Gallbladder varices: diagnosis in children with portal hypertension on duplex sonography.

We established the prevalence of gallbladder varices (GBVs) as seen on duplex sonogram of children with portal hypertension. Fifty-five consecutive children with portal hypertension underwent duplex sonographic examination by an experienced sonologist who was blinded to clinical presentation. Forty children had extrahepatic portovenous obstruction (EHPVO), 12 had cirrhosis, and three had noncirrhotic portal hypertension. GBVs were seen on sonography in 10 of 40 children with EHPVO (25%), two of 12 children with cirrhosis (16.6%), and no children with noncirrhotic portal hypertension. Sonographic findings of GBVs were confirmed on duplex sonographic imaging. Among patients with EHPVO, GBVs did not correlate with size of esophageal varices, number of sessions of sclerotherapy, presence or absence of gastric varices, portal gastropathy, or splenorenal shunt placement. In cirrhotic patients, GBVs did not correlate with Child Pugh grade. Children with EHPVO have a higher incidence of developing GBVs. The clinical significance of GBVs is their propensity to bleed during biliary surgery; thus, the operating surgeon should be made aware of them.

Asymptomatic spinal tuberculosis presenting as esophageal stricture.

Esophageal tuberculosis is rare and is usually due to secondary extension from contiguous structures. We report a patient who presented with dysphagia and was found to have esophageal stricture. Endoscopic biopsy was not suggestive of malignancy or tuberculosis. CT scan of the thorax revealed involvement of the fourth thoracic vertebra with paratracheal lymphadenopathy. The patient responded to anti-tubercular therapy.

Esophageal tuberculosis with intramural pseudodiverticulosis.

Esophageal tuberculosis is rare, and its association with intramural pseudodiverticulosis is not widely appreciated. We report a patient with dysphagia who proved to have esophageal narrowing, mediastinal lymphadenopathy, and intramural pseudodiverticulosis. Results of endoscopy and biopsy were nonspecific, but biopsy of the supraclavicular node showed histology consistent with tuberculosis. The patient experienced a dramatic response to antitubercular therapy, with resolution of the esophageal narrowing, mediastinal lymphadenopathy, and esophageal intramural pseudodiverticulosis.

Characterization of photothermal flowering responses in maturity isolines of soyabean [Glycine max (L.) Merrill] cv. Clark.

All eight isolines of three maturity genes (E(1)/e(1), E(2)/e(2), and E(3)/e(3)) of soyabean [Glycine max (L.) Merrill] cv. Clark were grown in widely different combinations of photoperiod and temperature. Under the more inductive conditions, i.e. in a warm mean temperature (30 degrees C) when daylengths were less than the critical value (i.e. less than about 13 h), the isolines flowered at similar times (23-24 d). The responses of all isolines to temperature were also similar, if not identical. Increase in daylength above the critical photoperiod progressively delayed flowering until the time taken to flower (f) reached a maximum at the ceiling photoperiod. The relations between the rate of progress towards flowering (1/f) and photoperiod (between the critical and ceiling values) were linear. The coefficient characterizing the slope of the response (photoperiod sensitivity) varied amongst the isolines. These responses could be grouped into three categories of increasing sensitivity: (1) least sensitive, e(1)e(2)e(3), e(1)E(2)e(3), e(1)e(2)E(3); (2) intermediate, E(1)e(2)e(3), e(1)E(2)E(3), and (3) most sensitive, E(1)E(2)e(3), E(1)e(2)E(3), E(1)E(2)E(3). Thus, in the Clark cultivar genetic background, E(1) induces greater photoperiod sensitivity but neither E(2) nor E(3) on their own have any effect. However, both E(2) and E(3) together induce photoperiod sensitivity comparable to that induced by E(1) alone. Furthermore, in addition to this epistasis, either E(2) or E(3) has considerable epistatic effect on E(1), further increasing photoperiod sensitivity. The effects of these genes and their epistasis were also reflected in the extent of the maximum delays to flowering which occur when the ceiling photoperiod is exceeded, and also possibly in earliness in circumstances when photoperiods were below the critical value.

Variation in the durations of the photoperiod-sensitive and photoperiod-insensitive phases of development to flowering among eight maturity isolines of soyabean [Glycine max (L.) Merrill].

In soyabean [Glycine max (L.) Merrill] the period between sowing and flowering is comprised of three successive developmental phases--pre-inductive, inductive and post-inductive--in which the rate of development is affected, respectively, by temperature only, by photoperiod and temperature, and then again by temperature only. A reciprocal-transfer experiment (carried out at a mean temperature of 25 degrees C) in which cohorts of plants were transferred successively between short and long photoperiods and vice-versa showed that eight combinations of three pairs of maturity alleles (E(1)/e(1), E(2)/e(2), E(3)/e(3)) had their greatest effect on the duration of the inductive phase in long days. This phase was increased with the increasing photoperiod sensitivity induced by the different gene combinations, and ranged from about 27 to 54 d according to genotype. In a short day regime (11.5 h d(-1)), less than the critical photoperiod, the duration of the inductive phase was brief-requiring about 11 photoperiodic cycles in the less photoperiod-sensitive genotypes and only about seven cycles in the more sensitive ones. The maturity genes also affected the duration of the two photoperiod-insensitive phases; these durations were positively correlated with the photoperiod-sensitivity potential of the gene combinations. The largest effect was on the pre-inductive phase which varied from 3 to 11 d, while the post-inductive phase varied from about 13 to 18 d. As a consequence of these nonphotoperiodic effects of the maturity genes, even in the most inductive regimes (daylengths less than the critical photoperiod) the time taken to flower by the less photoperiod-sensitive combinations of maturity genes was somewhat less than in the more sensitive combinations-ranging from about 28 to 34 d. The genetic and practical implications of these findings are discussed.