Evaluation of neuroendocrine staining and androgen receptor expression in incidental prostatic adenocarcinoma: prognostic implications.

Objectives: To identify neuroendocrine cells and androgen receptors (ARs), possible predictors of cancer progression, in a series of untreated patients with incidental Stage T1a prostate cancer (PCa). Neuroendocrine cells may exert a dynamic role in the microenvironment of PCa. The AR is thought to have a central role in the propagation of prostate carcinogenesis.

Evaluation of hypoxia-inducible factor 1alpha overexpression as a predictor of tumour recurrence and progression in superficial urothelial bladder carcinoma.

Objectives: To investigate the possible role of hypoxia-inducible factor 1alpha (HIF-1alpha, a transcription factor important in regulating O(2) homeostasis and physiological responses to oxygen deprivation) in the recurrence and progression of superficial urothelial bladder cancer, and to examine its expression in relation to proliferation status, apoptotic activity and intratumoral angiogenesis.

Patients And Methods: Paraffin wax-embedded tissue from 140 patients with superficial primary urothelial bladder carcinoma was immunostained for HIF-1alpha, Ki-67, single-stranded DNA antibody for apoptotic cells, p53, bcl-2, vascular endothelial growth factor and CD31 antigen. We calculated the proliferative rate, the apoptotic index and the microvessel density (MVD).

Hypoxia-inducible factor 1 alpha expression correlates with angiogenesis and unfavorable prognosis in bladder cancer.

Introduction And Objectives: Hypoxia-inducible factor 1 alpha (HIF-1 alpha) is a critical regulatory protein of cellular response to hypoxia and is closely related to the triggering of the angiogenic process. We examined the relationship between hypoxia and angiogenesis, as well as their prognostic impact in patients with urothelial bladder cancer.

Methods: The immunohistochemical expression of HIF-1 alpha was evaluated in 93 formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded primary transitional cell carcinoma tissue samples.

Site-selective electronic Raman excitation spectroscopy of the lowest 4f ? 5d transitions in Ce(3+):Y(2)O(3).

The intensities of electronic Raman-scattering transitions between the ground state and the first excited state of the (2)F(7/2) manifold of Ce(3+) in both the C(2) and C(3i) sites of Y(2)O(3) are measured as a function of excitation frequency in the region of the lowest 4f ? 5d intermediate-state resonance with a wavelength-tunable pulsed dye laser. As the dye laser is tuned through the center of the resonance, we observe a 2-order-of-magnitude enhancement in electronic Raman-transition intensity over that for nonresonant excitation. The electronic Raman excitation profiles (resonance enhancement as a function of frequency) in the 15 949- to 23 810-cm(-1) (627-420-nm) range provide spectrally resolved information about the lowest 4f ? 5d transitions of both the C(2) and C(3i) centers that could not be obtained from the strongly overlapping absorption spectra.