The repertory of bone marrow progenitor cells associated with lymphogenic metastasis in patients with invasive carcinoma of no special type

The high mortality of patients with breast cancer is determined by metastatic disease. It is thought that the metastatic disease development associated with the repertory of bone marrow progenitor cells in breast cancer patients. In our study the correlation between the bone marrow progenitor cells presences in the tumor and blood of patients and the lymphogenic metastasis development was studied. The main clinical and pathological parameters of 24 patients with invasive breast carcinoma of non-specific type were analyzed. Endothelial progenitor cells, mesenchymal stem cells, macrophage precursors, hematopoietic progenitor cells were detected with specific antibodies against CD34, CD133, CD90, VEGFR1, CD11b, CD45, CD202 in the cell-rich fluid from frozen tumor. The amount of MCP-1 in the patients blood serum was assessed by enzymelinked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), at a wavelength of 450 nm. The cytokines concentration was calculated from the calibration plot. The program package Statistica 10.0. was used for statistical data processing. The high risk of lymphogenic metastasis in patients who didn't complete a neoadjuvant chemotherapy course was associated with the number of HPC, EPC and MSC in tumor and MCP-1 in blood

Effects of Circulating and Local Uteroplacental Angiotensin II in Rat Pregnancy.

The renin-angiotensin (Ang) system is important during placental development. Dysregulation of the renin-Ang system is important in preeclampsia (PE). Female rats transgenic for the human angiotensinogen gene crossed with males transgenic for the human renin gene develop the PE syndrome, whereas those of the opposite cross do not. We used this model to study the role of Ang II in trophoblast invasion, which is shallow in human PE but deeper in this model. We investigated the following groups: PE rats, opposite-cross rats, Ang II–infused rats (1000 ng/kg per day), and control rats. Ang II infusion increased only circulating Ang II levels (267.82 pg/mL), opposite cross influenced only uteroplacental Ang II (13.52 fmol/mg of protein), and PE increased both circulating (251.09 pg/mL) and uteroplacental (19.24 fmol/mg of protein) Ang II. Blood pressure and albuminuria occurred in the models with high circulating Ang II but not in the other models. Trophoblast invasion increased in PE and opposite-cross rats but not in Ang II–infused rats. Correspondingly, uterine artery resistance index increased in Ang II–infused rats but decreased in PE rats. We then studied human trophoblasts and villous explants from first-trimester pregnancies with time-lapse microscopy. Local Ang II dose-dependently increased migration by 75%, invasion by 58%, and motility by 282%. The data suggest that local tissue Ang II stimulates trophoblast invasion in vivo in the rat and in vitro in human cells, a hitherto fore unrecognized function. Conceivably, upregulation of tissue Ang II in the maternal part of the placenta represents an important growth factor for trophoblast invasion and migration

Protein trafficking through the endosomal system prepares intracellular parasites for a home invasion

Toxoplasma (toxoplasmosis) and Plasmodium (malaria) use unique secretory organelles for migration, cell invasion, manipulation of host cell functions, and cell egress. In particular, the apical secretory micronemes and rhoptries of apicomplexan parasites are essential for successful host infection. New findings reveal that the contents of these organelles, which are transported through the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) and Golgi, also require the parasite endosome-like system to access their respective organelles. In this review, we discuss recent findings that demonstrate that these parasites reduced their endosomal system and modified classical regulators of this pathway for the biogenesis of apical organelles

Monitoring and Pay: An Experiment on Employee Performance under Endogenous Supervision

We present an experimental test of a shirking model where monitoring intensity is endogenous and effort a continuous variable. Wage level, monitoring intensity and consequently the desired enforceable effort level are jointly determined by the maximization problem of the firm. As a result, monitoring and pay should be complements. In our experiment, between and within treatment variation is qualitatively in line with the normative predictions of the model under standard assumptions. Yet, we also find evidence for reciprocal behavior. Our data analysis shows, however, that it does not pay for the employer to solely rely on the reciprocity of employees

The changing nature of risk and risk management: the challenge of borders, uncertainty and resilience

No abstract available

C-banding in sheep with balanced homolog interchromosomal translocation

International audienc

G-banding and fluorescent-banding in sheep with heterozygous and homozygous translocation

International audienc

Performance of Reinforced Concrete Structures Subjected to Earthquake Motions

Two simplified methods for estimating the performance of reinforced concrete structures subjected to earthquake motions were evaluated. Both the Flat-Rate and Target Period methods characterize the expected level of performance in terms of the maximum estimated drift for a given intensity of ground motion. Drift estimates using the Flat-Rate method are based on the area of structural members, the total floor area of the structure, and the peak ground acceleration as a measure of earthquake intensity. The main parameters for the Target Period method are the initial period of the structures and the peak ground acceleration. The applicability of these methods to assess the expected level of performance of existing structures was investigated using experimental data. Drift values calculated with the Flat-Rate and Target Period methods were compared with measurements obtained from earthquake simulator tests performed on reduced-scale models of reinforced concrete structures. Results indicate that both methods provided an adequate assessment of performance

Tissue-Informative Mechanism for Wearable Non-invasive Continuous Blood Pressure Monitoring

Accurate continuous direct measurement of the blood pressure is currently available thru direct invasive methods via intravascular needles, and is mostly limited to use during surgical procedures or in the intensive care unit (ICU). Non-invasive methods that are mostly based on auscultation or cuff oscillometric principles do provide relatively accurate measurement of blood pressure. However, they mostly involve physical inconveniences such as pressure or stress on the human body. Here, we introduce a new non-invasive mechanism of tissue-informative measurement, where an experimental phenomenon called subcutaneous tissue pressure equilibrium is revealed and related for application in detection of absolute blood pressure. A prototype was experimentally verified to provide an absolute blood pressure measurement by wearing a watch-type measurement module that does not cause any discomfort. This work is supposed to contribute remarkably to the advancement of continuous non-invasive mobile devices for 24-7 daily-life ambulatory blood-pressure monitoring.open