Glycosylation in Indolent,Significant and Aggressive Prostate Cancer by Automated High-Throughput N-Glycan Profiling

The diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer (PCa) is a major health-care concern worldwide. This cancer can manifest itself in many distinct forms and the transition from clinically indolent PCa to the more invasive aggressive form remains poorly understood. It is now universally accepted that glycan expression patterns change with the cellular modifications that accompany the onset of tumorigenesis. The aim of this study was to investigate if differential glycosylation patterns could distinguish between indolent, significant, and aggressive PCa. Whole serum N-glycan profiling was carried out on 117 prostate cancer patients’ serum using our automated, high-throughput analysis platform for glycan-profiling which utilizes ultra-performance liquid chromatography (UPLC) to obtain high resolution separation of N-linked glycans released from the serum glycoproteins. We observed increases in hybrid, oligomannose, and biantennary digalactosylated monosialylated glycans (M5A1G1S1, M8, and A2G2S1), bisecting glycans (A2B, A2(6)BG1) and monoantennary glycans (A1), and decreases in triantennary trigalactosylated trisialylated glycans with and without core fucose (A3G3S3 and FA3G3S3) with PCa progression from indolent through significant and aggressive disease. These changes give us an insight into the disease pathogenesis and identify potential biomarkers for monitoring the PCa progression, however these need further confirmation studies.     

Foetal alcohol syndrome in Saskatchewan: unchanged incidence in a 20-year period

Ethers and thioethers of monosaccharides have been synthesised which show potent toxicity to mouse (LD50 > or = 4 g.kg-1 O.W. and 0.2 to 1.5 g.kg-1 I.P.W.). A study of calcium antagonist activity for the full series of compounds indicated that the activity was similar for both O- and S- ethers and maximum activities were observed for monoacetoneglucose ethers possessing carbon chain close to 8 carbons.     

Effects of clozapine and haloperidol on baseline levels of vacuous jaw movements in aged rats

BACKGROUND: IgE-mediated hypersensitivity to latex proteins has become a significant clinical problem over the last decade. Nursing and medical staff are at risk because of their occupational exposure to latex. AIMS: To determine the prevalence of type I hypersensitivity to latex allergens in the nursing staff of an Australian hospital. METHODS: A questionnaire which asked about symptoms associated with the use of latex gloves was completed by 140 nurses working in the Alfred Hospital (72 in general medical wards, 68 in intensive care units). Skin prick tests with eluates of five different types of latex glove as well as common aeroallergens (rye pollen and house dust mite) and banana extract were performed. RESULTS: Thirty-one nurses (22%) were skin prick test positive to at least one of the five latex glove eluates. All of these nurses were atopic, having positive skin prick tests to rye pollen or house dust mite. Symptoms of local dryness, itch and erythema associated with glove use were reported by more than half the study group, but not more frequently by those who were skin prick test positive to latex. Urticaria associated with glove use was reported more frequently by those with positive latex skin prick tests (13% vs 4%, p = 0.05). Eighty-seven per cent of the nurses who were latex skin test positive were also positive to banana extract. CONCLUSIONS: IgE-mediated hypersensitivity to latex is common in nurses working in an Australian hospital. Glove associated symptoms were frequently reported, but in most cases the symptoms were more typical of irritant or contact dermatitis rather than type I hypersensitivity reactions. However, the extent of subclinical sensitisation to latex found in this study suggests that symptomatic latex allergy is likely to emerge as an increasing problem for nursing staff in this country.     

Korsakoff's syndrome, cognition and clonidine

Eighteen patients suffering from Alcoholic Korsakoff's Syndrome participated in a placebo-controlled double-blind cross-over trial of clonidine 0.3 mg b.d. for two weeks versus matched placebo for two weeks. A detailed neuropsychological assessment was carried out at the end of each treatment phase and staff ratings of behaviour were also obtained. Clonidine treatment resulted in no significant improvement over placebo on any of the cognitive measures employed. The results contradict previous smaller studies which had suggested that chronic treatment with clonidine had a memory-enhancing effect in Korsakoff's syndrome.     

The effect of the length of a malarial epitope on its antigenicity and immunogenicity in an epitope presentation system using the Pseudomonas aeruginosa outer membrane protein OprF as the carrier

The phenotypic characteristics of three Serpulina pilosicoli strains isolated from humans with diarrhoea (WesB, Kar, Hrm7) and two porcine S. pilosicoli strains isolated from pigs with intestinal spirochaetosis (1648, 3295), were compared with the type strain of the species P43/6/78T (T = type strain) and other intestinal spirochaetes within the genus Serpulina. All S. pilosicoli strains had a characteristic ultrastructural appearance, displayed similar growth rates, hydrolysed hippurate, lacked beta-glucosidase activity, utilised D-ribose as a growth substrate, and had similar sensitivities to rifampicin and spiramycin. The only consistent phenotypic characteristic that differentiated human strains from porcine strains of S. pilosicoli was that the human strains all utilised the pentose sugar D-xylose. These distinguishing phenotypic traits appear useful for identifying S. pilosicoli.     

Alcohol consumption as a self-handicapping strategy in women.

Assessed whether women self-handicap with alcohol consumption prior to engaging in a social evaluation task, which may be more relevant to their self-esteem than the intellectual tasks used in past self-handicapping studies on substance use. 113 women (aged 19–32 yrs), who were evaluated as normal drinkers, performed either a solvable or an insolvable social judgment task and then received either success feedback or no feedback. Ss received access to alcoholic and nonalcoholic beverages while awaiting a retest. The study terminated before the retest. The self-handicapping hypothesis that noncontingent success would produce relatively greater alcohol consumption was not supported. Regardless of feedback, insolvable test Ss consumed more alcohol than did solvable test Ss. Findings suggest that the hypothesis may be limited as a general model of alcohol consumption in both sexes. (13 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Selective employment of chemokine receptors as human immunodeficiency virus type 1 coreceptors determined by individual amino acids within the envelope V3 loop

The chemokine receptor CCR5 acts as an essential cofactor for cell entry by macrophage-tropic human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) strains, whereas CXCR4 acts as an essential cofactor for T-cell-line-adapted strains. We demonstrated that the specific amino acids in the V3 loop of the HIV-1 envelope protein that determine cellular tropism also regulate chemokine coreceptor preference for cell entry by the virus. Further, a strong correlation was found between HIV-1 strains classified as syncytium inducing in standard assays and those using CXCR4 as a coreceptor. These data support the hypothesis that progressive adaptation to additional coreceptors is a key molecular basis for HIV-1 phenotypic evolution in vivo.