Gq-protein alpha subunit expression and distribution in pregnant rat myometrial tissues

Coagulation patterns of 19 newly-diagnosed acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) patients with disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) at presentation were studied. Seventeen patients had hemorrhagic complications, of which four were fatal. Fatal hemorrhages were related with lower fibrinogen level and lower platelet count. DIC of the APL patients without infection was characterized by low fibrinogen and normal antithrombin III (ATIII) level. Thrombin-ATIII complex level was elevated in all patients examined. Patients with infection had higher fibrinogen levels than those without infection and some patients had reduced ATIII level. Ten remission inductions were tried with multidrug chemotherapy and seven with all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA). Complete remission was achieved in seven of ten inductions with chemotherapy and in all seven inductions with ATRA. Two patients treated with chemotherapy had fatal hemorrhage after starting therapy but none treated with ATRA.     

Restricting a familiar name in response to learning a new one: evidence for the mutual exclusivity bias in young two-year-olds

Children under 2 1/2 years old tend to interpret novel words in accordance with the Mutual Exclusivity Principle, but tend not to reinterpret familiar words this way. Because alternative principles have been proposed that only predict the novel word effects, and because tests of the familiar word effects may have been flawed, a new test was administered. In Experiment 1 (N = 32), 24- to 25-month-olds heard stories in which a novel noun was used for an atypical exemplar of a familiar noun. When asked to select exemplars of the familiar noun, they showed a small but reliable tendency to avoid the object from the story. In Experiment 2 (N = 16), the novel nouns in the stories were replaced by pronouns and proper names, and the children did not avoid the story object in the test of the familiar noun. Thus, the aversion to this object that was observed in Experiment 1 was not due to its greater exposure or its being referenced immediately before testing, but to toddlers' Mutual Exclusivity bias. Their bias is hypothesized to be a form of implicit probabilistic knowledge that derives from the competitive nature of category retrieval.     

Ephedrine-activated physiological sexual arousal in women

The cofactor specificity of serine hydroxymethyltransferase (SHMT) activities was tested in extracts of several methanogens using tetrahydromethanopterin (H4MPt) from Methanobacterium thermoautotrophicum Marburg, tetrahydrosarcinapterin (H4SPt) from Methanosarcina barkeri, and tetrahydrofolate (H4folate) as the potential C1 carrier. In Methanosphaera stadtmanae and Methanococcus thermolithotrophicus, the activities were H4MPt dependent. In Methanospirillum hungatei GP1, Methanosaeta concilii, Methanolobus tindarius, and Methanosarcina barkeri Fusaro, the activities were strictly H4folate dependent. H4SPt was reactive with the SHMT of Methanosphaera stadtmanae but not with that of Methanosarcina barkeri. In both Methanosarcina barkeri and Methanospirillum hungatei, pyridoxal phosphate stimulated SHMT activity. The apparent K(m) values for H4folate and L-serine were 0.086 and 0.29 mM in Methanosarcina barkeri and 0.065 and 0.31 mM in Methanospirillum hungatei, respectively.     

Lack of mda-6/WAF1/CIP1-mediated inhibition of cyclin-dependent kinases in interferon-alpha resistant murine B16 melanoma cells

Photodynamic therapy (PDT) is a treatment modality for malignancies that, uses the accumulation of a photosensitizer in tumor tissue and a subsequent laser light irradiation to selectively destroy tumor cells. Usually PDT is carried out with a hematoporphyrin derivative (HPD) as photosensitizer. Fluorescence characteristics of the HPD Photosan-3 were determined at different concentrations with time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy. Photosan-3 showed a concentration dependent fluorescence with one fluorescence decay time below a concentration of 10 micrograms/ml, two or three decay times at 50 and 100 micrograms/ml Photosan-3 respectively. These findings confirm results of former studies on other HPD that aggregates and dimers are probably more responsible for the photodynamic effect than monomers.