Dermoscopy for Tick Bite: Reconfirmation of the Usefulness for the Initial Diagnosis

Ticks transmit a variety of infectious diseases. Diagnosis requires verification of a tick's presence. Here, we describe a 61-year-old woman bitten by an eight-legged nymphal Amblyomma testudinarium. We re-emphasize the usefulness of dermoscopy for identifying signs of the bite and determining the species of the biting tick

Temporal convolutional neural networks to generate a head-related impulse response from one direction to another

Virtual sound synthesis is a technology that allows users to perceive spatial sound through headphones or earphones. However, accurate virtual sound requires an individual head-related transfer function (HRTF), which can be difficult to measure due to the need for a specialized environment. In this study, we proposed a method to generate HRTFs from one direction to the other. To this end, we used temporal convolutional neural networks (TCNs) to generate head-related impulse responses (HRIRs). To train the TCNs, publicly available datasets in the horizontal plane were used. Using the trained networks, we successfully generated HRIRs for directions other than the front direction in the dataset. We found that the proposed method successfully generated HRIRs for publicly available datasets. To test the generalization of the method, we measured the HRIRs of a new dataset and tested whether the trained networks could be used for this new dataset. Although the similarity evaluated by spectral distortion was slightly degraded, behavioral experiments with human participants showed that the generated HRIRs were equivalent to the measured ones. These results suggest that the proposed TCNs can be used to generate personalized HRIRs from one direction to another, which could contribute to the personalization of virtual sound

Clinical Characteristics of Hyponatremia

Background & aims : We investigated the contributing factors of hyponatremia in patients on nutrition support using bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA). Methods : Thirty patients administered enteral or parenteral nutrition support for at least 72 hours were studied. We collected nutritional and electrolyte intake, serum biochemical parameters, and body composition measured by BIA. Patients were classified into two groups according to their serum sodium levels : (1) Normanatremia group, 135–145 mEq / L (n = 18) and (2) Hyponatremia group, less than 135 mEq / L (n = 12), and their characteristics were analyzed. Results : There were no significant differences between the Normonatremia and Hyponatremia groups in terms of energy, protein, and sodium intake. Serum biochemical parameters other than serum sodium and chloride levels were comparable between the two groups. On the other hand, the ratio of extracellular water to total body water (ECW / TBW) obtained by BIA was significantly higher in the Hyponatremia group than in the Normonatremia group. Further, an elevated ECW / TBW significantly and negatively correlated with serum albumin level. Conclusions : Regardless of sodium intake, higher ECW / TBW was associated with hyponatremia in patients on nutrition support. ECW / TBW may be an important clinical parameter relevant to the nutritional care of hyponatremia

Radiosensitization by telomerase-dependent oncolytic adenovirus

DNA修復機能阻害は放射線感受性を増強させるため，DNA修復に関与する因子の阻害剤は放射線増感剤となり得る．我々の開発したテロメラーゼ依存的腫瘍融解アデノウイルス製剤OBP-301（テロメライシン）は，アデノウイルスE1B55kDaタンパクを介して細胞のDNA修復に重要な役割を果たすMRN複合体（Mre11，Rad50，NBS1）を分解する機能を有する．このMRN複合体の分解によりATM（ataxia-telangiectasia mutated）の活性化が抑制され結果的にDNA修復機構が阻害される．我々はOBP-301と放射線との併用が強力な相乗効果を生み出すことをマウスの皮下腫瘍モデルおよび食道癌同所性モデルにおいて証明した．これらの結果はOBP-301が将来有望な放射線増感剤となり得ることだけでなく，E1B55kDaタンパクを産生する腫瘍融解アデノウイルス製剤と放射線との併用が悪性腫瘍に対する有力な治療戦略となり得ることを示す