Patients who only had HCV infection did not differ from patients with HCV and HGV co-infection in clinical presentation, HCV RNA level, or response of HCV to interferon-alpha therapy. Thus, HGV infection had no apparent influence on the clinical or virologic course of HCV infection. Hepatitis G virus was uniformly sensitive to interferon-alpha therapy, but only a few patients had a sustained virologic response.

Previous studies from our laboratory showed that human amnion epithelial cells (AECs) have multiple functions, such as synthesis and release of catecholamines, acetylcholine, neurotrophic factors, activin, and noggin. In this study, we investigated the identity of neural progenitor cells in human amnion mesenchyme cells (AMCs), which lie immediately adjacent to the AECs. Cryostat sections revealed that vimentin expression was detected in the AMCs and CK19 in AECs. Vimentin-positive cells made up 97.5% of total cells tested in cultured AMCs. Interestingly, 3.6% of total AMCs expressed the phenotype CK19+/vimentin+, indicating coexpression of epithelial and mesenchyme cell markers. In culturing with bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) for 24 hr, 66-82% of cells were found to be BrdU positive, suggesting that they have proliferating potency. By using RT-PCR, AMCs express mRNA of nestin and Musashi1. With a neural cell differentiating protocol, cell bodies extended long bipolar or complex multipolar processes. Nestin (87.7% of total cells tested) and Musashi1 (93.1%) were expressed in undifferentiated cells, and their positively stained cells increased in number slightly after induction. Undifferentiated cells were stained by anti-Tuj1 and NF-M, and their positively stained cells increased significantly in number after induction, to 72.8% and 46.0%, respectively. Meanwhile, glial fibrillary acidic protein-positive cells increased from 25.4% to 43.2% after induction. These studies demonstrate that AMCs have phenotypes of neuroglial progenitor cells and can be differentiated into neuroglial phenotypes by optimal differentiation protocol. Eventually, AMC-derived stem cells may be a favorable cell vehicle in regenerative medicine.

The selectivity of silodosin , an antagonist of a 1 -adrenoceptor (AR), to the subtypes (a 1A -, a 1B -and a 1D -ARs) was examined by a receptor-binding study and a functional pharmacological study, and we compared its subtype-selectivity with those of other a 1 -AR antagonists. In the receptor-binding study, a replacement experiment using [ 3 H]-prazosin was conducted using the membrane fraction of mouse-derived LM (tk-) cells in which each of three human a 1 -AR subtypes was expressed. In the functional pharmacological study, the following isolated tissues were used as representative organs with high distribution densities of a 1 -AR subtypes (a 1A -AR: rabbit prostate, urethra and bladder trigone; a 1B -AR: rat spleen; a 1D -AR: rat thoracic aorta). Using the Magnus method, we studied the inhibitory eŠect of silodosin on noradrenaline-induced contraction, and compared it with those of tamsulosin hydrochloride, naftopidil and prazosin hydrochloride. Silodosin showed higher selectivity for the a 1A -AR subtype than tamsulosin hydrochloride, naftopidil or prazosin hydrochloride (a‹nity was highest for tamsulosin hydrochloride, followed by silodosin, prazosin hydrochloride and naftopidil in that order). Silodosin strong antagonized noradrenaline-induced contractions in rabbit lower urinary tract tissues (including prostate, urethra and bladder trigone, with pA 2 or pKb values of 9.60, 8.71 and 9.35, respectively). On the other hand, the pA 2 values for antagonism of noradrenaline-induced contractions in rat isolated spleen and rat isolated thoracic aorta were 7.15 and 7.88, respectively. Selectivity for lower urinary tract was higher for silodosin than for the other a 1 -AR antagonists. Our data suggest that silodosin has a high selectivity for the a 1A -AR subtype and for the lower urinary tract.Key words-silodosin (KMD-3213); a 1A -adrenoceptor subtype selectivity; lower urinary tract

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