BackgroundThe concept of "prehabilitation," or optimising individual physical and mental wellbeing prior to surgery is well established in cancer and orthopaedic populations.However, amongst the cardiac surgery population, the concept is relatively new.Of the few studies available, all focus on the elective surgical population.This pilot feasibilit
Early and Next-Generation KIT/PDGFRA Kinase Inhibitors and the Future of Treatment for Advanced Gastrointestinal Stromal Tumor
The majority of gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) harbor an activating mutation in either the KIT or PDGFRA receptor tyrosine kinases.Approval of imatinib, a KIT/PDGFRA tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI), meaningfully improved the treatment of advanced GIST.Other TKIs subsequently gained approval: sunitinib as a second-line therapy and regorafeni
A Meaningful Academic Life: Improvised, Amusing, Unsettling
In this essay, originally presented to an audience of colleagues, students, and university faculty, I briefly review the meanings I ascribe to my joe moreira jiu jitsu experience of nearly half a century as a university faculty member.I emphasize the improvisational quality of professorial life, the amusing characters I was able to observe and with
A three filament mechanistic model of musculotendon force and impedance
The force developed by actively lengthened muscle depends on different structures across different scales of lengthening.For small perturbations, the active response of muscle is well captured by a linear-time-invariant (LTI) system: a stiff spring in parallel with a light damper.The force response of muscle to longer stretches is better represente