Acute rheumatic fever (ARF) and acute poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis (APSGN), two important sequelae of streptococcal throat or skin infections, according to current concepts may be elicited by autoimmune mechanisms due to molecular mimicry between group A streptococci (GAS) and human tissue. In the case of APSGN, however, Our experimental data have indicated that GAS immunoglobulin-binding

The Leon-Chinandega plains are located in the north-western part of Nicaragua and represent the most important groundwater reservoir of the country. The aquifer is comprised of three hydrogeological units. The top unit is an unconfined alluvial and below a more consolidated volcanic aquifer is found. These aquifers rest on an ignimbrite unit that acts as the basement of the aquifer. The plains are

Let G be a locally nilpotent 4-Engel group. We show that the normal closure of any element from G is nilpotent of class at most 4. When G has no element of order 2 or 5, the normal closure has class at most 3. These bounds are sharp. (C) 2003 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The activites of ornithine decarboxylase (ODC) and ODC inhibitory protein (ODC-antizyme) were studied in Ehrlich ascites tumor cells, separated according to their position in the cell cycle by centrifugal elutriation. Release and/or synthesis of ODC-antizyme was induced by putrescine treatment. Each mouse received an intraperitoneal injection of 25 moles of putrescine at 0, 1, 2, and 3 hr after tu

PURPOSE: The design concept and the dosimetric characteristics of an applicator system for intraoperative radiation therapy (IORT) with special emphasis on alignment methods, the effect of a plastic scatterer in the beam, radiation leakage, and misalignment dosimetry, are presented in this paper. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A soft-docking system for a linear accelerator, which enables collimation of el

Over 70 equations approximating thermodynamic and transport properties of water and steam at pressure 1 bar and saturated pressure as well as air at pressure 1 bar were tested against reference data. Their accuracy and relative computing time were reported.

Viable suspended hepatocytes were prepared from surgical biopsy specimens of pig and human liver by digestion with collagenase. Initial perfusion of the tissue through cannulated blood vessels with 0.5 mM EGTA followed by 0.2% collagenase gave the best results. 20−870 × 106 cells of which 60–95 % excluded trypan blue were obtained from 5–30 g pig liver pieces, while results with human liver specim

We hypothesize that cerebral ischemia leads to enhanced expression of endothelin (ET), 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT), and angiotensin II (ANG II) receptors in the vascular smooth muscle cells. Our aim is to correlate the upregulation of cerebrovascular receptors and the underlying molecular mechanisms with the reduction in regional and global cerebral blood flow (CBF) after subarachnoid hemorrhage (S

Within the primitive model of electrolytes, partitioning the system free energy into contributions from entropy and energy requires an explicit description of the temperature dependence of the dielectric constant epsilonr. Taking this into account, the authors find that the ion-ion correlation attraction between like charged macroions is governed by entropy and not energy as often argued. The auth

We examined the attractiveness of a natural headspace sample of [i]Platanthera bifolia[/i blossoms, synthetic blends and Single compounds to the silver Y moth, Autographa gamma, in a flight tunnel. The synthetic blend consisted of previously identified electrophysiologically active compounds from P. bifolia: benzyl benzoate, benzyl salicylate, cinnamyl alcohol, lilac aldehydes, methyl benzoate and

Components of the urokinase plasminogen activator (u-PA) system are involved in the metastatic process, and have accordingly been associated with clinical outcome in a variety of malignant tumours. We investigated the prognostic importance of u-PA and plasminogen activator inhibitor type 1 (PAI-1) in endometrial cancer, analysed with luminometric immunoassay (LIA) and enzyme-linked immunosorbent a

We examine the phase diagram of a Bose-Einstein condensate of atoms, interacting with an attractive pseudopotential, in a quadratic-plus-quartic potential trap rotating at a given rate. Investigating the behavior of the gas as a function of interaction strength and rotational frequency of the trap, we find that the phase diagram has three distinct phases: one with vortex excitation, one with cente

A new standardized lipolysis approach is presented where the focus is on the initial rate of lipolysis. An advantage is that data obtained in this way reflect degradation before growing amounts of lipolysis products retard the process. The method can be used to rank different lipase substrates. In particular, the method can be used to obtain information about the susceptibility to degradation of v

The first excited 2(+) state of the unstable isotope Sn-110 has been studied in safe Coulomb excitation at 2.82 MeV/u using the MINIBALL array at the REX-ISOLDE post accelerator at CERN. This is the first measurement of the reduced transition probability of this state using this method for a neutron deficient Sn isotope. The strength of the approach lies in the excellent peak-to-background ratio t

Background: Collagenous colitis is a chronic inflammatory bowel disease accompanied mainly by nonbloody diarrhea. The objectives of treatment are to alleviate the symptoms and minimize the deleterious effects on health-related quality of life (HRQOL). There is still no generally accepted clinical definition of remission or relapse. The purpose of this study was to analyze the impact of bowel sympt

Chemokine signaling has been implicated in directing colonization of the fetal thymus by hematopoietic precursors. However, the patterns of expression of the chemokine receptors responsible for directing thymic colonization by the earliest thymic migrants remain unknown. We have identified heterogeneity within the earliest thymus seeding cells based on chemokine receptor expression. By analyzing t

The aggregation behavior of an amphiphilic supramolecular system, with potential application as a tumor-specific magnetic resonance imaging contrast agent, has been studied in detail by dynamic light scattering, small-angle neutron scattering and cryotransmission electron microscopy. The system was constituted of mixed aggregates formed by an anionic unimer containing the DTPAGlu, a chelating agen

Conflicting results have been reported of the long-term effects of treatment with inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) on bone. The objective of this study was to compare ICS users and non-users regarding bone mineral density (BMD) in a large population. A total of 65 225 adults participated in a cross-sectional study in the Nord-Trondelag Health Study 1995-1997. Those reporting asthma or asthma-related