Journal Articles, Hindawi Press

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https://hdl.handle.net/10919/78797

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Browsing Journal Articles, Hindawi Press by Subject "Biotechnology & Applied Microbiology"

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    Assessment of Deep Partial Thickness Burn Treatment with Keratin Biomaterial Hydrogels in a Swine Model
    Poranki, D.; Goodwin, C.; Van Dyke, M. (Hindawi, 2016-01-01)
    Partial thickness burns can advance to full thickness after initial injury due to inadequate tissue perfusion and increased production of inflammatory cytokines, which has been referred to as burn wound progression. In previous work, we demonstrated that a keratin biomaterial hydrogel appeared to reduce burn wound progression. In the present study, we tested the hypothesis that a modified keratin hydrogel could reduce burn wound progression and speed healing. Standardized burn wounds were created in Yorkshire swine and treated within 30 minutes with keratin hydrogel (modified and unmodified), collagen hydrogel, or silver sulfadiazine (SSD). Digital images of each wound were taken for area measurements immediately prior to cleaning and dressing changes. Wound tissue was collected and assessed histologically at several time points. Wound area showed a significant difference between hydrogels and SSD groups, and rates of reepithelialization at early time points showed an increase when keratin treatment was used compared to both collagen and SSD. A linear regression model predicted a time to wound closure of approximately 25 days for keratin hydrogel while SSD treatment required 35 days. There appeared to be no measurable differences between the modified and unmodified formulations of keratin hydrogels.
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    A Pattern Analysis of Gene Conversion Literature
    Lawson, Mark J.; Jiao, Jian; Fan, Weiguo; Zhang, Liqing (Hindawi, 2009-11-15)
    Gene conversion is an important biological process that involves the transfer of genetic (sequence) information from one gene to another. This can have a variety of effects on an organism, both short-term and long-term and both positive and detrimental. In an effort to better understand this process, we searched through over 3,000 abstracts that contain research on gene conversions, tagging the important data and performing an analysis on what we extract. Through this we established trends that give a better insight into gene conversion research and genetic research in general. Our results show the importance of the process and the importance of continuing gene conversion research.
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    Toxicity of Silver Nanoparticles at the Air-Liquid Interface
    Holder, Amara L.; Marr, Linsey C. (Hindawi, 2013-01-01)
    Silver nanoparticles are one of the most prevalent nanomaterials in consumer products. Some of these products are likely to be aerosolized, making silver nanoparticles a high priority for inhalation toxicity assessment. To study the inhalation toxicity of silver nanoparticles, we have exposed cultured lung cells to them at the air-liquid interface. Cells were exposed to suspensions of silver or nickel oxide (positive control) nanoparticles at concentrations of 2.6, 6.6, and 13.2 μg cm⁻² (volume concentrations of 10, 25, and 50 μg ml⁻¹) and to 0.7 μg cm⁻² silver or 2.1 μg cm⁻² nickel oxide aerosol at the air-liquid interface. Unlike a number of in vitro studies employing suspensions of silver nanoparticles, which have shown strong toxic effects, both suspensions and aerosolized nanoparticles caused negligible cytotoxicity and only a mild inflammatory response, in agreement with animal exposures. Additionally, we have eveloped a novel method using a differential mobility analyzer to select aerosolized nanoparticles of a single diameter to assess the size-dependent toxicity of silver nanoparticles.