Detection of mouse tyrosinase with a monoclonal antibody MAT-1 against human tyrosinase

Monoclonal Antibody (MoAb) HNK, or anti-leu-7, is reactive with several neuroendocrine and nonneuroendocrine tumors. The aim of this study is to examine anti-leu-7 reactivity in thyroid neoplasms and its relationship to cellular proliferation as determined by anti-PCNA reactivity. The expression of anti-leu-7 in 56 thyroid neoplasms (24 papillary carcinomas, 14 follicular carcinomas, two medullary carcinomas and 16 follicular adenomas) was examined immunohistochemically. Papillary and follicular thyroid carcinomas reacted with anti-leu-7 in a membranous and cytoplasmic pattern in 88% and 93% of cases, respectively. The adjacent benign tissues were nonreactive. Only eight cases diagnosed as follicular adenomas were reactive with anti-leu-7. Furthermore, the mean proliferative index (PI), as measured by the percentage of nuclei immunoreactive with anti-PCNA, was greater than 30% in all thyroid neoplasms reactive with anti-leu-7. The PI was 58% for papillary carcinomas and 68% and 48% for follicular carcinomas, and follicular adenomas, respectively. Lesions originally classified as follicular adenomas that were nonreactive with anti-leu-7 had a PI of 24% and were reclassified as hyperplastic nodules. These data suggest that anti-leu-7 may be useful for characterizing thyroid neoplasia.     

Suppressive effect of ethanol on the expression of hepatic asialoglycoprotein receptors augmented by interleukin-1beta, interleukin-6, and tumor necrosis factor-alpha

Blood levels of inflammatory-related cytokines, including interleukin (IL)-1beta, IL-6, and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-alpha, are elevated in patients with alcoholic liver diseases. We investigated the effects of these cytokines and ethanol on the expression of hepatic asialoglycoprotein receptors (AGPRs) in a human hepatoblastoma cell line, HepG2. An [125I]-asialo-orosomucoid binding assay showed significant increases in surface AGPR numbers in HepG2 cells by treatment with IL-1beta, IL-6, and TNF-alpha, to levels which were approximately 130% of the values in untreated control cells. However, the enhanced AGPR numbers induced by treatment with these cytokines were markedly suppressed, to 70%-80% of the number in the untreated cells, by treatment with ethanol. Immunological detection of AGPR with a specific antibody demonstrated that the modulation of surface AGPR numbers was correlated with the cellular expression levels of AGPR. These results suggest that, although IL-1beta, IL-6, and TNF-alpha stimulate the synthesis of hepatic AGPR, ethanol suppresses the expression of AGPR augmented by these cytokines. This leads to an increase in serum asialo-orosomucoid levels caused by the disordered catabolism mediated by AGPR in patients with alcoholic liver disease.     

An outbreak of group C rotavirus gastroenteritis among adults living in Valentim Gentil, S?o Paulo State, Brazil

A comparison among modified and unmodified supercritical fluid extraction (SFE), enhanced-fluidity liquid extraction, and accelerated solvent extraction (ASE) techniques was made for the extraction of polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) from an aged, spiked lignite coal fly ash. All of the attempted extraction conditions allowed the extraction of the PAHs to some degree, but no single extraction technique proved to be superior for all of the PAHs used. Three groups of PAHs with similar extraction efficiencies were identified. The group with the lowest molecular weights was best recovered using a 90% CO2-10% methanol mixture at 70 degrees C and 238 atm. The group of medium-molecular-weight PAHs was recovered equally well using any of three extraction conditions: SFE (100% CO2, 90 degrees C, and 238 atm), enhanced-fluidity liquid mixture (60% CO2-40% methanol, 70 degrees C, and 238 atm), and a methanol ASE mixture. The group of high-molecular-weight PAHs seemed to be equally well recovered with all of the attempted extraction conditions, but the enhanced-fluidity conditions (60% CO2-40% methanol, 70 degrees C, and 238 atm) had extraction recoveries (> 85%) with the lowest standard deviations (approximately 5%).     

Epilepsy and exacerbation of brain injury in mice lacking the glutamate transporter GLT-1

Extracellular levels of the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate in the nervous system are maintained by transporters that actively remove glutamate from the extracellular space. Homozygous mice deficient in GLT-1, a widely distributed astrocytic glutamate transporter, show lethal spontaneous seizures and increased susceptibility to acute cortical injury. These effects can be attributed to elevated levels of residual glutamate in the brains of these mice.     

Dynamic Spectrum Sharing for OFDMA-Based Multi-hop Cognitive Radio Networks with Priority

In this paper, we propose a resource assignment scheme of a secondary user (SU) for a multi-hop cognitive radio network. In multi-hop networks, since each link has different SNR because of their different distance between stations and multipath fading, the link of the smallest SNR is the bottleneck. For overcoming this problem, it is proposed to give a priority to each link based on the link SNR and to assign the resource blocks (RBs) in ordering of instantaneous SNR on the link. This link priority information is shared among nodes through a control channel. Then, we assign the selected SU RB to each SU node according to the SNR ordering with distributed manner. We confirm the effectiveness of the proposed SU RB assignment by using computer simulation.     

Crosslinking effects on the release force of addition cure silicone release agents in model systems

Summary Crosslinking effects on the release force of some addition curable silicones in a model system have been investigated. The release force at several release speeds and the contact angles of ethyleneglycol on release papers coated by release agents having different crosslinking densities were estimated. Physical properties of model release agents in the bulk were also measured in bulk. We found that release force at a low speed is affected by the wetability of the surfaces and release force at a high speed is affected by the bulk crosslinking density. Received: 2 February 1998/Revised version: 8 May 1998/Accepted: 20 May 1998     

Value-utilized taint propagation: toward precise detection of apps’ information flows across Android API calls

International Journal of Information Security - Android security researchers utilize taint analysis to uncover apps’ bugs and policy-violating behaviors. However, the investigations are...