What potential do mosses have as biomonitors of POPs? A comparative study of hexachlorocyclohexane sorption.

Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) pose a significant global threat to human health and the environment, and require continuous monitoring due to their ability to migrate long distances. Active biomonitoring using cloned mosses is an inexpensive but underexplored method to assess POPs, mainly due to the poor understanding of the loading mechanisms of these pollutants in mosses. In this work, Fontinalis antipyretica (aquatic moss) and Sphagnum palustre (terrestrial moss) were evaluated as potential biomonitors of hexachlorocyclohexanes (HCHs: α-, ß-, γ-, δ-HCH), crucial POPs. Moss clones, grown in photobioreactors and subsequently oven-dried, were used. Their lipid composition and distribution were characterized through molecular and histochemical studies. Adsorption experiments were carried out in the aqueous phase using the repeated additions method and in the gas phase using an active air sampling technique based on solid-phase extraction, a pioneering approach in moss research. F. antipyretica exhibited greater lipid content in the walls of most cells and higher adsorption capacity for all HCH isomers in both gaseous and liquid environments. These findings highlight the need for further investigation of POP loading mechanisms in mosses and open the door to explore other species based on their lipid content.

[Cholesterol granuloma of the choroid simulating a macular tumor]. / Granuloma de colesterol coroideo simulando un tumor macular.

CASE REPORT: We present a 76-year-old woman with a cholesterol granuloma of the choroid simulating a choroidal melanoma. DISCUSSION: Cholesterol granuloma in the choroid is a quite rare tumor with a characteristic histology of foreign body reactions surrounding cholesterol crystals.

A new case of eosinophilic esophagitis.

Eosinophilic esophagitis (EE) is a rarely diagnosed condition involving eosinophilic infiltration of the esophageal mucosa The hallmark of this condition is intermittent and often painful dysphagia that may become constant as the disease progresses. It was initially included within the more general condition known as eosinophilic gastroenteritis but it is now considered an independent entity. Attwood et al. called attention to eosinophilic esophagitis as a distinct clinical condition in 1993. Although eosinophilic esophagitis was thought to occur primarily in children, a significant body of evidence suggests that it affects adults as well. We describe a clinical case of a young woman with a long-standing history of dysphagia affected of this rare entity.

[Congenital fibrosarcoma. Diagnostic-therapeutic implications]. / Fibrosarcoma congénito. Implicaciones diagnóstico-terapéuticas.

Most of the soft tissue sarcomas of childhood other than rabdomyosarcoma, have as final diagnosis fibrosarcoma, specially in the first months of life. Overlapping features between infantile myofibromatosis and congenital fibrosarcoma, hemangiopericytoma and fibrohistiocytoma have seen noted. Five patients with congenital fibrosarcoma were operated since 1991. Anatomical sites included lower limb, hand and forearm, and three of them had previous diagnoses of hemangiopericytoma, fibrohistiocytoma and myofibromatosis, with provocated non radical surgery and reoperation. The postoperative course was satisfactory and all are live one to eight years later. In our experience accurate histological diagnosis must be achieved to perform radical surgery on these cases.

Lethal neonatal Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome.

We report on a 35-week gestation female fetus with Hutchinson-Gilford progeria (HGP). This patient, who is the first reported with neonatal HGP in the English literature but is the fourth, counting three previous French cases, supports the existence of a more severe prenatal form of progeria. She died 7 hours after birth and presented with intrauterine growth retardation, premature aging, absence of subcutaneous fat, brachydactyly, absent nipples, hypoplastic external genitalia, and abnormal ear lobes. The child's combination of clinical and skeletal manifestations differentiates this form of HGP from other progeroid syndromes with neonatal presentation. We also report previously undescribed autopsy findings including premature loss of hair follicles, premature regression of the renal nephrogenic layer, and premature closure of the growth plates in the distal phalanges that may be related to the aging processes in this condition. We could not find any histological data to support acro-osteolysis, which is the radiographic sign of brachydactyly. The terminal phalanges in HGP seem to be underdeveloped rather than osteolytic.