Addition of bevacizumab to gemcitabine/capecitabine did not improve outcome in an unselected group of patients with advanced BTC compared with historical controls. The selective benefit of vascular endothelial growth factor inhibition in BTC remains to be explored.

Software Defined Radios (SDRs) offer a programmable and dynamically reconfigurable method of reusing hardware to implement the physical layer processing of multiple communications systems. An SDR can dynamically change protocols and update communications systems over the air as a service provider allows. In this paper we discuss a baseband solution for an SDR system and describe a 2Mbps WCDMA design with GSM/GPRS and 802.11b capability that executes all physical layer processing completely in software. We describe the WCDMA communications p rotocols with a focus on latency reduction and unique implementation techniques. We also describe the underlying technology that enables software execution. Our solution is programmed in C and executed on a multithreaded processor in real-time.

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Novel agents have demonstrated enhanced efficacy when combined with other antimyeloma agents especially dexamethasone. The steroid doses employed in myeloma regimens are often poorly tolerated. Therefore, in a phase II clinical trial we investigated the efficacy of a steroid-free combination including bortezomib, pegylated liposomal doxorubicin and thalidomide (VDT regimen). Twenty-three patients with relapsed or refractory myeloma or other plasma cell cancers were treated with the VDT regimen. Patient had a median of five prior therapies and 65.2% were refractory to their last regimen. The overall response rates were 55.5% and 22%, respectively. The median progression free survival was 10.9 months (95% CI: 7.3-15.8) and the median overall survival was 15.7 months (95% CI: 9.1-not reached). Fatigue and sensory neuropathy were the most common side effects noted. We observe that VDT is an effective steroid-free regimen with ability to induce durable remission even in patients with refractory myeloma.