No abstract

Surface modification is an essential tool in tissue engineering using synthetic biomaterial scaffolds. The authors report in this study a simple approach to modify the surface hydrophobicity, roughness and chemistry of electrospun polycaprolactone (PCL) fibers using a combination of oxygen plasma treatment, sodium hydroxide treatment and arginine–glycine–aspartic acid (RGD) immobilization. The modified surfaces were characterized using scanning electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, water contact angle measurement and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Plasma treatment decreased the water contact angle. Sodium hydroxide treatment further improved the hydrophilicity and increased the surface roughness. XPS analysis confirmed the presence of amide bonds on RGD-treated fibers. The enhancement of proliferation of ligament fibroblasts within 1 week of culturing on both the plasma- and sodium hydroxide–treated fibers was most likely due to improved wettability by the oxygen plasma treatment. The alignment and penetration of cells on PCL fibers suggested that these materials could be potential scaffold materials for the regeneration of fibrous tissues.

The two different culture media employed in this study had a significant (p<0.01) impact both on the dynamics of post-fertilization development and embryo quality, as assessed by subjective morphological parameters. Media-A had a significantly higher proportion of embryos reaching the blastocyst stage at <110 hours and a higher proportion of top-quality blastocysts. The area under the receiver operating curve obtained from the ML models was 80.9% for Media-A and 80.5% for Media-B. The models were deployed as a web-based service running a Python script to extract the relevant morphokinetic and clinical parameters of embryos in real-time to provide the predicted probability of 110-hour blast formation.CONCLUSIONS: There were significant differences in the rate of embryo development and the proportion of top-graded blastocysts between the two culture media. The models developed to estimate the probability of reaching the blastocyst stage in <110 hours had a similar ROC-AUC but different structures to account for the different dynamics of development induced by the culture media.IMPACT STATEMENT: This work showcases the importance of continuously evaluating the characteristics of embryo development as the IVF laboratory evolves. Models implemented for embryo evaluation need to be adjusted accordingly. This study also suggests that embryo development is significantly impacted by laboratory-specific parameters; therefore, ML models should be tailored to the ART setting in which they will be utilized. Finally, deploying these models in platforms that allow for rapid and seamless updates to new versions increases the ability of these decision-support systems to adapt to the continuously evolving IVF laboratory.SUPPORT: Institutional

Highlights Choriocarcinomas can follow molar, ectopic, or normal pregnancies. The early diagnosis and treatment of choriocarcinomas is imperative. Atypical symptoms in pregnancy should raise suspicion for choriocarcinoma. Choriocarcinoma must always be in the differential in uncomplicated term pregnancies.

Principle of procreative beneficence: Until CRISPR and similar genetic editing technologies become available, patients currently only choose from a menu of possible embryos. The idea of procreative beneficence states that from this menu of possible children, the one with the Crimson PublishersWings to the Research Mini Review