Sequential intraluminal endoscopic and laparoscopic treatment for bile duct stones associated with gallstones

BACKGROUND: On the basis of a flowchart including prior or current jaundice or pancreatitis, abnormal liver function, ultrasound or IV cholangiography, bile duct (BD) stones were suspected in 71/593 patients referred for gallstones. METHODS: When endoscopic retrograde cholangiography detected BD stones, endoscopic sphincterotomy (ES) and endoscopic BD clearance were attempted, followed by laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC). BD stones were found in 44/71 patients. The sensitivity values of preoperative conditions were: 92% for IV cholangiography, 88% for abnormal liver function, 50% for ultrasound, and 37% for jaundice at admission. RESULTS: Endoscopic clearance succeeded in 37 patients and LC was completed in 33 patients. Conversion to open surgery (9%) was comparable with the rate in patients without BD stones. The median hospital stay for the sequential endoscopic and laparoscopic treatments was 13 days (range 4-54) or 22 days if open surgery was used. CONCLUSIONS: In conclusion, BD stones can be endoscopically cleared preoperatively in most patients without interfering with LC.     

Bacterial inactivation and organic oxidation via immobilized photo-Fenton reagent on structured silica surfaces

A woven inorganic silica fabric loaded with Fe-ions (EGF-Fe) was tested under simulated solar light during hydroquinone degradation. The abatement of hydroquinone was observed to attain about 80% within 3 h. The photo-catalyst was also tested to inactive Escherichia coli K12 at “natural” pH and in the presence of a low concentration of H₂O₂. Addition of H₂O₂ (10 mg L⁻¹) did not by itself to bacterial inactivation. Total bacterial inactivation was mediated by EGF-Fe fabrics in the presence of H₂O₂ (10 mg L⁻¹) under solar light irradiation. A sample containing active (culturable) bacteria (10⁵ CFU mL⁻¹) decreased to values <1 CFU mL⁻¹ within 3 h reaction. Fe-mediated homogeneous process decreased the bacterial CFU content by about two orders of magnitude within 4 h. During the degradation of hydroquinone only a small amount of iron ions were found in solution of about 1.2 mg L⁻¹, within 90 min decreasing to values ≤0.5 mg L⁻¹ after 180 min. The leaching of Fe-ions did not affect the photo-catalyst performance since EGF-Fe fabric did not deactivate after five or more cycles. The Fe-ions founds in solution mineralized hydroquinone to levels below 37% of its initial content. The present study presents the first report on the beneficial role of a heterogeneous iron supported catalyst leading to efficient bacterial inactivation in aqueous solution with iron leaching <0.1 mg L⁻¹, the detection limit for Fe-analysis in solution. No bacterial re-growth was observed during a post-irradiation period up to 24 h in the dark.     

The ECHORD project proposals analysis – Research profiles,collaboration patterns and research topic trends

This paper investigates the research profiles, collaboration patterns and research topic trends which can be identified in the proposals submitted to the ECHORD (European Clearing House for Open Robotics Development) FP7 project. On a country level, clusters were identified and characterized by patterns of proposal production per inhabitant, score and international cooperation. Belgium and Sweden constitute a cluster characterized by high proposal production, with very high scores and extensive international collaboration. Belgium also excels from another cluster analysis, being as the only country where 100% of proposals involve industry–academia cooperation and obtain scores above 10. Other findings show that single partner proposals have significantly lower quality than multi-partner proposals but, on the other hand, the number of countries involved shows no influence on the quality of the proposals. Despite the high number of industrial participants present on the proposals, it is observed that they play secondary roles in the proposals, with a very low number projects leaded by companies. Also, it is observed that partnerships between research institutions (non-universities) are the most successful. Concerning topics of the proposals, the technology human–robot interface and the product vision robot for small-scale manufacturing are the most significant. Finally, the paper shows clusters of institutions extracted from the giant network of relations obtained from the ECHORD set of proposals.     

Separation of recombinant human erythropoietin glycoforms by capillary electrophoresis using volatile electrolytes. Assessment of mass spectrometry for the characterization of erythropoietin glycoforms

The separation of the glycoforms of erythropoietin (EPO) by capillary electrophoresis (CE) was recently published as a monograph by the European Pharmacopoeia (European Pharmacopoeia 4 2002, 1316, 1123-1128). Although the experimental CE conditions employed a background electrolyte containing additives suitable for on-line UV-absorption detection, they were not appropriate for on-line mass spectrometry (MS) detection. In this work, an attempt was made to investigate experimental conditions employing volatile electrolyte systems to achieve the separation and characterization of EPO glycoforms using CE and ESI-MS methodologies. The influence of several operating conditions, such as the coating of the internal walls of the capillary as well as the composition, concentration, and the pH of the separation buffer were investigated. The results demonstrated that when the internal walls of the capillaries were permanently coated with Polybrene and a buffer electrolyte containing 400 mM of HAc-NH4Ac (acetic acid-ammonium acetate), pH 4.75, was used, a significantly reproducible separation was achieved for EPO glycoforms. Intact EPO was characterized by two mass spectrometry techniques: electrospray ionization (ESI-MS) and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight (MALDI-TOF-MS). The data demonstrated that MALDI-TOF-MS provided a good approximation to an average molecular mass of the EPO molecule. However, it was still necessary to carry out further separation of the intact EPO glycoforms in order to obtain molecular mass information when ESI-MS was used.     

High resolution modelling of the on‐shore technical wind energy potential in Spain

The potential of on‐shore wind energy in Spain is assessed using a methodology based on a detailed characterization of the wind resource. To obtain such a characterization, high‐resolution simulations of the weather in Spain during 1 year are performed, and the wind statistics thus gathered are used to estimate the electricity‐generation potential. The study reports also the evolution with the installed power of the capacity factor, a parameter closely related to the cost of the generated energy, as well as the occupied land, which bears environmental and social acceptance implications. A parametric study is performed to assess the uncertainties in the study associated to the choice of the characteristic wind‐turbine farm used; and comparisons are provided with other similar studies. The study indicates that the overall technical potential is approximately 1100 TWh/y; and that about 70 GW of installed wind power could operate with capacity factors in excess of 24%, resulting in an annual electricity generation of approximately 190 TWh/y, or 60% of the electricity consumption in 2008. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Vinylene-linked pyridine-pyrrole donor–acceptor conjugated polymers

Vinylene-linked donor–acceptor–donor semiconducting polymers have been prepared by electropolymerization of the new monomers 2,6-bis[(E)-2-(1-methylpyrrol-2-yl)vinyl]pyridine and 2,5-bis[(E)-2-(1-methylpyrrol-2-yl)vinyl]pyridine. The monomers, consisting of two pyrrole donor units and a central pyridine acceptor ring spaced by vinylene links, differ by the substitution pattern around the central pyridine core (2,6 vs. 2,5-substitution). The electropolymerization process is more efficient on the 2,5-derivative. The new polymers show reversible electrochemistry dominated by a strong charge trapping effect. Poly(2,5-bis[(E)-2-(1-methylpyrrol-2-yl)vinyl]pyridine) energy levels closely match those of design rules for optimized polymers in combination with fullerene derivatives in bulk heterojunction solar cells.     

Improving large-scale search engines with semantic annotations

Traditional search engines have become the most useful tools to search the World Wide Web. Even though they are good for certain search tasks, they may be less effective for others, such as satisfying ambiguous or synonym queries. In this paper, we propose an algorithm that, with the help of Wikipedia and collaborative semantic annotations, improves the quality of web search engines in the ranking of returned results. Our work is supported by (1) the logs generated after query searching, (2) semantic annotations of queries and (3) semantic annotations of web pages. The algorithm makes use of this information to elaborate an appropriate ranking. To validate our approach we have implemented a system that can apply the algorithm to a particular search engine. Evaluation results show that the number of relevant web resources obtained after executing a query with the algorithm is higher than the one obtained without it.     

An expert protein loop refinement protocol by molecular dynamics simulations with restraints

Protein structure prediction (PSP) is a long standing problem in structural biology and bioinformatics. Within the PSP problem loop refinement is a major bottleneck. In this article we report the latest version of the CReF expert predictor system for the PSP problem with emphasis on loop refinement of the approximate 3-D structure 1ZDD_P of the Z34C mini protein predicted by CReF. We designed a loop refinement protocol based on seven molecular dynamics (MD) simulations runs at different temperatures. We found that, by letting the loop residues move freely during dynamics at 325 K and restraining the internal coordinates of the correctly predicted helical structures, while allowing them to move relative to each other, the refinement protocol was very effective in predicting an accurate loop conformation in the first 100 ps of a 1000 ps MD simulation. The quality of the predictions was confirmed by the RMSD between refined and experimental structures which varied from 0.6 to 1.3 Å. In addition, stereochemical analyses showed that 100% of all residues of the refined 1ZDD_P, including those in the loop, populates the most favorable core regions of the Ramachandran plot. Our study suggests that the proposed protocol may be suitable to refine more complex mini proteins with different classes and architectures.     

Multicentre evaluation of the Monarch (IL) clinical chemistry analyser

A multicentre evaluation of the Monarch centrifugal analyser is reported. Precision, linearity and accuracy were assessed by comparison with routine methods. Calibration stability, photometric and dispensing accuracy, and carry-over related to samples and reagents were also evaluated. The overall performance of the instrument was good, showing an excellent photometric and dispensing accuracy, absence of sample-dependent carry-over, and almost negligible reagent carry-over. Good precision, linearity and correlation with routine methods were found for the parameters tested. The instrument is reliable and is now used as the routine clinical chemistry analyser in two of the three laboratories taking part in the evaluation.