Giant cell myocarditis. Report of a case

The authors report a case of giant cell myocarditis leading to rapidly progressive cardiac failure despite immuno-suppressor treatment in a 20 year old woman. The cardiac failure was successfully managed by implantation of a left ventricular assist device and then cardiac transplantation. The problems encountered underline the importance of accurate diagnosis by endomyocardial biopsy before undertaking treatment and the difficulties in the choice of appropriate method of assistance in this indication. Giant cell myocarditis is a rare cause of cardiac failure and should be considered in the differential diagnosis in view of its clinical features and risk of progression. The literature and the therapeutic implications are discussed.     

Multinuclear NMR spectroscopy studies on NH4Cl-induced metabolic alterations and detoxification processes in primary astrocytes and glioma cells

Glutamine synthesis, the major pathway of ammonia detoxification, and the intracellular concentration of organic osmolytes in primary astrocytes and F98 glioma cells were investigated with multinuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Acute exposure to ammonia (3 h incubation with NH4Cl) raised the concentration of glutamine and other amino acids, such as glutamate and aspartate, and decreased myo-inositol, hypotaurine, and taurine concentrations. The loss of these osmolytes was partially reversed by co-treatment with the glutamine synthetase inhibitor, methionine sulphoximine. Glutamate, the precursor of glutamine, is provided by stimulated anaplerotic flux via pyruvate carboxylase and glutamate dehydrogenase activity. Thus, the glutamine increase and myo-inositol decrease observed by in vivo magnetic resonance spectroscopy on patients with hepatic encephalopathy may be due to the disturbed osmoregulation in astrocytes caused by accumulation of glutamine and the subsequent loss of organic osmolytes.     

A new method forin-situ measurement of electrical resistivity of reinforced concrete

A new method is described for thein-situ measurement of electrical resistivity of concrete structures. The method is based on the early work of J. Newman who calculated the electrolyte resistivity between a disk and a counter electrode located at infinity. This method has the advantage compared with Wenner's of using a single small electrode for the measurements. In this paper, results are presented comparing this method with Wenner's and with results carried out using a conductivity cell in electrolytes. Finally, values of resistivity are compared to corrosion intensity, and a threshold for active corrosion is suggested.

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Résumé On décrit une nouvelle méthode de mesure de la résistivité électrique du béton dont la technique est basée sur un travail ancien de J. Newman qui avait calculé la résistivité entre un disque et une électrode auxiliaire placée à l'infini. Comparée à la méthode de Wenner, cette méthode présente l'avantage de n'utiliser, pour les mesures, qu'une petite électrode. Dans cet article, on présente les résultats de la comparaison établie avec la méthode de Wenner et avec les résultats obtenus avec une cellule de conductivité placée dans les électrolytes. Enfin, on compare les valeurs de la résistivité du béton avec celles de l'intensité de la corrosion et on suggère un seuil de corrosion active.

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Editorial note Camen Andrade and Maria-Cruz Alonso are working at the Instituto Eduardo de Torroja which is a RILEM Titular Member. Dr. Andrade, who was the 1986 RILEM Medallist, have had all these years great responsibilities within RILEM. Chairlady of the Advisory Technical Committee until 1993, she is now a member of the Coordinating Committee. She is active in 116-PCD Technical Committee on Permeability of Concrete as a Criterion of its Durability and has been appointed chairdlady of 154-EMC Technical Committee on Electrochemical Techniques for Measuring Metallic Corrosion. Carmen Andrade has been appointed RILEM Fellow in 1995.     

A method for improving classification reliability of multilayerperceptrons

Criteria for evaluating the classification reliability of a neural classifier and for accordingly making a reject option are proposed. Such an option, implemented by means of two rules which can be applied independently of topology, size, and training algorithms of the neural classifier, allows one to improve the classification reliability. It is assumed that a performance function P is defined which, taking into account the requirements of the particular application, evaluates the quality of the classification in terms of recognition, misclassification, and reject rates. Under this assumption the optimal reject threshold value, determining the best trade-off between reject rate and misclassification rate, is the one for which the function P reaches its absolute maximum. No constraints are imposed on the form of P, but the ones necessary in order that P actually measures the quality of the classification process. The reject threshold is evaluated on the basis of some statistical distributions characterizing the behavior of the classifier when operating without reject option; these distributions are computed once the training phase of the net has been completed. The method has been tested with a neural classifier devised for handprinted and multifont printed characters, by using a database of about 300000 samples. Experimental results are discussed.     

Influence of two-step process and of different stoichiometric ratios on morphologies generated in castor oil epoxy resins

Phase separation during polymerization was studied in a model system consisting of a diepoxide based on diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A (DGEBA), variable amounts of ethylenediamine (EDA) and the mass of castor oil (CO) necessary to obtain a mass fraction equal to 0-15 in a final system where the stoichiometric ratio of amine to epoxy equivalents, r, was equal to 1. A two-step polymerization process was performed by curing first a system with r = 0-5, during variable times before phase separation, and then carrying the system to r = 1. Thermodynamic analysis of samples with different r values led to a linear relationship between the Flory-Huggins interaction parameter and r. The concentration (P) and average size (D?) of dispersed-phase particles followed opposite trends, i.e. P increased while D? decreased, when either r was increased or the time of curing in the first step of a two-step process was decreased. This was explained by assuming that the competition between nucleation and growth was determined by the viscosity at the cloud point, η_cp. Low values of η_cp favoured growth over nucleation and led to fewer but larger particles.     

Crosslinking of tissue-derived biomaterials in 1-ethyl-3-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)-carbodiimide (EDC)

In contrast to bifunctional reagents such as glutaraldehyde or polyfunctional reagents such as polyepoxides, carbodiimides belong to the class of zero-length crosslinkers which modify amino acid side-groups to permit crosslink formation, but do not remain as part of that linkage. The authors have compared the effects of 1-ethyl-3-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)-carbodiimide (EDC) and glutaraldehyde (the de facto industrial standard crosslinker) on the hydrothermal, biochemical, and uniaxial mechanical properties of bovine pericardium. EDC crosslinking was optimized for maximum increase in collagen denaturation temperature using variables of pH, concentration, and ratio of EDC to N-hydroxysuccinimide (NHS): a reagent for formation of activated esters. EDC and glutaraldehyde crosslinked materials were subjected to hydrothermal denaturation tests, biochemical degradation by enzymes (collagenase, trypsin) and CNBr, amino acid analysis for unreacted lysine, and to high strain rate mechanical tests including: large deformation stress-strain studies (0.1 to 10 Hz), stress relaxation experiments (loading time 0.1 s) and small deformation forced vibration (1 and 10 Hz). A protocol for EDC crosslinking was developed which used 1.15% EDC (2:1 EDC:NHS) at pH 5.5 for 24 h. The increase in denaturation temperature for EDC (from 69.7±1.2°C to 86.0±0.3°C) was equivalent to that produced by glutaraldehyde (85.3±0.4°C). Both treatments equivalently increased resistance to collagenase and CNBr degradation; however, after denaturation, the EDC-treated tissue was slightly more resistant to collagenase, and markedly more resistant to trypsin. EDC-treated materials were more extensible and more elastic than glutaraldehyde-treated materials. Despite the differences in crosslinking mechanism, EDC and glutaraldehyde-treated materials are very similar. Subtle but intriguing differences in biochemical structure remain to be investigated.