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[EN] Spontaneous resolution of pediatric obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) may stand behind the observed benefit of rapid maxillary expansion (RME), mainly supported by uncontrolled case series. We aimed to review the controlled, ideally randomized, evidence on the effectiveness of RME as compared to watchful waiting or alternative treatment of pediatric OSA. We only found one randomized clinical trial comparing RME with watchful waiting. The other four studies compared RME with the gold-standard treatment adenotonsillectomy, three of them in a non-randomized fashion. The results of the RCT showed no statistically significant differences in the enhancement of main (apnea hypopnea index, AHI) and secondary outcomes between RME and watchful waiting. Furthermore, reproducibility of the published studies was limited by insufficient description of their patients' inclusion criteria. We could not find convincing evidence of the benefit of RME over watchful waiting in patients with pediatric OSA. RCTs with reproducible inclusion criteria comparing RME with watchful waiting are still critically needed to support this intervention for the treatment of pediatric OSA. In the absence of solid evidence with RCT, RME should not be recommended for the treatment of pediatric OSA. PROSPERO REGISTRATION NUMBER: CRD42021249261. RUNNING SUMMARY: This systematic review explores the benefits of rapid maxillary expansion compared to spontaneous resolution of pediatric obstructive sleep apnea.

The design, construction and evaluation of a low-cost cyclic olefin copolymer (COC)-based continuous flow microanalyzer with optical detection to determine the titratable acidity content of wine is here presented. The analysis method is based on the monitoring of the blue coloration decrease of a buffered bromothymol blue (BTB) solution in the presence of the acidic compounds of wine. The microanalyzer monolithically integrates the required microfluidic motifs as well as an optical flow cell where the measurements are performed by using a miniaturized and versatile photometric detection system. Fluid management is totally automated by the use of computer-controlled microvalves, permitting the automatic calibration of the system as well as the automatic sampling, including in-line dilution and analysis. The reduced size of the whole system along with its high simplicity and automation make it suitable for its application to the on-line monitoring of titratable acidity during wine-making processes. With the optimal conditions, a linear range up to 0.50 g L−1 tartaric acid, a quantification limit (LOQ) of 0.01 g L−1 and a detection limit (LOD) of 0.004 g L−1 were obtained, covering the most common acidity content of musts and wines. A sampling rate up to 26 h−1 could be achieved, consuming less than 3 mL of inexpensive reagents per analysis and requiring no pretreatment of the sample. The microsystem has been successfully applied to the quantification of the titratable acidity content of several wine samples, being the results in excellent agreement with the ones obtained by the reference method.

Microfluidic reactors offer many potential advantages in several research and industrial fields such as processes intensification, which includes a better reaction control (kinetics and thermodynamics), a high throughput and a safer operational environment (reduced manipulation of dangerous reagents and low sub-products generation). Nevertheless, scaling-down limitations appear concerning the materials used in the fabrication of microreactors for most of the liquid-phase reactions, since they usually require high temperatures (up to 300 °C), solvents and organic reagents. In this work, the development of a set of modular and monolithic microreactors based on the integration of microfluidics and a thermal platform (sensor/high-temperature heater) is proposed to perform high temperature reactions. The reliability and performance of both configurations were evaluated through an exhaustive characterization process regarding their thermal and microfluidic performance. Obtained results make the devices viable for their application in controlled and reproducible synthetic processes occurring at high temperatures such as the synthesis of quantum dots. The proposed microfluidic approach emerge as an engaging tool for processes intensification, since it provides better mass and temperature transfer than conventional methods with a reduction not only of the size and energy consumption, but also of by-products and reagents consumption. This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICINN) through projects CTQ2009-12128 and the Consolider Ingenio 2010 project CSD2006 -12 and Catalonia Government through SGR 2009 -0323.

The spatial distribution of tiny holes in sheet materials generated by means of electrical discharges is investigated using spatial statistics techniques. It is shown that whereas the holes appear to be randomly distributed according to a Poisson point pattern, there is in fact a small region around each hole in which the generation of a new one is statistically inhibited as a consequence of the lower impedance path offered by the already made hole. The resulting pattern is known in spatial statistics as a point process with a soft-core inhibition potential, which can be characterized using the pair correlation function. This work was supported by the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación of the Spanish Government under the project TRACE TRA2009-0119. Publicado

Several methods to enhance the efficiency of paper electroperforation processes are presented in this work. In all the cases, the discharge confinement effect is used for obtaining higher perforation densities than those found in the standard industrial processes. To quantify the efficiency of the proposed methods, statistical tools are used to characterize the 2-D perforation pattern. Publicado

The miniaturization of analytical systems for different applications is currently a very active field of research. The inherent advantages of micro total analysis systems (muTASs) are well known. Although the fluidic platforms and the development of suitable miniaturized detection systems have been studied extensively, the integration in a single substrate of the electronics that is needed to manage the whole system using a single technology is still a sizeable challenge. In this overview, we discuss the role of the low-temperature co-fired ceramics (LTCC) as a potential alternative for miniaturizing analytical systems, since a single technology can easily combine fluidics and electronics to produce a number of novel chemical microanalyzers. The authors would like to thank the Spanish MEC for its financial support through: Consolider-Ingenio 2010 (CSD2006-00012), TEC2006-13907-C04-04/MIC and CIT-310200-2007-29. Publicado

Recently, the low temperature co-fired ceramics technology has shown to be an excellent alternative to silicon-based microfabrication techniques for the production of three-dimensional structures using a multi-layer approach. This enables the integration of several unitary operations of a classical analytical process and also the integration of sensors, actuators and electronics in the same substrate. In this work, we show the integration of the actuators and the sensors needed for the control of temperature inside a miniaturized fluidic device. The proposed device presents enough thermal accuracy to be used in chemical systems where temperature control is a crucial factor, such as enzyme reactions or polymerase chain reaction systems. The authors would like to thank the Spanish MEC for its financial support through: Consolider-Ingenio 2010 (CSD2006-00012), TEC2006-13907-C04-04/MIC and CIT-310200-2007-29. CSM is also thankful to the Alban Program (High-level grants from the European Union to Latin America for its financial support (Grant number: E05D053315MX).