Membrane - bound Cathepsin B - like Protease Activity in Malignant Skin Tumors / 대한피부과학회지

BACKGROUND: Malignant skin tumor cells derived from epidemal keratinocyte penetrate the basement membrane to proliferate in dermal interstitial strozirarnd invade surrounding tissue and finally metastasize to distant organs. In this stage of invaiac a and metastsis, the existence of proteolytic enzymes, which are capable of degrading the tissue barrier composed primarily of collagen, elastin, glycoproteins and proteoglycans, is imagnant. One of theses enzymes, cathepsin B, a lysosomal thiol protease, has been reported to ie ound in association with plasma membrane in animal and human tumors and to be releasec b tumor cells. OBJECT: We assayed the cathepsin B activities of squamo is cell carcinoma and basal cell carcinoma in order to investigate the correlation between the degree of cathepsin B activities and invasiveness or metastatic potential of skin tumors. METHODS: Cathepsin B-like protease activity was measurec by the method of Hirao using a synthetic substrate, Z-Phe-Arg-MCA. The skin tissues (penie Koreskin for control, basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma tumor masses) were homogenized and their subcellular organelles were fractionated by centrifugation. Each of the fractionated preparations were used as enzyme solution. RESULTS: Cathepsin B-lilke activities were found mainly in the membrane fractions in all the samples. The activities of squamous cell carcinoma (12.484+1.904) and basal cell carcinoma (10.598+1.926) were higber than those of the control skin (9.115+0.815). CONCLUSION: These results suggest that membrane-bound conrt epsin B-like protease participates in local dissolution of the extracellular matrices and were ar endothelial cells to be able to make metastasis to other remote organ during the invasivest ges of malignant skin tumors.

Psychological Study of Dermographism Patients / 대한피부과학회지

The subjects of the present study was 300 out-patients and 304 people living in similar condition. The SCL-90(symptom check list-90) questionare was used and the two groups were compared by many factors. The rcsults were as follows. 1. All dimensional values of the dermographism group were much higher than the normal group except obsessive-compulsive dimension. The order of significance: Paranoid ideation, interpersonal sensitivity somatization, depression, anxiety, hostility and phobic anxiety(p<0. 01), The result indicates a significantly high incidence of psychological problems among dermographism patients. 2. In the dermographism group, the patients over 30 years old had significantly higher. scores in depression, anxiety, hostility and psychoticism. 3. Male patents showed significantly higher scores than female in paranoid ideation. 4. The unmarried patients had significantly higher scores in dcpression, para noid ideation and psychoticism. 5. Thc longer the duration of the disease was the higher the scores were. 6, There were no significant differences in educational status, family history, the job at onset of the disease, and the accuracy of understanding about the disease.