Comparative Efficacy Analysis of Mobilization and Collection of Autologous Hematopoietic Stem Cells in Patients with Lymphoproliferative Disorders and Multiple Sclerosis

Aim. Comparative efficacy analysis of autologous hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) prior to auto-HSCT in patients with lymphoproliferative disorders (LPDs) and multiple sclerosis (MS). Materials & Methods. The trial included 237 patients: 103 LPD and 134 MS patients. In 225 patients HSC mobilization involved only colony-stimulating factors (CSFs), in 12 patients chemotherapy (cyclophosphamide, etoposide) was combined with CSFs. On the intended date of cytapheresis all the patients were tested for CD34+ marker expression. Сytapheresis followed in the patients with CD34+ count more than 0.01 × 106/mL. Results. In 23 (22 %) LPD patients CD34+ count was too low for auto-HSCT (‘collection failure group’). Within this group 19 patients received CSF mobilization, and 4 patients received chemotherapy + CSF. Plerixafor was administered in 5 patients, in 4 of them a repeated mobilization also failed to collect enough cells. In 80 LPD patients the number of mobilized and collected CD34+ cells was sufficient for auto-HSCT (‘collection success group’). Within this group 77 patients received auto-HSCT, 74 patients were treated with CSF mobilization, 6 patients received chemotherapy + CSF, and in 11 patients plerixafor was administered. Median total number of CD34+ cells in the ‘collection success group’ was 2.7 × 106/kg. All 134 MS patients had enough CD34+ cells for auto-HSCT. All of them received CSF mobilization. Median total number of CD34+ cells in the MS group was 2.34 × 106/kg. Potential risk factors for HSC mobilization failure in LPDs were evaluated. They included age, gender, prior radiotherapy, number of antitumor treatment lines prior to auto-HSCT, clinical response prior to auto-HSCT (complete/partial remission or stabilization), and HSC mobilization regimen. These factors with the exception of gender were not associated with mobilization failure parameters. The worst mobilization outcomes were reported in male patients. Conclusion. In 22 % of LPD patients the planned high-dose chemotherapy and auto-HSCT failed due to insufficient counts of autologous CD34+ cells in apheresis product. Male gender can be considered to be a prognostic factor of mobilization failure in LPDs

Outcome of Classical Hodgkin’s Lymphoma Treatment Based on High-Dose Chemotherapy and Autologous Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation: The Experience in the NI Pirogov Russian National Medical Center of Surgery

Aim. To estimate the long-term outcome of the programmed treatment of classical Hodgkin’s lymphoma (cHL) including high-dose chemotherapy (HDCT) and autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (auto-HSCT) as well as the effect of various factors on the achieved results in a single-center study. Materials & Methods. In the A.A. Maksimov Clinical Center of Hematology and Cellular Therapy of the NI Pirogov Russian National Medical Center of Surgery 260 cHL patients received HDCT combined with auto-HSCT within the period from December 2006 to March 2017. The median age was 29 years (range 17–62). The study included 40 % men (n = 104), and 60 % women (n = 156). The median pretransplantation chemotherapy line was 3 (range 2–9). At this stage, prior to auto-HSCT, complete remission (CR) rate was 26.5 %, partial remission (PR) rate was 52.3 %, disease stabilisation rate was 13.5 %. HDCT with auto-HSCT was applied beyond progression as a salvage therapy in 7.7 % of patients. In 79.6 % of patients the standard BEAM and CBV conditioning regimens were used. Results. After HDCT combined with auto-HSCT overall 5-year survival (OS) of 260 cHL patients was 74 %, and 5-year progression-free survival (PFS) was 48 %, which corresponds to the results of some international studies. 5-year OS rates were significantly higher after HDCT and auto-HSCT performed during the first CR or PR (85 %) vs the second and subsequent CR and PR (71 %). Neither gender (p = 0.4) nor ECOG status (p = 0.2) effects on OS and PFS were revealed. 5-year OS rates were significantly higher after HDCT and auto-HSCT performed during CR or PR (82 %) vs disease stabilisation and progression (54 %) as well as upon achieving CR (93 %) vs PR (77 %). Conclusion. In cHL tumor sensitivity to chemotherapy is the essential indication for HDCT combined with auto-HSCT. The optimal time for HDCT and auto-HSCT in cHL is the first CR/PR, and the best treatment outcome is achieved in patients with complete response prior to HDCT and auto-HSCT

Evidence for Shared Cognitive Processing of Pitch in Music and Language

Language and music epitomize the complex representational and computational capacities of the human mind. Strikingly similar in their structural and expressive features, a longstanding question is whether the perceptual and cognitive mechanisms underlying these abilities are shared or distinct – either from each other or from other mental processes. One prominent feature shared between language and music is signal encoding using pitch, conveying pragmatics and semantics in language and melody in music. We investigated how pitch processing is shared between language and music by measuring consistency in individual differences in pitch perception across language, music, and three control conditions intended to assess basic sensory and domain-general cognitive processes. Individuals’ pitch perception abilities in language and music were most strongly related, even after accounting for performance in all control conditions. These results provide behavioral evidence, based on patterns of individual differences, that is consistent with the hypothesis that cognitive mechanisms for pitch processing may be shared between language and music.National Science Foundation (U.S.). Graduate Research Fellowship ProgramEunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (U.S.) (Grant 5K99HD057522

Areas activated during naturalistic reading comprehension overlap topological visual, auditory, and somatotomotor maps

Cortical mapping techniques using fMRI have been instrumental in identifying the boundaries of topological (neighbor-preserving) maps in early sensory areas. The presence of topological maps beyond early sensory areas raises the possibility that they might play a significant role in other cognitive systems, and that topological mapping might help to delineate areas involved in higher cognitive processes. In this study, we combine surface-based visual, auditory, and somatomotor mapping methods with a naturalistic reading comprehension task in the same group of subjects to provide a qualitative and quantitative assessment of the cortical overlap between sensory-motor maps in all major sensory modalities, and reading processing regions. Our results suggest that cortical activation during naturalistic reading comprehension overlaps more extensively with topological sensory-motor maps than has been heretofore appreciated. Reading activation in regions adjacent to occipital lobe and inferior parietal lobe almost completely overlaps visual maps, whereas a significant portion of frontal activation for reading in dorsolateral and ventral prefrontal cortex overlaps both visual and auditory maps. Even classical language regions in superior temporal cortex are partially overlapped by topological visual and auditory maps. By contrast, the main overlap with somatomotor maps is restricted to a small region on the anterior bank of the central sulcus near the border between the face and hand representations of M-I

Universal scaling behavior of non-equilibrium phase transitions

One of the most impressive features of continuous phase transitions is the concept of universality, that allows to group the great variety of different critical phenomena into a small number of universality classes. All systems belonging to a given universality class have the same critical exponents, and certain scaling functions become identical near the critical point. It is the aim of this work to demonstrate the usefulness of universal scaling functions for the analysis of non-equilibrium phase transitions. In order to limit the coverage of this article, we focus on a particular class of non-equilibrium critical phenomena, the so-called absorbing phase transitions. These phase transitions arise from a competition of opposing processes, usually creation and annihilation processes. The transition point separates an active phase and an absorbing phase in which the dynamics is frozen. A systematic analysis of universal scaling functions of absorbing phase transitions is presented, including static, dynamical, and finite-size scaling measurements. As a result a picture gallery of universal scaling functions is presented which allows to identify and to distinguish universality classes.Comment: review article, 160 pages, 60 figures include

Forty years of carabid beetle research in Europe - from taxonomy, biology, ecology and population studies to bioindication, habitat assessment and conservation

Volume: 100Start Page: 55End Page: 14

Lipid droplet remodeling and interaction with mitochondria in mouse brown adipose tissue during cold treatment

Brown adipose tissue (BAT) maintains animal body temperature by non-shivering thermogenesis, which is through uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1) that uncouples oxidative phosphorylation and utilizes β-oxidation of fatty acids released from triacylglycerol (TAG) in lipid droplets (LDs). Increasing BAT activity and “browning” other tissues such as white adipose tissue (WAT) can enhance the expenditure of excess stored energy, and in turn reduce prevalence of metabolic diseases. Although many studies have characterized the biology of BAT and brown adipocytes, BAT LDs especially their activation induced by cold exposure remain to be explored. We have isolated LDs from mouse interscapular BAT and characterized the full proteome using mass spectrometry. Both morphological and biochemical experiments showed that the LDs could tightly associate with mitochondria. Under cold treatment mouse BAT started expressing LD structure protein PLIN-2/ADRP and increased expression of PLIN1. Both hormone sensitive lipase (HSL) and adipose TAG lipase (ATGL) were increased in LDs. In addition, isolated BAT LDs showed increased levels of the mitochondrial protein UCP1, and prolonged cold exposure could stimulate BAT mitochondrial cristae biogenesis. These changes were in agreement with the data from transcriptional analysis. Our results provide the BAT LD proteome for the first time and show that BAT LDs facilitate heat production by coupling increasing TAG hydrolysis through recruitment of ATGL and HSL to the organelle and expression of another LD resident protein PLIN2/ADRP, as well as by tightly associating with activated mitochondria. These findings will benefit the study of BAT activation and the interaction between LDs and mitochondria

Impact of magnetite nanoparticle incorporation on optical and electrical properties of nanocomposite LbL assemblies.

Optical and electrical properties of polyelectrolyte/iron oxide nanocomposite planar films on silicon substrates were investigated for different amount of iron oxide nanoparticles incorporated in the films. The nanocomposite assemblies prepared by the layer-by-layer assembly technique were characterized by ellipsometry, atomic force microscopy, and secondary ion mass-spectrometry. Absorption spectra of the films reveal a shift of the optical absorption edge to higher energy when the number of deposited layers decreases. Capacitance-voltage and current-voltage measurements were applied to study the electrical properties of metal-oxide-semiconductor structures prepared by thermal evaporation of gold electrodes on nanocomposite films. The capacitance-voltage measurements show that the dielectric constant of the film increases with the number of deposited layers and the fixed charge and the trapped charge densities have a negative sign

Impact of magnetite nanoparticle incorporation on optical and electrical properties of nanocomposite LbL assemblies.

Optical and electrical properties of polyelectrolyte/iron oxide nanocomposite planar films on silicon substrates were investigated for different amount of iron oxide nanoparticles incorporated in the films. The nanocomposite assemblies prepared by the layer-by-layer assembly technique were characterized by ellipsometry, atomic force microscopy, and secondary ion mass-spectrometry. Absorption spectra of the films reveal a shift of the optical absorption edge to higher energy when the number of deposited layers decreases. Capacitance-voltage and current-voltage measurements were applied to study the electrical properties of metal-oxide-semiconductor structures prepared by thermal evaporation of gold electrodes on nanocomposite films. The capacitance-voltage measurements show that the dielectric constant of the film increases with the number of deposited layers and the fixed charge and the trapped charge densities have a negative sign