High uptake of 18F-FDG would be predictive of poor prognosis in patients with primary breast cancer, and aggressive features of cancer cells in patients with early breast cancer. 18F-FDG PET/CT could be a useful tool to pre-therapeutically predict biological characteristics and baseline risk of breast cancer.

Background: Accurate evaluation of axillary lymph node (ALN) involvement is mandatory before treatment of primary breast cancer. The aim of this study is to compare preoperative diagnostic accuracy between positron emission tomography/computed tomography with 18 Ffluorodeoxyglucose ( 18 F-FDG PET/CT) and axillary ultrasonography (AUS) for detecting ALN metastasis in patients having operable breast cancer, and to assess the clinical management of axillary 18 F-FDG PET/CT for therapeutic indication of sentinel node biopsy (SNB) and preoperative systemic chemotherapy (PSC).

We describe here a rapid, high-throughput genotyping procedure that allows the simultaneous detection of 16 high-and low-risk genital human papillomavirus (HPV) types by multiplex PCR in a single reaction tube. Multiplex PCR is based on the amplification of HPV DNA by sets of HPV genotype-specific primers, and the genotypes of HPV are visually identified by the sizes of amplicons after they are separated by capillary electrophoresis. The procedure does not include a hybridization step with HPV-specific probes and is rapid and labor-saving. We detected all 16 HPV genotypes (types 16, 58, 52, 51, 56, 31, 18, 39, 66, 59, 6, 33, 30, 35, 45, and 11) with a high sensitivity and a high degree of reproducibility. By using this newly developed method, we conducted a pilot study to examine the correlation between the prevalence and genotype distributions of HPV and the cytological group classifications for 547 cervical samples. Compared with the group of samples considered normal (14.7%), there was a significant increase in the prevalence of HPV in women with atypical squamous cells of unknown significance (61.3%), low-grade intraepithelial lesions (75.8%), and high-grade intraepithelial lesions (HSILs) (82.2%). The prevalence and distribution of type 58 were correlated with cytological malignancies, with the highest prevalence in women with HSILs. In conclusion, the novel multiplex PCR method described appears to be highly suitable not only for the screening of cervical cancer precursor lesions but also for the characterization of genotype distributions in large-scale epidemiological studies and HPV vaccination trials.Accumulating evidence indicates that persistent infection with high-risk human papillomaviruses (HPVs) is indeed a major causative factor in the development of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia and invasive cervical carcinoma (42,10,8,5,40,27,11,30). The HPV family includes over 100 genotypes, 30 to 40 of which are mucosotropic, and at least 15 types of the mucosotropic HPVs have been linked to cervical cancer (5,8,10,42). In addition, some of these types are also related to other cancers of the genital tract (21,22) and to cancers of other organs (14, 28). Light microscopic examination of a Papanicolaou (Pap)-stained smear is of primary importance for the detection of cervical cancer precursor lesions. It has been demonstrated that concomitant testing for DNA of the highrisk HPV types by the Pap test can clearly identify women at high risk for cervical cancer, particularly if persistent infection by high-risk HPV types is diagnosed (5,8,10,11,27,30,40). Furthermore, HPV genotyping is of critical importance for the investigation of the clinical behavior and the epidemiology of HPV infection, for population studies for HPV vaccination trials, and for monitoring of the efficacy of HPV vaccines. Several genotyping methods have been developed in order to identify high-risk HPV in liquid-based cytology (LBC) samples and tissue samples (1,12,34). The molecular techniques that have been applied for HPV DNA detect...

Cocultivation of spleen cells, lymph node cells, and thymocytes of female Wistar-King-Aptekman rats with short-term cultured male adult T cell leukemia (ATL) cells in the presence of 5-bromo-2'-deoxyuridine (BrdUrd) resulted in the establishment of rat lymphoid cell lines, TARS-1, TARL-2, and TART-1. Cytogenetic analysis of the three cell lines showed a female rat karyotype with 42 chromosomes. The surface phenotypes of TARS-1 and TART-1 were those of rat T cells. TARL-2 was only positive for rat Ia and leukocyte common antigens. The cell lines continuously produced a type C retrovirus, human T cell leukemia virus (HTLV) and expressed ATL-associated antigens. TARS-1 and TART-1, but not TARL-2 were transplantable into newborn syngeneic rats and nude mice. These results strongly indicate that HTLV not only immortalizes, but also transforms rat T cells in vitro. Adult rats immunized with either TARS-1 or TARL-2 produced antibodies specific for HTLV. The biochemical analysis of the antigens that reacted with rat sera revealed that they are the two HTLV-specific polypeptides, p24 and p28.

Japan 1 (7)-N-(trans-4-isopropylcyclohexanecarbonyl)-D-phenylalanine (A-4166), a novel oral hypoglycaemic agent is a non-sulphonylurea insulin secretagogue. 2 We investigated the insulin-releasing action and hypoglycaemic e ect of A-4166 compared to sulphonylureas in vitro and in vivo. 3 A-4166 stimulated insulin secretion from rat freshly isolated pancreatic islets at concentrations from 3610 -6 M to 3610 -4 M in the presence of 2.8 mM glucose. There was no obvious di erence in glucose dependency between the insulinotropic e ect of A-4166 and that of glibenclamide, and no additive or synergistic e ect was observed between these two drugs. 4 A-4166 displaced [ 3 H]-glibenclamide bound to intact HIT-T15 cells in a concentration-dependent manner. The K i value was 4.34+0.04610 77 M, and the displacement potency of A-4166 was between that of glibenclamide and tolbutamide, being similar to that of gliclazide. 5 In fasted beagle dogs, A-4166 showed a dose-dependent hypoglycaemic e ect after oral administration over the range 1 to 10 mg kg 71 . The hypoglycaemic action of A-4166 showed an earlier onset and a shorter duration than that of sulphonylureas. 6 Simultaneous measurement of plasma insulin levels revealed that the hypoglycaemic e ect of A-4166 was caused by a rapid-onset and brief burst of insulin secretion. 7 The pharmacokinetic pro®le of A-4166 was consistent with the changes of the blood glucose and plasma insulin levels. 8 Although the in vitro insulin-releasing e ect of A-4166 was similar to that of sulphonylureas, its hypoglycaemic e ect was more rapid and shorter-lasting, associated with rapid absorption and clearance. Thus, A-4166 may be useful in suppressing postprandial hyperglycaemia in patients with non-insulindependent diabetes mellitus.