Incorporation of a selective sigma-2 receptor ligand enhances uptake of liposomes by multiple cancer cells

Background: The sigma-2 receptor is an attractive target for tumor imaging and targeted therapy because it is overexpressed in multiple types of solid tumors, including prostate cancer, breast cancer, and lung cancer. SV119 is a synthetic small molecule that binds to sigma-2 receptors with high affinity and specificity. This study investigates the utility of SV119 in mediating the selective targeting of liposomal vectors in various types of cancer cells. Methods: SV119 was covalently linked with polyethylene glycol-dioleyl amido aspartic acid conjugate (PEG-DOA) to generate a novel functional lipid, SV119-PEG-DOA. This lipid was utilized for the preparation of targeted liposomes to enhance their uptake by cancer cells. Liposomes with various SV119 densities (0, 1, 3, and 5 mole%) were prepared and their cellular uptake was investigated in several tumor cell lines. In addition, doxorubicin (DOX) was loaded into the targeted and unmodified liposomes, and the cytotoxic effect on the DU-145 cells was evaluated by MTT assay. Results: Liposomes with or without SV119-PEG-DOA both have a mean diameter of approximately 90 nm and a neutral charge. The incorporation of SV119-PEG-DOA significantly increased the cellular uptake of liposomes by the DU-145, PC-3, A549, 201T, and MCF-7 tumor cells, which was shown by fluorescence microscopy and the quantitative measurement of fluorescence intensity. In contrast, the incorporation of SV119 did not increase the uptake of liposomes by the normal BEAS-2B cells. In a time course study, the uptake of SV119 liposomes by DU-145 cells was also significantly higher at each time point compared to the unmodified liposomes. Furthermore, the DOX-loaded SV119 liposomes showed significantly higher cytotoxicity to DU-145 cells compared to the DOX-loaded unmodified liposomes. Conclusion: SV119 liposomes were developed for targeted drug delivery to cancer cells. The targeting efficiency and specificity of SV119 liposomes to cancer cells was demonstrated in vitro. The results of this study suggest that SV119-modified liposomes might be a promising drug carrier for tumor-targeted delivery. © 2012 Zhang et al, publisher and licensee Dove Medical Press Ltd

Comment on "Conjectures on exact solution of three-dimensional (3D) simple orthorhombic Ising lattices" [arXiv:0705.1045]

It is shown that a recent article by Z.-D. Zhang [arXiv:0705.1045] is in error and violates well-known theorems.Comment: LaTeX, 3 pages, no figures, submitted to Philosophical Magazine. Expanded versio

Dorsal column is not involved in the mechanism of the hypotensive effect by simulating acupuncture on rat hindlimb

The present study investigated the role of the dorsal column (DC) in the mechanism of the hypotensive effect induced by simulating acupuncture on rat hindlimb. The femoral arterial pressure and electrocardiogram (ECG) of rats were recorded when the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus (PVN) was electrically stimulated with or without DC lesion. Stimulation of the deep peroneal nerve (DPN) decreased the pressor response elicited by electrical stimulation of the PVN. Thirty minutes after micro-dissection of the right DC, the inhibitory effect of stimulating the right or left DPN on the pressor response induced by stimulation of the contralateral PVN was not altered. Of 6 rats tested, the inhibitory effect of stimulating the right or left DPN could still be observed five days after the right DC was destroyed. The pain responses of both hindlimbs of the rats with the right DC destroyed showed no obvious difference when compared with the sham control rats. These data suggest that the DC is not involved in the inhibitory effect of stimulating the DPN on the pressor response induced by the PVN activation.published_or_final_versio

Feedback-induced nonlinearity and superconducting on-chip quantum optics

Quantum coherent feedback has been proven to be an efficient way to tune the dynamics of quantum optical systems and, recently, those of solid-state quantum circuits. Here, inspired by the recent progress of quantum feedback experiments, especially those in mesoscopic circuits, we prove that superconducting circuit QED systems, shunted with a coherent feedback loop, can change the dynamics of a superconducting transmission line resonator, i.e., a linear quantum cavity, and lead to strong on-chip nonlinear optical phenomena. We find that bistability can occur under the semiclassical approximation, and photon anti-bunching can be shown in the quantum regime. Our study presents new perspectives for engineering nonlinear quantum dynamics on a chip.Comment: 10 pages, 9 figure

Probing Shadowed Nuclear Sea with Massive Gauge Bosons in the Future Heavy-Ion Collisions

The production of the massive bosons $Z^0$ and $W^{\pm}$ could provide an excellent tool to study cold nuclear matter effects and the modifications of nuclear parton distribution functions (nPDFs) relative to parton distribution functions (PDFs) of a free proton in high energy nuclear reactions at the LHC as well as in heavy-ion collisions (HIC) with much higher center-of mass energies available in the future colliders. In this paper we calculate the rapidity and transverse momentum distributions of the vector boson and their nuclear modification factors in p+Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=63$TeV and in Pb+Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=39$TeV in the framework of perturbative QCD by utilizing three parametrization sets of nPDFs: EPS09, DSSZ and nCTEQ. It is found that in heavy-ion collisions at such high colliding energies, both the rapidity distribution and the transverse momentum spectrum of vector bosons are considerably suppressed in wide kinematic regions with respect to p+p reactions due to large nuclear shadowing effect. We demonstrate that in the massive vector boson productions processes with sea quarks in the initial-state may give more contributions than those with valence quarks in the initial-state, therefore in future heavy-ion collisions the isospin effect is less pronounced and the charge asymmetry of W boson will be reduced significantly as compared to that at the LHC. Large difference between results with nCTEQ and results with EPS09 and DSSZ is observed in nuclear modifications of both rapidity and $p_T$ distributions of $Z^0$ and $W$ in the future HIC.Comment: 13 pages, 21 figures, version accepted for publication in Eur. Phys. J.

A new species of Helophorus Fabricius, 1775 from the Chinese Altai, with notes on the former subgenus Atractohelophorus Kuwert, 1886 and selected species (Coleoptera: Hydrophilidae)

Helophorus sinoglacialis sp. n. (Coleoptera: Helophoridae) is described from a single female taken among gravel at the edge of the Kran river in the Chinese Altai (Xinjiang Province) and postglacial fossils representing about seven specimens. The possible habitats are discussed and illustrated and the fossil site, the Halashazi Wetland, is described. The status of the former subgenus Atractohelophorus Kuwert, 1896 is discussed, and an illustrated account is given of species of the Helophorus glacialis and h. guttulus groups, as set out by Angus (1985), as well as of othr relevant species.©Wiener Coleopterologenverein (WCV). The attached paper is the published pdf

The FENE dumbbell polymer model: existence and uniqueness of solutions for the momentum balance equation

We consider the FENE dumbbell polymer model which is the coupling of the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations with the corresponding Fokker-Planck-Smoluchowski di ffusion equation. We show global well-posedness in the case of a 2D bounded domain. We assume in the general case that the initial velocity is sufficiently small and the initial probability density is sufficiently close to the equilibrium solution; moreover an additional condition on the coeffcients is imposed. In the corotational case, we only assume that the initial probability density is sufficiently close to the equilibrium solution

An epidemiologic study of early biologic effects of benzene in Chinese workers.

Benzene is a recognized hematotoxin and leukemogen, but its mechanisms of action in humans are still uncertain. To provide insight into these processes, we carried out a cross-sectional study of 44 healthy workers currently exposed to benzene (median 8-hr time-weighted average; 31 ppm), and unexposed controls in Shanghai, China. Here we provide an overview of the study results on peripheral blood cells levels and somatic cell mutation frequency measured by the glycophorin A (GPA) gene loss assay and report on peripheral cytokine levels. All peripheral blood cells levels (i.e., total white blood cells, absolute lymphocyte count, platelets, red blood cells, and hemoglobin) were decreased among exposed workers compared to controls, with the exception of the red blood cell mean corpuscular volume, which was higher among exposed subjects. In contrast, peripheral cytokine levels (interleukin-3, interleukin-6, erythropoietin, granulocyte colony-stimulating factor, tissue necrosis factor-alpha) in a subset of the most highly exposed workers (n = 11) were similar to values in controls (n = 11), suggesting that benzene does not affect these growth factor levels in peripheral blood. The GPA assay measures stem cell or precursor erythroid cell mutations expressed in peripheral red blood cells of MN heterozygous subjects, identifying NN variants, which result from loss of the GPA M allele and duplication of the N allele, and N phi variants, which arise from gene inactivation. The NN (but not N phi) GPA variant cell frequency was elevated in the exposed workers compared with controls (mean +/- SD, 13.9 +/- 8.4 mutants per million cells versus 7.4 +/- 5.2 per million cells, (respectively; p = 0.0002), suggesting that benzene produces gene-duplicating but not gene-inactivating mutations at the GPA locus in bone marrow cells of exposed humans. These findings, combined with ongoing analyses of benzene macromolecular adducts and chromosomal aberrations, will provide an opportunity to comprehensively evaluate a wide range of early biologic effects associated with benzene exposure in humans

Homological algebra for osp(1/2n)

We discuss several topics of homological algebra for the Lie superalgebra osp(1|2n). First we focus on Bott-Kostant cohomology, which yields classical results although the cohomology is not given by the kernel of the Kostant quabla operator. Based on this cohomology we can derive strong Bernstein-Gelfand-Gelfand resolutions for finite dimensional osp(1|2n)-modules. Then we state the Bott-Borel-Weil theorem which follows immediately from the Bott-Kostant cohomology by using the Peter-Weyl theorem for osp(1|2n). Finally we calculate the projective dimension of irreducible and Verma modules in the category O