Frontonasal dysplasia: clinical evaluation on audiological and brainstem electrophysiological profiles

Frontonasal dysplasia (FND) is a rare malformative complex affecting the frontal portion of the face, the eyes and the nose; it may occur singly or associated with other clinical signs. No systematic studies describing hearing in this condition were found. AIM: To evaluate hearing sensitivity and sound stimulus conduction from cochlea to brainstem in patients with clinical signs of FND. METHODS: 21 patients with isolated or syndromic FND were submitted to a clinical (otological/vestibular antecedents and otoscopy) and instrumental (pure tone and speech audiometry, tympanometry and brainstem auditory evoked response) hearing evaluation. DESIGN: A clinical, cross-sectional observational prospective study. RESULTS: Hearing thresholds were normal in 15 (70%) patients, abnormal in 5 (25%), mostly with conductive hearing loss; one patient did not cooperate with testing. The tympanometric curve was type A in 30 (72%) ears, type C in 5 (12%), type As in 4 (9%) and type B in 3 (7%). The auditory brainstem response (ABR) showed no abnormalities. CONCLUSION: Patients with FND showed no abnormalities in the auditory system from cochlea to brainstem in this study. Mild conductive hearing loss found in some is probably related to cleft palate. Further evaluation of hearing pathways at higher levels is recommended.

Sensitivity evaluation of a single-step PCR assay using Ehrlichia canis p28 gene as a target and its application in diagnosis of canine ehrlichiosis

O objetivo deste estudo foi aperfeiçoar um ensaio de PCR que amplificasse um fragmento de 843 pares de bases do gene p28 da Ehrlichia canis e compará-lo com outros dois métodos de PCR utilizados para amplificar partes do gene 16S rRNA e dsb do gênero Ehrlichia. Amostras sanguíneas foram colhidas de cães com diagnóstico clínico de erliquiose. A amplificação do gene p28 pela PCR produziu um fragmento de 843pb e esse ensaio permitiu a detecção do DNA de um parasita dentre 1 bilhão de células. Todas as amostras positivas detectadas pela PCR baseada no gene p28 foram também positivas pela nested PCR para detecção do gene 16S rRNA e também pela PCR dsb. Dentre as amostras negativas para a PCR p28, 55,3% foram co-negativas, mas 27,6% foram positivas pela PCR baseada nos genes 16S rRNA e dsb. A PCR p28 parece ser um teste útil para detecção molecular de E. canis, entretanto otimizações na sensibilidade nesta PCR são necessárias, para que esta técnica se torne uma importante alternativa no diagnóstico da erliquiose canina.

Information Visualization to Enhance Sensitivity and Selectivity in Biosensing

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Cigarette smoke exposure severely reduces peripheral insulin sensitivity without changing GLUT4 expression in oxidative muscle of Wistar rats

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Insulin and glucose sensitivity, insulin secretion and beta-cell distribution in endocrine pancreas of the fruit bat Artibeus lituratus

The fruit bat Artibeus lituratus absorbs large amounts of glucose in short periods of time and maintains normoglycemia even after a prolonged starvation period. Based on these data, we aimed to investigate various aspects related with glucose homeostasis analyzing: blood glucose and insulin levels, intraperitoneal glucose and insulin tolerance tests (ipGTT and ipITT), glucose-stimulated insulin secretion (2.8, 5.6 or 8.3 mmol/L glucose) in pancreas fragments, cellular distribution of beta cells, and the amount of pAkt/Akt in the pectoral muscle and liver. Blood glucose levels were higher in fed bats (6.88 +/- 0.5 mmol/L) than fasted bats (4.0 +/- 0.8 mmol/L), whereas insulin levels were similar in both conditions. The values of the area-under-the curve obtained from ipGTT were significantly higher when bats received 2 (5.5-fold) or 3 g/kg glucose (7.5-fold) b.w compared to control (saline). These bats also exhibited a significant decrease of blood glucose values after insulin administration during the iplTT. Insulin secretion from fragments of pancreas under physiological concentrations of glucose (5.6 or 8.3 mmol/L) was similar but higher than in 2.8 mmol/L glucose 1.8- and 2.0-fold, respectively. These bats showed a marked beta-cell distribution along the pancreas, and the pancreatic beta cells are not exclusively located at the central part of the islet. The insulin-induced Akt phosphorylation was more pronounced in the pectoral muscle, compared to liver. The high sensitivity to glucose and insulin, the proper insulin response to glucose, and the presence of an apparent large beta-cell population could represent benefits for the management of high influx of glucose from a carbohydrate-rich meal, which permits appropriate glucose utilization. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Effects of hearing protector devices on speech intelligibility

The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of hearing protection devices (HPDs) on the understanding of speech in young adults with normal hearing, both in a silent situation and in the presence of ambient noise. The experimental research was carried out with the following variables: five different conditions of HPD use (without protectors, with two earplugs and with two earmuffs); a type of noise (pink noise); 4 test levels (60, 70, 80 and 90 dB[A]); 6 signal/noise ratios (without noise, + 5, + 10, zero, - 5 and - 10 dB); 5 repetitions for each case, totalling 600 tests with 10 monosyllables in each one. The variable measure was the percentage of correctly heard words (monosyllabic) in the test. The results revealed that, at the lowest levels (60 and 70 dB), the protectors reduced the intelligibility of speech (compared to the tests without protectors) while, in the presence of ambient noise levels of 80 and 90 dB and unfavourable signal/noise ratios (0, -5 and -10 dB), the HPDs improved the intelligibility. A comparison of the effectiveness of earplugs versus earmuffs showed that the former offer greater efficiency in respect to the recognition of speech, providing a 30% improvement over situations in which no protection is used. As might be expected, this study confirmed that the protectors' influence on speech intelligibility is related directly to the spectral curve of the protector's attenuation. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. Ltd. All rights reserved.

Sensitivity analysis by neural networks applied to power systems transient stability

This work presents a procedure for transient stability analysis and preventive control of electric power systems, which is formulated by a multilayer feedforward neural network. The neural network training is realized by using the back-propagation algorithm with fuzzy controller and adaptation of the inclination and translation parameters of the nonlinear function. These procedures provide a faster convergence and more precise results, if compared to the traditional back-propagation algorithm. The adaptation of the training rate is effectuated by using the information of the global error and global error variation. After finishing the training, the neural network is capable of estimating the security margin and the sensitivity analysis. Considering this information, it is possible to develop a method for the realization of the security correction (preventive control) for levels considered appropriate to the system, based on generation reallocation and load shedding. An application for a multimachine power system is presented to illustrate the proposed methodology. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Sensitivity analysis for transient stability studies

The paper presents a method for security control of electric power systems effected by generation reallocation, determined by sensitivity analysis and optimisation. The model is developed considering the dynamic aspects of the network (transient stability). Security control methodology is developed using sensitivity analysis of the security margin in relation to the mechanical power of synchronous machines in the system. The power reallocated to each machine is determined by means of linear programming. To illustrate the proposed methodology, an example is presented which considers a multimachine system composed of 10 synchronous machines, 45 buses, and 72 transmission lines, based on the configuration of a southern Brazilian system.