Acupuncture as a Treatment Option in Treating Posttraumatic Stress Disorder-Related Tinnitus in War Veterans: A Case Presentation.

Although close associations between tinnitus and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among war veterans has been documented, there is limited research that explores evidence-based, efficacious interventions to treat the condition in this particular population. This article presents a case of three war veterans with PTSD symptoms who received a series of acupuncture treatments for tinnitus with positive outcomes. Even though the article presents cases of only three veterans and was based on self-reports, there were very clear trends on how veterans with tinnitus symptoms responded to acupuncture treatments.

Spatiotemporal dynamics of the biological interface between cancer and the microenvironment: a fractal anomalous diffusion model with microenvironment plasticity.

Background: The invasion-metastasis cascade of cancer involves a process of parallel progression. A biological interface (module) in which cells is linked with ECM (extracellular matrix) by CAMs (cell adhesion molecules) has been proposed as a tool for tracing cancer spatiotemporal dynamics.

Methods: A mathematical model was established to simulate cancer cell migration.

Effects of auricular acupressure on menstrual symptoms and nitric oxide for women with primary dysmenorrhea.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of auricular acupressure on relieving menstrual symptoms and decreasing nitric oxide (NO) for women with primary dysmenorrhea.

Design: This was a randomized clinical trial comparing the effects of auricular acupressure by seed-pressure method and placebo adhesive patch.

Setting: Settings included colleges in northern and central Taiwan.

Maternal effects on daughters' eating pathology and body image.

Effects of maternal eating behaviors and attitudes, maternal feedback to daughter about weight issues, mother-daughter relationship closeness, media influences, and mothers' perceptions of daughters shape on daughters' body image and eating pathology were examined using 91 pairs of mothers and college-aged daughters. Hierarchical multiple regressions using daughters' BMI as the first step were separately performed for daughters' body image and eating pathology. Variables predictive of daughters' body image included negative feedback from mother, mother's disapproval of daughter's figure, and mothers' eating behaviors and attitudes as perceived by daughters.

Reliability and construct validity of the pain distress inventory.

We conducted three studies to evaluate further the reliability and construct validity of a new self-report instrument, the Pain Distress Inventory (PDI; Osman et al., 2003, The Pain Distress Inventory: Development and initial psychometric properties, J. Clin.

Degradation of sarcomeric and cytoskeletal proteins in cultured skeletal muscle cells.

The goal of this research was to evaluate the roles of calpains and their interactions with the proteasome and the lysosome in degradation of individual sarcomeric and cytoskeletal proteins in cultured muscle cells. Rat L8-CID muscle cells, in which we expressed a transgene calpain inhibitor (CID), were used in the study. L8-CID cells were grown as myotubes after which the relative roles of calpain, proteasome and lysosome in total protein degradation were assessed during a period of serum withdrawal.

Roles of mu-calpain in cultured L8 muscle cells: application of a skeletal muscle-specific gene expression system.

The goal of this work was to characterize the roles of mu-calpain in skeletal muscle protein degradation. Three approaches were developed to alter mu-calpain activity in rat myotubes. These included over-expression of antisense mu-calpain (mu-AS), dominant negative mu-calpain (mu-DN) and the antisense 30-kDa calpain subunit (30-AS).

Development of a ponasterone A-inducible gene expression system for application in cultured skeletal muscle cells.

The goal of this study was to develop an inducible gene expression system to assess functions of specific proteins in differentiated cultured skeletal muscle. We utilized and modified the ecdysone inducible system because others have used this system to express exogenous genes in vitro and in transgenic animals. A limitation of the commercially-available ecdysone system is its constitutive expression in all tissues.