The efficacy of three different treatment protocols was compared: 1) simple chest tube drainage (Drain); 2) adjunctive intrapleural streptokinase (IP-SK); and 3) an aggressive empirical approach incorporating SK and early surgical drainage (SK+early OP) in patients with pleural empyema and high-risk parapneumonic effusions. This was a nonrandomized, prospective, controlled time series study of ...

Transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) is central during the pathogenesis of pulmonary fibrosis, in which the plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1) also has an established role. TGF-β is also known to be the strongest inducer of PAI-1. To investigate the link between PAI-1 and TGF-β in fibrotic processes, we evaluated the effect of SK-216, a PAI-1-specific inhibitor, in TGF-β-dependent epithe...

Sphingosine kinases (SK) catalyze the phosphorylation of proapoptotic sphingosine to the prosurvival factor sphingosine 1-phosphate (S1P), thereby promoting oncogenic processes. Breast (MDA-MB-231), lung (NCI-H358), and colon (HCT 116) carcinoma cells were transduced with shRNA to downregulate SK-1 expression or treated with a pharmacologic SK-1 inhibitor. The effects of SK-1 targeting were inv...

background and objectives: urinary tract infection (uti) is one of the most common infections in human, and uropathogenic escherichia coli (upec) strains are the most common cause of uti. these strains colonize in bladder and cause cystitis, which could cause pyelonephritis by movement to the kidneys. since fimh protein has a very important role in colonization of upec strains and causing infec...

The cyanobacteria are an ancient group of Gram-negative prokaryotes. In addition to photosynthesis, the cyanobacteria possess many other interesting features: a) nitrogen-fixation, b) cellular differentiation, c) regulated genomic rearrangements (1, 2) and, d) introns (3). Studies of these features in the filamentous cyanobacteria are hampered by a lack of shuttle vectors. Currently, there is o...

For 1≤s1≤s2≤…≤sk and a graph G, packing (s1,s2,…,sk)-coloring of G is partition V(G) into sets V1,V2,…,Vk such that, for each 1≤i≤k the distance between any two distinct x,y∈Vi at least si+1. The chromatic number, χp(G), smallest k that has (1,2,…,k)-coloring. It known there are trees maximum degree 4 subcubic graphs with arbitrarily large χp(G). Recently, was series papers on (s1,s2,…,sk)-colo...

Introduction: Loss of inhibitory output from Purkinje cells leads to hyperexcitability of the Deep Cerebellar Nuclei (DCN), which results in cerebellar ataxia. Also, inhibition of small-conductancecalcium-activated potassium (SK) channel increases firing rate  f DCN, which could cause cerebellar ataxia. Therefore, SK channel activators can be effective in reducing the symptoms of this disease, ...

A [ An−1 + p1A n−2 + · · ·+ pn−1 In ] = −pn In . Since A is nonsingular, pn = (−1)n det(A) 6= 0; thus the result follows. Newton’s Identity. Let λ1, λ2, . . . , λn be the roots of the polynomial K(λ) = λ + p1λ n−1 + p2λ n−2 + · · · · · ·+ pn−1λ+ pn. If sk = λ k 1 + λ k 2 + · · ·+ λn, then pk = − 1 k (sk + sk−1 p1 + sk−2 p2 + · · ·+ s2 pk−2p1 + s1 pk−1) . Proof. From K(λ) = (λ − λ1)(λ − λ2) . . ...

Background and Aims: Formaldehyde (FA) exposure is an important cause of cellular injury and oxidative damage in testis, leading to infertility. This study aimed to assess the protective effects of curcumin on sperm and stereological parameters in testes from formaldehyde-exposed NMRI mice. Materials and Methods: At 6-8 weeks of age, 24 adult male NMRI mice weighing 30-35 g were categorized in...