Interleukin-8 in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid of patients with diffuse panbronchiolitis or idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

This study was designed to clarify the contribution of IL-8 as a specific neutrophil chemotactic factor in the human respiratory tract in various pulmonary diseases. The neutrophil chemotactic activity(NCA), neutrophil counts and IL-8 concentration in the bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) obtained from normal volunteers (NV), control patients (CP), patients with diffuse panbronchiolitis (DPB) and patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) were examined. Neutrophil counts, NCA and IL-8 concentration in BALF obtained from patients with DPB or IPF was significantly higher than that from NV or CP. The IL-8 concentration correlated with neutrophil count and also correlated with NCA in BALF from patients with IPF, whereas there was no correlation between these factors in BALF from DPB. These results suggest that the contribution of IL-8 to neutrophil accumulation of the lower respiratory tract is different between IPF and DPB

Autoantibodies to IL-1α in sera from rapidly progressive idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

To clarify the clinical significance of autoantibodies to interleukin-1α (IL-1α autoantibodies) in rapidly progressive idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis ( IPF ), we measured the level of IL-1α autoantibodies in serum of 11 patients on the first hospital day, when patients were admitted due to severe symptoms, and on the 21st hospital day. IL-1α autoantibodies in serum were measured using radioimmunoassay, and the limitation of this assay for IL-1α autoantibodies was 5 ng/ml. These antibodies were detected in 5 of 11 patients on the first hospital day. On the 21st hospital day, these antibodies were detected in all patients, and its level was increased compared with that on the first hospital day. IL-1α autoantibodies that appeared in patients corresponded to that of IgG. The half life of exogeneous autoantibodies was investigated following administration of autoantibody rich plasma obtained from healthy blood donors to 6 control patients (CP) and 6 progressive IPF patients. These autoantibody levels in their serum were less than 5 ng/ml before administration. Serum was obtained at the indicated time after administration of IL-1α autoantibodies and the level of these autoantibodies in serum was measured, then the half life was calculated. Half life of exogeneous IL-1α autoantibodies in progressive IPF patients was significantly shorter than that in CP (71.3±31.8 hr vs 352.0±98.3 hr, p<0.01).These findings suggested that IL-1α autoantibodies were generated in response to the inflammatory process of rapidly progressive IPF and may act as a regulatory factor for IL-1α

Investigation of the outpatient chemotherapy for lung cancer patients in Tokushima University Hospital

Platinum-doublet regimens and docetaxel as first- and second-line chemotherapy, respectively, are shown to prolong the survival of lung cancer patients in various randomized phase III studies. However, the evidence for the efficacy of chemotherapy for lung cancer in the clinical practice is still insufficient. In the present study, we investigated the effectiveness and safety of outpatient chemotherapy for lung cancer in the clinical practice. Ninety-four lung cancer cases were retrospectively analyzed. Among these cases, 67 (71.3%) were non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and 27 (28.7%) were small cell lung cancer (SCLC). The response rates in SCLC and NSCLC patients were 55.6% (15/27) and 16.9% (11/65), respectively. Objective tumor response rates for the patients were found to decrease substantially with each line of treatment as described previously. All adverse events were well tolerated and no treatment-related death was observed. Median time to treatment failures (TTFs) of first-line treatment were 10.1 months and 4.8 months in SCLC and NSCLC, respectively. These findings indicate that even in the setting of clinical practice, the efficacy and safety of chemotherapy is strictly insured by the appropriate therapeutic management

Epidemiological and clinical features of lung cancer patients from 1999 to 2009 in Tokushima Prefecture of Japan

Lung cancer is the leading cause of malignancy-related death worldwide. In the present study, we reviewed the epidemiologic and clinical features of lung cancer in Tokushima Prefecture, Japan. Between January 1999 and December 2009, 2,183 patients with lung cancer were enrolled in this study. One thousand five hundred ninety-one (73%) patients were male and 592 (27%) patients were female. Median age was 70 years, with a range of 15-93 years. Seventy-six percent of patients had smoking history. One thousand nine hundred five (87%) patients were non-small cell lung cancer and the predominant histological type was adenocarcinoma (51%). Among all 2,183 patients, 702 (32%) belonged to elderly population. Four hundred seventy-one (22%), 213 (10%), 24 (1%), 116 (5%), 238 (11%), 370 (17%) and 678 (31%) patients had stage IA, IB, IIA, IIB, IIIA, IIIB and IV lung cancer, respectively. In Tokushima University Hospital, 516 (29%), 191 (11%), 58 (3%), 755 (43%) and 216 (12%) patients were initially treated with chemotherapy, chemo-radiotherapy, thoracic radiotherapy, operation and best supportive care, respectively. The median time to progression (TTP) and the median survival time (MST) of patients treated with chemotherapy and chemo-radiotherapy were 3.5 months, 13.0 months and 7.0 months, 18.0 months, respectively. The median TTP and the MST of 33 elderly patients treated with chemotherapy were 3.3 months and 18.0 months, respectively, which were comparable with those of total population. These results indicated the benefit of chemotherapy in elderly patients with advanced lung cancer by proper selection

Accurate meso-scale dynamics by kinetic Monte Carlo simulation via free energy multicanonical sampling: oxygen vacancy diffusion in BaTiO3

A conceptually accurate method to connect the free energy multicanonical sampling to meso-scale kinetic Monte Carlo (kMC) dynamics is proposed. The required input parameters for kMC simulation are the attempt frequency and activation energy for each event, and the free energy multicanonical sampling enables to obtain the kinetic parameters as a function of temperature, which is the most significant difference from a conventional kMC approach that is based on fixed attempt frequency and activation energy. The present approach is applied to oxygen diffusion in single crystal BaTiO3 including Zn dopant (160 ppm) where an anomaly in the oxygen diffusion is experimentally confirmed; the oxygen diffusion coefficient is slightly dropped at around 1080 K. We carried out 1 μs kMC dynamics in the temperature range of 1020 to 1120 K, and obtained a diffusion anomaly at around 1060 K, which is not obtained in conventional kMC calculations. In addition, the calculated diffusion coefficients using the present approach are in the same order as those of experimental ones, whereas the calculated diffusion coefficients using the conventional method are larger than those of experiment by one order of magnitude at least. The results indicate the advantages of the present approach in comparison with the conventional ones because any assumption and fixation of kinetic parameters are not required in the dynamics simulation

The Influence of Gender, Athletic Events, and Athletic Experience on the Subjective Dominant Hand and the Determination of the Dominant Hand Based on the Laterality Quotient (LQ) and the Validity of the LQ

金沢大学人間社会研究域人間科学系This study aimed to reveal the influence of gender, athletic events and athletic experience on the subjective dominant hand and the dominant hand based on the laterally quotient (LQ). It also aimed to examine the validity of the Edinburgh Inventory (Oldfield, 1971). Males and females (n=3,726) living in 7 prefectures in Japan (age: 16-45yrs) participated in this survey. Analysis was performed on 3,557 separate datasets with high reliability. The reliability of the survey was examined using a test-retest method consisting of 100 people selected randomly from all participants. All participants provided the same answers for each question. The influence of gender, event and experience was examined for the subjective and LQ-based dominant hands. In addition, concordance rates of the subjective dominant hand and the LQ-based dominant hand and both dominant hands were examined. Differences of concordance rates between hands used in the 10 movement questions of the Inventory and the subjective dominant hand were tested using the χ^2 test. The frequency differences among items were tested using Ryan\u27s method (multiple comparisons). Significant gender differences were found between rates of the LQ-based dominant hand (males: 94.4%; females: 96.6%) and the subjective dominant hand (males: 91.6%; females: 94.0%), but the degree was only 2.0-4.0%. Insignificant differences were found among athletic events, two groups of different athletic experience, and gender according to each athletic event. The subjective dominant hand almost always agreed with the LQ-based dominant hand (complete concordance rate=0.96, k=0.67). Of the 10 question items, inexperienced answers were found only in the item "Knife (without fork)". The "Toothbrush", "Broom (upper hand)", and "Opening box (lid)" items had significantly lower correspondence with the subjective dominant hand (79.7-87.0%) than the other items (92.1-95.7%). In conclusion, athletic experience appears to have little influence on handedness, although there is a slight gender difference. The subjective dominant hand almost always agrees with the dominant hand based on the Inventory. A more efficient handedness inventory may be constructed by excluding the above 4 items

容器、ラップ、ビニール袋および ペットボトルから蒸留水へのビスフェノールＡの溶出

電子レンジを使用した際、プラスチック製容器からそれに含まれるビスフェノール A（BPA）の蒸留水への溶出量について検討した。ポリプロピレン製やポリスチレン製容器は使用回数が多くなるほど、BPA の蒸留水中への溶出量は少なくなる傾向がみられた。しかし、ポリエチレン製、ポリエチレン・エチレンビニルアルコール共重合体製の食品容器、ビニルバック、ラップおよびポリエチレンテレフタレート製のペットボトル等は電子レンジへの使用回数の多い方が、蒸留水への BPAの溶出量が多い傾向がみとめられた。また、1分間の処理において加熱時のワット数を変化させても、ポリプロピレン製やポリスチレン製の容器では BPA の溶出量にほとんど変化がみとめられなかった。ポリエチレンテレフタレート製ペットボトルから蒸留水中へ溶出した BPA の濃度と、耐容一日摂取量から算出した蒸留水中の BPA の許容濃度を比較した。蒸留水中の BPA の濃度は許容濃度に比べてかなり低かった。また、容器の材質に含まれている BPA の濃度が高いほど、蒸留水への溶出量も多いことがわかった。We examined the amount of BPA eluted from different plastics into distilled water when using a　microwave oven. For polypropylene and polystyrene products, the amount of BPA eluted into the water tended to decrease as the number of uses increased. However, it was found that polyethylene, polyethylene and ethylene vinyl alcohol copolymer, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) containers, wraps, etc., tended to show higher BPA elution when they were used more frequently in a microwave oven. Furthermore, even if the wattage during heating for 1 min was changed, almost no change was observed in the amount of BPA eluted. For PET bottles, the concentration of BPA eluted into distilled water and the acceptable concentration calculated from the acceptable daily intake were compared. The concentration of BPA in water was considerably lower than the acceptable concentration. It was also found that the higher the concentration of BPA in the material, the greater the elution into distilled water