Publications by authors named "Hiroaki Fujii"
Background: No previous studies have compared respiratory clinics and respiratory specialized facilities regarding causative diseases for bloody sputum and hemoptysis in Japan.
Methods: We retrospectively compared causative diseases for bloody sputum and hemoptysis between 3 respiratory clinics (clinic group) and 7 departments of respiratory medicine at hospitals (hospital group) in Japan.
Results: We collected data from 231 patients (median age, 51 years; age range, 24-96 years; 109 men (47.
Article Synopsis
- Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) have improved cancer treatment outcomes but identifying effective biomarkers for patient selection is essential due to current markers like PD-L1 showing limited predictive accuracy.
- * This study analyzes blood-based factors, like neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio and red cell distribution width (RDW), to predict benefits from ICI therapy using data from a Clinical Data Warehouse (CDW) and electronic medical records (EMR).
- * Results showed a significant correlation between high RDW and the likelihood of receiving fewer doses of the ICI pembrolizumab, highlighting its potential as a prognostic marker for predicting treatment efficacy.
Article Synopsis
- - The study investigates the link between HLA genotypes and the severity of COVID-19 in 209 Japanese patients, identifying how specific alleles correlate with severe respiratory cases over different epidemic periods (pre-Omicron and Omicron).
- - Significant associations were found, particularly with alleles HLA-DQA1*01:03 and HLA-DQB1*06:01, showing higher frequencies in severe COVID-19 cases compared to non-severe cases, primarily during the pre-Omicron period.
- - There was a strong correlation between the two significant alleles (r = 0.91), indicating they are often inherited together, and their presence in the severe group highlights potential genetic factors influencing COVID-19
Article Synopsis
- Benralizumab, an antibody for eosinophilic asthma, helps reduce flare-ups and reliance on corticosteroids, but its prescribing varies significantly across Japan’s 47 prefectures.
- A study using national insurance claim data found that higher average income correlates with increased benralizumab prescriptions, while correlations with physician density were weaker.
- The findings highlight that income is the most significant factor affecting access to advanced asthma treatments in Japan, suggesting that addressing financial barriers is crucial for improving patient care and outcomes.
Article Synopsis
- Protein phosphorylation is a key posttranslational modification in cell signaling, crucial for how cells respond to stress via kinases and phosphatases.
- Various methods exist to study phosphorylation, each with its own pros and cons; in vitro kinase assays help analyze these processes but may not fully capture the complexity of living systems.
- This chapter specifically details how to purify recombinant proteins from Escherichia coli and measure kinase activity using radioactive assays.
Article Synopsis
- Research aimed to create a panel of fewer tumor markers for lung cancer diagnosis, balancing sensitivity with the risk of false positives.
- The study involved 1,733 patients and used logistic regression to identify three key markers (CEA, CYFRA, NSE) linked to lung cancer diagnosis.
- The three-marker panel demonstrated better diagnostic accuracy and reduced false positives compared to a panel that included all six tumor markers.
Article Synopsis
- * In a study of 51 patients, those who died within 12 weeks had significantly higher serum HO-1 levels compared to survivors, highlighting its role in mortality prediction.
- * The study suggests that measuring serum HO-1 could help assess the prognosis and mortality risk for patients experiencing acute exacerbations of ILDs.
Article Synopsis
- Whole genome sequencing (WGS) can be used to predict drug resistance in tuberculosis either through a catalog-based method that identifies specific mutations or a noncatalog approach using advanced algorithms like machine learning.
- A systematic review analyzed 44 studies with nearly 17,000 specimens, revealing excellent test accuracy for isoniazid and rifampicin, very good accuracy for several other drugs, and good accuracy for a few more.
- Both catalog-based and noncatalog-based methods demonstrated similar effectiveness in predicting drug susceptibility using WGS results.
Article Synopsis
- Acute exacerbation (AE) of interstitial pneumonia (IP) has a poor prognosis due to severe lung damage combined with existing fibrosis.
- A study compared clinical data from 66 patients with AE of idiopathic interstitial pneumonias (IIPs) and 19 patients with collagen vascular disease-associated interstitial pneumonia (CVD-IP), focusing on factors like age, health status (Charlson Comorbidity Index score), blood biomarkers, treatment, and mortality.
- Findings revealed that the Charlson Comorbidity Index score and serum lactate dehydrogenase levels were significant predictors of 3-month mortality, indicating that these metrics may be more crucial indicators of patient outcomes than the specific type of interstitial pneumonia.
Article Synopsis
- * Researchers reviewed data from 130 IPF patients who underwent AFT between 2009 and 2019, noting factors like age, sex, and pulmonary function, but found no significant differences in outcomes based on CCIS scores.
- * While the CCIS did not correlate with disease outcomes overall, a longer duration of AFT appeared to improve results for patients with a low CCIS score.
Introduction: Tuberculosis (TB) remains a leading cause of death globally. Identifying the factors associated with mortality during hospitalization for TB is crucial for improving patient outcomes. This study aimed to investigate the potential risk factors, including T-SPOT.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The ILD-GAP scoring system has been widely used to predict the prognosis of patients with interstitial lung disease (ILD). The ability of the ILD-GAP scoring system combined with the Charlson Comorbidity Index score (CCIS) (ILD-GAPC) to predict ILD prognosis was investigated.
Methods: In ILD patients, including idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), idiopathic nonspecific interstitial pneumonia (iNSIP), collagen vascular disease-related interstitial pneumonia (CVD-IP), chronic hypersensitivity pneumonitis (CHP), and unclassifiable ILD (UC-ILD), treated between April 2013 and April 2017, the relationships between baseline clinical parameters, including age, sex, CCIS, ILD diagnosis, pulmonary function test results, and disease outcomes, were retrospectively assessed, and the ability to predict prognosis was compared between the ILD-GAP and ILD-GAPC models, respectively.
Background: This study aimed to determine the effectiveness of liquid biopsy in detecting epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutations at diagnosis, disease progression, and intermediate stages.
Methods: This prospective, multicenter, observational study included 30 patients with non-small cell lung cancer treated with afatinib, harboring a major EGFR mutation confirmed by tumor tissue biopsy. We collected blood samples for liquid biopsy at diagnosis, intermediate stage, and progressive disease.
Article Synopsis
- * Blood samples from 90 patients revealed that those experiencing AEs had significantly higher levels of HO-1 (35.2 ng/mL) compared to those without AEs (16.4 ng/mL), indicating a strong correlation.
- * ROC curve analysis showed that serum HO-1 had a high accuracy in identifying AEs (AUC of 0.87 for IIPs and 0.86 for SIPs), suggesting it could be a clinically valuable tool
Article Synopsis
- A 70-year-old man with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) experienced worsening breathing difficulties three weeks after contracting COVID-19.
- Imaging revealed new lung damage, leading to a diagnosis of an acute exacerbation of IPF related to the virus.
- Despite treatment with steroids, he showed no improvement, and later care focused on supportive measures; monitoring a specific biomarker was useful in assessing his condition.
Article Synopsis
- A 72-year-old Japanese male had lung infiltrates and masses for 3 years, but multiple biopsies did not lead to a diagnosis until he was transferred to another hospital.
- Using positron emission tomography, increased activity was found in his lungs and lymph nodes, leading to a surgical biopsy that confirmed Hodgkin's lymphoma (HL).
- After starting chemotherapy, the lung lesions significantly improved, highlighting the low diagnostic success rate (18.5%) of traditional transbronchial lung biopsies in HL cases.
Abscisic acid (ABA) is an important phytohormone mediating osmotic stress responses. SUCROSE NONFERMENTING 1 (SNF1)-RELATED PROTEIN KINASE 2.6 (SnRK2.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPlants adjust to unfavorable conditions by altering physiological activities, such as gene expression. Although previous studies have identified multiple stress-induced genes, the function of many genes during the stress responses remains unclear. Expression of ERD7 (EARLY RESPONSE TO DEHYDRATION 7) is induced in response to dehydration.
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- The text discusses the challenges posed by foam in industrial processes and the use of antifoaming agents to tackle these issues.
- It highlights the importance of the affinity between antifoaming agents and foam-generating components, suggesting that the Hansen solubility parameter (HSP) can quantitatively measure this affinity.
- The study found strong correlations (0.953-0.860) between the HSP of antifoaming agents and their defoaming effectiveness, indicating that HSP can help select the best antifoaming agent for specific processes.
On the basis of the evidence that amyloid β (Aβ)-induced Zn influx affects memory acquisition via attenuated long-term potentiation (LTP) induction, here we tested whether Aβ-induced Zn influx affects maintained LTP in freely moving rats, resulting in retrograde amnesia. Both maintained LTP and space memory were impaired by local injection of 250 μM ZnCl (2 μl) into the dentate gyrus, while maintained LTP was impaired by injection of either Aβ or Aβ (25 μM, 2 μl) into the dentate gyrus. Aβ-induced impairment of maintained LTP was rescued by co-injection of CaEDTA, an extracellular Zn chelator, but not by co-injection of ZnAF-2DA, an intracellular Zn chelator, suggesting that maintained LTP is impaired by Aβ via a mechanism that may involve extracellular Zn.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSucrose non-fermenting 1-related protein kinases (SnRKs) are important for plant growth and stress responses. This family has three clades: SnRK1, SnRK2 and SnRK3. Although plant SnRKs are thought to be activated by upstream kinases, the overall mechanism remains obscure.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSilver birch (Betula pendula) is a pioneer boreal tree that can be induced to flower within 1 year. Its rapid life cycle, small (440-Mb) genome, and advanced germplasm resources make birch an attractive model for forest biotechnology. We assembled and chromosomally anchored the nuclear genome of an inbred B.
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