Clinical Case of Arteriovenous Malformation in a Pregnant Woman

Extragenital pathology during pregnancy and childbirth occupies a leading place in maternal mortality and perinatal pathology. One of the main ways to maintain the health of mother and child is to identify somatic diseases in pregnant women and timely treat them. Nervous system diseases that occur in pregnant women are mainly epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, brain tumors, cerebrovascular disorders, although remain poorly understood, but require immediate decisions to prolong pregnancy, obstetric tactics during childbirth, conservative or conservative surgery. The pathology of cerebral vessels (arterial aneurysms and arteriovenous malformations) also remains an urgent problem, despite many years of experience in their diagnosis and treatment. The sudden development of symptoms, severity of clinical manifestations and high mortality in rupture of an aneurysm or arteriovenous malformation of cerebral vessels determine the urgency of this problem and increased interest in its study, especially in pregnant women. Material and methods. The paper presents a clinical case of arteriovenous malformation in a 25-year-old pregnant woman, her treatment and delivery. Results and discussion. Arteriovenous malformation is considered a congenital cerebrovascular pathology, which is accompanied by a sudden rupture of abnormal vessels with the development of hemorrhagic stroke, without specific clinical symptoms and precursors, which complicates lifelong diagnosis. Endovascular embolization during pregnancy saved the lives of women and children. An effective result was obtained after neurosurgical treatment of arteriovenous malformation in a pregnant woman in the second trimester of pregnancy (17 weeks), which allowed to bring the pregnancy to the physiological time of delivery. Taking into account the complex neurological pathology, neurosurgery, which requires the exclusion of a powerful period of childbirth, a pregnant woman gave birth by cesarean section at 38 weeks of pregnancy. Conclusion. An effective result was obtained after neurosurgical treatment of arteriovenous malformation in a pregnant woman in the second trimester of pregnancy, which allowed to bring the pregnancy to the physiological time of delivery. The obtained results indicated the possibility of full-term pregnancy, reduction of maternal and perinatal morbidity and mortality in pregnant women with arteriovenous malformation with timely preventive and curative measures with timely referral of pregnant women to the perinatal center on the basis of a multidisciplinary clinical institution to prevent complications

Impact of Postharvest Handling on Preharvest Latent Infections Caused by Monilinia spp. in Nectarines

Latent infections caused by Monilinia spp. in nectarines cause great economic losses since they are not detected and rejected at harvest and can appear at any time post-harvest, even at the consumer’s home. The effect of a pre-cooling chamber, water dump operation, and cold-storage chamber on the activation and/or development of preharvest latent infections caused by Monilinia spp. on nectarines were studied under different postharvest conditions: (a) cold storage for 0, 1, or 3 d at 4 °C at either 75% relative humidity (RH) or 100% RH before water dumping, (b) water dumping for 10 minutes at 15 °C, and (c) cold storage for 0, 3, or 10 d at 4 °C at either 75% RH or 100% RH after water dumping. These storage conditions were transformed to fungal physiological time. For visualization of the latent infections caused by Monilinia spp., the nectarines were placed in sterile paper bags and frozen at −20 °C for 48 h in order to damage the epidermis. To compare different handling scenarios, the incidence of latent infection was modelled for physiological time description by a modified Gompertz model. The activation and/or development of preharvest natural latent infections caused by Monilinia spp. at postharvest was mainly related to temperature and incubation time at postharvest. Storing nectarines with any postharvest handling less than 11 days at 4 °C avoids brown rot symptoms and reduced the activation and/or development of pre-harvest latent infections caused by Monilinia spp., while more cold days caused the exponential phase of latent infection activation and/or development. The Gompertz model employed could be used for predicting the activation and/or development of latent infection caused by Monilinia spp. at postharvest conditions and looks at the postharvest life. To our knowledge, this is the first time that the effects of post-harvest handling on latent infections in fruit have been studied.

All Sizes Fit the Red Queen

The Red Queen's hypothesis portrays evolution as a never-ending competition for expansive energy, where one species’ gain is another species’ loss. The Red Queen is neutral with respect to body size, implying that neither small nor large species have a universal competitive advantage. Here we ask whether, and if so how, the Red Queen's hypothesis really can accommodate differences in body size. The maximum population growth in ecology clearly depends on body size—the smaller the species, the shorter the generation length, and the faster it can expand given sufficient opportunity. On the other hand, large species are more efficient in energy use due to metabolic scaling and can maintain more biomass with the same energy. The advantage of shorter generation makes a wide range of body sizes competitive, yet large species do not take over. We analytically show that individuals consume energy and reproduce in physiological time, but need to compete for energy in real time. The Red Queen, through adaptive evolution of populations, balances the pressures of real and physiological time. Modeling competition for energy as a proportional prize contest from economics, we further show that Red Queen's zero-sum game can generate unimodal hat-like patterns of species rise and decline that can be neutral in relation to body size.