Abstract Swiss cheese space and classicalisation of Swiss cheeses

Swiss cheese sets are compact subsets of the complex plane obtained by deleting a sequence of open disks from a closed disk. Such sets have provided numerous counterexamples in the theory of uniform algebras. In this paper, we introduce a topological space whose elements are what we call “abstract Swiss cheeses”. Working within this topological space, we show how to prove the existence of “classical” Swiss cheese sets (as discussed in [6]) with various desired properties. We first give a new proof of the Feinstein–Heath classicalisation theorem [6]. We then consider when it is possible to “classicalise” a Swiss cheese while leaving disks which lie outside a given region unchanged. We also consider sets obtained by deleting a sequence of open disks from a closed annulus, and we obtain an analogue of the Feinstein–Heath theorem for these sets. We then discuss regularity for certain uniform algebras. We conclude with an application of these techniques to obtain a classical Swiss cheese set which has the same properties as a non-classical example of O’Farrell

Perspectives in visual imaging for marine biology and ecology: from acquisition to understanding

Durden J, Schoening T, Althaus F, et al. Perspectives in Visual Imaging for Marine Biology and Ecology: From Acquisition to Understanding. In: Hughes RN, Hughes DJ, Smith IP, Dale AC, eds. Oceanography and Marine Biology: An Annual Review. 54. Boca Raton: CRC Press; 2016: 1-72

Bupivacaine mandibular nerve block affects intraoperative blood pressure and heart rate in a Yucatan miniature swine mandibular condylectomy model: A pilot study

PURPOSE/AIM: The primary objective was to evaluate the effect of a bupivacaine mandibular nerve block on intraoperative blood pressure (BP) and heart rate (HR) in response to surgical stimulation and the need for systemic analgesics postoperatively. We hypothesized that a mandibular nerve block would decrease the need for systemic analgesics both intraoperatively and postoperatively. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Fourteen adult male Yucatan pigs were purchased. Pigs were chemically restrained with ketamine, midazolam, and dexmedetomidine and anesthesia was maintained with isoflurane inhalant anesthesia. Pigs were randomized to receive a mandibular block with either bupivacaine (bupivacaine group) or saline (control group). A nerve stimulator was used for administration of the block with observation of masseter muscle twitch to indicate the injection site. Invasive BP and HR were measured with the aid of an arterial catheter in eight pigs. A rescue analgesic protocol consisting of fentanyl and lidocaine was administered if HR or BP values increased 20% from baseline. Postoperative pain was quantified with a customized ethogram. HR and BP were evaluated at base line, pre-rescue, 10 and 20 min post-rescue. RESULTS: Pre-rescue mean BP was significantly increased (p = .001) for the bupivacaine group. Mean intraoperative HR was significantly lower (p = .044) in the bupivacaine versus saline group. All other parameters were not significant. CONCLUSION: Addition of a mandibular nerve block to the anesthetic regimen in the miniature pig condylectomy model may improve variations in intraoperative BP and HR. This study establishes the foundation for future studies with larger animal numbers to confirm these preliminary findings

Automated differentiation of pre-diagnosis Huntington's disease from healthy control individuals based on quadratic discriminant analysis of the basal ganglia: the IMAGE-HD study

We investigated two measures of neural integrity, T1-weighted volumetric measures and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), and explored their combined potential to differentiate pre-diagnosis Huntington's disease (pre-HD) individuals from healthy controls. We applied quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA) to discriminate pre-HD individuals from controls and we utilised feature selection and dimension reduction to increase the robustness of the discrimination method. Thirty six symptomatic HD (symp-HD), 35 pre-HD, and 36 control individuals participated as part of the IMAGE-HD study and underwent T1-weighted MRI, and DTI using a Siemens 3 Tesla scanner. Volume and DTI measures [mean diffusivity (MD) and fractional anisotropy (FA)] were calculated for each group within five regions of interest (ROI; caudate, putamen, pallidum, accumbens and thalamus). QDA was then performed in a stepwise manner to differentiate pre-HD individuals from controls, based initially on unimodal analysis of motor or neurocognitive measures, or on volume, MD or FA measures from within the caudate, pallidum and putamen. We then tested for potential improvements to this model, by examining multi-modal MRI classifications (volume, FA and MD), and also included motor and neurocognitive measures, and additional brain regions (i.e., accumbens and thalamus). Volume, MD and FA differed across the three groups, with pre-HD characterised by significant volumetric reductions and increased FA within caudate, putamen and pallidum, relative to controls. The QDA results demonstrated that the differentiation of pre-HD from controls was highly accurate when both volumetric and diffusion data sets from basal ganglia (BG) regions were used. The highest discriminative accuracy however was achieved in a multi-modality approach and when including all available measures: motor and neurocognitive scores and multi-modal MRI measures from the BG, accumbens and thalamus. Our QDA findings provide evidence that combined multi-modal imaging measures can accurately classify individuals up to 15 years prior to onset when therapeutic intervention is likely to have maximal effects in slowing the trajectory of disease development