Breast cancer, a malignant tumor originating from mammary epithelial tissue, is the most common cancer among women worldwide. Challenges facing the diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer necessitate the search for new mechanisms and drugs to improve outcomes. Estrogen receptor (ER) is considered to be important for determining the diagnosis and treatment strategy. The discovery of the second estrogen receptor, ERβ, provides an opportunity to understand estrogen action. The emergence of ERβ can be traced back to 1996. Over the past 20 years, an increasing body of evidence has implicated the vital effect of ERβ in breast cancer. Although there is controversy among scholars, ERβ is generally thought to have antiproliferative effects in disease progression. This review summarizes available evidence regarding the involvement of ERβ in the clinical treatment and prognosis of breast cancer and describes signaling pathways associated with ERβ. We hope to highlight the potential of ERβ as a therapeutic target.

This study indicated that (177)Lu-EDTMP was an effective and safe treatment for palliation of metastatic bone pain in patients with prostate or breast cancer. A dose of 1295 MBq (35 mCi) was sufficient for bone pain palliation therapy, and doses as high as 2590 MBq (70 mCi) were well tolerated.

These findings suggest that chronic heroin use induces long-lasting striatal DAT reductions. DAT availability remained unchanged during a 6-month period of abstinence. Treatment with Jitai appears to be effective at increasing striatal DAT availability.

Pancreatic cancer has the worst prognosis of any gastrointestinal cancer, with the mortality approaching the incidence. Early detection is crucial for improving patient prognosis. We therefore performed a meta-analysis to evaluate and compare the sensitivity and specificity of CA19-9 and CA242 in pancreatic cancer. We searched PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library for studies that evaluated the diagnostic validity of CA19-9 and CA242 between January 1966 and March 2011. Meta-analysis methods were used to pool sensitivity and specificity and to construct a summary receiver-operating characteristic (SROC) curve. A total of 11 studies that included 2,316 patients who fulfilled all of the inclusion criteria were considered for analysis. The pooled sensitivities for CA242 and CA19-9 were 0.719 (95 % confidence interval [CI] 0.690-0.746) and 0.803 (95 % CI 0.777-0.826), respectively. The pooled specificities of CA242 and CA19-9 were 0.868 (95 % CI 0.849-0.885) and 0.802 (95 % CI 0.780-0.823), respectively. The diagnostic odds ratio (DOR) estimate was significantly higher for CA242 (16.261) than for CA19-9 (15.637). Our meta-analysis showed that CA242 and CA19-9 could play different roles in the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. Although the sensitivity of CA242 is lower than that of CA19-9, its specificity is greater.

OBJECTIVE Chronic frontal hemodynamic disturbances are associated with executive dysfunction in adult patients with moyamoya disease (MMD). However, the impact of surgical revascularization on executive dysfunction and its underlying mechanism remains unclear. The aim of the present study was to examine the postoperative radiological correlates of cognitive improvement and thereby explore its underlying mechanism. METHODS Fourteen patients who met the inclusion criteria were identified at Huashan Hospital, were operated on, and were successfully followed up for 6 months. Postoperative changes in cortical perfusion and regional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) were examined by SPECT and resting-state functional MRI, respectively. Executive function was evaluated by 2 tests (Trail Making Test Part B and the summation of executive subtests of Memory and Executive Screening [MES-EX]). Follow-up neuropsychological outcomes were then correlated with radiological changes to identify nodes functioning as leading contributors to postoperative executive outcomes. RESULTS All patients underwent successful unilateral bypass procedures, with some operations performed on the left side and some on the right side. At the 6-month follow-up, the baseline and follow-up test scores for the different sides did not differ significantly. The group with good collaterals (Matsushima Grade A, 9 patients) exhibited significantly increased postoperative perfusion (change in [△] hemodynamics) in bilateral frontal (left, p = 0.009; right, p = 0.003) and left parietal lobe (p = 0.014). The Spearman's correlation test suggested that only the right frontal lobe exhibited significant positive postoperative radiological correlates with cognitive performance (△MES-EX vs △hemodynamics, r = 0.620, p = 0.018; △MES-EX vs △ALFF, r = 0.676, p = 0.008; △hemodynamics vs △ALFF, r = 0.547, p = 0.043). Subsequent regional ALFF analysis revealed that the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) was the only node in the responsible hemisphere to exhibit significant postoperative changes. CONCLUSIONS The results not only advance our understanding of pathological interactions of postoperative executive performance in adult MMD, but also indicate that the right DLPFC amplitude might be a quantitative predictor of postoperative executive control improvement.

Background/Aims: Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are valuable in both basic research and clinical application for cancer management. In the current study, we evaluated the diagnostic value of CTCs in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). Methods: In total, 143 blood samples from 95 consecutively diagnosed PDAC patients and 48 healthy donors were collected. Combined data from immunostaining of CD45, DAPI and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) with chromosome 8 centromere (CEP8) probe were used to identify CTCs. Cells with features of CD45-/DAPI+/CEP8>2 were detected as CTCs. Results: CTCs were classified as triploid, tetraploid and multiploid based on chromosome 8 copy number. CTC subtype composition was significantly different among groups. Both subtype number and total CTC number were significantly increased in PDAC patients, compared to healthy controls. Total CTC number had 75.8% sensitivity and 68.7% specificity at a cutoff value of 2 cells/3.2 mL. This study is the first to report that CTC subtype number is also useful in cancer diagnosis. Sensitivity was 53.7% and specificity was 85.4% at a cutoff point of 2 CTC subtypes. The diagnostic value of both total CTC number and CTC subtype number was a little poorer than CA199. Conclusions: Both CTC subtype and total CTC number may serve as potential biomarkers for PDAC.

The rapid resolution of excessive GH led to the reversible changes of systemic comorbidities in a time-dependent and organ-specific manner.

Myelin pathology is present in many neurological conditions such as multiple sclerosis (MS) and traumatic spinal cord injury (SCI). To facilitate development of novel therapies aimed at myelin repair, we set out to develop imaging agents that permit direct quantification of myelination in vivo. In this work, we designed and synthesized a series of fluorescent fluorinated myelin imaging agents that can be used for in vivo positron emission tomography (PET) imaging combined with subsequent post-mortem fluorescent cryoimaging. Structure-activity relationship (SAR) studies of the newly developed myelin imaging agents led us to identify a lead compound (TAFDAS, 21) that readily enters the brain and spinal cord and selectively binds to myelin. By conducting sequential PET and 3D cryoimaging in an SCI rat model, we demonstrated for the first time that PET and cryoimaging can be combined as a novel technique to image the spinal cord with high sensitivity and spatial resolution.