Neurotrophins are a collection of structurally and functionally related proteins. They play important roles in many aspects of neural development, survival, and plasticity. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) leads to different levels of central nervous tissue destruction and cellular repair through various compensatory mechanisms promoted by the injured brain. Many studies have shown that neurotrophins are key modulators of neuroinflammation, apoptosis, blood–brain barrier permeability, memory capacity, and neurite regeneration. The expression of neurotrophins following TBI is affected by the severity of injury, genetic polymorphism, and different post-traumatic time points. Emerging research is focused on the potential therapeutic applications of neurotrophins in managing TBI. We conducted a comprehensive review by organizing the studies that demonstrate the role of neurotrophins in the management of TBI.

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This paper presents the ongoing research into the design and development of a general-purpose autonomous robot. The major components of the robot are four ultrasonic sensors, one electronic compass, three microprocessors, a laptop computer, and three motors for three wheels. Software architecture was developed to process the information obtained from the sensors, plan the motion of the robot, and send the commands to the motors. This allows the robot to operate independently of human control thus fulfilling the definition of an autonomous robot. A preliminary test was conducted in the field. The results indicate that the robot is capable of sensing static and dynamic obstacles in the environment and avoiding contact with them during motion.

The dynamic hip screw (DHS) is commonly used in the treatment of femoral intertrochanteric fracture with high satisfactory results. However, post-operative failure does occur and result in poor prognosis. The most common failure is femoral head varus collapse, followed by lag screw cut-out through the femoral head. In this study, a novel-designed DHS with two supplemental horizontal blades was used to improve the fixation stability. In this study, nine convention DHS and 9 Orthopaedic Device Research Center (ODRC) DHSs were tested in this study. Each implant was fixed into cellular polyurethane rigid foam as a surrogate of osteoporotic femoral head. Under biaxial rocking motion, all constructs were loaded to failure point (12mm axial displacement) or up to 20,000 cycles of 1.45kN peak magnitude were achieved, whichever occurred first. The migration kinematics was continuously monitored and recorded. The final tip-to-apex distance, rotational angle and varus deformation were also recorded. The results showed that the ODRC DHS sustained significantly more loading cycles and exhibited less axial migration in comparison to the conventional DHS. The ODRC DHS showed a significantly smaller bending strain and larger torsional strain compared to the conventional DHS. The changes in tip-to-apex distance (TAD), post-study varus angle, post-study rotational angle of the ODRC DHS were all significantly less than that of the conventional DHS (p < 0.05). We concluded that the ODRC DHS augmented with two horizontal wings would increase the bone-implant interface contact surface, dissipate the load to the screw itself, which improves the migration resistance and increases the anti-rotational implant effect. In conclusion, the proposed ODRC DHS demonstrated significantly better migration resistance and anti-rotational effect in comparison to the conventional DHS construct.