Warning: Do Not Turtle Aquarium into Hot Water

Hydrophobicity--getting into hot water.

In his famous 1959 review, Walter Kauzmann clarified important features of the thermodynamic stabilities of proteins. The hydrophobic effect is recognised as an important contributor to the stability of proteins and an important determinant of their structural patterns. As generally understood, it depends on the unusual properties of cold water and its interactions with nonpolar solutes. Here w...

Praziquantel degradation in marine aquarium water

Praziquantel (PZQ) is a drug commonly utilized to treat both human schistosomiasis and some parasitic infections and infestations in animals. In the aquarium industry, PZQ can be administered in a "bath" to treat the presence of ectoparasites on both the gills and skin of fish and elasmobranchs. In order to fully treat an infestation, the bath treatment has to maintain therapeutic levels of PZQ...

Oral Administration of a Hot Water Extract of the Softshell Turtle (Trionyx sinensis) Improves Exercise Performance

Freshwater softshell turtle (Trionyx sinensis) extract has been used traditionally as a tonic soup, and to recover from physical fatigue. To support these claims, the forelimb grip strength of mice was measured after feeding a soft-shell turtle extract for 7 days. The T. sinensis extract significantly increased the grip strength to 1.25±0.07 N (P<0.01), which is 16.8% higher than the force on d...

Experimental Investigation of Hot Water Injection into Carbonate Heavy Oil Reservoir

Monocytes Do Not Transdifferentiate into Proper Osteoblasts

Recent publications suggested that monocytes might be an attractive cell type to transdifferentiate into various cellular phenotypes. Aim was, therefore, to evaluate the potential of blood monocytes to transdifferentiate into osteoblasts. Monocytes isolated from peripheral blood were subjected to two previously published treatments to obtain unique, multipotent cell fractions, named programmabl...