Although pancreatic cancer often invades peripancreatic adipose tissue, little information is known about cancer‐adipocyte interaction. We first investigated the ability of adipocytes to ...de‐differentiate to cancer‐associated adipocytes (CAAs) by co‐culturing with pancreatic cancer cells. We then examined the effects of CAA‐conditioned medium (CAA‐CM) on the malignant characteristics of cancer cells, the mechanism underlying those effects, and their clinical relevance in pancreatic cancer. When 3T3‐L1 adipocytes were co‐cultured with pancreatic cancer cells (PANC‐1) using the Transwell system, adipocytes lost their lipid droplets and changed morphologically to fibroblast‐like cells (CAA). Adipocyte‐specific marker mRNA levels significantly decreased but those of fibroblast‐specific markers appeared, characteristic findings of CAA, as revealed by real‐time PCR. When PANC‐1 cells were cultured with CAA‐CM, significantly higher migration/invasion capability, chemoresistance, and epithelial‐mesenchymal transition (EMT) properties were observed compared with control cells. To investigate the mechanism underlying these effects, we performed microarray analysis of PANC‐1 cells cultured with CAA‐CM and found a 78.5‐fold higher expression of SAA1 compared with control cells. When the SAA1 gene in PANC‐1 cells was knocked down with SAA1 siRNA, migration/invasion capability, chemoresistance, and EMT properties were significantly attenuated compared with control cells. Immunohistochemical analysis on human pancreatic cancer tissues revealed positive SAA1 expression in 46/61 (75.4%). Overall survival in the SAA1‐positive group was significantly shorter than in the SAA1‐negative group (P = .013). In conclusion, we demonstrated that pancreatic cancer cells induced de‐differentiation in adipocytes toward CAA, and that CAA promoted malignant characteristics of pancreatic cancer via SAA1 expression, suggesting that SAA1 is a novel therapeutic target in pancreatic cancer.
Cancer‐associated adipocyte (CAA) promotes migration/invasion of pancreatic cancer cells. CAA also induced pancreatic cancer cells drug resistance, epithelial‐mesenchymal transition.
Background The prevalence of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) in the non-obese population has increased and NAFLD is not always recognized in individuals with metabolic syndrome (MS). The ...risk of cirrhosis is higher in patients having NAFLD with elevated alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels than in those having NAFLD with normal ALT levels. Objective To measure the differences in clinical factors associated with NAFLD having elevation of ALT among subjects with Non-MS, Pre-MS, and MS, and to measure differences in metabolites between MS subjects with and without NAFLD having elevation of ALT. Methods Among 7,054 persons undergoing health check-ups, we included 3,025 subjects who met the selection criteria. We measured differences in clinical factors for NAFLD having elevation of ALT among subjects with Non-MS, Pre-MS, and MS, and compared metabolites between subjects with and without NAFLD having elevation of ALT in 32 subjects with MS. Results The prevalence of NAFLD and NAFLD having elevation of ALT was significantly progressively greater in subjects with Non-MS, Pre-MS, and MS (p <0.001, respectively). In the Non-MS group, there were significant differences between subjects with and without NAFLD having elevation of ALT with respect to body mass index (BMI), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, hemoglobin A1c, uric acid, aspartate aminotransferase (AST); In the Pre-MS group, there were significant differences in BMI, hypertension, AST, and gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase (GGT); In the MS group, there were significant differences in HDL-C, impaired glucose tolerance, AST, and GGT. There were significant differences in levels of metabolites of nicotinamide, inosine, and acetyl-L-carnitine between MS subjects with and without NAFLD having elevation of ALT (all p <0.05). Conclusions Although NAFLD having elevation of ALT is important for development of NAFLD, differences in factors associated with NAFLD having elevation of ALT at various stages of MS should be considered. Additionally, several metabolites may play roles in the identification of risk for NAFLD in individuals with MS.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Although many patients still have anxiety about upper gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy, there have been few reports on the influence of distractions for a person who is going to undergo upper GI ...endoscopy soon. This study was a prospective randomized controlled study investigating the influence of distractions, such as auditive and visual distractions using subjective and objective assessments including autonomic nervous function prior to upper GI endoscopy.
206 subjects who underwent upper GI endoscopy as regular health check-ups were divided randomly into 4 groups prior to upper GI endoscopy; group 1 (control group), group 2 (auditive group), group 3 (visual group), and group 4 (combination group). We measured vital signs, autonomic nervous function, profile of mood state (POMS), and the impression for upper GI endoscopy pre- and post-distraction in the 4 groups.
There was no significant difference in vital signs between 5 and 15 min after sitting in group 1, however, several vital signs in all distraction groups improved significantly after distraction (Pulse rate (P): p < 0.001 in group 4; blood pressure: p < 0.05 in group 2, 3, 4) and the rate of decrease in P and diastolic blood pressure was highest in group 4 (p < 0.001). Several scores of POMS and the impression for upper GI endoscopy post-distraction improved significantly compared to pre-distraction between distraction groups and the satisfaction for distraction was highest in group 4 (p < 0.01). Regarding autonomic nerve function, the low- frequency power/ high- frequency power ratio post-distraction was significantly lower than that pre-distraction in all distraction groups (p < 0.001).
Although auditive distraction alone and visual distraction alone were effective, a combination distraction was more effective than any other distraction by subjective and objective assessments. These distractions, which were simple and safe, may play an assistive role in the stability of physical and psychological conditions prior to upper GI endoscopy.
This trial was registered in the University Hospital Medical Information Network (UMIN) Clinical Trials Registry as UMIN000022801 . Registered on 10 July 2016.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
A 43-year-old woman being treated with steroids for leg ulcers caused by rheumatoid vasculitis came to our hospital for examination of bloody stool. Colonoscopy revealed multiple active ulcers and ...ulcer scars from the ascending colon to the sigmoid colon. Unusual microvascular structures were identified by magnifying endoscopy with narrow band imaging (NBI) around a semi-circumferential ulcer in the transverse colon, and biopsy specimens obtained from the abnormally vascularized areas presented pathologically specific findings of rheumatoid vasculitis. Her fecal blood disappeared while continuing steroid treatment, and colonoscopy performed two months later showed that the ulcer in the transverse colon was re-epithelialized and most lesions in other locations were scarred. Although the dose of steroids was tapered, clinical progression or recurrence of the disease has not been noted thus far. It is difficult to pathologically demonstrate colorectal vasculitis even in cases with systemic rheumatoid lesions. We surmised that the microvascular structure analysis of ulcerated areas with magnified NBI observation might yield more accurate target biopsies to pathologically prove colonic complications of rheumatoid vasculitis.
A primary splenic angiosarcoma is a rare type of soft tissue sarcoma and is associated with an extremely poor prognosis. In this study, we describe the case of a patient who was diagnosed with ...metastatic primary splenic angiosarcoma and survived for about 2 years. A 62-year-old female was referred to us for the treatment of splenic angiosarcoma with disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) and multiple liver and bone metastases. Paclitaxel therapy resulted in recovery from DIC and enabled her to continue sequential treatment through to sixth-line chemotherapy. We reviewed all splenic angiosarcoma case reports which were described as stage IV to date and compared with our case. From these data, we found that the median overall survival was 105 days, and the prognosis of splenic angiosarcoma of stage IV was worse than conventional case series. Splenectomy was performed in more patients than chemotherapy as a treatment. Moreover, various chemotherapeutic regimens were used. These data suggest that administering chemotherapy including paclitaxel to patients with splenic angiosarcoma might improve their prognosis.
The rectal tonsil is a rare polypoid lesion exclusively found in the rectum and is considered a reactive proliferation of the lymphoid tissue. Although this lesion is benign, we recommend that it ...should be differentiated from carcinoid or polypoid type of mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue lymphomas, based on gross findings. In this case report, we describe a case of rectal lesions with a unique appearance in a 41-year-old man. Colonoscopy revealed two 5-mm-sized nodules located opposite from each other on the left and right sides of the lower rectum. Endoscopic mucosal resection was conducted. Histopathologically, both lesions were mainly located in the submucosa and consisted of prominent lymphoid follicles with germinal centers of various sizes. No immunoreactivity of Bcl-2 was seen in the germinal centers. Immunohistochemical staining for kappa and lambda light chains revealed a polyclonal pattern. Therefore, these lesions were diagnosed as rectal tonsils.
Audio-visual voice conversion using noise-robust features Sawada, Kohei; Takehara, Masanori; Tamura, Satoshi ...
2014 IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP),
01/2014
Conference Proceeding
Voice Conversion (VC) is a technique to convert speech data of source speaker into ones of target speaker. VC has been investigated and statistical VC is used for various purposes. Conventional VC ...uses acoustic features, however, the audio-only VC has suffered from the degradation in noisy or real environments. This paper proposes an AudioVisual VC (AVVC) method using not only audio features but also visual information, i.e. lip images. Eigenlip feature is employed in our scheme as visual feature. We also propose a feature selection approach for audio-visual features. Experiments were conducted to evaluate our AVVC scheme comparing with audio-only VC, using noisy data. The results show that AVVC can improve the performance even in noisy environments, by properly selecting audio and visual parameters. It is also found that visual VC is also successful. Furthermore, it is observed that visual dynamic features are more effective than visual static information.
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