Cyclosporin A in patients receiving renal allografts from cadaver donors. 1978

A psychrotrophic yeast, Rhodotorula glutinis KUJ 2731, isolated from soil, effectively produced an extracellular endo-beta-glucanase (EC 3.2.1.4). The enzyme was monomeric, and the molecular mass was about 40,000 Da. The N-terminal amino acid sequence was H-Ser-Leu-Pro- Lys-Leu-Gly-Gly-Val-Asp-Leu-Ala-Gly-Leu-Asp-Ile-Gly-Lys-Asp-Lys-Asn-. alpha-Helix content was calculated to be about 32.6%. The isoelectric point was 8.57. The activation energy was 20.9 kJ/mol, which was much smaller than that of mesophilic enzymes. The enzyme was active at temperatures from 0 to 70 degrees C, with a highest initial velocity at 50 degrees C similar to other psychrotrophic enzymes. The enzyme was inhibited by Hg2+. The enzyme catalyzed hydrolysis of carboxymethyl cellulose with an apparent K(m) of 1.1% and Vmax of 556 mumol/min/mg. Products from the enzymatic hydrolysis of carboxymethyl cellulose by the enzyme were glucose, cellobiose, and cellotriose. The enzyme also catalyzed the transglycosylation of p-nitrophenyl-beta-cellotrioside to cellotetraose.     

Penicillin vs. erythromycin in the treatment of diphtheria

PURPOSE: To review the University of Florida experience in treating ependymomas, analyze prognostic factors, and provide treatment recommendations. METHODS AND MATERIALS: Forty-one patients with ependymoma and no metastases outside the central nervous system received postoperative radiotherapy with curative intent between 1966 and 1989. Ten patients had supratentorial lesions, 22 had infratentorial lesions, and 9 had spinal cord lesions. All patients had surgery (stereotactic biopsy, subtotal resection, or gross total resection). Most patients with high-grade lesions received radiotherapy to the craniospinal axis. Low-grade intracranial lesions received more limited treatment. Spinal cord lesions were treated using either partial spine or whole spine fields. RESULTS: Of 32 intracranial tumors, 21 recurred, all at the primary site; no spinal cord tumors recurred. Overall 10-year survival rates were 51% (absolute) and 46% (relapse-free); by tumor site: spinal cord, 100%; infratentorial, 45%; supratentorial, 20% (p = 0.002). On multivariate analysis, tumor site was the only factor that influenced absolute survival (p = 0.0004); other factors evaluated included grade, gender, age, duration of symptoms, resection extent, primary tumor dose, treatment field extent, surgery-to-radiotherapy interval, and days under radiotherapy treatment. CONCLUSIONS: Patients with supratentorial or infratentorial tumors receive irradiation, regardless of grade. Craniospinal-axis fields are used when spinal seeding is radiographically or pathologically evident. Spinal cord tumors are treated using localized fields to the primary site if not completely resected. Failure to control disease at the primary site remains the main impediment to cure.     

The effect of a two-week anti-orthostatic hypokinesia on the cardiac function and on the latter''s regulation in monkeys

Medical practice guidelines are being developed rapidly and advocated as a crucial component in transforming and improving the delivery of health care services. However, little is known about the ability of hospitals to institute guidelines outside of experimental settings. This article approaches guideline implementation from the viewpoint of process innovation assimilation and presents specific recommendations for organizational tactics leading to successful implementation of practice guidelines.     

Patient education for discharge after coronary bypass surgery in the 1990s: are patients adequately prepared?

Short hospitalizations for patients undergoing coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) require continuous nursing evaluation of patients' discharge education. Six institutions collaborated in surveying 300 postoperative patients with CABG to identify learning priorities and patients' perceptions of the effectiveness of discharge education. Data analysis from the self-administered questionnaire demonstrated consistent patient priorities across institutions. Differences in teaching methods and content did not affect perceived preparedness or importance scores. Regional experience demonstrates that variable teaching efforts meet patients' priorities and provide high overall patient preparedness for discharge. Patients with the shortest hospitalizations had higher preparedness scores.     

High-output congestive heart failure following transjugular intrahepatic portal-systemic shunting

A hyperdynamic circulatory state with elevated cardiac output, decreased peripheral vascular resistance, and sodium retention occurs in patients with portal cirrhosis. Surgical portal-systemic shunts and transjugular intrahepatic portal-systemic shunts (TIPS) have been shown to worsen the high-output state in these patients. However, clinical evidence of high-output congestive heart failure has been reported only rarely to complicate cirrhosis. We describe a patient who developed high-output congestive heart failure with markedly elevated filling pressures after TIPS and had complete resolution of heart failure after liver transplantation.     

Stock trading strategy creation using GP on GPU

This paper investigates the speed improvements available when using a graphics processing unit (GPU) for evaluation of individuals in a genetic programming (GP) environment. An existing GP system is modified to enable parallel evaluation of individuals on a GPU device. Several issues related to implementing GP on GPU are discussed, including how to perform tree-based GP on a device without recursion support, as well as the effect that proper memory layout can have on speed increases when using CUDA-enabled nVidia GPU devices. The specific GP implementation is designed to evolve stock trading strategies using technical analysis indicators. The second goal of this research is to investigate the possible improvement in performance when training individuals on a larger number of stocks and training days. This increased training size (nearly 100,000 training points) is enabled due to the speedups realized by GPU evaluation. Several different scenarios were used to test various speed optimizations of GP evaluation on the GPU device, with a peak speedup factor of over 600 (when compared to sequential evaluation on a 2.4 GHz CPU). Also, it is found that increasing the number of stocks and the length of the training period can result in higher out-of-training testing profitability.     

Fourth International Conference on Durability of Building Materials and Components

RILEM Bulletin

Fourth International Conference on Durability of Building Materials and Components     

Effects of the preparation Undevit on the indicators of vitamin provision of Norilsk's schoolchildren]

The effect of the prophylactic use of multivitamin "Undevitum" on parameters of vitamin providing of schoolchildren in Norilsk was studied. The results of the investigation showed a positive effect of the prophylactic vitamin administration on providing with vitamins of schoolchildren in Norilsk and proved the necessity of conducting mass vitamin administration to schoolchildren.     

Analytical electron microscopy of Al2O3 implanted with iron ions

Single crystals of -Al₂O₃ were implanted with iron ions at room temperature to fluences ranging from 4×10¹⁶ Fe cm^–2 to 1×10¹⁷ Fe cm^–2. The microstructure and composition in the implanted region were examined using analytical electron microscopy techniques. Special emphasis was placed on monitoring the microstructural changes which take place during post-implantation annealing. Clusters of metallic -Fe were identified in the specimen after implantation to a dose of 1×10¹⁷ Fe cm^–2. Analytical electron microscopy of implanted specimens annealed in oxygen revealed the redistribution of the implanted iron and the formation of surface precipitates of -Fe₂O₃, subsurface precipitates of various forms of spinel, and, in some cases, subsurface precipitates of iron, depending on the annealing temperature. Examination of implanted specimens annealed under reducing conditions revealed the presence of precipitates of -Fe.