Transurethral puncture of ureterocele associated with single collecting system in neonates

BACKGROUND/PURPOSE: It is believed by some investigators that transurethral puncture (TUP) of single-system intravesical ureterocele (SSU) is the treatment of choice in totally asymptomatic patients who receive this diagnosis in utero, but its success depends on the incision technique and type of the uroterocele incised. METHODS: Experience with 20 SSU in 17 asymptomatic newborns detected by prenatal ultrasound scan is reviewed. TUP of the SSU was performed as treatment of choice in 12 (60%) renal units (RU). RESULTS: Decompression of the ureterocele was achieved in 100% of cases, and a vesicoureteral reflux was created in three (25%) RU. Surgery was performed in only 30% of patients who underwent TUP of the ureterocele. Our experience confirms that short (2 to 3 mm) TUP achieves decompression of the affected renal unit and that this procedure can be performed in neonates as outpatient procedure. In addition, it is often the only procedure to perform. CONCLUSION: The authors believe that TUP should be considered the treatment of choice in the management of single-system ureteroceles.     

Comparison of two hyperspectral imaging and two laser-induced fluorescence instruments for the detection of zinc stress and chlorophyll concentration in bahia grass (Paspalum notatum Flugge.)

Bahia grass (Paspalum notatum Flugge.) plants were grown in silica sand and irrigated daily with one of five levels of Zn (0, 0.5, 25, 50, or 100 mg l⁻¹) to determine the effects of the heavy metal on the growth and development of plant canopies. Healthy and stressed plants were measured with two hyperspectral imagers, laser-induced fluorescence spectroscopy (LIFS), and laser-induced fluorescence imaging (LIFI) systems in order to determine if the four handheld remote sensing instruments were equally capable of detecting plant stress and measuring canopy chlorophyll levels in bahia grass. Symptoms of bahia grass plants grown at deficient (0 mg l⁻¹) or toxic (25, 50, or 100 mg l⁻¹) concentrations of Zn were dominated by leaf chlorosis and plant stunting. Leaf fresh weight, leaf dry weight, CO₂ assimilation, total chlorophyll, and leaf thickness followed (+) quadratic models in which control plants (0.5 mg l⁻¹ Zn) exhibited higher responses than plants grown at either deficient or toxic levels of Zn. Normalized difference vegetation index [NDVI=(NIR−Red)/(NIR+Red)] and ratio vegetation index [RVI=R₇₅₀/R₇₀₀, in which R denotes reflectance] values were calculated for calibrated digital images from both hyperspectral imagers. The NDVI and RVI values from both hyperspectral imagers were fit best by (+) quadratic models when treatments were constrained between 0 and 100 mg l⁻¹ Zn, but were fit best by linear regression models with (−) slopes when treatments were constrained between 0.5 and 100 mg l⁻¹ Zn. Furthermore, both NDVI and RVI algorithms were effective in predicting the concentrations of chlorophyll in canopies of bahia grass grown at the various levels of Zn. In contrast, red/far-red (R/FR) fluorescence ratios estimated from leaf fluorescence values measured with the LIFS and LIFI instruments were fit best by (−) quadratic models when treatments were constrained between 0 and 100 mg l⁻¹ Zn, but were fit best by linear regression models with (+) slopes when treatments were constrained between 0.5 and 100 mg l⁻¹ Zn. A series of regression analyses were conducted among plant biometric, biochemical, and leaf anatomical parameters (treated as independent variables) and the remote sensing algorithms, NDVI, RVI, blue/green (BL/GR), and R/FR (treated as dependant variables). In general, residuals were significantly higher for NDVI and RVI models compared to the BL/GR and R/FR models indicating that the NDVI and RVI algorithms were able to measure total chlorophyll and plant biomass more accurately than the BL/GR and R/FR algorithms. However, unique capabilities of LIFS and LIFI instruments continue to argue for the development of laser-induced fluorescence remote sensing technologies.     

Viscoelastic behavior of galss-reinforced epoxy resin

The viscoelastic behavior of epoxy composites containing various percentage of glass microspheres and random short glass fibers was investigated over a wide range of temperatures. The effect of the second phase is to increase the relaxation moduli of the system and to shift the time dependency to higher times. All the data were shifted to a single master curve at a reference temperature by using independent shift factors that were a function of either temperature or filler content.     

Heavy metals and essential elements in Italian cereals

Crops intended for human nutrition and food production containing different essential trace elements, such as copper and zinc, could be contaminated by toxic metals like cadmium and lead. The interrelationship between micronutrients and contaminant trace elements in different cereals was investigated in North-western Italy, where both agricultural and industrial activities are present. Elemental concentrations in sampled cereals were assessed by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Rice, oats and barley reached the highest median levels for Al, Cd and Pb content, while corn samples were less contaminated by toxic metals. Regarding essential elements highest median values of Cu and Zn were both found in barley, while Ni median content was higher in oats. Rice had the lowest median levels of essential elements. The correlation study between toxic and essential elements seemed to demonstrate fixed trends in analysed samples, corroborating the importance of a different diet to limit potential adverse effects caused by toxic elements.     

Automatic Stress Classification With Pupil Diameter Analysis

This article proposes a method based on wavelet transform and neural networks for relating pupillary behavior to psychological stress. The proposed method was tested by recording pupil diameter and electrodermal activity during a simulated driving task. Self-report measures were also collected. Participants performed a baseline run with the driving task only, followed by three stress runs where they were required to perform the driving task along with sound alerts, the presence of two human evaluators, and both. Self-reports and pupil diameter successfully indexed stress manipulation, and significant correlations were found between these measures. However, electrodermal activity did not vary accordingly. After training, the four-way parallel neural network classifier could guess whether a given unknown pupil diameter signal came from one of the four experimental trials with 79.2% precision. The present study shows that pupil diameter signal has good discriminating power for stress detection.     

Osteogenic differentiation and mineralization in fibre-reinforced tubular scaffolds: theoretical study and experimental evidences

The development of composite scaffolds with well-organized architecture and multi-scale properties (i.e. porosity, degradation) represents a valid approach for achieving a tissue-engineered construct capable of reproducing the medium- and long-term in vitro behaviour of hierarchically complex tissues such as spongy bone. To date, the implementation of scaffold design strategies able to summarize optimal scaffold architecture as well as intrinsic mechanical, chemical and fluid transport properties still remains a challenging issue. In this study, poly ɛ-caprolactone/polylactid acid (PCL/PLA) tubular devices (fibres of PLA in a PCL matrix) obtained by phase inversion/salt leaching and filament winding techniques were proposed as cell instructive scaffold for bone osteogenesis. Continuous fibres embedded in the polymeric matrix drastically improved the mechanical response as confirmed by compression elastic moduli, which vary from 0.214 ± 0.065 to 1.174 ± 0.143 MPa depending on the relative fibre/matrix and polymer/solvent ratios. Moreover, computational fluid dynamic simulations demonstrated the ability of composite structure to transfer hydrodynamic forces during in vitro culture, thus indicating the optimal flow rate conditions that, case by case, enables specific cellular events—i.e. osteoblast differentiation from human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs), mineralization, etc. Hence, we demonstrate that the hMSC differentiation preferentially occurs in the case of higher perfusion rates—over 0.05 ml min^–1—as confirmed by the expression of alkaline phosphate and osteocalcin markers. In particular, the highest osteopontin values and a massive mineral phase precipitation of bone-like phases detected in the case of intermediate flow rates (i.e. 0.05 ml min^–1) allows us to identify the best condition to stimulate the bone extracellular matrix in-growth, in agreement with the hydrodynamic model prediction. All these results concur to prove the succesful use of tubular composite as temporary device for long bone treatment.     

Effects of non-equidiffusion on unsteady propagation of hydrogen-enriched methane/air premixed flames

A Large Eddy Simulation (LES) model was developed to simulate the unsteady propagation of hydrogen-enriched methane/air premixed flames around toroidal vortices. Although the LES model does not take into account the non-equidiffusive effects associated with the hydrogen presence (preferential diffusion and non-unity Lewis number), it gives good predictions of experimental data previously obtained for lean mixtures with hydrogen mole fraction in the fuel (hydrogen plus methane) varying from 0 to 0.5. In particular, for each fuel composition, size and velocity of the toroidal vortex generated ahead of the propagating flame front are well reproduced along with the evolution of the flame shape and structure resulting from the interaction with the vortex. The negligible role played by the non-equidiffusive effects has been attributed to the fact that, at the conditions investigated, the characteristic time of hydrogen diffusion is one order of magnitude higher than the characteristic time of flame roll-up around the vortex.     

Morse Properties for the Minimum Time Function on 2-D Manifolds

Given a two-dimensional smooth manifold M and two smooth vector fields X and Y on M, we want to steer a point p M to a point q M in minimum time using only intergral curves of the vector fields X and Y. Fixing p, we define the minimum time function to reach q. We prove that, generically, is a Morse function in topological sense giving a positive answer to a question of V.I. Arnold.