Gliomatosis cerebri and Rasmussen's encephalitis: Two different entities causing refractory epilepsy. Comparison through two clinical cases.

BACKGROUND AND IMPORTANCE: Rasmussen's Encephalitis (RE) is a chronic and progressive childhood disease caused by an inflammatory disorder that affects a cerebral hemisphere. On the other hand, Gliomatosis Cerebri (GC) is a rare primary neoplastic glial process with a diffuse and infiltrative growth. CLINICAL PRESENTATION: We present two clinical cases with a history of continuous focal epilepsy refractory to antiepileptic drugs. They share similar clinical and radiologic features, but a different histopathological diagnosis. A brain biopsy was needed to distinguish GC from a RE. CONCLUSION: The debut of a drug-resistant epilepsy with focal seizures and an ipsilateral progressive hemiparesis suggests the diagnosis of RE. However, there are other entities such as GC, which, despite its rarity, should be considered in the differential diagnosis. So, in some cases, histological diagnosis is needed.

Biosynthesis of lead nanoparticles by the aquatic water fern, Salvinia minima Baker, when exposed to high lead concentration.

Salvinia minima Baker is a small floating aquatic fern that is efficient for the removal and storage of heavy metals such as lead and cadmium. In this study, we report that lead removal by S. minima causes large accumulation of lead inside the cells in the form of nanoparticles (PbNPs). The accumulation pattern of lead was analyzed in both, submerged root-like modified fronds (here named "roots"), and in its aerial leaf-like fronds ("leaves"). Analysis by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) confirmed the biosynthesis of PbNPs by the plant. In both, roots and leaves, PbNPs were found to accumulate almost exclusively at the cell wall and closely associated to the cell membrane. Two types of PbNPs shapes were found in cells of both tissues, those associated to the cell wall were quasi-spherical with 17.2±4.2 nm of diameter, while those associated to the cell membrane/cytoplasm were elongated. Elongated particles were 53.7±29.6 nm in length and 11.1±2.4 nm wide. Infrared spectroscopy (IR) results indicate that cellulose, lignin and pectin are the major components that may be acting as the reducing agents for lead ions; these findings strongly suggest the potential use of this fern to further explore the bio-assisted synthesis of heavy metal nanostructures.

Support vector machine-based feature extractor for L/H transitions in JET.

Support vector machines (SVM) are machine learning tools originally developed in the field of artificial intelligence to perform both classification and regression. In this paper, we show how SVM can be used to determine the most relevant quantities to characterize the confinement transition from low to high confinement regimes in tokamak plasmas. A set of 27 signals is used as starting point. The signals are discarded one by one until an optimal number of relevant waveforms is reached, which is the best tradeoff between keeping a limited number of quantities and not loosing essential information. The method has been applied to a database of 749 JET discharges and an additional database of 150 JET discharges has been used to test the results obtained.

Classifier based on support vector machine for JET plasma configurations.

The last flux surface can be used to identify the plasma configuration of discharges. For automated recognition of JET configurations, a learning system based on support vector machines has been developed. Each configuration is described by 12 geometrical parameters. A multiclass system has been developed by means of the one-versus-the-rest approach. Results with eight simultaneous classes (plasma configurations) show a success rate close to 100%.

[Protective effect of glutamine on microcirculation of the intestine in experimental colitis]. / Protektiver Effekt von Glutamin auf die Mikrozirkulation des Darms bei experimenteller Colitis.

Parenteral glutamine application can stabilize intestinal permeability and mucosal integrity. It is not known whether glutamine influences the microcirculation in the large intestine. This study thus employs intravital microscopy to investigate mucosal microcirculation in the ascending and descending Colon of Sprague-Dawley rats with TNBS colitis. The animals were randomized and treated with either saline solution (placebo) or glutamine (verum). In the severely inflamed descending colon, TNBS colitis involves a significant capillary blood flow reduction that is not improved by glutamine application. Though the ascending colon shows only a mild inflammatory reaction, its microcirculation is likewise significantly reduced. Here glutamine therapy is associated with an increase in capillary blood flow, indicating that it has a protective effect on the microcirculation of the secondarily involved intestinal segment.