94 research outputs found
Apparatus for a Search for T-violating Muon Polarization in Stopped-Kaon Decays
The detector built at KEK to search for T-violating transverse muon
polarization in K+ --> pi0 mu+ nu (Kmu3) decay of stopped kaons is described.
Sensitivity to the transverse polarization component is obtained from
reconstruction of the decay plane by tracking the mu+ through a toroidal
spectrometer and detecting the pi0 in a segmented CsI(Tl) photon calorimeter.
The muon polarization was obtained from the decay positron asymmetry of muons
stopped in a polarimeter. The detector included features which minimized
systematic errors while maintaining high acceptance.Comment: 56 pages, 30 figures, submitted to NI
Genetic Risk Can Be Decreased: Quitting Smoking Decreases and Delays Lung Cancer for Smokers With High and Low CHRNA5 Risk Genotypes - A Meta-analysis.
BACKGROUND: Recent meta-analyses show that individuals with high risk variants in CHRNA5 on chromosome 15q25 are likely to develop lung cancer earlier than those with low-risk genotypes. The same high-risk genetic variants also predict nicotine dependence and delayed smoking cessation. It is unclear whether smoking cessation confers the same benefits in terms of lung cancer risk reduction for those who possess CHRNA5 risk variants versus those who do not. METHODS: Meta-analyses examined the association between smoking cessation and lung cancer risk in 15 studies of individuals with European ancestry who possessed varying rs16969968 genotypes (N=12,690 ever smokers, including 6988 cases of lung cancer and 5702 controls) in the International Lung Cancer Consortium. RESULTS: Smoking cessation (former vs. current smokers) was associated with a lower likelihood of lung cancer (OR=0.48, 95%CI=0.30-0.75, p=0.0015). Among lung cancer patients, smoking cessation was associated with a 7-year delay in median age of lung cancer diagnosis (HR=0.68, 95%CI=0.61-0.77, p=4.9∗10(-10)). The CHRNA5 rs16969968 risk genotype (AA) was associated with increased risk and earlier diagnosis for lung cancer, but the beneficial effects of smoking cessation were very similar in those with and without the risk genotype. CONCLUSION: We demonstrate that quitting smoking is highly beneficial in reducing lung cancer risks for smokers regardless of their CHRNA5 rs16969968 genetic risk status. Smokers with high-risk CHRNA5 genotypes, on average, can largely eliminate their elevated genetic risk for lung cancer by quitting smoking- cutting their risk of lung cancer in half and delaying its onset by 7years for those who develop it. These results: 1) underscore the potential value of smoking cessation for all smokers, 2) suggest that CHRNA5 rs16969968 genotype affects lung cancer diagnosis through its effects on smoking, and 3) have potential value for framing preventive interventions for those who smoke
A century of trends in adult human height
Being taller is associated with enhanced longevity, and higher education and earnings. We reanalysed 1472 population-based studies, with measurement of height on more than 18.6 million participants to estimate mean height for people born between 1896 and 1996 in 200 countries. The largest gain in adult height over the past century has occurred in South Korean women and Iranian men, who became 20.2 cm (95% credible interval 17.5-22.7) and 16.5 cm (13.3-19.7) taller, respectively. In contrast, there was little change in adult height in some sub-Saharan African countries and in South Asia over the century of analysis. The tallest people over these 100 years are men born in the Netherlands in the last quarter of 20th century, whose average heights surpassed 182.5 cm, and the shortest were women born in Guatemala in 1896 (140.3 cm; 135.8-144.8). The height differential between the tallest and shortest populations was 19-20 cm a century ago, and has remained the same for women and increased for men a century later despite substantial changes in the ranking of countries
Smad4 expression in gastric adenoma and adenocarcinoma: Frequent loss of expression in diffuse type of gastric adenocarcinoma
Smads are signal transducers for the
members of the TGF-ß superfamily. Of these Smads,
Smad4 is essential for TGF-ß signaling. The purpose of
this study was to elucidate Smad4 expression and
localization in 65 gastric adenomas, 49 intestinal-type
and 39 diffuse type of gastric adenocarcinomas
(including 12 cases of fresh frozen tissue) using Realtime
RT-PCR and immunohistochemistry. Real-time RTPCR
showed that intestinal type gastric
adenocarcinomas have higher Smad4 mRNA expression
than diffuse type gastric adenocarcinomas.
Immunohistochemical stain for Smad4 revealed that
expression of Smad4 was significantly lower in diffusetype
gastric adenocarcinoma than intestinal-type gastric
adenocarcinomas. Also, higher Smad4 protein
expression in intestinal type gastric adenocarcinomas
than overall gastric adenoma was noted. The rate of
reduced Smad4 expression was higher in advanced
gastric cancer than early gastric cancer. These results
suggest that Smad4 might play different roles in human
gastric carcinogenesis, especially between intestinal type
and diffuse type of gastric adenocarcinoma
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