We report the case of a 64-year-old female patient with hepatitis C infection (HCV), who developed Sjögren's disease and sensory peripheral neuropathy. Clinical conditions worsened over three years ...with central nervous system involvement characterised by transient third cranial nerve paresis and mild selective impairment of attention and memory. Brain magnetic resonance imaging showed diffuse periventricular and lobar white matter hyperintensity. Laboratory findings included mixed cryoglobulinaemia (type II), cryocrit 1.47%, low serum levels of complement C4 and high levels of rheumatoid factor, HCV 1b genotype, high HCV mRNA levels in serum and cerebrospinal fluid. Skin biopsy showed evidence of vasculitis. After one year of plasmapheresis, immunosuppressant therapy and occasional corticosteroid treatment, neurological symptoms improved, skin biopsy changed and inflammation parameters normalised, suggesting that neurological symptoms might be related to the high levels of mixed cryoglobulins.
.
The
beam asymmetry in
photoproduction off the proton was measured at the GrAAL polarised photon beam with incoming photon energies of 1.461 and 1.480 GeV. For both energies the asymmetry as a ...function of the meson production angle shows a clear structure, more pronounced at the lowest one, with a change of sign around
. The observed behaviour is compatible with
P
-wave
D
-wave (or
S
-wave
F
-wave) interference, the closer to threshold the stronger. The results are compared to the existing state-of-the-art calculations that fail to account for the data.
The total photoabsorption cross section on a free proton was measured at the GRAAL facility in the energy range
E
γ
= 600−1500 MeV. The large-aperture LAGRANγE detector and a liquid hydrogen target ...were used in the experiment performed with a back-scattered Compton gamma beam. To improve the accuracy, two alternative methods were employed. First, a subtraction method of using empty-target measurements allowed the cross section
σ
tot
to be evaluated directly because of a low level of the electromagnetic background. Second, an algorithm for evaluating
σ
tot
on the basis of summing the dominating partial cross sections was developed. Experimental results obtained for
σ
tot
by the two methods are compared with existing data.
The only recent η′ photoproduction data off proton available in literature are the differential and total cross sections published by the CLAS and CB-ELSA-TAPS Collaborations. However, the wide ...information about reaction cross sections are not sufficient to understand the role of resonances involved in the process. Different theoretical works stressed the importance to measure also polarization observables in order to solve the ambiguities in the choice of the parameters used in their models. We present the analysis of η′ photoproduction off the proton analysis, identifying the investigated meson by the π+π−η, π0π0η, and γγ decay modes by using the GRAAL apparatus; and we show the preliminary GRAAL results on the beam asymmetry Σ at beam energy of 1475 MeV.
We present the details of an experiment on light particle interferometry. In particular, we focus on a time-of-flight technique which uses a cyclotron RF signal as a start and a liquid scintillator ...time signal as a stop, to measure neutron energy in the range of
E
n≈1.8–
150
MeV
. This dynamic range (up to
300
ns
) is much larger than the beam bunch separation
(54
ns)
of the AGOR cyclotron (KVI). However, the problem of a short burst period is overcome by using the time information obtained from a fast projectile fragment phoswich detector. The complete analysis procedure to extract the final neutron kinetic energy spectra, is discussed.
•Brain metastases in GI cancer patients are not uncommon.•Survival varies widely within this cohort.•New identified prognostic factors are incorporated in an updated prognostic index.•This index, the ...GI-GPA, will better estimate survival.•The GI-GPA is useful in treatment selection and stratification of clinical trials.
Patients with gastrointestinal cancers and brain metastases (BM) represent a unique and heterogeneous population. Our group previously published the Diagnosis-Specific Graded Prognostic Assessment (DS-GPA) for patients with GI cancers (GI-GPA) (1985–2007, n = 209). The purpose of this study is to update the GI-GPA based on a larger contemporary database.
An IRB-approved consortium database analysis was performed using a multi-institutional (18), multi-national (3) cohort of 792 patients with gastrointestinal (GI) cancers, with newly-diagnosed BM diagnosed between 1/1/2006 and 12/31/2017. Survival was measured from date of first treatment for BM. Multiple Cox regression was used to select and weight prognostic factors in proportion to their hazard ratios. These factors were incorporated into the updated GI-GPA.
Median survival (MS) varied widely by primary site and other prognostic factors. Four significant factors (KPS, age, extracranial metastases and number of BM) were used to formulate the updated GI-GPA. Overall MS for this cohort remains poor; 8 months. MS by GPA was 3, 7, 11 and 17 months for GPA 0–1, 1.5–2, 2.5–3.0 and 3.5–4.0, respectively. >30% present in the worst prognostic group (GI-GPA of ≤1.0).
Brain metastases are not uncommon in GI cancer patients and MS varies widely among them. This updated GI-GPA index improves our ability to estimate survival for these patients and will be useful for therapy selection, end-of-life decision-making and stratification for future clinical trials. A user-friendly, free, on-line app to calculate the GPA score and estimate survival for an individual patient is available at brainmetgpa.com.
The three-dimensional structure of nucleons (protons and neutrons) is embedded in so-called generalized parton distributions, which are accessible from deeply virtual Compton scattering. In this ...process, a high energy electron is scattered off a nucleon by exchanging a virtual photon. Then, a highly-energetic real photon is emitted from one of the quarks inside the nucleon, which carries information on the quark's transverse position and longitudinal momentum. By measuring the cross-section of deeply virtual Compton scattering, Compton form factors related to the generalized parton distributions can be extracted. Here, we report the observation of unpolarized deeply virtual Compton scattering off a deuterium target. From the measured photon-electroproduction cross-sections, we have extracted the cross-section of a quasi-free neutron and a coherent deuteron. Due to the approximate isospin symmetry of quantum chromodynamics, we can determine the contributions from the different quark flavours to the helicity-conserved Compton form factors by combining our measurements with previous ones probing the proton's internal structure. These results advance our understanding of the description of the nucleon structure, which is important to solve the proton spin puzzle.
Possible risk factors for hemiretinal vein occlusion were identified and compared with risk factor profiles for central and branch retinal vein occlusion.
The design was a multicenter case-control ...study.
The authors identified 79 patients with hemiretinal vein occlusion (HRVO), 258 patients with central retinal vein occlusion (CRVO), 270 patients with branch retinal vein occlusion (BRVO), and 1142 control subjects at 5 clinical centers. Risk factor data were obtained through interviews, clinical examinations, and laboratory analyses of blood specimens.
Systemic hypertension and history of diabetes mellitus were associated with increased risk of HRVO. Risk of CRVO increased with history of diabetes, systemic hypertension, and higher erythrocyte sedimentation rate (females only); risk of CRVO decreased with increasing amounts of physical activity and increasing amounts of alcohol consumption. Systemic hypertension, higher body mass index, and higher α
2-globulin levels were associated with increased risk of BRVO, whereas higher high-density lipoprotein levels and increasing levels of alcohol consumption were associated with decreased risk of BRVO. Glaucoma history was associated with all three types of retinal vein occlusion.
Patients presenting with retinal vein occlusion should be evaluated for cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and glaucoma.
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