Pear breeding and selection for Fire blight resistance

I.I.F - I.I.R. Commission C2Pear breeding and selection for Fire blight resistance. Working Group "Pears

804-4 A Randomized, Double-blind Trial of Streptokinase Versus Placebo for the Management of Unstable Angina and Non-Q-wave Myocardial Infarction in Patients with Previous Coronary Artery Bypass Surgery

This trial investigated the potential usefulness of thrombolysis in patients with previous coronary artery bypass surgery admired for unstable angina and non-Q-wave myocardial infarction, the rationale being more frequent non-Q-wave infarction in these patients and a high-fibrin content of older grafts. A total of 125 consecutive patients with symptoms evolving for less than 24 hr were randomized to intravenous streptokinase 1.5 million Units in 45 min, or to placebo. All patients received concomitant intravenous heparin, oral aspirin and standard anti-ischemic therapy. Mean age (62±9 yrs). sex (78% male). time of previous surgery (8±0.5 yrs), presence of a previous myocardial infarction (63%). prior medication including aspirin in 66%, an abnormal ECG at admission (79%) and time to treatment after the last ischemic episode (10±9 hr) were similar in the 2 study groups.Fatal and non-fatal myocardial infarctions in hospital occurred in 7 streptokinase (11.1%) and 3 placebo (4.8%) patients (relative risk 2.3, 95% confidence limits 0.62–8.48, p=0.19) and at 1 month in an additional 2 patients in each group. Refractory angina in hospital was observed in 12 (19.1%) streptokinase patients and 13 (20.9%) placebo patients. A revascularization procedure because of recurrent symptoms was required at 1 month in respectively 22 (34.9%) and 16 (25.8%) patients.ConclusionThe early cardiac event rate in unstable angina associated with previous bypass surgery is high. The nonsignificant excess in the risk of myocardial infarction with streptokinase in this population most likely to benefit, is similar to the excess reported in other populations of patients with unstable angina and non-a-wave myocardial infarction and supports the lack of benefit of thrombolysis in unstable angina

Accelerated Growth Rate Induced by Neonatal High-Protein Milk Formula Is Not Supported by Increased Tissue Protein Synthesis in Low-Birth-Weight Piglets

Low-birth-weight neonates are routinely fed a high-protein formula to promote catch-up growth and antibiotics are usually associated to prevent infection. Yet the effects of such practices on tissue protein metabolism are unknown. Baby pigs were fed from age 2 to 7 or 28 d with high protein formula with or without amoxicillin supplementation, in parallel with normal protein formula, to determine tissue protein metabolism modifications. Feeding high protein formula increased growth rate between 2 and 28 days of age when antibiotic was administered early in the first week of life. This could be explained by the occurrence of diarrhea when piglets were fed the high protein formula alone. Higher growth rate was associated with higher feed conversion and reduced protein synthesis rate in the small intestine, muscle and carcass, whereas proteolytic enzyme activities measured in these tissues were unchanged. In conclusion, accelerated growth rate caused by high protein formula and antibiotics was not supported by increased protein synthesis in muscle and carcass

Well-posedness results for non-autonomous dissipative complementarity systems

This paper deals with the well-posedness of a class of nonsmooth dynamical systems: dissipative complementarity systems. Both the linear and the nonlinear cases are treated, and the systems are non-autonomous. The dissipativity property is used to perform a particular change of state vector which allows one to transform the dynamics into a perturbed Moreau's sweeping process. As an example an electrical circuit with ideal diodes is presented

Effect of spray cooling on heat transfer in a two-phase helium flow

International audienceIn this paper, we describe an experimental study of the phenomenon of spray cooling in the case of liquid helium, either normal or superfluid, and its relationship to the heat transfer between an atomized diphasic flow contained in a long pipe, and the pipe walls. This situation is discussed in the context of the cooling of the superconducting magnets of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Experiments were conducted in a test loop reproducing the LHC cooling system, in which the vapor velocity and temperature could be varied in a large range. Shear induced atomization results in the generation of a droplet mist which was characterized by optical means. The thin liquid film deposited on the walls by the mist was measured using interdigitated capacitors. The cooling power of the mist was measured using thermal probes, and correlated to the local mist density. Analysis of the results shows that superfluidity has only a limited influence on both the film thickness and the mist cooling power. Using a simple model, we show that the phenomenon of spray cooling accounts for the measured non linearity of the global heat transfer. Finally, we discuss the relevance of our results for cooling the final focus magnets (inner triplets) in an upgraded version of the LHC

Drinking Patterns and Their Predictive Factors in CONTROL: a 12-Month Prospective Study in a Sample of Alcohol-Dependent Patients Initiating Treatment

Aims: To describe the drinking patterns and their baseline predictive factors during a 12-month period after an initial evaluation for alcohol treatment. Methods CONTROL is a single-center, prospective, observational study evaluating consecutive alcohol-dependent patients. Using a curve clustering methodology based on a polynomial regression mixture model, we identified three clusters of patients with dominant alcohol use patterns described as mostly abstainers, mostly moderate drinkers and mostly heavy drinkers. Multinomial logistic regression analysis was used to identify baseline factors (socio-demographic, alcohol dependence consequences and related factors) predictive of belonging to each drinking cluster. ResultsThe sample included 143 alcohol-dependent adults (63.6% males), mean age 44.6 ± 11.8 years. The clustering method identified 47 (32.9%) mostly abstainers, 56 (39.2%) mostly moderate drinkers and 40 (28.0%) mostly heavy drinkers. Multivariate analyses indicated that mild or severe depression at baseline predicted belonging to the mostly moderate drinkers cluster during follow-up (relative risk ratio (RRR) 2.42, CI [1.02-5.73, P = 0.045] P = 0.045), while living alone (RRR 2.78, CI [1.03-7.50], P = 0.044) and reporting more alcohol-related consequences (RRR 1.03, CI [1.01-1.05], P = 0.004) predicted belonging to the mostly heavy drinkers cluster during follow-up. Conclusion In this sample, the drinking patterns of alcohol-dependent patients were predicted by baseline factors, i.e. depression, living alone or alcohol-related consequences and findings that may inform clinicians about the likely drinking patterns of their alcohol-dependent patient over the year following the initial evaluation for alcohol treatmen