Biomechanical study of the funnel technique applied in thoracic pedicle screw replacement

Background: Funnel technique is a method used for the insertion of screw into thoracic pedicle.Aim: To evaluate the biomechanical characteristics of thoracic pedicle screw placement using the Funnel technique, trying to provide biomechanical basis for clinical application of this technology.Methods: 14 functional spinal units (T6 to T10) were selected from thoracic spine specimens of 14 fresh adult cadavers, and randomly divided into two groups, including Funnel technique group (n=7) and Magerl technique group (n=7). The displacement-stiffness and pull-out strength in all kinds of position were tested and compared.Results: Two fixed groups were significantly higher than that of the intact state (P<0.05) in the spinal central axial direction, compression, anterior flexion, posterior bending, lateral bending, axial torsion, but there were no significant differences between two fixed groups (P>0.05). The mean pull-out strength in Funnel technique group (789.09±27.33) was lower than that in Magerl technique group (P<0.05).Conclusions: The Funnel technique for the insertion point of posterior bone is a safe and accurate technique for pedicle screw placement. It exhibited no effects on the stiffness of spinal column, but decreased the pull-out strength of pedicle screw. Therefore, the funnel technique in the thoracic spine affords an alternative for the standard screw placement.Keywords: Thoracic; Pedicle screws; Biomechanics; Funnel techniqu

Identification of genes differentially expressed in Jining Grey and Liaoning Cashmere goats ovaries

To search for genes controlling high prolificacy of Chinese indigenous goats, differential display reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (DDRT-PCR) was used to screen differentially expressed cDNA bands in the sexually matured ovaries of 3-year-old prolific Jining Grey goats and monotocous Liaoning Cashmere goats with 24 combinations of three anchored primers and eight arbitrary primers. 22 expressed sequence tags (ESTs) were proved to be the positive bands by Northern hybridization. They comprised 10 known ESTs and 12 ESTs without homologous sequences in the GenBank. These results indicate that several genes such as GATA-4, metallothionein-like protein, CAT genes and unknown ESTs (CV983340 and CV983341) were expressed only in Jining Grey goats.Keywords: Differential display reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction, goat, ovary, prolificacyAfrican Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(27), pp. 4408-441

Perceptions of malaria control and prevention in an era of climate change: a cross-sectional survey among CDC staff in China

Published online: 31 March 2017Background: Though there was the significant decrease in the incidence of malaria in central and southwest China during the 1980s and 1990s, there has been a re-emergence of malaria since 2000. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted amongst the staff of eleven Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in China to gauge their perceptions regarding the impacts of climate change on malaria transmission and its control and prevention. Descriptive analysis was performed to study CDC staff’s knowledge, attitudes, perceptions and suggestions for malaria control in the face of climate change. Results: A majority (79.8%) of CDC staff were concerned about climate change and 79.7% believed the weather was becoming warmer. Most participants (90.3%) indicated climate change had a negative effect on population health, 92.6 and 86.8% considered that increasing temperatures and precipitation would influence the transmission of vector-borne diseases including malaria. About half (50.9%) of the surveyed staff indicated malaria had re-emerged in recent years, and some outbreaks were occurring in new geographic areas. The main reasons for such re-emergence were perceived to be: mosquitoes in high-density, numerous imported cases, climate change, poor environmental conditions, internal migrant populations, and lack of health awareness. Conclusions: This study found most CDC staff endorsed the statement that climate change had a negative impact on infectious disease transmission. Malaria had re-emerged in some areas of China, and most of the staff believed that this can be managed. However, high densities of mosquitoes and the continuous increase in imported cases of malaria in local areas, together with environmental changes are bringing about critical challenges to malaria control in China. This study contributes to an understanding of climate change related perceptions of malaria control and prevention amongst CDC staff. It may help to formulate in-house training guidelines, community health promotion programmes and policies to improve the capacity of malaria control and prevention in the face of climate change in China.Michael Xiaoliang Tong, Alana Hansen, Scott Hanson, Easey, Scott Cameron, Jianjun Xiang, Qiyong Liu, Xiaobo Liu, Yehuan Sun, Philip Weinstein, Gil, Soo Han, Craig Williams and Peng B

Observation of a ppb mass threshoud enhancement in \psi^\prime\to\pi^+\pi^-J/\psi(J/\psi\to\gamma p\bar{p}) decay

The decay channel $\psi^\prime\to\pi^+\pi^-J/\psi(J/\psi\to\gamma p\bar{p})$ is studied using a sample of $1.06\times 10^8$ $\psi^\prime$ events collected by the BESIII experiment at BEPCII. A strong enhancement at threshold is observed in the $p\bar{p}$ invariant mass spectrum. The enhancement can be fit with an $S$-wave Breit-Wigner resonance function with a resulting peak mass of $M=1861^{+6}_{-13} {\rm (stat)}^{+7}_{-26} {\rm (syst)} {\rm MeV/}c^2$ and a narrow width that is $\Gamma<38 {\rm MeV/}c^2$ at the 90% confidence level. These results are consistent with published BESII results. These mass and width values do not match with those of any known meson resonance.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, submitted to Chinese Physics

Pacific warm pool excitation, earth rotation and El Niño southern oscillations

2002-2003 > Academic research: refereed > Publication in refereed journalVersion of RecordPublishe

Sensitivity of MEG and EEG to Source Orientation

An important difference between magnetoencephalography (MEG) and electroencephalography (EEG) is that MEG is insensitive to radially oriented sources. We quantified computationally the dependency of MEG and EEG on the source orientation using a forward model with realistic tissue boundaries. Similar to the simpler case of a spherical head model, in which MEG cannot see radial sources at all, for most cortical locations there was a source orientation to which MEG was insensitive. The median value for the ratio of the signal magnitude for the source orientation of the lowest and the highest sensitivity was 0.06 for MEG and 0.63 for EEG. The difference in the sensitivity to the source orientation is expected to contribute to systematic differences in the signal-to-noise ratio between MEG and EEG.National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant NS057500)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant NS037462)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant HD040712)National Center for Research Resources (U.S.) (P41RR14075)Mind Research Networ

Experimental review of oxygen content at mixing layer in cone calorimeter

This work aims to elucidate whether the hypothesis of zero oxygen at the mixture layer when flame takes place is assumable for every kind of material. For that purpose, we investigated the oxygen concentration there by cone calorimeter tests. A modified holder was developed in order to collect oxygen in this mixture layer. In addition, thermogravimetric tests were carried out so as to relate the possible effects of the presence of oxygen in the atmosphere where the pyrolysis process takes place, since the cone calorimeter does not allow to control the oxygen level of the atmosphere during the experiment. The reaction rates and per cent of residue in the cone calorimetric tests were measured and compared with the results from thermogravimetric tests. Six products were analysed which can be classified in three main groups: lignocellulosic, thermoplastic polymers and thermoset polymers. Cone calorimetric results showed that for some of the materials analysed (PET, Nylon and PUR foam) the oxygen level at mixture layer decreased until values close to zero. The comparison of reaction rates between cone calorimetric and thermogravimetric tests revealed the char layer created in cone calorimetric tests over the exposed face for brushed fir, Nylon and PET established an important heat barrier that modifies the thermal behaviour of these materials.Authors would like to thank to the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness for the PYRODESIGN Project grant, Ref.: BIA2012-37890, financed jointly by FEDER funds

Phase Diagram and High Temperature Superconductivity at 65 K in Tuning Carrier Concentration of Single-Layer FeSe Films

Superconductivity in the cuprate superconductors and the Fe-based superconductors is realized by doping the parent compound with charge carriers, or by application of high pressure, to suppress the antiferromagnetic state. Such a rich phase diagram is important in understanding superconductivity mechanism and other physics in the Cu- and Fe-based high temperature superconductors. In this paper, we report a phase diagram in the single-layer FeSe films grown on SrTiO3 substrate by an annealing procedure to tune the charge carrier concentration over a wide range. A dramatic change of the band structure and Fermi surface is observed, with two distinct phases identified that are competing during the annealing process. Superconductivity with a record high transition temperature (Tc) at ~65 K is realized by optimizing the annealing process. The wide tunability of the system across different phases, and its high-Tc, make the single-layer FeSe film ideal not only to investigate the superconductivity physics and mechanism, but also to study novel quantum phenomena and for potential applications.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figure