Conformity Assessment of Lead Aprons Used in Conventional Radiology: A Multi-Centre Survey in Togo

Aim: Lead aprons are used to protect against scattered radiation from the patient during interventional procedures and certain special conventional radiological examinations. Given the importance of the role lead aprons are supposed to play in radiation protection, we propose to assess their conformity in medical imaging departments in public and religious hospitals in Togo. Materials and method: A multi-centre survey conducted from 26 November to 06 December 2021 in the radiology departments of public and religious health facilities in Togo. All aprons in use were included. The evaluation criteria were physical (visual), quantitative (radiographic) and qualitative (dosimetric). Results: We had registred 43 aprons among wich 27 (62.79%) leaded aprons were labelled non-compliant and 16 (37.21%) were labelled compliant. Of the aprons judged to be non-compliant, 70.37% were more than 10 years old and 96.30% showed defects on the radiographic images. The most common defects were vampire marks (18.64%), multiple folds (16.96%), cracks (16.96%), multiple cracks (15.25%), tears (8.47%), absence of lead (5.08%), holes (3.39%) and lead corrosion (1.69%). Defective aprons (62.96%) had at least two defects. The defects were of thoraco-abdomino-pelvic (74.07%), thoracic (14.82%) and abdomino-pelvic (11.11%) topography. For indirect exposure at 50 and 70 kilovolts, all the aprons had an attenuation factor greater than 90%. After dosimetric measurement, 13.95% of aprons had attenuation factors below 90% for indirect exposure at 100 kilovolts. Conclusion: The compliance of the leaded decks is trifactorial (physical, radiographic and dosimetric). However, there is no significant difference in X-ray attenuation capacity between defective and normal decks.

Relevance of Medical Imaging in the Pre-Therapeutic Evaluation of Acute Intestinal Obstruction at CIMED

Objective: We initiated this work with the aim of studying the contribution of imaging in the diagnosis of acute intestinal obstruction at CIMED. Patients and methods: This was a prospective, descriptive and analytical study involving 96 patients collected at the radiology and medical imaging department of CIMED, from January 2022 to January 2023. Result: The age of our patients varied between 11 and 86 years with an average age of 36 years. There was a male predominance of 64.6% compared to 35.4% for women, i.e. a sex ratio of 1.82. The notion of previous surgery was found in 61.5% of our patients. Pain was present in all patients. Radiography of the ASP was performed in 89.6% of patients. It showed hydro-aerial levels in 96.5% of patients. Abdominopelvic CT was performed in 12 patients and made it possible to make the diagnosis of occlusion in all patients. The results of the positive diagnosis were concordant with those intraoperatively in 92% of cases. 8% of our patients, compared to the treatment, spontaneously resumed their transit, 91% benefited from surgical treatment and 1% died before surgery. The outcome was favorable in 80 patients or 83.3%, poor with death in 16 patients or 16.7% of cases. Conclusion: Acute intestinal obstruction remains a serious pathology for which ASP radiography often remains the only radiological examination performed urgently. However, abdominopelvic CT seems widely indicated thanks to its contribution both for the positive diagnosis and for the serious and etiological diagnoses. However, this imaging technique is largely underused in our practice due to its high cost and lack of availability.

Compliance of Magnetic Resonance Imaging Examination Requests at the Diagnostic Center of the National Social Security Fund of Conakry

Introduction: MRI is a rapidly growing technique with more and more indica-tions and requests in the Republic of Guinea. Its correct prescription is a guar-antee for the satisfaction of the actors, both prescribers, radiologists and pa-tients. The main objective of this study was to evaluate the compliance of MRI examination requests at the Diagnostic Center of the National Social Se-curity Fund (CNSS) in Conakry. Material and Methods: This was a descriptive cross-sectional study of MRI prescription forms sent to the MRI unit of the CNSS Diagnostic Center from February 1 to May 1, 2021. The 8 compliance criteria established by the French High Authority for Health were used to evaluate the compliance of the examination requests. Results: A total of 7003 examination forms were sent to the facility, including 7% (n = 468) of MRIs. 56.2% of MRI requests were performed by specialists. We observed an overall compliance of 10%. Administrative and clinical compliance were missing in 24% and 38%, respectively. More specifically, the purpose of the examination was not mentioned in 60%, followed by the requesting department in 48.1% and the patient’s age in 35.1%. Conclusion: This study allowed us to highlight the gaps in establishing MRI requests. It would be important to organize an awareness campaign for prescribers on the usefulness of correctly filling an MRI request and to design templates to be filled out by prescribers.

The Impact of the Storm-Induced SST Cooling on Hurricane Intensity

The effects of storm-induced sea surface temperature （SST） cooling on hurricane intensity are investigated using a 5-day cloud-resolving simulation of Hurricane Bonnie （1998）. Two sensitivity simulations are performed in which the storm-induced cooling is either ignored or shifted close to the modeled storm track. Results show marked sensitivity of the model-simulated storm intensity to the magnitude and relative position with respect to the hurricane track. It is shown that incorporation of the storm-induced cooling, with an average value of 1.3℃, causes a 25-hPa weakening of the hurricane, which is about 20 hPa per 1℃ change in SST. Shifting the SST cooling close to the storm track generates the weakest storm, accounting for about 47% reduction in the storm intensity. It is found that the storm intensity changes are well correlated with the air-sea temperature difference. The results have important implications for the use of coupled hurricane-ocean models for numerical prediction of tropical cyclones.

Seismic performance of a reinforced concrete building retrofitted with self-centering shape memory alloy braces

Self-centering earthquake-resistant structures have received increased attention due to their ability to reduce post-earthquake residual deformations and,thus,repair time and cost.This stimulated the development of recentering shape memory alloy(SMA)dampers that use superelastic nitinol wires to dissipate energy and self-center the structure.However,there are still a few case studies applications on full-scale RC buildings in the literature.Moreover,general guidelines or even simplified approaches for the practical design of SMA damped braces are still lacking.This paper focuses on evaluating the effect of using self-centering shape memory alloy dampers for buckling-restrained braces applied for the seismic retrofit of a complex RC building structure.A design method originally proposed for elastoplastic dampers was implemented to size the SMA dampers to be placed on selected spans and stories of a building.The effectiveness of the design procedure was demonstrated by nonlinear time-history analyses under different sets of earthquake strong ground motions.The analysis results show that the recentering shape memory alloy bracing system is effective in limiting the maximum transient inter-story drifts and reducing the residual inter-story drifts after strong seismic events,due to its excellent recentering behavior together with its not negligible energy dissipation capacity.

Assessment of possible impacts of climate change on the hydrological regimes of different regions in China

The aim of this work is to investigate the soil water budget across China by means of hydrological modeling under current and future climate conditions and to evaluate the sensitivity to soil parameters. For this purpose, observed precipitation and temperature data(1981-2010) and climate simulations(2021-2050, 2071-2100) at high resolution(about 14 km) on a large part of China are used as weather forcing. The simulated weather forcing has been bias corrected by means of the distribution derived quantile mapping method to eliminate the effects of systematic biases in current climate modeling on water cycle components. As hydrological models, two 1D models are tested: TERRA-ML and HELP. Concerning soil properties, two datasets, provided respectively by Food and Agriculture Organization and U.S. Department of Agriculture, are separately tested. The combination of two hydrological models, two soil parameter datasets and three weather forcing inputs(observations, raw and bias corrected climate simulations) results in ?ve different simulation chains.The study highlights how the choice of some approaches or soil parameterizations can affect the results both in absolute and in relative terms and how these differences could be highly related to weather forcing in inputs or investigated soil. The analyses point out a decrease in average water content in the shallower part of the soil with different extents according to climate zone, concentration scenario and soil/cover features.Moreover, the projected increase in temperature and then in evapotranspirative demand do not ever result in higher actual evapotranspiration values, due to the concurrent variations in precipitation patterns.

Climate change projections for the Middle EasteNorth Africa domain with COSMO-CLM at different spatial resolutions

In this study,projected changes in the future climate conditions for the Middle EasteNorth Africa domain over the 21st century have been investigated.Two simulations with the COSMO-CLM model have been conducted respectively,at a spatial resolution of 0.44
and 0.22
,over the period 1979e2100,employing the IPCC RCP4.5 scenario.Initial and boundary conditions have been derived by the global model CMCCCM.The main aim of the work is to provide regional climate projections for this area,widening the range of the data already available,yet with higher resolution,useful for many applications,especially as an input for the impact models.The two different resolutions have been employed in order to quantify the differences due to the spatial scale effects,comparing the results also with the driving global model.Climate projections show a significant warming expected over the whole area considered at the end of the 21st century,along with a reduction in precipitation,which is particularly evident over the western part of the domain.Precipitation projections depend on the horizontal resolution,suggesting the need for additional simulations at higher resolution,especially for a proper representation of extreme weather events.

美国陆军研究人员抛出中国核威胁论——中国是否正在形成相互确保摧毁能力?

本文译自美国陆军作战学院战略研究所(SSI)和不扩散政策教育中心(NPEC)2004年11月合作出版的《形成相互确保摧毁的核打击能力:起源和实践》一书,为原书第8章,本文反映了美国部分研究中国军事问题的人士对中国核政策及核实力的最新看法。本刊摘要编发此文,并非证实文中提到的有关内容,亦非代表本刊同意其观点与结论,仅供感兴趣的读者参考。

Post-COVID-19 Late Pulmonary Embolism in a Young Woman about a Case

COVID-19 appears to be associated with a disproportionate risk of thrombosis. The occurrence of thrombosis is a frequent complication of many medical and surgical conditions. Their prevention by LMWH is the option of choice as well as their early diagnosis in this pandemic context. In addition, several recent observations support that severe pulmonary embolism is very common in hospitalized patients with COVID-19. We report the case of late pulmonary embolism in a 26-year-old patient with a medical history of (SARS-CoV2) and newly discovered diabetes. The clinical examination found exertional dyspnea, intense chest pain, blood pressure at 145/85mmHg, heart rate at 129 bpm, respiratory rate at 25 cycles/min, blood sugar at 1.45 g/l, oxygen saturation at 92%. In front of this clinical picture, the thoracic CT angiography to ask shows a pulmonary embolism of the right segmental and sub-segmental branches less marked on the left, involving the lingular and basal branches; the management was limited to anticoagulation associated with rehabilitation sessions (respiratory physiotherapy).

Feasibility of large experimental animal models in testing novel therapeutic strategies for diabetes

Diabetes is among the top 10 causes of death in adults and caused approximately four million deaths worldwide in 2017.The incidence and prevalence of diabetes is predicted to increase.To alleviate this potentially severe situation,safer and more effective therapeutics are urgently required.Mice have long been the mainstay as preclinical models for basic research on diabetes,although they are not ideally suited for translating basic knowledge into clinical applications.To validate and optimize novel therapeutics for safe application in humans,an appropriate large animal model is needed.Large animals,especially pigs, are well suited for biomedical research and share many similarities with humans,including body size,anatomical features,physiology,and pathophysiology.Moreover,pigs already play an important role in translational studies,including clinical trials for xenotransplantation.Progress in genetic engineering over the past few decades has facilitated the development of transgenic animals,including porcine models of diabetes.This article discusses features that attest to the attractiveness of genetically modified porcine models of diabetes for testing novel treatment strategies using recent technical advances.

The AMS measurement of ^236U at CIRCE

Accelerator mass spectrometry(AMS) is an ultrasensitive technique for measuring long-lived actinides,e.g.,^(236)U,^(237)Np and Pu isotopes.In order to improve the detection limit for actinides abundance,and to increase the detection efficiency in actinides AMS measurement,a 16-strip silicon detector was used to identify actinides at the Center for Isotopic Research on Cultural and Environmental heritage in Caserta,Italy.The sensitivity of ^(236)U/^(238)U was 1×10^(-11) by special resolution and 5.0×10^(-12) by time resolution.The pulse height defect of^(236)U in an ion-implanted silicon detector in the low-energy range with 17.26 MeV is presented.

Rainfall Influence on the Abundance of Bacteria in Dubrovnik Marine Waters

Microbiological testing of the sea gives us great knowledge about its quality for swimming. Here we are following the fluctuations in the abundance of E. coli colonies, intestinal enterococci and total coliforms on three beaches in Dubrovnik during the rainfall in winter and spring. Three beaches Porporela, Banje and Excelsior are the most visited beaches during the summer season. Samples were taken before, during and after the rainfall on the surface, in the depth of 0.5 m and 1 m. Membrane filtration was used for sample treatment. Expected increase in the abundance of colonies is shown most on the Banje beach where the total coliforms increased 15.80 times while on the Excelsior beach E. coli colonies increased 12 times during the rainfall. On the Porporela beach there was a mild increase of intestinal enterococci colonies for 6.66 times. Regarding the data of the Institute of Public Health Dubrovnik-Neretva County the beaches were mostly marked as “excellent” especially since 2003 when the sewers were regulated in the Dubrovnik Old Town. The number of all colonies after the rainfall reduced for 99.80% in all three locations.

Long Term Fuel Sustainable Fission Energy Perspective Relevant for Combating Climate Change

A climate relevant and immediately available proven light water nuclear strategy with a potential to contribute essentially and timely to reduction of carbon dioxide emission to the year 2065 was assumed. The perspective of fission energy after that year is considered. Two technologies with long term perspective which need no or small amounts of uranium, i.e. fast breeders and molten salt thorium reactors were singled out. The main technical and safety characteristics were considered. In both of these technologies it is essential to have starter nuclides as neither U238 nor Th232 are fissile. It was investigated whether plutonium from spent fuel of light water reactors generated to the year 2065 would be present in quantities sufficient to continue operation on the same or similar level in both technologies. However, taking into account operational safety, proliferation risks, and waste production preference must be given to thorium technology.

Carbon Emission Impact for Energy Strategy in Which All Non-CCS Coal Power Plants Are Replaced by NPPs

A threat of global warming should convince the public to accept a nuclear fission energy contribution to climate change mitigation, at least for the climate critical years up to 2065. The nuclear fission energy is available now, with proven reactors, such as advanced LWR （light water reactors）. Nuclear strategy in this paper outlines a proposal to replace all coal power plants （without carbon and capture storage system） with nuclear power plants in the period 2025-2065. Assuming once through advanced LWR technology, one would need nuclear capacity of 1,600 GW to replace coal power plants in that period. Corresponding reduction of emission would amount to 11.8 Gt of CO2. This energy strategy would reduce carbon emission by approximately 22% in the year 2065 and would be covered by projected uranium resources. An estimation of replacement costs showed that future carbon tax has a considerable potential to offset higher costs of nuclear replacement power.

Resistive Cerebral Blood Flow as a Potential Marker of Subclinical Brain Damage in Essential Hypertension

Introduction: Subclinical brain damage in essential hypertension is more prevalent than cardiovascular or renal impairment;nevertheless, screening for nervous system involvement is difficult due to the low accessibility and high costs of these techniques. Objective: To assess the frequency of silent target organ damage in a cohort of asymptomatic hypertensive patients and to evaluate the potential usefulness of carotid ultrasonographic (US) variables as predictors of subclinical brain damage. Patients and Methods: Thirty four neurologically asymptomatic subjects (mean age 59 years) with essential hypertension were included. Target organ damage was evaluated: degree of hypertensive retinopathy, heart, kidney and brain. Structural and hemodynamical carotid Doppler US parameters were also investigated. Results: The brain was the most frequently affected target organ (70.6%), followed by the heart (67.9%) and kidney (58.6%). Carotid US parameters showed no association of intima media thickness with brain MRI results;nevertheless, decreased diastolic flow velocity and increased resistive index pointed to a resistive carotid flow pattern in patients with classical brain MRI lesions and predicted subclinical lesions with a sensitivity of 70% and 74% and a specificity of 72% and 80% respectively. Conclusions: This study supports previous findings that place the brain as the most frequently affected target organ in essential hypertensive patients and sheds more light on the potential usefulness of carotid structure and hemodynamics as imaging biomarkers of subclinical brain lesions.

Myelin protein zero (P0)- and Wnt1-Cre marked muscle resident neural crest-derived mesenchymal progenitor cells give rise to heterotopic ossification in mouse models

Heterotopic ossification(HO)describes bone formation at non-skeletal sites and results from traumatic injury,surgery,or genetic disease such as fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva(FOP).1,2 Although it is known that BMP signaling regulates HO,knowledge about the developmental origin of the osteogenic progenitors responsible for the BMP-associated metamorphosis is comparably less.With the use of transgenic mice and labelled neural crest-derived cell,3 we found myelin protein zero(P0,or MPZ)-and Wnt1-lineage cells give rise to BMP-7 induced adult ectopic cartilage and bone.

Recommendations for improved tropical cyclone formation and position probabilistic Forecast products

Prediction of the potentially devastating impact of landfalling tropical cyclones(TCs)relies substantially on numerical prediction systems.Due to the limited predictability of TCs and the need to express forecast confidence and possible scenarios,it is vital to exploit the benefits of dynamic ensemble forecasts in operational TC forecasts and warnings.RSMCs,TCWCs,and other forecast centers value probabilistic guidance for TCs,but the International Workshop on Tropical Cyclones(IWTC-9)found that the“pull-through”of probabilistic information to operational warnings using those forecasts is slow.IWTC-9 recommendations led to the formation of the WMO/WWRP Tropical Cyclone-Probabilistic Forecast Products(TC-PFP)project,which is also endorsed as a WMO Seamless GDPFS Pilot Project.The main goal of TC-PFP is to coordinate across forecast centers to help identify best practice guidance for probabilistic TC forecasts.TC-PFP is being implemented in 3 phases:Phase 1(TC formation and position);Phase 2(TC intensity and structure);and Phase 3(TC related rainfall and storm surge).This article provides a summary of Phase 1 and reviews the current state of the science of probabilistic forecasting of TC formation and position.There is considerable variability in the nature and interpretation of forecast products based on ensemble information,making it challenging to transfer knowledge of best practices across forecast centers.Communication among forecast centers regarding the effectiveness of different approaches would be helpful for conveying best practices.Close collaboration with experts experienced in communicating complex probabilistic TC information and sharing of best practices between centers would help to ensure effective decisions can be made based on TC forecasts.Finally,forecast centers need timely access to ensemble information that has consistent,user-friendly ensemble information.Greater consistency across forecast centers in data accessibility,probabilistic forecast products,and warnings and their communication to users will produce more reliable information and support improved outcomes.

心脏修复与再生治疗的干细胞研究进展

缺血性心脏病是全球范围内人类死亡的主要原因,可简单分为冠状动脉血管问题和心肌问题。冠状动脉血管狭窄、堵塞,导致血流中断,引起心肌梗死。针对冠状动脉血管狭窄、堵塞,临床多采用药物溶栓,或行经皮冠状动脉介入术、冠状动脉搭桥术等方法恢复血流灌注,但我国缺血性心脏病病死率并未因上述技术的开展下降,反而呈增高趋势。分析其原因,是心肌梗死发作时心肌细胞大量死亡,而目前缺乏使梗死心肌修复的有效方法,从而导致治疗失败。因此,在基本解决血管堵塞问题后,探寻梗死心肌修复、再生的方法是临床研究的重点。近年来,有关干细胞的研究不断深入,干细胞诱导心肌再生技术不断获得突破。本文就心脏修复与再生治疗的干细胞研究进展作一综述。

SARISTU:Adaptive Trailing Edge Device(ATED)design process review

SARISTU was a big cooperation project granted by the European Commission,7th Framework Programme,carried out between 2011 and 2015.It dealt with smart aeronautic structures,both morphing and sensored;its main target was to demonstrate the feasibility of designing,manufacturing and operating in representative environment,instrumented structures.Till now,it represents the major effort carried out within the European Union on the development of adaptive architectures for air systems.Inside that big activity,the realization of an Adaptive Trailing Edge Device(ATED)for wing camber adaptations aimed at compensating the weight reduction following the fuel consumption during cruise was addressed.It made the core of investigations target variable geometry aircraft components together with two other analyses concerning the development of shape-changing winglet and droop nose.ATED activities were conducted by the Italian Aerospace Research Centre(CIRA)in tight cooperation with the University of Napoli,"Federico II",who coordinated a group of 12 different partners from 8 different nations(France,Germany,Greece,the Netherlands,Israel,Spain,Turkey,and Italy).In this paper,an integral synthesis of that work is reported,with a focus on the definition and realization of the components of the presented device.The publication is in fact meant as the first part of a series that is aimed at overviewing the whole adaptive trailing edge development,till wind tunnel tests execution.Such a concise report is a critical and harmonized review of what have been performed by many colleagues spread all over Europe,all of which are duly recalled in the reported bibliography where the reader may access more detailed information and descriptions.In detail,the paper starts with a general introduction of the concept and its aims,to move to the specs definition immediately after.Then,it deals with a short but comprehensive description of the main ATED components:structural skeleton,skin,actuation and sensing systems.It is worth remarking that the paragraph dedicated to the body frame includes some discussion about aeroelastic assessment and manufacture,seen as complementation for a complete assessment of the design constraints.

Inducible overexpression of RUNX1b/c in human embryonic stem cells blocks early hematopoiesis from mesoderm

RUNXI is absolutely required for definitive hematopoiesis, but the function of RUNXlb/c, two isoforms of human RUNX1, is unclear. We established inducible RUNXlb/c-overexpressing human embryonic stem cell （hESC） lines, in which RUNXlb/c overexpression prevented the emergence of CD34＋ cells from early stage, thereby drastically reducing the production of hematopoi- etic stem/prognnitor cells. Simultaneously, the expression of hematopoiesis-related factors was downregulated. However, such blockage effect disappeared from day 6 in hESC/AGM-S3 ceU co-cultures, proving that the blockage occurred before the generation of hemogenic endothelial cells. This blockage was partially rescued by RepSox, an inhibitor of the transforming growth factor （TGF）-β signaling pathway, indicating a close relationship between RUNX1b/c and TGF-β pathway. Our results suggest a unique inhibitory function of RUNX1b/c in the development of early hematopoiesis and may aid further understanding of its biological function in normal and diseased models.