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The authors studied with scanning electron microscopy the surface of peripheral mononucleated blood cells of healthy subjects and neoplastic patients before and after incubation with thymomodulin, a calf thymus derivative with immunomyelomodulating activity. In the healthy subjects before incubation with thymomodulin a wide number of lymphocytes with villous surface was observed, while monocytes appeared as bigger cells with a central portion of cytoplasm with an adhesion plate. Already after an hour of incubation with the thymic derivative an increase of rough lymphocytes and the appearance of cytoplasmic bridges between lymphocytes and monocytes were observed. Afterwards thymomodulin induced in lymphocytes the forming of cytoplasmic appendages named "uropods" and "pseudopods" which are expression of lymphocytic activation. In cancer patients at base line "monstrous" cells, considered as suffering lymphocytes, were seen and they became morphologically normal after incubation with the thymic derivative.

A sufficient condition of convergence for unconstrained optimization methods is introduced. An alternative proof for the convergence of some algorithms is presented too.

During the year 1985 the Authors, using three-monthly blood abstractions, monitored 67 patients affected with carcinoma in order to observe the serum levels of immune complexes using two enzyme immunoassays. They compared the results obtained by the two methods in connection with the type of tumor and moreover they attempted to find a correlation with the neoplastic progression. The final results are nevertheless little encouraging in the use of these methods to observe the development of the disease.

The much less than Quantigen T and B Cell Assay much greater than method is used to evaluate T and B lymphocyte levels, Nuls Cells and monocytes in the peripheral venous blood of patients surgically treated for breast cancer. The results obtained show a change in immune competent cell levels and temporary immune restoration of the immune response during treatment with immunostimulators.

We have evaluated, by means of stereological analysis, the dimensions of the lymph node functional areas (cortical, medullary, paracortical, histiocytosis of the sinuses, germinal centers) in regional lymph nodes of women with cervical cancer (15 women) and endometrial carcinoma (6 women) in Ist and IInd stage, treated 8 days before surgery with a dose of 1-1.5 mg/kg of body weight of thymostimulin directly into the uterine cervix. 4 women with cervical and endometrial cancer (stages I and II) and treated with the same doses of physiological saline solution were used as controls. The quantitative results show that in the lymph nodes of women treated with thymostimulin there is a statistically significant marked increase (P less than 0.001), of the paracortical areas.

The data of 56 patients with plastic induration of the penis treated at the Department of Urology of Semmelweis University Medical School are presented. After a survey of the literature and of the therapeutic possibilities the surgical solution worked out by the authors recommended. Conservative treatment alone cannot secure a cure and its pre-operative application will not improve the chances of a cure. A palpable knot is the indication for surgery. Postoperative cease on ultrasonic treatment. If for some reason (concomitant illness, oppositions of the patient to operation) only conservative treatment can be applied, ultrasonic therapy is believed the most suitable.

Typical sources of error in the UV spectroscopy of DNA near and below 200 nm are pointed out. In the case of native DNA a procedure for extending the wavelenght range and for analysing the spectra is proposed. As illustration, spectra for DNAs of various origin recorded in the 164–350 nm range at room temperature and at 110 K are presented.

Nonlinear optical phenomena as noncollinear second harmonic and sum frequency generation and also degenerate four-wave mixing can be used to obtain a one-to-one mapping of the temporal intensity distribution function of a short laser pulse on the transversal, spatial intensity distribution of an output beam. Methods for high contrast single shot measurements in the femtosecond to subnanosecond region are suggested using tilting of the wave front and/or short sampling pulses.

Scanning electron microscopy has been used to study the surface of lymphocytes and monocytes before and after treatment with interferon in vitro. Aliquots of peripheral blood isolated cells have been tested using either human leucocytic interferon (HuIFN-alpha) and human fibroblast interferon (HuIFN-beta) and both types combined. The investigation has been performed at various incubation times. The freshly isolated untreated lymphocytes exhibit a rough and villous surface. The smooth forms are uncommon. The treatment by various interferon types induces a new distribution of villous and rough structures as well as the forming of new elements called "uropods" and "pseudopods". At the same time, the binding of lymphocytic elements is enhanced by "cytoplasmic bridges" coming even to real "cellular fusions". Later, macrophages are also involved in these phenomena. These observations seem to confirm the hypothesis that the lymphocyte surface performs significant functions in detecting its surroundings and clearly underlines this cell capacity of reacting to specific substances such as interferons.

The problems of prostatectomy in diabetic patients are discussed. The preoperative state of 54 surgical patients is analysed, the relationships between diabetes and prostatic hypertrophy are pointed out. The special issues of preoperative management are dealt with in detail. The various problems of preoperative and postoperative management are outlined. The significance of arteriosclerosis as a major surgical hazard is emphasized.

Faced with a vaginal melanoma relapse in an old cardiac patient operated in May 1985 for melanoma in the upper 3rd of the vagina, we had to solve a therapeutic problem in view of the impossibility of excising a lesion larger than the preceding one and because the patient refused every type of surgery. So we then chose the combined treatment of intralesional BCG and intravenous beta-Interferon. Monthly intravenous administration of beta-Interferon has reached a total of 8,000,000 I/U, while the BCG has been inoculated intralesionally in the submucosa in doses of 0.1 ml after observing the negative result of the PPD test. Our aim was to achieve double immunological stimulation by combining two drugs that are often used separately with satisfactory results. Before and after every therapy cycle, the immunological status was established, and showed a small but constant and permanent increase in T-lymphocytes, both helper and suppressor. Histological results before and after therapy and immunological responses are reported, and the case distinguishes itself by its brilliant results.

A staining procedure with a new stain easy to prepare is described for the morphologic study of spermatozoa. The stain gives the spermatozoa a dichromatic appearance within 10 seconds (the postacromial part of the head stains blue, the middle piece and tail stain red), which facilitates the morphological classification of spermatozoa for the spermatocytogram.

The \(\overline{K}N\) system at rest plays a key role for the understanding of strong interaction of hadrons with strangeness involved. The experiment SIDDHARTA used X-ray spectroscopy of kaonic atoms to measure the strong interaction induced shift and width of the ground state. It was the first experiment on kaonic He3 and deuterium ever, kaonic hydrogen was measured with improved precision resulting in \(\epsilon_{1s} = -283 \pm 36 \mbox{(stat)} \pm 6 \mbox{(syst)}\) eV and \(\Gamma_{1s} = 541 \pm 89 \mbox{(stat)} \pm 22 \mbox{(syst)}\) eV. Additionally a scheme for an improved future experiment on kaonic deuterium is introduced in this contribution.

The recent advances in GEM detector development has led to the requirement of a custom readout to fully exploit the advantages of this technology. GEM detectors can be realized with various shapes, also irregular, and high number of channels. GEMINI has been specifically designed to work with Triple-GEM detectors and it integrates 16 channels to perform readout with both analog and digital signal with Time over Threshold. GEMINI also allows to set a different threshold for every channel to compensate channel inhomogeneity. This work compares simulations with lab measurements and presents results of the imaging of an X-ray source performed with GEMINI.

Chlamydia trachomatis infection has been investigated in the prostate gland using in-situ DNA hybridization and transmission electron microscopy. Sixty-four samples of tissue removed by trans-urethral resection or by open surgery from men with benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH), were examined histologically and 20 of the cases were found to be positive for mononuclear cell infiltration. Some samples were then investigated using in-situ hybridization and transmission electron microscopy. Out of 20 tissue samples with mononuclear cell infiltration, nine were found to be positive for C. trachomatis infection.

The Mu2e experiment at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory searches for the charged-lepton flavor violation neutrino-less conversion of a negative muon into an electron in the field of an aluminum nucleus. This decay results in a mono- energetic electron with energy slightly below the muon rest mass. The design of the Mu2e experiment has been studied to reach a single event sensitivity that is four order of magnitudes better than previous experiments.The Mu2e calorimeter plays an important role to provide particle identification and an online trigger filter. After a long period of R&D conducted both at INFN and Caltech on the different components, the final technical choice has been made and the calorimeter now consists of two disks, each one made by about 700 un-doped CsI crystals read out by two large area UV-extended silicon photomultipliers.In this paper, we describe the main components of the detector and the tests performed on a large size calorimeter prototype (Module 0) that has been equipped with final crystals, photosensors, front-end electronics and cooling system.

The Mu2e experiment at Fermilab aims to search for the SM forbidden μ− → e− conversion in Al muonic atoms. The signal signature consists of 104.96 MeV electrons, identified by a straw-tube tracker and a crystal calorimeter, made of two annular disks. In order to calibrate the calorimeter disks with minimum ionizing particles (MIP) before the installation, we have realized a Cosmic Ray Tagger (CRT) at Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati (LNF) of INFN. The CRT consists of two planes of eight 2.5×1.5×160 cm3 plastic scintillator (EJ-200) bars, coupled to SiPMs on both edges, so as to estimate longitudinal hit positions from time differences. 3D MIP tracking is achieved by reconstructing hit positions in the two planes, placed above and below the disks, and allows to calibrate the energy response, to align the time offsets, and to study the detector performances dependence along the crystals axis., {"references":["N. Atanov, et al., The Mu2e e.m. calorimeter: Crystals and sipms production status, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science 67 (6) (2020) 978–982. doi:10.1109/TNS.2020.2988422.","N. Atanov, et al., The Mu2e calorimeter final technical design report, arXiv e-prints (2018) arXiv:1802.06341"]}

The muon anomaly ( g − 2 ) μ / 2 has been measured to 0.54 parts per million by E821 experiment at Brookhaven National Laboratory, and at present there is a 3–4 standard-deviation difference between the Standard Model prediction and the experimental value. A new muon g −2 experiment, E989, is being prepared at Fermilab that will improve the experimental error by a factor of four to clarify this difference. A central component to reach this fourfold improvement in accuracy is the high-precision laser calibration system which should monitor the gain fluctuations of the calorimeter photodetectors at 0.04% accuracy.