Increased IL6 plasma levels in indolent systemic mastocytosis patients are associated with high risk of disease progression

Systemic mastocytosis (SM) is a heterogeneous disease with altered interleukin (IL)-6 and IL13 plasma levels. However, no study has simultaneously investigated the plasma levels of IL1 beta, IL6, IL13, CCL23 and clusterin in SM at diagnosis and correlated them with disease outcome. Here we investigated IL1 beta, IL6, IL13, CCL23 and clusterin plasma levels in 75 SM patients-66 indolent SM (ISM) and 9 aggressive SM-and analyzed their prognostic impact among ISM cases grouped according to the extent of hematopoietic involvement of the bone marrow cells by the KIT D816V mutation. Although increased IL1 beta, IL6 and CCL23 levels were detected in SM patients versus healthy controls, only IL6 and CCL23 levels gradually increased with disease severity. Moreover, increased IL6 plasma levels were associated with ISM progression to more aggressive disease, in particular among ISM patients with multilineal KIT mutation (ISM-ML), these patients also showing a higher frequency of organomegalies, versus other ISM-ML patients. Of note, all ISM patients who progressed had increased IL6 plasma levels already at diagnosis. Our results indicate that SM patients display an altered plasma cytokine profile already at diagnosis, increased IL6 plasma levels emerging as an early marker for disease progression among ISM cases, in particular among high-risk ISM patients who carry multilineage KIT mutation

Electroweak parameters of the z0 resonance and the standard model

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Radiative τ pair production and search for new particles decaying into τ

A study of radiative τ pair production,e + e −→τ+τ−γ ande + e −→τ+τ−γγ, is presented. The observed events agree with QED predictions of order α3 and α4. Excited τ′s have been searched for and lower limits on single and pair production are obtained. For QED-like coupling the τ* mass is limited to values greater than 40 GeV (95% CL). A search for unstable charged scalars (S ±) decaying into τ, e.g. charged Higgs, technipions or the supersymmetric partners of τ′s, yields no evidence for such particles. Assuming a branching fraction ofB(S→τν)=1,S masses up to 18.7 GeV are excluded with 95% CL

Determination of the B lifetime

We have determined the lifetime of B-hadrons produced ine + e − annihilation into multihadronic final states, by measuring the impact parameter of the track with respect to the centre of the interaction region. Two different analyses of the data were performed and gave compatible results. The lifetime is τ B =1.8 −0.4 +0.5±0.4 ps