Background: Magnetic resonance imaging diagnostic criteria for paediatric multiple sclerosis have been established on the basis of brain imaging findings alone. The 2010 McDonald criteria for the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis, however, include spinal cord imaging for detection of lesion dissemination in space. The new criteria have been recommended in paediatric multiple sclerosis.Objective:(1) To evaluate the 2010 McDonald multiple sclerosis criteria in children with a clinically isolated syndrome and to compare them with recently proposed magnetic resonance criteria for children;(2) to assess whether the inclusion of spinal cord imaging provided additional value to the 2010 McDonald criteria.Methods: We performed a retrospective analysis of brain and spinal cord magnetic resonance imaging scans from 52 children with a clinically isolated syndrome. Sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of the magnetic resonance criteria were assessed.Results and conclusion: The 2010 McDonald dissemination in space criteria were more sensitive (85% versus 74%) but less specific (80% versus 100%) compared to the 2005 McDonald criteria. The Callen criteria were more accurate (89%) compared to the 2010 McDonald (85%), the 2005 McDonald criteria for dissemination in space (81%), the KIDMUS criteria (46%) and the Canadian Pediatric Demyelinating Disease Network criteria (76%). The 2010 McDonald criteria for dissemination in time were more accurate (93%) than the dissemination in space criteria (85%). Inclusion of the spinal cord did not increase the accuracy of the McDonald criteria.

BACKGROUND In recent decades the frequency and severity of natural disturbances by e.g., strong winds and insect outbreaks has increased considerably in many forest ecosystems around the world. Future climate change is expected to further intensify disturbance regimes, which makes addressing disturbances in ecosystem management a top priority. As a prerequisite a broader understanding of disturbance impacts and ecosystem responses is needed. With regard to the effects of strong winds - the most detrimental disturbance agent in Europe - monitoring and management has focused on structural damage, i.e., tree mortality from uprooting and stem breakage. Effects on the functioning of trees surviving the storm (e.g., their productivity and allocation) have been rarely accounted for to date. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS Here we show that growth reduction was significant and pervasive in a 6.79·million hectare forest landscape in southern Sweden following the storm Gudrun (January 2005). Wind-related growth reduction in Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst.) forests surviving the storm exceeded 10% in the worst hit regions, and was closely related to maximum gust wind speed (R(2) = 0.849) and structural wind damage (R(2) = 0.782). At the landscape scale, wind-related growth reduction amounted to 3.0 million m(3) in the three years following Gudrun. It thus exceeds secondary damage from bark beetles after Gudrun as well as the long-term average storm damage from uprooting and stem breakage in Sweden. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE We conclude that the impact of strong winds on forest ecosystems is not limited to the immediately visible area of structural damage, and call for a broader consideration of disturbance effects on ecosystem structure and functioning in the context of forest management and climate change mitigation.

AIM Postoperative vertigo is a well-known complication after cochlear implantation. The aim of the study was to investigate whether the electrical stimulation of the auditory structures via cochlear implant electrodes can affect the vestibular system and induce vertigo. MATERIALS AND METHODS In the first group, 114 patients were surveyed retrospectively via questionnaires to evaluate the occurrence and frequency of sound-induced vertigo after cochlear implantation. In the second group of 26 patients, the effects of electrical stimulation on the vestibular system were studied prospectively. RESULTS In the first group of patients without any preoperative sound-induced vertigo (n = 104), 20 patients (18%) reported sound-induced vertigo, which occurred after cochlear implantation. In the second group, an acoustic stimulus delivered via the speech processor of the cochlear implant elicited a vestibular evoked myogenic potential response in 4 of the 26 patients as a sign of vestibular costimulation (of the macula sacculi as part of the otolith organs). Horizontal and vertical nystagmus was triggered, whereas utricular function and postural stability remained unchanged. No correlation was found between C/M levels and the vestibular evoked myogenic potentials and nystagmus responses. CONCLUSION Sound-induced vertigo can occur in cochlear implantees. This seems to be primarily caused by electrical costimulation of the sacculus as part of the otolith organs.

Flow coefficients v_{n} for n=2, 3, 4, characterizing the anisotropic collective flow in Au+Au collisions at sqrt[s_{NN}]=200  GeV, are measured relative to event planes Ψ_{n}, determined at large rapidity. We report v_{n} as a function of transverse momentum and collision centrality, and study the correlations among the event planes of different order n. The v_{n} are well described by hydrodynamic models which employ a Glauber Monte Carlo initial state geometry with fluctuations, providing additional constraining power on the interplay between initial conditions and the effects of viscosity as the system evolves. This new constraint can serve to improve the precision of the extracted shear viscosity to entropy density ratio η/s.

Back-to-back hadron pair yields in d+Au and p+p collisions at √s(NN)=200 GeV were measured with the PHENIX detector at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. Rapidity separated hadron pairs were detected with the trigger hadron at pseudorapidity |η|<0.35 and the associated hadron at forward rapidity (deuteron direction, 3.0<η<3.8). Pairs were also detected with both hadrons measured at forward rapidity; in this case, the yield of back-to-back hadron pairs in d+Au collisions with small impact parameters is observed to be suppressed by a factor of 10 relative to p+p collisions. The kinematics of these pairs is expected to probe partons in the Au nucleus with a low fraction x of the nucleon momenta, where the gluon densities rise sharply. The observed suppression as a function of nuclear thickness, p(T), and η points to cold nuclear matter effects arising at high parton densities.

We present measurements of J/ψ yields in d+Au collisions at sqrt[s(NN)]=200  GeV recorded by the PHENIX experiment and compare them with yields in p+p collisions at the same energy per nucleon-nucleon collision. The measurements cover a large kinematic range in J/ψ rapidity (-2.2<y<2.4) with high statistical precision and are compared with two theoretical models: one with nuclear shadowing combined with final state breakup and one with coherent gluon saturation effects. In order to remove model dependent systematic uncertainties we also compare the data to a simple geometric model. The forward rapidity data are inconsistent with nuclear modifications that are linear or exponential in the density weighted longitudinal thickness, such as those from the final state breakup of the bound state.

The exchange of an cochlear implant or the re-positioning of an electrode have become more frequently required than a decade ago. The consequences of such procedures at a microstructural level within the cochlea are not known. It was the aim of the present study to further investigate the effects of an CI electrode pull-out. Therefore 10 freshly harvested temporal bones (TB) were histologically evaluated after a cochlear implant electrode pull-out of a perimodiolar electrode. In additional 9 TB the intrascalar movements of the CI electrode while being pulled-out were digitally analysed by video- capturing. Histologically, a disruption of the modiolar wall or the spiral osseous lamina were not observed. In one TB, a basilar membrane lifting up was found, but it could not be undoubtedly attributed to the pull-out of the electrode. When analyzing the temporal sequence of the electrode movement during the pull-out, the electrode turned in one case so that the tip elevates the basilar membrane. The pull- out of perimodiolarly placed CI electrodes does not damage the modiolar wall at a microstructural level and should be guided (e.g., forceps) to prevent a 90 o turning of the electrode tip into the direction of the basilar membrane.

The interference fragmentation function translates the fragmentation of a quark with a transverse projection of the spin into an azimuthal asymmetry of two final-state hadrons. In e^{+}e^{-} annihilation the product of two interference fragmentation functions is measured. We report nonzero asymmetries for pairs of charge-ordered π^{+}π^{-} pairs, which indicate a significant interference fragmentation function in this channel. The results are obtained from a 672  fb^{-1} data sample that contains 711×10^{6} π^{+}π^{-} pairs and was collected at and near the Υ(4S) resonance, with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric-energy e^{+}e^{-} collider.

The loss of an auricle as a side-effect of burn injuries is a rare clinical event. If the patient also suffers fromsensorineural deafness, it is necessary, in planning management, to consider the aesthetic effects ofreconstructing or replacing the auricle as well as restoring the hearing. In this case report of a 17-year-oldboy who suffered a third-degree burn injury to his head we describe the surgical approach for cochlearimplantation combined with placement of a bone-anchored auricular prosthesis. Hearing restoration forone ear was successfully combined with an adequate aesthetic rehabilitation of both external ears.

OBJECTIVE To observe the in vivo effects of MRI scanning on the Vibrant Soundbridge system. STUDY DESIGN Retrospective questionnaire. METHOD Sixty-three implantees answered a retrospective questionnaire covering their medical/otological and physical conditions pre-, intra-, and post-magnetic resonance imaging scanning (MRI). Bone conduction (BC) thresholds were measured after MRI scanning and compared with the prescan BC. RESULTS Thirteen implantees (20.6%) underwent 19 MRI scans (1; 1.5 T) for different medical indications (e.g., exclusion of a brain tumour, lumbar disc herniation etc.). Scanner-related impulse noise, pain in the middle ear, or pressure at the receiver bed, as well as changes of the transfer function of the floating mass transducer (FMT) are observed frequent effects of MRI scanning. Two patients required transtympanal repositioning of the FMT. A subjectively reported or objectively documented sensorineural hearing loss was not found in any of our patients in this series. CONCLUSION MRI scanning with an implanted Vibrant Soundbridge has possible major side effects, but did not affect cochlear function in this series.