Videoscopic Heller myotomy for achalasia--results beyond short-term follow-up.

Background: Heller myotomy has long been utilized for patients failing nonoperative management of achalasia. Videoscopy has been advocated to decrease the morbidity of Heller myotomy; however, few reports document outcome beyond 1 year after videoscopic Heller myotomy.

Purpose: To determine perioperative morbidity, relief of dysphagia, and the incidence of postoperative reflux symptoms following videoscopic Heller myotomy with follow-up to over 4 years.

Financial status does not predict weight loss after bariatric surgery.

Background: Lower socioeconomic status and poor funding are thought to be associated with suboptimal outcome after bariatric surgery. We undertook this study to determine if funding status is a predictor of outcome in patients undergoing bariatric surgery.

Methods: The medical records of 131 consecutive patients who underwent vertical banded gastroplasty (VBG) for clinically severe obesity (BMI >40 kg/m2) were reviewed.

Regional assignment and tissue expression of twenty-three expressed sequence tags (ESTs) from human chromosome 5.

Regional localization and expression patterns are reported for 19 expressed sequence tags (ESTs) from human chromosome 5, two of which were derived from the same transcript. Two of the ESTs correspond to genes not previously characterized in humans: a stress-activated protein kinase and nicotinamide nucleotide transhydrogenase. Expression was determined by three methods: Northern blots, PCR from tissue-specific cDNA libraries, and sequence sampling from EST sequencing projects.

Comparison of methods to determine chromophore concentrations from fluorescence spectra of turbid samples.

Background And Objective: This paper compares the ability of three analytic techniques to predict chromophore concentration from fluorescence emission spectra of homogeneous, turbid samples with optical properties similar to human tissue.

Study Design, Materials And Methods: Two models of light propagation were implemented (exponential attenuation, two flux Kubelka-Munk theory); a priori information about sample optical properties was used to analyze data with the two flux Kubelka-Munk model. The third data analysis technique utilizes the method of partial least squares (PLS) to develop an empirical, linear model of sample fluorescence from a training set with optical properties and known concentrations representative of those to be predicted.

Relation between fluorescence spectra of dilute and turbid samples.

We present a method to extend rank-annihilation-factor analysis (RAFA) for the analysis of fluorescence from homogeneous turbid samples. The method is based on a fundamental relationship between the fluorescence of a dilute solution and that of a turbid solution. We have derived this relationship, known as the transfer function, for turbid materials using the two-flux Kubelka-Munk theory.

Chromosome assignment of human brain expressed sequence tags (ESTs) by analyzing fluorescently labeled PCR products from hybrid cell panels.

Sixty-three human brain cDNA sequences were newly assigned to individual human chromosomes. Ten of these were subregionally localized, and one was also mapped in the mouse genome. Four previously reported assignments were refined.

Evaluation of shipboard formation of a neurotoxicant (trimethylolpropane phosphate) from thermal decomposition of synthetic aircraft engine lubricant.

MIL-L-23699 lubricants that are composed principally of trimethylolpropane triheptanoate (TMP) and tricresyl phosphate (TCP) have been shown to form a neurotoxicant, trimethylolpropane phosphate (TMPP), during pyrolysis and/or combustion. Mechanistically, TMPP is thought to irreversibly inhibit the GABA-mediated inhibitory response and thereby produce epileptiform clonic/tonic seizures with convulsions followed by death. Thermal decomposition of MIL-L-23699 lubricant produces TMPP under laboratory conditions, but this product has not been detected in the workplace following actual fires.

Chromosomal assignment of the human thrombin receptor gene: localization to region q13 of chromosome 5.

A functional thrombin receptor (TR) structurally related to other members of the seven-transmembrane receptor family has been isolated from diverse cellular types intimately involved in the regulation of the thrombotic response. This receptor recapitulates many of the previously identified sequelae of thrombin-mediated cell activation phenomenon, and requires proteolytic cleavage for downstream effector-response coupling events. Using two complementary approaches, we have now completed the chromosomal assignment of the human thrombin receptor gene.

Chromosomal assignment of 38 human brain expressed sequence tags (ESTs) by analyzing fluorescently labeled PCR products from hybrid cell panels.

We have localized 38 human brain cDNA sequences to individual human chromosomes. PCR primers were designed from expressed sequence tags and tested for specific amplification from human genomic DNA. The sizes of amplification products from DNA of somatic cell hybrid mapping panels were determined electrophoretically using an automated fluorescence detection system.