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Platelet derived products have gained increasing attention as promising alternative biologicals for the treatment of canine wounds. Specifically, platelets play a crucial role during the inflammatory phase of wound healing due to the release of chemokines, proteins, cytokines, and growth factors. Additionally, platelets possess antimicrobial properties, which can be influenced by their manufacturing process, platelet and leukocyte concentration, activation method, and the presence of plasma and complement. The objective of this study was to assess how various preparation methods of platelet products affect their antimicrobial effect against bacteria commonly isolated from wounds. In this study, blood was collected from eight purpose-bred dogs, and platelet-rich plasma was produced using two methods of centrifugation, one leukocyte-enriching and one leukocyte-reducing. Some samples were processed for plasma depletion and platelet lysate was subsequently generated through freeze-thaw cycles. Additionally, portions of platelet lysate samples underwent heat treatment for complement inactivation. All treatment groups were tested against four common bacteria found in canine skin wounds: , , and . The antimicrobial effect of various lysate formulations was evaluated using a bacteria-spiking (time-killing) assay. Platelet lysate significantly reduced the number of and after 3 h compared to culture media. No significant differences were noted in the log reduction of bacteria between the centrifugation techniques. After depleting plasma, the log reduction of was significantly less than before plasma depletion, whereas the opposite was seen for after 3 h. Complement-depleted plasma led to a significantly lower log reduction for after 24 h compared to platelet lysate. Therefore, the presence of plasma and complement proteins in platelet lysate appear to play a critical role in inhibiting the growth of certain bacterial strains, whereas the leukocyte concentration does not have a significant effect. Further research is needed to identify the ideal formulation and dose of canine platelet lysate as an antimicrobial and wound healing treatment.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper then, is to add to the existing literature on financial contagion. While a vast amount of the debate has been made using data from the late 1990s, this paper differentiates itself by analysing more current data, centred around the most recent global financial crisis, with specific focus on the stock markets of Hong Kong and Tokyo.Design/methodology/approachEmploying Pearson and Spearman correlation measures, the dynamic relationship of the two markets is determined over tranquil and crisis periods, as specified by an Markov-Switching Bayesian Vector AutoRegression (MSBVAR) model.FindingsThe authors find evidence in support of the existence of financial contagion (defined as an increase in correlation during a crisis period) for all frequencies of data analysed. This contagion is greatest when examining lower-frequency data. Additionally, there is also weaker evidence in some data sub-samples to support “herding” behaviour, whereby higher market correlations persist, following a crisis period.Research limitations/implicationsThe intention of this paper was not to analyse the cause or transmission mechanism of contagion between financial markets. Therefore future studies could extend the methodology used in this paper by including exogenous macroeconomic factors in the MSBVAR model.Originality/valueThe results of this paper serve to explain why the debate of the persistence and in fact existence of financial contagion remains alive. The authors have shown that the frequency of a time series dataset has a significant impact on the level of observed correlation and thus observation of financial contagion.

Unsafe driver habits pose a serious threat to all vehicles on the road. This thesis outlines the development of an automotive IoT device capable of monitoring and reporting adverse driver habits to mitigate the occurrence of unsafe practices. The driver habits targeted are harsh braking, harsh acceleration, harsh cornering, speeding and over revving the vehicle. With the intention of evaluating and expanding upon the industry method of fault detection, a working prototype is designed to handle initialization, data collection, vehicle state tracking, fault detection and communication. A method of decoding the broadcasted messages on the vehicle bus is presented and unsafe driver habits are detected using static limits. An analysis of the initial design’s performance revealed that the industry method of detecting faults fails to account for the vehicle’s speed and is unable to detect faults on all roadways. A framework for analyzing fault profiles at varying speeds is presented and yields the relationship between fault magnitude and speed. A method of detecting the type of road driven was developed to dynamically assign fault limits while the vehicle traveled on a highway, city street or in traffic. The improved design correctly detected faults along all types of roads and proved to greatly expand upon the current method of fault detection used by the automotive IoT industry today.

Watch Elon Musk at the WSJ CEO Council Summit talk about future plans for Tesla and SpaceX. Musk also reveals why he moved to Texas and shares his advice for business leaders.

ABSTRACTBackgroundTo produce a practice guideline that includes a set of detailed consensus principles regarding the prescription of antipsychotics (APs) amongst people with dementia living in care homes. MethodsWe used a modified Delphi consensus procedure with three rounds, where we actively specified and optimized statements throughout the process, utilizing input from four focus groups, carried out in UK, Norway, and the Netherlands. This was done to identify relevant themes and a set of statement that experts agreed upon using the Research and Development/University of California at Los Angeles (RAND/UCLA) methodology. ResultsA total of 72 scientific and clinical experts and 14 consumer experts reached consensus upon 150 statements covering five themes: (1) General prescription stipulations, (2) assessments prior to prescription, (3) care and treatment plan, (4) discontinuation, and (5) long-term treatment. ConclusionsIn this practice guideline, novel information was provided about detailed indication and thresholds of symptoms, risk factors, circumstances at which APs should be stopped or tapered, specific criteria for justifying long-term treatment, involvement of the multidisciplinary team, and family caregiver in the process of prescription. The practice guideline is based on formal consensus of clinicians and consumer experts and provides clinicians relevant practical information that is lacking in current guidelines.

This paper examines the presence of asymmetry in the response of the Libyan economy to fluctuations in oil prices, subsequent to discovery of oil in the country. Three Vector Autoregressive (VAR) models are illustrated and estimated along with a multivariate rolling VAR approach. All sectors are found to react asymmetrically to shocks in oil prices over the 1962-2012 period. The magnitude of the adverse effect of the negative oil shocks on the manufacturing and agriculture sector appears to outweigh the positive effect of the positive oil shocks. The services sector, on the other hand, is able to overcome the shocks of the oil prices, due to absence of external competition. In addition, the results of the Multivariate rolling VAR highlight the existence of structural changes in the relationship between sectors of the Libyan economy and oil prices. The essay recommends implementing fiscal policy reform to de-link the real sector from fluctuations in oil prices. It also advises promoting the development of the financial sector in order for it to contribute in the diversification of the economy.

IntroductionRecent failures of potential novel therapeutics for Alzheimer’s disease (AD) have prompted a drive towards clinical studies in prodromal or preclinical states. However, carrying out clinical trials in early disease stages is extremely challenging—a key reason being the unfeasibility of using classical outcome measures of dementia trials (eg, conversion to dementia) and the lack of validated surrogate measures so early in the disease process. The Deep and Frequent Phenotyping (DFP) study aims to resolve this issue by identifying a set of markers acting as indicators of disease progression in the prodromal phase of disease that could be used as indicative outcome measures in proof-of-concept trials.Methods and analysisThe DFP study is a repeated measures observational study where participants will be recruited through existing parent cohorts, research interested lists/databases, advertisements and memory clinics. Repeated measures of both established (cognition, positron emission tomography (PET) imaging or cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) markers of pathology, structural MRI markers of neurodegeneration) and experimental modalities (functional MRI, magnetoencephalography and/or electroencephalography, gait measurement, ophthalmological and continuous smartphone-based cognitive and other assessments together with experimental CSF, blood, tear and saliva biomarkers) will be performed. We will be recruiting male and female participants aged >60 years with prodromal AD, defined as absence of dementia but with evidence of cognitive impairment together with AD pathology as assessed using PET imaging or CSF biomarkers. Control participants without evidence of AD pathology will be included at a 1:4 ratio.Ethics and disseminationThe study gained favourable ethical opinion from the South Central—Oxford B NHS Research Ethics Committee (REC reference 17/SC/0315; approved on 18 August 2017; amendment 13 February 2018). Data will be shared with the scientific community no more than 1 year following completion of study and data assembly.