Nonprofit Business Plan Development: From Vision, Mission and Values to Implementation

Describes steps for nonprofit planning, with sections that cover organizational assessment, vision and mission statements, goal-setting, and plan implementation

Novel Betaherpesvirus in Bats

Because bats are associated with emerging zoonoses, identification and characterization of novel viruses from bats is needed. Using a modified rapid determination system for viral RNA/DNA sequences, we identified a novel bat betaherpesvirus 2 not detected by herpesvirus consensus PCR. This modified system is useful for detecting unknown viruses

Evaluation of Surface CD56 Expression

Surface CD56 is the most important cell marker for defining NK cells. However, the relationship between the expression of surface CD56 and NK cell activity has not yet been elucidated in detail. Thirteen healthy volunteers were enrolled in the present study. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were stimulated with rIL-2 or rIL-12 (1, 10, 100 U/mL) for 18 h at 37 ℃. After incubation, surface CD56 expression on NK cells was evaluated using a flow cytometric analysis. A colorimetric-based lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) assay was used for experiments on cytotoxicity. IFN-γmRNA gene expression was quantified by real-time PCR. The expression level of surface CD56 on NK cells, cytotoxicity, and IFN-γmRNA gene expression were significantly increased by the rIL-2 and rIL-12 stimulations. In addition, a positive correlation was found between surface CD56 expression and cytotoxic activity or IFN-γmRNA gene expression. We revealed that the quantification of surface CD56 expression was applicable to the evaluation of cytotoxicity and IFN-γproduction in activated NK cells. These results suggest that the measurement of surface CD56 expression represent an easy and rapidly reproducible technique to evaluate the activated state of NK cells and monitor NK cell activity in immunotherapy

Long-term efficacy of bevacizumab and irinotecan in recurrent pediatric glioblastoma.

A 5-year-old boy with glioblastoma relapsed soon after postoperative irradiation in combination with temozolomide. Second-line chemotherapy was also ineffective; therefore, the bevacizumab and irinotecan were given after a third gross-total resection of the tumor. Treatment was interrupted for 1 month due to development of posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome, but was re-initiated at a lower dose of bevacizumab with prolonged intervals between treatments. The patient was alive and disease free 2 years after initial diagnosis. Bevacizumab and irinotecan are a promising regimen for pediatric cases of recurrent glioblastoma after gross-total resection, although the optimal treatment schedule must be determined on a patient-by-patient basis

Rituximab-combination chemotherapy achieves a 10th cycle of remission for Burkitt's lymphoma.

A 14-year-old girl with multiple intra-abdominal tumors was diagnosed with stage III Burkitt's lymphoma. She achieved complete remission after multi-drug chemotherapy, but she relapsed after six courses. Autologous peripheral blood stem cells (PBSC) or allogeneic PBSC harvested from an HLA-identical sibling were insufficient, and her family did not agree to bone marrow collection from the sibling. Although the patient relapsed nine times (the relapses involved intra-abdominal organs or bone) during the following 4 years 7 months, treatment with rituximab monotherapy or in combination with ifosphamide, carboplastin, and etoposide, or local irradiation (33.8-40.0 Gy) to treat the bone metastases, proved effective, resulting in complete or partial remission. At the time of writing, the patient was in a 10th cycle of remission lasting 1 year 6 months and had not required transplantation. Thus, a chemotherapy regimen including rituximab might be effective for Burkitt's lymphoma in patients experiencing multiple relapse

The Oxidative Esterification of Propionaldehyde to Methyl Propionate in the Liquid-Phase Using a Heterogeneous Palladium Catalyst

The optimization of the oxidative esterification of propionaldehyde to methyl propionate using a supported palladium catalyst in methanol under heavy-metal-free and pressurized-oxygen conditions, which we recently reported in a previous paper, were carried out together with a study of the reaction route, the nature of the catalytic active sites, and the effect of the support. In our previous paper, we reported significantly improved activity for oxidative esterification using commercially available 5%Pd/Al2O3 at 1.5 MPa of O2 gas and 333 K and emphasized that the doping of 5%Pd/Al2O3 with lead was not needed for the reaction system, but we could not improve the activity that was reported when using 5%Pd/γ-Al2O3 doped with 5% Pb (a 93.2% conversion of propionaldehyde, 76.8% selectivity for methyl propionate and a 71.6% yield of methyl propionate) at 0.3 MPa of O2 gas and 353 K, as reported by another laboratory. In the present study, however, we exceeded those values and obtained a 98.3% conversion of propionaldehyde, 75.3% selectivity for methyl propionate and a 74.0% yield of methyl propionate using 5%Pd/γ-Al2O3 undoped with Pb at 1.5 MPa of O2 gas and 333 K. It should be noted that, in the preparation of the present 5%Pd/γ-Al2O3, Pd was doped onto Al2O3 that had been previously treated with aqueous NaOH. Another active alumina support,η-Al2O3, prepared from boehmite, afforded activity that was substantially lower than that of γ-Al2O3 and depended on the calcination temperature of boehmite to η-Al2O3. When using various concentrations of CH3OH in the aqueous reaction solution, the oxidative esterification proceeded through the formation of propionic acid. To determine why the Al2O3 support afforded better activity than the active carbon support, Pd/Al2O3 and Pd/C catalysts were examined by XAFS (X-ray absorption fine structure). XAFS revealed that Pd on Al2O3 shows a better redox nature than Pd on C, which resulted in activity on Pd/Al2O3 that was better than that on Pd/C