Chinese expert consensus of image-guided irreversible electroporation for pancreatic cancer.

Pancreatic cancer (PC) is a lethal disease with extremely high mortality. Although surgical resection is the optimal therapeutic approach for PC, about 30%-40% of those patients are not candidates for surgical resection when diagnosed. Chemotherapy and radiotherapy also could not claim a desirable effect on PC. The application of interventional radiology approaches is limited by unavoidable damage to the surrounding vessels or organs. By the superiority of mechanism and technology, IRE could ablate the tumor by creating irreversible pores on the membrane of PC cells with other tissues like vessels and pancreatic ducts untouched. This consensus gathers the theoretical basis and clinical experience from multiple Chinese medical centers, to provide the application principles and experience from Chinese experts in the IRE field.

Non-Gaussian fluctuations and non-Markovian effects in the nuclear fusion process: Langevin dynamics emerging from quantum molecular dynamics simulations.

Macroscopic parameters as well as precise information on the random force characterizing the Langevin-type description of the nuclear fusion process around the Coulomb barrier are extracted from the microscopic dynamics of individual nucleons by exploiting the numerical simulation of the improved quantum molecular dynamics. It turns out that the dissipation dynamics of the relative motion between two fusing nuclei is caused by a non-Gaussian distribution of the random force. We find that the friction coefficient as well as the time correlation function of the random force takes particularly large values in a region a little bit inside of the Coulomb barrier. A clear non-Markovian effect is observed in the time correlation function of the random force. It is further shown that an emergent dynamics of the fusion process can be described by the generalized Langevin equation with memory effects by appropriately incorporating the microscopic information of individual nucleons through the random force and its time correlation function.

Constraints on the density dependence of the symmetry energy.

Collisions involving 112Sn and 124Sn nuclei have been simulated with the improved quantum molecular dynamics transport model. The results of the calculations reproduce isospin diffusion data from two different observables and the ratios of neutron and proton spectra. By comparing these data to calculations performed over a range of symmetry energies at saturation density and different representations of the density dependence of the symmetry energy, constraints on the density dependence of the symmetry energy at subnormal density are obtained. The results from the present work are compared to constraints put forward in other recent analyses.

Clinical application of a combination therapy of lentinan, multi-electrode RFA and TACE in HCC.

INTRODUCTION: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common cancer-related causes of death worldwide and there is a clear need for further treatment options. In this study, we assessed the efficacy of a combination of lentinan (a fungal extract), transcatheter arterial chemoembolisation (TACE) and radiofrequency ablation (RFA) in HCC patients. METHODS: Seventy-eight patients with HCC confirmed by pathology and iconographical checks were used in this study. A total of 136 tumours with a mean diameter of 6.5 cm were detected (standard deviation [SD]+/-0.7). Subjects were divided into four groups, receiving either TACE only, RFA only, RFA and TACE, or the combination group - receiving lentinan, RFA and TACE. RESULTS: The tumour necrosis was significantly higher in the combination group (88.6%), compared to the TACE group (37.5%), the RFA group (47.8%) and the TACE/RFA group (60.3%; P<0.05). The tumour recurrence rate was significantly lower in the combination group (17.8%), compared to the TACE group (45.8%), the RFA group (34.7%) and the TACE/RFA group (29.0%; P<0.05). Finally, mean survival duration was significantly higher in the combination group (28.2 months; P<0.05). CONCLUSION: Combination therapy involving lentinan, RFA and TACE was beneficial in terms of increasing mean survival duration, tumour necrosis and reducing the recurrence rate. Lentinan may therefore be of benefit to HCC patients.