Effects of two alar base suture techniques suture techniques on nasolabial changes after bimaxillary orthognathic surgery in Taiwanese patients with class III malocclusions.

A randomized controlled trial was designed to assess the effectiveness of two alar base cinch techniques on the changes in nasolabial morphology after bimaxillary orthognathic surgery. Sixty patients requiring a Le Fort I osteotomy to correct skeletal discrepancies were selected randomly to receive either conventional or modified alar base cinching during the intraoral wound closure procedure. Conventional cinching passed through nasalis muscle and anterior nasal spine. Modified cinching also passed through dermis tissue to increase the anchorage. Postoperative hard and soft tissue changes were evaluated using cone beam computed tomography and three-dimensional stereophotogrammetry at predefined time points. Forty-eight patients with a skeletal class III malocclusion were included. In the conventional group, there was an increase of 0.31 ± 1.31 mm in nasal width and an increase of 0.97 ± 1.60mm in columellar length. In the modified group, there was an increase of 0.81 ± 1.87 mm in the cutaneous height of the upper lip and a decrease of 0.76 ± 1.56 mm in lower prolabial width. Patients with an initial narrow nasal width, alar base width, and less vertical nostril show were more susceptible to a greater degree of change after surgery. Both alar base suture techniques are effective at controlling nasolabial form changes resulting from class III dual-jaw orthognathic surgery.

Thermally stable silver nanoparticles formed on a zeolite surface show multiple crystal twinning.

Surface templated and supported silver nanoparticles form on silver-exchanged mineral chabazite upon thermal reduction. The method generates high concentrations of thermostable, uniform silver nanoparticulates that may have applications as catalysts. Properties of such nanoparticles are expected to vary with particle size, composition, metallic character, defect type and density. We establish that these silver nanoparticles are metallic, crystalline and highly twinned. The twinned nature of the particles may influence both their remarkable thermal stability and their enhanced chemical and biological activity.

XPS characterization of silver exchanged ETS-10 and mordenite molecular sieves.

Silver exchanged molecular sieves ETS-10 (Ag-ETS-10) and mordenite (Ag-mordenite) were dehydrated under vacuum at temperatures between 100 degrees C-350 degrees C. Changes in the state of the silver were studied using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Silver cations in titanosilicate Ag-ETS-10 are fully reduced to Ag(0) at temperatures as low as 150 degrees C. The characteristic features of the XPS spectrum of silver in this Ag-ETS-10 species correspond to only metallic silver. The signal for metallic silver is not observed in the XPS spectrum of aluminosilicate Ag-mordenite, indicating that silver cations are not reduced, even after heating to 350 degrees C.

Genetic influences on the difference in variability of height, weight and body mass index between Caucasian and East Asian adolescent twins.

OBJECTIVE: Twin studies are useful for investigating the causes of trait variation between as well as within a population. The goals of the present study were two-fold: First, we aimed to compare the total phenotypic, genetic and environmental variances of height, weight and BMI between Caucasians and East Asians using twins. Secondly, we intended to estimate the extent to which genetic and environmental factors contribute to differences in variability of height, weight and BMI between Caucasians and East Asians. DESIGN: Height and weight data from 3735 Caucasian and 1584 East Asian twin pairs (age: 13-15 years) from Australia, China, Finland, Japan, the Netherlands, South Korea, Taiwan and the United States were used for analyses. Maximum likelihood twin correlations and variance components model-fitting analyses were conducted to fulfill the goals of the present study. RESULTS: The absolute genetic variances for height, weight and BMI were consistently greater in Caucasians than in East Asians with corresponding differences in total variances for all three body measures. In all 80 to 100% of the differences in total variances of height, weight and BMI between the two population groups were associated with genetic differences. CONCLUSION: Height, weight and BMI were more variable in Caucasian than in East Asian adolescents. Genetic variances for these three body measures were also larger in Caucasians than in East Asians. Variance components model-fitting analyses indicated that genetic factors contributed to the difference in variability of height, weight and BMI between the two population groups. Association studies for these body measures should take account of our findings of differences in genetic variances between the two population groups.