Peritumoural haematoma and meningioma: a common tumour with an uncommon presentation

Spontaneous peritumoural haemorrhage in meningiomas is a rare but serious complication with a grave prognosis. It occurs at the interface between the tumour and the parenchyma, either from the tumour surface or the cortical vessels in association with it. Although several pathophysiologic mechanisms for this complication have been proposed, they all remain speculative. We report a 72-year-old female who presented with sudden onset of headache and a left homonymous hemianopia. Neuroimaging revealed a parasagittal meningioma at the posterior third of the superior sagittal sinus with peritumoural intracerebral haematoma, 1 cm away from the tumour. An uncomplicated gross total excision of the meningioma and aspiration of the haematoma was achieved through a craniotomy. The postoperative course was uneventful with an excellent clinical out-come. Possible mechanisms for this unusual complication are discussed. We emphasise the importance of prompt diagnosis and simultaneous excision of the tumour and aspiration of the haematoma as prerequisites for a favourable outcome. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Breast Cancer and Biomedical Informatics: The PrognoChip Project

Abstract- Breast cancer is the most common malignancy affecting women, the life time risk being approximately 10%. Breast cancer is both genetically and histopathologically heterogeneous, and the underling development mechanisms remain largely unknown. Global expression analysis using microarrays offers unprecedented opportunities to obtain molecular signatures of the state of activity of diseased cells and patient samples. The predictive power of this approach is much greater than that of currently used approaches, but remains to be validated in prospective clinical studies. The PrognoChip project is based on the synergy between Bioinformatics and Medical Informatics, following the lines of the new raising discipline of Biomedical Informatics. In this context we are moving towards the specification and creation of an Integrated Clinico-Genomics Information Technology Environment (ICG-ITE) where, the smooth integration between the clinical and the genomics worlds as well as the intelligent processing of the underlying data, enables the identification of reliable and clinically valid (i.e., in terms of prognosis) molecular (gene) markers

Combining nonmonotonic knowledge bases with external sources

Abstract. The developments in information technology during the last decade have been rapidly changing the possibilities for data and knowledge access. To respect this, several declarative knowledge representation formalisms have been extended with the capability to access data and knowledge sources that are external to a knowledge base. This article reviews some of these formalisms that are centered around Answer Set Programming, viz. HEX-programs, modular logic programs, and multi-context systems, which were developed by the KBS group of the Vienna University of Technology in cooperation with external colleagues. These formalisms were designed with different principles and four different settings, and thus have different properties and features; however, as argued, they are not unrelated. Furthermore, they provide a basis for advanced knowledge-based information systems, which are targeted in ongoing research projects.

Rules and ontologies for the Semantic Web

Abstract. Rules and ontologies play a key role in the layered architecture of the Semantic Web, as they are used to ascribe meaning to, and to reason about, data on the Web. While the Ontology Layer of the Semantic Web is quite developed, and the Web Ontology Language (OWL) is a W3C recommendation since a couple of years already, the rules layer is far less developed and an active area of research; a number of initiatives and proposals have been made so far, but no standard as been released yet. Many implementations of rule engines are around which deal with Semantic Web data in one or another way. This article gives a comprehensive, although not exhaustive, overview of such systems, describes their supported languages, and sets them in relation with theoretical approaches for combining rules and ontologies as foreseen in the Semantic Web architecture. In the course of this, we identify desired properties and common features of rule languages and evaluate existing systems against their support. Furthermore, we review technical problems underlying the integration of rules and ontologies, and classify representative proposals for theoretical integration approaches into different categories.