Tracking muscle wasting and disease activity in facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy by qualitative longitudinal imaging.

Background: Facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) is one of the most frequent late-onset muscular dystrophies, characterized by progressive fatty replacement and degeneration involving single muscles in an asynchronous manner. With clinical trials at the horizon in this disease, the knowledge of its natural history is of paramount importance to understand the impact of new therapies. The aim of this study was to assess disease progression in FSHD using qualitative muscle magnetic resonance imaging, with a focus on the evolution of hyperintense lesions identified on short-tau inversion recovery (STIR+) sequences, hypothesized to be markers of active muscle injury.

A rare case of non-traumatic intrasplenic pseudoaneurysms in a patient with acute T-cell lymphoblastic leukemia.

Pseudoaneurysm (PSA) or false aneurysm is a vascular lesion resulting from a focal and incomplete rupture of the arterial wall (intimate and/or elastic lamina), that allows blood to escape into the arterial wall; this small contained break causes a contained collection of blood and the creation of a "new" less resistant vessel wall, consisting of adventitia and perivascular tissues. Intrasplenic pseudoaneurysms are rare and more frequently recognize traumatic origin, sometimes are also unexpected lesions due to non-recent trauma. In contrast, non-traumatic intrasplenic pseudoaneurysms are rare complications usually due to splenic infarction, infiltration by malignant systemic disorders, infectious process, chronic pancreatitis, and arteritis.

Kasabach-Merritt syndrome arising from a vascular fistula.

A 58-year-old woman presented with gum bleeding, hematuria, and cutaneous ecchymoses. Left hip replacement had been performed five years prior. The overall findings of our work-up were consistent with ongoing DIC triggered by the presence of an arterio-venous left femoral fistula.

Non covalent interactions stabilizing the chiral dimer of CHClF: a rotational study.

We report the rotational spectra of three isotopologues of the dimer of chlorofluoromethane, namely CH235ClF-CH235ClF, CH235ClF-CH237ClF and CH237ClF-CH235ClF. The assigned (most stable) conformer is chiral (C1 symmetry) and displays a network of two C-HCl-C and one C-HF-C weak hydrogen bonds, combined with a ClF halogen bond. The hyperfine structures due to the quadrupolar effects of the two non-equivalent 35Cl (or 37Cl) atoms have been fully resolved, leading to an accurate determination of two sets of diagonal and of some mixed quadrupole coupling constants.