Nasal secretion analysis in allergic rhinitis, cystic fibrosis, and nonallergic fibromyalgia/chronic fatigue syndrome subjects

Vascular surgery can be safely performed in approximately 60% of patients with advanced peripheral vascular disease, because of the high frequency of concomitant coronary artery disease and consequent increased risk of perioperative cardiac complications. The aim of this study was to validate the hypothesis that endovascular revascularization could be safely applied to high-cardiac-risk patients with a lower incidence of perioperative cardiac complications. One hundred and fourteen patients with peripheral vascular disease referred for revascularization underwent preoperatively a clinical and echocardiographic evaluation, at rest and under dipyridamole stress test, to assess the cardiac risk. Patients with high clinical score (according to Goldman and Detsky), or low left ventricular ejection fraction at rest, or positive dipyridamole stress test, were considered at high cardiac risk. To record adverse cardiac events, all patients were monitored during surgery, postoperatively, and followed up for 18 months after hospital discharge. Forty-eight patients (42%) were found to be at high cardiac risk. In this high-cardiac-risk group, endovascular surgery was performed in 37/48 patients (77%) (group A), while the remaining 11/48 patients (23%) were bypassed with open surgery (group B). Postoperative cardiac complications occurred in 16% of patients in group A and in 45% of patients in group B with two deaths (p < 0.05). At follow-up, 51% of patients in group A and 44% of patients in group B had suffered late cardiac events (p=ns), with 10 deaths in group A and three deaths in group B (p=ns). Limb salvage rate was similar in the two groups (95% group A, 100% group B; p=ns). These data show that high-cardiac-risk patients with limb-threatening ischemia have significantly less perioperative cardiac complications when treated by endovascular procedures instead of bypass surgery. Follow-up data on cardiac events confirm the severity of concomitant coronary artery disease in patients with peripheral vascular disease.     

Structure-activity relationships of spontaneous nitric oxide releasers, FK409 and its derivatives

(+/-)-(E)-4-Ethyl-2-[(E)-hydroxyimino]-5-nitro-3-hexenamide (FK409) shows both potent in vitro vasorelaxant and antiplatelet activities via nitric oxide (NO) generated spontaneously from the compound. In this study, we measured spontaneous NO-releasing rates of a series of FK409 derivatives, of which chain lengths or substituents were systematically modified, in sodium-phosphate buffer solution at pH 7.4. Furthermore, we studied their in vitro antiplatelet and vasorelaxant effects to evaluate relationships between spontaneous NO-releasing activities of FK409 analogs and their biological activities. FK409 derivatives were found to possess different spontaneous NO-releasing rates and biological activities according to their structural modification. In addition, these studies revealed a close correlation between NO-releasing rates of FK409 derivatives and their in vitro antiplatelet activities in human platelet-rich plasma, whereas the in vitro vasorelaxant activities of these compounds in isolated rat aorta did not correlate with the rates of NO liberation. The vasorelaxant effects were supposed to be affected by the structural properties of FK409 derivatives as well as their NO-releasing abilities.     

Efficacy of heat-killed <Emphasis Type="Italic">Lactococcus lactis</Emphasis> JCM 5805 on immunity and fatigue during consecutive high intensity exercise in male athletes: a randomized,placebo-controlled,double-blinded trial

Background

Lactococcus lactis JCM 5805 (LC-Plasma) is a unique lactic acid bacteria (LAB) which activates plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDC). We aimed to evaluate the effect of LC-Plasma on dendritic cell (DC) activity and subjective indices of upper respiratory tract infections (URTI) and fatigue in athletes under high intensity exercise.

Methods

We conducted a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blinded trial. Fifty-one male subjects belonging to a university sports club were randomized into placebo (n?=?25) and LC-Plasma (n?=?26) groups. Individuals ingested placebo capsules containing cornstarch or LC-Plasma capsules containing 100 billion cells of heat-killed LC-Plasma per day for 13 days. During the intervention period, subjects performed high intensity exercise according to their sports club training regime. Blood and saliva sampling were obtained at days 1 and 14, and physical conditions were recorded in a diary. We investigated expression of maturation markers on DCs, muscle damage and stress markers and used student’s t test adjusted by Bonferoni’s method for multiple comparison between groups. These data were presented as mean?±?SD. We also investigated cumulative days of symptoms regarding infections and fatigue and used Chi-square test for comparison between groups. These data were presented as cumulative number.

Results

CD86 as maturation marker on pDC was significantly increased in the LC-Plasma group at day 14 (Placebo: 296?±?70 vs. LC-Plasma: 365?±?115; Mean Fluorescent Intensity; p?=?0.013). Cumulative days of URTI were significantly lower in the LC-Plasma group (Placebo: URTI positive 56, URTI negative 256 vs. LC-Plasma: URTI positive 39, URTI negative 299; days; p?=?0.028) and symptoms like sneeze or running nose were significantly lower in the LC-Plasma group (Placebo: Symptom positive 52, Symptom negative 258, vs. LC-Plasma: Symptom positive 36, Symptom negative 301; days; p?=?0.032). Moreover, the cumulative days of fatigue were significantly fewer in the LC-Plasma group (Placebo: Symptom positive 128, Symptom negative 182, vs. LC-Plasma: Symptom positive 110, Symptom negative 225; days; p?=?0.032). Markers of muscle damage and stress markers were not significantly different between groups.

Conclusion

We consider that heat-killed LC-Plasma supplementation relieves morbidity and symptoms of URTI via activation of pDC and decreases fatigue accumulation during consecutive high intensity exercise in athletes. However, LC-Plasma ingestion did not affect markers of muscle damage and stress.

Trial registration

UMIN-CTR, UMIN000020372. Registered 28 December 2015.

     

Nutrient Supply to Seawater from Steelmaking Slag: The Coupled Effect of Gluconic Acid Usage and Slag Carbonation

Metallurgical and Materials Transactions B - Vanishing of seaweeds in coastal areas has become a serious environmental problem. Part of the reason is nutrient deficiency in seawater, especially...     

Intermediate filaments

The antibodies for intermediate filaments, including keratin, vimentin, desmin, GFAP and neurofilaments, have been much useful in routinely-processed immunohistochemical study for identifying characteristics of tumor cells or making the definite diagnosis. In general, when neoplastic transformation has taken place, the affected cells would reveal to some extent alterated immunolocalization of intermediate filaments in the cytoplasm. Whether the tumor cells are of epithelial or non-epithelial origin is significant from diagnostic points of view when utilizing those intermediate filaments as tumor markers. But there are many "exceptional" cases of epithelial tumors with expression of vimentin, or those of non-epithelial tumors with expression of keratin, indicating some "variants". Immunohistochemical application of the intermediate filaments is indispensable not only as "a diagnostic tool for surgical pathologists", but also a method for analyzing relationship between morphological changes and functional aspects of the tumor cells.     

Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman Quasi-Variational Inequality arising in an environmental problem and its numerical discretization

A Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman Quasi-Variational Inequality (HJBQVI) for a river environmental restoration problem with wise-use of sediment is formulated and its mathematical properties are analyzed. A finite difference scheme with a penalization technique is then established for solving the HJBQVI. The scheme is free from any iterative solvers and is unconditionally stable and convergent in the viscosity sense under certain conditions. A demonstrative application example of the HJBQVI is finally presented.     

Electrical Conduction at the Interface between Insulating van der Waals Materials

Emergent properties of 2D materials attract considerable interest in condensed matter physics and materials science due to their distinguished features that are missing in their bulk counterparts. A mainstream in this research field is to broaden the scope of material to expand the horizons of the research area, while developing functional interfaces between different 2D materials is another indispensable research direction. Here, the emergence of electrical conduction at the interface between insulating 2D materials is demonstrated. A new class of van der Waals heterostructures consisting of two sets of insulating transition‐metal dichalcogenides, group‐VI WSe₂ and group‐IV TMSe₂ (TM = Zr, Hf), is developed via molecular‐beam epitaxy, and it is found that those heterostructures are highly conducting although all the constituent materials are highly insulating. The WSe₂/ZrSe₂ interface exhibits more conducting behavior than the WSe₂/HfSe₂ interface, which can be understood by considering the band alignments between constituent materials. Moreover, by increasing Se flux during heterostructure fabrication, the WSe₂/ZrSe₂ interface becomes more conducting, reaching nearly metallic behavior. Further improvement of the crystalline quality as well as exploring different material combinations are expected to lead to metallic conduction, providing a novel functionality emerging at van der Waals heterostructures.