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Objective: To investigate the characteristics and distribution patterns of clinically metastatic nodes assessed by Computed Tomography (CT) in preoperative cervical cancer patients, to address the importance of obturator and/or inguinal lymph nodes as sentinel lymph nodes. Methods: A total of 217 patients with cervical carcinoma treated by lymph node dissection (LND) between 2009 and 2014 were included. All preoperative CT/MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) imaging data of these patients were reviewed. The relationship of patient characteristics age, tumor stages, and corresponding lymph node metastasis status were analyzed. We put emphasis on the distribution pattern of positive lymph nodes from pre-operative imaging and compared the different frequencies of each regional and non-regional lymph node group respectively. The data of the 5-year survival rate from follow-up was taken into consideration too. SPSS 24.0 (IBM Corp., Chicago, IL, USA) was used for statistical analysis. Results: The overall lymph node metastasis (LNM) rate was 92.6% in 217 cases. When regional nodes were involved, obturator groups were concerned in 154 (76.6%). The inguinal group was involved in 146 (72.6%) in the area of non-regional lymph node. The 5-year survival rates of return visits were 92.6% and 82.1% in stage IB and IIA, respectively. Age distribution was not associated with the International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) stage as well as the incidence and patterns of nodal metastasis. Conclusions: obturator and inguinal groups play a decisive role in the metastases process of cervical cancer, and can be regarded as a candidate for sentinel lymph nodes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We are concerned with the initial value problem for the two-species Vlasov–Poisson system in the plasma physics case in R³. It is assumed that initially the phase-space densities of ions and electrons decay only polynomially with respect to the velocities, but the net charge density vanishes at infinity with a polynomial rate, which allows for defining the electrostatic field. This situation falls into the so-called infinite charge problem, and there is no rigorous result as far as we know. Local existence, uniqueness, and continuation criteria of the classical solution are established in this paper. Moreover, this article also shows the existence of a global solution in the case of radial symmetry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a conceptual framework for understanding contemporary sustainability challenges, telecoupling emphasizes the importance of socioeconomic and environmental interactions over long distances. These long-distance interactions can occur through multiple human activities. We focus on international trade, a major channel of telecoupling flows and in particular on the international trade of metals. We use the data of physical products and embedded greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions trade in the World Input-Output Database (WIOD) to quantitatively examine how countries contribute to both economic and environmental flows through the trade of metals, but also how that contribution varies depending on their position in the global value chain (GVC) of contemporary international trade. This analysis is built on previously developed techniques for decomposing gross exports of products, which we apply to examine embedded GHG emissions. We make comparisons between countrie's contributions to flows of economic value versus embedded GHG emissions, but also examine contributions beyond total volumes of trade and bilateral trade. Specifically, we quantify the economic and environmental spillover effects that occur in contemporary international trade because of the GVC in which flows of intermediate goods form components in other subsequently traded goods. We interpret differences between countrie's contributions to the flows of economic value versus embedded GHG emissions as being related to the intensity and efficiency of resource use during production. In turn, differences in contributions to direct trade flows versus spillover flows are related to their positions in the GVC. Subsequently, we discuss other elements of the telecoupling framework in trade, i.e., agents, causes, and effects. Quantitatively incorporating these telecoupling framework elements alongside spillover flows will enable investigation of dynamics and relationships that traditional trade theories, data, and models do not currently account for well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]