Hearing disorders in Turner’s syndrome

Introduction: Turner’s Syndrome (TS) is associated with hearing disorders in about 20 to 50% of affected individuals. The most common hearing disorders include congenital auricular malformations, recurrent otitis media and sensorineural hearing loss, although altered vestibular function and tinnitus have also been reported. Objectives: The aim of this paper is to provide an up-to-date overview of the principal ndings and research perspectives about the association between TS and hearing disorders. Review: Middle ear disorders, found in a range between 21 and 91% of subjects, are a consequence of morphological cranio-facial alterations resulting in middle ear ventilation dysfunc- tion. Sensorineural hearing loss follows 2 main audiological pro les: a bilateral symmetrical mid-frequency dip and a high frequency down-sloping curve. Although the pathophysiologic basis of sensorineural hearing loss in TS patients are still unclear, several hypothesis have been made so far and are reviewed in this paper. Conclusion: Literature confirms that hearing disorders, although not the most relevant clinical problem in these patients, have a high incidence in patients with TS and should therefore undergo early evaluation and monitoring over time

Metastatic renal cell carcinoma presenting as a paranasal sinus mass: the importance of differential diagnosis

Metastases in the paranasal sinuses are rare; renal cell carcinoma is the most common cancer that metastasizes to this region. We present the case of a patient with a 4-month history of a rapidly growing mass of the nasal pyramid following a nasal trauma, associated with spontaneous epistaxis and multiple episodes of hematuria. Cranial CT scan and MRI showed an ethmoid mass extending to the choanal region, the right orbit, and the right frontal sinus with an initial intracranial extension. Patient underwent surgery with a trans-sinusal frontal approach using a bicoronal incision combined with an anterior midfacial degloving; histological exam was compatible with a metastasis of clear cell renal cell carcinoma. Following histological findings, a total body CT scan showed a solitary 6 cm mass in the upper posterior pole of the left kidney identified as the primary tumor. Although rare, metastatic renal cell carcinoma should always be suspected in patients with nasal or paranasal masses, especially if associated with symptoms suggestive of a systemic involvement such as hematuria. A correct early-stage diagnosis of metastatic RCC can considerably improve survival rate in these patients; preoperative differential diagnosis with contrast-enhanced imaging is fundamental for the correct treatment and follow-up strategy

Somatic modulation of tinnitus: a review and some open questions

Tinnitus modulation by movements of the temporomandibular joint, head and neck musculoskeletal structures and the eye, can be found in one to two thirds of tinnitus sufferers; unfortunately this condition is often overlooked by otolaryngologists. Although somatic modulation has been initially hypothesized as a fundamental characteristic of tinnitus, there is increasing evidence of a tight connection with disorders of non-auditory regions. The structure that mostly modulates tinnitus is the temporomandibular joint, which mainly causes an increase in tinnitus loudness, followed by head and neck movements that may result in an increase or decrease of loudness and eye movements (gaze-evoked tinnitus). Besides loudness, somatic movements can also modulate tinnitus pitch and localization. Somatosensory tinnitus is a relatively new nding that leaves several open questions: are there individual predisposing factors to somatic modulation? How strong is the association between the capability to somatically modulate tinnitus and an underlying non-auditory disorder? Changes that occur after somatic maneuvers are only transitory? Why patients that have concomitant hyperacusis also have higher chances of tinnitus modulation? Further basic science and clinical research is required to address these and many other questions about somatosensory tinnitus

Le lingue in Africa Nera

A general overview of typological characteristics of Bantu, Nilotic and Khoisan languages. Sociolinguistic aspects of multilingual societies in black Africa. Relationship between mother tongues and official languages.In Banfi E - Grandi N. Le lingue del mondo. Asia, Africa. Roma, Carocci, 2008

PIXEL 2010 - a Resume

The Pixel 2010 conference focused on semiconductor pixel detectors for particle tracking/vertexing as well as for imaging, in particular for synchrotron light sources and XFELs. The big LHC hybrid pixel detectors have impressively started showing their capabilities. X-ray imaging detectors, also using the hybrid pixel technology, have greatly advanced the experimental possibilities for diiffraction experiments. Monolithic or semi-monolithic devices like CMOS active pixels and DEPFET pixels have now reached a state such that complete vertex detectors for RHIC and superKEKB are being built with these technologies. Finally, new advances towards fully monolithic active pixel detectors, featuring full CMOS electronics merged with efficient signal charge collection, exploiting standard CMOS technologies, SOI and/or 3D integration, show the path for the future. This r\'esum\'e attempts to extract the main statements of the results and developments presented at this conference.Comment: 8 pages, 19 figures, conference summar

Approximately Efficient Double Auctions with Strong Budget Balance

Mechanism design for one-sided markets is an area of extensive research in economics and, since more than a decade, in computer science as well. Two-sided markets, on the other hand, have not received the same attention despite the numerous applications to web advertisement, stock exchange, and frequency spectrum allocation. This work studies double auctions, in which unit-demand buyers and unit-supply sellers act strategically. An ideal goal in double auction design is to maximize the social welfare of buyers and sellers with individually rational (IR), incentive compatible (IC) and strongly budget-balanced (SBB) mechanisms. The first two properties are standard. SBB requires that the payments charged to the buyers are entirely handed to the sellers. This property is crucial in all the contexts that do not allow the auctioneer retaining a share of buyers' payments or subsidizing the market. Unfortunately, this goal is known to be unachievable even for the special case of bilateral trade, where there is only one buyer and one seller. Therefore, in subsequent papers, meaningful trade-offs between these requirements have been investigated. Our main contribution is the first IR, IC and SBB mechanism that provides an O(1)-approximation to the optimal social welfare. This result holds for any number of buyers and sellers with arbitrary, independent distributions. Moreover, our result continues to hold when there is an additional matroid constraint on the sets of buyers who may get allocated an item. To prove our main result, we devise an extension of sequential posted price mechanisms to two-sided markets. In addition to this, we improve the best-known approximation bounds for the bilateral trade problem

The ZEUS Micro Vertex Detector

During the HERA luminosity shutdown period 2000/01 the tracking system of the ZEUS experiment has been upgraded with a silicon Micro Vertex Detector (MVD). The barrel part of the detector consists of three layers of single sided silicon strip detectors, while the forward section is composed of four wheels. In this report we shortly present the assembly procedure and in more details the test beam results on the spatial resolution of half modules. The first results of a cosmic ray test are presented and the radiation monitor system is described.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, Talk presented at the VERTEX 2001 Workshop, 23-28 Sept. 2001, Brunnen, Switzerland. Submitted to Nucl. Instr. and Meth.

Nasal manifestations in granulomatosis with polyangiitis: a case report and review of the literature

Granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA) is an anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA)-associated vasculitides of medium and small arteries, characterized by necrotizing granulomatous inflammation of the upper and lower respiratory tract with coexist- ing glomerulonephritis. We report a case of GPA in a patient presenting with a six-month history of spontaneous epistaxis, nasal obstruction and frontal headache. Nasal endoscopy showed a large nasal septum perforation and an anterior translucid mass in the right nasal fossa. Findings were confirmed by computed tomography (CT) scan with contrast. The patient underwent func- tional transnasal endoscopic removal of the mass; histological examination showed tissue features suggestive of GPA; dosage of c-ANCA e p-ANCA antibodies confirmed GPA diagnosis. Nasal septum perforation has long been recognized as a feature of GPA, in which granulomatous destruction of nasal cartilage can result in perforation and saddle-nose deformity. Prompt diagno- sis of GPA is important to initiate therapy which may be life-saving and organ sparing