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Mental stress is a known risk factor for disease. This study investigated changes in sensations of taste and pungency before and after mental stress. Thirty healthy male university students rested for 20 min, performed mental arithmetic tasks for 10 min, and then underwent measurement of changes in their taste and ability to discern pungency. Taste was measured with the "Taste Disk®," and pungency was measured by a filter-paper disc method using capsaicin solution. Subjects were not told the order of the reagent solutions used. To quantify pain sensation, a weak current applied to the central inner forearm skin by a Pain Vision® quantitative pain sensation analyzer was gradually increased. The degree of stress was measured by portable electrocardiography (ECG). During mental stress, the cognitive threshold of salty taste, sweet taste, and bitterness was significantly decreased, whereas the sensations of pungency and forearm skin pain were increased and showed significant correlation. Based on sympathetic nerve activity analyzed with the ECG, the subjects were divided into the mental stress group and non-mental stress group. The mental stress group experienced an increase in the pungency threshold and sensation of forearm skin pain with significantly high correlations obtained, whereas no correlation was found between these factors in the non-mental stress group. Acute mental stress increased the sensitivity to taste but decreased the sensitivity to the sensation of pungency on the tongue and pain on the skin. Sympathetic activity activated by stress may affect taste and the sensation of pungency.

Developments in subcellular fractionation strategies have provided the means to analyze the protein and lipid composition of organelles by proteomics. Here, we developed ultrasmall magnetic-plasmonic hybrid nanobeads and applied them to the isolation of autophagosomes by applying a magnetic field. The beads were chemically synthesized and comprised an Ag/FeCo/Ag core/shell/shell structure with a mean diameter of 15 nm. The Ag core and the FeCo shell conferred imaging and magnetic separation capabilities, respectively. The nanobeads were transfected into mammalian cells by lipofection. Thirty minutes after lipofection, the nanobeads colocalized with Vps26 and subsequently with LC3. Cell lysates were prepared at the appropriate time points and were subjected to magnetic separation. The separated fraction contained LC3-II, transferrin receptor, and LAMP2, but not LC3-I, suggesting that autophagosomes engulfing endosomal origin had been isolated. The magnetic separation process was completed in less than 30 min, providing a rapid method for isolation of autophagosomes. The present organelle isolation technique using the hybrid nanobeads with imaging and magnetic separation capabilities is highly promising for isolation of other types of organelles such as endosomes and endosome-related organelles.

Purpose To demonstrate the usefulness of precolonoscopy intravenous contrast material-enhanced CT for colonic diverticular bleeding (CDB). Materials and Methods A prospective, multicenter, observational study was performed. Patients with acute-onset hematochezia who were admitted to hospital were included, and those without CDB were excluded. CT was performed before colonoscopy. A Mann-Whitney U test, χ2 test, and multivariable logistic regression analysis were performed to determine the accuracy of CT before colonoscopy. Results A total of 442 patients (mean age, 71.2 years; 302 male patients; 68.3% men) were included between January 2014 and December 2015, and 202 patients were diagnosed as having CDB. The positive extravasation rate during CT was 50 of 202 (24.7%) among all patients and five of nine (55.6%) among patients who underwent CT within 1 hour of the last hematochezia. At multivariable analysis, the interval from the last hematochezia until CT was a predictor of extravasation (beta coefficient, -.0038 ± 0.0014 [standard deviation]). Extravasation at CT had a sensitivity of 38 of 66 (57.6%; 95% confidence interval: 44.8%, 69.7%) and a specificity of 124 of 136 (91.2%; 95% confidence interval: 85.1%, 95.4%) for the prediction of stigmata of recent hemorrhage of diverticula during colonoscopy. The sensitivity was higher in patients who underwent CT examination within 4 hours of hematochezia, compared with those examined after 4 hours (64.7% [33 of 51] vs 33.3% [five of 15]; P < .01). Conclusion Extravasation findings for CT with intravenous contrast material had high specificity for the prediction of stigmata of recent hemorrhage of diverticula during colonoscopy, regardless of the timing of the CT examination. Although the sensitivity was relatively low, it was higher when the CT examination was performed within 4 hours after the last hematochezia. Therefore, urgent precolonoscopy CT may contribute to decision making regarding whether an urgent colonoscopy should be performed.

Natural plant populations consist of individuals that exhibit variation in their phenotypic traits and demographic parameters. Here we report a study on maternal effects and the effects of different light environments on intra-specific variation in survivorship and ecologically relevant phenotypic traits of Fagus crenata seedlings in a cool-temperate forest community. We collected 901 seedlings from the ground beneath five maternal trees and used microsatellite DNA markers to identify maternal siblings that germinated naturally in the forest community. Selected seedlings were planted at three sites––one under a closed canopy with low light availability, one under a canopy gap in the natural forest community with moderate light availability, and one in a common garden with high light availability. The proportion of seedlings that were correctly assigned to their putative mother ranged from 60.0 to 82.7 % per maternal family, and 655 (72.7 %) seedlings in total were used for the analysis of survivorship and phenotypic traits. Among-family differences in survivorship remained after correcting for the effects of initial stem size during the first year after planting. However, this difference in survivorship became less pronounced in subsequent years. Seedlings grown under the canopy gap and/or in the common garden exhibited better performance in terms of phenotypic traits such as stem, leaf, and root morphology. In addition, seedlings of different maternal origins grown in the same environments had different individual leaf areas. These findings suggest that phenotypic variation due to maternal effects was a significant source of intra-specific variation within the local population.

A novel type of membrane vesicles was formed in vitro from microsomes of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which carries Dpm1p, an enzyme involved in dolichol-sugar synthesis, but not a typical secretory cargo. While COPII vesicles formed in vitro were sedimentable by centrifugation at 200,000g(max) for 15 min, the novel vesicles were not. However, they were sedimented by additional centrifugation at the same speed for 1 h. Immunoelectron microscopy showed that the Dpm1p-containing vesicles had small vesicular/saccular structures of around 40-50 nm in diameter. The addition of glycerol-3-phosphate and oleoyl-CoA, substrates for lipid biosynthesis, significantly enhanced the efficiency of vesicle budding in an ATP-dependent fashion. Dpm1p was localized to lipid droplets as well as endoplasmic reticulum. Fluorescence microscopy further showed that Dpm1p-GFP was present in restricted subregions in isolated lipid droplets. The possibility that the vesicles were intermediates from the endoplasmic reticulum to lipid droplets was examined, and their possible role is discussed.

Sema4D, originally identified as a negative regulator of axon guidance during development, is involved in various physiological and pathological responses. In this study, we evaluated the effect of Sema4D-deficiency on oligodendrocyte restoration after the cerebral ischemia/reperfusion using direct ligation of the middle cerebral artery followed by reperfusion. In both Sema4D(+/+) wild-type and Sema4D(-/-) null mutant mice, the peri-infarct area showed a decrease in the number of oligodendrocytes at 3 days post-reperfusion. Subsequently, the number of oligodendrocytes was observed to gradually recover in both groups. Sema4D-deficient mice, however, showed an enhanced recovery of oligodendrocytes and an upregulation of oligodendrocyte progenitor cells at days 14 and 28 of reperfusion. Cell proliferation identified by incorporation of bromodeoxyuridine was enhanced in Sema4D(-/-) mice from days 3 to 14 post-reperfusion compared to the Sema4D(+/+) mice. Furthermore, apoptotic cell death of oligodendrocytes was reduced at days 7 post-reperfusion in Sema4D(-/-) mice compared to Sema4D(+/+) mice. These findings indicate that enhanced proliferation of progenitor cells and survival of oligodendrocytes resulted in improved oligodendrocyte recovery in Sema4D(-/-) mice. This may provide a new approach for neurorestorative treatment in patients with stroke, which aims to manipulate endogenous oligodendrogenesis and thereby to promote brain repair after stroke.

The large scale asymmetry in surface (poly)peptides of the plasma membrane (PM) of mung bean (Vigna radiata L.) hypocotyl cells was investigated by protease and 1 M KCl treatments of PM vesicles obtained by an aqueous two-phase partition technique. Proteases only slightly reduced the protein content of right-side-out PM vesicles and the treatment with 1 M KCl resulted in the dissociation of only a few peripheral proteins from the outer surface of right-side-out PM vesicles, indicating that few surface peptides including peripheral proteins existed on the outer surface. From experiments of the re-partitioning of endomembrane vesicles removed from surface peptides, it was found that the surface peptide content is a factor determining the partitioning, and the hypothesis that sterols are asymmetrically distributed across higher plant PM was proposed. We speculate that asymmetrical properties between the outer and the inner surfaces of plant PM, especially in partitioning in the two-phase system, derive from the asymmetry of the bulk of surface peptides and PM sterols. The comparatively low hydrophilicity of the outer surface of the PM would be important for the partitioning of right-side-out PM vesicles in the upper phase of the two-phase system.

The transmembrane distribution of phospholipids (PLs) in the plasma membrane (PM) of mung bean (Vigna radiata L.) hypocotyl cells was investigated using annexin V-fluorescein isothiocyanate, porcine pancreas phospholipase A2, and 31P-nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. Phosphatidylserine was not located on the cell surface of mung bean protoplasts. However, phosphatidylcholine, phosphatidylethanolamine and phosphatidic acid were found to be almost symmetrically distributed across right-side-out PM vesicles obtained by aqueous two-phase partitioning by porcine pancreas phospholipase A2 assay. 31P-NMR assay showed that the amount of PLs is about equal in the outer and the inner leaflets of the right-side-out PM vesicles. These results suggest that the topography of PM PLs might not contribute to well-known asymmetrical properties of the outer and inner surfaces of higher plant PMs. It is also indicated that inside-out PM vesicles created by Brij 58-treatment do not retain the native PL topography on dithionate reduction of 7-nitro-2,1,3-benzoxadiazol-4-yl-labeled PLs incorporated in the PM vesicles.

Background: A combination of chemotherapy and radiotherapy (chemoradiation therapy; CRT) has recently been developed to improve the survival of esophageal cancer patients. However, the optimal choice of chemotherapeutic agents and their doses, as well as chemotherapy and radiotherapy regimens, remain unclear. Methods: Based on recent advances in knowledge on the radiosensitizing and biochemical modulation effects of chemotherapeutic agents, we have recently developed concurrent CRT which consisted of continuous 5-fluorouracil (5FU) administration (600 mg/m 2/day, days 1-5) combined with a low dose of daily cisplatin administration (10 mg/m 2/day, days 1-5, and 5 or 10 mg/m 2/day, days 8-12 and 15-19) before each fraction of radiation (2 Gy each). To evaluate the efficacy and safety of our concurrent CRT, 10 esophageal cancer patients received one or one and a half courses of the CRT. Results: All patients tolerated and completed a full course of the CRT. The effectiveness of the CRT on the primary tumor included pathologically or endoscopically complete responses in three patients (30%), partial response in five (50%), no response in two (20%) and tumoral downstaging (T-c1assification) in five (50%). Grade 2 and Grade 3 toxicity, seen in six patients, did not affect surgical operation. No patients showed CRT-related deaths. Eight patients (80%) underwent resection with no operative mortality. Of these, two patients (25%) showed pathologically or endoscopically complete responses, and four (50%) showed partial response. Three patients died of cancer after resection. The two inoperable patients showed a pathologically complete response and partial response, respectively. They were relieved of their cancer-related complaints and were living without hospitalization at the time of this analysis. Conclusions: These results suggest that the concurrent CRT based on the theoretical backgrounds is effective and has acceptable toxicities with maintaining its efficacy for the treatment of esophageal cancer patients.

James(1960) defined the zonal polynomials and used it to represent the joint distributions of latent roots of VVisfiart matrix. The zonal polviionnals played an important role to define the generalized hypergeometric function of symmetric matrix argument Since then, many density functions and moments based on Wishart matrix have been expressed in terms of the generalized hy¬pergeometric Function. The purpose of this paper is to get the recurrence relations for the coefficients of it. In Section 1 we derive a partial differen¬tial equations having the generalized hypergeometric function as the unique solution. Then we ubtain the recurrence relations until order 7 in Section 2.

Next Section Abstract The fusogenic activity of plant Golgi membranes was studied in a cell-free system by assaying lipid mixing and content leakages of fluorescence probes. Golgi membranes from mung bean (Vigna radiata L.) hypocotyl cells fused to liposomes in the absence of any cytosolic proteins and nucleotides. It was demonstrated that the fusion was mediated by integral membrane protein(s), and was influenced by divalent cations (mm). Mg2+, Ca2+, and Mn2+ ions enhanced the lipid mixing by reducing repulsive forces between membranes. In the content leakage assay, Mg2+ ions also showed a stimulative effect. However, other divalent cations were inhibitory. It is suggested that the fusion system of Golgi membranes comprises at least two components: one that mediates the formation of fusion intermediates prior to pore opening, and one that mediates the subsequent processes. The latter must be sensitive to divalent cations at millimolar concentrations. The fusion of Golgi and biological membranes was induced by divalent cations. We speculated about the biological role of the fusion system studied here.

To improve the survival rate of patients with esophageal cancer, several protocols of a preoperative combination of chemotherapy and radiotherapy, known as chemoradiation therapy, have been developed, recently characterized by the combination of 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), cisplatin, and radiation. Although some of these combinations have been demonstrated to be effective, the optimal chemoradiation dose and schedule are not yet precisely established. Recent investigations have elucidated that the radiosensitizing effects of cisplatin are able to be achieved more effectively by the daily administration of cisplatin before each fraction of radiation. Based on these investigations, we report herein the case of a patient with esophageal cancer with direct invasion to the trachea, in whom a complete response was achieved by the continuous administration of 5-FU, 600 mg/m2 per day, from days 1-5 combined with the daily administration of low-dose cisplatin, 10 mg/m2 per day before each fraction of radiation, given as 2Gy each time, throughout the entire treatment period of 3 weeks beginning on day 1. The benefits of our preoperative chemoradiation therapy included no severe side effects, down-staging and resectability of the tumor, as well as a pathological complete response, which could prolong the survival time. Our experience of this case prompts us to recommend the concurrent daily preoperative chemoradiation therapy for patients with locally advanced esophageal cancer.

The approximate distribution of the largest latent root was proposed by Sugiyama 1972b. We extend his idea and propose an approximate distribution of the upper percentile points for the second largest latent root of the Wishart matrix. The proposed approximate distribution is adjusted by the expectation of each latent root. The simulation results show the validity of our adjustment for the expectation of each latent root, and the proposed approximate distribution is effective also in various cases, even when the dimension and sample size are both large.

原発性空腸癌の発生頻度はきわめて低く, 最近14年間の本邦報告例でも, 200例に満たない, したがって空腸癌の細胞像に関する報告も, 文献上ほとんどみられていないこ. 最近, われわれは原発性空腸癌を経験し, その捺印細胞像の検索と, CEA, CA 19-9, CA 125の腫瘍マーカーによる免疫組織化学的検索を行い, 興味ある知見が得られたので報告した.(1) 細胞形態は, おおむね高円柱状で, 核は類円形ないし楕円形であった. 核形の不整, 核縁の不均等肥厚の比率は半数以上であり, 核小体は2μ 以下で2～3個認めるものが多かった. 核chromatinの性状と分布は粗顆粒状不均等分布のものが主体であり, 全体的に高分化型乳頭状または管状腺癌を示唆していた.(2) CEA, CA 19-9, CA 125の腫瘍マーカーの血中濃度は術前高値を示し, パラフィン包埋切片による酵素抗体法染色でも陽性であった.CEAとCA 19-9の染色態度は類似しており, 細胞質表面で強い染色傾向にあった. また, CA125では, 管腔内側の核の辺縁に, 小胞状に局在して認められた.