Functional palatoraphy and modified genioplasty in obstructive sleep apnea

10 patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) have been treated with the new surgical procedure functional palatoraphy and modified genioplasty. 5 months after surgery 7 patients with an apnea hypopnea index under 10 were cured. Three therapy refractory patients were all overweight with a body mass index of more than 29 kg/m2. Excessively overweight patients should therefore not be operated. Following the selection criteria we introduced an effective new treatment method for OSAS.     

Analysis of adaptive routing schemes in multirate loss networks

As technology evolves, it is now feasible to implement sophisticated adaptive routing schemes on networks which support different kinds of services with heterogeneous bandwidth characteristics. Adaptive routing can increase the network throughput by routing calls to less congested paths. It can also be used to bypass transmission facility failures. In this paper, we analyze and compare two adaptive routing schemes. The first is called theMaximum mean time to blocking (MTB) routing which is based on themean time to blocking measure of a link. This measure captures the traffic rates, bandwidth characteristic and link capacity information and reflects more accurately the congestion status of different paths. The second is theM ² routing, which is a modification of the least loaded routing (LLR). Aggregation of link status information can significantly reduce signalling traffic. We show in this paper that with properly designed aggregation, the aggregatedM ² and MTB routings can have performance that approach that of the non-aggregated schemes. The use of complete sharing and restricted access policies together with trunk reservation control in multirate loss networks are also studied.     

A study of reinforced refractory concretes

Results of a laboratory study of the properties of corundum concrete with metallic fibers of five compositions are presented. It is shown that some of the fibers affect favorably the strength and heat resistance of the concrete. Industrial tests of parts made of the suggested reinforced concrete have proved these conclusions.Translated from Ogneupory i Tekhnicheskaya Keramika, No. 11, pp. 22–24, November, 1996.     

Morphology and structure of poly(p-phenylene terephthalamide) crystallized from dilute organic solution

The high-temperature crystallization of poly(p-phenylene terephthalamide) (PPTA) from dilute organic solutions was achieved through the introduction of a non-solvent, or precipitating agent, at the desired crystallization temperature. The morphology and crystal structure were examined for crystals produced from PPTA polymer with two different molecular weights (M_w = 46000 and 3430 g mol⁻¹), using transmission electron microscopy. For the high-molecular-weight polymer, ribbon-like crystals were produced, while the low-molecular-weight polymer yielded small needles or platelets. In both cases, electron diffraction showed that the Northolt allomorph was obtained. For the high-molecular-weight polymer, the molecular axes were parallel to the ribbon axes in a chain-extended type structure. A hypothesis for the orientation of the low-molecular-weight PPTA in the small platelets, is also given.     

Design of an X-band transformer-coupled amplifier withimproved stability and layout

The authors present a push-pull transformer-coupled amplifier for monolithic microwave applications, and discuss how its stability and layout have been improved with respect to conventional approaches by means of opposite-phase feedback and fully symmetrical layout. The circuit provides state-of-the-art performance (10-dB gain and 18-dBm saturated power in the 4-8-GHz band) with only 165-mW DC power consumption     

Data management and analysis for high-throughput DNA sequencingprojects

The rapid advances in molecular biology have begun to shift many of the bottlenecks in genome research from the laboratory to the data analysis facility. The pace at which this has occurred creates a situation in which software development always has to catch up with the flow of data. Since such large-scale processes were not anticipated, the analysis infrastructure has not been fully established. Furthermore, most systems that have been built were designed by the biologists who collected the data. More recently, computer scientists, mathematicians, and engineers have taken an interest in this problem. This has had a positive effect, since it has created a tight synergy between the informatics and the biology. Several principles affected the design of the system developed at TIGR. Each of the sample preparation, sequencing, and analysis steps had to be managed, scheduled, and tracked. This information had to be made readily available to those who needed it for carrying out their tasks. Different skill levels of the users had to be taken into account. The degree of human intervention at each step had to be evaluated and built into the design. A mixed processing environment of Macintosh and Unix platforms had to be integrated. Most importantly, the system had to save time, reduce error, and ensure uniformity of the analysis and quality of the results. In the authors' experience, the tools they have built work well because of their early decisions as to which systems to use for development. The authors settled on a robust relational database management system (Sybase) and a portable development environment (C, C++)     

Study of Desorption and Adsorption During Grain Aeration

One requirement in designing and operating and operating system is to minimize the moisture change in stored grain. Moisture transfer during the aeration process is generally believed to be caused by the partial pressure difference between water in grain and water in air (P₃-P₄). A mathematical model was developed for rough rice, which predicts the partial pressure difference under various grain and ambient conditions. Observations of moisture change over 10 aeration tests confirmed the good correlation between sorption phenomena and partial pressure differences. Studies indicated that air relative humidity, air temperature, grain temperature and grain moisture are significant factors influencing the partial pressure differences and, thus, affecting     

Progress in the study of mechanism of fetal scarless wound healing

From January 1987 to December 1993, 426 patients with lung cancer were operated in our hospital, among which 159 patients were diagnosed postoperatively to be N2 disease by pathology including 81 central type and 78 peripheral type lung cancer. Radical operations were performed on 135 cases, palliative operations on 24 cases. Follow up study: one-year survival rate was 71.7%, three-year survival rate 29.0% and five-year survival rate 21.7%. The main factors affecting operative results are tumor cell type, the number and location of metastatic lymph nodes and the thoroughness of dissection. Tumor staging, except T4 tumor is not a main factor influencing prognosis. The indications of operation performed on N2 lung cancer and the necessity of extensive nodal exenteration are also discussed in this article. We consider extensive hilar and mediastinal nodal exenteration necessary in order to achieve radical resection and good prognosis.     

Criteria of cure and follow-up of central hyperthyroidism due to thyrotropin-secreting pituitary adenomas

The recorded number of patients with central hyperthyroidism due to TSH-secreting pituitary adenoma doubled in the last few years after the introduction of ultrasensitive TSH assays in the assessment of thyroid function; however, information about the results and the criteria for cure after pituitary surgery is scanty. Seventeen patients with a TSH-secreting adenoma, diagnosed on the basis of detectable TSH levels in the face of high free thyroid hormone concentrations and pituitary lesion at neuroimaging, underwent pituitary surgery. Hypersecretion of other pituitary hormones was diagnosed in 5 of 17 patients. Four patients were initially misdiagnosed and treated with thyroid surgery or radioiodine therapy. The majority (86%) of hyperthyroid patients normalized thyroid hormone concentrations and regained euthyroidism, although pituitary imaging, alpha-subunit, and alpha-subunit/TSH molar ratio normalized in only 47%, 54%, and 58% of patients, respectively. Moreover, TSH secretion was normally suppressed by T3 in 40% of the patients. Interestingly, the finding of undetectable TSH levels 7 days after surgery was highly predictive of successful outcome. During long term follow-up, there was one relapse of hyperthyroidism. Early diagnosis of TSH-secreting adenomas permits a high rate of remission of hyperthyroidism after surgery. However, normalization of thyroid function alone does not necessarily reflect complete removal of the tumor, and more comprehensive criteria of cure based on pituitary imaging, hormone measurement, and suppression of TSH during T3 administration should be used. Lastly, all patients need an accurate long term follow-up to monitor the possible recurrence of the adenoma.