Modification of chest radiography exposure parameters using a neonatal chest phantom.

Background: The acquisition of chest radiographs in neonates is of critical importance in diagnostics because of the risk of respiratory distress syndrome and pneumothorax in preterm infants.

Objective: To achieve a dose reduction while preserving a diagnostic image quality for chest radiographs of neonates.

Materials And Methods: All radiographs, generated on a fully digital X-ray unit by using a neonatal chest phantom, were evaluated under variation of the tube voltage (40-70 kV) and mAs levels (1-10.

Optimization of Whole-Body CT Examinations of Polytrauma Patients in Comparison with the Current Diagnostic Reference Levels.

Purpose:  Evaluation of the dose values of a polytrauma whole-body CT examination used in clinical practice with regard to the 2016 updated diagnostic reference levels and reduction of the mean exposure levels using simple optimization steps.

Materials And Methods:  In each case, 100 exposure values before and after dose optimization were compared with the old and new diagnostic reference levels. The grayscale values and the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) were determined for the lung, the aortic arch and the liver.

Munich Oktoberfest experience: remarkable impact of sex and age in ethanol intoxication.

Approximately 5,000 of 6 million annual visitors of the Oktoberfest in Munich have to undergo medical treatment. Patients with alcohol intoxication without trauma or further complications are all treated in a specialized medical camp. We studied these patients in order to identify risk factors and to assess the relevance of the Glasgow Coma Score (GCS) and of ethanol blood concentrations for patient management.

Tracking of human cells in mice.

Tracking and tracing of transplanted cells in mice is required in many fields of research. Examples are transplantation of stem cells into organs of mice to study their differentiation capacity and injection of tumor cells to examine metastatic behavior. In the present study we tested the lipid dye CM-DiI and red fluorescent nanoparticles Qdot655 for their applicability in tagging and tracing of human cells in mice.

Long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids are required for efficient neurotransmission in C. elegans.

The complex lipid constituents of the eukaryotic plasma membrane are precisely controlled in a cell-type-specific manner, suggesting an important, but as yet, unknown cellular function. Neuronal membranes are enriched in long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LC-PUFAs) and alterations in LC-PUFA metabolism cause debilitating neuronal pathologies. However, the physiological role of LC-PUFAs in neurons is unknown.