Tissue macerating instrument

A surgical tissue macerating and removal tool is described which has a rotating rod with a cutting member at one end and which disposed in a tube which is then contained in an extension of the tool handle. A frusto-conical member extends into the extension at the cutter member end of the rotating rod with its small end engaging the tube. The portion of the frusto-conical member outside of the extension forms a tissue engaging member and may be cut-off at an angle to the axis of the rod to form a tissue engaging edge. Apertures are provided in the extension adjacent the frusto-concial member so that treatment fluid supplied in the annular space between the tube and the extension may flow to the operative site. An aperture is provided in the frustoconical member between the extension and the tube so that fluid may also flow into the tube where it mixes with macerated tissue being directed through an aperture in the tube to a passageway which may have suction applied to help remove macerated material

An effective method to read out large scintillator areas with precise timing

Using scintillator tile technology several square meters of plastic scintillator are read out by only two photomultiplier with a time precision of about 1.5 nsec. Two examples are discussed to build a detector based on this technology to search for cosmic muons and neutrinos.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures. Contributed to Workshop on Scintillating Fiber Detectors (SCIFI97), Notre Dame, IN, 2-6 Nov 199

An Analysis of Expansion and Relocation Sites for Major League Soccer

This research develops a model of optimal locations for Major League Soccer teams and investigates the important underlying factors.soccer; MLS; regression; probit; demand; location

Intraocular pressure reduction and regulation system

An intraocular pressure reduction and regulation system is described and data are presented covering performance in: (1) reducing intraocular pressure to a preselected value, (2) maintaining a set minimum intraocular pressure, and (3) reducing the dynamic increases in intraocular pressure resulting from external loads applied to the eye

Isolation and characterization of cGMP phosphodiesterase from bovine rod outer segments

Journal ArticleA simple purification method has been developed for isolation of bovine cGMP phosphodiesterase from photoreceptor rod outer segments. The enzyme is peripherally membrane bound in its native state and is present in relatively high concentrations. In the bovine photoreceptors its molar ratio to rhodopsin can be estimated to be as great as 1:40 and not lower than 1: 170. The isolated enzyme is purified to homogeneity as demonstrated by gel electrophoresis under native and denaturing conditions and analytical ultracentrifuga- Con. The core enzyme has a molecular weight of approximately 170,000, as demonstrated by sucrose gradient centrifugation and analytical ultracentrifugation, and is composed of two major subunits, 88,000 (CY) and 84,000 (p), augmented by a small subunit of 13,000 (y). In its purified state, the enzyme is activated neither by light nor GTP in contrast to the native membranebound enzyme. As isolated, the molar activity of the enzyme is 45 mol of cGMP hydrolized s-' mol-' with a Km = 150 PM (cGMP) and Km > 4 XnM (CAMP). Protamine activates the enzyme to 360 mol of cGMP see-' mol-' @-fold) and limited digestion by trypsin activates it to as great as 2100 mol of cGMP s-l mol-' @O-fold)

Primary structure and chromosomal localization of human and mouse rod photoreceptor cGMP-gated cation channel

Journal ArticleWe have determined the primary structures of the human and mouse retinal rod cGMP-gated cation channel by analysis of cDNA clones and amplified DNA. The open reading frames predicted polypeptides of 690 and 683 residues exhibiting 88% sequence similarity. Sequence comparison indicated that the rod channels consist of a variable 90-residue N-terminal region, a short highly charged segment rich in lysine and glutamate, and a 540-residue C-terminal portion that is well conserved in three mammalian species. Significant sequence similarity (59%) of the visual cGMP-gated channel to the olfactory cAMP-gated channel established the existence of a family of cyclic nucleotide-gated ion channel genes. RNA blot analysis revealed transcripts of 3.2 kilobases (kb) in human, mouse, and dog, 3.2, 4.6, and 5.2 kb in bovine, and 3.6 kb in fish. The human channel gene was mapped by polymerase chain reaction of somatic cell hybrid DNAs to chromosome 4 (p14-q13) near the centromere. The mouse channel gene locus (Cncg) was mapped by interspecific backcross haplotype analysis 0.9 centimorgan proximal of the Kit locus on chromosome 5

Mechanisms of variability in decadal sea-level trends in the Baltic Sea over the 20th century

Coastal sea-level trends in the Baltic Sea display decadal-scale variations around a long-term centennial trend. In this study, we analyse the spatial and temporal characteristics of the decadal trend variations and investigate the links between coastal sea-level trends and atmospheric forcing on a decadal timescale. For this analysis, we use monthly means of sea-level and climatic data sets. The sea-level data set is composed of long tide gauge records and gridded sea surface height (SSH) reconstructions. Climatic data sets are composed of sea-level pressure, air temperature, precipitation, evaporation, and climatic variability indices. The analysis indicates that atmospheric forcing is a driving factor of decadal sea-level trends. However, its effect is geographically heterogeneous. This impact is large in the northern and eastern regions of the Baltic Sea. In the southern Baltic Sea area, the impacts of atmospheric circulation on decadal sea-level trends are smaller. To identify the influence of the large-scale factors other than the effect of atmospheric circulation in the same season on Baltic Sea sea-level trends, we filter out the direct signature of atmospheric circulation for each season separately on the Baltic Sea level through a multivariate linear regression model and analyse the residuals of this regression model. These residuals hint at a common underlying factor that coherently drives the decadal sea-level trends in the whole Baltic Sea. We found that this underlying effect is partly a consequence of decadal precipitation trends in the Baltic Sea basin in the previous season. The investigation of the relation between the AMO index and sea-level trends implies that this detected underlying factor is not connected to oceanic forcing driven from the North Atlantic region

On the origin of discrepancies between observed and simulated memory of Arctic Sea ice

To investigate the inherent predictability of sea ice and its representation in climate models, we compare the seasonal-to-interannual memory of Arctic sea ice as given by lagged correlations of sea-ice area anomalies in large model ensembles (Max Planck Institute Grand Ensemble and Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 6) and multiple observational products. We find that state-of-the-art climate models significantly overestimate the memory of pan-Arctic sea-ice area from the summer months into the following year. This cannot be explained by internal variability. We further show that the observed summer memory can be disentangled regionally into a reemergence of positive correlations in the perennial ice zone and negative correlations in the seasonal ice zone; the latter giving rise to the discrepancy between observations and model simulations. These findings could explain some of the predictability gap between potential and operational forecast skill of Arctic sea-ice area identified in previous studies