Objective: Iron deficiency anemia (IDA) and beta-thalassemia trait (ß-TT) are the most common forms of microcytic anemia. This study was conducted to compare the validity of various discrimination indices in differentiating β-TT from IDA by calculating their sensitivity, specificity and Youden's index. Methods: Totally 323 subjects (173 children and 150 adults) with microcytic anemia were invol...

A number of immunocytochemical studies show that the vasopressinergic (AVP) system in the rat brain is far from homogeneous. For example the AVP innervation of the lateral septum (LS), originating from the medial amygdala and bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, appears to be sexually dimorphic and testosterone (T) dependent. At an adult age, T appears to induce AVP synthesis in these neurons, ...

Although the limulus amebocyte lysate (LAL) assay is widely used to determine the concentration of LPS in biological samples, it is known to be susceptible to interference caused by substances of non-bacterial origin. In particular, polysaccharides such as β-glucans and pectic polysaccharides from fungi or plants, respectively, were shown to give higher LPS readings than were actually present i...

Wolman disease results from an inherited deficiency of lysosomal acid lipase (LAL; EC 3.1.1.13). This enzyme is essential for the hydrolysis of cholesteryl esters and triacylglycerols derived from endocytosed lipoproteins. Because of a complete absence of LAL activity, Wolman patients accumulate progressive amounts of cholesteryl esters and triacylglycerols in affected tissues. To investigate t...

An attempt was made to confirm and extend the findings of an earlier study on the rewarding properties of testosterone in male mice using conditioned place preference (CPP). Previous results had only partially demonstrated such an effect because the reinforcement depended on environmental cues such as the colour of the compartment. High individual variability was evident, suggesting that basal ...

The objective of this study was to fill in additional knowledge gaps with respect to the extraction, storage, and analysis of airborne endotoxin, with a specific focus on samples from a dairy production facility. We utilized polycarbonate filters to collect total airborne endotoxins, sonication as the extraction technique, and 0.05% Tween 20 in pyrogen-free water (PFW) as the extraction solutio...

Reaction of AlCl(3) with the monoanionic α-diimine ligand [NaL] yielded the complex [L˙(-)Al(III)Cl(2)(-)] (1, L = [(2,6-iPr(2)C(6)H(3))NC(Me)](2)), and subsequent reduction of by sodium metal afforded the mononuclear [L(2-)Al(III)Cl(-)(THF)] (2) and binuclear [L(2-)(THF)Al(II)-Al(II)(THF)L(2-)] (3). Compounds 2 and 3 exhibit interesting reactivities to sodium alkynides at room temperature. Tre...

Eggplants sortirtg plant has been constructed by using image processors, programable contra1 lers and I'A pcrs~lal computers. In order t m a s u r e and analyze an eggplant" size and shape quality, high

PyroSmart NextGen® is a recombinant cascade reagent (rCR) for the detection and quantification of bacterial endotoxins developed using cloned genes derived from Limulus polyphemus horseshoe crab genome. Requirements use this alternative include analysis analytical performance, method suitability, test result equivalency to amoebocyte lysate (LAL) reagents used in compendial Bacterial Endotoxins...

We have investigated whether pyrene-labelled cholesterol esters (PyrnCEs) (n indicates the number of aliphatic carbons in the pyrene-chain) can be used to observe the degradation of low-density lipoprotein (LDL)-derived cholesterol esters (CEs) in the lysosomes of living cells. To select the optimal substrates, hydrolysis of the PyrnCE species by lysosomal acid lipase (LAL) in detergent/phospho...