Resection in the popliteal fossa for metastatic melanoma

BACKGROUND: Traditionally metastatic melanoma of the distal leg and the foot metastasize to the lymph nodes of the groin. Sometimes the first site of nodal disease can be the popliteal fossa. This is an infrequent event, with rare reports in literature and when it occurs, radical popliteal node dissection must be performed. CASE PRESENTATION: We report a case of a 36-year old man presented with diagnosis of 2 mm thick, Clark's level II-III, non ulcerated melanoma of the left heel, which developed during the course of the disease popliteal node metastases, after a superficial and deep groin dissection for inguinal node involvement. Five months after popliteal lymph node dissection he developed systemic disease, therefore he received nine cycles of dacarbazine plus fotemustine. To date (56 months after prior surgery and 11 months after chemotherapy) he is alive with no evidence of disease. CONCLUSION: In case of groin metastases from melanoma of distal lower extremities, clinical and ultrasound examination of ipsilateral popliteal fossa is essential. When metastatic disease is found, radical popliteal dissection is the standard of care. Therefore knowledge of anatomy and surgical technique about popliteal lymphadenectomy are required to make preservation of structures that if injured, can produce a permanent, considerable disability

CONTOUR Dust Shield Performance

The Comet Nucleus Tour (CONTOUR) is one of NASA\u27s Discovery series missions in which a single spacecraft will be launched in July 2002 to journey to the coma of comets Encke and Schwassmann-Wachmann-3 at velocities of 28.2 and 14 km/s, respectively. A multishock bumper dust shield with four ceramic fabric bumpers and a Kevlar-based rear wall, normally aligned to the dust velocity field vector, will provide the protection. Various configurations of the prototype shield were shot with surrogate nylon particles of various diameters at about 7 km/s to determine empirical ballistic limit equations. The performance is scaled to flyby velocities and comet dust particles using laws of momentum and kinetic energy and is related to the expected comets\u27 dust fluence to determine flyby distances from the nuclei for a desired level of reliability. Empirical damage models to predict the size of the holes and mass loss of each layer are developed from measurements of the damage on the prototype targets. For small dust particles, a shield erosion model is assumed to only affect the first bumper. The damage and erosion models are incorporated into a Monte Carlo probabilistic simulation that predicts the shield damage and the probability of no penetration of the shield. This paper describes the methodology to evaluate the shield performance

Temporal analysis of branches pod production in peanut (Arachis hypogaea) genotypes with different growth habits and branching patterns

Peanut is an annual crop with indeterminate growth habits and different branching patterns. The combination of these parameters produces different modes of pod distribution in the soil, mainly due to spatial and temporal variation in the gynophore penetration and subsequent pod development. Different levels of lateral and main stem branches have variable influences on plant yield. Branch influence on yield also is significantly different among virginia, runner, and spanish cultivars. The objective of this study was to describe and quantify the number and weight of pod determinations for each branch type, and to estimate the relationship with prevailing mean temperature and solar radiation during the respective moment. The study was carried out under field conditions using two genotypes sowed at three different dates. The differences in the relative contribution to pod yield provided by each branch are due to the critical period of determination of number and weight of pods. Critical periods differ between genotypes, and are dependent on the growth habit and branching pattern. Branches with a greater contribution to pod yield (n+1 cotyledonary and others with 65 to 67%, and n+2 cotyledonary with 24 to 26%) have an earlier onset, higher rate of appearance and pod growth, and longer duration of these critical stages. However, there was no difference in the amount of intercepted photosynthetically active radiation (IPAR) and mean temperature due to temporal overlap of these stages in the main branch categories (cotyledonary n+1 and n+2, and other n+1). Instead, the partitioning coefficient (p) was different among branch types, due to the sink strength (number and weight of pods) in both cultivars. Thus, p ranged 0.01–0.32 and 0.01–0.33 in Utre, and between 0.02–0.24 and 0.03–0.26 for number and weight of pods in Granoleico, respectively. This sink strength, in turn, is greater in the branches that first define the yield components, thus giving them a comparative advantage with respect to later ontogenetic development branches. These results suggest that to improve peanut yield it may be desirable obtain cultivar with lower indetermination growth level and more branch types of earlier onset.Fil: Giayetto, Oscar. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Agronomía y Veterinaria; ArgentinaFil: Morla, FEDERICO DANIEL. Universidad Nacional de Rio Cuarto. Facultad de Agronomia y Veterinaria. Departamento de Producción Vegetal. Cátedra de Producción Oleaginosas; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba; ArgentinaFil: Fernandez, Elena Mercedes. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Agronomía y Veterinaria; ArgentinaFil: Cerioni, Guillermo Angel. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Agronomía y Veterinaria; ArgentinaFil: Kearney, Marcelo Isaías. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Agronomía y Veterinaria; ArgentinaFil: Rosso, María Belén. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Agronomía y Veterinaria; ArgentinaFil: Violante, María Gabriela. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Facultad de Agronomía y Veterinaria; Argentin