Early changes in lung perfusion, among other factors initiate, the development of hypoxia and chronic oxidative stress after irradiation. Tissue hypoxia is associated with a significant increase in the activation of macrophages and their continuous production of reactive oxygen species, stimulating the production of fibrogenic and angiogenic cytokines, and maintaining the development of chronic radiation-induced lung injury.

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The objective of this study was to determine whether administration of a catalytic antioxidant, Mn(III) tetrakis(N,N'-diethylimidazolium-2-yl) porphyrin, AEOL10150, reduces the severity of long-term lung injury induced by fractionated radiation (RT). Fisher 344 rats were randomized into five groups: RT+AEOL10150 (2.5 mg/kg BID), AEOL10150 (2.5 mg/kg BID) alone, RT+ AEOL10150 (5 mg/kg BID), AEOL10150 (5 mg/kg BID) alone and RT alone. Animals received five 8 Gy fractions of RT to the right hemithorax. AEOL10150 was administered 15 min before RT and 8 h later during the period of RT treatment (5 days), followed by subcutaneous injections for 30 days, twice daily. Lung histology at 26 weeks revealed a significant decrease in lung structural damage and collagen deposition in RT+AEOL10150 (5 mg/kg BID) group, in comparison to RT alone. Immunohistochemistry studies revealed a significant reduction in tissue hypoxia (HIF1alpha, CAIX), angiogenic response (VEGF, CD-31), inflammation (ED-1), oxidative stress (8-OHdG, 3-nitrotyrosine) and fibrosis pathway (TGFbeta1, Smad3, p-Smad2/3), in animals receiving RT+ AEOL10150 (5 mg/kg BID). Administration of AEOL10150 at 5 mg/kg BID during and after RT results in a significant protective effect from long-term RT-induced lung injury. Low dose (2.5 mg/kg BID) delivery of AEOL10150 has no beneficial radioprotective effects.

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Low Temperature Co-fired Ceramic (LTCC) material systems offer a highly versatile microwave and millimeter wave packaging platform. Extremely low microwave loss, excellent control of dielectric constant, uniform dielectric thickness, non-existent water absorption leading to very high hermeticity, ability to support multilayer structure leading to 3-dimensional packaging, ability to embed passive functions within the tape layers, availability of a wide range of metallizations, etc. are some of the key advantages of LTCC for microwave packaging. One of the important parameters which needs to be determined at the very early stages of circuit designs are the dielectric properties - dielectric constant and loss tangent, both of which are functions of frequency. These properties need to be known accurately over the entire frequency range of operation for the circuit. For LTCC based designs, the use of dielectric constant of bulk material can lead to deviations between the performance expected at the design stage and for the fabricated circuit. Such deviations are a significant concern for broadband circuits as well as for circuits with sharp resonant behavior such as filters. One of the significant sources of deviation between bulk LTCC and “in-circuit” dielectric constant is the nature of the thick film metallizations used in LTCC technology. Work described here is a comprehensive characterization of three DuPont™ GreenTape™ LTCC systems 951, 943, and 9K7 - in the frequency range 10 to 70 GHz. Both bulk and “in-circuit” dielectric properties with silver and gold metallizations are studied to quantify the deviations in dielectric properties. A Fabry-Perot open resonator technique is used for the bulk characterization while printed ring resonators are used for the in-circuit characterization. This comprehensive characterization will provide key design data for LTCC designers in the 10 – 70 GHz frequency range.