Cerebral hemorrhagic infarction following cranioplasty in a shunted patient with tension pneumocephalus resulting from depressed skull and craniodural defect

SummaryA 34-year-old female sustained a severe traumatic brain injury that was treated with decompressive craniectomy and subsequent cranioplasty, then with ventriculoperitoneal shunt about 10 years previously. However, the skull flap was found to be depressed ever since. She was admitted to our hospital for a headache and left hemiparesis with sudden onset. The computed tomography scan displayed tension pneumocephalus in the right frontoparietal region. First, she underwent emergency burr hole drainage and placement of a subdural drain with external ventricular drainage tube. Then her symptoms improved considerably. Unfortunately, 6 months later she was admitted again to our hospital because of headache and left hemiparesis with sudden onset, and the brain computed tomography showed tension pneumocephalus in the right frontoparietal region. She underwent craniectomy to remove the previous depressed skull and simultaneous cranioplasty with Ti-Mesh. On the day of her operation, generalized seizure occurred and her consciousness deteriorated. The magnetic resonance imaging showed hemorrhagic infarction on both sides of the thalamus and the right parieto-occipital region. We think it probable that a sudden increase of cerebral blood flow in the cerebral hemisphere where the cranioplasty had been performed caused reperfusion injury and resulted in hemorrhagic infarction

Urolithiasis Is a Risk Factor for Uroseptic Shock and Acute Kidney Injury in Patients With Urinary Tract Infection.

Urinary tract infection (UTI) is a common complication in patients with urolithiasis. This study aimed to compare clinical manifestations and treatment outcomes among UTI patients with or without urolithiasis. It also focused on identifying relationships among urolithiasis, uroseptic shock, and acute kidney injury (AKI). This retrospective study enrolled hospitalized UTI patients who underwent imaging in an acute care setting from January 2006 to March 2015. Of 662 participants enrolled, 113 (17.1%) had urolithiasis, 107 (16.2%) developed uroseptic shock, and 184 (27.8%) developed AKI. A multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that in UTI patients, urolithiasis is associated with an increased risk of uroseptic shock (OR 1.80, 95% CI: 1.08-3.02, P = 0.025), AKI (OR 1.95, 95% CI: 1.22-3.12, P = 0.005), and bacteremia (OR 1.68, 95% CI: 1.08-2.64, P = 0.022). Urolithiasis is common in UTI patients and is associated with an increased risk of uroseptic shock and AKI

Bacteremic pneumonia caused by Nocardia veterana in an HIV-infected patient

SummaryDisseminated Nocardia veterana infection has rarely been reported. We describe the first reported case of N. veterana bacteremic pneumonia in an HIV-infected patient. The isolate was confirmed by 16S rRNA sequencing analysis. The patient initially responded well to trimethoprim–sulfamethoxazole treatment (minimum inhibitory concentration 0.25μg/ml), but died of ventilator-associated pneumonia

Continuous Production of Lipase-Catalyzed Biodiesel in a Packed-Bed Reactor: Optimization and Enzyme Reuse Study

An optimal continuous production of biodiesel by methanolysis of soybean oil in a packed-bed reactor was developed using immobilized lipase (Novozym 435) as a catalyst in a tert-butanol solvent system. Response surface methodology (RSM) and Box-Behnken design were employed to evaluate the effects of reaction temperature, flow rate, and substrate molar ratio on the molar conversion of biodiesel. The results showed that flow rate and temperature have significant effects on the percentage of molar conversion. On the basis of ridge max analysis, the optimum conditions were as follows: flow rate 0.1 mL/min, temperature 52.1°C, and substrate molar ratio 1 : 4. The predicted and experimental values of molar conversion were 83.31 ± 2.07% and 82.81 ± .98%, respectively. Furthermore, the continuous process over 30 days showed no appreciable decrease in the molar conversion. The paper demonstrates the applicability of using immobilized lipase and a packed-bed reactor for continuous biodiesel synthesis

Low-Resolution Tactile Image Recognition for Automated Robotic Assembly Using Kernel PCA-Based Feature Fusion and Multiple Kernel Learning-Based Support Vector Machine

In this paper, we propose a robust tactile sensing image recognition scheme for automatic robotic assembly. First, an image reprocessing procedure is designed to enhance the contrast of the tactile image. In the second layer, geometric features and Fourier descriptors are extracted from the image. Then, kernel principal component analysis (kernel PCA) is applied to transform the features into ones with better discriminating ability, which is the kernel PCA-based feature fusion. The transformed features are fed into the third layer for classification. In this paper, we design a classifier by combining the multiple kernel learning (MKL) algorithm and support vector machine (SVM). We also design and implement a tactile sensing array consisting of 10-by-10 sensing elements. Experimental results, carried out on real tactile images acquired by the designed tactile sensing array, show that the kernel PCA-based feature fusion can significantly improve the discriminating performance of the geometric features and Fourier descriptors. Also, the designed MKL-SVM outperforms the regular SVM in terms of recognition accuracy. The proposed recognition scheme is able to achieve a high recognition rate of over 85% for the classification of 12 commonly used metal parts in industrial applications

Increasing Incidence of Nontuberculous Mycobacteria, Taiwan, 2000–2008

To assess the species distribution and epidemiologic trends of nontuberculous mycobacteria, we examined isolates from patients in Taiwan. During 2000–2008, the proportion increased significantly from 32.3% to 49.8%. Associated disease incidence increased from 2.7 to 10.2 cases per 100,000 patients. Mycobacterium avium complex and M. abscessus were most frequently isolated

A CMOS-Compatible Poly-Si Nanowire Device with Hybrid Sensor/Memory Characteristics for System-on-Chip Applications

This paper reports a versatile nano-sensor technology using “top-down” poly-silicon nanowire field-effect transistors (FETs) in the conventional Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS)-compatible semiconductor process. The nanowire manufacturing technique reduced nanowire width scaling to 50 nm without use of extra lithography equipment, and exhibited superior device uniformity. These n type polysilicon nanowire FETs have positive pH sensitivity (100 mV/pH) and sensitive deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) detection ability (100 pM) at normal system operation voltages. Specially designed oxide-nitride-oxide buried oxide nanowire realizes an electrically Vth-adjustable sensor to compensate device variation. These nanowire FETs also enable non-volatile memory application for a large and steady Vth adjustment window (>2 V Programming/Erasing window). The CMOS-compatible manufacturing technique of polysilicon nanowire FETs offers a possible solution for commercial System-on-Chip biosensor application, which enables portable physiology monitoring and in situ recording