ObjectiveSerine protease 3 (PRSS3) is an isoform of trypsinogen, and plays an important role in the development of many malignancies. The objective of this study was to determine PRSS3 mRNA and protein expression levels in invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast and normal surrounding tissue samples.ResultsBoth PRSS3 mRNA and protein levels were significantly higher in invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast tissues than in normal or benign tissues (all P < 0.05). High PRSS3 protein levels were associated with patients’ age, histological grade, Her-2 expression level, ki-67 expression, and the 5.0-year survival rate. These high protein levels are independent prognostic markers in invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast.Materials and MethodsWe used real-time quantitative polymerase chain reactions (N = 40) and tissue microarray immunohistochemistry analysis (N = 286) to determine PRSS3 mRNA and protein expression, respectively. PRSS3 protein levels in invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast tissues were correlated with the clinical characteristics of patients with invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast and their 5.0-year survival rate.ConclusionsPRSS3 acts as an oncogene in invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast development and progression. This finding implies that detection of PRSS3 expression can be a useful prognosis marker and the targeting of PRSS3 can potentially represent a new strategy for invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast treatment.

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We used statistical methods on rock properties derived from more than 480 wells to catalog shale velocity and density trends in different pressure regimes in the Gulf of Mexico and evaluated the reasons for their variations. A detailed evaluation of the density and velocity trends revealed that in the northern part of the Louisiana shelf, unloading is the major mechanism of overpressure. The onset of overpressure occurs at depths around 3000 m where temperatures are normally greater than 70°C. The relationship of the temperature gradient increase and the velocity decrease to the smectite-illite transformation allowed us to believe that inelastic unloading may be the major mechanism for overpressure in this region. On the other hand, in the southern part of the Louisiana shelf, abnormal pore pressure is often caused by compaction disequilibrium where the sediment section has a low sand percentage. In this type of pressure regime, velocity and density values cease to change at the onset of overpressure and essentially remain at the same value below the onset.

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We investigate the on-line writing identical fiber Bragg grating (FBG) arrays using the phase mask technique. Given the limitation of laser power, the energy density uniformity and the horizontal width of the writing spot cannot be further optimized. The results show that the FBG arrays obtained in the optimal process (drawing speed of 12 ± 0.15 m/min and average tension of 38.2 g) have a central wavelength bandwidth of less than 0.1 nm and an average reflectivity of 0.26%. Thus, the phase mask method is a promising alternative for on-line writing identical FBG arrays.OCIS codes: 060.2370, 060.3738. doi: 10.3788/COL201311.030602.On-line writing weak fiber Bragg grating (FBG) arrays is the process in which FBGs are directly inscribed into fiber during drawing. In this case, FBG writing must be performed before the fiber coating application because the fiber coating is usually not transparent to ultraviolet (UV) light. In traditional FBG preparation, the fiber needs to be decoated prior to FBG writing, and then recoated after the grating exposure. The conventional process is difficult to handle and degrades fiber strength, which causes damage to the engineering application. However, draw-tower FBGs can overcome these disadvantages because of simple operation and high mechanical stability [1,2] . Furthermore, such method can produce FBG sensor arrays without fiber splicing, which cannot be avoided in the traditional FBG array construction. Avoiding fiber splicing is important because splicing loss greatly reduces the multiplexing capacity of weak FBG arrays. These advantages have thus prompted researchers to investigate draw-tower FBGs [3,4] . The multiplexing capacity of traditional FBG sensor arrays is limited to dozens of FBGs although various multiplexing methods are used, e.g., wavelength-division multiplexing, time-division multiplexing, and so on [5−7] . Recently, several investigations have reported that identical weak FBG arrays can greatly improve the multiplexing capacity and sensing distance because of their narrow bandwidth and weak reflection characteristics [8−10] . However, these promising characteristics require that the weak FBG array should have good uniformity, especially in its wavelength. The draw-tower grating technique is a good option for preparing identical and weak FBG arrays.Various factors of central wavelength separation, including fluctuations of drawing tension and core temperature, have been reported previously [3] . However, by detecting the surface temperature of bare fiber, we found that the core temperature of bare fiber at the writing spot was almost consistent at the stable drawing state. Several draw-tower FBGs are currently available in the market [11] . However, their wavelength accuracy of 0.4 nm does not meet the requirements of high-quality FBG arrays, as shown in Table 1. In their FBG writing platforms, the interference fringes used for writing FBGs are easily influenced by air flow because of the long optical path of the Talbot interferometer [12] . Moreover, very s...