We found a significant Treatment (p=.0453) and Time differences (p=.005), but no significant Treatment×Time interactions although we found that the absolute change was only significant in the Haptic group (p=.011). We observed no significant changes in the ARAT score. Participants tolerated treatments well with a low drop-out rate. In the subjects evaluated at after 12 week (11 subject in sensory-motor and 17 in haptic group) no retention of the effect was found. CONCLUSIONS Task oriented training may improve upper limb function in persons with MS especially in prevalent pyramidal impaired subjects without maintain the effects after three months. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER NCT02711566 (clinicaltrial.gov). INTRODUCTION In myasthenia gravis (MG) patients on intravenous methylprednisolone (IVMP) therapy, initial deterioration should be carefully monitored because it may cause myasthenic crisis. The aim of this study was to investigate the onset, duration and related factors of initial deterioration from the first IVMP in MG patients. METHODS A total dose of IVMP in the first cycle of 750 mg or less, over 750 to 1500 mg, and over 1500 to 3000 mg was used in the analysis. Initial deterioration was evaluated in qualitative and quantitative evaluation and was defined as an increase of 2 or more points on the The Myasthenia Gravis Activities of Daily Living (MG-ADL) scale after the start of IVMP therapy in the quantitative evaluation. RESULTS We enrolled 51 mainly mild MG patients. The mode of onset of initial deterioration from the first IVMP treatment was day 4 in the qualitative and quantitative evaluation. In addition, the mode of duration was 3 days. In multiple logistic regression analysis, factors related to initial deterioration were MGFA classification with overall disease duration up to just before IVMP and thymectomy before IVMP in both the qualitative and the quantitative evaluation (p  less then  .001). One to four cycles of IVMP improved the MG-ADL score at hospital discharge from that at the start of IVMP (p  less then  .001). CONCLUSION Disease severity and thymectomy before IVMP are related to initial deterioration in MG patients. IVMP can be repeated after initial deterioration weekly in most patients. Hydrodynamic cavitation is an effective method for chitosan degradation, of which the mechanism directly determines the molecular weight distribution of degradation products. In this study, based on the Monte Carlo simulation and experimental results, the mechanism of chitosan degradation with hydrodynamic cavitation and molecular weight distribution of products were analyzed. The results showed that the algorithm established in the simulation could effectively analyze degradation mechanism and the factors that influenced degradation mechanism and molecular weight distribution of products. The degradation with hydrodynamic cavitation was caused by chemical and mechanical effects, of which the former dominated the degradation process. The outlet and inlet angles and throat length of the cavitator had major and minor influences on the degradation pattern, respectively. read more The chemical effect led to random cuts resulting in wide distribution of the products, while the mechanical effect led to central cuts resulting in narrow distribution of the products. With more central cuts, the slide-shaped molecular weight distribution curve of degradation products was gradually transferred into a bell-shaped curve. These results provide instructions for researches on the molecular weight distribution of chitosan products degraded with hydrodynamic cavitation. The influences of dual-frequency slit ultrasound (DFSU) pretreatment with various working parameters on the enzymolysis efficiency and conformational characteristics of corn gluten meal (CGM) were studied. Results indicated that under the conditions of ultrasonic power density of 80 W/L, time of 30 min, ultrasonic intermittent ratio of 52 s/s, temperature of 30 °C, and substrate concentration of 50 g/L, the relative enzymolysis efficiency (REE) of CGM reached a maximum of 21.05%, and the protein dissolution rate was 68.50%. In addition, ultrasonication had considerable impact on the conformation of CGM and consequently improved the susceptibility to alcalase proteolysis. Changes in free sulfhydryl (SHF) and disulfide bonds (SS) groups indicated spatial conformation of CGM was altered following sonication (sonochemical) treatment. Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrum (FITR) analysis showed a reduction in α-helix and β-turn content; and an increase in β-sheet and random coil content of CGM. Alterations in the particle size, particle size distribution, microstructure and surface roughness (Ra, Rq) indicated generation of smaller and more uniform protein fragments of CGM by sonochemical pretreatment. The proposed mechanism of sonicated CGM was elaborated. Our findings suggest that using DFSU in pretreating CGM may be an efficacious approach to enhance proteolysis. Ultrasonication is an emerging and evergreen technique for the efficient synthesis of the catalytically active heterostructured materials. In-situ one-pot ultrasonic-assisted synthesis method was demonstrated in this work for the fabrication of silver tungstate encrusted polypyrrole nanocomposite using semi-automatic ultrasonic probe maintained at 34°C/50 kHz ultrasonic frequency and at 150 W ultrasonic power. This material retains enhanced optical, electrical, morphological properties, photocatalytic behavior in photodegradation of congo red dye, tetracycline drug and its electrochemical sensing potential for the effective determination of a broad spectrum of antibacterial drug, nitrofurazone. Optical properties were investigated using UltraViolet-Visible diffuse reflectance spectral (UV-VIS DRS) data along with Tauc’s bandgap energy calculations. The morphological properties were examined using FESEM and TEM micrographs. All the PXRD and XPS details prove the effective distribution of PPy on the surface of Ag2WO4 rods with the help of powerful ultrasonic assistance. PPy acted as a support for nucleation and growth of Ag2WO4 and an inhibitor of phase transformations. Ag2WO4/PPy exhibits great photocatalytic behavior while comparing with pure PPy and Ag2WO4 in the degradation of carcinogenic dye congo red and antibiotic drug tetracycline. In addition to that, Ag2WO4/PPy modified GCE exposed a widespread linear range from 0.1 to 107 µM along with a very low detection limit of 12 nM and huge sensitivity of 1.74 µA µM-1cm-2 in the electrochemical determination of nitrofurazone.