Recurrent epithelioid malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor with neurofibromatosis type 1: A case report and literature review.

Malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors (MPNSTs) are unusual and aggressive malignant soft-tissue tumors that comprise 5-10% of all soft-tissue sarcomas. Approximately 50% of MPNST cases are associated with neurofibromatosis type-1 (NF-1). As a rare MPNST subset, the epithelioid variant of MPNST (eMPNST) is histologically characterized by the predominant presence of epithelioid tumor cells, and accounts for <5% of all MPNSTs. In addition, eMPNST is rarely associated with NF-1 when compared with conventional MPNST. Although extensive clinicopathological studies have been conducted on eMPNST, clinicians face difficulty when attempting to make an accurate diagnosis. Subsequently, the biological consequences, including recurrence, metastasis and mortality rate in patients with eMPNST remain unclear. The current study presents the case of a 71-year-old woman with eMPNST and a family history of NF-1 in whom tumors had recurred twice on the lower back. A literature search for eMPNSTs was conducted by browsing PubMed and MEDLINE for English-language articles, as well as references from review articles, and revealed 129 published cases. Only 5 cases of eMPNST were associated with NF-1. The studies were retrospectively reviewed and the clinicopathological data of the patients, including tumor site, treatment, follow-up, prognosis, and immunohistochemical positivity were collected.

Observation of Interference between Resonant and Detuned stirap in the Adiabatic Creation of

Stimulated Raman adiabatic passage (stirap) allows efficiently transferring the populations between two discrete quantum states and has been used to prepare molecules in their rovibrational ground state. In realistic molecules, a well-resolved intermediate state is usually selected to implement the resonant stirap. Because of the complex molecular level structures, the detuned stirap always coexists with the resonant stirap and may cause unexpected interference phenomenon. However, it is generally accepted that the detuned stirap can be neglected if compared with the resonant stirap. Here we report on the first observation of interference between the resonant and detuned stirap in the adiabatic creation of ^{23}Na^{40}K ground-state molecules. The interference is identified by observing that the number of Feshbach molecules after a round-trip stirap oscillates as a function of the hold time, with a visibility of about 90%. This occurs even if the intermediate excited states are well resolved, and the single-photon detuning of the detuned stirap is about 1 order of magnitude larger than the linewidth of the excited state and the Rabi frequencies of the stirap lasers. Moreover, the observed interference indicates that if more than one hyperfine level of the ground state is populated, the stirap prepares a coherent superposition state among them, but not an incoherent mixed state. Further, the purity of the hyperfine levels of the created ground state can be quantitatively determined by the visibility of the oscillation.

Observation of magnetically tunable Feshbach resonances in ultracold 23Na40K + 40K collisions.

Resonances in ultracold collisions involving heavy molecules are difficult to simulate theoretically and have proven challenging to detect. Here we report the observation of magnetically tunable Feshbach resonances in ultracold collisions between potassium-40 (40K) atoms and sodium-23-potassium-40 (23Na40K) molecules in the rovibrational ground state. We prepare the atoms and molecules in various hyperfine levels of their ground states and observe the loss of molecules as a function of the magnetic field. The atom-molecule Feshbach resonances are identified by observing an enhancement of the loss. We have observed 11 resonances in the magnetic field range of 43 to 120 gauss. The observed atom-molecule Feshbach resonances at ultralow temperatures probe the three-body potential energy surface with exceptional resolution and will help to improve understanding of ultracold collisions.

Anti-tumor effect of hot aqueous extracts from Sonchus oleraceus (L.) L. and Juniperus sabina L - Two traditional medicinal plants in China.

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE: Sonchus oleraceus (L.) L (SO) and Juniperus sabina L (JS) are traditional medicinal plants in China. And the aqueous extracts of them have been used to treat tumor, inflammatory diseases, infection and so on in Chinese folk culture. However, the underlying mechanisms of their anti-tumor activities have not been illustrated yet. OBJECTIVE: This study aims to evaluate the inhibitory effects of aqueous extracts from SO and JS on tumor cells. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The prepared aqueous extracts of SO and JS were used to treat HepG-2 and K562 tumor cells, while the human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were set as normal control. The viabilities, cell cycle and apoptosis of tumor cells after extracts treatment were assessed, in addition the expression of apoptosis-related genes (FasL, caspase 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10) were analyzed. Meanwhile, the adherence and migration of HepG-2 were tested, and the expression levels of MMPs and ICAM-1 were analyzed. On top of that, the pSTAT in the two cells were also analyzed and suggested the related signaling pathway that the extracts acted on with in these tumor cells. RESULTS: Results showed that aqueous extracts of SO and JS have inhibitory effects on HepG-2 and K562 cells by decreasing cell viability and inducing apoptosis via up-regulation of the expression of the apoptosis-related genes FasL, caspase 3 and caspase 9. The extracts had different IC50 on tumor cells and PBMCs, which could block the tumor cell cycle at the G(0)/G(1) stage and significantly inhibit the adherence of HepG-2 cells. The extracts inhibited migration of these cells by inhibiting the expression of ICAM-1, MMP-2 and MMP-9. Further study indicated that the inhibition of pSTAT1 and 3 might be responsible for the inhibitory effects of the extracts on tumor cells. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION: The results of this study indicated that SO and JS extracts had the anti-tumor effects, which may be developed as novel anti-tumor drugs and used in cancer therapy.

Choledochojejunostomy with an innovative magnetic compressive anastomosis: How to determine optimal pressure?

AIM: To investigate the optimal magnetic pressure and provide a theoretical basis for choledochojejunostomy magnetic compressive anastomosis (magnamosis). METHODS: Four groups of neodymium-iron-boron magnets with different magnetic pressures of 0.1, 0.2, 0.3 and 0.4 MPa were used to complete the choledochojejunostomy magnamosis. Twenty-six young mongrel dogs were randomly divided into five groups: four groups with different magnetic pressures and 1 group with a hand-suture anastomosis. Serum bilirubin levels were measured in all groups before and 1 wk, 2 wk, 3 wk, 1 mo and 3 mo after surgery. Daily abdominal X-ray fluoroscopy was carried out postoperatively to detect the path and the excretion of the magnet. The animals were euthanized at 1 or 3 mo after the operation, the burst pressure was detected in each anastomosis, and the gross appearance and histology were compared according to the observation. RESULTS: The surgical procedures were all successfully performed in animals. However, animals of group D (magnetic pressure of 0.4 MPa) all experienced complications with bile leakage (4/4), whereas half of animals in group A (magnetic pressure of 0.1 MPa) experienced complications (3/6), 1 animal in the manual group E developed anastomotic stenosis, and animals in group B and group C (magnetic pressure of 0.2 MPa and 0.3 MPa, respectively) all healed well without complications. These results also suggested that the time required to form the stoma was inversely proportional to the magnetic pressure; however, the burst pressure of group A was smaller than those of the other groups at 1 mo (187.5 ± 17.7 vs 290 ± 10/296.7 ± 5.7/287.5 ± 3.5, P < 0.05); the remaining groups did not differ significantly. A histologic examination demonstrated obvious differences between the magnamosis groups and the hand-sewn group. CONCLUSION: We proved that the optimal range for choledochojejunostomy magnamosis is 0.2 MPa to 0.3 MPa, which will help to improve the clinical application of this technique in the future.