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We employed a modified refractory-metal-addition method to achieve higher coercivity and remanence in heavy rare earth element (HREE)-free Nd--Fe--B sintered magnets. This process involved inducing the formation of a homogeneous secondary phase at the grain boundaries during sintering, making it possible to control the intergrain diffusion by adding small amounts of Mo, a refractory metal. To control the microstructure of the secondary phase effectively, a metal organic compound of the refractory metal was coated on the surfaces of the particles of an HREE-free Nd--Fe--B powder. The average grain size after this process was 5.60 μm, which was approximately 1.8 μm smaller than that of the HREE-free sintered Nd--Fe--B magnets (7.4 μm). The coercivity of the magnets prepared through this process could be increased from 11.88 kOe to 13.91 kOe without decreasing their remanence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kynurenine (Kyn) is a key inducer of an immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME). Although indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO)-selective inhibitors have been developed to suppress the Kyn pathway, the results were not satisfactory due to the presence of various opposing mechanisms. Here, we employed an orally administered novel Kyn pathway regulator to overcome the limitation of anti-tumor immune response. We identified a novel core structure that inhibited both IDO and TDO. An orally available lead compound, STB-C017 (designated hereafter as STB), effectively inhibited the enzymatic and cellular activity of IDO and TDO in vitro. Moreover, it potently suppressed Kyn levels in both the plasma and tumor in vivo. STB monotherapy increased the infiltration of CD8+ T cells into TME. In addition, STB reprogrammed the TME with widespread changes in immune-mediated gene signatures. Notably, STB-based combination immunotherapy elicited the most potent anti-tumor efficacy through concurrent treatment with immune checkpoint inhibitors, leading to complete tumor regression and long-term overall survival. Our study demonstrated that a novel Kyn pathway regulator derived using deep learning technology can activate T cell immunity and potentiate immune checkpoint blockade by overcoming an immunosuppressive TME. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background/Aim: Colon cancer is prone to distant metastases to other sites and the risk of recurrence is relatively high. Therefore, the identification of liver metastasis-related factors is important for the diagnosis or treatment of colon cancer. The aim of this study was to identify the metastasis-related factors that are differentially expressed in synchronous solitary liver metastasis compared to primary colon cancer. Materials and Methods: Tissues of primary colon cancer and associated with liver metastases of five patients were used for mass spectrometry. Identified proteins were validated by western blotting. The in silico analysis was performed using the STRING database and GeneMANIA. Results: We identified 58 differentially expressed proteins (DEPs), including 51 under-expressed and 7 over-expressed proteins among a total of 164 identified proteins. Major hubs of protein-protein networks were ACTC1, PRDX6, TPI1, and ALDH1A1. DEPs were located in the extracellular region and cytoplasm and were involved in the regulation of enzymatic activity. The metabolic process was significantly enriched in biological processes and an involvement in the KEGG pathway. Conclusion: These DEPs can potentially be used as biomarkers for the diagnosis of liver metastasis and they may provide a new strategy for developing anti-metastatic liver drugs in colon cancer patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The mental V-Y advancement flap method is useful for reconstruction of lower lip defect because of its many advantages. However, it is not easy to select the optimal reconstructive method for the vermilion defect that remains after application of the mental V-Y advancement flap. In choosing the representative surgical method for vermilion mucosal reconstruction including mucosal V-Y advancement flap, buccal mucosal flap, and buccal mucosal graft. We describe an efficient technique to large lower lip defects combining mental V-Y advancement flap and buccal mucosal graft. Methods: This study included 16 patients who underwent reconstructive surgery for full-thickness and large defect (> half the entire width) of the lower lip from October 2006 to September 2017. The operation was conducted using mental V-Y advancement flap with various vermilion mucosal reconstruction methods considering the location of the defect and the amount of residual tissue of the lip coloboma after excision. Results: All patients underwent mental V-Y advancement flap. In vermilion mucosal reconstruction, five patients underwent mucosal V-Y advancement flap, three underwent buccal mucosal flap, and eight underwent buccal mucosal graft. There were good aesthetic and functional results in all patients who underwent buccal mucosal graft. However, two patients who underwent mucosal V-Y advancement flap complained of oral incompetence, and all patients who underwent buccal mucosal flap had oral commissure deformity. Conclusion: Buccal mucosal graft combined with mental V-Y advancement flap can produce suitable functional and aesthetic outcomes in near total lower lip reconstruction in patient with large mucosal defect including vermilion portion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we aimed to investigate the neuroprotective effects of caffeic acid phenethyl ester (CAPE), an active component of propolis purified from honeybee hives, on photothrombotic cortical ischemic injury in mice. Permanent focal ischemia was achieved in the medial frontal and somatosensory cortices of anesthetized male C57BL/6 mice by irradiation of the skull with cold light laser in combination with systemic administration of rose bengal. The animals were treated with CAPE (0.5-5 mg/kg, i.p.) twice 1 and 6 h after ischemic insult. CAPE significantly reduced the infarct size as well as the expression of tumor necrosis factor-α, hypoxiainducible factor-1α, monocyte chemoattractant protein-1, interleukin-1α, and indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase in the cerebral cortex ipsilateral to the photothrombosis. Moreover, it induced an increase in heme oxygenase-1 immunoreactivity and interleukin-10 expression. These results suggest that CAPE exerts a remarkable neuroprotective effect on ischemic brain injury via its anti-inflammatory properties, thereby providing a benefit to the therapy of cerebral infarction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A vision sensor was introduced and tested for early detection of citrus Huanglongbing (HLB). This disease is caused by the bacterium Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus (CLas) and is transmitted by the Asian citrus psyllid. HLB is a devastating disease that has exerted a significant impact on citrus yield and quality in Florida. Unfortunately, no cure has been reported for HLB. Starch accumulates in HLB infected leaf chloroplasts, which causes the mottled blotchy green pattern. Starch rotates the polarization plane of light. A polarized imaging technique was used to detect the polarization-rotation caused by the hyper-accumulation of starch as a pre-symptomatic indication of HLB in young seedlings. Citrus seedlings were grown in a room with controlled conditions and exposed to intensive feeding by CLas-positive psyllids for eight weeks. A quantitative polymerase chain reaction was employed to confirm the HLB status of samples. Two datasets were acquired; the first created one month after the exposer to psyllids and the second two months later. The results showed that, with relatively unsophisticated imaging equipment, four levels of HLB infections could be detected with accuracies of 72%-81%. As expected, increasing the time interval between psyllid exposure and imaging increased the development of symptoms and, accordingly, improved the detection accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: KIOM-CRC#BP3B (BP3B) is a novel herbal prescription that is composed of three plant extracts. Our preliminary study identified that BP3B exhibited potent anti-proliferative activity against various types of cancer cell lines in vitro. Because the in vivo anti-tumor effect of BP3B is not evaluated before clinical trial, we want to test it using patient's samples. Methods: To confirm the in vivo anti-cancer effect of BP3B, we used genetically characterized patient-derived colon tumor xenograft (PDTX) mouse model. Anti-cancer activity was evaluated with apoptosis, proliferation, angiogenesis and histological analysis. Results: Oral administration of BP3B significantly inhibited the tumor growth in two PDTX models. Furthermore, TUNEL assay showed that BP3B induced apoptosis of tumor tissues, which was associated with degradation of PARP and Caspase 8 and activation of Caspase 3. We also observed that BP3B inhibited cancer cell proliferation by down-regulation of Cyclin D1 and induction of p27 proteins. Inhibition of angiogenesis in BP3B-treated group was observed with immunofluorescence staining using CD31 and Tie-2 antibodies. Conclusion: These findings indicated that BP3B has a strong growth-inhibitory activity against colon cancer in in vivo model and will be a good therapeutic candidate for treatment of refractory colon cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Selective 5-hydroxytryptamine type 3 (5-HT3) receptor antagonists are reported to have potent antiemetic effects for postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV). The purpose of this study was to prospectively evaluate the efficacy of palonosetron, granisetron, and ramosetron for the prevention of PONV in patients undergoing laparoscopic gynecologic surgery. Methods: In this prospective, randomized observational study, 105 healthy female patients who were undergoing laparocopic hystectomy under general anaesthesia were enrolled (clinical trial number: NCT01752374, www.clinicaltrials.gov). Patients were divided into three groups: the palonostron (0.075 mg i.v.; n = 35), the granisetron group (3 mg i.v.; n = 35), and the ramosetron group (0.3 mg i.v.; n = 35). The treatments were given before the end of surgery. The incidence of PONV, severity of nausea/vomiting, and the use of rescue antiemetic requirements during the first 48 h after surgery were evaluated. Results: The overall incidence of PONV was 33.3 % for this series. The number of complete responders at 48 h after the surgery was 21 (60.0 %) for palonosetron, 24 (68.6 %) for granisetron, and 26 (71.4 %) for ramosetron, representing no statistical difference (P = 0.086). Conclusions: There were no significant differences in the overall incidence of postoperative nausea and vomiting and complete responders for palonosetron, granisetron and ramosetron group. Trial registration: Clinical trial number: NCT01752374, www.clinicaltrials.gov. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To trace the changes of association rules over an on line data stream efficiently, this paper proposes two different methods of generating association rules directly over the changing set of currently frequent itemsets. These methods can avoid the drawbacks of the conventional two-step approach and provide an efficient way. The prefix tree itself can be utilized as an index structure for finding the current support of an association rule. While all of the currently frequent itemsets are monitored by the prefix tree, a traversal stack is employed to efficiently enumerate all association rules. In the on-line environment, a user may be interested in finding those association rules whose antecedents or consequents are fixed as a specific itemset. For this purpose, two additional methods, namely Assoc-X and Assoc-Y, are introduced. Finally, the proposed methods are compared by a series of experiments to identify its various characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The effect of insufficient node sampling in patients with rectal cancer managed by neoadjuvant chemoradiation followed by surgery has not been clearly determined. We evalulated the impact of insufficient sampling or even abscence of lymph nodes in the specimen on survival in patients at high-risk (T3, T4 or node positive) for rectal cancer.Methods: We conducted a single institution, retrospective analysis of all patients who underwent surgical rectal resection following neoadjuvant chemoradiation for treatment of mid to lower rectal cancer between 1997 and 2009. ypNX was defined as the absence of lymph nodes retrieved in the resected specimen.Results: A total of 132 patients underwent resection for treatment of rectal cancer following neoadjuvant chemoradiation. Ninety four patients (71.2%) were considered as having node-negative disease, including ypNx and ypN0. In 38 patients (28.8%), the primary tumor was associated with regional lymph node metastases (ypNpos). The mean number of retrieved nodes per specimen was 14.2, respectively. The five-year overall survival from initial operation for the ypNx group was 100%, respectively. The estimated five-year overall survival for ypN0 and ypNpos was 84.0% and 60.3%, respectively (P =0.001). No significant differences in overall survival were observed between the ypNx and ypN0 group (P =0.302).Conclusion: Absence of recovered LN in resected specimens after neoadjuvant chemoradiation was observed in 7.6% of specimens. Absence of LN should not be regarded as a risk factor for poor survival or as a sign of less radical surgery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis usually resulted in admission to the intensive care unit (ICU) during hospitalization. When admitted to the ICU, the mortality was high. The aim of this study is to identify multiple prognostic factors for mortality and to analyze the significance of prognostic survival model with each scoring system in patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis who was admitted to the ICU. Methods: From January 2008 to December 2008, 60 consecutive patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis were admitted in the ICU and retrospectively reviewed. Prognostic models used were Child-Turcotte-Pugh (CTP), model for end-stage liver disease (MELD), model for end-stage liver disease with incorporation of serum sodium (MELD-Na), acute physiology and chronic health evaluation (APACHE) II, and sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA). The predictive prognosis was analyzed using the area under the receiver's operating characteristics curve (AUC). Results: The median follow up period was 20 months, and ICU mortality was 17% (n = 10). A total of 24 patients (40%) died during the study period. The average survival of five prognostic models was related with the severity of the disease. All of the five systems showed significant differences in the cumulative survival rate, according to the scores on admission, and the MELD-Na had the highest AUC (0.924). Multivariate analysis showed that bilirubin and albumin were significantly related to mortality. Conclusions: The CPT, MELD, MELD-Na, APACHE II, and SOFA may predict the prognosis of patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis. The MELD-Na could be a better prognostic predictor than other scoring systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mg-Al layered double hydroxide was entrapped in calcium alginate beads (LDH-alginate beads) for phosphate removal. A field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM), combined with an energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer and an X-ray diffractometer, were used to analyze the properties of LDH-alginate beads. Batch and flow-through column experiments were performed to examine phosphate removal in LDH-alginate beads. FESEM images show that the crosssectional surface of LDH-alginate beads was heterogeneous in surface topography, and LDH powders were intermingled with alginate polymers. Experimental results indicate that Mg-Al LDH-alginate beads are effective in the removal of phosphate. Batch experiments indicate that phosphate removal in 8% LDH-alginate beads was not sensitive to initial solution pHs between 4.9 and 8.9. Kinetic experiments demonstrate that phosphate removal reached equilibrium around 12 h of reaction time. Column experiments show that the removal capacity of 8% LDH-alginate beads was two orders of magnitude greater than that of pure alginate beads. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

K-Ras somatic mutations in advanced colorectal cancer (CRC) can predict resistance to mAbs that target the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR). The relationships between K-ras mutations and the EGFR status have not yet been examined, especially in Korean patients. A total of 82 colorectal tumors (stage III-IV) were analyzed. K-Ras mutations at codons 12 and 13 were detected by polymerase chain reaction—single strand conformational polymorphism. The EGFR expressions were examined by immunohistochemistry, and these were graded according to a modified EGFR expression scoring system. The relationships between the patients’ characteristics and the survival time and the gene mutation status were analyzed. The EGFR expression was positive in 69 patients (84.1%) and negative in 13 patients (15.9%). The K-ras mutation rate was 35.4%. In all, 20 (68.9%) cases were mutated at codon 12 and 9 (31.1%) cases were mutated at codon 13. No relationship was observed between the EGFR status and K-ras mutation. The median overall survival (OS) was 68.1 months. There was no difference between the K-ras mutant group and the wild type group for overall survival (30.3% vs 21.0%, respectively, at 36 months, P = .777). K-ras mutation and the EGFR status were not independent prognostic factors for OS (P = .105 and P = .499, respectively). For the Korean patients with CRC, the rate of an EGFR protein expression was greater than that for the patients in Western countries, and the rate of K-ras mutations was lower than that for patients in Western countries. This study found no correlation between the EGFR status and K-ras mutations in colorectal tumors. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses a study on the prognostic role of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) in stage 2 colon cancers. The study was participated by patients who were diagnosed with pathologic stage 2 colon cancer after curative resection for colon carcinoma at the Samsung Medical Center at Sungkyunkwan University. The study concluded that FOXP3-positive and CD45RO-positive TILs have independent prognostic significance that can provide an independent predictor for prognosis and help refine the selection of patient subgroups with unfavorable prognosis.

The purpose of this study was to investigate clinically useful information for effective screening for synchronous and metachronous second primary cancers and to suggest potential surveillance tool. We retrospectively reviewed 1,063 patients who were treated with potentially curative surgery for colorectal cancer at Gachon University, Gil Hospital from 1997 to 2007. The incidence of synchronous or metachronous cancer in addition to colorectal cancer was 5.3% (57 patients). The most common second primary cancer was stomach (54.3%), followed by cancers in cervix (12.2%). The time interval between the first and second tumor in colorectal cancer associated with metachronous extracolonic malignancy ranged from 1.1 to 10.8 years. The incidence of early-stage tumor was higher in patients with synchronous cancer than in those with a metachronous cancer with statistical significance ( p = 0.034). The 5-year survival rate of the colorectal cancer group without second primary cancer was 70.1%, whereas that for the second primary cancer group was 63.8% ( p = 0.253). The 5-year survival rate of the colorectal cancer group with stomach cancer was 70.5%, whereas that for the second primary cancer other than stomach cancer group was 56.6% ( p = 0.282). The frequent association between colorectal cancer and gastric cancer suggests an inclusion of gastrofiberscope when surveillancing patients with colorectal cancer in Korean population. Second primary cancers may develop even 10 years after the initial operation; thus, a need for lifelong surveillance even more than 5 years may be necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the effectiveness of cilostazol in the treatment of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). It describes the method of the study wherein a mice was induced with arthritis and treated with cilostazol. It states that cilostazol enhances apoptosis and inhibits the proliferation of synovial fibroblasts. It also emphasizes the ability of the drug to block cytokine production by the medication of the cyclic adenylic acid (cAMP)-dependent protein kinase activation.

The identification of differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) observed under specific conditions is one of the key issues inproteomics research. There are currently several ways to detect the changes of a specific protein's expression level in two-dimensionalelectrophoresis (2-DE) gel images such as statistical analysis and graphical visualization. However, it is quite difficult to handle the information of an individual protein manually by these methods due to the large distortions of patterns in 2-DE images. This paperproposes a method of analyzing DEPs for a specific disease. In order to automatically extract meaningful DEPs in a set of 2-DE gel images, we have designed an exception function that is suitableto measure the anomalous change of the expression level of an individual protein. We present the comparison results of the proposed method versus aWilcoxon paired t-test that is one of the widely used statistical analysis methods. Several experiments are performed to address not only the effectiveness of the exceptionfunction but also the fact that these two methods can compensate each other practically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Query processing for a data stream should also be continuous and rapid. This article proposes a novel approach for consistent collective evaluation of multiple continuous queries for filtering two different types of data streams: a relational stream and an XML stream. The proposed approach commonly provides region-based selection constructs: an attribute selection construct for relational queries and a path selection construct for XPath queries. Both collectively evaluate the selection predicates of the same attribute (path), based on the precomputed matching results of the queries in each of the disjoint regions divided by the selection predicates. The performance experiments show that the proposed approach is practically more efficient and stable than other approaches at run-time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Frequent item set mining is one of the most challenging issues for descriptive data mining. In general, its resulting set tends to produce a large number of frequent item sets. To represent them in a more compact notation, closed or maximal frequent item sets are often used but finding such item sets over online transactional data streams is not easy due to the requirements of a data stream. For this purpose, this paper proposes a method of tracing the set of MFIs instantly over an online data stream. The method, namely estMax, maintains the set of frequent item sets by a prefix tree and extracts all MFIs without any additional superset/subset checking mechanism. Upon processing a new transaction, those frequent item sets that are matched maximally by the transaction are newly marked in their corresponding nodes of the prefix tree as candidates for MFIs. At the same time, if any subset of a newly marked item set has been already marked as a candidate MFI by a previous transaction, it is cleared as well. By employing this additional step, it is possible to extract the set of MFIs at any moment. The performance of the estMax method is comparatively analyzed by a series of experiments to identify its various characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Platelet-activating factor (PAF) has been long believed to be associated with many pathophysiological processes during septic shock. Here we present novel activities for PAF in protecting mice against LPS-mediated endotoxic shock. Principal Findings: In vivo PAF treatment immediately after LPS challenge markedly improved the survival rate against mortality from endotoxic shock. Administration of PAF prominently attenuated LPS-induced organ injury, including profound hypotension, excessive polymorphonuclear neutrophil infiltration, and severe multiple organ failure. In addition, PAF treatment protects against LPS-induced lymphocytes apoptosis. These protective effects of PAF was correlated with significantly decreases in the production of the inflammatory mediators such as TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-12, and IFN-γ, while increasing production of the anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10 in vivo and in vitro. Conclusions: Taken together, these results suggest that PAF may protect mice against endotoxic shock via a complex mechanism involving modulation of inflammatory and anti-inflammatory mediators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Aim: The resection of synchronous or metachronous pulmonary and liver metastasis is an aggressive treatment option for patients with stage IV colorectal cancer and has been shown to yield acceptable long-term survival. We reviewed our experience with colorectal cancer patients with both liver and lung resections to determine the efficacy of surgical resections. Methods: We performed a single institution, retrospective analysis of all patients who underwent surgical hepatic and pulmonary resection for metastatic colorectal cancer between 1995 and 2004. Results: A total of 32 patients underwent resection of both hepatic and pulmonary metastases secondary to colorectal cancer. The 5-year overall survival from initial operation was 60.8%. The disease-free interval was 44.3 months (95% confidence interval: 24.7 and 63.8, respectively). Neither the number of pulmonary lesions nor the time interval between the primary surgery and the metastasectomy had a significant impact on survival ( P = 0.134). Conclusion: An aggressive surgical treatment of selected colorectal cancer patients with lung and liver metastases resulted in prolonged survival. The 5-year survival rate of 60.8% with no perioperative mortality was observed in our study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Anastomosis leakage is a major complication of rectal surgery. The aim of this study was to identify risk factors for anastomotic leakage after low anterior resection (LAR) in rectal cancer patients and study its impact on long-term prognosis and disease-free survival and overall survival in rectal cancer patients. Consecutive patients who underwent rectal resection with primary anastomosis below the pelvic peritoneal reflexion for rectal cancer between October 1996 to February 2006 were included. Anastomosis leakage after LAR occurred in 51 patients (4.0%). The median time to leakage was 4 days (range = 2–30 days). In univariate analysis, gender, level of anastomosis less than 4 cm, preoperative concomitant chemoradiation (CCRT), and length of operation greater than 120 min were significantly associated with anastomosis leakage. In a multivariate analysis, gender ( p = 0.041; relative risk = 2.007; 95% CI = 1.030–3.912) and preoperative CCRT ( p = 0.003; relative risk = 2.861; 95% CI = 1.417–5.778) were identified as independent prognostic factors. The overall survival of the nonleakage group and the leakage group was 80.2% and 64.9%, respectively ( p = 0.170). The 5-year disease-free survival rates were not significantly different between the nonleakage and leakage groups (78.1% vs. 65.9%, p = 0.166). The incidence of anastomotic leakage after low anterior resection is relatively low. Male gender and preoperative CCRT were associated with increased risk for anastomotic leakage after rectal cancer surgery. No effect of anastomosis leakage on local recurrence was found in this series. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cilostazol increases intracellular cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cyclic AMP) levels by inhibiting type III phosphodiesterase. It was approved by the Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of intermittent claudication. Its principal actions include inhibition of platelet aggregation, antithrombotic action in cerebral ischemia, and vasodilation, mediated by increased cyclic AMP levels. In a multicenter, randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind clinical trial, cilostazol has been shown to protect patients from recurrent cerebral infarction. It has been recently suggested that cilastozol could be useful in the treatment of transient focal cerebral ischemic injury. Beneficial effects of cilostazol in cerebral ischemic infarction and edema formation has been confirmed in rats by the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The preventive effect was ascribed to cAMP-dependent protein kinase (PKA)-coupled maxi-K channel activation with additional antioxidant and poly(adenosine diphosphate [ADP]-ribose) polymerase inhibitory actions. Most recently, cilostazol has been shown to prevent vacuolation and rarefaction in the white matter of the rats subjected to chronic cerebral hypoperfusion in association with suppression of astrocyte and microglial activation. Taken together, recent experimental studies with cilostazol showed promising results in cerebral ischemia and chronic cerebral hypoperfusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study was conducted to devise a prognostic model for patients undergoing simultaneous liver and colorectal resection. A retrospective analysis was performed on 138 colorectal patients who underwent simultaneous liver and colorectal resection between September 1994 and September 2005. The primary endpoint of the study was overall survival. Three patients with positive liver resection margin were excluded from the analysis. At multivariate level, poor prognostic factors were liver resection margin ≤5 mm ( P = 0.047; relative risk, 1.684; 95% CI = 1.010–2.809), CEA greater than 5 ng/ml ( P = <0.001; relative risk, 2.507; 95% CI = 1.499–4.194), number of liver metastasis > 1 ( P = <0.042; relative risk, 1.687; 95% CI = 1.020–2.789), and lymph node ≥ 4 ( P = <0.012; relative risk, 1.968; 95% CI = 1.158–3.347). The risk stratification grouping of the 135 patients was performed according to the following criteria: low risk group, 0–1 factor; intermediate risk group, 2 factors; high-risk group, 3–4 factors. Of 135 patients, 86 patients (63.0%) were categorized as low-risk group, 36 patients (26.6%) as intermediate risk group, and 14 patients (10.4%) as high-risk group. Median survival times for low, intermediate, high-risk groups were 68.0, 43.6 (95% CI, 24.7–62.4), and 23.5 months (95% CI, 9.4–31.5), respectively. The high-risk group demonstrated an approximately threefold (relative risk, 3.1; 95% CI, 1.6–6.0) increased risk of death. A simple risk factor stratification system was proposed to evaluate the chances of cure of patients after simultaneous resection of liver metastases and primary colorectal carcinoma. The risk factor stratification showed three groups with distinct survival. The risk stratification may help to predict patient survival after simultaneous liver and colorectal resection. This system needs further prospective validation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of chest radiography (CXR) and abdominal computed tomography (CT) for detecting pulmonary metastases after curative surgery for colorectal cancer. We performed a retrospective analysis of the records of all patients with pulmonary metastasis from colorectal cancer who underwent curative resection between 1994 and 2004 at our institution. Pulmonary metastases were detected in 193 patients by either CXR or abdominal CT. They were initially detected by CXR in 87 patients (45.1%) and by abdominal CT in 106 patients (54.9%). In the CXR group, the patterns of pulmonary recurrence were as follows: solitary ( n = 38, 43.7%), multiple unilateral ( n = 11, 12.6%), and multiple bilateral ( n = 38, 43.7%). In the CT group, there were 22 patients (20.8%) with a solitary nodule, 17 patients (16.0%) with multiple unilateral nodules, and 67 (63.2%) with multiple bilateral nodules. The overall survivals of the CXR group and abdominal CT group were 34.6% and 31.7%, respectively ( p = 0.312). There was no difference in the median disease-free interval between the CXR group and the abdominal CT group (23.8 vs. 23.2 months, p = 0.428). Although this study is limited by its small sample size, it can be speculated that abdominal CT with lower thorax images may replace CXR in surveillance programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because palpating colonic tumors during laparoscopy is impossible, the precise location of a tumor must be identified before operation. The aim of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of various diagnostic methods that are used to localize colorectal tumors and to propose an adequate localization protocol for laparoscopic colorectal surgery. A total of 310 patients underwent laparoscopy-assisted colectomy between April 2000 and March 2006. We investigated if the locations of the tumors that were estimated preoperatively were consistent with the actual locations according to the operation. All the tumors were correctly localized and resected. Altogether, 203 patients had complete endoscopic reports available. Colonoscopy was inaccurate for tumor localization in 23 cases (11.3%). In total, 104 patients (33.5%) underwent barium enema; five tumors (4.8%) were not visualized, and three tumors were incorrectly localized. Another group of 94 patients (30.3%) underwent computed tomography (CT) colonography, which identified 91 of 94 lesions (96.8%). Finally, 96 patients (31.0%) underwent endoscopic tattooing; 2 patients (2.1%) did not have tattoos visualized laparoscopically and required intraoperative colonoscopy to localize their lesions during resection. Dye spillage was found in six patients intraoperatively, but only one patient experienced clinical symptoms. Intraoperative colonoscopy was performed in four patients; two of the four were followed by endoscopic tattooing, and the other two underwent intraoperative colonoscopy for localization. All lesions were correctly localized by intraoperative colonoscopy. The accuracy of tumor localization was as follows: colonoscopy (180/203, 88.7%), barium enema (97/104, 93.3%), CT colonography (89/94, 94.7%), endoscopic tattooing (94/96, 97.9%), and intraoperative colonoscopy (4/4, 100%). With a combination of methods, localization of tumors for laparoscopic surgery did not seem very different from that during open surgery. Preoperative endoscopic tattooing is a safe, highly effective method for localization. In the case of tattoo failure, intraoperative colonoscopy can be used for accurate localization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pulmonary metastases occur in up to 10% of all patients who undergo curative resection. Surgical resection is an important part in the treatment of pulmonary metastasis from colorectal cancer. We analyzed the treatment outcome and prognostic factors affecting survival in this subset of patients. Between October 1994 and December 2004, 59 patients underwent curative resection for pulmonary metastases of colorectal cancer. Uncontrollable synchronous liver and lung metastasis or synchronous colorectal cancer with isolated lung metastasis were excluded from this study. A retrospective review of patient characteristics and factors influencing survival was performed. Survival was analyzed by the Kaplan–Meier method. Comparison between groups were performed by a log-rank analysis and the Cox proportional hazard model. The 5-year overall survival rate of all patients who received pulmonary resection was 50.3%. The number of pulmonary metastases was significantly related with survival in univariate analysis, but not in multivariate analysis ( p = 0.032). Prethoracotomy carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) level exceeding 5 ng/ml was related with poor survival ( p = 0.001). A disease-free interval of greater than 2 years did not correlate with survival after thoracotomy ( p = 0.3). The prethoracotomy CEA level and the number of metastases were independent prognostic factors. Resection of pulmonary metastasis from colorectal cancer may result in improved survival or even healing in selected patients. Pulmonary resection of colorectal cancer is regarded as a safe and effective treatment with low morbidity and mortality rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Semantically related mediators form a hierarchical structure based on the definition of views in each mediator, since a view in a mediator is defined by views in other mediators or base tables in several local information servers. A global query is transformed into a set of its sub-queries; and, each sub-query is the unit of evaluation in an information server or a child mediator. Therefore, it is possible to speed up the execution of a global query if the previous results of frequently requested sub-queries are materialized in a mediator. However, the integrating schema in a mediator can be incrementally modified; and, the evaluation frequency of a global query can also be continuously varied. In order to select the optimized set of materialized sub-queries, with respect to their current evaluation frequencies, the proposed method applies a decay factor for modeling the recent access behavior of each sub-query. As a result, it is possible to adjust the optimized set of materialized sub-queries adaptively according to the recent changes in the evaluation frequencies of sub-queries. Consequently, this paper proposes an algorithm for selecting the optimized set of sub-queries to be materialized in each mediator of a hierarchical mediator system adaptively such that the overall query evaluation cost of the hierarchical mediator system can be minimized at all times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the development of a data acquisition software and hardware system for acquiring off-road vehicle operator health and safety assessment. The data acquisition system was developed using National Instruments' LabView graphical programming language and in conjunction with a modular data acquisition and signal conditioning system and a Differential Global Positioning System receiver. Agricultural machinery is used under a wide variety of road and field conditions, resulting in unwanted shocks and vibrations. This can reduce the driver's comfort, increase the noise level, and can result in inefficient control of machinery.

Abstract

In a mediator, query usage should be carefully monitored to determine the optimized set of materialized sub-queries, since the integration schema of a mediator can be incrementally modified and the evaluation frequency of a global query can also be continuously varied. This paper proposes a theoretical basis for adaptive selection of materialized sub-queries such that available storage in a mediator can be highly utilized at any time. In order to differentiate the recent usage of a query from the past, the accumulated usage frequency of a query decays as time goes by. Consequently, it is possible to find the optimum set of materialized sub-queries which minimizes the total evaluation cost of global queries in linear search complexity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the usefulness of data mining in various fields of information science, various mining methods have been proposed in previous research. Recently, in these fields, data has taken the form of continuous data streams rather than finite stored data sets. In this paper, a mining method of sequential patterns over an online sequence data stream is proposed, which is useful for retrieving embedded knowledge in the data stream. The proposed method can minimize memory usage of the mining process while an error is allowed in its mining result, and supports flexible trade-off between memory usage and mining accuracy. However, the error is minimized by an accurate estimation method for the count of a sequence, which considers the ordering information of items. The proposed method can catch a recent change in a sequence data stream in a short time, by a decaying mechanism gracefully discarding old information that may be no longer useful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: This study evaluated the antiapoptotic effect of antiplatelet drugs, aspirin and clopidogrel, and the antioxidant drug, MCI-186, against focal cerebral ischemic rat brain damage. Methods: Cerebral ischemia was mechanically induced by 2-hour occlusion of the left middle cerebral artery (MCA) using an intraluminal filament followed by 24-hour reperfusion. Results: The cerebral infarct size was little affected by oral administration of 300 mg/kg aspirin, 30 mg/kg clopidogrel or 100 mg/kg MCI-186, but was significantly reduced by 30 mg/kg cilostazol. However, intravenous administration of 10 mg/kg MCI-186 suppressed the infarct size. DNA fragmentation observed in the cortical tissues corresponding to the penumbral zone was not suppressed by aspirin, clopidogrel or MCI-186, but was significantly suppressed by cilostazol. Increased phosphorylation of phosphatase and tensin homolog deleted from chromosome 10 (PTEN) and Bax protein, and decreased Akt/cyclic AMP response element binding protein (CREB) phosphorylation, including Bcl-2 protein in the vehicle-treated group were not affected by treatment with aspirin, clopidogrel and MCI-186, whereas those effects were reversed by cilostazol. Conclusion: Thus, it is suggested that antiplatelet drugs, aspirin and clopidogrel, and antioxidant drug, MCI-186, showed little antiapoptotic effect in contrast to cilostazol. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Knowledge embedded in a data stream is likely to be changed as time goes by. Identifying the recent change of the knowledge quickly can provide valuable information for the analysis of the data stream. However, most mining algorithms over a data stream are not able to extract the recent change of knowledge in a data stream adaptively. This is because the obsolete information of old data elements which may be no longer useful or possibly invalid at present is regarded as being as important as that of recent data elements. This paper proposes a sliding window method that finds recently frequent itemsets over a transactional online data stream adaptively. The size of a sliding window defines the desired life-time of information in a newly generated transaction. Consequently, only recently generated transactions in the range of the window are considered to find the recently frequent itemsets of a data stream. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A data stream is a massive unbounded sequence of data elements continuously generated at a rapid rate. Due to this reason, most algorithms for data streams sacrifice the correctness of their results for fast processing time. The processing time is greatly influenced by the amount of information that should be maintained. This issue becomes more serious in finding frequent itemsets or frequency counting over an online transactional data stream since there can be a large number of itemsets to be monitored. We have proposed a method called the estDec method for finding frequent itemsets over an online data stream. In order to reduce the number of monitored itemsets in this method, monitoring the count of an itemset is delayed until its support is large enough to become a frequent itemset in the near future. For this purpose, the count of an itemset should be estimated. Consequently, how to estimate the count of an itemset is a critical issue in minimizing memory usage as well as processing time. In this paper, the effects of various count estimation methods for finding frequent itemsets are analyzed in terms of mining accuracy, memory usage and processing time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents the development of the inverse model and its application for the characterization of heterogeneous reservoir. Until now, in a area of reservoir characterization, researches that reduce their uncertainty have been performed by integrating static data of cores, logs, seismic, experiment, etc., and dynamic data of production and 4D seismic data. In order to integrate dynamic data into reservoir characterization models, an optimization algorithm must be used in order to minimize the difference between observed and calculated data. In this study, we developed the inverse model using a genetic algorithm, and the optimization method for the inverse calculation was the real-coded genetic algorithm, which is not sensitive for initial value and is possible to search the global optimum. By utilizing the developed model, we performed the characterization to estimate the distributions of porosity and permeability. Firstly, in order to determine the optimal constraint for this system, the inverse calculations were carried out by increasing the maximum values of initial constraints estimated by Kriging method. To obtain results, we determined the case for 2.5 times the maximum permeability as the optimal constraint. From the results of inverse calculations to determine the optimal parameters, such as population size, operator and operation probability for this system, it was found that the selection operator was more sensitive than the crossover, and the roulette wheel operator was more suitable than the tournament as the selection operator. Also, the optimal population size and crossover probability were determined to be 450 and 0.85, respectively. Finally, as the result of characterization for this reservoir system, it is proved that the developed model have been generated the favorable porosity and permeability distributions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]