A technology-aided program to support leisure engagement and communication by a man with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Objective: To assess a technology-aided programme for promoting leisure engagement and communication in a man with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

Method: The programme involved a laptop computer equipped with a Clicker 5 software package, an optic microswitch and an interface device. The participant could choose between two leisure options (i.

Insulin-like growth factor-1 isoforms in rat hepatocytes and cholangiocytes and their involvement in protection against cholestatic injury.

A 'locally acting' IGF1 (insulin-like growth factor 1) isoform has been recently identified in the skeletal muscle and neural tissues where it accelerates injury repair. No information exist on the expression and function of IGF1 isoforms in the liver. We investigated IGF1 isoforms in rat hepatocytes and cholangiocytes and evaluated their involvement in cell proliferation or damage induced by experimental cholestasis (bile duct ligation, BDL) or hydrophobic bile salts.

Differential vascular endothelial growth factor A protein expression between small hepatocellular carcinoma and cirrhosis correlates with serum vascular endothelial growth factor A and alpha-fetoprotein.

Background/aims: Drugs with antivascular endothelial growth factor A (anti-VEGF-A) action are under clinical evaluation with encouraging results in advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The relative VEGF-A protein expression in non-advanced HCC and in the cirrhotic non-tumoral tissue in the same patient, a variable that could be important for treatment efficacy, has been investigated with conflicting results, only using the cirrhotic tissue surrounding the neoplasm (CS).

Methods: We measured, for the first time, VEGF-A expression in non-advanced HCC and in the respective CS and cirrhotic tissue at a distance from the tumour (CD), in 24 patients who underwent liver transplantation.

Quantitative assay of total dsDNA with PicoGreen reagent and real-time fluorescent detection.

We describe a quantitative assay of dsDNA based on real-time PCR measurement of fluorescence due to the interaction of PicoGreen dye with dsDNA. An aliquot of 1 to 5 ml of the sample is mixed with 45 ml of diluted PicoGreen reagent within an optical PCR tube. This is placed into the real-time apparatus set to read SYBR Green I dye at the end of three cycles of 94 degrees C for 30 s and 65 degrees C for 30 s.

Quantitative polymerase chain reaction and microchip electrophoresis to detect major rearrangements of the low-density lipoprotein receptor gene causing familial hypercholesterolemia.

A variety of rearrangements in the low-density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR) gene cause severe forms of familial hypercholesterolemia (FH). However, current methods for searching these abnormalities in FH samples, e.g.

Nicastrin gene in familial and sporadic Alzheimer's disease.

Nicastrin is a protein recently discovered associated to presenilins and involved in the production of amyloid beta peptide that accumulates in Alzheimer's disease (AD) brain. In this study the nicastrin gene was examined for unknown mutations and polymorphisms in 104 patients with familial AD (52 early-onset and 52 late-onset), 174 sporadic AD and 191 healthy neurological controls of Italian origin. The scanning of the nicastrin gene identified a missense mutation (N417Y) in two patients with sporadic AD, in an early-onset familial AD and in a young control subject.

Evaluation of RNA messengers involved in lipid trafficking of human intestinal cells by reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction with competimer technology and microchip electrophoresis.

We developed a semiquantitative reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) procedure based on the combination of competimer technology with microchip electrophoresis. The approach was applied to total RNA extracts from the human colon carcinoma cell line CaCo-2 cultured for 22 days onto tissue plate inserts that allow the polarized cell growth. At time of experiment these cells were incubated for 2 h with lipid micelles containing either cholesterol or a mixture cholesterol/beta-sitosterol or serum-free Dulbecco's modified Eagle medium (DMEM) alone.

Investigation into the role of apolipoprotein B gene 8344C/T variant on plasma cholesterol levels by allele-specific PCR amplification.

The 8344C/T polymorphism of the apoB gene was genotyped by an original modification of PCR allele-specific amplification consisting in a single amplification reaction double-primed by two opposite allele-specific oligonucleotides nested in a larger amplified fragment. This method was used to genotype 200 randomly selected healthy individuals (113 males, 87 females). The frequency of the rare allele in this random Italian population was 0.