Hand transplantation: The state-of-the-art

The feasibility of hand transplantation has been demonstrated, both surgically and immunologically. Levels of immunosuppression comparable to regimens used in solid organ transplantation are proving sufficient to prevent graft loss. Many patients have achieved discriminative sensibility and recovery of intrinsic muscle function. In addition to restoration of function, hand transplantation offers considerable psychological benefits. The recipient's pre-operative psychological status, his motivation and his compliance with the intense rehabilitation programme are key issues. While the induction of graft specific tolerance represents a hope for the future, immunosuppression currently remains necessary and carries significant risks. Hand transplantation should, therefore, only be considered a therapeutic option for a carefully selected group of patients. © 2006 The British Society for Surgery of the Hand.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Polarization of the Sky

International audienceBased on full-sky imaging polarimetric measurements, in this chapter we demonstrate that the celestial distribution of the angle of polarization (or E-vector direction) of skylight is a very robust pattern being qualitatively always the same under all possible sky conditions. Practically the only qualitative difference among clear, partly cloudy, overcast, foggy, smoky and tree-canopied skies occurs in the degree of linear polarization d: The higher the optical thickness of the non-clear atmosphere, the lower the d of skylight. We review here how well the Rayleigh model describes the E-vector pattern of clear and cloudy skies. We deal with the polarization patterns of foggy, partly cloudy, overcast, twilight, smoky and total-solar-eclipsed skies. We describe the possible influences of the changed polarization pattern of smoky and eclipsed skies on insect orientation. We consider the polarization of ‘water-skies’ above Arctic open waters and the polarization characteristics of fogbows. Finally, we deal with the change of skylight polarization due to the transmission through Snell’s window of the flat water surface