Search

Resume But de l’etude. – Les sarcomes des tissus mous thoraciques regroupent les sarcomes parietaux, pulmonaires et mediastinaux. Il s’agit de tumeurs rares pour lesquelles les indications therapeutiques et les facteurs pronostiques sont mal connus. Le but de ce travail etait de rapporter une serie de 40 patients atteints de sarcomes des tissus mous thoraciques en analysant les caracteristiques anatomocliniques, la prise en charge et les facteurs pronostiques. Methodes et patients. – Les dossiers de 40 patients pris en charge de 1994 a 2001 ont ete analyses a partir d’une base de donnees constituee de facon prospective. Les survies etaient analysees selon la methode de Kaplan-Meier et comparees par un test du log-rank. Les facteurs pronostiques etaient identifies par un modele de Cox. Resultats. – L’âge median des patients etait de 48 ans et le sex-ratio de 15 hommes/25 femmes. Le type histologique principal etait l’histiocytofibrome malin (11 cas). Vingt et une lesions etaient de haut grade de malignite. La paroi thoracique representait la localisation principale (26 cas). Trente-deux tumeurs ont ete traitees chirurgicalement, dont 22 par une exerese radicale (marges saines). Les traitements associes etaient une chimiotherapie neo-adjuvante (8 cas) ou adjuvante (8 cas) et/ou une radiotherapie postoperatoire (17 cas). La survie a 5 ans etait de 45 %. En analyse univariee, les facteurs pronostiques etaient l’âge (p = 0,05), l’index de Karnofsky (p = 0,008), l’absence de metastases d’emblee (p = 0,003), une exerese radicale (p = 0,043) et une chimiotherapie adjuvante (p = 0,04). La localisation tumorale n’avait pas de valeur pronostique. Conclusions. – La prise en charge des sarcomes des tissus mous thoraciques est multidisciplinaire et reposent avant tout sur une exerese si possible radicale. Le pronostic des sarcomes pulmonaires, parietaux et mediastinaux est comparable.

We initiated a pilot study of adjuvant hepatic arterial infusion chemotherapy (AHAIC) using 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and leucovorin. Hepatic arterial infusion ports were placed in 15 consecutive patients undergoing curative resection of colorectal liver metastases. The chemotherapy regimen consisted of a weekly infusion of 5-FU (12 mg m 2 per day) and leucovorin (200 mg m 2 per day) for 12 months. The mean follow-up was 22 months (range 3-62 months, SD 21-37 months). There were no clinical or biological complications related to chemotherapy, except for sharp epigastric burns in four patients immediately after 5-FU infusions. Catheter irreversible occlusions led to early cessation of the treatment in three patients. Four of the 15 evaluable patients developed recurrent disease. The site of relapse was the liver in two patients and extra-hepatic sites in the two remaining patients. Three of these four patients died of their recurrent disease. These results suggest that 5-FU and leucovorin can be combined for AHAIC in a long duration regimen with a very low rate of side-effects. This protocol could be safely employed in a prospective randomized study in combination with 5-FU systemic infusions.

This paper presents the implementation of a real-time electronic polarization tracking algorithm which enables robust optical polarization-multiplexed synchronous quadrature phase shift keying transmission with DFB lasers. The achieved BER at a data rate of 2.8 Gbit/s is well below the FEC threshold.

Proteases contribute to tumor invasion and metastasis via their potential to degrade basement membranes and extracellular matrix. Our aim was to compare the level of several proteases: urokinase-type plasminogen activator (u-PA), matrix metalloproteinase 2 (MMP-2; 72-kDa type IV collagenase, also known as gelatinase A), MMP-11 [also known as stromelysin 3 (STR3)], and cathepsins B and L in resected non-small cell lung cancer. Between June 1996 and March 1998, samples of lung tumor tissues were taken from 119 surgically treated patients. Thirty out of the 119 tumor samples were matched with corresponding adjacent normal tissue. u-PA was measured by a commercially available immunoluminometric assay. Metalloproteinases and cathepsins have been evaluated at the RNA level by Northern blot and quantified with a PhosphorImager. Expression of these proteases was compared to the following clinicopathological parameters: pathological diagnosis, tumor size, exposure to asbestos, radiotherapy, neo-adjuvant chemotherapy, tumor-node-metastasis stage, lymph node involvement, presence of metastasis. u-PA, MMP-2, MMP-11/STR3, and cathepsin B were significantly increased in tumor (the tumor:normal ratio was on average increased by 5.4-, 2.2-, 83.5-, and 2.2-fold, respectively). The tumor:normal ratio of MMP-11/ STR3 was found to be significantly linked to the lymph node involvement (P0.05). Our results suggest that several proteases are involved in the invasive potential of non-small cell lung cancer and that the quantification of MMP-11/ STR3 could represent an useful prognostic marker.

Molecular markers can improve staging and predict aggressive clinical behavior in esophageal cancer, thus helping to define appropriate therapeutic protocols and to identify patients who will benefit from surgery. We therefore characterized, by Northern blot and/or immunohistochemistry, the relative expression of three effectors involved in the invasion, angiogenesis, and dissemination of tumor cells in esophageal cancer versus nontumoral mucosae: (a) stromelysin-3 (ST3), a member of the metalloproteinase family; (b) basement membrane 40/secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine (BM-40/SPARC), an extracellular matrix-associated protein involved in angiogenesis; and (c) the hepatocyte growth factor receptor MET, which triggers the scattering of epithelial cells. Results were analyzed in relation to clinicopathological parameters (cpTNE) including tumor size (T), lymph node status (N), periesophageal tissue invasion (E), disease recurrence, and overall survival. The ST3, BM-40/SPARC, and MET genes were found to be overexpressed in tumor samples compared to control mucosa. BM-40/SPARC and MET mRNA levels were not linked to any one of the cpTNE, indicating that this overexpression occurs at an early stage of neoplastic progression. In contrast, ST3 expression, identified by immunohistochemistry in fibroblastic cells surrounding neoplastic islets, correlated with tumor size and periesophageal tissue invasion. Of the 36 patients studied, those with high ST3 levels had shorter disease-free survival than those with low levels, but there was no relationship between the cpTNE and disease recurrence or survival. Our study demonstrates that ST3, BM-40/SPARC, and MET are involved in different steps of esophageal carcinogenesis and that ST3 overexpression is a marker of aggressive clinical behavior. We conclude that in esophageal cancer, ST3 might help to assess survival and the risk of recurrence after surgical resection.

Silicon photonics have generated an increasing interest in the recent year, mainly for optical telecommunications or for optical interconnects in microelectronic circuits. The rationale of silicon photonics is the reduction of the cost of photonic systems through the integration of photonic components and an IC on a common chip, or in the longer term, the enhancement of IC performance with the introduction of optics inside a high performance chip. In order to build a Opto-Electronic Integrated circuit (OEIC), a large European project HELIOS has been launched two years ago. The objective is to combine a photonic layer with a CMOS circuit by different innovative means, using microelectronics fabrication processes. High performance generic building blocks that can be used for a broad range of applications are developed such as WDM sources by III-V/Si heterogeneous integration, fast Si modulators and Ge or InGaAs detectors, Si passive circuits and specific packaging. Different scenari for integrating photonic with an electronic chip and the recent advances on the building blocks of the Helios project are presented.