Short communications normal fetal growth despite persistent amniotic fluid leakage after genetic amniocentesis

Two women not only lost relatively large amounts of amniotic fluid immediately following genetic amniocentesis, but continued to lose fluid for the remainder of their pregnancies. Periodic ultrasonographic assessment confirmed normal fetal growth and presence of some amniotic fluid. Both women were delivered at term of normal offspring who showed no evidence of fetal deformations. Although amnionitis is a risk, cautious surveillance may permit continuation of pregnancies complicated by copious or persistent amniotic fluid leakage following genetic amniocentesis.     

TWIN: a TWo-stage INdex to evaluate ecological quality status in lagoon environments by means of hard bottom zoobenthos

The macrobenthos colonizing the artificial hard bottoms in lagoons has been used in biomonitoring programs as it requires easy sampling procedures and provides a variety of responses to different environmental pressures, like marine or continental influence, eutrophication, and urban pollution. In this paper we present the development and application of a new TWo-stage INdex (TWIN), aimed to assess water quality of lagoon environments using the hard bottom macrobenthos community. TWIN is calculated in two separate stages. First, the presence and abundance of macrobenthic species are used to define, through a fuzzy model, a station's membership grade in six pre-defined ecological sectors (Lagoon Mouth, Vivified Lagoon, Rough Eutrophic, Calm Eutrophic, Urban, Estuarine), each corresponding to characteristic communities. Then a formula links the membership grades to the five ecological status classes ranging from high to bad quality, as requested by the European Water Framework Directive. This method was tested in four Adriatic lagoons: the results are consistent with literature information and expert judgement, therefore we propose its use in the definition of water quality in lagoons.     

Assessment of aquatic plants in the reservoirs of AES-tietê and development of an integrated control model for the most important species

The general objective of this work was to develop a monitoring and management model for aquatic plants that could be used in reservoir cascades in Brazil, using the reservoirs of AES-Tietê as a study case. The investigations were carried out at the reservoirs of Barra-Bonita, Bariri, Ibitinga, Promiss?o, and Nova-Avanhandava, located in the Tietê River Basin; Agua Vermelha, located in the Grande River Basin; Caconde, Limoeiro, and Euclides da Cunha, which are part of the Pardo River Basin; and the Mogi-Gua?u reservoir, which belongs to the Mogi-Gua?u River basin. The main products of this work were: development of techniques using satellite-generated images for monitoring and planning aquatic plant control; planning and construction of a boat to move coating plant masses and an airboat equipped with a DGPS navigation and application flow control system. Results allowed to conclude that the occurrence of all types of aquatic plants is directly associated with sedimentation process and, consequently, with nutrient and light availability. Reservoirs placed at the beginning of cascades are more subject to sedimentation and occurrence of marginal, floating and emerged plants, and are the priority when it comes to controlling these plants, since they provide a supply of weeds for the other reservoirs. Reservoirs placed downstream show smaller amounts of water-suspended solids, with greater transmission of light and occurrence of submerged plants.