A long-survival case of systemic AL amyloidosis with nephrotic syndrome.

A 49-year-old Japanese female was initially diagnosed as having monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance in June 1993 (IgG lambda: 3,120 mg/dl). Four years later, she developed AL amyloidosis complicated by nephrotic syndrome and renal failure. Before receiving 5 courses of MP therapy (melphalan plus prednisolone), her serum IgG level had decreased in accordance with the appearance of nephrotic syndrome, which led to the leakage of serum immunoglobulin into the urine.

Telomerase activity during carcinogenesis in the bronchus.

Telomerase is a ribonucleoprotein reverse transcriptase that synthesizes telomeric DNA onto chromosome ends, and is not detected in most normal cells. It has been clarified that some bronchial squamous cell carcinomas may arise through the metaplasia and dysplasia sequence accompanied by accumulation of genetic mutations in metaplastic cells. Recently a highly sensitive polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based telomerase assay (TRAP assay) was developed for the detection of telomerase activity.

Malignancy: Subsequential Alterations of Telomeric DNA Length Correlate with Cytogenetic Response in Chronic Myeloid Leukemia Treated with Interferon alpha.

Telomeres consist of simple tandem hexametric (TTAGGG) repeats and progressively shorten with cell replication. To determine a relationship between telomeric erosion and response to treatment, we measured telomere length following treatment in patients with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) in the chronic phase. We used 70 samples of bone marrow mononuclear cells obtained from 26 patients with CML in the chronic phase subsequently.