Clinical significance of fascin-1 and laminin-5 in non-small cell lung cancer.

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in men and the second leading cause of cancer death in women worldwide. Fascin-1 and laminin-5 were associated with the invasiveness and prognoses of several cancers. The expression and the serum levels of fascin-1 and laminin-5 in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) were analyzed in this study. The expression of fascin-1 and laminin-5 were examined in 378 patients and their serum level was measured in 154 patients. The health of all patients was followed post-surgery. The expression of fascin-1 (P = 0.000) and lanminin-5 (P = 0.001) and the serum levels of fascin-1 (P = 0.015) and laminin-5 (P = 0.046) were related to the relapse of patients with NSCLC. Both serum levels and expression of fascin-1 and laminin-5 can be used to effectively evaluate the prognoses of patients with NSCLC.

The effect of the ferroelectric domain walls in the scanning near field optical microscopy response of periodically poled Ba(2)NaNb(5)O(15) and LiNbO(3) crystals.

A study of Ba(2)NaNb(5)O(15) and LiNbO(3) crystals with periodic ferroelectric domain structures using the scanning near field optical microscopy technique is reported. Optical contrast is observed in the regions of ferroelectric domain boundaries and it is analysed using beam propagation method modelling. This reveals that the optical contrast, a consequence of changes in the refractive index, is not due to variation of the waveguide-coupling efficiency, and supports the hypothesis that it is associated with the domain array, which is related to the size of the domain.

Femtosecond pump-probe measurements of non-radiative relaxation in LiAlO(2):V(3+).

We report on time-resolved studies of non-radiative relaxation of V(3+) ions in LiAlO(2) by means of a two-beam, pump-probe saturation experiment performed with the 150 fs pulsed output of a Ti-sapphire laser. Exciting into the vibronically broadened [Formula: see text] transition at 800 nm, a (3)T(1) relaxation time of 199 ps has been measured at 4 K. This value decreases to 82 ps at room temperature, representing a reduction in the lifetime of a factor of 2.5 due to internal-conversion processes. The relative probabilities for non-radiative, phonon-assisted barrier hopping and quantum mechanical tunnelling through the potential barrier to the (3)A(2) ground state have been obtained using Mott's expression, yielding best-fit parameters of W(0) = (5.2 ± 1) × 10(9) Hz and W(1) = (7.5 ± 1) × 10(10) Hz for a potential barrier of E(nr) = 530 ± 50 cm(-1).

Vacuum ultraviolet spectroscopy of Ce(3+)-doped SrMgF(4) with superlattice structure.

X-ray diffraction of Ce(3+)-doped SrMgF(4) (SMF:Ce) crystals shows a superlattice structure, reflecting the distribution of Ce(3+) polyhedra centres observed in optical experiments. Optical absorption bands and fluorescence bands from the Ce(3+) polyhedra centres overlap in the vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) and ultraviolet (UV) regions, respectively, so that wide pumping and tuning ranges are expected for laser operation. The SMF:Ce crystals, as well as the isomorphous BaMgF(4), are candidates for a tunable laser gain material with nonlinear properties. The optical absorption, excitation, and fluorescence bands observed in the SMF:Ce crystals at low temperatures are ascribed to five distinct fluorescent centres. Three centres have well-known Ce(3+) optical characters, for example, fluorescence with double peaks separated by 2000 cm(-1) and five resolved absorption/excitation bands. These centres are assigned to Ce(3+)-polyhedra classified by weak and strong crystal fields as a consequence of the superlattice structure. The other two fluorescence bands observed in the visible region have 1.5-2 times larger linewidths than those of the former three bands. These bands are interpreted as optical transitions from complexes consisting of Ce(3+) and one or two electrons trapped at a vacancy of the nearest neighbour F(-) ligand ions.

Reversible polarized bleaching in hydrogenated rare-earth-doped fluorites.

By using site-selective laser spectroscopy, several sites in hydrogenated and deuterated rare-earth-doped fluorite crystals have been found to exhibit reversible bleaching. The site orientations can be switched between orthogonal directions by corresponding changes in the laser polarization. Such effects are a form of photochemical hole burning and are attributed to laser-induced migration of H(-) or D(-) ions between equivalent interstitial positions adjacent to the rare-earth ion.