BACKGROUND Duplex real-time PCR assays have been widely used to determine amounts and concentrations of free circulating DNA in human blood plasma samples. Circulatory plasma DNA is highly fragmented and hence a PCR-based determination of DNA concentration may be affected by the limited availability of full-length targets in the DNA sample. This leads to inaccuracies when counting PCR target co...

Health Reports, Vol. 17, No. 1, November 2005 Statistics Canada, Catalogue 82-003 Diseases of the circulatory system are the major cause of illness, disability, and death in Canada.1 The most common of these diseases are ischemic heart disease (which includes acute myocardial infarction or heart attack ), congestive heart failure, and cerebrovascular disease (stroke). A heart attack is typicall...

Millions of years of exposure to similar selective pressures have resulted in convergent evolution between modern coleoid cephalopods and modern chondrichthian and teleost fishes (Packard, 1972; O’Dor and Webber, 1986; Hanlon and Messenger, 1996). The cephalopod circulatory system was shaped by this convergent evolution (Packard, 1972; O’Dor and Webber, 1991; Wells, 1994; Hanlon and Messenger, ...

We have been developing a pulmonary circulatory assist device using shape memory alloy fibres for Fontan circulation. It consisted of several shape memory alloy fibres, which covered the ePTFE conduit circumferentially. We designed the sequential motion control system for pulsatile flow generation for sophisticated pulmonary hemodynamics. In order to achieve physiological pulsatile flow assista...

This chapter describes a simulation system for modeling and testing aerobic circulatory physiology on the virtual environment. There have been many models of the biological system at various scales and from various viewpoints, intended to simulate physiological changes and pathological conditions (McLeod, 1966). However, these models are designed primarily for medical education, and are unsuita...