The Bjork aortic prosthesis. Study of phonomechanographic parameters, and comparison with the Starr aortic prosthesis

The presence of a cardiodepressant factor of pancreatic origin has been reported in the plasma of experimental animals and man in a variety of shock states. It has been suggested that the depression of developed tension of the isolated cat papillary muscle may be caused by excess NaCl in the bathing medium rather than a specific cardiodepressant peptide. Incubated pancreatic homogenate was used as a source of this factor, and after protein precipitation, ultrafiltration (10,00 and 1,000 MW), dialysis and lyophilization, the residue was applied to a Sephadex G-10 column in order to ensure the removal of all salts. The protein effluent of the Sephadex column contained all the cardiodepressant activity of the filtered, dialyzed pancreatic homogenate and none of the salt content. To further isolate this cardiodepressant factor, the active residue was applied to a cellulose column and eluted with butanol: glacial acetic acid: water (25:26 v/v/v). This elution gave 8 distinct peptide peaks, one of which, peak 4, contained significant depressant activity. Thus, a cardiodepressant peptide of approximately 250-1,000 MW exists in pancreatic homogenates and this compound is not excess NaCl in the assay system.     

Cervical spinal cord compression caused by ossification of the posterior vertebral ligament. Apropos of a case

In eight Japanese patients, three different laparoscopic procedures were used to excise an early gastric carcinoma; partial resection in four, intragastric resection of the gastric mucosa in two, and laparoscopic-assisted distal partial gastrectomy with the abdominal wall-elevating method in two patients. Histological examinations revealed that the lesions were completely resected, and there was no evidence of lymphatic metastasis. The operation time ranged from 2 to 4 h. These forms of laparoscopic gastric surgery for patients with early gastric carcinomas may be useful from the standpoint of minimal access, rapid recovery, less pain, and good cosmesis.     

Annotating mobile phone location data with activity purposes using machine learning algorithms

Individual human travel patterns captured by mobile phone data have been quantitatively characterized by mathematical models, but the underlying activities which initiate the movement are still in a less-explored stage. As a result of the nature of how activity and related travel decisions are made in daily life, human activity-travel behavior exhibits a high degree of spatial and temporal regularities as well as sequential ordering. In this study, we investigate to what extent the behavioral routines could reveal the activities being performed at mobile phone call locations that are captured when users initiate or receive a voice call or message.Our exploration consists of four steps. First, we define a set of comprehensive temporal variables characterizing each call location. Feature selection techniques are then applied to choose the most effective variables in the second step. Next, a set of state-of-the-art machine learning algorithms including Support Vector Machines, Logistic Regression, Decision Trees and Random Forests are employed to build classification models. Alongside, an ensemble of the results of the above models is also tested. Finally, the inference performance is further enhanced by a post-processing algorithm.Using data collected from natural mobile phone communication patterns of 80 users over a period of more than one year, we evaluated our approach via a set of extensive experiments. Based on the ensemble of the models, we achieved prediction accuracy of 69.7%. Furthermore, using the post processing algorithm, the performance obtained a 7.6% improvement. The experiment results demonstrate the potential to annotate mobile phone locations based on the integration of data mining techniques with the characteristics of underlying activity-travel behavior, contributing towards the semantic comprehension and further application of the massive data.     

Albumin exchange and polymorphonuclear vascular transit in hyperoxic pulmonary oedema in awake rats

Vascular inflammatory response to hyperoxia (FIO2 greater than 0.98) was studied in awake jugular and carotid catheterized rats. Simultaneous i.v. injection of 125I albumin (125I A), 99mTc polymorphonuclear cells (99mTc PMN) and 51Cr red blood cells (51Cr RBC) allowed to study both the macromolecule exchange through vascular endothelium and the leukocyte uptake by several organs (liver, lungs, spleen) with respect to radiolabelled red blood cells, as an intravascular reference. Rats were exposed to O2 for 24, 38 and 45 h. They were anesthetized and killed by exanguination 15 to 120 min following the tracer injection. After 45 h exposure, the plasmatic 125I A half-life decreased significantly (158 +/- 42 min for the control; 106 +/- 34 min for the exposed animals). The ratio 125I A/51Cr RBC varied significantly in the lung. The iodinated albumin exchange through lung vascular endothelium was altered at the 24th h, with a significant difference reached by the 45th h. At the same time, the pulmonary decreasing curve of 99mTc/51Cr RBC ratio versus time was not not modified. In our experimental conditions, there was no detectable variation in the lung uptake and vascular transit of PMN cells. The discussion of the results must be related with the technics used in the present work when the albumin exchange increased.     

Formation of linear aldehydes during surface water preozonization and their removal in water treatment in relation to mutagenic activity and sum parameters

Low molecular weight aldehydes were formed during surface water preozonization, their levels showing a positive correlation with increasing ozone dose applied and with increasing water temperature. A strong negative correlation was observed between aldehyde levels and U.V. absorbance at 254 nm.Coagulation had no influence on the aldehydes present and the influence of rapid double layer filtration varied strongly with temperature : significant removals were only observed above 10°C.Mutagenic activity generated by preozonization in Salmonella typhimurium TA98 shows an ozone dose depending relationship different from the formation of linear aldehydes. Its removal by coagulation is not effective but rapid double layer filtration reduces mutagenic activity to marginal levels.In this respect too no clear parallel can be drawn between the presence of low molecular weight aldehydes and mutagenic activity.     

Somatic deletion of the imprinted 11p15 region in sporadic persistent hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia of infancy is specific of focal adenomatous hyperplasia and endorses partial pancreatectomy

Sporadic persistent hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemia of infancy (PHHI) or nesidioblastosis is a heterogeneous disorder characterized by profound hypoglycemia due to inappropriate hypersecretion of insulin. An important diagnostic goal is to distinguish patients with a focal hyperplasia of islet cells of the pancreas (FoPHHI) from those with a diffuse abnormality of islets (DiPHHI) because management strategies differ significantly. 16 infants with sporadic PHHI resistant to diazoxide and who underwent pancreatectomy were investigated. Selective pancreatic venous sampling coupled with peroperative surgical examination and analysis of extemporaneous frozen sections allowed us to identify 10 cases with FoPHHI and 6 cases with DiPHHI. We show here that in cases of FoPHHI, but not those of DiPHHI, there was specific loss of maternal alleles of the imprinted chromosome region 11p15 in cells of the hyperplastic area of the pancreas but not in normal pancreatic cells. This somatic event is consistent with a proliferative monoclonal lesion. It involves disruption of the balance between monoallelic expression of several maternally and paternally expressed genes. Thus, we provide the first molecular explanation of the heterogeneity of sporadic forms of PHHI such that it is possible to perform only partial pancreatectomy, limited to the focal somatic lesion, so as to avoid iatrogenic diabetes in patients with focal adenomatous hyperplasia.