Purpose. Oxidative stress plays an important role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease (AD). This paper aims to examine whether biomarkers of oxidative stress and antioxidants could be useful biomarkers in AD, which might form the bases of future clinical studies. Methods. PubMed, SCOPUS, and Web of Science were systematically queried to obtain studies with available data regarding markers of oxidative stress and antioxidants from subjects with AD. Results and Conclusion. Although most studies show elevated serum markers of lipid peroxidation in AD, there is no sufficient evidence to justify the routine use of biomarkers as predictors of severity or outcome in AD.

Background and aimThe sensitivity and specificity of biomarkers and scoring systems used for predicting fatality of severe sepsis patients remain unsatisfactory. This study aimed to determine the prognostic value of circulating plasma DNA levels in severe septic patients presenting at the Emergency Department (ED).MethodsSixty-seven consecutive patients with severe sepsis and 33 controls were evaluated. Plasma DNA levels were estimated by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction assay using primers for the human β-hemoglobin and ND2 gene. The patients’ clinical and laboratory data on admission were analyzed.ResultsThe median plasma nuclear and mitochondria DNA levels for severe septic patients on admission were significantly higher than those of the controls. The mean plasma nuclear DNA level on admission correlated with lactate concentration (γ = 0.36, p = 0.003) and plasma mitochondrial DNA on admission (γ = 0.708, p < 0.001). Significant prognostic factors for fatality included mechanical ventilation within the first 24 hours (p = 0.013), mean sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) score on admission (p = 0.04), serum lactate (p < 0.001), and both plasma nuclear and mitochondrial DNA on admission (p < 0.001). Plasma mitochondrial DNA was an independent predictor of fatality by stepwise logistic regression such that an increase by one ng/mL in level would increase fatality rate by 0.7%.ConclusionPlasma DNA has potential use for predicting outcome in septic patients arriving at the emergency room. Plasma mitochondrial DNA level on admission is a more powerful predictor than lactate concentration or SOFA scores on admission.

We construct a SCUBA-2 450-µm map in the COSMOS field that covers an area of 300 arcmin 2 and reaches a 1σ noise level of 0.65 mJy in the deepest region. We extract 256 sources detected at 450 µm with signal-to-noise ratio > 4.0 and analyze the physical properties of their multi-wavelength counterparts. We find that most of the sources are at z 3, with a median of z = 1.79 +0.03 −0.15 . About 35 +32−25 % of our sources are classified as starburst galaxies based on their total star-formation rates (SFRs) and stellar masses (M * ). By fitting the far-infrared spectral energy distributions, we find that our 450-µm-selected sample has a wide range of dust temperatures (20 K T d 60 K), with a median of T d = 38.3 +0.4 −0.9 K. We do not find a redshift evolution in dust temperature for sources with L IR > 10 12 L at z < 3. However, we find a moderate correlation where dust temperature increases with the deviation from the SFR-M * relation. The increase in dust temperature also correlates with optical morphology, which is consistent with merger-triggered starbursts in sub-millimeter galaxies. Our galaxies do not show the tight IRX-β UV correlation that has been observed in the local Universe. We construct the infrared luminosity functions of our 450-µm sources and measure their comoving SFR densities. The contribution of the L IR > 10 12 L population to the SFR density rises dramatically from z = 0 to 2 (∝ (1 + z) 3.9±1.1 ) and dominates the total SFR density at z 2.