Telomerase is a specific enzyme required for the replication of telomeres. Its activity is detected in almost human cancers. We examined in esophageal carcinoma and lesions unstained with Lugol's solution telomerase activity by using telomeric repeat amplification protocol (TRAP) assay.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRecently, spinal cord stimulation (SCS) has been used for the treatment of patients in prolonged coma. However, the results of SCS in unresponsive patients with hypoxic encephalopathy at the chronic stage have not been satisfactory. Considering these circumstances, we began SCS from one month after the onset of hypoxic encephalopathy and evaluated its effect.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe Trk family of tyrosine protein kinase receptors plays a significant role in the development and maintenance of neural tissues. It has been recently shown that Trk receptors are also expressed by a wide range of normal non-neuronal tissues in humans in a cell type-specific manner. In the present study, the expression patterns of TrkA in 337 non-neuronal invasive carcinomas of 15 different human tissues were investigated immunohistochemically.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe have improved the sonic spray interface to enable the analysis of multiply charged ions of protein from a solution at a flow rate of 1 mL/min using a conventional liquid chromatograph/mass spectrometer. In this interface, we added a multihole plate in front of the sampling orifice of a mass spectrometer. This plate does not have a hole coaxial to the sampling orifice but has small holes around the central region of the plate.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnviron Health Perspect
February 1998
Carcinogenicity testing is indispensable for identifying environmental carcinogens and for evaluating the safety of drugs in the process of development. Conventional 2-year rodent bioassays are one of the most resource-consuming tests in terms of animals, time, and costs. Development of rapid carcinogenicity testing systems that can assess carcinogenicity within a short period has become a social demand and is essential to improve efficacy in the identification of environmental carcinogens as well as in the development of new drugs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA method is proposed for extracting target dipolesource activities from two sets of evoked magnetoencephalographic (MEG) data, one measured using task stimuli and the other using control stimuli. The difference matrix between the two covariance matrices obtained from these two measurements is calculated, and a procedure similar to the MEG-multiple signal classification (MUSIC) algorithm is applied to this difference matrix to extract the target dipole-source configuration. This configuration corresponds to the source-configuration difference between the two measurements.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNihon Geka Gakkai Zasshi
September 1997
Advanced esophageal carcinoma invades adjacent structures, and its resection without residual tumor is difficult. Preoperative chemotherapy and combined modality therapy are being tried to improve survival in patients with T4 esophageal carcinoma. For these cases, chemotherapy with 5-fluorouracil and cisplatin (FP) is known to be not so effective.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFVitamin D3 is a new therapeutic agent for psoriasis. Hyperproliferation of epidermis and over-secretion of IL-8 by keratinocytes are the characteristic features of psoriasis. The present study was conducted to determine whether a new vitamin D3 analogue, 22-oxacalcitriol, could be effective in inhibiting the proliferation and IL-8 secretion of normal human epidermal keratinocytes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPhotosynthetic characteristics, leaf longevity and biomass accumulation of a threatened herb species, Arisaema heterophyllum, were studied in the understory of a riparian forest and at a neighboring deforested open site for 3 years in order to understand the combined effects of light and water availability. Light availability was 2- to 4-fold higher at the deforested than at the forest site during the growing season of the species, and precipitation varied considerably over the 3 years. Despite the difference in water availability among the years (dry in 1994 and 1996, and wet in 1995), the species showed a strong acclimation to the different light environments.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis paper proposes a method of localizing multiple current dipoles from spatio-temporal biomagnetic data. The method is based on the multiple signal classification (MUSIC) algorithm and is tolerant of the influence of background brain activity. In this method, the noise covariance matrix is estimated using a portion of the data that contains noise, but does not contain any signal information.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA liquid chromatographic method using semi-microcolumn separation combined with laser resonance Raman detection was developed for the determination of monosaccharides in fruit juices. Reducing sugars (galactose, glucose, mannose, arabinose, xylose and ribose) were derivatized with 4-dimethylaminoazobenzene-4'-sulfonyl (DABSYL) hydrazine. The derivatives of the monosaccharides exhibited strong resonance Raman scattering at 1136 cm(-1) when Ar+ laser emission line 488.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe somatotopical organization of the somatosensory cortex was analyzed. Echo-planar imaging was used to obtain functional images, and magnetic field strength was 1.5T.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOne of main purposes of functional MRI is to identify functional map on human brain. We considered spatial resolution was a important factor and investigated influences of it on signal changes and activated region size. Functional images were acquired with Echo-Planar imaging (EPI) and interleaved EPI (IEPI).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe control of cell survival and cell death is of central importance in tissues with high cell turnover such as the lymphoid system. We have examined the effect of cytokines on IL-2 deprivation-induced apoptosis of human antigen-specific T helper clones with different cytokine production profiles. We found that IL-2, interferon-alpha (IFN-alpha), and IFN-beta inhibited IL-2 deprivation apoptosis in Th0, Th1, and Th2 clones.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEpidermal keratinocytes express beta 2-adrenergic receptors on the cell membrane. The binding of the agonists to the beta 2-adrenergic receptors regulates activation of adenylate cyclase. This transmembrane signaling system has been regarded to be one of the important pathways for the functions of keratinocytes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe exact mechanism of hypothermic cerebroprotection after traumatic brain injury (TBI) is not fully understood. The present study was conducted to investigate the effects of mild hypothermia on trauma-induced synthesis of nitric oxide (NO), which has been implicated in the pathogenesis of ischemic brain damage associated with glutamate neurotoxicity. Cerebral contusion was created in the rat parietal cortex by a weight-drop method, and extracellular concentrations of the NO end products nitrite and nitrate were measured using in vivo brain microdialysis and capillary electrophoresis under normothermic (37 degrees C) and mild hypothermic (32 degrees C) conditions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe examined the incidence of thrombophilia in deep vein thrombosis (DVT). Of 38 cases, we found 4 cases of protein C abnormality, 2 cases each of protein S abnormality and lupus anticoagulant, 1 case of antithrombin III abnormality. The total incidence was 23.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNihon Hinyokika Gakkai Zasshi
March 1997
We experienced a case of adenocarcinoma occurring in the reconstructed bladder 38 years after ileocystoplasty. The patient was a 48-year-old woman, who had undergone ileocystoplasty and left nephrectomy at the age of 10 for the treatment of tuberculous contracted bladder and left renal tuberculosis. She had often suffered from right pyelonephritis following the operation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe mechanism of hypothermic cerebroprotection after traumatic brain injury (TBI) is unknown. The present study was conducted to investigate the effects of mild hypothermia on the changes in cortical extracellular amino acids and cerebral blood flow (CBF) caused by cerebral contusion created in the rat parietal cortex by a weight-drop method. CBF in both normothermia (37 degrees C) and hypothermia (32 degrees C) groups, which was monitored using the hydrogen clearance technique, decreased significantly after contusion, but never fell below the threshold for ischemia.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFClin Exp Immunol
February 1997
Phenotypic and functional properties of gammadelta T cells, which play an important role in mucocutaneous immunity, were examined to elucidate whether immunological abnormality in Behcet's disease may be related to a specific T cell population. We found that CD45RA+ Vgamma9+ Vdelta2+ gammadelta T cells, which constitute a minor population of gammadelta T cells in healthy individuals, were increased in number in Behçet's disease irrespective of disease activity. This CD45RA+ subset of gammadelta T cells in the active, but not inactive, phase of this disease expressed IL-2Rbeta and HLA-DR, suggesting that they are activated in vivo in active Behçet's disease.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe investigated the in vivo expression of cyclin B1 and Cdc2 (key molecules for G2-M transition during the cell cycle) in nonmalignant and cancerous human breast lesions using immunohistochemistry and quantitative proliferative index (PI) analysis. Breast epithelial cells co-expressed cyclin B1 and Cdc2 in their cytoplasm in the G2 phase and in their nuclei in the M phase. Cyclin B1, but not Cdc2, immunostaining rapidly disappeared from the nuclei during the mitotic metaphase to anaphase transition.
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