Cervical lymph nodes metastases from a pituitary carcinoma

Ipratropium bromide is a synthetic derivative of atropine with little absorption when used in inhalation, and therefore little secondary effects. The authors review its pharmacological properties and therapeutic efficacy in the treatment of asthma in children. Combined nebulized inhalation of ipratropium bromide and beta 2 sympathomimetic results in a more efficient and more sustained bronchodilatation than beta 2 sympathicomimetic alone in the treatment of acute asthma in children. Ipratropium bromide should be usefully introduced in the therapeutic scheme of acute asthma in children. Further studies will be necessary in order to determine its efficacy and tolerance in infants.     

Clinical and experimental studies of intraoperative autotransfusion using a new filtration device

The Haemocell S-350 device has recently been introduced for intraoperative autotransfusion. The system uses a novel membrane filter to process shed blood. In the first part of this study a 0.2-micron pore size filter was used in a randomized trial comparing the use of autotransfusion (n = 8) with bank blood controls (n = 9) during aortic reconstruction. This part of the trial was abandoned because of unexpected non-surgical bleeding. Bank blood requirements fell from a median of 3.0 (range 0.0-9.0) units to 1.5 (range 0.0-7.0) units when autotransfusion was used, but these patients had a greater perioperative blood loss (1791 (range 932-3104) versus 1140 (range 440-3840) ml). There was evidence of postoperative heparin excess with an activated partial thromboplastin time ratio of 1.3 (range 0.9-3.0) versus 1.0 (range 1.0-1.2) in controls and an activated clotting time of 206 (range 143-280) versus 137 (range 107-142) s. This was confirmed by raised plasma heparin levels and a prolonged thrombin time normalized by protamine. To improve performance a 0.6-micron pore size filter was studied in ten patients. Filtration efficiency doubled from 19 to 38 per cent. Electron micrographs demonstrated better filter clearance, but 44 per cent of the original concentration of heparin remained in the reinfusate. The S-350 device may be an attractive alternative to centrifugation for intraoperative autotransfusion but, until efficiency is improved, it should only be used for cardiovascular surgery when excess heparin can be reversed with protamine.     

Influence of the silicon surface treatment by plasma etching and scratching on the nucleation of diamond grown in HFCVD - a comparative study

A comparative study for the nucleation of diamond was carried out using surface treatment like (i) surface scratching with 1 μm diamond paste and (ii) surface etching using chlorine plasma at different RF powers (50, 100 and 150 W). Atomic force microscopic study shows variation in roughness from 31 nm to 110 nm. Scratching results in random scratches, whereas plasma etches a surface uniformly. Scanning electron microscopic observations show well faceted crystallites with a predominance of angular shaped grains corresponding to 〈100〉 and 〈110〉 crystallite surfaces for the scratched as well as plasma etched substrate. Surface etching at 150 W plasma power results in a better growth in comparison with 50 and 100 W plasma powers. Chlorine-radical is found responsible for the changes in the growth morphology. Raman spectroscopy shows a sharp peak at 1,332 cm⁻¹ and a peak at ∼1,580 cm⁻¹ for both samples.     

Biology and pathology of Schistosoma mansoni and Schistosoma japonicum infections in several strains of nude mice

Schistosoma mansoni and S. japonicum infections in nude mice (nu/nu) were compared with infections in nu/+ heterozygotes or intact mice. Seven to 12 weeks after exposure to S. mansoni, the responses of Swiss NCR, C3H, BALB/c and C57B1/6 nude mice did not differ substantially. Nude mice of all these strains showed minute granulomas around eggs in the liver and minimal hepatic fibrosis. Microvesicular and necrotizing changes in hepatocytes were similar in all mouse strains, and S. mansoni infections were frequently lethal to nude, but not to intact mice between the seventh and ninth weeks of infection. Nude mice that survived the ninth week of infection generally lived until the 12th week. The number of eggs per mature worm pair in the tissues of S. mansoni-infected nude mice was similar to the number in intact mice, but nude mice passed fewer eggs in the feces. Nude mice that received serum from infected intact mice excreted eggs in the stool in numbers equivalent to intact mice, but continued to form minute granulomas around S. mansoni eggs. Reconstitution with fetal thymus or with splenocytes from normal or S. mansoni-infected mice partially or completely restored hepatic granuloma size, granuloma eosinophils, hepatic fibrosis, and excretion of eggs in the feces. In contrast to S. mansoni infection, S. japonicum infections in nude mice did not cause necrosis of hepatocytes or excessive mortality, and S. japonicum eggs were passed in the feces in numbers equivalent to those passed by infected intact mice.     

Dynamic Testing of Prestressed Concrete Bridges and Numerical Verification

This paper describes different dynamic tests carried out on three bridges, B14, B15, and B13, over highway E19, which connects Brussels and Antwerpen in Belgium. Different excitation types are considered: a drop weight, a heavy truck on the bridge, and ambient vibrations mainly due to the traffic under the bridge. Finite-element models are constructed to support and verify the dynamic measurements. The modal parameters are extracted from the response time series using the data dependent system approach. A vector autoregressive model is developed and successfully applied to the measured responses in time domain. Good correlation between the finite-element simulations and the experiments is obtained.     

Radiation doses in the population of the coastal area of the Kakhovsk Water Reservoir

Central and cerebral hemodynamics was studied using echocardiography and transcranial dopplerography in 200 poststroke patients over 60 in the course of 5-year follow-up. It was established that cardiac hypodynamic syndrome, i.e. continuous or paroxysmal fall of minute blood volume below 3 l, is the most significant contributing factor in the onset of cerebral ischemia. Drugs are recommended for prevention of ischemic stroke. Those lowering cardiac hemodynamic reserve should be excluded in patients at high risk of acute failure of cerebral circulation.     

Effect of different rates of N-fertilizers on nodulation, nodule activities and growth of two field grown cvs. of soybean

The effect of N fertilizers on nodulation, nitrogenase, nitrate reductase activities and growth of two cultivars of soybean, Clark and Crauford was evaluated in a field experiment. KNO₃ or NH₄Cl were applied 27 days after planting at 0,16, 32, 64 and 128 kg N/ha. Nodulation and growth of both cultivars significantly increased when N was applied at low levels whereas specific N₂-ase activity (SNA) slightly and insignificantly increased. Cv Crauford showed a greater positive response than cv. Clark. Higher rates of KNO₃ and NH₄Cl (128 kg N/ha) significantly depressed nodulation and SNA but slightly decreased the plant dry matter. Cv. Crauford was more tolerant to N fertilizers than cv. Clark. The decline in SNA was ascribed to increased nitrate reductase activity (NRA) and higher accumulation of nitrites in nodule cytosol. NRA and nitrate contents in nodules of cv. Clark were greater than that in cv. Crauford. Results showed that NH₄ ⁺ is the preferred N source with occasional increases in nodule number and weight. This study provides an evidence for the nodulation and growth variability of soybean cultivars fertilized with different levels of N. The results also suggest that diminishing NRA could contribute to increased N₂ fixation and the interaction between NO₃ ^– assimilation and N₂ fixation is strongly dependent on the plant cultivar.     

Feature Selection and Extraction Methods for Power Systems Transient Stability Assessment Employing Computational Intelligence Techniques

One of the important aspects in achieving better performance for transient stability assessment (TSA) of power systems employing computational intelligence (CI) techniques is by incorporating feature reduction techniques. For small power system the number of features may be small but when larger systems are considered the number of features increased as the size of the systems increases. Apart from employing faster CI techniques to achieve faster and accurate TSA of power system, feature reduction techniques are needed in reducing the input features while preserving the needed information so as to make faster training of the CI technique. This paper presents feature reductions techniques used, namely correlation analysis and principle component analysis, in reducing number of input features presented to two CI techniques for TSA, namely probabilistic neural network (PNN) and least squares support vector machines (LS-SVM). The proposed feature reduction techniques are implemented and tested on the IEEE 39-bus test system and 87-bus Malaysia’s power system. Numerical results are presented to demonstrate the performance of the feature reduction techniques and its effects on the accuracies and time taken for training the two CI techniques.     

Observations of slip patterns on the surface of fatigued gold using the scanning tunnelling microscope

Observations of fatigue-induced slip patterns on the surface of polycrystalline gold (+99.9%) using the scanning tunnelling microscope (STM) are presented. The samples were cycled in four-point bending between zero and 0.0025 strain for 250 and 2500 cycles. STM observations of the sample fatigued for 250 cycles revealed broad slip bands 0.38–0.69 m wide containing narrow slip bands 0.015–0.123 m wide and fine slip lines 0.006 m wide. The depth of these features are 20–57 nm for broad slip bands, 3–7 nm for narrow slip bands, and approximately 2–4 nm for fine slip lines. The sample fatigued for 2500 cycles showed similar values for the width of the slip bands and slip lines except that their depth was increased by a factor of between 2 and 4 times for the narrow slip bands and the fine slip lines. Apparent persistent slip bands (PSBs) spaced 2.4 m, 300–500 nm deep were also observed. These results demonstrate that STM is a significant new tool for observing and distinguishing various types of fatigue-induced surface slip patterns on suitably prepared samples. The vertical resolution obtained with STM is vastly superior to current SEM and TEM methods.     

A 2-D five-noded finite element to model power singularity

A 2-D five-noded finite element which contains a singularity is developed. The new element is compatible with cubic standard isoparametric elements. The main advantage of using cubic isoparametric elements over quadratic elements is to reduce the number of elements required to model a structure for results of comparable accuracy. The element is tested on two different examples. In the first example, an edge crack problem is analyzed using two different meshes. The second example is a crack perpendicular to the interface problem which is solved for two different specific composites. The results obtained using the proposed element are compared with those obtained using other existing elements in the literature. Those comparisons demonstrate the superiority of the present technique in using less number of elements and nodes to produce accurate results.