Ki-67 expression predicts locoregional recurrence in stage I oral tongue carcinoma

Oral tongue squamous cell carcinoma (OTSCC) is an aggressive cancer associated with poor prognosis. Methods for determining the aggressiveness of OTSCC from analysis of the primary tumour specimen are thus highly desirable. We investigated whether genomic instability and proliferative activity (by means of Ki-67 activity) could be of clinical use for prediction of locoregional recurrence in 76 pretreatment OTSCC paraffin samples (stage I, n=22; stage II, n=33; stage III, n=8; stage IV, n=13). Eleven surgical tumour specimens were also analysed for remnants of proliferative activity after preoperative radiotherapy. Ninety-seven percent of cases (n=72) were characterised as being aneuploid as measured by means of image cytometry. Preoperative radiotherapy (50–68 Gy) resulted in significant reduction of proliferative activity in all patients for which post-treatment biopsies were available (P-value=0.001). Proliferative activity was not associated with response to radiation in stage II patients. However, we report a significant correlation between high proliferation rates and locoregional recurrences in stage I OTSCC patients (P-value=0.028). High-proliferative activity is thus related to an elevated risk of recurrence after surgery alone. We therefore conclude that Ki-67 expression level is a potentially useful clinical marker for predicting recurrence in surgically treated stage I OTSCC

LUMIO: achieving autonomous operations for Lunar exploration with a CubeSat

The Lunar Meteoroid Impacts Observer (LUMIO) is one of the four projects selected within ESA’s SysNova competition to develop a small satellite for scientific and technology demonstration purposes to be deployed by a mother ship around the Moon. The mission utilizes a 12U form-factor CubeSat which carries the LUMIO-Cam, an optical instrument capable of detecting light flashes in the visible spectrum to continuously monitor and process the meteoroids impacts. In this paper, we will describe the mission concept and focus on the performance of a novel navigation concept using Moon images taken as byproduct of the LUMIO-Cam operations. This new approach will considerably limit the operations burden on ground, aiming at autonomous orbit-attitude navigation and control. Furthermore, an efficient and autonomous strategy for collection, processing, categorization, and storage of payload data is also described to cope with the limited contact time and downlink bandwidth. Since all communications have to go via a Lunar Orbiter (mothership), all commands and telemetry/data will have to be forwarded to/from the mother ship. This will prevent quasi-real time operations and will be the first time for CubeSats as they have never flown so far from Earth

Discovery of gymnodimine fatty acid ester metabolites in shellfish using liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry

Gymnodimines (GYMs) are fast-acting toxins that belong to the cyclic imine group, a subclass of lipophilic marine toxins. GYMs are considered to be emerging toxins but have not yet been linked to incidents of human poisoning, Limited knowledge on the metabolism of GYMs means that a proper risk assessment has not been possible and caution must be taken when establishing the relevance of GYMs in terms of food safety of marine products.Peer reviewed: YesNRC publication: Ye

Insights from an international stakeholder consultation to identify informational needs related to seafood safety

Food safety assessment and communication have a strong importance in reducing human health risks related to food consumption. The research carried out within the ECsafeSEAFOOD project aims to assess seafood safety issues, mainly related to non-regulated priority environmental contaminants, and to evaluate their impact on public health. In order to make the research results accessible and exploitable, and to respond to actual stakeholders' demands, a consultation with international stakeholders was performed by means of a survey. The focus was on policy and decision makers, food producers and processors, and agencies (i.e. EU and National or Regional agencies related to Food Safety or Public Health) and consumer organisations. The survey considered questions related to: seafood safety assessment and mitigation strategies, availability of data, such as the level of information on different contaminants, and communication among different stakeholder groups. Furthermore, stakeholders were asked to give their opinion on how they believe consumers perceive risks associated with environmental contaminants. The survey was distributed to 531 key stakeholders and 91 responses were received from stakeholders from 30 EU and non-EU countries. The main results show that communication between different groups of stakeholders needs to be improved and that there is a deficit of information and data in the field of seafood safety. This pertains mainly to the transfer of contaminants between the environment and seafood, and to the diversity of environmental contaminants such as plastic additives, algal toxins and hormones. On-line tools were perceived to be the most useful communication channel