Publications by authors named "Guglielmone R"

Introduction: The end stage renal disease confers a high morbidity and mortality risk, mainly due to cardiovascular disease. The cardiac T troponin and carbohydrate antigen-125 (CA-125) are useful biomarkers to determine cardiovascular prognosis in order to start preventive treatment in the high risk patients.

Methods: We included patients with end stage renal disease in hemodialysis treatment.

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Introduction And Objectives: Patients with heart failure and similar left ventricular systolic dysfunction have differing exercise capacity. The aim of this study was to identify echocardiographic predictors of exercise capacity in patients with heart failure and systolic dysfunction.

Methods: We included 150 patients with class II (70%) or III (30%) heart failure with left ventricular ejection fraction below 40%.

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Catabolism and inflammation play a role in the physiopathology of heart failure with reduced ejection fraction and are more pronounced in the advanced stages of the disease. Our aim was to demonstrate that in patients with stable heart failure with reduced ejection fraction adequately treated, a direct relation exists between functional impairment, as evaluated by left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) and the 6-minute walking distance (6MWD), and catabolic and inflammatory markers. In 151 outpatients with heart failure and a LVEF of < or =40% (median age 64 years, LVEF 29%, and 6MWD 290 m) we measured the laboratory and body composition parameters that indicate directly or indirectly inflammatory activation, anabolic-catabolic balance, and nutritional status.

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Size estimation of myelinated nerve fibers in peripheral nerves is a very common task in neuromorphology and different dedicated morpho-quantitative procedures have been devised and used to date. Unfortunately, many reports on experimental nerve studies lack comprehensive information on the procedures that have been designed and applied for myelinated fiber size estimation. This paper addresses the issue in the light of the recent advances in quantitative morphology that have recognized the concept of unbiased estimates as the key methodological issue to be addressed in morpho-quantitative studies.

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This study is a stereological analysis, by the 2-D dissector method, on the long-term regeneration of myelinated nerve fibers of the rat sciatic nerve repaired by muscle-vein-combined graft, a surgical technique that has been shown to be a valid tool for the repair of peripheral nerve defects with substance loss. Quantitative analysis showed that the total number and mean density of regenerated myelinated nerve fibers was significantly higher than in control nerves. The contrary was true for fiber mean size.

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Clinical data have shown that a vein segment filled with fresh skeletal muscle can be considered a good autologous grafting conduit for the repair of peripheral nerve lesions. In this study, the long-term morphological organization of rat sciatic nerve fibers regenerated along a muscle-vein-combined graft conduit is further analysed by light and electron microscopy. Regenerated nerve fibers were organized into fascicles of various sizes that were clearly delimited by perineurial-like shells made by long and thin cytoplasmic processes of perineurial-like bipolar cells and by densely packed collagen fibrils.

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Silver impregnation studies in chick embryos have shown that, by the 2nd day of incubation, the earliest neurofibrillar differentiation occurred in neuroblasts located at the diencephalic-mesencephalic junction and in the rhombencephalon; some of these neuroblasts were believed to become reticular neurons. Since calretinin, a cytosolic calcium-binding protein of the "E-F hand" family, occurs in reticular neurons, the present study investigated immunohistochemically whether the early differentiating reticular neurons are also the first neurons to express this marker during chick embryo development. The first calretinin-immunoreactive neuroblasts appeared at stage 11 (40-45 h of incubation according to the series of Hamburger and Hamilton), and were located in the basal plate of the diencephalic-mesencephalic junction and of rhombomeres adjacent to the otic placode and in the alar plate and intermediate zone of the cervical spinal cord.

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Quantification of the number of myelinated fibers in peripheral nerves is a common requirement in quantitative morphology. This parameter provides important information on the consequences of various physiological, pathological and experimental conditions on the nerve structure and is one of the main indicators of success of peripheral nerve repair. In this paper, the theoretical rationale for the application of stereological principles to obtain unbiased estimates of the density and total number of myelinated fibers in peripheral nerves is discussed and a simple stereological method is described.

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The morphological features of regeneration in long-distance (3 cm) muscle-vein-combined grafts were experimentally investigated in the rat sciatic nerve by means of light and electron microscopy. In the early phases of regeneration (14 days after surgery), many regenerating nerve fibers were detected along the muscle-vein-combined graft. Six months after surgery, quantitative morphometrical analysis of myelinated nerve fibers showed that both the total number and density of myelinated nerve fibers were significantly greater in regenerated nerves than in control nerves.

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Chemically induced Syrian hamster cheek-pouch squamous cell carcinoma is very similar to the corresponding human tumour. This paper describes a blind study in which inhibition of dimethylbenzanthracene-induced cheek-pouch tumours by a goat liver extract denominated UK101 was investigated. Less than 40% of animals treated with UK101 developed tumours compared with 100% of the controls.

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Subsets of neurons ensheathed by perineuronal nets containing chondroitin unsulfated proteoglycan have been immunohistochemically mapped throughout the rat central nervous system from the olfactory bulb to the spinal cord. A variable proportion of neurons were outlined by immunoreactivity for the monoclonal antibody (Mab 1B5), but only after chondroitinase ABC digestion. In forebrain cortical structures the only immunoreactive nets were around interneurons; in contrast, throughout the brainstem and spinal cord a large proportion of projection neurons were surrounded by intense immunoreactivity.

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With the existing literature on the aspects of anatomic and physiological ocular choroid membrane variables in mind, the authors verify the possibility of applying the methods of Axelsson et al and of Lindvall and Bjorklund, as simplified by Furness and Costa for fluorescent microscopy, to the study of human choroid nerve topographic distribution. The material for the study was obtained from three human eyeballs, two enucleated because of malignant melanoma of the choroid and one because of neoplasia of the ciliary body. A binocular dissecting microscope was used.

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Although the cerebrospinal fluid-contacting neurons of the avian paraventricular organ exhibit considerable amounts of catecholamines, they show no tyrosine hydroxylase immunoreactivity. In the quail embryo, the development of these neurons has been studied using the paraformaldeyde-glutaraldeyde method for the fluorescence-histochemical localization of catecholamines. The timing of the appearance of catecholamine fluorescence in cerebrospinal fluid-contacting neurons and that in catecholamine-containing neurons of the brainstem have been compared.

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Recently we reported that the keratan sulphate epitope recognised by the monoclonal antibody 5D4 is expressed by a population of ramified microglia in adult rats. As ramified microglia is believed to differentiate from ameboid microglia during postnatal development, we studied the rat brain from birth to 90 postnatal days of life with the monoclonal antibody 5D4. Contrary to all the other microglia markers until now described, keratan sulphate is not expressed by ameboid microglia and by macrophages but appears on the surface of microglia only when the cells are differentiated and show ramified processes.

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The costo-uterine muscle provides a skeletal attachment to the longitudinal myometrial layer of the uterine horn. In this study we investigated the possibility that the muscle is responsive to sex steroid hormones. In rats of 4 weeks of age, injected with oestradiol for 5 days, the cross-sectional area of nucleated muscle cell profiles was significantly increased.

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The effects of Mancozeb and Zineb, two dithiocarbamate fungicides used to protect vegetables, on rat thyroid and liver function were studied in an acute and a chronic trial. These compounds may be spontaneously or metabolically transformed to ethylene thiourea, a goitrogenic, mutagenic and teratogenic molecule. Sex linked differences in sensitivity and the possibility that toxicity might be potentiated through induction of the microsomal drug metabolising system by phenobarbitone were investigated.

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The early appearance of catecholaminergic neurons, as revealed by fluorescence histochemistry, has been determined in the central nervous system of quail, pheasant, and pigeon embryos. The first neuronal assemblies displaying specific fluorescence are the locus coeruleus and the nucleus subcoeruleus ventralis. Taking into account the differences in the length of the prehatching period of these three avian species, the first catecholamine-containing neurons appear earlier in the precocial quail and pheasant than in the altricial pigeon.

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Fluorescence-histochemical investigations by use of the FAGLU method show the presence of several groups of catecholamine (CA)-containing neurons in the chicken brain. The distribution, shape and orientation of the fluorescent perikarya as well as the number and orientation of primary dendrites have been systematically examined. In the chick embryo, the first neurons displaying specific catecholamine fluorescence are identifiable on the 9th day of incubation.

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Development and maturation of the catecholamine-containing neurons of the embryonic chick and quail Remak's ganglion were studied, using the glyoxylic acid method. Fluorescent neurons were detected in the pararectal segment of the ganglion from its earliest in vivo formation, and along the whole ganglionic chain in later developmental stages. In tissue culture, a large number of catecholamine-containing neurons matured in explants of both early and more developed ganglia, producing an extensive network of outgrowing fluorescent nerve processes.

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Golgi- and fluorescence-histochemical studies in the chicken shown the presence of a sharply delimited group of aminergic neurons beneath the floor of the fourth ventricle at the mesen-metencephalic boundary. According to the observations reported in other avian species a homology can be established between the mammalian locus coeruleus (LC) and this fluorescent cell mass of the chicken brainstem. Golgi studies revealed an isodendritic pattern of ramification of the neurons in this nucleus.

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The distribution pattern of adrenergic fibres innervating the ocular choroid membrane of the chicken was studied by means of fluorescence and electron microscopy. In addition, the origin of these fibres was investigated after superior cervical ganglionectomy. Adrenergic axons reach the choroid, partly forming the perivascular plexuses and partly running in the choroid nerves and the choroidal branches of the ciliary nerves.

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The administration of desoxycorticosterone acetate (DOCA) induces morphological changes in the kidney of mice and eels. Such changes mainly concern the cells of the distal tubules and collecting tubules. These changes are consistent with the hypothesis that the hormone would exert a different action in Mammals and in Teleosts.

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Study of the kidney innervation in the lizard (Lacerta muralis), using the silver impregnation technique, showed nerve terminals with the same contiguous relationship to the proximal and distal convoluted tubules and Bowman's capsule as in Mammals. Innervation of these segments may serve to regulate the contractile activity assigned to the capsule and tubule epithelial cells by various workers. Perimetral fibres were also noted on the so-called "sexual segment".

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The serum of mice with IgA-secreting transplantable myelomas contains high IgA concentrations, and polymeric IgA with secretory characteristics are observed in the intestinal and salivary secretions. Immunofluorescence was used to demonstrate the transepithelial transfer of these secretory IgAs. IgA molecules were noted within the cytoplasm of intestinal columnar and salivary-secreting cells; they were not present in goblet cells or the salivary-excretory duct cells.

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