Novel artificial ion channels (1 and 2) based on CB[n] (n = 6 and 5, respectively) synthetic receptors with carbonyl-fringed portals (diameter 3.9 and 2.4 A, respectively) can transport proton and alkali metal ions across a lipid membrane with ion selectivity. Fluorometric experiments using large unilamellar vesicles showed that 1 mediates proton transport across the membranes, which can be blocked by a neurotransmitter, acetylcholine, reminiscent of the blocking of the K+ channels by polyamines. The alkali metal ion transport activity of 1 follows the order of Li+ > Cs+ approximately Rb+ > K+ > Na+, which is opposite to the binding affinity of CB[6] toward alkali metal ions. On the other hand, the transport activity of 2 follows the order of Li+ > Na+, which is also opposite to the binding affinity of 2 toward these metal ions, but virtually no transport was observed for K+, Rb+, and Cs+. It is presumably because the carbonyl-fringed portal size of 2 (diameter 2.4 A) is smaller than the diameters of these alkali metal ions. To determine the transport mechanism, voltage-clamp experiments on planar bilayer lipid membranes were carried out. The experiments showed that a single-channel current of 1 for Cs+ transport is approximately 5 pA, which corresponds to an ion flux of approximately 3 x 107 ions/s. These results are consistent with an ion channel mechanism. Not only the structural resemblance to the selectivity filter of K+ channels but also the remarkable ion selectivity makes this model system unique.

No abstract

AIM:To evaluate the prevalence and predictive factors of osteoporosis in patients with gastric adenocarcinoma after gastrectomy. METHODS:The study included 133 patients diagnosed with gastric adenocarcinoma but who did not undergo prior diagnostic work-up for osteoporosis. Bone mineral density (BMD) was measured by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) and vertebral deformity was assessed by plain X-rays. We evaluated the effects of age, sex, body mass index (BMI), anemia, back pain, vertebral deformity, tumor staging, reconstruction type, and past medical history to determine predictive factors of osteoporosis in these patients. RESULTS:The prevalence of osteoporosis in the lumbar spine was 38.3% (male, 28.9%; female, 54.0%), and 15.0% in the femoral neck (male, 10.8%; female, 22.0%). The vertebral deformity rate was 46.6% (male, 43.4%; female, 52.0%). Age, BMI and hemoglobin correlated with BMD (P < 0.01). In males, anemia and age > 64 years were independent predictive factors of osteoporosis in multivariate analysis. In females, back pain was an independent factor for osteoporosis. CONCLUSION:The results of this study revealed that prevalence of osteoporosis and vertebral bone deformity rate were high in gastric cancer patients, regardless of post-gastrectomy duration and operation type. Early diagnosis and a proper management plan must be established in these patients.

Objective To define the reference range for the ratio of Mannheim, Germany). Serum tPSA, fPSA and fPSA% were then assessed as a function of the subjects' age. free to total prostate-specific antigen (fPSA%) in a population of healthy men with no clinically evident Results The serum tPSA and fPSA were significantly diCerent among age decades 2-8 (P<0.001), with prostate cancer and to assess the influence of age on this tumour marker, thus determining the utility of increasing median values, indicating that both variables depend on age. The recommended upper refer-fPSA% in enhancing the discriminatory power of PSA to diCerentiate healthy men and patients with benign ence limit (95th percentile) for tPSA is 1.78 ng/mL for men aged 30-39 years, 1.75 ng/mL for 40-49 prostatic hyperplasia from those with prostate cancer. Subjects and methods In a prospective cohort study years, 2.27 ng/mL for 50-59 years, 3.48 ng/mL for 60-69 years and 4.26 ng/mL for 70-79 years. The between May and August 1996, 1160 white men aged 20-89 years (957 were 40-69 years old, 82% fPSA% was not significantly diCerent between decades 3-8 (P=0.06). Those aged 20-29 years had a slightly of all subjects) from nine European and eight non-European countries were assessed. None of the part-higher median value (P=0.03) than the other age groups. The recommended lower reference limit (fifth icipants who had a history of prostate cancer had undergone prostatectomy. A standard clinical examin-percentile) for fPSA% is 12.6%. Conclusion The fPSA% for clinically relevant age groups ation including a digital rectal examination was performed to exclude the presence of prostate cancer.in healthy men was independent of age, which simplifies the use and interpretation of this relatively new Transrectal ultrasonography was not an inclusion criterion, as it was not available in every case. Total tumour marker. Keywords Prostate specific antigen, free PSA, tumour PSA (tPSA) and free PSA (fPSA) were determined in 61 laboratories using the appropriate Enzymun-TestA marker, reference range for tPSA and fPSA (Boehringer Mannheim Diagnostics, of the prostate but also in patients with BPH or inflam-

The world is developing an app that alerts my smartphone when a COVID-19 (COrona VIrus Disease 19) confirmed case comes near me. However, regardless of what will be put to practical use first, the COVID-19 tracking system should satisfy the issues of legalization of location tracking and scalability as a public platform used by the world. Additional problems need solutions related to real-time authentication for information gathering, blind naming and privacy of tracked persons, and quality of service on the Query/Reply procedure. This paper proposes the Software-Defined Networking Controller-centric global public platform to monitor and track information for the COVID-19 relevant people and provide real-time information disclosure services to world-wide Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCs) and regular users. The CDC manages a list of people who needs to be monitored related to the COVID-19 and forcibly installs COVID-19 virtual Internet of Things (vIoT) nodes in the form of applications on their smartphones. In addition to these nodes, the vIoT support nodes also engage as information providers to improve the quality of information services. The design of our platform aims to ensure confidentiality and authentication services giving individually different secret keys. In addition, our platform meets system scalability and reduces Query/Reply latency, where the platform accommodates a large number of world-wide CDCs and persons in control per CDC.

No abstract

No abstract

Patients who received echinocandins were more severely ill. Echinocandin use was associated with a non-significant 7% decrease of 28-day mortality and a trend to a beneficial effect for patient with septic shock.