Optic Pit Maculopathy

This paper discusses a 32-year-old woman's case who presented a chronic decrease of visual acuity. In this case, the treatment was complex and consisted of a 25 GA vitrectomy, MLI peeling, covering the defect at the optic nerve papilla with that patch, gas endotamponade (C3F8). Abbreviations: MLI = internal limiting membrane; ODP-M = optic disc pit maculopathy.

Chromovitrectomy

The term "chromovitrectomy" has been coined to define the use of vital dyes in vitreoretinal surgery. The basic concept for the application of vital dyes during vitreoretinal surgery is to assist in highlighting preretinal membranes and tissues which are very thin and semitransparent and thus difficult to detect. Various dyes are currently being used in routine clinical procedures, however, the ideal staining agent has not yet been found. The vital dyes indocyanine green, infracyanine green, and brilliant blue stain the internal limiting membrane, trypan blue and triamcinolone acetonide help to visualize the epiretinal and vitreous membranes. New dyes with a better safety profile than the synthetic ones are important for optimizing the outcome of modern ophthalmic surgery and natural dyes, such as lutein, offer a potentially safer and more efficient method of identifying intraocular structures such as vitreous and ILM. Any dye, which is intravitreally injected has the potential to become toxic.

New perspectives in retinal imaging - angio OCT

In the last few years, structural and functional optical coherence tomography (OCT) technology has seen new and revolutionary developments. The most important of all is OCT angiography (Angio-OCT). Angio-OCT already plays an important role in clinical ophthalmology as a new, non invasive and dyeless diagnostic tool, which serves as an adjunct to, or even a replacement for fluorescein and indocyanine green (ICG) angiographies. Angio-OCT brings multiple technical and clinical improvements in the study of retinal diseases, glaucoma, and optic nerve disorders. It enables rapid, high-resolution, detailed images of large retinal vessels and capillary networks in seconds by using a strategy called "motion contrast", as opposed to revealing detailed images of large retinal vessels and capillary networks in seconds by using a strategy called "motion contrast" as opposed to the minutes required in conventional fluorescein angiography. These images are uniquely three-dimensional and allow an isolated study of individual capillary beds at different depths of the retina.

Molecular weight – viscosity relationships for a broad molecular weight distribution polymer

A novel and simple method is described for evaluation of molecular weight – viscosity relationships for a polymer where only broad molecular weight distribution samples are available. The method demands measurement of the intrinsic viscosity and GPC chromatograms of several samples. Results of applying the procedure to bisphenol A – Diethyleneglycol (50:50) copolycarbonate are presented.