International Validation of Echocardiographic AI Amyloid Detection Algorithm.

Background: Diagnosis of cardiac amyloidosis (CA) is often missed or delayed due to confusion with other causes of increased left ventricular wall thickness. Conventional transthoracic echocardiographic measurements like global longitudinal strain (GLS) has shown promise in distinguishing CA, but with limited specificity. We conducted a study to investigate the performance of a computer vision detection algorithm in across multiple international sites.

Catheter ablation of atrial fibrillation results in significant QTc prolongation in the postoperative period.

Background: The corrected QT interval (QTc) is a measure of ventricular repolarization time, and a prolonged QTc increases risk for malignant ventricular arrhythmias. Pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) may increase QTc but its effects have not been well studied.

Objective: Determine the incidence, risk factors, and outcomes of patients presenting for PVI in sinus and atrial fibrillation with postoperative QTc prolongation in a large cohort.

Pervasive multinucleotide mutational events in eukaryotes.

Many aspects of mutational processes are nonrandom, from the preponderance of transitions relative to transversions to the higher rate of mutation at CpG dinucleotides [1]. However, it is still often assumed that single-nucleotide mutations are independent of one another, each being caused by separate mutational events. The occurrence of multiple, closely spaced substitutions appears to violate assumptions of independence and is often interpreted as evidence for the action of adaptive natural selection [2, 3], balancing selection [4], or compensatory evolution [5, 6].