Erdheim-Chester disease: a rare cause of bilateral renal artery stenosis, mimicking large vessel vasculitis

A man in his 50s with resistant hypertension and history of Langerhans cell histiocytosis (LCH) was referred to rheumatology after suspicion of inflammatory arteritis was raised. This followed detection of bilateral renal artery stenosis during investigation for severe hypertension refractory to medical therapy. CT angiography revealed diffuse wall thickening of the abdominal aorta, in keeping with an aortitis. However, there was no serological or clinical evidence suggestive of a vasculitic process. Medical history included cranial diabetes insipidus, subclavian artery stenosis and spinal stenosis requiring surgery, over the course of 8 years. These findings led to consideration of Erdheim-Chester disease (ECD), a form of non-Langerhans cell histiocytosis, where there is abnormal proliferation of histiocytes which causes tissue fibrosis and sclerosis of the long bones. Subsequent plain radiographs of the long bones revealed appearances consistent with a diagnosis of ECD. Thus, a diagnosis of an LCH/ECD overlap syndrome was made

Hydrostatic pressure study of paramagnetic-ferromagnetic phase transition in (Ga,Mn)As

The effect of hydrostatic pressure on the paramagnetic - ferromagnetic phase transition has been studied in (Ga,Mn)As. The variation of the Curie temperature (TC) with pressure was monitored by two transport methods: (1) - measurement of zero field resistivity versus temperature {\rho}(T), (2) - dependence on temperature of the Hall voltage hysteresis loop. Two specimens of different resistivity characteristics were examined. The measured pressure-induced changes of TC were relatively small (of the order of 1K/GPa) for both samples, however they were opposite for the two.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figure

Human cytomegalovirus-specific cytotoxic T cells. Relative frequency of stage-specific CTL recognizing the 72-kD immediate early protein and glycoprotein B expressed by recombinant vaccinia viruses.

CTL are held to be an important host defense mechanism in persistent herpes-virus infections. We have therefore studied the nature and specificity of human cytomegalovirus (HCMV)-specific CTL in normal persistently infected individuals. This was achieved by using vaccinia recombinants encoding viral genes expressed at different stages of the virus replicative cycle, a structural glycoprotein gB (vac.gB) and the major 72-kD immediate early nonstructural protein (vac.IE) of HCMV, combined with limiting dilution analysis of the CTL response. In two subjects, 43 and 58% of HCMV CTL precursors (CTLp) lysed vac.IE-infected cells, in contrast to less than 6% lysing gB-infected cells. HCMV-specific CTL could also be generated by secondary in vitro stimulation with vac.gB- but not vac.IE-infected autologous fibroblasts. The high frequency of 72-kD IE protein-specific CTL suggests that this is at least a major recognition element for the HCMV-specific CTL response in asymptomatic persistently infected individuals, and CTL with this specificity may be important in maintaining the normal virus/host equilibrium

Coexistence of Anomalous Hall Effect and Weak Net Magnetization in Collinear Antiferromagnet MnTe

Anomalous Hall effect (AHE) plays important role in the rapidly developing field of antiferromagnetic spintronics. It has been recently discussed that it can be a feature of not only uncompensated magnetic systems but also in altermagnetic materials. Hexagonal MnTe belongs to this appealing group of compounds exhibiting AHE and is commonly perceived as magnetically compensated. Here, we demonstrate that bulk form of MnTe exhibits small but detectable magnetic moment correlating with hysteretic behaviour of the AHE. We formulate a phenomenological model which explains how this feature allows to create a disbalance between states with opposite N\'eel vector and prevent the AHE signal from averaging out to zero. Moreover, we show how the dependence of AHE on the N\'eel vector arises on microscopical level and highlight the differences in Berry curvature between magnetically compensated and uncompensated systems

Acute fat igue in chronic fat igue syndrome pat ients

ABSTRACT Background. Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) patients often complain that they are more susceptible to acute mental fatigue. It is important to determine whether this is observed using objective tests of sustained attention and responding

Presentation of CMV immediate-early antigen to cytolytic T lymphocytes is selectively prevented by viral genes expressed in the early phase

The regulation of antigen processing and presentation to MHC class I-restricted cytolytic T lymphocytes was studied in cells infected with murine cytomegalovirus. Recognition by cytolytic T lymphocytes of the phosphoprotein pp89, the immunodominant viral antigen expressed in the immediate-early phase of infection, was selectively prevented during the subsequent expression of viral early genes. The surface expression of MHC class I glycoproteins and their capacity to present externally added pp89-derived antigenic peptides were not affected. Because recognition of several other antigens occurred during the early phase, a general failure in processing and presentation was excluded. Since neither rate of synthesis, amount, stability, nor nuclear transport of pp89 was modified, the failure in recognition indicates a selective interference with pp89 antigen processing and presentation

Acute fatigue in chronic fatigue syndrome

BACKGROUND: Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) patients often complain that they are more susceptible to acute mental fatigue. It is important to determine whether this is observed using objective tests of sustained attention and responding. METHODS: Sixty-seven patients who fulfilled the criteria for CFS proposed by Sharpe et al. (1991) were compared with 126 matched healthy controls. Acute fatigue was assessed by comparing performance at the start and end of a lengthy test session and by examining changes over the course of individual tasks. RESULTS: CFS patients showed impaired performance compared to the controls and these differences increased as the volunteers developed acute fatigue. In addition, differences between the two groups were larger at the end of the test session. CONCLUSIONS: The present results show that CFS patients are more susceptible to acute fatigue than healthy controls. This could reflect motor fatigue or an inability to compensate for fatigue with increased effort. This profile is consistent with previous research on fatigue and suggests that interpretation of certain aspects of CFS may be helped by considering it as the end point of a continuum of fatigue rather than a distinct disease

Significance of herpesvirus immediate early gene expression in cellular immunity to cytomegalovirus infection

Interstitial pneumonia linked with reactivation of latent human cytomegalovirus due to iatrogenic immunosuppression can be a serious complication of bone marrow transplantation therapy of aplastic anaemia and acute leukaemia1. Cellular immunity plays a critical role in the immune surveillance of inapparent cytomegalovirus infections in man and the mouse1−7. The molecular basis of latency, however, and the interaction between latently or recurrently infected cells and the immune system of the host are poorfy understood. We have detected a so far unknown antigen in the mouse model. This antigen is found in infected cells in association with the expression of the herpesvirus 'immediate early' genes and is recognized by cytolytic T lymphocytes (CTL)8. We now demonstrate that an unexpectedly high proportion of the CTL precursors generated in vivo during acute murine cytomegalovirus infection are specific for cells that selectively synthesize immediate early proteins, indicating an immunodominant role of viral non-structural proteins

A new perspective of the structural complexity of HCMV-specific T-cell responses

Background: In studies exploring the effects of HCMV infection on immune system aging (‘immunosenescence’), after organ transplantation or in other settings, HCMV-specific T-cell responses are often assessed with respect to purportedly ‘immunodominant’ protein subunits. However, the response structure in terms of recognized antigens and response hierarchies (architecture) is not well understood and actual correlates of immune protection are not known. Methods: We explored the distribution of T-cell response sizes and dominance hierarchies as well as response breadth in 33 HCMV responders with respect to >200 HCMV proteins. Results: At the individual responder level HCMV-specific T-cell responses were generally arranged in clear dominance hierarchies; interestingly, the number of proteins recognized by an individual correlated closely with the size of their biggest response. Target-specificity varied considerably between donors and across hierarchy levels with the presence, size, and hierarchy position of responses to purportedly ‘immunodominant’ targets being unpredictable. Conclusions: Predicting protective immunity based on isolated HCMV subunit-specific T-cell responses is questionable in light of the complex architecture of the overall response. Our findings have important implications for T-cell monitoring, intervention strategies, as well as the application of animal models to the understanding of human infection

Innate recognition of bacteria in human milk is mediated by a milk-derived highly expressed pattern recognition receptor, soluble CD14.

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