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These paradoxical findings are not consistent with the notion that reward and locomotion are mediated by a common substrate; this dissociation may be useful in modeling psychiatric disorders such as mixed depressive states. In addition, our findings suggest that central reward circuitry may constitute a possible target for rationally designed therapeutics for depression.

Sewage sludge sorption and desorption measurements were conducted for nine diverse contaminants of varying polarity: caffeine, sulfamethoxazole, carbamazepine, atrazine, estradiol, ethinylestradiol, diclofenac, and, for the first time desethylatrazine and norethindrone. Two types of sorption behaviour were observed. Compounds with a log octanol-water partition coefficient, log Kow, below 3 showed little or no sorption over 48 hours of shaking, while compounds with log Kow over 3 showed 30 to 90% sorption within the first few minutes. After 6 hours of shaking, mass loss through suspected biotransformation became evident for some compounds. At the pH range considered (5.7-6.7), diclofenac (pKa 4.0, log Kow 4.5) was the only compound in which pH dependent sorption could be quantified. The log sewage sludge-water distribution coefficients, log Kd, ranged from 0.2 to 2.9, and, as expected, increased with increasing log Kow of the compound and organic carbon (OC) content of the sewage sludge. A sewage sludge precipitated with alum had a substantially lower Kd values, as well as lower OC content, compared to alum-free sludge. Desorption was studied by sequentially replacing supernatant water. With each water replacement, log Kd values tended to either remain similar (following a linear isotherm) or in some cases increase (following a Freundlich-type isotherm). The length of time required to restore equilibrium increased with each rinsing step. A literature review of reported Kd values compared well with the alum-free sludge data, but not the alum-sludge data. Sewage sludge Kd across the literature appear more consistent with increasing Kow.

Background: The familial chylomicronemia syndrome (FCS) is an ultra rare disease caused by lipoprotein lipase (LPL) deficiency associated with potentially lethal acute pancreatitis risk. Thrombocytopenia (platelet count < 150,000 x 109/L) has been reported in patients with FCS, treated or not with volanesorsen, a second generation APOC3 anti-sense oligonucleotide. Chylomicrons are the lipoproteins delivering fat after a meal and FCS is thus a post-prandial disease. Platelet count and activity have not been studied post-prandially in FCS. Objective: To evaluate post-prandial fluctuations in the platelet count (PLC) and platelet activity in FCS. Methods: PLC, platelet activity and hematologic variables were measured up-to 5 hours after a meal in 6 homozygotes for FCS causing gene variants (HoLPL), 6 heterozygotes for LPL loss-of-function variants (HeLPL) and 7 normolipidemic controls. Results: Hourly post-prandial PLC was significantly lower in HoLPL than in controls (p< 0.009). Compared to the other groups, the PLC tended to decrease rapidly (in the first hour) post-meal in HoLPL (p=0.03) and remained lower than baseline 5-hour post-meal (p=0.02) whereas it tended to slightly increase in normolipidemic controls (p=0.02). Platelet activity was not affected by the prandial status. In HoLPL, post-prandial fluctuations in the PLC positively correlated with the lymphocyte count (p=0.005) and negatively with neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio (NLR). Conclusion: The PLC decreases post-prandially in FCS (HoLPL), is not associated with changes in platelet activity and correlates with the NLR, a marker of acute pancreatitis severity.