Plethysmographic Studies on Vasomotor Regulation in Stomach, Intestine and Skin.

It has been attempted to clarify regional differentiation of vasomotor control in urethane-chloralose anesthetized cats. For this purpose, vasomotor patterns of gastric, intestinal and cutaneous blood vessels have been investigated by means of a photoelectric plethysmography. Following an intravenous administration of a small dose (5 mg/kg) of pentobarbital, paw volume pulse showed a remarkable, sometimes enormous, increase in amplitude, whereas gastric and intestinal volume pulses were only slightly augmented. Occlusion of bilateral carotid arteries caused a rise of systemic blood pressure. At the same time, volume pulse amplitude was usually decreased in the paw, while in most cases increased in the stomach and intestine. That is, the resistance vessels of the paw was more affected in this homeostatic reflex than those of the gastrointestinal tract. It was also noticed that the baseline of paw plethysmogram was lowered during carotid occlusion irrespective of changes in volume pulse amplitude. The result suggests veno-constriction in the paw. Intravenous gastrin augmented volume pulses in the stomach as well as in the intestine, but reduced in the paw. It was concluded that a positive correlation exists between secretion and blood flow after intravenous gastrin. The results were discussed in terms of their functional significances

Menaquinone (vitamin K2) therapy for bronchial asthma. I. Mechanism of action menaquinone on allergic reactions.

The mechanism of action of the drug was investigated from various points of view. The findings may be summarized as follows: 1. In the experiments of the degranulation of mesenteric mast cells of rats, menaquinone proved to significantly inhibit the degranulation either in active or passive sensitization with the reagin-like antibody. 2. Menaquinone did not inhibit the formation of the reagin-like antibody. 3. In the experiements of the degranulation of basophilic granulocytes from patients of bronchial asthma, the rate of appearance of A form basophilic cells upon addition of the antihuman IgE goat serum was not markedly but significantly inhibited in the patients treated with menaquinone for long periods, as compared with that in the control, whereas the in vitro addition of menaquinone did not exert a significant inhibitory action.</p

Quark condensate in nuclear matter based on Nuclear Schwinger-Dyson formalism

The effects of higher order corrections of ring diagrams for the quark condensate are studied by using the bare vertex Nuclear Schwinger Dyson formalism based on $\sigma$-$\omega$ model. At the high density the quark condensate is reduced by the higher order contribution of ring diagrams more than the mean field theory or the Hartree-Fock

IgE, IgG, and IgG4 antibody titers to fractionated house dust mite antigens in nasal allergy patients.

Using 6 fractions differing in molecular weight of Dermatophagoides pteronyssinus (Dp)-antigen, we measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) the titers of specific IgE, IgG and IgG4 antibodies against Dp antigen in sera of allergic subjects who were sensitive to house dust mite. We intended to evaluate which Dp fraction acts as the major antigenicity for allergic subjects. Results were as follows: 1) In comparison with normal controls, the titer of IgE antibody specific to crude Dp antigen was evaluated, but no significant difference was found among the titers of IgE antibody against each Dp fraction. 2) The titer of IgG antibody against the fraction with a high molecular weight (190 KD, 95 KD) was significantly higher than the titer of the 15 KD fraction in the nasal allergy patients. 3) The 15 KD fraction induced significant elevation of the titer of IgG4 antibody. It suggests that the low molecular weight fraction may act as the major allergenicity of Dp-antigen for inducing both IgE and competitive IgG4 antibodies, although other fractions induce significant IgE responses in patients with nasal allergy.</p

Heterozygous B beta-chain C-terminal 12 amino acid elongation variant, B beta X462W (Kyoto VI), showed dysfibrinogenemia

A heterozygous patient with dysfibrinogenemia with slight bleeding and no thrombotic complications was diagnosed with fibrinogen Kyoto VI (K-VI). To elucidate the genetic mutation(s) and characterize the variant protein, we performed the following experiments and compared with identical and similar variants that have already been reported. The proposita's PCR-amplified DNA was analyzed by sequencing and her purified plasma fibrinogen underwent SDS-PAGE followed by immunoblotting, fibrin polymerization, and scanning electron microscopic observation of fibrin clot and fibers. Sequence analyses showed that K-VI fibrinogen substituted W (TGG) for terminal codon (TAG), resulting in 12 amino acid elongation 462-473 (WSPIRRFLLFCM) in the B beta-chain. Protein analyses indicated that the presence of some albumin-binding variant fibrinogens and a dimeric molecule of variant fibrinogens reduced fibrin polymerization, with a thinner fiber and aberrant fibrin network. These results are almost the same as for the identical variant of Magdeburg, however, different from the similar variant of Osaka VI [ 12 amino acid elongation 462-473 (KSPIRRFLLFCM) in the B beta-chain] in the presence of variant forms and clot structure. We speculate the side-chain difference at 462 residues, W in K-VI, K in Osaka VI, and/or the difference in the presence of disulfide bridged forms of variant fibrinogens, led to the notable difference in the fibrin bundle network. Although a strong evolutional and structural association between B beta-chain and gamma-chain molecules is established, the corresponding recombinant 15 residue elongation variants of the fibrinogen gamma-chain showed reduced assembly and secretion.ArticleBLOOD COAGULATION & FIBRINOLYSIS. 23(1):87-90 (2012)journal articl

A Large Periureteral Lipoma Associated with Renal Lithiasis and Hydronephrosis.

A rare case of large periureteral lipoma in a 66-year-old woman is reported. The tumor measuring 16×7×7cm in size was located from the upper portion of the right ureter to the renal pelvis. It is considered that the severe hydronephrosis and renal lithiasis occurred as a result of stenosis in the upper urinary tract due to compression by the tumor. Although the differential diagnosis was difficult radiologically, the tumor was easily diagnosed as lipoma by hi stop athological investigation

ヨシ Phragmites australis Trin ノ セイチョウカテイ ニ オケル ヨウメンセキ カンイ ソクテイホウ

緑色植物の葉の大きさは光合成による物質生産やその成長を左右する基本的要素の一つであり、生態学の領域において関心の高い要素である。葉面積の測定には自動葉面積計(Murata 1967)を用いるのが一般的であるが、近年は画像解析ソフトを用いたパソコン上での解析方法(石井2007)も提唱されている。また、植物群落の生産構造では、葉の乾燥重量を物質生産の場の大きさとしてとらえる間接的な方法も採られている。いずれの方法においても葉面積の測定には、対象の葉を植物体から切り離して行うのが通例であり、対象の葉は1回限りである。しかし、植物の成長期間中の成長量を調べようとする場合にはフィールドにおいて同一植物体の同一葉を連続的に測定することが必要となり、前述の方法で生かしたまま多数の同一葉を繰返し測定することは困難である。このような問題を解決するため、生育中の実の部分的な計測によって面積を求めることができないかということについて検討した。多くの植物で、同一種の植物の葉は互いに相似形を採っているのがほとんどであり、ヨシやススキ、ササ類などイネ科植物の実は広線形で全線といった単純な形態をしており、その大きさを左右する要素は葉身の長さと幅である。筆者らは、青森県の津軽平野を流れる岩木川下流の河川敷におけるヨシ群落の人為的な撹乱による影響を調べるにあたって、ヨシの成長に伴う葉面積拡大の経緯の追跡や葉面積指数の推定を行う目的で、ヨシの葉の葉長と葉幅から葉面積を求める方法と、葉の乾燥重量から葉面積を得る簡易的な方法を得たので報告する。なお、本研究は岩木川における河川生態学術研究会の総合的な調査研究の一環として実施されたものである

Effect of Visual Information on Active Touch During Mirror Visual Feedback

Several studies have demonstrated that observation of a dummy or mirror-reflected hand being stroked or moving at the same time as the hidden hand evokes a feeling that the dummy hand is one’s own, such as the rubber hand illusion (RHI) and mirror visual feedback (MVF). Under these conditions, participants also report sensing the tactile stimulation applied to the fake hands, suggesting that tactile perception is modulated by visual information during the RHI and MVF. Previous studies have utilized passive stimulation conditions; however, active touch is more common in real-world settings. Therefore, we investigated whether active touch is also modulated by visual information during an MVF scenario. Twenty-three participants (13 men and 10 women; mean age ± SD: 21.6 ± 2.0 years) were required to touch a polyurethane pad with both hands synchronously, and estimate the hardness of the pad while observing the mirror reflection. When participants observed the mirror reflection of the other hand pushing a softer or harder pad, perceived hardness estimates were significantly biased toward softer or harder, respectively, even though the physical hardness of the pad remained constant. Furthermore, perceived hardness exhibited a strong correlation with finger displacement of the mirrored, but not hidden, hand. The modulatory effects on perceived hardness diminished when participants touched the pad with both hands asynchronously or with their eyes closed. Moreover, participants experienced ownership of the mirrored hand when they touched the pad with both hands synchronously but not asynchronously. These results indicate that hardness estimates were modulated by observation of the mirrored hand during synchronous touch conditions. The present study demonstrates that, similar to passive touch, active touch is also modulated by visual input

Building prognostic models for adverse outcomes in a prospective cohort of hospitalised patients with acute leptospirosis infection in the Philippines

Leptospirosis is endemic to the Philippines. Ten per cent of cases will develop severe or fatal disease. Predicting progression to severity is difficult. Risk factors have been suggested, but few attempts have been made to create predictive models to guide clinical decisions. We present two models to predict the risk of mortality and progression to severe disease. Data was used from a prospective cohort study conducted between 2011 and 2013 in San Lazaro Hospital, Manila. Predictive factors were identified from a literature review. A strategy utilizing backwards stepwise-elimination and multivariate fractional polynomials identified key predictive factors. A total of 203 patients met the inclusion criteria. The overall mortality rate was 6.84%. Multivariable logistic regression revealed that neutrophil counts [OR 1.38, 95% CI 1.15–1.67] and platelet counts [OR 0.99, 95% CI 0.97–0.99] were predictive for risk of mortality. Multivariable logistic regression revealed that male sex (OR 3.29, 95% CI 1.22–12.57) and number of days between symptom onset and antibiotic use (OR 1.28, 95% CI 1.08–1.53) were predictive for risk of progression to severe disease. The multivariable prognostic models for the risks of mortality and progression to severe disease developed could be useful in guiding clinical management by the early identification of patients at risk of adverse outcomes

Using spin to understand the formation of LIGO's black holes

With the detection of four candidate binary black hole (BBH) mergers by the Advanced LIGO detectors thus far, it is becoming possible to constrain the properties of the BBH merger population in order to better understand the formation of these systems. Black hole (BH) spin orientations are one of the cleanest discriminators of formation history, with BHs in dynamically formed binaries in dense stellar environments expected to have spins distributed isotropically, in contrast to isolated populations where stellar evolution is expected to induce BH spins preferentially aligned with the orbital angular momentum. In this work we propose a simple, model-agnostic approach to characterizing the spin properties of LIGO's BBH population. Using measurements of the effective spin of the binaries, which is LIGO's best constrained spin parameter, we introduce a simple parameter to quantify the fraction of the population that is isotropically distributed, regardless of the spin magnitude distribution of the population. Once the orientation characteristics of the population have been determined, we show how measurements of effective spin can be used to directly constrain the underlying BH spin magnitude distribution. Although we find that the majority of the current effective spin measurements are too small to be informative, with LIGO's four BBH candidates we find a slight preference for an underlying population with aligned spins over one with isotropic spins (with an odds ratio of 1.1). We argue that it will be possible to distinguish symmetric and anti-symmetric populations at high confidence with tens of additional detections, although mixed populations may take significantly more detections to disentangle. We also derive preliminary spin magnitude distributions for LIGO's black holes, under the assumption of aligned or isotropic populations