Recent arguments in advanced gastric cancer treatment]

In advanced inoperable gastric cancer patients, survival was significantly prolonged for the group receiving antineoplastic treatment against only the best supportive care group by some randomized controlled studies. Greater prolongation of survival is expected from surgery in CR and PR cases because of the change from inoperable to operable. One problem is that the evaluation of response to the primary site is different between Japan and other countries. Outside of Japan, it is considered that barium contrast studies and routine endoscopy are not sufficient for tumor response assessment at the primary site. I think this is not true evaluation of the response to gastric cancer chemotherapy to exclude primary site assessment. We must generalize the Japanese criteria of gastric cancer chemotherapy throughout the world.     

A case of biliary cystadenoma with obstructive jaundice

Biliary cystadenoma is a rare cause of obstructive jaundice. We report a case of a 78-year-old Japanese man with biliary cystadenoma presenting repetitive abdominal pain and jaundice. Ultrasound sonography revealed a hyperechoic mass in the left lateral lobe of the liver. Histological examination revealed a biliary cystadenoma. Intracystic hemorrhage was assumed to be the cause of obstruction of the bile ducts.     

Modification of parallel activity elicited by propagating bursts in developing networks of rat cortical neurones

The fine specificity of the cellular immune response to Candida albicans (i.e., recognition of different antigenic components) between normal controls and human immunodeficiency virus-infected patients in various stages of disease was compared. C. albicans-specific T cells, enriched by antigen stimulation and interleukin-2 expansion, were challenged with antigenic fractions of different molecular weight obtained by SDS-gel fractionation of C. albicans extracts in the presence of autologous mononuclear cells as antigen-presenting cells. Proliferative responses showed similar patterns of reactivity between controls and category A and B seropositive subjects. Category C patients with concurrent C. albicans infections did not give rise to C. albicans-specific T cell lines, confirming the T cell defect. Patients without clinically evident C. albicans infection had a low but broad reactivity pattern of C. albicans-specific T cells. These results suggest that depletion of C. albicans-specific T cells, independent of their fine specificity, occurs along with disease progression.     

Design of multivariable feedback systems with infinite gain margin and decoupling

This letter discusses the problem of designing a feedback compensator that attains the infinite gain margin under the uncertainties of feedback gains. A sufficient condition is given for the existence of compensators and then it is shown that the condition becomes necessary subject to the requirement that the feedback system is decoupled. The nonlinear case is also discussed.     

Antitumor activity of degraded products of lentinan: its correlation with molecular weight

Twelve of 25 patients with mixed connective tissue disease complained of xerostomia and/or ocular symptoms of keratoconjunctivitis sicca. In addition to the clinical features of mixed connective tissue disease, all 12 patients had high titers of antibody to the ribonuclease-sensitive component of the extractable nuclear antigen. Eight patients had both clinical xerostomia and keratoconjunctivitis sicca, one had keratoconjunctivitis sicca and salivary gland enlargement, while there had xerostomia but no ocular complaints. Sj?rgren's syndrome was confirmed in all 12 patients by means of Schirmer's tests, Rose Bengal staining tests, salivary gland scintiscans, radionuclide excretion studies in saliva, parotid sialographies, and lip biopsies. At least three of these tests were abnormal in all patients.     

Dipolar-decoupled carbon-13 NMR study of highly oriented polyethylene films

Summary High-resolution solid-state ¹³C NMR spectra and ¹³C relaxation times T₁ and T₁ have been measured at 40–100° C for uniaxially oriented polyethylene films with the drawing direction parallel to the magnetic field; this sample has a unique morphological structure that the noncrystalline chains are nearly disordered irrespective of the high degree of drawing. A sharp resonance line(line A) appears at the position corresponding to the principal value ₃₃ of the chemical shift tensor for the CH₂ carbons with the trans-trans conformation. Another sharp linedine B) is observed at almost the same chemical shift as for the CH₂ carbons of polyethylene in solution. Although these observations are similar to those for a cold-drawn polyethylene sample reported previously, line B is much enhanced in intensity and the linewidth is narrower in the present sample, reflecting the disorientation of the noncrystalline component. It is found from T₁ measurements that line A contains two components with different molecular mobility, both being assigned to the crystalline components. On the other hand, the line B is composed of a single component assignable to the noncrystalline component with liquid-like molecular mobility.     

Co-carbonization of solvent fractions of hydrogenated and alkylated SRC pitches in studies of formation of needle-cokes

The optical texture of cokes from two SRC pitches of different coking properties, from co-carbonizations of these materials and of hydrogenated and alkylated products has been studied. The objective, relative to formation of needle-cokes, is to correlate the optical texture of cokes with the chemical structure of the pitch materials using both benzene-soluble (BS) and insoluble (BI) fractions of the pitches. Hydrogenation improved the compatibility of the BS fraction of the inferior SRC pitch (No. 2) with the BI fractions of the two pitches (non-hydrogenated) using a ratio of only 1 to 9. Before hydrogenation, a ratio of BS to BI of 8 to 2 did not give a needle-coke. In contrast, alkylation destroyed the compatibility of the BS fraction of the superior SRC pitch (No. 1) with the BI fraction (non-alkylated) using a ratio of 6 to 4, and which gave a needle-coke before alkylation. Hydrogenation of the alkylated material restored the compatability. The relevance of these studies to industrial carbonization processes is discussed in terms of chemical treatment and the hydrogen economy.     

Injection molding of 316L stainless steel microstructures

Micro powder injection molding (PIM) is a promising process for low cost fabrication of three-dimensional microstructures. The PIM can be used for a wide range of metal and ceramic materials, combined with the potential for mass production. In this paper, initial study on the molding of 316L stainless steel microstructures was investigated. Three different micro-cavity shapes were used. Small powder with mean size of 4 m was used with two multi-component binder systems. Microstructures with dimension as small as 35 m could be injection molded. For successful molding, the binder system must provide high green strength to withstand ejection from the mold and suitable molding parameters used. For example, a high mold temperature is required and ejection speed must be reduced. The cross-sections of the microstructures are precisely replicated. The general shape in the depth direction is replicated although it is not as good as that for the cross-section. More work has to be conducted to realize the full potentials of the process.The authors would like to thank the Nanyang Technological University for awarding a research grant to conduct this research and Adeka Fine Chemicals (Tokyo) for the supply of PAN 250 binder.