No abstract

Intraparenchymal schwannomas of the CNS are extremely rare. Between 1979 and 1993 400 cases of intracranial schwannomas were operated on and among them were eight patients with intraparenchymal schwannomas comprising 2% of intracranial benign nerve sheath tumours. Four of them were located in the cerebral hemispheres and two each in the brain stem and in the cerebellum. In two cases, there was associated neurofibromatosis (NF-1 and NF-2, one case each). The age ranged from 6 months to 45 years with a male/female ratio of 3:1 and, surprisingly, six of them were in the left cerebral or cerebellar hemisphere.

No abstract

The aim of the present investigation was to evaluate the protective effect of a 70% methanolic leaf extract of Cyclea peltata Lam on cisplatin-induced renal toxicity. The concentration of creatinine, urea, sodium, and potassium in serum and levels of malonyldyaldehyde (MDA), glutathione (GSH), as well as gluathione peroxidase (GSH-Px), superoxide dismutase (SOD), and catalase (CAT) activities were determined in kidney tissue. The marked cisplatin-induced renal damage, characterized by a significant increase in creatinine and urea levels, decreased in extract-treated group, whereas sodium and potassium levels did not change significantly. C. peltata Lam extract significantly changed the increased MDA level and decreased GSH levels found in rats treated with cisplatin alone. The reduced activities of GSH-Px, SOD, and CAT in groups treated with cisplatin alone were significantly increased by the extract. The protective effect was greater in the post-treated than in the pre-treated group of animals. The results indicate that the post-treatment of C. peltata Lam extract might effectively ameliorate the oxidative stress parameters observed in cisplatin induced renal toxicity and could be used as a natural antioxidant against cisplatin-induced oxidative stress.

The annual cycle of a Metopograpsus population (Muzhupilangad estuary) had three distinct periods : (1) growthreproduction (January-May), when crabs were involved in moult and reproduction ; (2) inactive period (JuneJuly), and (3) reproductive period (August-December) . Usually, spawning was immediately followed by another vitellogenic cycle, paralleled by the embryogenesis of prehatch eggs in the brood . Moulting was seemingly an annual event . In the programming of moult and reproduction, the species deviated from the common brachyuran pattern, inasmuch as the postmoult females engaged in active vitellogenesis . The synchrony in the stages of maturation and spawning, and the precision with which the physiological events are programmed, make this highly fecund species an ideal model for an integrated study of the physiology of growth and reproduction .