A MSFD complementary approach for the assessment of pressures, knowledge and data gaps in Southern European Seas: The PERSEUS experience.

PERSEUS project aims to identify the most relevant pressures exerted on the ecosystems of the Southern European Seas (SES), highlighting knowledge and data gaps that endanger the achievement of SES Good Environmental Status (GES) as mandated by the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). A complementary approach has been adopted, by a meta-analysis of existing literature on pressure/impact/knowledge gaps summarized in tables related to the MSFD descriptors, discriminating open waters from coastal areas. A comparative assessment of the Initial Assessments (IAs) for five SES countries has been also independently performed. The comparison between meta-analysis results and IAs shows similarities for coastal areas only. Major knowledge gaps have been detected for the biodiversity, marine food web, marine litter and underwater noise descriptors. The meta-analysis also allowed the identification of additional research themes targeting research topics that are requested to the achievement of GES.

Early onset of a nasal perivascular epithelioid cell neoplasm not related to tuberous sclerosis complex.

Perivascular epithelioid cell neoplasms are a group of rare tumours reported in various organs under a variety of designations. Such tumours are of interest primarily because of the distinctive morphology of their cell population and their immunoreactivity with melanocytic and myoid markers. There is a strong association between perivascular epithelioid cell neoplasms and tuberous sclerosis complex. Perivascular epithelioid cell neoplasms very rarely occur in the upper aero-digestive tract. To date only three cases of nasal perivascular epithelioid cell neoplasms have been reported in the literature. The present report refers to a 22-year old woman, without any stigmata of tuberous sclerosis complex, with early onset of a polypoid nasal mass with pathological and immunohistochemical features entirely compatible with those of a perivascular epithelioid cell neoplasm.

Shwachman-Diamond syndrome and type 1 diabetes mellitus: more than a chance association?

Shwachman-Diamond syndrome is a rare clinical condition consisting of exocrine pancreatic dysfunction, various degree of pancytopenia, and metaphyseal dysplasia. The majority of Shwachman-Diamond syndrome cases result from mutations in the Shwachman-Bodian-Diamond Syndrome gene. To date, type 1 diabetes mellitus has only been reported in 4 independent cases presenting with Shwachman-Diamond syndrome, 3 of them with molecular confirmation of the diagnosis. We describe 2 unrelated patients with clinical and molecular features typical of Shwachman-Diamond syndrome and type 1 diabetes mellitus. In addition, we report the occurrence rate of type 1 diabetes mellitus in the Italian registry for Shwachman-Diamond syndrome, which is low (3.23%) but increased at least 30-fold over the type 1 diabetes mellitus occurrence rate in the general population. No evidence of a direct correlation between Shwachman-Diamond syndrome and type 1 diabetes mellitus have been reported, therefore the presence of both diseases in the same patient might be a chance association, however we suggest that the defects in immune regulation of Shwachman-Diamond syndrome might play a role in the development of type 1 diabetes mellitus.

Isolation and characterization of halophilic Archaea able to produce biosurfactants.

Halotolerant microorganisms able to live in saline environments offer a multitude of actual or potential applications in various fields of biotechnology. This is why some strains of Halobacteria from an Algerian culture collection were screened for biosurfactant production in a standard medium using the qualitative drop-collapse test and emulsification activity assay. Five of the Halobacteria strains reduced the growth medium surface tension below 40 mN m(-1), and two of them exhibited high emulsion-stabilizing capacity. Diesel oil-in-water emulsions were stabilized over a broad range of conditions, from pH 2 to 11, with up to 35% sodium chloride or up to 25% ethanol in the aqueous phase. Emulsions were stable to three cycles of freezing and thawing. The components of the biosurfactant were determined; it contained sugar, protein and lipid. The two Halobacteria strains with enhanced biosurfactant producers, designated strain A21 and strain D21, were selected to identify by phenotypic, biochemical characteristics and by partial 16S rRNA gene sequencing. The strains have Mg(2+), and salt growth requirements are always above 15% (w/v) salts with an optimal concentration of 15-25%. Analyses of partial 16S rRNA gene sequences of the two strains suggested that they were halophiles belonging to genera of the family Halobacteriaceae, Halovivax (strain A21) and Haloarcula (strain D21). To our knowledge, this is the first report of biosurfactant production at such a high salt concentration.

Publication pattern of medical theses, France, 1993-98.

CONTEXT AND OBJECTIVE: In many countries, medical training must be completed by presentation of a thesis. We report publication patterns of French medical theses. MATERIALS: We drew a random sample of theses presented in the 36 French medical universities between 1 January 1993 and 31 December 1997. The sample was stratified according to size of university, and drawn from the CD-ROM Doc-Thèse. METHODS: We recorded the research area (medicine, surgery, biology) and study type (clinical, epidemiological, laboratory). We used the name of the student and supervisor to assess whether the thesis resulted in a publication indexed in MEDLINE. RESULTS: Most of the 300 theses included were from medicine (79.3%) and were clinical studies (69.3%). A total of 51 theses (17. 0%) resulted in publication. The proportion of theses which were published, the median impact factor of the journals in which they were published, the proportion of publications in English and the proportion of publications in which the name of the student was missing varied with the research domain and type of study. CONCLUSIONS: Most French medical theses are not made available to the scientific community. In the European context, where medical training and qualification have to be standardized, our study provides a simple method of assessing that publication objectives of thesis research are met. Further research is needed to explore the educational value of medical professional theses.

Cuerpo lúteo hemorrágico: oveja con piel de lobo / Haemorragic corpus luteum

Se presentan 11 pacientes con diagnóstico ecográfico presuntivo de hemorragia del cuerpo lúteo (HCL) en quienes se comprobó desaparición espontánea de la lesión en controles posteriores

A study of the performance of patients with frontal lobe lesions in a financial planning task.

It has long been argued that patients with lesions in the prefrontal cortex have difficulties in decision making and problem solving in real-world, ill-structured situations, particularly problem types involving planning and look-ahead components. Recently, several researchers have questioned our ability to capture and characterize these deficits adequately using just the standard neuropsychological test batteries, and have called for tests that reflect real-world task requirements more accurately. We present data from 10 patients with focal lesions to the prefrontal cortex and 10 normal control subjects engaged in a real-world financial planning task. We also introduce a theoretical framework and methodology developed in the cognitive science literature for quantifying and analysing the complex data generated by problem-solving tasks. Our findings indicate that patient performance is impoverished at a global level but not at the local level. Patients have difficulty in organizing and structuring their problem space. Once they begin problem solving, they have difficulty in allocating adequate effort to each problem-solving phase. Patients also have difficulty dealing with the fact that there are no right or wrong answers nor official termination points in real-world planning problems. They also find it problematic to generate their own feedback. They invariably terminate the session before the details are fleshed out and all the goals satisfied. Finally, patients do not take full advantage of the fact that constraints on real-world problems are negotiable. However, it is not necessary to postulate a 'planning' deficit. It is possible to understand the patients' difficulties in real world planning tasks in terms of the following four accepted deficits: inadequate access to 'structured event complexes', difficulty in generalizing from particulars, failure to shift between 'mental sets', and poor judgment regarding adequacy and completeness of a plan.

Doppler color transvaginal en tumores ováricos / Transvaginal color Doppler in ovarian tumors

Se estudiaron prospectivamente 31 pacientes con diagnóstico clínico y ultrasonográfico de tumor ovárico, mediante doppler color transvaginal; 24 tumores fueron benignos y 7 malignos: 4 borderline en estado I, 1 cistoadenocarcinoma en estadio IA y 2 adenocarcinoma III. Seis tumores malignos presentaron índices de resistencia IR entre 0,17 y 0,55 y en un borderline, no se logró registrar señal vascular. La posibilidad de malignidad fue aumentando en la medida que el IR iba descendiendo, desde 60 por ciento con IR bajo 0,60, hasta 100 por ciento con bajo IR bajo 0,40

Evacuación de colecciones pelvianas por vía transabdominal: casos clínicos / Pelvis collections evacuation by transabdominal way: clinical cases

Se presentan dos casos clínicos de colecciones pelvianas de diferente etiología, ingresados a la Unidad de Aislamiento del Servicio de Ginecología y Obstetricia del Hospital del Salvador, resueltos ambos por punción bajo visión ecográfica transabdominal; el primero un absceso tuboovárico, en el cual se dejó drenaje percutáneo y el segundo un quíste lúteo residual (post embarazo ectópico operado) puncionado. En el primer caso (absceso tuboovárico) la paciente se embaraza a los dos meses post punción con evolución fisiológica actual. En el segundo caso la paciente está clínicamente asintomática a la fecha, post procedimiento

Importancia del somatotipo del feto en la estimación de su peso / Importance of the fetal somatotype in the weight prediction

Se estudia el error en la predicción del peso fetal en una población de 183 fetos, mediante 6 fórmulas desarrolladas por diversos autores. Al agrupar los fetos según el índice ponderal: longitud femoral/diámetro abdominal, se observan diferencias significativas en la cuantía del error producido por cada una de las ecuaciones analizadas