Rhinologic changes in Wegener's granulomatosis

Twenty-eight patients with a clinical diagnosis of sinonasal Wegener's granulomatosis were referred for imaging during the period 1990-2001. Of these, 10 had clinical symptoms and signs confined to the nose and sinuses and 18 had classical systemic Wegener's. The computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MRI) scans of the series were reviewed by a panel of one otolaryngologist and two radiologists. From the total of 28 patients, 85.7 per cent showed non-specific mucosal thickening in the nasal cavity or paranasal sinuses, 75 per cent showed evidence of bone destruction, and 50 per cent new bone formation in the walls of the sinus cavities. In addition the orbit was affected in 30 per cent of patients.The diagnosis of systemic Wegener's granulomatosis is made clinically but the condition may present characteristic features on imaging by CT and MRI. In a patient without a history of previous sinonasal surgery, a combination of bone destruction and new bone formation on CT is virtually diagnostic of Wegener's especially when accompanied on MRI by a fat signal from the sclerotic sinus wall. These changes are important diagnostically in localized sinonasal Wegener's granulomatosis where the clinical diagnosis may be uncertain and the cANCA test can be negative

Microbial acetone oxidation in coastal seawater

Acetone is an important oxygenated volatile organic compound (OVOC) in the troposphere where it influences the oxidizing capacity of the atmosphere. However, the air-sea flux is not well quantified, in part due to a lack of knowledge regarding which processes control oceanic concentrations, and, specifically whether microbial oxidation to CO2 represents a significant loss process. We demonstrate that 14C labeled acetone can be used to determine microbial oxidation to 14CO2. Linear microbial rates of acetone oxidation to CO2 were observed for between 0.75-3.5 h at a seasonally eutrophic coastal station located in the western English Channel (L4). A kinetic experiment in summer at station L4 gave a Vmax of 4.1 pmol L-1 h-1, with a Km constant of 54 pM. We then used this technique to obtain microbial acetone loss rates ranging between 1.2 and 42 pmol L-1 h-1.(monthly averages) over an annual cycle at L4, with maximum rates observed during winter months. The biological turnover time of acetone (in situ concentration divided by microbial oxidation rate) in surface waters varied from ~3 days in February 2011, when in situ concentrations were 3 ± 1 nM, to >240 days in June 2011, when concentrations were more than twofold higher at 7.5 ± 0.7 nM. These relatively low marine microbial acetone oxidation rates, when normalized to in situ concentrations, suggest that marine microbes preferentially utilize other OVOCs such as methanol and acetaldehyde. © 2014 Dixon, Beale, Sargeant, Tarran and Nightingale

Absolute differential positronium-formation cross sections

The first absolute experimental determinations of the differential cross-sections for the formation of ground-state positronium are presented for He, Ar, H2 and CO2 near 0○. Results are compared with available theories. The ratio of the differential and integrated cross-sections for the targets exposes the higher propensity for forward-emission of positronium formed from He and H2

System integration report

Several areas that arise from the system integration issue were examined. Intersystem analysis is discussed as it relates to software development, shared data bases and interfaces between TEMPUS and PLAID, shaded graphics rendering systems, object design (BUILD), the TEMPUS animation system, anthropometric lab integration, ongoing TEMPUS support and maintenance, and the impact of UNIX and local workstations on the OSDS environment

Characterisation of bulk water samples from copper pipes undergoing microbially influenced corrosion by diagnostic metabolomic profiling

This paper presents the application of metabolomic techniques to determine the presence of microbial influenced corrosion (MIC). In a previous study, the extracellular metabolites expressed from pipe biofilm was identified by analysing the passing water. This investigation extends this work by successfully applying a chemometric statistical analysis to the extracellular metabolomic profile of a number of water samples to identify critical metabolomic biomarkers. The chemometric analysis was able to differentiate samples due to a reduction of carboxylic acids in samples exposed to bacteria believed to cause MIC

Research on an expert system for database operation of simulation-emulation math models. Volume 2, Phase 1: Results

A reference manual is provided for NESS, a simulation expert system. This manual gives user information regarding starting and operating NASA expert simulation system (NESS). This expert system provides an intelligent interface to a generic simulation program for spacecraft attitude control problems. A menu of the functions the system can perform is provided. Control repeated returns to this menu after executing each user request

Detection of s-Triazine pesticides in natural waters by modified large-volume direct injection HPLC

There is a need for simple and inexpensive methods to quantify potentially harmful persistent pesticides often found in our water-ways and water distribution systems. This paper presents a simple, relatively inexpensive method for the detection of a group of commonly used pesticides (atrazine, simazine and hexazinone) in natural waters using large-volume direct injection high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) utilizing a monolithic column and a single wavelength ultraviolet–visible light (UV–vis) detector. The best results for this system were obtained with a mobile phase made up of acetonitrile and water in a 30:70 ratio, a flow rate of 2.0 mL min−1, and a detector wavelength of 230 nm. Using this method, we achieved retention times of less than three minutes, and detection limits of 5.7 μg L−1 for atrazine, 4.7 μg L−1 for simazine and 4.0 μg L−1 for hexazinone. The performance of this method was validated with an inter-laboratory trial against a National Association of Testing Authorities (NATA) accredited liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry/mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) method commonly used in commercial laboratories

Optimizing the ensemble for equilibration in broad-histogram Monte Carlo simulations

We present an adaptive algorithm which optimizes the statistical-mechanical ensemble in a generalized broad-histogram Monte Carlo simulation to maximize the system's rate of round trips in total energy. The scaling of the mean round-trip time from the ground state to the maximum entropy state for this local-update method is found to be O([N log N]^2) for both the ferromagnetic and the fully frustrated 2D Ising model with N spins. Our new algorithm thereby substantially outperforms flat-histogram methods such as the Wang-Landau algorithm.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure

Nonexistence of self-similar singularities for the 3D incompressible Euler equations

We prove that there exists no self-similar finite time blowing up solution to the 3D incompressible Euler equations. By similar method we also show nonexistence of self-similar blowing up solutions to the divergence-free transport equation in $\Bbb R^n$. This result has direct applications to the density dependent Euler equations, the Boussinesq system, and the quasi-geostrophic equations, for which we also show nonexistence of self-similar blowing up solutions.Comment: This version refines the previous one by relaxing the condition of compact support for the vorticit