The Context of the Teaching Methods of Full Communicative Competence in English of the 11th Grade Teachers of the Middle Technical - Vocational Institutes in the Province of Cabinda (Angola)

The objective of this article is to analyse the context of teaching methods of English as a foreign language of English teachers of 11th grade of the Middle Technical - Vocational Institutes of Cabinda (Angola). This work consists of understanding why students do not learn full communicative competence in English, the reasons why students study this subject for two years in tenth and eleventh grade at school and three years in seventh to ninth grade but do not speak, do not read and cant even understand a simple request. They finish their studies without acquiring necessary linguistic competence in English. However, it is known that the role of the teacher is to guide the students to build their knowledge to orient their social lives. The results of the research show that teachers mostly use grammar translation methods, and they dont use other pedagogical resources such as publicity posters which would help students to acquire the necessary linguistic communicative competences.</jats:p

Identification of novel chromosomal abnormalities and prognostic cytogenetics markers in intracranial pediatric ependymoma

Aim of this study was to search for novel chromosomal imbalances and potential prognostic markers in pediatric ependymoma. Tumor DNA, obtained from 20 children with intracranial ependymoma (World Health Organization WHO grades 11 and 111), was analyzed using metaphase-based comparative genomic hybridization (CGH) and fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH). The novel copy number aberrations (CNAs) here identified are (i) 4q33-qter loss, (ii) 10q25.2-q26.3 gain, (iii) 3q23-qter losses, (iv) 18q22.2 loss, and (v) 19p 13. 1-p 13.3 gain. The combined presence of 6p22-pter and 13q14.3-qter losses predicted significantly reduced survival. Larger studies are warranted to validate these findings. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved

A 5-Year-Old Child with a Deep Neck Abscess Complicated by Laryngeal Obstruction

Deep neck space infections (DNSI) are defined as infections in the potential spaces and fascial planes of the neck. We show the clinical case of a retro and para-pharyngeal abscess in a healthy 5-year-old child complicated by compression and dislocation of the larynx with marked airway caliber reduction and potentially fatal extension up to the mediastinal aditus. DNSI can occur at any age and, due to its rapid progression, requires immediate treatment in children. In healthy children, concurrent abscesses in separate neck spaces are rare. DNSI recurrence should alert the physician to the possibility of a congenital problem, and if imaging fails, laryngoscopy may be the best diagnostic technique

Bilateral renal artery stenosis treated with drug-eluting balloon angioplasty in unique treatment

Renal artery stenosis commonly manifests with hypertension refractory to medical treatment. We report a case of renal artery stenosis occurring in a 19-year-old female patient who presented with extremely high blood pressure and bilateral renal stenosis at the duplex ultrasound. Renal angiography confirmed the bilateral and irregular stenosis due to fibromuscular dysplasia, associated to extent collaterals suppling the poststenotic right renal artery. Therefore, angioplasty with drug-eluting balloon was performed in order to obtain a good vessel patency and to improve patency in the long term follow-up. After the endovascular treatment the blood pressure improved markedly, maintaining this result at 12 months follow-up at clinical examination and duplex ultrasound. Keywords: Bilateral renal artery stenosis, Fibromuscular dysplasi

Craniosynostosis, hydrocephalus, Chiari I malformation and radioulnar synostosis: Probably a new syndrome

We report on clinical and molecular findings of two brothers that both presented with sagittal craniosynostosis, hydrocephalus, Chiari I malformation, blepharophimosis, small low-set ears, hypoplastic philtrum, radioulnar synostosis, kidney malformation, and hypogenitalism. Their father presented mild brachydactyly. Conventional cytogenetic and array CGH screening did not show any chromosomal gains or losses. Furthermore, molecular genetic screening of genes involved in different craniosynostosis syndromes, namely FGFR1, FGFR2, FGFR3, TWIST, RECQL4, and POR genes failed to detect any mutations in genomic DNA. The unique range of clinical manifestations in these two patients and the negative findings of the molecular genetic screening suggest the hypothesis of a previously unrecognized syndrome

TP53 codon 72 polymorphism may predict early tumour progression in paediatric pilocytic astrocytoma

International audiencePilocytic astrocytoma and ganglioglioma may occur in inaccessible or surgically difficult areas. In case of incomplete resection, the availability of biological predictors of tumour progression could be particularly important. To this end, an analysis of p53 codon 72 polymorphism and assessment of its role as prognostic marker were performed. The status of the p53 Arg72Pro polymorphism was evaluated by pyrosequencing method in a multicenter cohort of 170 paediatric patients. Genotype/phenotype associations were investigated either by means of bivariate or multivariate analyses. In the partially resected pilocytic astrocytomas, the Arg/Arg variant predicts early tumour progression (median survival time: 23.1 months) and is associated with poor event-free survival (p value = 0.0009). This finding remains true also in case of adjuvant therapies, with a 5-year event-free survival of 30.6% for cases with Arg/Arg variant vs. 78.7% for those with other genotypes. There is no association between ganglioglioma and the polymorphism. The assessment of Arg/Arg variant could improve the management of pilocytic astrocytoma. TP53 codon 72 analysis could distinguish low-risk cases, in which surgery could be conservative, from high-risk cases needing an aggressive surgery plan

Molecular fingerprinting reflects different histotypes and brain region in low grade gliomas

BACKGROUND: Paediatric low-grade gliomas (LGGs) encompass a heterogeneous set of tumours of different histologies, site of lesion, age and gender distribution, growth potential, morphological features, tendency to progression and clinical course. Among LGGs, Pilocytic astrocytomas (PAs) are the most common central nervous system (CNS) tumours in children. They are typically well-circumscribed, classified as grade I by the World Health Organization (WHO), but recurrence or progressive disease occurs in about 10-20% of cases. Despite radiological and neuropathological features deemed as classic are acknowledged, PA may present a bewildering variety of microscopic features. Indeed, tumours containing both neoplastic ganglion and astrocytic cells occur at a lower frequency. METHODS: Gene expression profiling on 40 primary LGGs including PAs and mixed glial-neuronal tumours comprising gangliogliomas (GG) and desmoplastic infantile gangliogliomas (DIG) using Affymetrix array platform was performed. A biologically validated machine learning workflow for the identification of microarray-based gene signatures was devised. The method is based on a sparsity inducing regularization algorithm l1l2 that selects relevant variables and takes into account their correlation. The most significant genetic signatures emerging from gene-chip analysis were confirmed and validated by qPCR. RESULTS: We identified an expression signature composed by a biologically validated list of 15 genes, able to distinguish infratentorial from supratentorial LGGs. In addition, a specific molecular fingerprinting distinguishes the supratentorial PAs from those originating in the posterior fossa. Lastly, within supratentorial tumours, we also identified a gene expression pattern composed by neurogenesis, cell motility and cell growth genes which dichotomize mixed glial-neuronal tumours versus PAs. Our results reinforce previous observations about aberrant activation of the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway in LGGs, but still point to an active involvement of TGF-beta signaling pathway in the PA development and pick out some hitherto unreported genes worthy of further investigation for the mixed glial-neuronal tumours. CONCLUSIONS: The identification of a brain region-specific gene signature suggests that LGGs, with similar pathological features but located at different sites, may be distinguishable on the basis of cancer genetics. Molecular fingerprinting seems to be able to better sub-classify such morphologically heterogeneous tumours and it is remarkable that mixed glial-neuronal tumours are strikingly separated from PAs