Pressure-Wire-Guided Percutaneous Transluminal Pulmonary Angioplasty A Breakthrough in Catheter-Interventional Therapy for Chronic Thromboembolic Pulmonary Hypertension

AbstractObjectivesThis study sought to prove the safety and effectiveness of pressure-wire-guided percutaneous transluminal pulmonary angioplasty (PTPA).BackgroundPTPA has been demonstrated to be effective for treatment of chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension. However, a major and occasionally fatal complication after PTPA is reperfusion pulmonary edema. To avoid this, we developed the PEPSI (Pulmonary Edema Predictive Scoring Index). The pressure wire has been used to detect insufficiency of flow in a vessel.MethodsWe included 350 consecutive PTPA sessions in 103 patients with chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension from January 1, 2009 to December 31, 2013. During these 5 years, 140 PTPA sessions were performed without guidance, 65 with guidance of PEPSI alone, and 145 with both PEPSI and pressure-wire guidance. Each PTPA session was finished after achieving PEPSI scores of <35.4 with PEPSI guidance and each target lesion achieving distal mean pulmonary arterial pressure <35 mm Hg with pressure-wire guidance.ResultsThe occurrence of clinically critical reperfusion pulmonary edema and vessel injuries were lowest in the group using the guidance of both pressure wire and PEPSI (0% and 6.9%, respectively). Furthermore, the group guided by pressure wire and PEPSI accomplished the same hemodynamic improvements with fewer numbers of target lesions treated and sessions performed.ConclusionsThe combined approach using pressure wire and PEPSI produced more efficient clinical results and greatly reduced reperfusion pulmonary edema and vessel complications. This is further evidence that PTPA is an alternative strategy for treating chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension

NKX2-1/TITF1/TTF-1-Induced ROR1 Is Required to Sustain EGFR Survival Signaling in Lung Adenocarcinoma

SummaryWe and others previously identified NKX2-1, also known as TITF1 and TTF-1, as a lineage-survival oncogene in lung adenocarcinomas. Here we show that NKX2-1 induces the expression of the receptor tyrosine kinase-like orphan receptor 1 (ROR1), which in turn sustains a favorable balance between prosurvival PI3K-AKT and pro-apoptotic p38 signaling, in part through ROR1 kinase-dependent c-Src activation, as well as kinase activity-independent sustainment of the EGFR-ERBB3 association, ERBB3 phosphorylation, and consequential PI3K activation. Notably, ROR1 knockdown effectively inhibited lung adenocarcinoma cell lines, irrespective of their EGFR status, including those with resistance to the EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor gefitinib. Our findings thus identify ROR1 as an “Achilles' heel” in lung adenocarcinoma, warranting future development of therapeutic strategies for this devastating cancer

RETRACTED: The Chromatin-Remodeling Complex WINAC Targets a Nuclear Receptor to Promoters and Is Impaired in Williams Syndrome

This article has been retracted: please see Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal (http://www.elsevier.com/locate/withdrawalpolicy).This article has been retracted at the request of the Authors.Our paper reported that a chromatin-remodeling complex, WINAC, recruited the unliganded vitamin D receptor to promoters in cooperation with the transcription factor implicated in Williams syndrome, WSTF. The findings provided insights into the coordination between chromatin remodelers and sequence-specific transcription factors and pointed to a role of chromatin remodeling defects in Williams syndrome. We recently identified errors affecting several figure panels where original data were processed inappropriately such that the figure panels do not accurately report the original data. We believe that the most responsible course of action is to retract the paper. We sincerely apologize to the scientific community for any inconvenience that this might cause. The first author, H.K., declined to sign the retraction notice

Catalytic Enantioselective Mannich-Type Reaction via a Chiral Silver Enolate

A catalytic asymmetric Mannich-type reaction of alkenyl trichloroacetates with aldimines was achieved using SEGPHOS·AgOTf as the chiral precatalyst and <i>N</i>,<i>N</i>-diisopropylethylamine as the base precatalyst in the presence of 2,2,2-trifluoroethanol. Optically active β-amino ketones with up to >99% ee were <i>syn</i>-selectively obtained in moderate to high yields via the in situ generated chiral silver enolates

慢性腎不全患者に合併したBellini管腫瘍の1例

We report a hemodialysis patient with an atypical renal neoplasm. The tumor cells were arranged in a two-cell pattern similar to that in the usual excretory duct systems. The histochemical staining pattern with some lectins and monoclonal antibody corresponded to the distal nephrons of normal kidney tissue. These findings enabled us to diagnose this patient as having so-called Bellini's duct tumor

On-Chip Evaluation of DNA Methylation with Electrochemical Combined Bisulfite Restriction Analysis Utilizing a Carbon Film Containing a Nanocrystalline Structure

This paper reports an on-chip electrochemical assessment of the DNA methylation status in genomic DNA on a conductive nanocarbon film electrode realized with combined bisulfite restriction analysis (COBRA). The film electrode consists of sp² and sp³ hybrid bonds and is fabricated with an unbalanced magnetron (UBM) sputtering method. First, we studied the effect of the sp²/sp³ ratio of the UBM nanocarbon film electrode with <i>p</i>-aminophenol, which is a major electro-active product of the labeling enzyme from <i>p</i>-aminophenol phosphate. The signal current for <i>p</i>-aminophenol increases as the sp² content in the UBM nanocarbon film electrode increases because of the π–π interaction between aromatic <i>p</i>-aminophenol and the graphene-like sp² structure. Furthermore, the capacitative current at the UBM nanocarbon film electrode was successfully reduced by about 1 order of magnitude thanks to the angstrom-level surface flatness. Therefore, a high signal-to-noise ratio was achieved compared with that of conventional electrodes. Then, after performing an ELISA-like hybridization assay with a restriction enzyme, we undertook an electrochemical evaluation of the cytosine methylation status in DNA by measuring the oxidation current derived from <i>p</i>-aminophenol. When the target cytosine in the analyte sequence is methylated (unmethylated), the restriction enzyme of HpyCH4IV is able (unable) to cleave the sequence, that is, the detection probe cannot (can) hybridize. We succeeded in estimating the methylation ratio at a site-specific CpG site from the peak current of a cyclic voltammogram obtained from a PCR product solution ranging from 0.01 to 1 nM