Myocardial perfusion imaging with 99 mTc - tetrofosmin SPECT in breast cancer patients that received postoperative radiotherapy: a case-control study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Purpose</p> <p>To evaluate the cardiac toxicity of radiotherapy (RT) in breast cancer (BC) patients employing myocardial perfusion imaging (MPI) with Tc-99 m Tetrofosmin - single photon emission computer tomography (T-SPECT).</p> <p>Materials and methods</p> <p>We studied 46 BC female patients (28 patients with left and 18 patients with right BC) treated with postoperative RT compared to a control group of 85 age-matched females. The median time of RT to SPECT was 40 months (6-263).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Abnormalities in the summed stress score (SSS) were found in 54% of left BC patients, 44.4% of right BC patients, and 32.9% of controls. In left BC patients there were significantly more SSS abnormalities compared to controls (4.0 ± 3.5 vs 2.6 ± 2.0, p = 0.05) and possible trend of increased abnormalities of right BC patients (3.7 ± 3.0 vs 2.6 ± 2.0, p = 0.14). Multiple regression analysis showed more abnormalities in the MPI of left BC patients compared to controls (SSS, p = 0.0001); Marginal toxicity was also noted in right BC patients (SSS, p = 0.045). No additional toxicity was found in patients that received adjuvant cardiotoxic chemotherapy. All T-SPECT abnormalities were clinically silent.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The study suggests that radiation therapy to BC patients result in MPI abnormalities but without apparent clinical consequences.</p

Inclusion of people in decision-making: The new challenges

Reflecting on the May 2019 European Parliament elections, the EU democratic institutions are in need of efficiently responding to the discrepancies between public agendas and policy-making (as shown in the Macedonia naming dispute), and the threatening dynamics of authoritarian populism, as well as to unpredictable reactions from diverse groups and citizens, especially from the neglected, excluded and marginal ones. These citizens cannot handle complexity and react by voting for protest candidates/movements and supporting radical, yet oversimplified and inadequate, solutions to complex problems. Given the potentiality of crisis cascades and that an over-standardized “one size fits all” approach does not work anymore, the EU policy-making experts should arguably turn their analytic attention to existing drivers of political destabilisation by adopting new knowledge bases and sources. This pertains to a fresh theoretical understanding of nonlinear sociopolitical phenomena (from populist reactions of any kind to social media behaviours), that is, a deeper, complexity-friendly approach drawn from new scientific advancements and coupled with innovative policy designs, aimed to rebalance the system and to defend the European project against further failures. © 2020 University of Zagreb, Faculty of Political Sciences. All rights reserved

Etude expérimentale de la production de deutérons négatifs par double échange de charges dans le xénon

It is thought that additional heating of fusion plasma will result from D0 energetic beam injection in large plasma devices. Due to the fact that the conversion rate D+ to D0 rapidly decreases at high énergies, it seems that an interesting way to get these high energy neutrals should be : conversion of D+ to D-, acceleration of D- and further neutralization of D- to have D 0 at the desired energy. The efficiency of D+ to D- and D +2 to D- conversions at low énergies have been studied on a Xe gas target : it appears that D-/D+ conversion efficiency shows a smooth variation peaking slightly at 5 % for a D + energy of 5 keV. D-/D+2 increases up to 4 % at 12 keV and then decreases. It is shown that the agreement between sample calculation results and experimental values is quite fair for D -/D+.Dans la perspective du chauffage des plasmas de fusion, on envisage d'utiliser des faisceaux de deutérons D0 de grande énergie. Afin d'obtenir ces faisceaux, il convient de procéder à la conversion d'ions D+ en ions D-, ceux-ci devant être accélérés ultérieurement aux énergies intéressantes pour le chauffage. Les résultats présentés concernent donc l'évaluation du rendement de conversion D+ → D- et D+2 → D- en en fonction de l'énergie. La conversion D+/D- passe par un maximum à 6 keV (5 à 6 %), en accord raisonnable avec les estimations théoriques. La conversion D+2 /D- atteint une valeur de 2 à 3 % vers 12 keV. Pour ce dernier processus il n'existe pas, en l'état actuel, de modèle théorique. Les expériences ont été conduites dans le xénon, gaz cible du double échange de charge

Ti-ii transition probabilities and radiative lifetimes in TI and the solar titanium abundance

Transition probabilities of 100 Ti-II emission lines, originating from 7 different atomic levels, have been determined by combining branching fractions with radiative lifetimes. The branching fractions were measured using Fourier transform spectroscopy on a hollow cathode. The radiative lifetimes of these 7 - and 35 additional - levels were measured using time resolved laser-induced fluorescence on a slow Ti ion beam. The transition probabilities of 21 very weak lines have been used to derive a solar titanium abundance of α[SUB]Ti[/SUB] = log(N[SUB]Ti[/SUB]/N[SUB]H[/SUB]) + 12=5.04±0.04 dex, which is insensitive to the solar model. This value is in disagreement with the meteoritic titanium abundance (4.93±0.02)