Liquid crystals (LCs), because of their long-range molecular ordering, are anisotropic, elastic fluids. Herein, we report that elastic stresses imparted by nematic LCs can dynamically shape soft colloids and tune their physical properties. Specifically, we use giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) as soft colloids and explore the interplay of mechanical strain when the GUVs are confined within aque...

In vitro incubation and centrifugation is known to decrease human sperm quality. In the human body, besides its antioxidant effects, L-carnitine (LC) facilitates the transport of activated fatty acids from the cytosol to the mitochondrial matrix. In this study, we investigated the effect of LC on human sperm motility, viability and DNA oxidation after incubation and centrifugation, following th...

Introduction: It has been shown that orexin peptides have a role in opioid withdrawal behaviors. Orexin-expressing neurons that are present in the hypothalamic nuclei send dense projections to the Locus Coeruleus (LC). Withdrawal syndrome is temporally associated with hyperactivity of LC neurons. However, LC neurons do not show withdrawalinduced hyperactivity in the brain slices from morphine-d...

AIM To evaluate changes in indicators of endothelial function and their relationship with morphological forms of disease, stage of pathological process and tumor markers, by analysis the peripheral blood of lung cancer (LC) patients. MATERIALS AND METHODS 38 LC patients without metastases (mean age - 57 years) prior chemo- and radiotherapy were included in the study. The duration of the disea...

background and aims: a selective and sensitive high performance liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization mass spectrometry method has been established for determination of methotrexate in human plasma. methods: methotrexate was extracted from plasma with acetonitrile. the mobile phase consisted of acetonitrile-water-formic acid 74: 25: 1(v/v). twenty µl of sample was chromatographically an...

Botulinum neurotoxins (BoNT) are the most potent of all toxins. The 50 kDa N-terminal endopeptidase catalytic light chain (LC) of BoNT is located next to its central, putative translocation domain. After binding to the peripheral neurons, the central domain of BoNT helps the LC translocate into cytosol where its proteolytic action on SNARE (soluble NSF attachment protein receptor) proteins bloc...

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES Due to ever growing insecticide resistance in mosquitoes to commonly used insecticides in many parts of the globe, there is always a need for introduction of new insecticides for the control of resistant vector mosquitoes. In this study, larvicidal and adulticidal efficacies of three neonicotinoids (imidacloprid, thiacloprid and thiamethoxam) were tested against resistan...

This research is the first to quantify complex PAH mixtures in NIST SRMs using comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography coupled to time-of-flight mass spectrometry (GC×GC/ToF-MS), with and without extract cleanup, and reports previously unidentified PAH congeners in the NIST SRMs. We tested a novel, high orthogonality GC column combination (LC-50×NSP-35), as well as with a commonly used...

Despite the important roles played by insects in most ecosystems, surprisingly little is known about how anthropogenic pollutants or their mixtures interact to affect insect populations. The independent and joint actions of selenate and methylmercury on a ubiquitous insect detritivore, Megaselia scalaris (Loew), were determined in this study. Ovipositing females did not distinguish between untr...

The locus coeruleus (LC) harbors a compact group of noradrenergic cell bodies projecting to virtually all parts of the central nervous system. By using combined measurements of amperometry and patch-clamp, quantal vesicle release of noradrenaline (NA) was detected as amperometric spikes, after depolarization of the LC neurons. After a pulse depolarization, the average latency of amperometric sp...