Functioning metastases in liver from thyroid carcinoma: Case report

Radioiodine uptake in liver metastases was observed in two patients with follicular carcinoma of the thyroid

Does Large-Scale Ocean Circulation Structure Life History Connectivity in Antarctic Toothfish (Dissostichus mawsoni)?

A multidisciplinary approach incorporating otolith chemistry, age data, and numerical Lagrangian particle simulations indicated a single, self-recruiting population of Antarctic toothfish (Dissostichus mawsoni) in the Southeast Pacific Basin (SPB) and Ross Sea, with a life history structured by the large-scale circulation. Chemistry deposited prior to capture along otolith edges demonstrated strong environmental heterogeneity, yet the chemistry in otolith nuclei, deposited during early life, showed no differences. Age data showed only adult fish in catches on the Pacific-Antarctic Ridge in the SPB and structuring of life stages consistent with transport pathways from the northern Ross Sea. Lagrangian particle simulations predicted that early life stages following the flow in the SPB would be transported to areas in the Ross Sea where juveniles are caught, whereas the circulation would facilitate adult movement along the shelf slope and back into the SPB where spawning adults are caught. These results suggest that successfully spawning fish spend only a part of their adult life history in the Ross Sea, areas in the eastern Ross Sea contribute disproportionately to the spawning population, and areas in the southwestern Ross Sea may supply fisheries in the southern Indian Ocean

Non-invasive focus localization, right ventricular epicardial potential mapping in patients with an MRI-conditional pacemaker system ‐ a pilot study

Abstract Background With the advent of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) conditional pacemaker systems, the possibility of performing MRI in pacemaker patients has been introduced. Besides for the detailed evaluation of atrial and ventricular volumes and function, MRI can be used in combination with body surface potential mapping (BSPM) in a non-invasive inverse potential mapping (IPM) strategy. In non-invasive IPM, epicardial potentials are reconstructed from recorded body surface potentials (BSP). In order to investigate whether an IPM method with a limited number of electrodes could be used for the purpose of non-invasive focus localization, it was applied in patients with implanted pacing devices. Ventricular paced beats were used to simulate ventricular ectopic foci. Methods Ten patients with an MRI-conditional pacemaker system and a structurally normal heart were studied. Patientspecific 3D thorax volume models were reconstructed from the MRI images. BSP were recorded during ventricular pacing. Epicardial potentials were inversely calculated from the BSP. The site of epicardial breakthrough was compared to the position of the ventricular lead tip on MRI and the distance between these points was determined. Results For all patients, the site of earliest epicardial depolarization could be identified. When the tip of the pacing lead was implanted in vicinity to the epicardium, i.e. right ventricular (RV) apex or RV outflow tract, the distance between lead tip position and epicardial breakthrough was 6.0±1.9 mm. Conclusions In conclusion, the combined MRI and IPM method is clinically applicable and can identify sites of earliest depolarization with a clinically useful accuracy

Assessment of intergenomic recombination through GISH analysis of F1, BC1 and BC2 progenies of Tulipa gesneriana and T. fosteriana

Using 23 F1 hybrids, 14 BC1 and 32 BC2 progenies, the genome composition of Darwin hybrid tulips was analysed through genomic in situ hybridisation (GISH) of somatic chromosomes. All plants were diploids (2n = 2x = 24) with the exception of one tetraploid BC1 (2n = 4x = 48) and one aneuploid BC2 (2n = 2x + 1 = 25) hybrid. Morphometric analysis in F1 hybrids revealed a difference in the total length of chromosomes representing genomes of T. gesneriana and T. fosteriana, where the percentage of each genome equaled 55.18 ± 0.8 and 44.92 ± 0.6% respectively. GISH distinguished chromosomes from both parent genomes although there was a lack of consistent chromosome labelling in some cases. In both T. gesneriana and T. fosteriana chromosomes some segments of heterochromatin in the telomeric and intercalary regions exhibited a higher intensity of fluorescence. In situ hybridisation with 5S rDNA and 45S rDNA probes to metaphase chromosomes of F1 hybrids showed that these regions are rich in rDNA. A notable feature was that, despite genome differences, there was a considerable amount of intergenomic recombination between the parental chromosomes of the two species as estimated in both BC1 and BC2 offspring. The number of recombinant chromosomes ranged from 3 to 8 in BC1 and from 1 to 7 in BC2 progenies. All recombinant chromosomes possessed mostly a single recombinant segment derived from either a single crossover event or in a few cases double crossover events. This explains the fact that, unlike the situation in most F1 hybrids of other plant species, certain genotypes of Darwin hybrid tulips behave like normal diploid plants producing haploid gametes and give rise to mostly diploid sporophytes

Five-year safety and efficacy of leadless pacemakers in a Dutch cohort

BACKGROUND: Adequate real-world safety and efficacy of leadless pacemakers (LPs) have been demonstrated up to 3 years after implantation. Longer-term data are warranted to assess the net clinical benefit of leadless pacing.OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the long-term safety and efficacy of LP therapy in a real-world cohort.METHODS: In this retrospective cohort study, all consecutive patients with a first LP implantation from December 21, 2012, to December 13, 2016, in 6 Dutch high-volume centers were included. The primary safety endpoint was the rate of major procedure- or device-related complications (ie, requiring surgery) at 5-year follow-up. Analyses were performed with and without Nanostim battery advisory-related complications. The primary efficacy endpoint was the percentage of patients with a pacing capture threshold ≤2.0 V at implantation and without ≥1.5-V increase at the last follow-up visit.RESULTS: A total of 179 patients were included (mean age 79 ± 9 years), 93 (52%) with a Nanostim and 86 (48%) with a Micra VR LP. Mean follow-up duration was 44 ± 26 months. Forty-one major complications occurred, of which 7 were not advisory related. The 5-year major complication rate was 4% without advisory-related complications and 27% including advisory-related complications. No advisory-related major complications occurred a median 10 days (range 0-88 days) postimplantation. The pacing capture threshold was low in 163 of 167 patients (98%) and stable in 157 of 160 (98%).CONCLUSION: The long-term major complication rate without advisory-related complications was low with LPs. No complications occurred after the acute phase and no infections occurred, which may be a specific benefit of LPs. The performance was adequate with a stable pacing capture threshold.</p

Efficient IBE with Tight Reduction to Standard Assumption in the Multi-challenge Setting

In 2015, Hofheinz et al. [PKC, 2015] extended Chen and Wee\u27s almost-tight reduction technique for identity based encryptions (IBE) [CRYPTO, 2013] to the multi-instance, multi-ciphertext (MIMC, or multi-challenge) setting, where the adversary is allowed to obtain multiple challenge ciphertexts from multiple IBE instances, and gave the first almost-tightly secure IBE in this setting using composite-order bilinear groups. Several prime-order realizations were proposed lately. However there seems to be a dilemma of high system performance (involving ciphertext/key size and encryption/decryption cost) or weak/standard security assumptions. A natural question is: can we achieve high performance without relying on stronger/non-standard assumptions? In this paper, we answer the question in the affirmative by describing a prime-order IBE scheme with the same performance as the most efficient solutions so far but whose security still relies on the standard k-linear (k-Lin) assumption. Our technical start point is Blazy et al.\u27s almost-tightly secure IBE [CRYPTO, 2014]. We revisit their concrete IBE scheme and associate it with the framework of nested dual system group. This allows us to extend Blazy et al.\u27s almost-tightly secure IBE to the MIMC setting using Gong et al.\u27s method [PKC, 2016]. We emphasize that, when instantiating our construction by the Symmetric eXternal Diffie-Hellman assumption (SXDH = 1-Lin), we obtain the most efficient concrete IBE scheme with almost-tight reduction in the MIMC setting, whose performance is even comparable to the most efficient IBE in the classical model (i.e., the single-instance, single-ciphertext setting). Besides pursuing high performance, our IBE scheme also achieves a weaker form of anonymity pointed out by Attrapadung et al. [AsiaCrypt, 2015]

Assignment of genetic linkage maps to diploid Solanum tuberosum pachytene chromosomes by BAC-FISH technology

A cytogenetic map has been developed for diploid potato (Solanum tuberosum), in which the arms of the 12 potato bivalents can be identified in pachytene complements using multicolor fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) with a set of 60 genetically anchored bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) clones from the RHPOTKEY BAC library. This diagnostic set of selected BACs (five per chromosome) hybridizes to euchromatic regions and corresponds to well-defined loci in the ultradense genetic map, and with these probes a new detailed and reliable pachytene karyotype could be established. Chromosome size has been estimated both from microscopic length measurements and from 4′,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole fluorescence-based DNA content measurements. In both approaches, chromosome 1 is the largest (100–115 Mb) and chromosome 11 the smallest (49–53 Mb). Detailed measurements of mega-base-pair to micrometer ratios have been obtained for chromosome 5, with average values of 1.07 Mb/μm for euchromatin and 3.67 Mb/μm for heterochromatin. In addition, our FISH results helped to solve two discrepancies in the potato genetic map related to chromosomes 8 and 12. Finally, we discuss the significance of the potato cytogenetic map for extended FISH studies in potato and related Solanaceae, which will be especially beneficial for the potato genome-sequencing project