Correlation between imaging findings and hormonal markers at the onset of puberty in girls.

INTRODUCTION: This study aimed to determine the diagnostic performance of transabdominal pelvic ultrasonography and bone age in identifying the onset of puberty in girls at the Clínica Las Américas in Medellín, Colombia. METHODS: We included girls aged ≤11 years referred to our clinic between March 2016 and March 2019 for signs of puberty. We compared the findings on pelvic and breast ultrasonography and bone age versus the baseline measurement of luteinizing hormone (LH) in serum, used as the reference standard for identifying the onset of puberty. We calculated the sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), negative predictive value (NPV), and positive and negative likelihood ratios, analyzing subgroups of patients of different ages. RESULTS: We analyzed 43 patients. Ultrasound assessment of breast development had the highest sensitivity (94.1%) of all the imaging parameters evaluated, but its specificity was low. However, characteristics such as the length of the body of the uterus >3.0 cm and the presence of endometrial echoes were highly specific for identifying the onset of puberty, particularly in patients aged ≤8 years. CONCLUSION: Pelvic ultrasonography, ultrasonographic assessment of Tanner stage of breast development, and the evaluation of bone age are useful tools for the imaging confirmation of the onset of puberty. The results of this study support the use of these techniques in clinical practice in the workup for pubertal disorders in girls.

Genome Sequence of Euphorbia mosaic virus from Passionfruit and Euphorbia heterophylla in Florida.

Euphorbia mosaic virus (EuMV) was found in a symptomatic passionfruit (Passiflora edulis) plant from Homestead, Florida, USA, as well as in the symptomatic weed Euphorbia heterophylla This is the first identification of EuMV in Florida and the United States and the first report of a natural infection of passionfruit by EuMV.

The complete genome sequence of New World jatropha mosaic virus.

Full-length sequences of a bipartite begomovirus were obtained from a plant of Jatropha multifida in Florida showing symptoms of foliar mosaic, distortion and necrosis. Sequences of four clones each of a DNA-A and DNA-B were obtained, which showed very low sequence diversity among themselves. The clones were infectious when biolistically inoculated to J. multifida, Phaseolus vulgaris and Nicotiana tabacum, but not to J. curcas. The DNA-A sequences had less than 89 % pairwise identity scores with the DNA-A of other begomoviruses. The DNA-A appeared to be a recombinant in that 18 % of the DNA-A (470 nt) had a pairwise identity score of 91.98 % with RhRGMV, indicating that this portion most likely originated from a virus closely related to RhRGMV. The remaining 82 % of the DNA-A had lower identity scores with TbMoLCV (87.84 %) and RhRGMV (87.46 %), which suggests that this part of the component originated from an undescribed virus. There was no evidence for recombination in the DNA-B. Equivalent sequences of the DNA-A had the highest identity score (94.18 %) with a 533-nt sequence obtained from J. multifida from Puerto Rico in 2001 (GenBank accession no. AF058025). Pairwise comparison, recombination and phylogenetic analysis, and biology suggest that these clones are those of jatropha mosaic virus first reported from Puerto Rico. This is the first report of the complete genome sequence of jatropha mosaic virus.