Visual recovery after perinatal stroke evidenced by functional and diffusion MRI: case report

BACKGROUND: After perinatal brain injury, clinico-anatomic correlations of functional deficits and brain plasticity remain difficult to evaluate clinically in the young infant. Thus, new non-invasive methods capable of early functional diagnosis are needed in young infants. CASE PRESENTATION: The visual system recovery in an infant with perinatal stroke is assessed by combining diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and event-related functional MRI (ER-fMRI). All experiments were done at 1.5T. A first DTI experiment was performed at 12 months of age. At 20 months of age, a second DTI experiment was performed and combined with an ER-fMRI experiment with visual stimuli (2 Hz visual flash). At 20 months of age, ER-fMRI showed significant negative activation in the visual cortex of the injured left hemisphere that was not previously observed in the same infant. DTI maps suggest recovery of the optic radiation in the vicinity of the lesion. Optic radiations in the injured hemisphere are more prominent in DTI at 20 months of age than in DTI at 12 months of age. CONCLUSION: Our data indicate that functional cortical recovery is supported by structural modifications that concern major pathways of the visual system. These neuroimaging findings might contribute to elaborate a pertinent strategy in terms of diagnosis and rehabilitation

Retrofitting Biomass Burning Equipment to an Existing Gas/Oil Burning Plant

Industries that produce biomass are usually large consumers of energy. The biomass, a byproduct of their process, is usually a liability in that it is costly and increasingly more difficult to dispose of. Conventional power and fuels are costly and becoming more so. The ability to utilize this "waste" to satisfy all or part of plant power needs is, therefore, attractive The attractiveness and feasibility is further enhanced by utilizing the waste in an existing plant power system

Supercavitating three-dimensional hydrofoil analysis by viscous lifting-line approach

A new viscous lifting-line method for three-dimensional supercavitating hydrofoils is presented. The method is designed to allow for the strong nonlinear hydrodynamic characteristic of two-dimensional supercavitating sections. These nonlinearities, manifesting as sudden variation of the sectional lift-curve slope, are included in the numerical model by the introduction of variable positions of the collocation points where the body boundary condition is enforced. The nonlinear hydrodynamic performance of the two-dimensional sections is predicted via multiphase Navier-Stokes computations. An iterative algorithm is necessary to converge on the three-dimensional hydrofoil performance measured in terms of lift and drag forces. The convergence properties of the method are verified, and it is validated via a systematic series of experiments on a three-dimensional hydrofoil, considering a wide range of angle of attack and cavitation numbers, which comprise very different cavitation regimes on both the front and the rear sides of the hydrofoil. Results of the viscous lifting-line model are compared with both experimental measurements in the cavitation tunnel and high-fidelity three-dimensional unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes computations. Findings of the validation study suggest that the proposed viscous lifting-line method can be applied toward predicting the hydrodynamic performance of three-dimensional hydrofoils in fully wet, partially cavitating, and supercavitating regimes and for planform aspect ratios that are as low as 1

Water distribution in insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus in various states of metabolic control.

Alterations in water compartments have been described in insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM). Both insulin and lack of natriuretic counteracting response lead to water expansion, while hyperglycemica-induced osmotic diuresis leads to water depletion. Both total body water and water distribution in the extra-intracellular space, as well as their relationships to metabolic control, were investigated in 15 controls (30.1 +/- 1.4 years) and in 26 IDDM patients (31.3 +/- 1.6, diabetes duration 11.3 +/- 1.4 years) who were neither hypertensive nor proteinuric. The amounts of total body water (TBW) and extracellular water (ECW) were predicted by impedance measurements at 100 KHz and at 1 KHz. The amount of intracellular water (ICW) was computed as the difference between the two. Water distribution was estimated by measuring the ratio between low- and high-frequency impedance and by computing the ratio between ECW and ICW. The IDDM patients were divided into four groups on the basis of reference HbA(lc) mean and SD: A < or = mean + 2 SD < B < or = mean + 4 SD < C < or = mean +6SD < D. The groups were comparable with sodium intake, insulin dosage, fasting glycemia and laboratory hydration markers. As compared to controls, impedance values at 1, 5, 10, 50 and 100KHz were significantly lower in diabetic patients and the difference within group D increased as the frequency increased: -3.9% at 1 KHz, -10.1% at 100 KHz. As compared to controls, groups A, B and C showed higher TBW, ECW and ICW while water distribution was normal, and group D showed higher TBW and ICW but normal ECW and a different water distribution. In all IDDM patients, HbA(lc) correlated with ECW (r = -0.49) and distribution ratios (r = 0.42, impedance; r = 0.40, ECW/ICW ratio). These observations suggest that good or moderate long-term control IDDM patients have proportionately normal distributions of ECW and ICW excess. However, water excess in poor control IDDM patients was only found in the ICW space

Comparative Performance of Optimum High Speed SWATH and Semi-SWATH in Calm Water and in Waves

The hydrodynamic performance of unconventional SWATH and Semi-SWATH for high speed applications are analyzed and compared in this paper. Bare hull resistance in calm water is estimated by an inviscid boundary element method with viscous corrections and verified by a fully turbulent, multiphase unsteady RANSE solver. Motions response in head waves, calculated by a frequency domain 3D panel method with forward speed effects are also evaluated and compared. Both considered hulls are the best designs coming from full parametric hull form optimization procedures, based on CFD solvers for the estimation of their hydrodynamic performance and driven by evolutionary minimization algorithms. The SWATH has twin parabolic struts and an unconventional underwater shape, the semi-SWATH has a slender triangular waterline, a bulbous shape in the entrance body which gradually morph into a U-section with a shallow transom in the run body. In general, as expected, the Semi-SWATH hull shows a lower drag at high speeds while the single strut SWATH is superior at lower speeds. As regards seakeeping, the SWATH shows unbeatable lower pitch and heave motions in shorter waves, where the Semi-SWATH evidences a double peaked RAO. More detailed analysis and conclusion are drawn in the paper