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Favourable Properties (favourable + property)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Medical Sciences	50%

Selected Abstracts

Intravenous lidocaine for status epilepticus during childhood

DEVELOPMENTAL MEDICINE & CHILD NEUROLOGY, Issue 3 2006
Shin-ichiro Hamano MD;
The clinical efficacy of lidocaine for convulsive status epilepticus in 53 convulsive episodes was examined in 37 children (17 males, 20 females). Mean age of patients receiving lidocaine was 3 years 7 months (SD 3y 5mo). Lidocaine administration achieved control of status epilepticus in 19 of 53 convulsive episodes (35.8%). Seizures ceased within 5 minutes of lidocaine administration in all 19 patients who were responsive to the drug. Regarding aetiology of status epilepticus and types of seizures, there was no statistical difference in effectiveness. Mild decrease of oxygen saturation, monitored by pulse oximetry, was observed in one patient, which improved by oxygenation using a mask. Lidocaine is a useful anticonvulsive agent; however, the response rate to lidocaine appears to be quite low, as less than half of the seizures were effectively controlled by lidocaine. Favourable properties of the drug include prompt responses, less alteration of consciousness, and fewer adverse effects, including less respiratory depression. [source]

Novel coupling Rosenbrock-based algorithms for real-time dynamic substructure testing

EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING AND STRUCTURAL DYNAMICS, Issue 3 2008
O. S. Bursi
Abstract Real-time testing with dynamic substructuring is a novel experimental technique capable of assessing the behaviour of structures subjected to dynamic loadings including earthquakes. The technique involves recreating the dynamics of the entire structure by combining an experimental test piece consisting of part of the structure with a numerical model simulating the remainder of the structure. These substructures interact in real time to emulate the behaviour of the entire structure. Time integration is the most versatile method for analysing the general case of linear and non-linear semi-discretized equations of motion. In this paper we propose for substructure testing, L-stable real-time (LSRT) compatible integrators with two and three stages derived from the Rosenbrock methods. These algorithms are unconditionally stable for uncoupled problems and entail a moderate computational cost for real-time performance. They can also effectively deal with stiff problems, i.e. complex emulated structures for which solutions can change on a time scale that is very short compared with the interval of time integration, but where the solution of interest changes on a much longer time scale. Stability conditions of the coupled substructures are analysed by means of the zero-stability approach, and the accuracy of the novel algorithms in the coupled case is assessed in both the unforced and forced conditions. LSRT algorithms are shown to be more competitive than popular Runge,Kutta methods in terms of stability, accuracy and ease of implementation. Numerical simulations and real-time substructure tests are used to demonstrate the favourable properties of the proposed algorithms. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]

Review: doxorubicin delivery systems based on chitosan for cancer therapy

JOURNAL OF PHARMACY AND PHARMACOLOGY: AN INTERNATI ONAL JOURNAL OF PHARMACEUTICAL SCIENCE, Issue 2 2009
Mei Lin Tan
Abstract Objectives This review sheds insight into an increasingly popular polymer that has been widely explored as a potential drug delivery system. The abundant, biodegradable and biocompatible polysaccharide chitosan, with many other favourable properties, has been favoured as a drug delivery system for the purposes of encapsulating and delivery of doxorubicin with reduced side-effects. Key findings Doxorubicin is frequently used as a frontline chemotherapeutic agent against a variety of cancers. It has largely been able to demonstrate anti-tumour effects, though there are major shortfalls of doxorubicin, which include serious side-effects such as cardiomyopathy and myelosuppression, and also an ever-present danger of extravasation during drug administration. In view of this, drug delivery systems are currently being explored as alternative methods of drug delivery in a bid to more effectively direct doxorubicin to the specific lesion site and reduce its systemic side-effects. Liposomes and dendrimers have been tested as potential carriers for doxorubicin; however they are not the focus of this review. Summary Recent advancements in doxorubicin and chitosan technology have shown some preliminary though promising results for cancer therapy. [source]

A higher-order PDE-based image registration approach

NUMERICAL LINEAR ALGEBRA WITH APPLICATIONS, Issue 5 2006
Volker Grimm
Abstract This paper addresses the problem of image registration with higher-order partial differential equation (PDE) methods. From the study of existing affine-linear and non-linear methods, a new framework is proposed that unifies common image registration methods within a generic formulation. Currently image registration strategies are classified into either affine-linear or non-linear methods subject to the underlying transformations. The new approach combines both strategies to obtain proper approximations which are invariant under global geometrical distortion (shearing), anisotropic resolution (scale changes), as well as rotation and translation. To achieve this favourable property, a modified gradient flow approach is proposed which uses an operator with a kernel consisting of affine-linear transformations. An approximation with finite differences leads to a large singular linear system. The pseudo-inverse solution of this system can be computed efficiently by augmenting the singular system to a regular system. Numerical experiments show the improvements compared to unmodified gradient flow approaches. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]