ICAR: endoscopic skull‐base surgery

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Evaluation of prognostic risk models for postoperative pulmonary complications in adult patients undergoing major abdominal surgery: a systematic review and international external validation cohort study

Background Stratifying risk of postoperative pulmonary complications after major abdominal surgery allows clinicians to modify risk through targeted interventions and enhanced monitoring. In this study, we aimed to identify and validate prognostic models against a new consensus definition of postoperative pulmonary complications. Methods We did a systematic review and international external validation cohort study. The systematic review was done in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines. We searched MEDLINE and Embase on March 1, 2020, for articles published in English that reported on risk prediction models for postoperative pulmonary complications following abdominal surgery. External validation of existing models was done within a prospective international cohort study of adult patients (≥18 years) undergoing major abdominal surgery. Data were collected between Jan 1, 2019, and April 30, 2019, in the UK, Ireland, and Australia. Discriminative ability and prognostic accuracy summary statistics were compared between models for the 30-day postoperative pulmonary complication rate as defined by the Standardised Endpoints in Perioperative Medicine Core Outcome Measures in Perioperative and Anaesthetic Care (StEP-COMPAC). Model performance was compared using the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROCC). Findings In total, we identified 2903 records from our literature search; of which, 2514 (86·6%) unique records were screened, 121 (4·8%) of 2514 full texts were assessed for eligibility, and 29 unique prognostic models were identified. Nine (31·0%) of 29 models had score development reported only, 19 (65·5%) had undergone internal validation, and only four (13·8%) had been externally validated. Data to validate six eligible models were collected in the international external validation cohort study. Data from 11 591 patients were available, with an overall postoperative pulmonary complication rate of 7·8% (n=903). None of the six models showed good discrimination (defined as AUROCC ≥0·70) for identifying postoperative pulmonary complications, with the Assess Respiratory Risk in Surgical Patients in Catalonia score showing the best discrimination (AUROCC 0·700 [95% CI 0·683–0·717]). Interpretation In the pre-COVID-19 pandemic data, variability in the risk of pulmonary complications (StEP-COMPAC definition) following major abdominal surgery was poorly described by existing prognostication tools. To improve surgical safety during the COVID-19 pandemic recovery and beyond, novel risk stratification tools are required. Funding British Journal of Surgery Society

Rational design of peptide-based building blocks for nanoscience and synthetic biology

The rational design of peptides that fold to form discrete nanoscale objects, and/or self-assemble into nanostructured materials is an exciting challenge. Such efforts test and extend our understanding of sequence-to-structure relationships in proteins, and potentially provide materials for applications in bionanotechnology. Over the past decade or so, rules for the folding and assembly of one particular protein-structure motif-the alpha-helical coiled coil have advanced sufficiently to allow the confident design of novel peptides that fold to prescribed structures. Coiled coils are based on interacting alpha-helices, and guide and cement many protein-protein interactions in nature. As such, they present excellent starting points for building complex objects and materials that span the nano-to-micron scales from the bottom up. Along with others, we have translated and extended our understanding of coiled-coil folding and assembly to develop novel peptide-based biomaterials. Herein, we outline briefly the rules for the folding and assembly of coiled-coil motifs, and describe how we have used them in de novo design of discrete nanoscale objects and soft synthetic biomaterials. Moreover, we describe how the approach can be extended to other small, independently folded protein motifs-such as zinc fingers and EF-hands-that could be incorporated into more complex, multi-component synthetic systems and new hybrid and responsive biomaterials

New Records of Some Euglenoid Algae From Bangladesh

The following taxa belong to eight species under five genera of euglenoid algae, namely, Euglena anabaena Mainx., Phacus glaber Pochmann (Defl.) Posch, Phacus indicus Skvortzov, Protaspis obovata Skuja, Strombomonas lanceolata (Playfair) Deflandre, Trachelomonas hexangulata (Swir) Playf., T. obovata var. klebsiana Defl. and T. pseudocaudata Defl. are described here for the first time for Bangladesh. Bangladesh J. Plant Taxon. 28(2): 311-315, 2021 (December)</jats:p

New records of Euglenophyceae for Bangladesh

A total of 8 species of Euglenophyceae where 5 species of Euglena namely, Euglena lucens Günther, E. paludosa Mainx., E. gaumei Allorge &amp; Lefèvre , E. heimii Lef., E. mangini Lefévre, and 3 species of Lepocinclis namely, Lepocinclis ovum var. deflandriana (Ehrenberg) Lemmermann, L. ovum var. globulus ( Perty) Lemmermann and L. steinii Lemmermann from Sylhet Division which are all new records for Bangladesh.&#x0D; Bangladesh J. Plant Taxon. 28(1): 11-15, 2021 (June)</jats:p

New records of some phytoplankton for Bangladesh: Class - Chlorophyceae

The paper records 6 species of phytoplankton under the class Chlorophyceae namely, Pteromonas golenkiniana Pascher belonging to Family Phacotaceae; Pediastrum biradiatum var. biradiatum Meyen.belonging to Family Hydrodictyaceae; Scenedesmus alternas var. indicus Hortob. and Scenedesmus quadricauda var. inermis Playfair belonging to Family Scenedesmaceae ; Teilingia excavata (Rafls) Bourelly and Cosmarium vexatum W. West var. vexatum W. West belonging to Family Desmidaceae from Sylhet Division of Bangladesh which are all new records for Bangladesh.&#x0D; Bangladesh J. Plant Taxon. 27(1): 79-83, 2020 (June)</jats:p