Background: The involvement of serum ornithine carbamoyltransferase (OCT) in the progression of chronic hepatitis and liver cirrhosis is unclear.Methods: A total 256 patients with chronic hepatitis C and 5 healthy controls were examined. Serum OCT concentrations were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Serum OCT concentrations were compared with serum cytokine and chemokine levels, and with disease severity and development of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).Results: The median OCT concentrations were 21.8 ng/ml for healthy controls, 36.7 ng/ml for F0 stage disease, 48.7 ng/ml for F1 stage, 77.9 ng/ml for F2 stage, 104.8 ng/ml for F3 stage, and 121.4 ng/ml for F4 stage. OCT concentrations were correlated with aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, γ-glutamyl transpeptidase, platelet counts, indocyanine green retention rate at 15 min, prothrombin times, the molar ratio of branched chain amino acids to tyrosine, and tyrosine. Furthermore, there were significant correlations among OCT concentrations and IP10 and IL18 levels. There were weak correlations between serum OCT concentrations and liver histology. The cumulative incidence of HCC in the high-OCT concentration group (≥75.3 ng/ml) was higher than that in the low-OCT concentration group.Conclusion: The measurement of serum OCT concentration may provide a useful marker of disease severity, and thus could be a useful marker for a high risk of HCC occurrence.

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O 5 and S. The standard material is a natural altered tuff, which was suspended in water and filtrated under reduced pressure. The accuracy, the standard deviation and the lower limit detection qualify this method. This method is conveniently quick and applicable to the chemical analysis of suspended matter in water.

In order to promote the recycle of fiber products, it is necessary to expand the application of recovered fibers. In the present study, the forming method of spherical fiber assembly using recovered fibers was devised; its compatibility as pillow fillers was evaluated as well. By revealing the relationship between structure and compression property of the obtained spherical fiber assembly, it was found that the compression property can be controlled by changing the mixture ratio of core-sheath conjugate fiber, the density of fiber assembly, and the fiber composition. Consequently, it was shown that by using the spherical fiber assembly as pillow fillers, it was possible to make pillows with controlled sinking ratio and body pressure value, indicating that the spherical fiber assembly had sufficient physical properties required for application to pillow fillers.

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