Publications by authors named "Akihito Imai"

This article describes data of effect sizes in studies on an association between theory of mind (ToM) and popularity. The data included 1946 children from 17 studies (22 effect sizes). The data are suitable for and were subjected to meta-regression to compare effect sizes of an interaction group (ToM was assessed in person) with that of non-interaction (ToM was assessed by computer).

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Background And Purpose: Immunization with heat shock proteins, gp96, elicits specific protective immunity against parent tumors. However, it is marginally effective as a therapeutic tool against established tumors. In the present study, we evaluated the efficacy and mechanism of immunotherapy with bone marrow-derived dendritic cells (DCs) pulsed with tumor-derived gp96 against murine lung cancer.

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We previously reported that 1,2-di-O-acyl-3-O-(-D-sulfoquinovosyl)-glyceride with two stearic acids (beta-SQAG9) bound to L-selectin on the cell surface of the CD62L(+) T-cell subset and inhibited T-cell migration into lymph nodes in a rat skin allograft model. The aim of this study was to verify the efficacy of beta-SQAG9 for kidney allograft survival in miniature swine. Recipient swine underwent bilateral nephrectomy and then received renal allograft transplantation from a swine leukocyte antigen-mismatched donor.

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The effect of tacrolimus (FK506) on down-regulation of IL-2 production by T cells is considered to be mainly responsible for its strong suppression of immunological events. In this study, we show that FK506 also has an affect on antigen presentation by antigen-presenting cells in vitro. FK506 was able to inhibit the presentation of endogenous MHC class II-restricted minor histocompatibility antigens in primary dendritic cells (DC) in vitro, but cyclosporine A (CsA) and rapamycin (RAP) were not.

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We previously reported that synthetic sulfo-glycolipid, 3-O-(6-deoxy-6-sulfono-beta-D-glucopyranosyl)-1,2-di-O-acylglycerol (beta-SQDG(18:0)) which was deduced from sulfonoquinovosyl-diacylglycerols of sea urchin possessed immunosuppressive effects, such as human mixed lymphocyte reaction (MLR) and skin allograft in rat, and that these effects were caused by contact inhibition between T-cells and antigen presenting cells (APCs). Here, we investigated the mechanism of these immunosuppressive effects on human MLR by beta-SQAG9 which had been newly synthesized from beta-SQDG(18:0) to improve structural stability in water solution. CD62L+ T-cells in peripheral blood predominantly respond to APCs, and beta-SQAG9 inhibited the response of CD62L+ T-cell subset in human allogeneic MLR.

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