Primary intrathoracic lymphangioma masquerading as teratoma

Two cases of cystic hygroma arising as a primary lesion in the chest are presented. Because of calcifications discovered on CT and because of the anterior location of the mass in both cases, teratoma was the first diagnostic consideration. However, after surgical removal, histologic study determined that both lesions were cystic hygromas with areas of scattered calcification probably secondary to hemorrhage. These cases are presented because of the remarkable similarity of their imaging features to those of teratoma.     

Methods of measuring susceptibility of anaerobic bacteria to trovafloxacin, including quality control parameters

Three methods approved by the National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards for testing the susceptibility of anaerobic bacteria were used to evaluate the fluoroquinolone, trovafloxacin. The methods gave essentially comparable results with 126 anaerobes and with three quality control strains. A collaborative study defined the quality control range for trovafloxacin MICs. Trovafloxacin had good in vitro activity against the more common anaerobes (MIC 90 < = or 2.0 micrograms/ml).     

Are nursing's 'extraordinary' moral standards realistic?

This paper discusses a hypothetical situation, taken from the author's book Nursing Ethics: a principle-based approach, in which a nurse feels pressured into working beyond his official span of duty. The nurse experiences a conflict between a number of obligations; to patients and clients, to his family and to himself. To which should he give greatest weight? Steven Edwards suggests the nurse's decision is a moral one, based on personal standards held by the nurse.     

Acute arthritis of cats associated with feline calicivirus infection

Twelve specific pathogen-free cats were infected either by intra-articular inoculation or by contact exposure to one of two strains of feline calicivirus (FCV), either F65, a field strain originating from an outbreak of lameness in a group of cats, or a vaccine strain. Following either route of exposure, both strains induced signs typical of FCV infection including oral and nasal ulceration, conjunctivitis and ocular discharge. These signs were of equal severity for both virus strains, but overall, following either route of infection, F65 induced more severe disease than the vaccine strain, with marked pyrexia, lethargy and lameness. Vaccine virus only induced a relatively mild lameness following intra-articular inoculation. Gross pathological and histopathological lesions were seen in some of the joints, but again changes were more severe in the F65-exposed cats. Virus was isolated from both normal and affected joints from both groups of F65-exposed cats, and from a joint from each cat inoculated intra-articularly with vaccine virus. Mild transient lameness was also seen in one of two control cats inoculated intra-articularly, but no pathological changes were seen or virus isolated from joints. A cDNA probe used in RNA dot blot hybridisation experiments was found to be specific and more sensitive than virus isolation in detecting FCV in selected tissues. This may be useful in future studies on the pathogenesis of FCV disease and in studies on viral persistence in FCV carriers.     

Activation of auditory cortex during silent lipreading

Watching a speaker's lips during face-to-face conversation (lipreading) markedly improves speech perception, particularly in noisy conditions. With functional magnetic resonance imaging it was found that these linguistic visual cues are sufficient to activate auditory cortex in normal hearing individuals in the absence of auditory speech sounds. Two further experiments suggest that these auditory cortical areas are not engaged when an individual is viewing nonlinguistic facial movements but appear to be activated by silent meaningless speechlike movements (pseudospeech). This supports psycholinguistic evidence that seen speech influences the perception of heard speech at a prelexical stage.     

Psychological aspects of systemic lupus erythematosus: cognitive function, mood, and self-report

Previous studies have shown that Tetrahymena citrate synthase and the Tetrahymena 14-nm filament protein are encoded by a single gene and translated from one species of mRNA, and that they are identical in terms of molecular weight, antigenicity, and some enzymatic properties. In this study, using two-dimensional gel electrophoresis, we demonstrated that the citrate synthase comprised pI 7.7 and 8.0 isoforms, while the 14-nm filament protein comprised three isoforms with isoelectric points of 7.7, 8.0, and 8.4. The amino acid sequences of the NH2-terminal portions of all isoforms were identical and the peptide maps with V8 protease were almost the same. In addition, when the citrate synthase activity of each isoform was measured after separation by non-urea isoelectric focusing without denaturing treatment, the pI 7.7 and/or pI 8.0 isoforms exhibited the citrate synthase activity, but the pI 8.4 isoform only found for the 14-nm filament protein did not possess this activity. These results suggest that the polymorphism of these isoforms is caused by some posttranslational modifications, and that it may have resulted in the different compartmentalization and functions of Tetrahymena citrate synthase and the 14-nm filament protein.     

Bidirectional calibration results for 11 spectralon and 16 BaSO4 reference reflectance panels

Eleven Spectralon¹ (a sintered polytetrafluoroethylene-based material) and 16 BaSO₄ reference reflectance panels were calibrated using a field calibration technique. The Spectralon panels differed both in their directional/hemispherical and directional/directional reflectance. However, the differences were sufficiently small that “general” calibration equations were developed. For panels constructed of the same material and with the same methods as those used in these experiments, the directional/directional reflectance may be within ± 0.020 at 10°, ± 0.015 at 45°, and ± 0.041 at 80° of that predicted by the “general” equations. For field measurements, these values are considerably better than those that would be obtained using a value of the directional/hemispherical reflectance. The directional/directional reflectance of the 16 BaSO₄ panels varied considerably among panels, so much so that it was not feasible to develop “general” calibration equations. Apparently, the nonlambertian properties of BaSO₄ panels are dependent upon the method of applying the barium sulfate coating.     

Microsoft robotics studio: A technical introduction

Microsoft robotics studio (MSRS) was publicly released in December 2006 with the explicit goal of providing an industry software standard for robot control. To become a viable standard, several technical challenges needed to be solved. In this article, we examine the composition of MSRS, looking generally at its architecture and specifically at its solutions for concurrency, distribution, abstraction, simulation, and programmer interaction. We also examine briefly the emerging industry and academic adoption of the robotics studio.     

Non-aqueous titration of the acidic groups in coals: a warning!

Non-aqueous potentiometric titration using ethylenediamine as a solvent and sodium aminoethoxide as a titrant has been shown to be reliable for the estimation of total acidity only when the substrate is completely dissolved in the solvent.