The ecology of echo

Echo is a generic ecosystem model in which evolving agents are situated in a resource-limited environment. The Echo model is described, and the behavior of Echo is evaluated on two well-studied measures of ecological diversity: relative species abundance and the species-area scaling relation. In simulation experiments, these measures are used to compare the behavior of Echo with that of a neutral model, in which selection on agent genotypes is random. These simulations show that the evolutionary component of Echo makes a significant contribution to its behavior and that Echo shows good qualitative agreement with naturally occurring species abundance distributions and species-area scaling relations.     

Overexpression of Glut1 and Glut3 in stage I nonsmall cell lung carcinoma is associated with poor survival

We report the electrophysiologic findings of myoclonus in a patient with Huntington's disease (HD). This patient was studied postoperatively after a bilateral fetal cell transplant in his striatum. Incomplete transient improvement was seen in the myoclonus, followed by gradual deterioration. The myoclonus itself had a cortical correlate and was associated with an enlarged somatosensory evoked potential (SEP), consistent with the presence of cortical reflex myoclonus. An enlarged SEP has not been previously reported in myoclonus associated with HD. The postulated mechanisms for myoclonus, when it occurs in HD, have differed in the literature. The reason for the transient improvement of the myoclonus following transplantation is unclear, but this case raises the possibility that basal ganglia circuits may modulate cortical myoclonic activity.     

Meckel''s diverticulum presenting as gastric outlet obstruction: case report

We report a case of gastric outlet obstruction simulating gastric antral neoplasm resulting from a perforated Meckel's diverticulum. Presentation of this nature has not been previously reported.     

Extracorporeal photochemotherapy (photopheresis) induces apoptosis in lymphocytes: a possible mechanism of action of PUVA therapy

The mechanism of action of psoralen plus UVA (PUVA) and photopheresis is not entirely understood. These therapies are assumed to be immunomodulating partly by gradually decreasing leukocyte viability. We investigated whether this delayed form of cell death was due to apoptosis. Untreated and treated (PUVA exposed) leukocytes obtained from six patients with systemic sclerosis and (untreated) leukocytes from healthy control individuals were studied. Qualitative gel electrophoresis and quantitative in situ nick translation analysis of DNA fragmentation was performed. Apoptosis of the treated cells did occur (gel electrophoresis) after 24 h. At t = 0 h, immediately after exposure to PUVA, there was no evidence of DNA fragmentation in the treated cells. The percentage of treated cells undergoing apoptosis was 20-55% at t = 24 h (in situ nick translation). The untreated leukocytes of the patients and the healthy individuals showed no distinctive rise in apoptotic cells. Apoptosis of the leukocytes after PUVA or photopheresis treatment might be a mechanism of action and might explain the therapeutic response.     

立达C60型梳棉机使用经验

介绍了一印度尼西亚纺纱厂使用瑞士立达机械工程公司生产的C60型梳棉机在环锭细纱操作方面运转性能和质量的经验。     

Metastatic carcinoma of the prostate mimicking primary carcinoid tumor of the lung and mediastinum

AIMS: To investigate the current use of thrombolytic therapy in the management of patients with acute myocardial infarction and to determine the potential for an increased use of thrombolysis or percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA). METHODS AND RESULTS: All hospitalised cases of acute myocardial infarction were identified in three health districts in the UK (population of 960,000) in patients under the age of 76 years during a 2-year period; 2439 patients had acute myocardial infarction, of whom 1264 (52%) received thrombolytic therapy. Failure to administer thrombolytic therapy was a result of the absence of diagnostic electrocardiograms in 712 (29.2%) patients, late presentation in 127 (5.2%), therapeutic error in 112 (4.6%), presence of a bleeding risk in 139 (5.7%) and other miscellaneous reasons in 80 (3.3%) patients. Thirty-eight of the 139 patients in whom bleeding risk was reported as a contra-indication could, in retrospect, have received thrombolytic therapy and a further 76 would have been suitable for primary PTCA. CONCLUSIONS: The potential for increasing the use of thrombolytic therapy seems to be limited and is unlikely to make a major impact on the in-hospital mortality from acute myocardial infarction. However, primary PTCA should be considered in those who are ineligible for thrombolysis because of bleeding risk as a contra-indication.     

Expression of smooth-muscle actin in cultured cells from human plasmacytoid myoepithelioma

BACKGROUND: Endoscopic sclerotherapy (ST), widely used as treatment of bleeding esophageal varices, might cause motility disturbances of the esophagus as well as mucosal damage. We performed this study to evaluate the long-term effects of repeated sclerotherapy on esophageal motility and mucosa. METHODS: Ten patients with liver cirrhosis and bleeding esophageal varices treated with repeated ST were evaluated after the last ST, median 52 months, by esophageal manometry and gastroscopy where forceps biopsies were taken. RESULTS: We found a significant difference in the distal esophageal sphincter intraabdominal length. The distal esophageal sphincter pressure was somewhat lower in the ST group although the difference did not reach statistical significance. There was infiltration of neutrophil leukocytes in biopsies from four patients and normal findings in the rest. CONCLUSIONS: Long-term follow-up evaluation showed statistically longer distal esophageal intraabdominal length in the ST group. No mucosal alterations were found at the histopathological investigation.     

Hydroxylation of salicylate by the in vitro diaphragm: evidence for hydroxyl radical production during fatigue

There is increasing evidence that oxygen-derived free radicals produced during strenuous work by the diaphragm may contribute to diaphragm fatigue and/or injury. However, the precise identity of these oxygen radicals remains unknown, inasmuch as oxygen free radicals are extremely short lived and their detection in biologic systems is quite difficult. There is recent evidence that the salicylate-trapping method may be a useful means of monitoring tissue production of hydroxyl radical (.OH). This method is predicated on the fact that salicylate's phenolic ring can be attacked by .OH at the 3 or 5 position to yield 2,3- or 2,5-dihydroxybenzoic acid (DHB). These metabolites are stable and can be identified by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled with electrochemical or ultraviolet detection. To test the hypothesis that hydroxylated salicylates are produced during diaphragm fatigue, we exposed in vitro rat diaphragm strips to a physiological saline solution containing 2.0 mM sodium salicylate for approximately 15 min. The solution was then removed, and the strips were fatigued (20 Hz, 200-ms train duration, 1 train/s) via phrenic nerve stimulation for 30 s-10 min. The diaphragm strips were subsequently homogenized, and the homogenate was analyzed by HPLC coupled with ultraviolet detection. Levels of 2,3-DHB were significantly higher in fatigued than in control nonfatigued strips. There was also a significant correlation between the amount of 2,3-DHB in the fatigued muscle and the accumulated tension-time product developed during fatigue. 2,5-DHB was not consistently identified in control or experimental strips.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)     

Evidence of visual processing negativity with attention to orientation and color in central space

The aim of this study was to determine whether the visual frontal processing negativity reported in our earlier paper (Karayanidis, F. and Michie, P.T. Electroenceph. clin. Neurophysiol., 1996, 99: 38-56) is related to selection of spatial location, or occurs regardless of the stimulus features used to define the target. Subjects were instructed to respond to infrequent target stimuli of a particular combination of orientation, color and size. All stimuli were presented at central fixation. Posteriorly, orientation selection enhanced P125 amplitude over the right hemisphere but neither orientation nor color selection had an effect on N190. Posterior selection negativities emerged for orientation, color and their conjunction. At anterior sites, widespread effects of orientation and color processing were evident. The effect of location selection on the anterior N1 seen in our previous study was not evident with orientation selection. Instead, selection of orientation, color and their conjunction resulted in P145-250 frontally. Two later anterior negativities emerged. The early negativity (vPNe) was affected independently by orientation and color selection while the late negativity (vPNl) was affected only by selection of feature conjunction. Thus, the present results show that, like its auditory counterpart, the visual processing negativity occurs with a variety of stimulus classification features and is not exclusively related to spatial selection.