Meningitis without Rash after Reactivation of Varicella Vaccine Strain in a 12-Year-Old Immunocompetent Boy.

Acute neurologic complications from Varicella-Zoster-Virus reactivation occur in both immunocompromised and immunocompetent patients. In this report, we describe a case of a previously healthy immunocompetent boy who had received two doses of varicella vaccine at 1 and 4 years. At the age of 12 he developed acute aseptic meningitis caused by vaccine-type varicella-zoster-virus without concomitant skin eruptions. VZV-vaccine strain DNA was detected in the cerebrospinal fluid. The patient made a full recovery after receiving intravenous acyclovir therapy. This disease course documents another case of a VZV vaccine-associated meningitis without development of a rash, i.e., a form of VZV infection manifesting as "zoster sine herpete".

Magnetic-Field-Induced Dielectric Anomalies in Cobalt-Containing Garnets.

Here we present a comparative study of the magnetic and crystal chemical properties of two Co2+ containing garnets. CaY2Co2Ge3O12 (which has been reported previously) and NaCa2Co2V3O12 both exhibit the onset of antiferromagnetic order around 6 K as well as field-induced transitions around 7 and 10 T, respectively, that manifest as anomalies in the dielectric properties of the material. We perform detailed crystal-chemistry analyses and complementary density functional theory calculations to show that very minor changes in the local environment of the Co ions explain the differences in the two magnetic structures and their respective properties.

Toward surfactant-free and water-free microemulsions.

It was recently demonstrated that a nano-clustering was present in the monophasic "pre-Ouzo" region of ternary liquid mixtures without surfactants. The goal of this work is to check if this nano-clustering is also present in the surfactant-free and water-free "green" microemulsions glycerol/ethanol/1-octanol and deep eutectic solvent/tetrahydrofurfuryl alcohol/diethyl adipate. The deep eutectic solvents used instead of water were ethylene glycol-choline chloride (molar ratio 4-1) and urea-choline chloride (molar ratio 2-1). To our knowledge this is the first time that deep eutectic solvents were used to formulate microemulsions. The surfactant-free and water-free microemulsions were studied using phase diagrams, dynamic light scattering, and small-angle X-ray scattering. The presence of aggregate fluctuations was demonstrated and they were found to be independent of molecular critical fluctuations, except when approaching the critical point where the critical phenomenon is superimposed to the signal. These structures have similarities to classical microemulsions but, in contrast to them, without having a sharp interface between the non-miscible phases, much as it was the case for systems previously investigated like water/ethanol/oil, where the oil was 1-octanol, fragrance molecules, or mosquito repellents.

Low-melting mixtures based on choline ionic liquids.

In this article a strategy is proposed for the design of low toxic, room temperature liquid low-melting mixtures (LMMs) which are entirely composed of natural materials. From literature it is well known that, in general, deep eutectic solvents based on choline chloride and dicarboxylic acids are LMMs, but not liquids at room temperature, with one exception: a 1 : 1 molar mixture of malonic acid and choline chloride. Therefore, the starting point of this study was the decrease of the melting point of one of the components, namely the dicarboxylic acid, which is succinic, glutaric or adipic acid. For this purpose, one of the two protons of the acidic group was exchanged by a bulky unsymmetrical choline cation. The resulting ionic liquids (ILs) were still solid at room temperature, but have a reduced melting temperature compared to the corresponding acids. In the second step, mixtures of these ILs with choline chloride were prepared. It turned out that choline glutarate-choline chloride mixtures are liquids at room temperature at compositions containing 95-98 wt% of choline glutarate. Finally, urea was added as another hydrogen bond donor. Density, conductivity and viscosity measurements were performed for all obtained mixtures. Moreover, a Walden plot was drawn which indicates that all mixtures are liquids with fully dissociated ions moving independently. Therefore, they are considered as "good" ionic liquids and, thus, for example they can be used to exchange more toxic or less biodegradable ILs in application processes. A brief outlook containing application possibilities is given. It is demonstrated that choline dodecylsulfate is readily soluble in these mixtures, forming aggregates in the LMM at temperatures exceeding 55 °C.