Eradication of intractable malignant ascites by abdominocentesis, reinfusion of concentrated ascites, and adoptive immunotherapy with dendritic cells and activated killer cells in a patient with recurrent lung cancer: a case report

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Introduction</p> <p>Malignant ascites is often a sign of a terminal stage in several malignant diseases. To control ascites, drainage and intra-abdominal chemotherapy are often used in those patients but eradication of ascites is difficult and prognosis is poor.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>A 55-year-old woman was admitted to our hospital on 26 January 2007 with dyspnea, abdominal distention and oliguria. Abdominocentesis revealed peritoneal carcinomatosis resulting from abdominal recurrence from lung cancer. To alleviate the dyspnea and abdominal distention, we drained the ascites aseptically and infused them intravenously back into the patient after removal of tumor cells by centrifugation, and then concentration by apheresis. After the drainage of ascites, we intraperitoneally infused activated killer cells and dendritic cells from the patient's tumor-draining lymph nodes, together with 4.5 × 10⁵U interleukin-2 in 50 ml saline by 2.1 ml/hour infuser balloon.</p> <p>Drastic decreases in the tumor cell count and in ascite retention were observed after several courses of ascites drainage, intravenous infusion and intraperitoneal immunotherapy. The plasma protein level was maintained during the treatment notwithstanding the repeated drainage of ascites. Cell surface marker analysis, cytotoxic activities against autologous tumor cells and interferon-gamma examination of ascites suggested the possibility that these effects were mediated by immunological responses of activated killer cells and dendritic cells infused intraperitoneally.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Combination of local administration of immune cells and infusion of concentrated cell free ascites may be applicable for patients afflicted with refractory ascites.</p

Islet Endothelial Activation and Oxidative Stress Gene Expression Is Reduced by IL-1Ra Treatment in the Type 2 Diabetic GK Rat

Inflammation followed by fibrosis is a component of islet dysfunction in both rodent and human type 2 diabetes. Because islet inflammation may originate from endothelial cells, we assessed the expression of selected genes involved in endothelial cell activation in islets from a spontaneous model of type 2 diabetes, the Goto-Kakizaki (GK) rat. We also examined islet endotheliuml/oxidative stress (OS)/inflammation-related gene expression, islet vascularization and fibrosis after treatment with the interleukin-1 (IL-1) receptor antagonist (IL-1Ra)

Identification and characterization of antibacterial compound(s) of cockroaches (Periplaneta americana)

Infectious diseases remain a significant threat to human health, contributing to more than 17 million deaths, annually. With the worsening trends of drug resistance, there is a need for newer and more powerful antimicrobial agents. We hypothesized that animals living in polluted environments are potential source of antimicrobials. Under polluted milieus, organisms such as cockroaches encounter different types of microbes, including superbugs. Such creatures survive the onslaught of superbugs and are able to ward off disease by producing antimicrobial substances. Here, we characterized antibacterial properties in extracts of various body organs of cockroaches (Periplaneta americana) and showed potent antibacterial activity in crude brain extract against methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and neuropathogenic E. coli K1. The size-exclusion spin columns revealed that the active compound(s) are less than 10 kDa in molecular mass. Using cytotoxicity assays, it was observed that pre-treatment of bacteria with lysates inhibited bacteria-mediated host cell cytotoxicity. Using spectra obtained with LC-MS on Agilent 1290 infinity liquid chromatograph, coupled with an Agilent 6460 triple quadruple mass spectrometer, tissues lysates were analyzed. Among hundreds of compounds, only a few homologous compounds were identified that contained isoquinoline group, chromene derivatives, thiazine groups, imidazoles, pyrrole containing analogs, sulfonamides, furanones, flavanones, and known to possess broad-spectrum antimicrobial properties, and possess anti-inflammatory, anti-tumour, and analgesic properties. Further identification, characterization and functional studies using individual compounds can act as a breakthrough in developing novel therapeutics against various pathogens including superbugs

Pan-cancer analysis of whole genomes

Cancer is driven by genetic change, and the advent of massively parallel sequencing has enabled systematic documentation of this variation at the whole-genome scale(1-3). Here we report the integrative analysis of 2,658 whole-cancer genomes and their matching normal tissues across 38 tumour types from the Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium of the International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC) and The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). We describe the generation of the PCAWG resource, facilitated by international data sharing using compute clouds. On average, cancer genomes contained 4-5 driver mutations when combining coding and non-coding genomic elements; however, in around 5% of cases no drivers were identified, suggesting that cancer driver discovery is not yet complete. Chromothripsis, in which many clustered structural variants arise in a single catastrophic event, is frequently an early event in tumour evolution; in acral melanoma, for example, these events precede most somatic point mutations and affect several cancer-associated genes simultaneously. Cancers with abnormal telomere maintenance often originate from tissues with low replicative activity and show several mechanisms of preventing telomere attrition to critical levels. Common and rare germline variants affect patterns of somatic mutation, including point mutations, structural variants and somatic retrotransposition. A collection of papers from the PCAWG Consortium describes non-coding mutations that drive cancer beyond those in the TERT promoter(4); identifies new signatures of mutational processes that cause base substitutions, small insertions and deletions and structural variation(5,6); analyses timings and patterns of tumour evolution(7); describes the diverse transcriptional consequences of somatic mutation on splicing, expression levels, fusion genes and promoter activity(8,9); and evaluates a range of more-specialized features of cancer genomes(8,10-18).Peer reviewe