Highlights
Perceived risk of COVID-19 was higher as compared to other potential threats.
Knowledge gaps existed regarding transmission and prevention of COVID-19.
Depressive states were positively related to risk perception.
Risk communicators need to understand specific knowledge needs of vulnerable groups.
Popular media platforms can be adopted by health professionals in risk communication.
High-performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection has been utilized for the rapid determination of total homocysteine, cysteine, and cysteinylglycine in human serum and plasma. Our earlier procedure (Anal Biochem 1989;178:208), which used monobromobimane to specifically derivatize thiols, has been extensively modified to allow for rapid processing of samples. As a result, > 80 samples a day can be assayed for total homocysteine, cysteine, and cysteinylglycine. The method is sensitive (lower limit of detection < or = 4 pmol in the assay) and precise (intra- and interassay CV for homocysteine, 3.31% and 4.85%, respectively). Mean total homocysteine concentrations in plasma and serum were significantly different, both from healthy male donors (9.26 and 12.30 mumol/L, respectively; P < 0.001) and healthy female donors (7.85 and 10.34 mumol/L, respectively; P < 0.001). The differences in total homocysteine between sexes were also significant (P = 0.002 for both plasma and serum). Similar differences were found for cysteine and cysteinylglycine. We found a significant inverse correlation between serum cobalamin and total homocysteine in men (P = 0.0102) and women (P = 0.0174). Serum folate also inversely correlated with total homocysteine in both sexes.
An electrochemical biosensor has been developed for sensitive determination of protein kinase activity and inhibition, taking advantage of specific binding of the phosphate groups with TiO2 nanoparticles, on which silver nanoparticles are photo-catalytically deposited to achieve signal enhancement.
An on-chip microreactor was proposed toward the acceleration of protein digestion through the construction of a nanozeolite-assembled network. The nanozeolite microstructure was assembled using a layer-by-layer technique based on poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride) and zeolite nanocrystals. The adsorption of trypsin in the nanozeolite network was theoretically studied based on the Langmuir adsorption isotherm model. It was found that the controlled trypsin-containing nanozeolite networks assembled within a microchannel could act as a stationary phase with a large surface-to-volume ratio for the highly efficient proteolysis of both proteins at low levels and with complex extracts. The maximum proteolytic rate of the adsorbed trypsin was measured to be 350 mM min-1 microg-1, much faster than that in solution. Moreover, due the large surface-to-volume ratio and biocompatible microenvironment provided by the nanozeolite-assembled films as well as the microfluidic confinement effect, the low-level proteins down to 16 fmol per analysis were confidently identified using the as-prepared microreactor within a very short residence time coupled to matrix-assisted laser desorption-time-of-flight mass spectrometry. The on-chip approach was further demonstrated in the identification of the complex extracts from mouse macrophages integrated with two-dimensional liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization-tandem mass spectrometry. This microchip reactor is promising for the development of a facile means for protein identification.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.