The effect of motor control training on abdominal muscle contraction during simulated weight bearing in elite cricketers.

Objectives: To investigate whether motor control training alters automatic contraction of abdominal muscles in elite cricketers with low back pain (LBP) during performance of a simulated unilateral weight-bearing task.

Design: Clinical trial.

Methods: 26 male elite-cricketers attended a 13-week cricket training camp.

A rapid one-generation genetic screen in a Drosophila model to capture rhabdomyosarcoma effectors and therapeutic targets.

Rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS) is an aggressive childhood malignancy of neoplastic muscle-lineage precursors that fail to terminally differentiate into syncytial muscle. The most aggressive form of RMS, alveolar-RMS, is driven by misexpression of the PAX-FOXO1 oncoprotein, which is generated by recurrent chromosomal translocations that fuse either the PAX3 or PAX7 gene to FOXO1. The molecular underpinnings of PAX-FOXO1-mediated RMS pathogenesis remain unclear, however, and clinical outcomes poor.

Drosophila and mammalian models uncover a role for the myoblast fusion gene TANC1 in rhabdomyosarcoma.

Rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS) is a malignancy of muscle myoblasts, which fail to exit the cell cycle, resist terminal differentiation, and are blocked from fusing into syncytial skeletal muscle. In some patients, RMS is caused by a translocation that generates the fusion oncoprotein PAX-FOXO1, but the underlying RMS pathogenetic mechanisms that impede differentiation and promote neoplastic transformation remain unclear. Using a Drosophila model of PAX-FOXO1-mediated transformation, we show here that mutation in the myoblast fusion gene rolling pebbles (rols) dominantly suppresses PAX-FOXO1 lethality.

Results of the phase I dose-escalating study of motexafin gadolinium with standard radiotherapy in patients with glioblastoma multiforme.

Purpose: Motexafin gadolinium (MGd) is a putative radiation enhancer initially evaluated in patients with brain metastases. This Phase I trial studied the safety and tolerability of a 2-6-week course (10-22 doses) of MGd with radiotherapy for glioblastoma multiforme.

Methods And Materials: A total of 33 glioblastoma multiforme patients received one of seven MGd regimens starting at 10 doses of 4 mg/kg/d MGd and escalating to 22 doses of 5.

Pulmonary sequelae after electron spinal irradiation.

We measured pulmonary function in 21 patients, after craniospinal irradiation with a posterior spinal electron beam. The median age at treatment was 7.5 years.