Beta-glucan reflects liver injury after preservation and transplantation in dogs.

Graft failure and extrahepatic organ complications, which frequently develop after transplantation, may be related to inflammatory mediators stimulated by endotoxin (ET). The role of endotoxemia after liver transplantation is controversial and may depend upon differences in the ET assay method used in the various contradicting studies. While the standard Limulus amebocyte lysate (LAL) is reactive for ET and beta-glucan, a novel turbidimetric assay method enables separate determinations of ET and beta-glucan.

Diurnal rhythm of serum steroid hormone levels in the Japanese whiting, Sillago japonica, a daily-spawning teleost.

Ovarian developmental stages and serum steroid hormone levels were examined at six different times of day (0100, 0600, 1000, 1300, 1600, 2000 h) in a marine teleost, the Japanese whiting Sillago japonica, which has an asynchronous-type ovary containing oocytes at various stages of development and spawns every day during a period ranging up to three months. The largest oocytes in the ovaries at the active vitellogenic or post-vitellogenic stages were found between 0100 and 1300 h. Oocyte maturation indicated by germinal vesicle breakdown (GVBD) occurred at 1600 h, and ovulated oocytes were observed in the ovaries collected at 2000 h.

[Nuclear magnetic resonance study of water in Nitella mucronata cells].

The properties of water contained in Nitella mucronata cells are examined by proton spin relaxation measurements. Two fractions of the cell water are observed. About 70% of cell water exhibits a longer relaxation time (T 1 congruent to 600 ms, T2 congruent to 300 ms), the exchange time of water molecules to and from hydration layer of macromolecules is equal to 0.

[Proton magnetic relaxation time of normal and tumor cells].

A proton NMR analysis of an in vitro culture of cells in heavy water has been made. The relaxation times of L-strain cells 929, He-La, transformed and normal embryonic human cells, C3H mice and isolated Yoshida sarcoma tumour cells, as well as of Yoshida sarcoma tumour tissue were determined. It turned out that spin-lattice (T1) and spin-spin (T2) relaxation times are characteristic of every cell and fairly different from those of corresponding tissues, which may be used for NMR identification of cells (NMR cytology).