Localized rest and stress human cardiac creatine kinase reaction kinetics at 3 T.

Changes in the kinetics of the creatine kinase (CK) shuttle are sensitive markers of cardiac energetics but are typically measured at rest and in the prone position. This study aims to measure CK kinetics during pharmacological stress at 3 T, with measurement in the supine position. A shorter "stressed saturation transfer" (StreST) extension to the triple repetition time saturation transfer (TRiST) method is proposed.

Surface anatomy and surface landmarks for thoracic surgery.

A thorough knowledge of thoracic anatomy is of fundamental importance to the thoracic surgeon. Surface anatomy is an often-neglected component of traditional topographic anatomic teaching, but a proper understanding of the relationship of surface features to deeper structures is invaluable in the clinical assessment of a patient and in the interpretation of radiologic imaging. Familiarity with thoracic surgical landmarks is a prerequisite for the successful placing of a thoracic incision.

Prognostic factors in resected satellite-nodule T4 non-small cell lung cancer.

Background: The 1997 non-small cell lung cancer staging revisions assigned a T4 descriptor to satellite nodules in the primary tumor lobe. We reviewed our experience of satellite-nodule T4 non-small cell lung cancer following these revisions and evaluated prognostic factors for this group.

Methods: All patients who underwent resection of non-small cell lung cancer between April 1997 and June 2005 with satellite nodule(s) confirmed at pathologic examination were identified from our institutional Lung Tumor Registry.

Selective down-regulation of sub-endocardial ryanodine receptor expression in a rabbit model of left ventricular dysfunction.

Defective sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) Ca2+ handling is evident in cardiomyopathy and may be mediated by selective dysregulation of SR Ca2+ handling proteins. To assess whether regulation of SR Ca2+ release may vary regionally within the normal and diseased heart, left ventricular transmural expression and activity of the ryanodine receptor (RyR2) was studied in a rabbit coronary artery ligation model of left ventricular dysfunction (LVD). Tissue/cells were isolated from both the sub-endocardial and subepicardial layers of the left ventricular free wall from sham-operated and coronary artery ligated rabbit hearts.

Post-transcriptional regulation of the cystic fibrosis gene in cardiac development and hypertrophy.

Eukaryotic gene expression, reflected in the amount of steady-state mRNA, is regulated at the post-transcriptional level. The 5'-untranslated regions (5'-UTRs) of some transcripts contain cis-acting elements, including upstream open reading frames (uORFs), that have been identified as being fundamental in modulating translation efficiency and mRNA stability. Previously, we demonstrated that uORFs present in the 5'-UTR of cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regular (CFTR) transcripts expressed in the heart were able to modulate translation efficiency of the main CFTR ORF.

Cardiac expression of the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator involves novel exon 1 usage to produce a unique amino-terminal protein.

Cystic fibrosis is caused by mutations in the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) gene, which encodes a chloride channel present in many cells. In cardiomyocytes, we report that multiple exon 1 usage and alternative splicing produces four CFTR transcripts, with different 5'-untranslated regions, CFTR(TRAD-139), CFTR(-1C/-1A), CFTR(-1C), and CFTR(-1B). CFTR transcripts containing the novel upstream exons (exons -1C, -1B, and -1A) represent more than 90% of cardiac expressed CFTR mRNA.