Focal neuromyotonia: do I love you?

We present a rare case of focal neuromyotonia in a 73-year-old woman with a follow up of 5years. The clinical picture showed a fixed contraction of the 3rd and 4th finger of the left hand. Similar to other published cases, our patient suffered from COPD and was treated with beta-2-sympathomimetics. This clinical picture shows a rare but rather salient differential diagnosis of Dupuytren's contracture. EMG of the affected muscles may yield a diagnosis and prevent the patient from a long and ineffective treatment "odyssey

In Situ Cell Signalling of the Hippo-YAP/TAZ Pathway in Reaction to Complex Dynamic Loading in an Intervertebral Disc Organ Culture

Recently, a dysregulation of the Hippo-YAP/TAZ pathway has been correlated with intervertebral disc (IVD) degeneration (IDD), as it plays a key role in cell survival, tissue regeneration, and mechanical stress. We aimed to investigate the influence of different mechanical loading regimes, i.e., under compression and torsion, on the induction and progression of IDD and its association with the Hippo-YAP/TAZ pathway. Therefore, bovine IVDs were assigned to one of four different static or complex dynamic loading regimes: (i) static, (ii) “low-stress”, (iii) “intermediate-stress”, and (iv) “high-stress” regime using a bioreactor. After one week of loading, a significant loss of relative IVD height was observed in the intermediate- and high-stress regimes. Furthermore, the high-stress regime showed a significantly lower cell viability and a significant decrease in glycosaminoglycan content in the tissue. Finally, the mechanosensitive gene CILP was significantly downregulated overall, and the Hippo-pathway gene MST1 was significantly upregulated in the high-stress regime. This study demonstrates that excessive torsion combined with compression leads to key features of IDD. However, the results indicated no clear correlation between the degree of IDD and a subsequent inactivation of the Hippo-YAP/TAZ pathway as a means of regenerating the IVD

Neoclassical tearing modes on AUG: improved scaling laws, high confinement at high β_N and new stabilization experiments

The accuracy of the scaling laws derived so far for the normalised beta values at the onset of neoclassical tearing modes is limited as the results depend on the presence and magnitude of seed islands. Therefore power ramp down experiments have been performed on ASDEX Upgrade, allowing to find a scaling law for the critical β value at which the NTMs disappear. For (m,n)=(3,2) NTMs these critical beta values have been found to scale nearly proportional to ρ*. As it has been recently found on ASDEX Upgrade, at high βN values there is a regime in which (3,2) NTMs cause a much smaller confinement degradation as one would expect from the β dependence of the saturated island size. The transition to this regime allows high confinement (H = 1) at high beta values ( βN > 2.3) on ASDEX Upgrade in spite of the presence of (3,2) NTMs. The plasma conditions for the transition into such a high confinement regime are discussed in detail. Furthermore, new results on NTM stabilization by localized ECCD will be presented, showing that NTMs remain stabilized even with increased heating power and thus normalized beta values well above the NTM threshold

Effect of different cryopreservation media on human nucleus pulposus cells' viability and trilineage potential

Introduction: Low back pain (LBP) is a significant cause of disability in many countries, affecting more than half a billion people worldwide. In the past, progenitor cells have been found within the nucleus pulposus (NP) of the human intervertebral disc (IVD). However, in the context of cell therapy, little is known about the effect of cryopreservation and expansion on here called “heterogenic” human NP cells (hNPCs), and whether commercially available cryopreservation media are more efficient than “commonly used” media in terms of cell viability. Materials: In this study, hNPCs from four trauma patients (age 40.5 ± 14.3 years) and two patients with degenerated IVDs (age 24 and 46 years), undergoing spinal surgery, were collected. To isolate hNPCs, the tissue was digested with a mild two-step protocol. After subsequent expansion, hNPCs at passages 2-5 were separated and either cryo-preserved for 1 week at −150°C or differentiated into osteogenic, adipogenic, or chondrogenic lineages for 21 days. Cryopreservation was performed with five different media to compare their effect on the cell's viability and differentiation potential. Cell viability was determined with flow cytometry using propidium iodide and the trilineage differentiation potential was assessed by quantitative polymerase chain reaction and histological analysis. Results: After 1 week of cryopreservation, the hNPC's cell viability was comparable for all conditions, that is, independent of the cryopreservation medium used (82.3 ± 0.8% of cell viability). Furthermore, hNPCs from trauma patients showed some evidence for adipogenic and chondrogenic differentiation and at lower levels, this and evidence of osteogenic differentiation could be confirmed with hNPCs from degenerated discs. Moreover, cryopreservation did not affect the cell's differentiation potential in the majority of the cases tested. Conclusion: “Commonly used” cryopreservation media seem to perform just as well as commercially available media in terms of cell viability and the overall maintenance of the hNPCs trilineage differentiation potential

Gyrotron multistage depressed collector based on E × B drift concept using azimuthal electric field. II: Upgraded designs

Multistage Depressed Collectors (MDCs) are nontrivial for high-frequency gyrotrons. A basic conceptual design of an E x B MDC using azimuthal electric fields was proposed in Part I of this series. In the present work, several upgraded design proposals based on the basic one will be elaborated. These proposals will significantly reduce the back-stream of electrons, which was the main drawback of the basic design proposal. Another upgraded design proposal will shrink the length and maximal radius of the MDC to be only a fraction of its full-length version. A conceptual design of the final MDC proposal will be given at the end

Investigation of a Mini-Channel Cavity Cooling Concept for a 170 GHz, 2 MW Coaxial-Cavity Gyrotron

The maximum heat load on the cavity wall of high power fusion gyrotrons is one of the major limiting technological factors for the operation of the tube. To achieve the requested output power, efficiency and pulse length, a very efficient cooling of the interaction structure is mandatory. In this work, the performance of a mini-channel cavity cooling system for a 170 GHz, 2 MW coaxial-cavity gyrotron is numerically investigated, including the development of a mock-up test set-up for experimental validation