For millennia, naturopaths and physicians have used Ganoderma lucidum (reishi mushroom) for its diverse therapeutic properties, as recorded in the oldest Chinese herbal encyclopedia. Indeed, a radioprotective effect has been reported in the isolated components of its extracts. A systematic review and meta-analyses (PRISMA) was conducted in March 2020, searching databases including PubMed, Scopus, Embase, and Google Scholar, along with Clinical Trials. The inclusion criteria were ex vivo, in vitro, and in vivo studies, with full texts in English, conducted to determine the radioprotective benefits of G. lucidum, or reports in which ionizing radiation was used. From a total number of 1109 records identified, 15 full text articles were eligible, none of them were clinical trials. In vivo studies reveal the efficiency of G. lucidum aqueous extracts of polysaccharides and triterpenes in mice exposed to γ-rays. In plasmid, they can reduce radiation damage as an increment of the open circular form, as well as increase the DNA extension, as shown in vitro studies. Ex vivo studies conducted in human blood cells show the radioprotective effect of β-glucan of aqueous extract of G. lucidum, nevertheless, its implementation as radioprotector to humans is in need of further clinical research studies.Stapled peptides targeting the interaction between p53 and its negative regulators MDM2 and MDM4 have exhibited great potential as anti-cancer drugs, albeit with room for improvement in formulation and tumor specificity. Lipid bilayer disks (lipodisks) have emerged as promising drug nanocarriers and can by attachment of targeting moieties be directed selectively towards tumor cells. Tumor-targeted delivery of stapled peptides by use of lipodisks may therefore increase the uptake in the tumors and limit toxicity in healthy tissue. Here, we utilized epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-targeted lipodisks to deliver p53-activating stapled peptide VIP116 to EGFR-expressing tumor cells. We demonstrate that VIP116 can be stably formulated in lipodisks (maximum peptide/lipid molar ratio 0.11). In vitro cell studies verify specific binding of EGF-decorated lipodisks to tumor cells and confirm that targeted delivery of VIP116 significantly decreases tumor cell viability.White Guinea yam is mostly a dioecious outcrossing crop with male and female flowers produced on distinct plants. Fertile parents produce high fruit set in an open pollination polycross block, which is a cost-effective and convenient way of generating variability in yam breeding. However, the pollen parent of progeny from polycross mating is usually unknown. This study aimed to determine paternity in white Guinea yam half-sib progenies from polycross mating design. A total of 394 half-sib progenies from random open pollination involving nine female and three male parents was genotyped with 6602 SNP markers from DArTSeq platform to recover full pedigree. A higher proportion of expected heterozygosity, allelic richness, and evenness were observed in the half-sib progenies. A complete pedigree was established for all progenies from two families (TDr1685 and TDr1688) with 100% accuracy, while in the remaining families, paternity was assigned successfully only for 56 to 98% of the progenies. Our results indicated unequal paternal contribution under natural open pollination in yam, suggesting unequal pollen migrations or gene flow among the crossing parents. A total of 3.8% of progenies lacking paternal identity due to foreign pollen contamination outside the polycross block was observed. This study established the efficient determination of parental reconstruction and allelic contributions in the white Guinea yam half-sib progenies generated from open pollination polycross using SNP markers. Findings are useful for parental reconstruction, accurate dissection of the genetic effects, and selection in white Guinea yam breeding program utilizing polycross mating design.In this work, the effect of short carbon fibre (CF) on the mechanical and geometric properties of 3D printed polylactic acid (PLA) composite parts processed using the Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) technique have been analysed. Tensile, flexural and interlaminar shear strength (ILSS) tests were performed to obtain the mechanical performance of the different samples. The surface quality and geometric accuracy of the printed specimens were also evaluated. Finally, Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images of the printed samples are analysed. The results revealed that the addition of carbon fibres effectively improved all assessed mechanical properties of PLA-CF composites as compared to the neat PLA. In particular, Flat PLA-CF samples showed an average increase in tensile performance of 47.1% for the tensile strength and 179.9% for the tensile stiffness in comparison to the neat PLA. From the flexural behaviour point of view, Flat PLA-CF samples revealed an increase in average flexural strength and stiffness of 89.75% and 230.95%, respectively in comparison to the neat PLA. Furthermore, PLA-CF samples depicted the best ILSS performance. In general, the use of short carbon fibre as reinforcement did not affect the dimensional accuracy of the PLA-CF samples, and even improved the surface roughness in certain cases, particularly in Flat and On-edge orientations.Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) belong to a heterogeneous pool of rare cells, and a unequivocal phenotypic definition of CTC is lacking. Here, we present a definition of metabolically-altered CTC (MBA-CTCs) as CD45-negative cells with an increased extracellular acidification rate, detected with a single-cell droplet microfluidic technique. We tested the prognostic value of MBA-CTCs in 31 metastatic breast cancer patients before starting a new systemic therapy (T0) and 3-4 weeks after (T1), comparing results with a parallel FDA-approved CellSearch (CS) approach. An increased level of MBA-CTCs was associated with i) a shorter median PFS pre-therapy (123 days vs. 306; p less then 0.0001) and during therapy (139 vs. 266 days; p = 0.0009); ii) a worse OS pre-therapy (p = 0.0003, 82% survival vs. 20%) and during therapy (p = 0.0301, 67% survival vs. 38%); iii) good agreement with therapy response (kappa = 0.685).  https://www.selleckchem.com/products/azd3229.html  The trend of MBA-CTCs over time (combining data at T0 and T1) added information with respect to separate evaluation of T0 and T1.