Exceptional response to immunotherapy in association with radiotherapy in patient with breast metastasis from urothelial carcinoma: A case report

Most common sites of metastasis of urothelial carcinoma (UC) are lungs, liver, lymph nodes and bone. Pembrolizumab, a humanized monoclonal antibody directed against programmed cell death protein-1 (PD-1), represents an effective second-line therapy for advanced UC. Radiotherapy has been shown to induce a mechanism of immunogenic cell death (ICD) resulting in immune memory and advantageous systemic effects. We present the first case of breast metastasis (BM) from a UC described in literature who had an exceptional response to second-line therapy with pembrolizumab in association with radiotherapy, showing the efficacy of combining immunotherapy and radiotherapy even in patients with atypical metastatic sites

Lexical Disambiguation in LTAG using Left Context

International audienceIn this paper, we present an optimization for parsing with Lexicalized Tree-Adjoining Grammar which takes inspiration from previous work on polarity based grammar abstraction (Bonfante et al., 2004). We illustrate the impact of this optimization on two benchmarks and we relate our approach to the more general optimization framework proposed for Interaction Grammars by (Bonfante et al., 2009) and (Morey et al., 2011)

Complexity Bounds for Ordinal-Based Termination

`What more than its truth do we know if we have a proof of a theorem in a given formal system?' We examine Kreisel's question in the particular context of program termination proofs, with an eye to deriving complexity bounds on program running times. Our main tool for this are length function theorems, which provide complexity bounds on the use of well quasi orders. We illustrate how to prove such theorems in the simple yet until now untreated case of ordinals. We show how to apply this new theorem to derive complexity bounds on programs when they are proven to terminate thanks to a ranking function into some ordinal.Comment: Invited talk at the 8th International Workshop on Reachability Problems (RP 2014, 22-24 September 2014, Oxford

Considering Intra-individual Genetic Heterogeneity to Understand Biodiversity

In this chapter, I am concerned with the concept of Intra-individual Genetic Hetereogeneity (IGH) and its potential influence on biodiversity estimates. Definitions of biological individuality are often indirectly dependent on genetic sampling -and vice versa. Genetic sampling typically focuses on a particular locus or set of loci, found in the the mitochondrial, chloroplast or nuclear genome. If ecological function or evolutionary individuality can be defined on the level of multiple divergent genomes, as I shall argue is the case in IGH, our current genetic sampling strategies and analytic approaches may miss out on relevant biodiversity. Now that more and more examples of IGH are available, it is becoming possible to investigate the positive and negative effects of IGH on the functioning and evolution of multicellular individuals more systematically. I consider some examples and argue that studying diversity through the lens of IGH facilitates thinking not in terms of units, but in terms of interactions between biological entities. This, in turn, enables a fresh take on the ecological and evolutionary significance of biological diversity

Impact of implant thread design on insertion torque and osseointegration:a preclinical model

Successful osseointegration of endosteal dental implants has been attributed to implant design, including the macro-, micro- and nano- geometric properties. Based on current literature pertaining to implant design, the resultant cellular and bone healing response is unknown when the thread thickness of the implants is increased, resulting in an increased contact area in implants designed with healing chambers. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of two implant designs with different thread profiles on the osseointegration parameters and implant stability at 3- and 6-weeks in vivo using a well-established preclinical dog model. A total of 48 type V Ti alloy implants were divided in two groups according to their thread design (D1= +0.1x/mm and D2= +0.15x/mm) and placed in an interpolated fashion into the radii of six beagles. Insertion torque was measured at time of placement, radii were extracted for histological processing following 3- and 6-week healing intervals. Histologic and histomorphometric analyses were performed in terms of bone to implant contact (%BIC) and bone area fraction occupancy within implant threads (%BAFO). Statistical analyses were performed through a linear mixed model with fixed factors of time and implant thread design. Surface roughness analysis demonstrated no significant differences in Sa and Sq between D1 and D2 implant designs, which confirmed that both implant designs were homogenous except for their respective thread profiles. For insertion torque, statistically significant lower values were recorded for D1 in comparison to D2 (59.6 ± 11.1 and 78.9 ± 10.1 N?cm, respectively). Furthermore, there were no significant differences with respect to histological analysis and histomorphometric parameters, between D1 and D2 at both time points. Both thread profiles presented equivalent potential to successfully osseointegrate in the osteotomies, with D2 yielding higher mechanical retention upon placement without detrimental bone resorption

Bone regeneration at extraction sockets filled with leukocyte-platelet-rich fibrin:an experimental pre-clinical study

We aimed to histomorphometrically evaluate the effects of Leucocyte-Platelet-Rich Fibrin (L-PRF), with and without the combination of a bone grafting material, for alveolar ridge preservation using an in vivo canine model. Seven dogs (Female Beagles, ~18-month-old) were acquired for the study. L-PRF was prepared from each individual animal by drawing venous blood and spinning them through a centrifuge at 408 RCF-clot (IntrasSpin, Intra-Lock, Boca Raton, FL). L-PRF membranes were obtained from XPression fabrication kit (Biohorizons Implant Systems, Inc., AL, USA). A split mouth approach was adopted with the first molar mesial and distal socket defects treated in an interpolated fashion of the following study groups: 1) Empty socket (negative control); 2) OSS filled defect 3) L-PRF membrane; and 4) Mix of Bio-Oss® with L-PRF. After six weeks, samples were harvested, histologically processed, and evaluated for bone area fraction occupancy (BAFO), vertical/horizontal ridge dimensions (VRD and HRD, respectively), and area of coronal soft tissue infiltration. BAFO was statistically lower for the control group in comparison to all treatment groups. Defects treated with Bio-Oss® were not statistically different then defects treated solely with L-PRF. Collapsed across all groups, L-PRF exhibited higher degrees of BAFO than groups without L-PRF. Defects filled with Bio-Oss® and Bio-Oss® with L-PRF demonstrated greater maintenance of VRD relative to the control group. Collapsed across all groups, Bio-Oss® maintained the VRD and resulted in less area of coronal soft tissue infiltration compared to the empty defect. Soft tissue infiltration observed at the coronal area was not statistically different among defects filled with L-PRF, Bio-Oss®, and Bio-Oss® with L-PRF. Inclusion of L-PRF to particulate xenograft did not promote additional bone heading at 6 weeks in vivo. However, we noted that L-PRF alone promoted alveolar socket regeneration to levels comparable to particulate xenografts, suggesting its potential utilization for socket preservation