Age estimation from the structure of adult human teeth: review of the literature.

The literature on age estimation from the structure of adult human teeth is reviewed. Several anatomic changes of teeth have been shown to be valuable in age determination, but there is still controversy concerning the accuracy of cemental annulation. It is believed that improvements in age estimation can be made using direct measurement rather than scoring systems.     

A pathological study of sudden coronary death in China: report of 89 autopsy cases.

This paper reports the results of a forensic pathological study of 89 autopsy cases of Sudden Coronary Death (SCD). Of 89 cases, 63 (52 male, 11 female) were narrowed by 76-100% in cross-sectional area (XSA) of the coronary artery (CA) and 26 (22 male, 4 female), by 51-75%. Atherosclerotic plaques in the CA were serious and extensive, especially in the left anterior descending and often involved several branches of CA at the same time. Recent thrombosis was found in 18 cases, haemorrhage in plaques in 17 cases. Only 2 cases had visible acute myocardial infarction. Inflammatory cell infiltration was found in coronary plaques in 36 cases. Myocardial fibrosis or small scar formation was detected in 51 cases. It is suggested that although the incidence of coronary heart disease (CHD) is low in China, SCD is the commonest mode of Sudden Unexpected Death. The majority of SCD (52%) were middle aged males (30-49 years old). Most of the cases died suddenly during sleep without any clear precipitating factors. The characteristics of occurrence and pathological changes in the CA and myocardium and the pathological diagnosis of SCD are also analysed and discussed.     

Corporate Governance: Towards a Theory of Regulatory Shift

Providing effective corporate governance regulation and controls is a contemporary challenge to all law makers. There exists a need to restore investor confidence while seeking to facilitate and encourage enterprise. This paper reflects on the traditional choice between shareholder versus stakeholder models of corporate governance and suggests that these are inappropriate in the light of emerging news theories of the firm. Instead this paper suggests that law makers should accommodate a shift away from the traditional paradigms of these models in favour of a processual approach of governance. This would require a recognition of the tensions that exist in the regulation of corporate governance and invite the application of a collibratory process to the control of governance. The development and reform of directors’ duties and liabilities, in the UK, is provided as an illustration of the need for the recognised application of a collibratory process. Within that we also consider the application of the economists concept of ‘rent-seeking’ and the conflict between private property rights and public interference.JEL M14, D72, K22, K33     

Experimental study of the expansion dynamic of 9 mm Parabellum hollow point projectiles in ballistic gelatin

We study in this paper the expanding behaviour of hollow point 9 mm Parabellum projectiles (Hornady XTP(?) and Speer Gold Dot(?)). We defined a deformation rate that takes into account both the diameter increase and the length reduction. We plotted the behaviour of this parameter versus impact velocity (we refer to this curve as the expanding law). This expanding law has been plotted for different gelatin weight ratios and different gelatin block lengths. We completed our experiments with a set of high speed movies in order to correlate the deceleration to the state of expansion and size of the temporary cavity. Our results pointed out that full expansion is reached shortly after the projectile fully penetrates the gelatin. This result shows that the key point to accurately simulate human body interaction with a hollow point projectile is to accurately simulate the interface (skin, skull, clothes thoracic walls). Simulating accurately organs is only an issue if a quantitative comparison between penetration depths is required, but not if we only focus on the state of expansion of the projectile. By varying the gelatin parameters, we discovered that the expanding law exhibits a velocity threshold below which no expansion occurs, followed by a rather linear curve. The parameters of that expanding law (velocity threshold and line slope) vary with the gelatin parameters, but our quantitative results demonstrate that these parameters are not extremely critical. Finally, our experiments demonstrate that the knowledge of the expansion law can be a useful tool to investigate a gunshot in a human body with a semi-jacketed projectile, giving an estimation of the impact velocity and thus the shooting distance.     

An immunohistochemical study of basic fibroblast growth factor in early acute myocardial ischemia

With the use of immunohistochemistry, the expression of basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) in early acute myocardial ischemia of rats was studied. It was observed that there was an initial (30 min) rise in bFGF expression in limited ischemic myocardium areas and perimyocardial ischemia areas. The grade of expression of bFGF increased with the continuation of ischemia. The results of image analysis and statistical process suggested that the expression of bFGF reach a high level in ischemic myocardial areas after three hour's of ischemia, significantly higher than in control group and in group B1, but no significant difference in pericardial ischemia areas and normal areas of the same group. In summary, early acute myocardial ischemia is accompanied by rapid and prolonged increase in expression of bFGF with characteristic spatial and temporal kinetic. This finding suggests that the immunohistochemical staining of bFGF provide objective morphologic evidence for the diagnosis of early myocardial ischemia.