Pulmonary blood flow in children with univentricular heart and unilateral diaphragmatic paralysis.

Objectives: Spontaneous breathing has an important effect on pulmonary arterial blood flow in patients with Glenn/Fontan circulation. Unilateral diaphragmatic paralysis (DP) is a frequent complication after heart surgery in congenital heart disease. The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of unilateral DP on blood flow distribution in the pulmonary arteries with Glenn/Fontan circulation.

Stenting of Native Right Ventricular Outflow Tract Obstructions in Symptomatic Infants.

Objective: To assess feasibility, safety and effectiveness of right ventricular outflow tract (RVOT) stenting in symptomatic young infants.

Methods: Multicentre evaluation of 35 patients intended to undergo RVOT stenting in 11 pediatric cardiac centres from 2009 to August 2011.

Results: Median age and weight at the time of first stent implantation were 8 weeks and 3.

Salinity as a regulator of DMSP degradation in Ruegeria pomeroyi DSS-3.

Dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP) is an important carbon and sulfur source to marine bacterial communities and the main precursor of dimethylsulfide (DMS), a gas that influences atmospheric chemistry and potentially the global climate. In nature, bacterial DMSP catabolism can yield different proportions of DMS and methanethiol (MeSH), but relatively little is known about the factors controlling the pathways of bacterial degradation that select between their formation (cleavage vs. demethiolation).

Coronary interventions in congenital heart diseases: from preterm to young adult patients.

Background: The small vessel size of infants and children makes interventional treatment of impaired coronary perfusion, such as stenoses, complete occlusions, and fistulae, demanding. Materials and techniques appropriate for this young age group have to demonstrate their ability to effectively treat these lesions.

Methods And Results: Between 2004 and 2011, 14 patients with an age of 9 days to 25 years (median 4.

Telemonitoring with implantable electronic devices in young patients with congenital heart diseases.

Aims: In paediatric patients with a pacemaker (PM) or an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) device, interrogation during in-clinic visits is usually required to obtain information on arrhythmias or system failures. An automated telemonitoring system tracking patient- and system-related parameters provides this information on a daily basis and might assist patient management.

Methods And Results: This retrospective analysis evaluates telemetric data obtained from 48 devices implanted in 45 patients (median age, 12.

Methanethiol accumulation exacerbates release of N2 O during denitrification in estuarine sediments and bacterial cultures.

Microbes play critical roles in the biogeochemical cycling of nitrogen and sulfur in aquatic environments. Here we investigated the interaction between the naturally occurring organic sulfur compound methanethiol (MeSH) and the final step of the denitrification pathway, the reduction of nitrous oxide (N2 O) to dinitrogen (N2 ) gas, in sediment slurries from the temperate Douro and Ave estuaries (NW Portugal) and in pure cultures of the marine bacterium Ruegeria pomeroyi. Sediment slurries and cell suspensions were amended with a range of concentrations of either MeSH (0-120 µM) or methionine (0-5 mM), a known precursor of MeSH.

Vascular interventions in young patients undergoing transvenous pacemaker revision.

Aims: Transvenous lead implantation for pacemaker (PM) or implantable cardioverter defibrillators systems in children and young patients with congenital heart disease is widely practiced. With longer implantation times, the risk for vascular occlusion increases. Transvenous angioplasty may be used to maintain venous patency for system revision in the future.

Lead removal in young patients in view of lifelong pacing.

Aims: In young patients with or without a congenital heart disease, transvenous leads for pacemakers or implantable cardioverter defibrillators can cause later vascular obstruction or infection. Removal of non-functional leads is controversial as it bears the risk of vascular disrupture and embolizations. We report the data of a single centre for paediatric cardiology on efficiency and safety of transvenous lead removal.

Transvenous cardiac resynchronization therapy in complex congenital heart diseases: dextrocardia with transposition of the great arteries after Mustard operation.

Cardiac resynchronization therapy revealed first promising results in patients with a congenital heart disease and a systemic right ventricle. Contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging showed accessibility of the coronary sinus in an 18-year-old male patient with mirror dextrocardia, d-transposition of the great arteries and ventricular septal defect (VSD) after Mustard operation and VSD patch closure. In literatures, transvenous lead placement is discussed in this anatomical setting, with opposed position of the ventricular leads and reliable lead characteristics.

Composition and activity of beta-Proteobacteria ammonia-oxidizing communities associated with intertidal rocky biofilms and sediments of the Douro River estuary, Portugal.

Aims: To characterize the phylogenetic composition of ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (AOB) of the beta-subclass of the class Proteobacteria in intertidal sediment and rocky biofilms of the Douro estuary, and evaluate relationships with environmental variables and N-biogeochemistry.

Methods And Results: Cluster analysis of denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis profiles showed differences in beta-Proteobacteria AOB assemblage composition between rocky biofilms and sediments. All sequences obtained from intertidal rocky biofilm sites exhibited phylogenetic affinity to Nitrosomonas sp.

Dynamics of nitrous oxide reductase genes (nosZ) in intertidal rocky biofilms and sediments of the Douro River estuary (Portugal), and their relation to N-biogeochemistry.

In this study, temporal variability of nosZ genotypes was evaluated in two intertidal rocky biofilms and two intertidal sediment sites of the Douro River estuary, Portugal. The results were compared to rates of key N-cycle processes and environmental variables to examine possible links between denitrifier community dynamics and N biogeochemistry. Genetic heterogeneity of the nosZ gene was evaluated by terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis (T-RFLP) and by sequencing cloned nosZ gene fragments.

A Water Quality Index applied to an international shared river basin: the case of the Douro River.

A Water Quality Index (WQI) is a numeric expression used to evaluate the quality of a given water body and to be easily understood by managers. In this study, a modified nine-parameter Scottish WQI was used to assess the monthly water quality of the Douro River during a 10-year period (1992-2001), scaled from zero (lowest) to 100% (highest). The 98,000 km(2) of the Douro River international watershed is the largest in the Iberian Peninsula, split between upstream Spain (80%) and downstream Portugal (20%).

Effect of salinity and inorganic nitrogen concentrations on nitrification and denitrification rates in intertidal sediments and rocky biofilms of the Douro River estuary, Portugal.

The regulatory effects of salinity and inorganic nitrogen compounds on nitrification and denitrification were studied in intertidal sandy sediments and rocky biofilms in the Douro River estuary, Portugal, over a 12-month period. Nitrification and denitrification rates were measured in slurries of field samples and enrichment experiments using the difluoromethane and the acetylene inhibition techniques, respectively. Salinity did not regulate denitrification in either environment, suggesting that halotolerant bacteria dominated the denitrifier communities.

New trends in chromosomal investigation in children with cardiovascular malformations.

We investigated a group of 376 children, seen over a period of 7 years with different types of congenital cardiovascular defects, to assess the presence of chromosomal aberrations. The diagnostic approach, achieved in 3 consecutive steps, revealed conventional chromosomal aberrations in 30 of the patients (8%) excluding trisomies 13, 18, 21. Fluorescence in situ hybridisation for microdeletions showed 51 microdeletions (15%), with 43 patients having deletions of 22q11.

[A doctor's reflections on the breast ornament of the Artemis Ephesia].

Up to now, the discussion concerning the icongraphical identification of the mysterious ornamental dress of the breasts of the Ephesian Artemis a new approach of interpretation has been sought, a medically-diagnostic examination of this very likely polymastic form. Basing on the opinion of Christian apologists, the Ephesia to be a sample of pathologically morphological deformation with the pagan anthropomorphous idea of deities, the process of development of iconographic symbols, to be exact, the "macromasty" and the "pubic triangle", has been traced, beginning with the palaeolithic idols, coming futhermore to the old Anatolian mother deity and finally the Ephesia. In the Artemision, votive gifts where found, breastshaped and trigonal forms, inter alia made of amber.

[Congenital cardiovascular malformations and chromosome microdeletions in 22q11.2].

Background And Objective: Congenital cardiovascular (c-v) malformations are the leading signs of two syndromes of highly variable phenotypes, the DiGeorge syndrome (DGS) and the velo-cardio-facial syndrome (VCFS), both of which in the majority of cases are caused by microdeletion in the chromosome region 22q11.2. It was the aim of this study to ascertain the frequency of these chromosomal abnormalities in patients with unselected congenital cardiovascular malformation, and to assess the type of c-v malformation for which microdeletion analysis of the mentioned region would be indicated.

Prokaryotes: the unseen majority.

The number of prokaryotes and the total amount of their cellular carbon on earth are estimated to be 4-6 x 10(30) cells and 350-550 Pg of C (1 Pg = 10(15) g), respectively. Thus, the total amount of prokaryotic carbon is 60-100% of the estimated total carbon in plants, and inclusion of prokaryotic carbon in global models will almost double estimates of the amount of carbon stored in living organisms. In addition, the earth's prokaryotes contain 85-130 Pg of N and 9-14 Pg of P, or about 10-fold more of these nutrients than do plants, and represent the largest pool of these nutrients in living organisms.

Evidence for an enhanced substrate requirement by marine mesophilic bacterial isolates at minimal growth temperatures.

Bacterial isolates from the subtropical southeastern continental shelf were cultured in a matrix of temperature and substrate concentrations encompassing a range of temperature and substrate concentrations equal to and exceeding natural ones. At the annual minimum temperature, marine heterotrophic bacterial isolates required higher concentrations of dissolved substrates for active growth than are usually found in seawater. We show this to result from a nonlinear interaction of the combined effects of temperature and substrate concentration on bacterial growth and respiratory rate.

Bacterial growth in the cold: evidence for an enhanced substrate requirement.

Growth responses and biovolume changes for four facultatively psychrophilic bacterial isolates from Conception Bay, Newfoundland, and the Arctic Ocean were examined at temperatures from - 1.5 to 35 degrees C, with substrate concentrations of 0.15, 1.

Populations of methanogenic bacteria in a georgia salt marsh.

Methanogens represented about 0.5% of the total bacteria in sediments from a Georgia salt marsh in which Spartina alterniflora is the predominant vegetation. The population of methanogens was composed of at least two groups of nearly equal size.

Tracer analysis of methanogenesis in salt marsh soils.

Differences in paths of carbon flow have been found in soils of the tall (TS) and short (SS) Spartina alterniflora marshes of Sapelo Island, Ga. Gaseous end products of [U-C]glucose metabolism were CO(2) and CH(4) in the SS region and primarily CO(2) in the TS region. Sulfate concentration did not demonstrably affect glucose catabolism or the distribution of end products in either zone.

Arylsulfatase activity in salt marsh soils.

The presence of arylsulfatase(s) was confirmed in salt marsh soils. The temperatures of maximum activity and inactivation, the pH range over which the enzyme was active, and the K(m) values were similar to those of soil enzymes. Unlike soil arylsulfatases, however, the salt marsh enzymes do not appear to be repressed by sulfate.