OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to establish normative data on spherical grip strength of children 3 to 6 years of age with the Martin Vigorimeter. METHOD Two hundred twenty-five preschoolers in the Kalamazoo, Michigan, area were tested with standardized positioning and instructions. The mean of three trials for each hand was used as the grip-strength score. A repeated measure design ...

It is perceived that fuller lips are more attractive, and hence lip augmentation has become common in esthetic plastic surgery. Numerous materials have been used, including collagen, autologous adipocytes, and more recently Restylane; however, little data exist on what comprises esthetically beautiful lips. Photographs of 28 models from fashion magazines were scanned to obtain digital images. T...

In this paper we investigate the one-dimensional hyperbolic mean curvature flow for closed plane curves. More precisely, we consider a family of closed curves F : S × [0, T ) → R which satisfies the following evolution equation ∂F ∂t (u, t) = k(u, t) ~ N(u, t)− ▽ρ(u, t), ∀ (u, t) ∈ S1 × [0, T ) with the initial data F (u, 0) = F0(u) and ∂F ∂t (u, 0) = f(u) ~ N0, where k is the mean curvature an...

Coherent thermal transport, using thermal channels with length smaller than the mean-free path of the thermal carriers, is important for fundamental study of thermal processes and for new device opportunities in thermal management.1–11 In this Brief Report, we consider a coherent thermal channel formed by cascading a series of nonidentical photonic crystals. We show that its thermal conductance...

HYPOTHESIS Minimally invasive correction of pectus excavatum (PE) deformities of the anterior chest wall in children is safe and effective. DESIGN Prospective cohort study. SETTING Tertiary pediatric referral center. PATIENTS Between February 1996 and July 2000, 36 patients underwent minimally invasive repair (MIR) of PE deformities, and 6 patients had traditional Ravitch repairs (RR). ...

introduction: correct interpretation of kidney images requires the knowledge of its normal size. this study aimed to establish normal values for kidney length and parenchymal thickness and identify the potential related factors in a group of iranian adults. methods: renal dimensions, including length and parenchymal thickness were measured by sonography in 103 individuals with no renal disease....