubble Contactors. 1. Rate Coefficient Determination

A study of the ozonation of distillery and tomato wastewaters was carried out in a small bubble contactor in order to obtain kinetic data for scaling-up. Thus, several parameters, such as chemical oxygen demand (COD), 254 nm absorbance (A₂₅₄) and organic carbon content (OC), were followed during ozonation at different experimental conditions.

For distillery wastewaters all parameters investigated have the highest decreases during the first minutes of ozonation, A₂₅₄ showing the highest disappearance rates. Thus, during the first fifteen minutes of ozonation an important decrease of the 254 nm absorbance (? 75%) was observed. At further reaction times values of all parameters studied decrease slowly, eventually reaching a plateau value. During approximately the first two hours of reaction, dissolved ozone was never found, which suggested that fast or moderate gas-liquid reactions took place in the wastewaters.     

Color encoding for polychromatic single-channel optical pattern recognition

The common multichannel system for recognizing colored images is replaced by a color-encoded single-channel system. Amethod inspired by the Munsell color system is used for encoding the different colors as phase and amplitude functions. It is shown that for many practical cases the phase information part of the color code is sufficient for obtaining good results. An implementation based on a liquid-crystal television panel that works in a phase-modulation mode is suggested. Computer simulations that demonstrate the capabilities of the suggested method are given as well as a comparison with previously published multichannel performance.     

Microbial growth and biochemical changes on naturally contaminated chilled-beef subcutaneous adipose tissue stored aerobically

Naturally contaminated beef-brisket fat showed a psychrotroph count of 4 × 10(9) CFU/cm(2) after 14 days of aerobic refrigerated storage (5°C ± 1°C). Pseudomonas was the predominating genus. Other micro-organisms, such as Enterobacteriaceae and Brochothrix thermosphacta, grew up to 2·5 × 10(8) cfu/cm(2) and 1·6 × 10(8) cfu/cm(2), respectively. Concentrations of different substrates that could support microbial growth were measured. Glucose concentration dropped to approximately one-third of the initial level during the first week of storage. Lactic acid also declined. Free fatty acids increased significantly (P < 0·05) during refrigeration. However, other lipid-deterioration indices, such as the thiobarbituric acid number and the peroxide value, remained unchanged. Beef subcutaneous fat had a high initial microbial load and a capacity to support extensive bacterial growth. It may therefore constitute an important source of contamination for meat and manufactured meat products.     

New approach for optimizing the interpretation and representation of the degree of historical-archaeological evidence in the virtual reconstructions

Virtual Reality - Virtual reconstruction is defined as the visual recovery of a building or object through the creation of a three-dimensional model of the asset to be reconstructed, in a...     

Ball-burnishing effect on deep residual stress on AISI 1038 and AA2017-T4

Ball-burnishing induces compressive residual stresses on treated materials by the effect of plastic deformation. The result is an increase in the fatigue life of the treated part, retarding the initiation of cracks on the surface. Compressive residual stresses have been previously measured by X-ray diffraction near the surface, revealing considerably high values at the maximum analyzed depth, in relation to other finishing processes such as shot peening. However, the maximum analyzed depth is very limited by using this technique. In this paper, the incremental hole drilling (IHD) technique is tested to measure residual stresses, being able to reach a 2-mm measuring depth. To that objective, a commercial strain gage is used and calibrated using finite element model simulations. A second Finite Element Model based on material removal rate is developed to obtain the equations to calculate the strain release through IHD. Finally, residual stresses are measured experimentally with that technique on two different materials, confirming that ball-burnishing increases the compressive residual stresses in layers up to 0.5?mm deep for the testing conditions, which is a good response to industrial needs. The method proves to be suitable, simple and inexpensive way to measure the value of these tensions.     

Control Charts with Variable Dimension for Linear Combination of Poisson Variables

This article analyzes the simultaneous control of several correlated Poisson variables by using the Variable Dimension Linear Combination of Poisson Variables (VDLCP) control chart, which is a variable dimension version of the LCP chart. This control chart uses as test statistic, the linear combination of correlated Poisson variables in an adaptive way, i.e. it monitors either p₁ or p variables (p₁ < p) depending on the last statistic value. To analyze the performance of this chart, we have developed software that finds the best parameters, optimizing the out‐of‐control average run length (ARL) for a shift that the practitioner wishes to detect as quickly as possible, restricted to a fixed value for in‐control ARL. Markov chains and genetic algorithms were used in developing this software. The results show performance improvement compared to the LCP chart. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.