Ultrasonography with color Doppler is useful for evaluating abnormalities of gastroduodenal motility and can be used to understand the pathogenesis of such disorders.

To assist in the evaluation of inflammatory changes of the affected bowel, we classified the transabdominal ultrasonographic findings into types A-C. We compared the in vivo and in vitro sonographic images to the histopathologic findings of resected specimens. A total of 22 bowel specimens (five normal, 12 with Crohn's disease, five with ulcerative colitis) were examined sonographically with a 3.75-MHz curved and a 7.5-MHz linear array scanner; histologic examination of the same area of tissue was performed afterwards. These three examinations corresponded well to each other. Our classification scheme is useful in quantifying the severity of inflammatory changes in the affected bowel.

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Double label immunofluorescence against PCNA and BrdU clearly revealed several characteristics of DNA replication sites in synchronized CHO cells. We observed that the distribution of replication sites changed from early to late S phase, particularly in the nucleolar and perinuclear regions, and the amount of PCNA in each replication site markedly decreased or disappeared with the progression of S phase. Although co-localization of PCNA and BrdU was usually seen, the intensity of fluorescence occasionally differed between the labeled PCNA and BrdU, particularly in late S phase. Based on the assumption that such a difference may reflect a different configuration of the chromatin, we propose that the brightly granular fluorescent staining of PCNA or BrdU in early S phase indicates a condensed segment of euchromatin. In the late S phase nucleus, we clearly observed a chromatin-like structure in the late replicating segments of heterochromatin in anti-PCNA stained material. In vincristine-induced multinucleate cells, a discrepancy between PCNA-distribution and BrdU-incorporation in sister nuclei was sometimes seen. Such observations indirectly support the following two mechanisms for premature chromosome condensation proposed by others: asynchronous initiation of DNA synthesis; and a difference in the rate of DNA synthesis. In addition, the finding that BrdU was not incorporated into sites that had PCNA deposits suggests a third mechanism: the local disturbance of replication sites. Furthermore, unusual distribution patterns for replication sites suggest that the nucleation process in multinucleate cells differs from that in normal cells.

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