Etiological distribution of isolated oculomotor nerve palsy: analysis of 633 patients and literature review.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: The etiological distribution of oculomotor nerve palsy has varied amongst the studies. This study aimed to define the clinical features and underlying etiologies of isolated oculomotor nerve palsy by recruiting patients from all departments in a referral-based university hospital. METHODS: The medical records of 672 patients who had a confirmed diagnosis of isolated oculomotor nerve palsy at all departments of Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, Seongnam, South Korea, from 2003 to 2020 were reviewed. A proportion of the etiology of isolated oculomotor nerve palsy was also compared with that of patients pooled from the previous studies that were searched on PubMed in May 2022. RESULTS: The most common etiology was microvascular (n = 168, 26.5%), followed by vascular anomalies (n = 110, 17.4%), neoplastic (n = 86, 13.6%), inflammatory (n = 79, 12.5%), idiopathic (n = 60, 9.5%) and traumatic (n = 53, 8.4%). Neurologists were mainly involved in the management of microvascular and inflammatory oculomotor nerve palsies whilst ophthalmologists mainly participated in the care of idiopathic, neoplastic and traumatic palsies. Neurosurgeons mostly took care of oculomotor nerve palsy due to vascular anomalies. CONCLUSIONS: The proportion of etiologies of isolated oculomotor nerve palsy may differ according to the specialties involved in the management. The results of previous studies on the etiological distribution of isolated oculomotor nerve palsy should be interpreted with this consideration.

Ultrathin Crystalline Silicon Nano and Micro Membranes with High Areal Density for Low-Cost Flexible Electronics.

Ultrathin crystalline silicon is widely used as an active material for high-performance, flexible, and stretchable electronics, from simple passive and active components to complex integrated circuits, due to its excellent electrical and mechanical properties. However, in contrast to conventional silicon wafer-based devices, ultrathin crystalline silicon-based electronics require an expensive and rather complicated fabrication process. Although silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafers are commonly used to obtain a single layer of crystalline silicon, they are costly and difficult to process. Therefore, as an alternative to SOI wafers-based thin layers, here, a simple transfer method is proposed for printing ultrathin multiple crystalline silicon sheets with thicknesses between 300 nm to 13 µm and high areal density (>90%) from a single mother wafer. Theoretically, the silicon nano/micro membrane can be generated until the mother wafer is completely consumed. In addition, the electronic applications of silicon membranes are successfully demonstrated through the fabrication of a flexible solar cell and flexible NMOS transistor arrays.

Etiologic distribution of isolated abducens nerve palsy: Analysis of 807 patients and literature review.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: The etiologies of abducens nerve palsy have shown a large variability among studies. This study aimed to establish the clinical features and underlying etiologies of isolated abducens nerve palsy by recruiting patients from all departments in a referral-based university hospital. METHODS: We reviewed the medical records of 807 patients with a confirmed diagnosis of isolated abducens nerve palsy at all departments of Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, Seongnam, Republic of Korea, from 2003 to 2020. We also compared the proportion of etiology with that of the patients pooled from the previous studies. RESULTS: The most common etiology was microvascular (n = 296, 36.7%), followed by idiopathic (n = 143, 17.7%), neoplastic (n = 115, 14.3%), vascular anomalies (n = 82, 10.2%), inflammatory (n = 76, 9.4%), and traumatic (n = 35, 4.3%). Patients were mostly managed by ophthalmologists (n = 576, 71.4%), followed by neurologists (n = 479, 59.4%), emergency physicians (n = 278, 34.4%), neurosurgeons (n = 191, 23.7%), and others (n = 72, 8.9%). The proportion of etiology significantly differed according to the age and sex of the patients and the specialties involved in the management (p < 0.001). Compared to the pooled data from the previous reports, the current study showed a higher prevalence of microvascular cause but a lower occurrence of traumatic and neoplastic causes. CONCLUSIONS: The results of previous studies on etiologic distribution of isolated abducens nerve palsy should be interpreted with consideration of the demographic features of patients recruited and the specialties involved.

Etiologic distribution of isolated trochlear palsy: Analysis of 1020 patients and literature review.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Trochlear palsy is the most common cause of vertical diplopia. The etiologies of trochlear palsy have shown a large discrepancy among studies. This study aimed to establish the clinical features and underlying etiologies of isolated trochlear palsy by recruiting the patients from all departments in a referral-based university hospital. METHODS: We reviewed the medical records of 1258 patients who had a confirmed diagnosis of isolated trochlear palsy at all departments of Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, Seongnam, South Korea, from 2003 to 2020. We also compared the proportion of etiologies with that of the patients pooled from previous studies. RESULTS: The most common etiology was congenital (n = 330, 32.4%), followed by idiopathic (n = 256, 25.1%), microvascular (n = 212, 20.8%), and traumatic (n = 145, 14.2%). These four etiologies explained 92.5% of isolated trochlear palsy. Patients were mostly managed by ophthalmologists (n = 841, 82.5%), followed by neurologists (n = 380, 37.3%), emergency physicians (n = 197, 19.3%), neurosurgeons (n = 75, 7.4%), and others (n = 18, 1.8%). The etiologic distribution of isolated trochlear palsy in the current study did not differ from that of 2664 patients pooled from the previous studies. CONCLUSIONS: The proportion of etiologies of isolated trochlear palsy differs according to the age ranges of the patients and specialties involved in the management. The etiologic distribution of isolated trochlear palsy in the current study was comparable to the pooled result of previous reports.

Taurine Chloramine Inhibits Leukocyte Migration by Suppressing Actin Polymerization and Extracellular Signal-Regulated Kinase.

Taurine, one of the most abundant amino acids, is ubiquitously distributed in mammalian tissues and is known to react with myeloperoxidase-derived hypochlorous acid (HOCl/OCl-) to produce taurine chloramine (Tau-Cl), which prevents inflammation by both suppressing pro-inflammatory mediators and increasing antioxidant levels. The migration of inflammatory cells, including neutrophils and macrophages, to infection sites is critical to the development of inflammation. In the present study, we investigated whether Tau-Cl suppresses the migration of inflammatory cells. Tau-Cl inhibited thioglycollate-induced leukocyte migration to the peritoneal cavity, as well as both fMLP-induced neutrophil migration and LPS-stimulated macrophage migration in a transwell system. Tau-Cl also inhibited LPS-induced actin polymerization, adhesion, and ERK phosphorylation in macrophages. Together, these findings suggest that Tau-Cl inhibits the infiltration of inflammatory cells into infection sites by inhibiting ERK activation, thereby preventing actin polymerization, and thus, the excessive infiltration of inflammatory cells, which can cause chronic inflammation.

Olfactory dysfunction is related to postoperative delirium in Parkinson's disease.

Operations often lead to delirium in elderly patients, particularly those with impaired cognition, suggesting that underlying neuropathology may play a role in the development of postoperative delirium. Olfactory dysfunction is a well-known marker of underlying Lewy body pathology in Parkinson's disease (PD). However, the prognostic value of olfaction for the development of postoperative delirium in PD remains unclear. 34 PD patients with or without postoperative delirium following surgery under general anesthesia were included in this study (n = 17 for each group). Cross-Cultural Smell Identification scores were lower in PD patients with postoperative delirium (4.4 ± 1.5) relative to the delirium-free controls (6.8 ± 2.4, p < 0.005). Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that olfaction and operation time were significant predictors of the development of postoperative delirium. Impaired olfaction is significantly associated with postoperative delirium in PD. Olfaction may be useful for identifying PD patients susceptible to postoperative delirium.