Procalcitonin (PCT) is a marker of severe bacterial infections and organ failure due to sepsis. The purpose of the present study was to identify the appropriate cutoff level of PCT based on the findings of a blood culture and polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The PCT levels were measured in 116 patients in an intensive care unit who were suspected of having bacteremia, to examine its relationship with a blood culture or PCR. The PCT levels were significantly high in patients with bacteremia, but they were also moderately high in some patients who were positive for fungus DNA. The area under the curve was significantly higher for PCT than for C-reactive protein. The appropriate cutoff values of PCT for bacteremia were 0.38 microg/L for the high negative predictive value and 0.83 microg/L for the high positive predictive value. Procalcitonin was slightly related to mortality, and the combination of a blood culture and PCR was thus found to increase the sensitivity for mortality. These findings suggest that PCT is useful for the diagnosis of bacteremia and that the diagnostic value of PCT in combination a with blood culture and PCR for bacterial infection or mortality further increases.

An Aβ42 analog crosslinked within the molecule at the 17th and 28th amino acid residues exhibited high aggregative ability and potent neurotoxicity comparable to those of E22P-Aβ42.

Our panfungal PCR approach allows for the highly sensitive and specific detection and identification of a wide spectrum of fungal pathogens, which provides indispensable information for managing IFDs, especially refractory or breakthrough IFDs during antifungal therapy in high-risk patients with haematologic disorders.

Rare-earth-free phosphors based on vanadate compounds were investigated, where the vanadates included chloride vanadates (M II 2 VO 4 Cl), pyrovanadates (M II 2 V 2 O 7 ), orthovanadates (M II 3 (VO 4 ) 2 ) with divalent cations M II of Mg, Sr, Ba, and Zn, and oxofluorovanadates (A I VOF 4 ) with an alkali metal A I . A chloride pyrolysis method and a liquid phase precipitation method were proposed for preparing the chloride vanadates and pyro-and orthovanadates, respectively. These vanadate compounds showed self-activated photoluminescence (PL) based on the VO 4 clusters against the ultraviolet (UV) light irradiation. The colors of PL covered almost the whole visible-light region from blue to yellow as Sr 2 VO 4 Cl (deep blue), Ca 2 VO 4 Cl (sky blue), Ba 2 V 2 O 7 (green), Sr 2 V 2 O 7 (yellowish green), Zn 3 (VO 4 ) 2 (yellow), and Mg 3 (VO 4 ) 2 (yellow). A correlation was suggested from these compounds between the luminescent colors and the structural feature as the longer V-O distances in the VO 4 tetrahedra in the crystal structures led to the longer wavelength in PL. This seemed to be also applicable for the oxofluorovanadates A I VOF 4 (A I = K and Cs) which contain the VOF 4 polyhedra with one O 2ion and four Fions as the ligands, as they exhibited the reddish PL.

Rapid weight reduction reduced the wrestlers' cross-sectional areas of muscle and fat tissues, which tended to recover through rehydration after the weigh-in. These results suggest that rapid weight reduction of wrestlers induced changes in different regions of the body.