Segmentation of vertebral bodies is useful for diagnosis of certain spine pathologies, such as scoliosis, spondylolisthesis and vertebral fractures. In this paper, we present a fast and semi-automatic approach for spine segmentation in routine clinical MR images. Segmenting a single vertebra is based on multiple-feature boundary classification and mesh inflation, and starts with a simple point-in-vertebra initialization. The inflation retains a star-shape geometry to prevent selfintersections and uses a constrained subdivision hierarchy to control smoothness. Analyzing the shape of the first vertebra, the main spine direction is deduced and the locations of neighboring vertebral bodies are estimated for further segmentation. The method was tested on 11 routine lumbar datasets with 92 reference vertebrae resulting in a detection rate of 93%. The average Dice Similarity Coefficient (DSC) against manual reference segmentations was 78%, which is on par with state of the art. The main advantages of our method are high speed and a low amount of user interaction.

An investigation was conducted on the sample of primary school students in urban area with the aim of analyzing the anthropometric parameters between boys and girls entering 1st-9th grade. The main objective is to determine the frequency and causes of obesity in the population of school children with the intention of preventing the risks of developing the 'modern man' diseases (diabetes, hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, the development of metabolic syndromes, coronary heart disease, etc). The basic anthropometric parameters were measured: body weight and height, chest, waist and hips circumference, and from the obtained values the following were calculated: body mass index, ratio of waist circumference to body height and ratio of waist circumference to hips circumference. The comparison of the results according to age and sex of the pupils is expected to give the values that might answer some questions, such as: the degree of development and nutritional status of schoolchildren according to age and sex in relation to the environment in which they live, the annual increment of the measured parameters value, the differences between age and gender groups. Results were compared with parameters of growth and development of the children of same age in rural areas based on earlier research. The goal of the study is to confirm or reject the existence of a linear regression in correlation to some anthropometric parameters in relation to sex and age of the pupils from urban and rural areas, by means of the allometric method.

OBJECTIVE The aim of the study was to investigate plasma D-dimer concentration in patients with liver cirrhosis with and without ascites and to evaluate the impact of ascites depletion on circulating plasma D-dimer levels. METHODS Sixty patients with liver cirrhosis were recruited and categorized into two groups: cirrhotic patients without ascites in group 1 (n = 30) and patients with liver cirrhosis and ascites in group 2 (n = 30). D-dimer levels were measured on day of admission, in patients with ascites D-dimer concentration levels were repeated measured after ascites resolution cofirmed by ultrasonography. RESULTS Mean D-dimer levels showed significant increase in cirrhotic patients decompensated by ascites (626.0 +/- 231.08 microg/L) when compared with healthy controls (140.73 +/- 49.16 microg/L, p < 0.001). There was also a statistically significant increase of mean D-dimer levels in patients with liver cirrhosis and no evidence of ascites (333.4 +/- 109.05 microg/L, p < 0.001). In all patients after ascites resolution D-dimer levels showed significant reduction (437.66 +/- 130.47 microg/L, p < 0.05). Values of D-dimer levels achieved after abdominal paracenthesis (n = 21) where still higher than those in patients without ascites (480.14 +/- 122.85 microg/L, p = 0.001). In cirrhotic patients treated with diuretic therapy (n = 9) circulating D-dimer levels were not significantly different from those in cirrhotic patients without ascites (338.56 +/- 90.55 microg/L, p = 0.96). CONCLUSION The presence of ascites in patients with liver cirrhosis is associated with increased plasmatic fibrinolytic activity. Less aggressive ascites resolution therapy has an greater impact on reducing plasmatic fibrinolytic activity than achieved by abdominal paracenthesis.

The most important anthropogenic sources of metals in aquatic ecosystem are certainly wastewaters, that are being discharged untreated or with different levels of purity, so they can cause many changes in the stream / recipient. Heavy metals pass go through biogeochemical process with different retention time in different parts of atmosphere. They do not decompose and have the ability of bioaccumulation, because they are being retained in plants, animals and nature in general. This is an extremely heterogeneous group of elements in terms of biological and ecological effects. Large numbers of metals is essential for proper functioning of the human body and appertain to the group of essential elements. A deficiency of heavy metals on one side can lead to serious symptoms; and on the other, their presence in slightly elevated concentrations can lead to serious illnesses. Their toxicity depends on concentration, and the allowed concentration range varies from metal to metal. Concentrations in which heavy metals can occur depend from source of pollution and features of system in which they are found, so they can range from traces to very high concentrations. Water, as well as air can receive large amounts of pollutants, but beside ability of self-cleaning, some pollutants among which are also heavy metals leads to modification of water quality to that level that it becomes useless for many purposes. From that reason most of European countries have issued maximum allowed amount of heavy metals in industrial waters that are being discharged into natural flow. Some of those values are given in table 1.