Renal crystal deposits and histopathology in patients with cystine stones

We have biopsied the papillae of patients who have cystine stones asking if this stone type is associated with specific tissue changes. We studied seven cystine stone formers (SF) treated with percutaneous nephrolithotomy using digital video imaging of renal papillae for mapping and obtained papillary biopsies. Biopsies were analyzed by routine light and electron microscopy, infrared spectroscopy, electron diffraction, and micro-CT. Many ducts of Bellini (BD) had an enlarged ostium, and all such were plugged with cystine crystals, and had injured or absent lining cells with a surrounding interstitium that was inflamed to fibrotic. Crystal plugs often projected into the urinary space. Many inner medullary collecting ducts (IMCD) were dilated with or without crystal plugging. Apatite crystals were identified in the lumens of loops of Henle and IMCD. Abundance of interstitial Randall's plaque was equivalent in amount to that of non-SF. In the cortex, glomerular obsolescence and interstitial fibrosis exceeded normal. Cystine crystallizes in BD with the probable result of cell injury, interstitial reaction, nephron obstruction, and with the potential of inducing cortical change and loss of IMCD tubular fluid pH regulation, resulting in apatite formation. The pattern of IMCD dilation, and loss of medullary structures is most compatible with such obstruction, either from BD lumen plugs or urinary tract obstruction from stones themselves

Search for long-lived doubly charged Higgs bosons in p(p)over-bar collisions at root s=1.96 TeV

We present a search for long-lived doubly charged Higgs bosons (H+/-+/-), with signatures of high ionization energy loss and muonlike penetration. We use 292 pb(-1) of data collected in p (p) over bar collisions at root s=1.96 TeV by the CDF II detector at the Fermilab Tevatron. Observing no evidence of long-lived doubly charged particle production, we exclude H-L(+/-+/-) and H-R(+/-+/-) bosons with masses below 133 GeV/c(2) and 109 GeV/c(2), respectively. In the degenerate case we exclude H+/-+/- mass below 146 GeV/c(2). All limits are quoted at the 95% confidence level

Measurement of the W+W- Production Cross Section in ppbar Collisions at sqrt(s)=1.96 TeV using Dilepton Events

We present a measurement of the W+W- production cross section using 184/pb of ppbar collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 1.96 TeV collected with the Collider Detector at Fermilab. Using the dilepton decay channel W+W- -> l+l-vvbar, where the charged leptons can be either electrons or muons, we find 17 candidate events compared to an expected background of 5.0+2.2-0.8 events. The resulting W+W- production cross section measurement of sigma(ppbar -> W+W-) = 14.6 +5.8 -5.1 (stat) +1.8 -3.0 (syst) +-0.9 (lum) pb agrees well with the Standard Model expectation.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, 2 tables. To be submitted to Physical Review Letter

Gluttony, excess, and the fall of the planter class in the British Caribbean

Food and rituals around eating are a fundamental part of human existence. They can also be heavily politicized and socially significant. In the British Caribbean, white slaveholders were renowned for their hospitality towards one another and towards white visitors. This was no simple quirk of local character. Hospitality and sociability played a crucial role in binding the white minority together. This solidarity helped a small number of whites to dominate and control the enslaved majority. By the end of the eighteenth century, British metropolitan observers had an entrenched opinion of Caribbean whites as gluttons. Travelers reported on the sumptuous meals and excessive drinking of the planter class. Abolitionists associated these features of local society with the corrupting influences of slavery. Excessive consumption and lack of self-control were seen as symptoms of white creole failure. This article explores how local cuisine and white creole eating rituals developed as part of slave societies and examines the ways in which ideas about hospitality and gluttony fed into the debates over slavery that led to the dismantling of slavery and the fall of the planter class

Hospitality, Improvisation and Gestell: A Phenomenology of Mobile Information

This paper reports on longitudinal research into the implementation and use of the first mobile vehicle mounted data system (VMDS) at a UK fire service. Using insights from Claudio Ciborra’s work, the paper develops a phenomenological ontology for conceptualising the co-constitutive relation between organisational practices and information technology mediated practices. The paper sets out how the brigade’s mobile data system can be understood in terms hospitality, improvisation and Gestell. It is argued that despite the seemingly innocent and potentially mundane replacement of paper-based practices by electronically mediated mobile information and communication, the VMDS is associated with significant and far-reaching outcomes, both empirical and ontological, within the brigade and for the modernisation of fire service provision across the UK. We suggest that the dynamic of hospitality between guest and host provides a way to think through and beyond the deployment information infrastructures as enframed by a technological mood. The paper concludes with some general implications for a phenomenology of information technology