F-18 FP-CIT PET in Multiple System Atrophy of the Cerebellar Type: Additional Role in Treatment

We evaluated the difference in the status of dopamine transporters (DATs) depending on Parkinsonism, cerebellar, and autonomic features using F-18 FP-CIT positron emission tomography (PET) in multiple system atrophy with cerebellar ataxia (MSA-C). We also assessed whether the DAT PET could be useful in the management of MSA-C. Forty-nine patients who were clinically diagnosed as possible to probable MSA-C were included. Based on the F-18 FP-CIT PET results, patients were classified into normal (n=25) and abnormal (n=24) scan groups. There were statistically significant differences in rigidity, bradykinesia, postural instability, asymmetry, and specific uptake ratio (SUR) between the two groups but no significant differences in tremor and cerebellar/autonomic symptoms. Dopaminergic medications were administered to 22 patients. All seven patients with normal scans showed no change, while 10 of the 15 patients with abnormal scans showed clinical improvement. There was a trend of a negative correlation between levodopa equivalent dose and SUR, but it was not statistically significant. DAT imaging, such as F-18 FP-CIT PET, may be useful in predicting the response to dopaminergic medication regardless of cerebellar/autonomic symptoms in MSA-C. In addition to being used for the diagnosis of the disease, it may be used as a treatment decision index

Value of Paraspinal Electromyography in the Evaluation of Thoracic Myelopathy

The authors have performed paraspinal needle EMG studies in twenty five patients with thoracic myelopathy. They were divided into demonstrable thoracic lesions and non-demonstrable thoracic lesions by neuroimaging studies resulting in 12 cases of the former and 13 cases of the latter. There were abnormal paraspinal EMG findings in 83% with demonstrable thoracic lesions. All five patients with thoracic disc diseases revealed abnormalities which indicated subsequent involvement of ventral roots by compressive lesions. In non-demonstrable thoracic lesions, the authors could demonstrate abnormal paraspinal EMGs in a relatively high percentage (62.5%) of preseumed and still occult thoracc myelopathy, but not in all four patients with demyelinating disease. Therefore it is concluded that paraspinal EMG studies are valuable in those patients wih thoracic myelopathy as a method of predicting he presumed nature of their causes and indicating the level of anticipated myelography or spinal CT. However, it was impossible to differentiate among patients with malignancy, those with thoracic disc diseases and those with unknown thoracic myelopathy by the paraspinal EMG studies

Numerical Study on Influences of Barrier Arrangements on Dielectric Barrier Discharge Characteristics

A numerical study has been carried out to understand the influences of barrier arrangements on the discharge characteristics of dielectric barrier discharge (DBD). A 1.5-dimensional modeling is considered in the arrangements of bare, single-barrier, and double-barrier electrodes while a 2-dimensional approach is employed in a configuration of ferroelectric packed discharge (FPD). Numerical simulations show that the evolution of microdischarges in DBD occurs sequentially in the three distinctive phases of avalanche, streamer, and decay, and that the dielectric barriers make streamer discharges stabilized and sustained in lowered electric fields without transition to spark compared with no barrier case. Especially, the highly non-uniform strong electric field effect created by the pellets appears to be formed in FPD, which enables the flue gas cleaning to be expected to enhance the decomposition efficiency

Expression of Osteocalcin and Transglutaminase and Labelling of Bromodeoxyuridine during Fracture Healing in the Rat Tibia

The expression of osteocalcin and transglutaminase C(TGase C) during fracture healing was inwstigated with immunohistochemical studies. A transverse osteotomy was made at the proximal tibia in Sprague-Dawley male rats and immobilized with a small external skeletal fixator. The animals lU!l'e sacrificed serially I, 3, 5, 7, 14, 42 days respectively after fracture. Longitudinal sections of the healing bone were stained with pohclonal antibody against osteocalcin and TGase C, and monoclonal antibody against bromodeoxyuridine. During the intramembranous bone formation at the periosteum around the fracture site, osteocalcin was strongly expressed in the proliferating osteoprogenitor cells from the 1st day of fracture, and then, in osteoblasts, osteoid matrix and osteocytes. The expression of TGase C was weakly positive in both osteoprogenitor cells and osteoblasts. Ai the site of endochondral bone formation, which was first reoealed 5 days after fracture, cell proliferation occurred at the periphery of cartilaginous callus where the number of cells stained with BrdU was highest During the maturation of callus, those cells uere entrapped in the chondroid matrix and became larger and larger. Osteocalcin was demonstrated in the cytoplasm of chondrocytes, while chondroid matrix was negatiwly stained. TGase C was found in the cytoplasm of more centrally located and matured chondrocytes as compared with osteocalcin. Osteoid matrix was stained with osteocalcin but not with TGase C. These finding may suggest that osteocalcin participates in the early phase of endochondral bone formation, while TGase C participates in the late phase, suggesting the role of TGase C in matrix stabilization. But the reason for the difference in the expression of TGase C between the endochondral bone formation and intramembranous bone formation should be further inwstigated. Healing of IAA2Il immobilized fracture in this study was predominantly induced by intramembranous ossification rather than endochondral ossification. Periosteal osteoprogenitor cells appeared to initiate and to lead bone formation after osteotomy. These findings indicate that preservation of the periosteum is essential to achieve successful fracture healing

5-lipoxygenase mediates docosahexaenoyl ethanolamide and N-arachidonoyl-L-alanine-induced reactive oxygen species production and inhibition of proliferation of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma cells

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.Abstract Background Endocannabinoids have recently drawn attention as promising anti-cancer agents. We previously observed that anandamide (AEA), one of the representative endocannabinoids, effectively inhibited the proliferation of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) cell lines in a receptor-independent manner. In this study, using HNSCC cell lines, we examined the anti-cancer effects and the mechanisms of action of docosahexaenoyl ethanolamide (DHEA) and N-arachidonoyl-L-alanine (NALA), which are polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA)-based ethanolamides like AEA. Methods and Results DHEA and NALA were found to effectively inhibit HNSCC cell proliferation. These anti-proliferative effects seemed to be mediated in a cannabinoid receptor-independent manner, since the antagonist of cannabinoid receptor-1 (CB1) and vanilloid receptor-1 (VR1), two endocannabinoid receptors, did not reverse the ability of DHEA and NALA to induce cell death. Instead, we observed an increase in reactive oxygen species (ROS) production and a decrease of phosphorylated Akt as a result of DHEA and NALA treatment. Antioxidants efficiently reversed the inhibition of cell proliferation and the decrease of phosphorylated Akt induced by DHEA and NALA; inhibition of 5-lipoxygenase (5-LO), which is expected to be involved in DHEA- and NALA-degradation pathway, also partially blocked the ability of DHEA and NALA to inhibit cell proliferation and phosphorylated Akt. Interestingly, ROS production as a result of DHEA and NALA treatment was decreased by inhibition of 5-LO. Conclusions From these findings, we suggest that ROS production induced by the 5-LO pathway mediates the anti-cancer effects of DHEA and NALA on HNSCC cells. Finally, our findings suggest the possibility of a new cancer-specific therapeutic strategy, which utilizes 5-LO activity rather than inhibiting it

Somatic Mutations from Whole Exome Sequencing Analysis of the Patients with Biliary Tract Cancer

Biliary tract cancer (BTC) is a rare cancer and is associated with a poor prognosis. To understand the genetic characteristics of BTC, we analyzed whole-exome sequencing data and identified somatic mutations in patients with BTC. Tumors and matched blood or normal samples were obtained from seven patients with cholangiocarcinoma who underwent surgical resection. We discovered inactivating mutations of tumor suppressor genes, including APC, TP53, and ARID1A, in three patients. Activating mutations of KRAS and NRAS were also identified. Our analyses identified somatic mutations in Korean patients with BTC

Evaluation of tropospheric ozone reanalyses with independent ozonesonde observations in East Asia

The modern reanalysis datasets provide not only meteorological variables, but also atmospheric chemical compositions such as tropospheric ozone and aerosol concentration. However, the quality of chemical compositions has been rarely assessed especially over East Asia. To better understand the characteristics of reanalysis datasets on regional scale, the present study evaluates tropospheric ozone derived from seven reanalyses against five independent ozonesonde observations in East Asia. The reanalysis datasets are the ECMWF Reanalysis 5th (ERA5), Monitoring Atmospheric Composition and Climate reanalysis (MACCRA), Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service reanalysis (CAMSRA), as well as the NCEP Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (CFSR), NASA Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications version 2 (MERRA2), Japanese 55-year Reanalysis (JRA-55), and updated Tropospheric Chemistry Reanalysis (TCR-2). It turns out that MACCRA, CAMSRA, and TCR-2, which incorporate chemical transport model, depict most reasonable spatio-temporal variability of tropospheric ozone in East Asia. The MACC exhibits a better quality with relatively small mean biases of 6.4 +/- 1.3% in tropospheric column ozone than biases of 7.8 +/- 2.7% and 7.8 +/- 2.8% for CAMSRA and TCR-2. The CAMSRA further shows a significant monthly correlation with the observation of up to 0.7 at 850 hPa. Among the seven reanalyses, MACC, CAMSRA, and TCR-2 are suitable for local tropospheric ozone study on seasonal to inter-annual time scales. However, none of the seven reanalysis datasets reproduce the observed trend of tropospheric ozone. This result suggests that even the latest datasets are inadequate for the long-term ozone change study

Purification of Sulfhydryl Oxidase from Human Foreskin Tissue and Immunohistochemical Localization

Human sulfhydryl oxidase, catalyzing the conversion of either free or bound thiol to disulfide compound, was isolated from human skin tissue to apparent homogeneity through multiple steps of ammonium sulfate salting-out, DEAE-cellulose chromatography, CM-cellulose chromatography and ACA54 gel filtration. The enzyme was shown to have a molecular weight of 65 kDa and a specific activity of 8.39 x 103 Ufmg protein. The specific polyclonal antibody was raised, with which the tissue distribution of the enzyme was studied immunohistochemically. The enzyme is present ubiquitously in most human tissues. However, the granular layer of the epidermis, stromal tissues of the breast and uterine cervix, hepatocytes and islets of the pancreas are noted to contain a comparatively high amount of the enzyme