Publications by authors named "Shimoda N"

Objective: To investigate the impact of body mass index (BMI) and exercise habits on readmission rates among older patients with heart failure.

Methods: Ninety-seven older patients admitted for heart failure (median age: 81 years; 57.7% male) were included in the study.

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Background: Positron emission tomography, which assesses the binding of translocator protein radiotracers, C-DPA-713, may be a sensitive method for determining glial-mediated neuroinflammation levels. This study investigated the relationship between regional C-DPA713 binding potential (BP) and anxiety in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) continuum.

Methods: Nineteen patients with AD continuum determined to be amyloid-/p-tau 181-positive via cerebrospinal fluid analysis were included in this cross-sectional study (mild cognitive impairment [MCI, n = 5] and AD [n = 14]).

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Abortion caused by the parasite Neospora caninum is an important threat to the livestock industry worldwide. Trophoblasts and caruncular cells play major roles in initiating innate immune responses and controlling parasite infection at the fetal-maternal interface. In the present study, bovine uterine epithelial cells (BUECs) and bovine trophoblastic (BT) cells treated with bovine interferon-gamma (IFN-γ), IFN-alpha (IFN-α) and IFN-tau (IFN-τ) followed by infection with N.

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  • The study examined how the COVID-19 pandemic affected hemodialysis treatment at a hospital by comparing data before and after the pandemic began.
  • Researchers analyzed various factors such as patient demographics, hospital stay duration, mortality rates, and the number of surgeries performed.
  • Findings revealed an increase in surgeries for maintenance dialysis patients and a higher percentage of patients classified as DPC III after the pandemic, indicating worsened health conditions and longer hospital stays for these patients.
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Toxoplasma gondii is a pervasive protozoan parasite that is responsible for significant zoonoses. A wide array of vaccines using different effector molecules of T. gondii have been studied worldwide to control toxoplasmosis.

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Introduction: NcSAG1 is one of most widely investigated antigens of in various research fields. Such studies demonstrated the proficiency of NcSAG1 in the regulatory process of parasite adhesion and invasion of host cells. Accordingly, the contribution of NcSAG1 to the pathogenesis of neosporosis can undoubtedly be extrapolated, but direct evidence is lacking.

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In this study, our aim was to validate whether the automated measurement of salivary testosterone and cortisol concentrations and the testosterone-to-cortisol (T/C) ratio, considering their individual circadian rhythms can be used to assess the stress response of male athletes to different exercise intensities accurately and effectively. We measured the salivary testosterone and cortisol concentrations and their respective serum concentrations that were collected from 20 male long-distance runners via passive drooling in the morning and evening for two consecutive days involving different exercise intensities. An electrochemiluminescence immunoassay was performed to evaluate the salivary testosterone and cortisol concentrations.

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Background: Glial activation is central to the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease (AD). However, researchers have not demonstrated its relationship to longitudinal cognitive deterioration. We aimed to compare the prognostic effects of baseline positron emission tomography (PET) imaging of glial activation and amyloid/tau pathology on the successive annual cognitive decline in patients with AD.

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  • * A transurethral resection was done to diagnose the tumor, which was initially identified as a leiomyoma through pathology.
  • * After the tumor increased in size, she underwent a partial cystectomy, and further analysis identified it as an inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor, with no signs of recurrence after 9 months.
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  • * Research showed that vitiligo patients have increased collagen production and elevated levels of anti-oxidative enzymes in their skin, indicating a defense mechanism against oxidative stress.
  • * The study revealed that vitiligo lesions maintained collagen integrity through upregulated NRF2 signaling, which helps with antioxidant defense, suggesting a unique resilience in these areas despite the condition's challenges.
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  • DNA methylation, regulated by DNA methyltransferases (Dnmts) like Dnmt3a and Dnmt3b, plays a crucial role in gene expression control in vertebrates.
  • In zebrafish, homologs Dnmt3aa and Dnmt3ab were studied by creating a maternal-zygotic deficient mutant to explore their impact on developmental gene expression.
  • Raw and processed transcriptome datasets from various developmental stages are available for further research on gene expression differences and potential implications for human diseases linked to DNMT3A, like acute myelogenous leukemia (AML).
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CaMK phosphatase (CaMKP/POPX2/PPM1F) is a Ser/Thr protein phosphatase that belongs to the PPM family. Accumulating evidence suggests that CaMKP is involved in the pathogenesis of various diseases, including cancer. To clarify the relationship between CaMKP activity and human breast cancer cell motility, we examined the phosphatase activity of CaMKP in cell extracts.

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Background: The evaluation of C-DPA-713 binding using positron emission tomography for quantifying the translocator protein can be a sensitive approach in determining the level of glial activation induced by neuroinflammation. Herein, we aimed to investigate the relationship between regional C-DPA713-binding potential (BP ) and neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) in amyloid-positive Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients.

Methods: Fifteen AD patients were enrolled in this study.

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Background: Neuroinflammation is a well-known feature of Alzheimer's disease (AD), and a blood-based test for estimating the levels of neuroinflammation would be expected. In this study, we examined and validated a model using blood-based biomarkers to predict the level of glial activation due to neuroinflammation, as estimated by C-DPA-713 positron emission tomography (PET) imaging.

Methods: We included 15 patients with AD and 10 cognitively normal (CN) subjects.

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Genomic DNA methylation is an epigenetic marker mediated by DNA methyltransferases (Dnmts); in vertebrates, it comprises of a maintenance DNA methyltransferase, Dnmt1, and two DNA methyltransferases (Dnmt3a and Dnmt3b). In zebrafish, there are two homologs of the mammalian Dnmt3a: Dnmt3aa and Dnmt3ab. A knockout (KO) mutant of zebrafish was generated using the CRISPR/Cas9 genome-editing system as a new model for DNA methylation research.

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  • CpG methylation is a key epigenetic marker that typically silences genes by affecting DNA regions like promoters, but its role in transcription termination (when genes stop being expressed) is less understood.
  • Recent research has shown that Dnmt3a, a DNA methyltransferase in mice, is primarily responsible for adding methyl groups to specific regions of DNA during development, including areas at the end of genes called transcription termination sites (TTSs).
  • An analysis of various mouse cell types revealed that hypomethylation (low methylation) at TTSs led to either increased or decreased transcription activity depending on the cell type, highlighting the complex role of DNA methylation in regulating how and when genes are turned off.
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  • Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) is a common treatment for high-risk non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC), but it often causes various adverse side effects.
  • A study involving 106 Japanese patients investigated whether adding levofloxacin after BCG treatments could help reduce these side effects without affecting treatment effectiveness.
  • The results showed that levofloxacin significantly lowered the rates of certain adverse events and was associated with better 5-year survival rates compared to BCG alone.
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There are conflicting reports regarding the efficacy of cortisol as a stress marker in altitude training due to the influence of the circadian rhythm. This study aimed to verify whether the automated measurement of salivary cortisol concentration via sequential sampling could detect the differences in exercise stress between two altitudes. We enrolled 12 elite female long-distance runners living near sea level.

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Introduction: C-DPA-713 is a positron emission tomography (PET) radiotracer developed for imaging the expression of the translocator protein (TSPO) in glial cells, which is considered to be a marker of the neuroinflammatory burden. This study investigated the pharmacokinetic profile of C-DPA-713 and evaluated kinetic modeling and non-invasive TSPO quantification using dynamic PET imaging data in the Alzheimer's disease (AD) and cognitive normal (CN) participants.

Methods: Eleven patients with AD and 6 CN participants were examined using dynamic C-DPA-713 PET imaging for 60 min with arterial blood sampling.

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CaMK phosphatase (CaMKP/PPM1F/POPX2) is a Mn-dependent, calyculin A/okadaic acid-insensitive Ser/Thr protein phosphatase that belongs to the PPM family. CaMKP is thought to be involved in regulation of not only various protein kinases, such as CaM kinases and p21-activated protein kinase, but also of cellular proteins regulated by phosphorylation. A large-scale screening of a chemical library identified gallic acid and some of its alkyl esters as novel CaMKP inhibitors highly specific to CaMKP.

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  • Tolvaptan is the first effective drug for treating autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD), but there are limited long-term studies on its effects.
  • A study examined nine patients from a clinical trial, dividing them into two groups: those who stopped taking tolvaptan (discontinuation group) and those who continued (continuation group).
  • Results indicated that the continuation group showed significant improvements in kidney function over three years, while the discontinuation group did not, suggesting that long-term tolvaptan use may benefit renal health and slow kidney enlargement.
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Neospora caninum is one of the main causes of bovine abortions worldwide, including Japan. Nothing is known about the N. caninum population substructures in Japan, and only one isolate from a pregnant sheep has been studied to date.

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Mental imagery of movement is a potentially valuable rehabilitation task, but its therapeutic efficacy may depend on the specific cognitive strategy employed. Individuals use two main strategies to perform the hand mental rotation task (HMRT), which involves determining whether a visual image depicts a left or right hand. One is the motor imagery (MI) strategy, which involves mentally simulating one's own hand movements.

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