ABSTRACT
Biopsy material of patients with malignant and benign breast diseases was examined. HRG mRNA expression was detected in 70% of cases in biopsy material obtained from patients with nonspecific invasive carcinoma and in 66.7% of cases in biopsy material of patients with benign breast diseases. Immunohistochemical analysis revealed expression of collagen II, the beta-1 integrin, and E-cadherin-markers of epithelial-mesenchymal transition. The use of RT-qPCR combined with immunohistochemical study made it possible to identify atypical cells, which can be regarded as precancerous changes, in individual patients.
Subject(s)
Biomarkers, Tumor/biosynthesis , Breast Neoplasms/metabolism , Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition , Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic , Neoplasm Proteins/biosynthesis , Proteins/metabolism , Adolescent , Adult , Aged , Antigens, CD/biosynthesis , Antigens, CD/genetics , Biomarkers, Tumor/genetics , Breast Neoplasms/genetics , Breast Neoplasms/pathology , Cadherins/biosynthesis , Cadherins/genetics , Female , Humans , Middle Aged , Neoplasm Proteins/genetics , Proteins/geneticsABSTRACT
The refractive index n is one of the most important materials parameters of solids and, in recent years, has become the subject of significant interdisciplinary interest, especially in nanostructures and meta-materials. It is, in principle, a macroscopic quantity, so its meaning on a length scale of a few nanometers, i.e., well below the wavelength of light, is not clear a priori and is related to methods of its measurement on this length scale. Here we introduce a novel experimental approach for mapping the effective local value [Formula: see text] of the refractive index in solid films and the analysis of related local-field enhancement effects. The approach is based on the imaging and spectroscopy of single chromophore molecules at cryogenic temperatures. Since the fluorescence lifetime T1 of dye molecules in a transparent matrix depends on the refractive index due to the local density of the electromagnetic field (i.e., of the photon states), one can obtain the local [Formula: see text] values in the surroundings of individual chromophores simply by measuring their T1 times. Spatial mapping of the local [Formula: see text] values is accomplished by localizing the corresponding chromophores with nanometer accuracy. We demonstrate this approach for a polycrystalline n-hexadecane film doped with terrylene. Unexpectedly large fluctuations of local-field effects and effective [Formula: see text] values (the latter between 1.1 and 1.9) were found.
