Bosentan reduces intraocular inflammation and has similar effects as dexamethasone in a rat model of EIU.

The properties of false-twist textured yarns in the aspects of crimp characteristic and tensile behavior depend mainly on the draw ratio and the D/Y ratio. This study comprises investigations of the effect of D/Y ratio and draw ratio on the crimp and tensile properties and percent crystallinity. While there was no noticeable change on the percent crystallinity by altering these parameters, tenacity increased and crimp contraction decreased with increasing draw ratio, and crimp stability decreased when the D/Y ratio increased. K/S value also decreased with increasing draw ratio.

A maximum principle is derived for the optimal control of a beam with Kelvin–Voigt damping subject to an external excitation with the control exercised by means of piezoelectric patch actuators. The objective functional is defined as a weighted quadratic functional of the displacement and velocity which is to be minimized at a given terminal time. A penalty term is also part of the objective functional defined as the control voltage used in the control process. The maximum principle makes use of a Hamiltonian defined in terms of an adjoint variable and the control function. The optimal control problem is expressed as a coupled system of partial differential equations in terms of state, adjoint and control variables subject to boundary, initial and terminal conditions. The solution is obtained by expanding the state and adjoint variables in terms of eigenfunctions and determining the optimal control using the maximum principle. Numerical examples are given to demonstrate the applicability and the efficiency of the proposed method.

AimTo evaluate levels of homocysteine, asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA), and nitric oxide (NO), as well as activity of endothelial NO synthase (eNOS), in patients with age-related macular degeneration (AMD).MethodsThe levels of homocysteine, ADMA, and NO and activity of eNOS in patients who were diagnosed with wet AMD by fundus fluorescein angiography (n=30) were compared to a control group with no retinal pathology (n=30).ResultsLevels of homocysteine and ADMA were found to be significantly higher in the wet AMD group than in the control group (P<0.001), whereas NO levels and eNOS activity were higher in the control group (P<0.001). In the wet AMD group, we detected a 2.64- and 0.33-fold increase in the levels of ADMA and homocysteine, respectively, and a 0.49- and 2.41-fold decrease in the eNOS activity and NO level, respectively.ConclusionElevated levels of homocysteine and ADMA were observed in patients with wet AMD. Increased ADMA may be responsible for the diminished eNOS activity found in these patients, which in turn contributes to the decrease in NO levels, which likely plays a role in the pathogenesis of AMD.

Abstract:In this paper, a sinc-collocation method is described to determine the approximate solution of fractional order boundary value problem (FBVP). The results obtained are presented as two new theorems. The fractional derivatives are defined in the Caputo sense, which is often used in fractional calculus. In order to demonstrate the efficiency and capacity of the present method, it is applied to some FBVP with variable coefficients. Obtained results are compared to exact solutions as well as Cubic Spline solutions. The comparisons can be used to conclude that sinc-collocation method is powerful and promising method for determining the approximate solutions of FBVPs in different types of scenarios.