OBJECTIVE : To evaluate the efficacy and safety of therapy for patients with histologically mild hepatitis C virus (HCV) liver disease. DESIGN : A randomized, double blind, placebo controlled trial of interferon alpha-2b with or without ribavirin. SETTING : Regional and university hospitals. PARTICIPANTS : One hundred and sixteen treatment naive patients with mild chronic HCV infection. Mild HCV i

Extracellular matrix (ECM) surrounding conidia and germlings of B. sorokiniana was studied using light microscopy (LM), scanning (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Conidial ECM surrounding dry-inoculated, ungerminated conidia was fluid-like and observed only using a cryo-preparation technique, suggesting that the material was water soluble. ECM enveloping germlings appeared fibrilla

The decay properties of an above-threshold resonance in core-ionized water, which is difficult to. identify with usual spectroscopic methods, have been analyzed by resonant Auger spectroscopy. The resonance is. shown to correspond to a doubly excited neutral state embedded in the O 1s ionization continuum. The main, result of the experiments is the assessment on the dissociative nature of the inte

The present study reports a novel pattern of cytomegalic endothelial cells (CEC) in peripheral blood from a female renal transplant recipient infected with human cytomegalovirus (HCMV), which has not been reported previously. Localization of specific early antigen of HCMV, pp65 antigen, was examined by immunohistochemistry. Staining of an endothelial cell marker (CD34) was used to characterize end

A semidefined medium based on Casamino Acids allowed Lactococcus lactis ATCC 19435 to grow in the presence of oxygen at a slow rate (0.015 h(-1)). Accumulation of H2O2 in the culture prevented a higher growth rate. Addition of asparagine to the medium increased the growth rate; whereby H2O2 accumulated only temporarily during the lag phase. H2O2 is an inhibitor for several glycolytic enzymes, glyc

Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) are group of enzymes thought to play an important role in trophoblastic and tumor invasion. The aim of our study was to investigate the trophoblastic expression of MMPs and p53 in normal trophoblast and hydatidiform moles (HM). Paraffin sections of 45 specimens, including 14 complete hydatidiform moles (CM), 15 partial hydatidiform moles (PM), 8 atypical partial hy

Two hypotheses concerning cerebellar function and predictive behavior are the sensory prediction hypothesis and the timing hypothesis. The former postulates that the cerebellum is critical in generating expectancies regarding forthcoming sensory information. The latter postulates that this structure is critical in generating expectancies that are precisely timed; for example, the expected duration

Omega-3 fatty acids (omega-3 FA) are constituents of the membranes of all cells in the body and are precursors of locally produced hormones, eicosanoids, which are important in the prevention and treatment of various diseases, especially in women. Omega-3 FA are of interest in some of the most common conditions affecting women. One mechanism underlying dysmenorrhea is a disturbed balance between a

Objectives: S100B is an acidic calcium-binding protein of the EF-hand family present in the central nervous system, where it is concentrated in glial cells. It has been suggested to act as a cytokine with neurotrophic effects at physiological concentrations. Design and methods: S100B concentration was assessed in saliva by western blot analysis and an immunoluminometric assay. A reference curve of

In 1782, Jon Petursson, a district physician in Northern Iceland, published a textbook on arthritis and its remedies intended for common use. Working within a very simple diagnostic system, essentially comprising osteoarthritis (arthritis h a ) and inflammatory arthritis (arthritis vaga), he describes arthritis vaga as a common, chronic, symmetric, destructive, inflammatory polyarthritis, sometime

This case-control study of tobacco smoking and acute myeloid leukemia (AML), emphasizing specific associations with morphologic and cytogenetic subtypes, comprised smoking histories for 333 cases and 351 controls. Smoking status (ever smokers versus life-long non-smokers) showed no evident effect on AML risk. However, an effect of smoking was indicated at high cumulative smoking doses (pack-years)

A method for evaluating a band offset of a heterojunction is proposed by measuring temperature dependence of current-voltage (I-V) characteristics in triple-barrier resonant tunneling diodes (TBRTDs). The method was applied for investigating a conduction band offset by using GaAs0.25P0.75/GaAs TBRTDs with thin strain heterobarriers grown by MOCVD and DeltaE(c) was estimated as 200-240 meV. In the

Aim: To investigate the urethral motor function in incontinent women. Materials and Methods: The intraurethral pressure was measured continuously in the high-pressure zone of the urethra at rest and during repeated short squeezes around the microtip transducer catheter in a group of 205 women with clinically manifest urinary incontinence (severe), and compared with the findings of investigations i

The Ebf (O/E) family of helix-loop-helix transcription factors plays a significant role in B lymphocyte and neuronal development. The three primary members of this family, Ebf1, 2, and 3, are all expressed in adipocytes, and Ebf1 promotes adipogenesis when overexpressed in NIH 3T3 fibroblasts. Here we report that these three proteins have adipogenic potential in multiple cellular models and that p

This paper capitalizes on the types of portrayal of the event in recommendations of prime drinking time using data from wine tasting notes. It argues that the weakly deontic nature of recommendation fosters semantic middles, not only the middle construction proper such as This beauty should drink well for 10–12 years, but recommendation as such is characterized by a mid-degree of transfer of actio

In recent years there have been some rather successful applications of a new variational technique for calculating the total energies of electronic systems. The new method is based on many-body perturbation theory and uses the one-electron Green function as the basic "variable" rather than the wave function of traditional variational calculations. It is the purpose of the present work to promote t