Role of clinical and CT findings in the identification of adult small-bowel intussusception requiring surgical intervention

Background In adults, intussusception has been considered traditionally to have an underlying aetiology. The aim of this study was to determine CT and clinical features of small-bowel intussusceptions that required surgical intervention. Methods Adult patients were identified in whom small-bowel intussusceptions were noted on CT images. The appearance, number, type (enteroenteric versus enterocolic), length and maximum short-axis diameter of intussusceptions, and presence of bowel obstruction (short-axis diameter of proximal small bowel greater than 3 cm) were analysed. The outcome was defined as surgical (complicated) or self-limiting (uncomplicated). Associations between complicated and uncomplicated intussusceptions and patient characteristics were investigated. Results Among 75 patients (56 male) with a mean age of 45 years, 103 intussusceptions were identified, of which 98 (95 per cent) were enteroenteric and 5 (5 per cent) enterocolic. Only 12 of 103 intussusceptions (12 per cent) in 12 of 75 (16 per cent) patients required surgical therapy and were considered to be complicated, with half of these having a neoplastic lead point. Length (P < 0.001), diameter (P < 0.001) and type (P = 0.002) of intussusception as well as presence of vessels (P = 0.023) within an intussusception on a CT scan, clinical symptoms (P = 0.007) and signs of bowel obstruction (P < 0.001) were associated with a surgical outcome. Conclusion Clinical symptoms, signs of bowel obstruction, type and length of intussusception, and a visible tumour within an intussusception on CT scan were critical signs of complicated intussusception, requiring surgical intervention

Quinpramine Ameliorates Rat Experimental Autoimmune Neuritis and Redistributes MHC Class II Molecules

Activation of inflammatory cells is central to the pathogenesis of autoimmune demyelinating diseases of the peripheral nervous system. The novel chimeric compound quinpramine—generated from imipramine and quinacrine—redistributes cholesterol rich membrane domains to intracellular compartments. We studied the immunological and clinical effects of quinpramine in myelin homogenate induced Lewis rat experimental autoimmune neuritis (EAN), a model system for acute human inflammatory neuropathies, such as the Guillain-Barré syndrome. EAN animals develop paresis of all limbs due to autoimmune inflammation of peripheral nerves. Quinpramine treatment ameliorated clinical disease severity of EAN and infiltration of macrophages into peripheral nerves. It reduced expression of MHC class II molecules on antigen presenting cells and antigen specific T cell proliferation both in vitro and in vivo. Quinpramine exerted its anti-proliferatory effect on antigen presenting cells, but not on responder T cells. Our data suggest that quinpramine represents a candidate pharmaceutical for inflammatory neuropathies

Contact, cognates, and the Dictionary of Canadianisms Online

The Charter of the French Language (1977) made Quebec a unilingual francophone province. Most Quebec anglophones lives in Montreal; 70% report that they are bilingual (2006 census). Bilingualism is also high in young francophones and allophones, making Montreal a perfect site for contact phenomena. Borrowings from Quebec French (QF) are common in Quebec English (QE), e.g. dépanneur, 'corner store' and guichet, 'bank machine', 'cash point'. The use of "false friends" or cognates with clearly distinct meanings in QF and QE has increased-one hears and occasionally reads library for bookstore or circulation for traffic. The primary focus of this paper is on partial cognates, "pairs ... that have the same meaning in some, but not all contexts" (Frunza &amp; Inkpen 2007). For example, the primary meaning of primordial in English is "primeval", while in French it is "essential," leading to sentences like "The freshness of the fish is primordial." Using dictionary definitions to test for the effects of QF on QE sometimes fails, however. In QE, security is often used where Canadian English speakers would choose safety although the Canadian Oxford and the OED give 'safety' as the first sense: "The left-turn ban was part of a plan ... to improve security at the rail crossing." Other cognates have different frequencies, connotations, or degrees of formality that affect QE usage. Evidence on these differences for about 30 cognates will come from the English-language Montreal daily, the Gazette, with control data from The Toronto Star. The newspaper corpus will be supplemented with correctness / acceptibility judgements by Vancouver and Montreal speakers. The results will directly inform how the second edition of the (DCHP-Online) should document such differences, if at all. Sample dictionary entries will be provided for several new senses for cognates along with the supporting evidence. Existing work (e.g. Poplack, Walker and Malcolmson 2006) does not apply the fine-grained semantic analysis proposed here and therefore tends to under-report the nature of French influence.</dictionary

Unraveling Structure and Device Operation of Organic Permeable Base Transistors

Organic permeable base transistors (OPBTs) are of great interest for flexible electronic circuits, as they offer very large on-current density and a record-high transition frequency. They rely on a vertical device architecture with current transport through native pinholes in a central base electrode. This study investigates the impact of pinhole density and pinhole diameter on the DC device performance in OPBTs based on experimental data and TCAD simulation results. A pinhole density of NPin = 54 µm−2 and pinhole diameters around LPin = 15 nm are found in the devices. Simulations show that a variation of pinhole diameter and density around these numbers has only a minor impact on the DC device characteristics. A variation of the pinhole diameter and density by up to 100% lead to a deviation of less than 4% in threshold voltage, on/off current ratio, and sub-threshold slope. Hence, the fabrication of OPBTs with reliable device characteristics is possible regardless of statistical deviations in thin film formation. © 2020 The Authors. Published by WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinhei

Unraveling Structure and Device Operation of Organic Permeable Base Transistors

Organic permeable base transistors (OPBTs) are of great interest for flexible electronic circuits, as they offer very large on-current density and a record-high transition frequency. They rely on a vertical device architecture with current transport through native pinholes in a central base electrode. This study investigates the impact of pinhole density and pinhole diameter on the DC device performance in OPBTs based on experimental data and TCAD simulation results. A pinhole density of NPin = 54 µm−2 and pinhole diameters around LPin = 15 nm are found in the devices. Simulations show that a variation of pinhole diameter and density around these numbers has only a minor impact on the DC device characteristics. A variation of the pinhole diameter and density by up to 100% lead to a deviation of less than 4% in threshold voltage, on/off current ratio, and sub-threshold slope. Hence, the fabrication of OPBTs with reliable device characteristics is possible regardless of statistical deviations in thin film formation. © 2020 The Authors. Published by WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinhei

Size-selected gold clusters on porous titania as the most “gold-efficient” heterogeneous catalysts

Research on homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis is indeed convergent and finds subnanometric particles to be at the heart of catalytically active species. Here, monodisperse gold clusters are deposited from the gas phase onto porous titania generating well-defined model systems and the resulting composite materials exhibit a sharp size-dependency on the number of gold atoms per cluster and exceptionally high-turnovers toward the bromination of 1,4-dimethoxybenzene are observed. This indicates that the deliberate generation of active centres is of utmost importance for the creation of the most “gold-efficient” catalysts.ISSN:1463-9084ISSN:1463-907