Reconstruction of the cheek

LEARNING OBJECTIVES: After studying this article, the participant should be able to: 1. Describe the cheek unit and its specific requirements for quality, outline, and contour. 2. Identify factors involving the patient, wound, and donor materials that determine technique. 3. Understand the application of anteriorly based, posteriorly based, and advancement flaps, and the use of serial excisions for specific defects. 4. Identify, prevent, and treat complications of cheek reconstruction.     

Time-Dependent-Asymmetric-Linear-Parsimonious Ancestral State Reconstruction

The time-dependent-asymmetric-linear parsimony is an ancestral state reconstruction method which extends the standard linear parsimony (a.k.a. Wagner parsimony) approach by taking into account both branch lengths and asymmetric evolutionary costs for reconstructing quantitative characters (asymmetric costs amount to assuming an evolutionary trend toward the direction with the lowest cost). A formal study of the influence of the asymmetry parameter shows that the time-dependent-asymmetric-linear parsimony infers states which are all taken among the known states, except for some degenerate cases corresponding to special values of the asymmetry parameter. This remarkable property holds in particular for the Wagner parsimony. This study leads to a polynomial algorithm which determines, and provides a compact representation of, the parametric reconstruction of a phylogenetic tree, that is for all the unknown nodes, the set of all the possible reconstructed states associated with the asymmetry parameters leading to them. The time-dependent-asymmetric-linear parsimony is finally illustrated with the parametric reconstruction of the body size of cetaceans.     

Reconstruction of phylogenetic relationships

In this paper, we provide an introductory overview to the field of phylogenetic analysis, which has wide applications in modern biology.     

Reconstruction of strings past

A major use of string–alignment algorithms is to comparemacro molecules that are thought to have evolved from a commonancestor to estimate the duration of, or the amount of mutationin, their separate evolution and to infer as much as possibleabout their most recent common ancestor. Minimum message lengthencoding, a method of inductive inference, is applied to thestnng-oJignment pmblem. it leads to an alignment method thataverages over all alignments in a weighted fashion. Esperimentsindicates that this method can recover the actual parametersof evolution with high accuracy and over a wide range of values,whereas the use of a single optimal alignment gives biased results.     

Reconstruction of the burned hand

This article summarizes the initial management of acute burn injuries to the hand, in addition to treatment and reconstructive options. The goal of treatment for a burn injury to the hand is primarily a functional hand. This is best achieved by appropriate early treatment, the right selection from a wide range of possible reconstructive procedures, and focused occupational hand therapy.