News by Subject Medicine & Health

Vinorelbine bitartrate (VRL), a semi synthetic vinca alkaloid approved for breast cancer, has been proven to be beneficial as first line and subsequent therapies. However, its hydrophilic and thermo labile nature provides hindrance to oral clinical translation. The current work focused on the application of DOE a modern statistical optimization tool for the development and optimization of a solid lipid nanoparticle (SLN) formulation that can encapsulate hydrophilic and thermolabile Vinorelbine bitartrate (VRL) to a maximum extent without compromising integrity and anticancer activity of the drug.

In 1994, Chinese university student Zhu Ling began experiencing stomach pain, hair loss and partial paralysis. By the time doctors diagnosed Ling with thallium poisoning about four months later, she was in a coma. Two decades after the poisoning, Richard Ash--an associate research scientist in the University of Maryland's Department of Geology--used mass spectrometry to analyze several of Ling's hairs collected in 1994 and 1995 and established a timeline of her poisoning.

Working as part of an international group of toxicologists scientists of the Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU) have found that harmful nanoparticles are formed in the process of arc welding using the most common types of electrodes today. Suspending in the welding fume, these particles infiltrate the human body through the respiratory tract. An article about this is published in Scientific Reports.

New Mexico contains hundreds of historic uranium mines. Although active uranium mining in the state has ceased, rates of cardiovascular and metabolic disease remain high in the population residing close to mines within the Navajo Nation. According to a new study in ACS' journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters, inhaled uranium in dusts from the mines could be a factor.