A Multicenter, Open-label, Clinical Trial to Assess the Effectiveness and Safety of Allogeneic Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation Using Reduced-intensity Conditioning in Relapsed/refractory Anaplastic Large-cell Lymphoma in Children

No standard treatment for relapsed or refractory anaplastic large-cell lymphoma (ALCL) has been established. This study is a multicenter, open-label trial to examine the effectiveness and safety of transplantation with reduced-intensity conditioning (RIC) for patients under 20 years old with relapsed or refractory ALCL. We defined RIC as the administration of fludarabine (30 mg/m2/day) for five days plus melphalan (70 mg/m2/day) for two days and total body irradiation at 4 Gy, followed by allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation

Computed tomographic arteriography in the diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma.

Computed tomographic arteriography (CTA) was performed in 30 patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Detection of HCC by CTA was compared with that of conventional celiac or hepatic arteriography. CT scanning was performed immediately, 30 seconds and 1 min after an injection of 5 to 10 ml of contrast medium into the common or proper hepatic artery. Repeated infusions allowed whole liver sections to be visualized. HCC was localized in 28 of the 30 patients by conventional arteriography, with CTA detecting the masses in 27 of the 28 patients. CTA imaging presented the tumor mass in 1 of the 2 patients missed by arteriography. Conventional arteriography delineated the boundaries of HCC in 15 (50%) of the 30 patients. CTA clearly delineated the masses in 26 (87%) of the 30 patients including 11 patients in which the tumor borders were obscure by conventional arteriography. HCC lesions smaller than 1 cm in diameter were detected only by CTA in 6 (20%) of the patients. It was concluded that CTA is both useful and necessary in the demarcation of small HCC masses.</p

Associations between the orexin (hypocretin) receptor 2 gene polymorphism Val308Ile and nicotine dependence in genome-wide and subsequent association studies

Impact of the HCRTR2 gene risk variant on schizotypal personality traits (mean ± SD). (DOC 54 kb

A novel single-stranded DNA-specific 3′–5′ exonuclease, Thermus thermophilus exonuclease I, is involved in several DNA repair pathways

Single-stranded DNA (ssDNA)-specific exonucleases (ssExos) are expected to be involved in a variety of DNA repair pathways corresponding to their cleavage polarities; however, the relationship between the cleavage polarity and the respective DNA repair pathways is only partially understood. To understand the cellular function of ssExos in DNA repair better, genes encoding ssExos were disrupted in Thermus thermophilus HB8 that seems to have only a single set of 5′–3′ and 3′–5′ ssExos unlike other model organisms. Disruption of the tthb178 gene, which was expected to encode a 3′–5′ ssExo, resulted in significant increase in the sensitivity to H2O2 and frequency of the spontaneous mutation rate, but scarcely affected the sensitivity to ultraviolet (UV) irradiation. In contrast, disruption of the recJ gene, which encodes a 5′–3′ ssExo, showed little effect on the sensitivity to H2O2, but caused increased sensitivity to UV irradiation. In vitro characterization revealed that TTHB178 possessed 3′–5′ ssExo activity that degraded ssDNAs containing deaminated and methylated bases, but not those containing oxidized bases or abasic sites. Consequently, we concluded that TTHB178 is a novel 3′–5′ ssExo that functions in various DNA repair systems in cooperation with or independently of RecJ. We named TTHB178 as T. thermophilus exonuclease I