Adhesion Molecules Associated with Female Genital Tract Infection

Altres ajuts: Marie Curie Career Integration Grant i una beca Fundació Dexeus Salut de la DonaEfforts to develop vaccines that can elicit mucosal immune responses in the female genital tract against sexually transmitted infections have been hampered by an inability to measure immune responses in these tissues. The differential expression of adhesion molecules is known to confer site-dependent homing of circulating effector T cells to mucosal tissues. Specific homing molecules have been defined that can be measured in blood as surrogate markers of local immunity (e.g. α4β7 for gut). Here we analyzed the expression pattern of adhesion molecules by circulating effector T cells following mucosal infection of the female genital tract in mice and during a symptomatic episode of vaginosis in women. While CCR2, CCR5, CXCR6 and CD11c were preferentially expressed in a mouse model of Chlamydia infection, only CCR5 and CD11c were clearly expressed by effector T cells during bacterial vaginosis in women. Other homing molecules previously suggested as required for homing to the genital mucosa such as α4β1 and α4β7 were also differentially expressed in these patients. However, CD11c expression, an integrin chain rarely analyzed in the context of T cell immunity, was the most consistently elevated in all activated effector CD8+ T cell subsets analyzed. This molecule was also induced after systemic infection in mice, suggesting that CD11c is not exclusive of genital tract infection. Still, its increase in response to genital tract disorders may represent a novel surrogate marker of mucosal immunity in women, and warrants further exploration for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes

Maximal Points of Head's Zone in Fixed Drug Eruption

The principles determining the primary localization of lesions in fixed drug eruption (FDE) are still unknown. Studies investigating the predilection areas in FDE have indicated drug-related, trauma-related, or inflammation-related specific site involvement, as well as visceracutaneous reflex-related specific site involvement. The importance of viscerocutaneous reflexes for the location of dermatoses was first recognized in the 1960s. Head's zones are viscerocutaneous reflex projection fields on the skin that extend over certain dermatomes and possess a reflex-associated maximal point. Recently, in a Turkish collective of patients, three women with the primary location of FDE lesions on the maximal points of Head's zones were presented. We also experienced 3 cases with FDE where the lesions were located at specific sites (buttocks), the so-called maximal points of Head's zones, which are known to be the most active dermatomal areas of an underlying visceral pathology. An underlying internal disturbance (ureter stone, pyelonephritis and chronic pelvic inflammatory disease) was found in all 3 patients, corresponding to the organ-related maximal point of Head's zones in each case. In conclusion, the primary location of FDE lesions on the maximal points of Head's zones revealed relevant organ disorders with corresponding projection fields

大阪地域における近世被差別部落の人口動態とその背景についての一考察 : 河内国丹北郡更池村内の近世部落を中心として

The overall demographic pattern in early-modern Japan showed a steady increase in population during the early Edo period, followed by a phase during which the population remained stagnant or actually declined during the mid-Edo period, and finally a stage of resumed growth at the end of the period. On the other hand, the trend among Buraku communities almost everywhere in Japan during the mid- and late-Edo periods was toward continued growth. During the 1950s researchers were already attributing this paradox not to the influx of new blood into the Buraku communities but to a natural increase brought about by a high birth rate. New research since the 1970s has sought to pursue the reasons for the increase more deeply. Among the factors that have come to light is that occupations of the residents of the Buraku communities had come to include the making of straw sandals and drums, farming, day-labouring, and many other pursuits as well as the traditional tanning of animal hides. As a result, their economic well-being improved to the extent that the practices of abortion and infanticide, previously common among both peasants and townspeople especially during famines, became less of a necessity than before, leading naturally to an increase in population. In the present paper I begin by setting out the data about population increase in Buraku communities in both the Osaka region and Japan as a whole during the period in question. Following that I outline the increase in the Buraku population of Saraike Village, Tanboku county, Kawachi from the pre-Edo period to the beginning of the modern period, seeking especially to throw light on the background to the changes. By these means I show that in the said village too there was a variety of occupations, and that this variety lay behind the natural increase that the village population showed. However, another conclusion that emerges clearly from this research is that more than 60% of the houses were rented, and that during times of bad harvests the death rate among babies and infants was considerably higher than among other peasants. It is clear, in other words, that life was by no means stable for those living in the Buraku communities