Bibliography: leaves 242-298. / xxxiii, 298 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / This thesis investigates the effects of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) on macrophage oxygen radical production. The role of fatty acid structure in the ability to stimulate the fMLP response is also examined. The mechanisms by which fatty acids induce their effects on mononuclear phagocytes are partially elucidated. The mechanisms of the biological effects of the PUFAs in terms of intracellular signalling pathway are partly defined. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of Paediatrics, 1997

Bibliography: leaves 242-298. / xxxiii, 298 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / This thesis investigates the effects of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) on macrophage oxygen radical production. The role of fatty acid structure in the ability to stimulate the fMLP response is also examined. The mechanisms by which fatty acids induce their effects on mononuclear phagocytes are partially elucidated. The mechanisms of the biological effects of the PUFAs in terms of intracellular signalling pathway are partly defined. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of Paediatrics, 1997

Thesis (M.S.)--Missouri State University, 2008. / "May 2008." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 83-87). Also available online.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2008. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Submitted by Fabio Sobreira Campos da Costa (fabio.sobreira@ufpe.br) on 2016-07-20T15:04:22Z No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) Luiza Lima_Tese de Doutorado_2015.pdf: 5654099 bytes, checksum: da2a7cb303b6562f1bc8af5fc0c76f13 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-07-20T15:04:22Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) Luiza Lima_Tese de Doutorado_2015.pdf: 5654099 bytes, checksum: da2a7cb303b6562f1bc8af5fc0c76f13 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-10-29 / CAPEs / Com o objetivo de criar um modelo biológico reprodutível e eficiente que possa mimetizar a interação proteína-carboidrato, nós reportamos o uso do ensaio quimiluminescente com lectinas conjugadas a éster de acridina (EA) para investigar a complexação da lectina ao carboidrato e para avaliação quantitativa da expressão de carboidratos em tumores cutâneos. Polissacarídeos de N-acetil-D-glicosamina (quitosana), glicose (phytagel) e galactose (carragenana) foram utilizados para sintetizar membranas (0,0314 – 0,6358 cm2). Concanavalina A-EA (Con A), Wheat germ aglutinina (WGA), Peanut aglutinina (PNA), Ulex europeaus aglutinina-I (UEA-I) e Maackia amurensis aglutinina (MAA) foram conjugadas a EA. A atividade hemaglutinante das lectinas-EA foi avaliada e a quimiluminescência quantificada e expressa em Unidades Relativas de Luz (URL). Biópsias de pele normal e de tumores cutâneos, tais como ceratose actínica (AK), ceratoacantoma (KA), carcinoma espinocelular (CEC) e basocelular (CBC), e as membranas foram incubadas com o conjugado lectina-EA (100 μL 100 μg mL-1) por 2h a 4°C. A emissão de fótons foi quantificada e correlacionada com a marcação de tecidos normais, transformados e das membranas. Inibições com carboidratos específicos foram realizadas. AK, KA , CBC e CEC apresentaram menor expressão de α -D- glucose/manose e resíduos de α-L-fucose, em comparação com o tecido normal. Os tumores cutâneos apresentaram maior expressão resíduos de β Gal-(1-3)-GalNAc que o tecido normal . AK e SCC exibiram maior expressão de resíduos Neu5Ac-α(2,3)Gal que a epiderme normal. KA e BCC apresentaram valores de URL equivalentes, em comparação com o tecido normal. Os valores de URL diminuíram quando as lectinas foram incubadas com seus carboidratos específicos. Os valores das constantes e os sítios de ligação foram calculados para cada lectina utilizando a equação obtida a partir das curvas hiperbólicas, 2,4 x 10-7 M-1 ± 0,8 x 10-7 M-1and 1,3 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 ± 0,3 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 (Con A); 0,9 x 10-6 M-1  0,4 x 10-6 M-1 and 0,021 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 ± 0,003 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 (WGA) and 2,0 x 10-6 M-1  0,9 x 10-6 M-1 and 0,069 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 ± 0,010 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 (PNA). O método quimiluminescente permitiu a avaliação quantitativa direta da expressão de carboidratos em neoplasias de pele e a investigação a complexação da lectina ao carboidrato através do modelo de Langmuir, combinando a especificidade desta interação e a sensibilidade dos ensaios quimiluminescentes. / Aiming to create a reproducible and efficient biological model that mimic the protein-carbohydrate interaction, we report the use of chemiluminescent assay with lectins labeled to acridinium ester (AE) to investigate the complexation of lectin to carbohydrate and for the quantitative evaluation of carbohydrates expression in cutaneous tumors. Polysaccharides made N-acetyl-D-glucosamine (chitosan), glucose (phytagel) and galactose (carrageenan) were used to synthetize membranes (0,0314 – 0,6358 cm2). Concanavalin A-AE (Con A), Wheat germ agglutinin (WGA), Peanut agglutinin (PNA), Ulex europeaus agglutinin-I (UEA-I) e Maackia amurensis agglutinin (MAA) were labeled to AE. The hemmagglutinating activity of lectins-AE was evaluated and the chemiluminescence was quantified and expressed in Relative Light Unit (RLU). Biopsies of normal skin and cutaneous tumors such as, actinic keratosis (AK), keratoacantoma (KA), squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and basal cell carcinoma (BCC), and membranes were incubated with lectins-AE (100 μL 100 μg mL-1) for 2h at 4°C. Photon emission was measured and correlated to the labeling of the normal, transformed tissues and membranes. Inhibitions with specific carbohydrate were carried out. AK, KA, SCC and BCC showed lower expression of -D-glucose/mannose and -L-fucose residues compared to normal tissue. Cutaneous tumors displayed higher expression of Gal-(1-3)-GalNAc residues than normal tissue. AK and SCC exhibited higher expression ofNeu5Ac-(2,3)Gal residues than normal epidermis. KA and BCC showed equivalent RLU values compared to normal tissue. The RLU values decreased when the lectins were incubated with their specific carbohydrate. The constant values and maximum binding sites on the membranes were calculated for each lectin using the equation obtained from hyperbolic curves, 2.4 x 10-7 M-1 ± 0.8 x 10-7 M-1and 1.3 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 ± 0.3 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 (Con A); 0.9 x 10-6 M-1  0.4 x 10-6 M-1 and 0.021 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 ± 0.003 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 (WGA) and 2.0 x 10-6 M-1  0.9 x 10-6 M-1 and 0.069 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 ± 0.010 x 10-3 mol . mg-1 (PNA). The chemiluminescence method allowed quantitative assessment of the carbohydrate expression in cutaneous tissues and was an analytical technique efficient to investigate the complexation of lectin to carbohydrate through Langmuir model, combining the specifity this interaction and sensibility of chemiluminescent assays.

Abstract The aim of the study was to evaluate pulmonary endogenous and inhaled nitric oxide (NO) in neonates with severe respiratory failure. Infant autopsy documents were reviewed for fulminant early-onset bacterial pneumonia. 12 infants with the onset at < 72 h of age and three control groups were identified. Immunohistochemistry revealed that 11 of the infants with early-onset pneumonia (92%) had no or faint inducible nitric oxide synthase (NOS2) staining in their alveolar macrophages (AM). All control infants, regardless of their postnatal age, had NOS2-positive AM. The marker of NO-toxicity, nitrotyrosine, was low in all specimens. To confirm this finding, airway specimens of 21 newborns requiring mechanical ventilation were examined. Seven of them had fulminant early-onset pneumonia with maternal ascending intra-uterine infection (IUI). The controls had no infection at birth despite IUI or neither infection nor IUI. In early-onset pneumonia, NOS2 and nitrotyrosine immunoreactivity were low at birth and increased during the recovery phase (p < 0.05). Analyses of interleukin-1 and surfactant protein A showed the same pattern of age-dependent change. Of the autopsied infants, 12 had received inhaled NO (iNO) before death. Each case was paired with a matched control. Additional five infants without respiratory failure prior to death were also studied. The iNO-treated ones tended to have more intensive NOS2 staining in the bronchiolar epithelium and adjacent tissue than the controls. No differences in other NOS isoforms or nitrotyrosine were detected. A novel method for exhaled NO measurements of intubated infants was developed. Six preterm and six term newborns were prospectively recruited for expired and nasal NO measurements. During the first week of life, the preterm infants showed a different pattern of exhaled NO excretion compared to the term infants. For the pilot intervention study on very early iNO, the eligible patients had a birth weight < 1500 g and progressive, therapy-resistant respiratory failure before five hours of age. Five infants received iNO, showed immediately improved oxygenation and survived without deleterious side effects. Deficient production of NO in small premature infants is associated with severe infection and respiratory failure. Very early iNO therapy may be exceptionally effective in a select group of infants, and did not appear to cause oxidation lung injury.

No description available.

No description available.

Chemiluminescence from the OH(A-X) transition near 307 nm is a commonly used diagnostic in combustion applications such as flame chemistry, shock-tube experiments, and reacting-flow visualization. Measurements of the chemiluminescent intensity provide a simple, cost-effective, non-intrusive look at the combustion environment. The presence of the ultra-violet emission is often used as an indicator of the flame zone in practical combustion systems, and its intensity may be correlated to the temperature distribution or other parameters of interest. While absolute measurements of the ground-state OH(X) concentrations are well-defined, there is no elementary relation between emission from the electronically excited state (OH*) and its absolute concentration. Thus, to enable quantitative emission measurements, a kinetics model has been assembled and optimized to predict OH* formation and quenching at combustion conditions. Shock-tube experiments were conducted in mixtures of H2/O2/Ar, CH4/O2/Ar and CH4/H2/O2/Ar with high levels of argon dilution (> 98%). Elementary reactions to model OH*, along with initial estimates of their rate coefficients, were taken from the literature. The important formation steps follow. CH + O2 = OH* + CO (R0) H + O + M = OH* + M (R1) H + OH + OH = OH* + H2O (R2) Sensitivity analyses were performed to design experiments at conditions most sensitive to the formation reactions. A fitting routine was developed to express the key rate parameters as a function of a single rate, k1 at the reference temperature (1490 K). With all rates so expressed, H2/CH4 mixtures were designed to uniquely determine the value of k1 at the reference temperature, from which the remaining rate parameters were calculated. Quenching rates were fixed at their literature values. Comparisons to predictions of previously available models show marked improvement relative to the new shock-tube data. An approach for using this work in the calibration of further measurements is outlined taking examples from a recent ethane oxidation study. The new model qualitatively matches the experimental data over the range of conditions studied and provides quantitative results applicable to real combustion environments, containing higher-order hydrocarbon fuels and lower levels of dilution in air.

Increasingly stringent emissions regulations have led combustion system designers to look for more environmentally combustion strategies. For gas turbine combustion, one promising technology is lean premixed combustion, which results in lower flame temperatures and therefore the possibility of significantly reduced nitric oxide emissions. While lean premixed combustion offers reduced environmental impacts, it has been observed to experience increased possibility of the occurrence of combustion instabilities, which may damage hardware and reduce efficiency. Thermoacoustic combustion instabilities occur when oscillations in the combustor acoustics and oscillations in the flame heat release rate form a closed feedback loop, through one of two possible mechanisms. The first is direct coupling which occurs due to the mean mass flow oscillations induced by the acoustic velocity. Secondly, the acoustics may couple with the flame due to acoustic interactions with fuel/air mixing, resulting in an oscillating equivalence ratio. Only velocity coupling was considered in this study. The methodology used in this study is analysis of instabilities through linear systems theory, requiring knowledge of the individual transfer functions making up the closed-loop system. Methods already exist by which combustor acoustics may be found. However, significant gaps still remain in knowledge of the nature of flame dynamics. Prior knowledge in literature about the flame transfer function suggests that the flame behaves as a low-pass filter, with cutoff frequency on the order of hundreds of hertz. Nondimensionalization of the frequency by flame length scales has been observed to result in a convenient scaling for the flame transfer function, suggesting that the flame dynamics may be dominated by spatial effects. This work was proposed in two parts to extend and apply the body of knowledge on flame dynamics. The phase one goal of this study was to further understand this relationship between the flame heat release rate dynamics and the dynamics of the reaction zone size. The second goal of this work was to apply this flame transfer function knowledge to predictions of instability, validated against measurements in an unstable combustor. Both of these goals meet an existing practical need, providing a design tool for prediction of potential thermoacoustic instabilities in a combustor at the design stage.Measurements of the flame transfer function were made in a swirl-stabilized, lean-premixed combustor. The novel portion of these measurements was the inclusion of spatial resolution of the heat release rate dynamics. By using a speaker, a sine dwell excitation to the velocity was introduced over the range of 10-400Hz. Measurements were then made of the input (inlet velocity) and output (heat release rate, or flame size) resulting in the flame transfer function. The spatial dynamics measurement was approached through several measures of the flame size: the volume and offset distance to the center of the heat release. Each was obtained from deconvoluted, phase averaged images of the flame, referenced to the speaker excitation signal. The results of these measurements showed that the spatial dynamics for each of these three measures were virtually identical to the heat release rate dynamics. This suggests a quite important result, namely that the flame heat release rate dynamics are completely determined by the dynamics of the flame structure. Therefore, prediction of flow structure interaction with the flame distribution is crucial to predict the dynamics of the flame. These spatially resolved transfer function measurements were used in conjunction with the linear closed-loop model to make predictions of instability. These predictions were made by applying the Bode stability criterion to the open-loop system transfer function. This criterion states that instabilities may occur at frequencies where the heat release rate and acoustic oscillations occur in phase and the system gain has a value greater than unity. Performing this analysis on the combined system transfer function yielded results that agreed quite well with actual instability measurements made in the combustor. Closed-loop predictions identified two possible modes for instability, both of which were observed experimentally. One mode resulted from an acoustic peak around 160 Hz, and occurred at lean equivalence ratios. A second mode occurred at lower frequencies (100-150 Hz) and was associated with the increase in flame transfer function gain at increasing equivalence ratios. These are some of the first successful predictions of combustion instability based on linear systems theory. When multiple modes were predicted, it was assumed that if non-linear effects were to be considered, the lower frequency mode would become the dominant mode at these operating conditions due to its higher gain margin. Also of note is that in the practical system, high frequency oscillations are observed, but not predicted, associated with harmonics of the low frequency mode due to the linear nature of the predictions. While these non-linear effects are not captured, the linear predictive capability is thought to be most important, as from a practical perspective, instabilities should be avoided altogether. The primary findings of this study have significant applications to modeling and prediction of combustion dynamics. The classic heat release rate flame transfer function was observed to coincide almost exactly with the flame size transfer functions. The time scales observed in these transfer functions correspond to convective length scales in the combustor, suggesting a fluid mechanical basis of the heat release rate response. Additionally, linear systems theory predictions of instability based on the measured flame transfer functions were proved capable of capturing the stability of the actual combustor with a reasonable degree of accuracy. These predictions should have considerable application to design level avoidance of combustion instability in practical systems. / Ph. D.