Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to C L Smith.
Pulmonary function has been assessed in 36 outpatients with inflammatory bowel disease. The carbon monoxide transfer factor was found to be significantly reduced in patients as compared with matched controls (P less than 0.01). The reason for this reduction is not clear but it is unlikely to be due to sulfasalazine (Salazosulphapyridine).
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Four cases of malignant histiocytosis of the intestine (MHI) are described in detail, with emphasis on the clinical features and laboratory findings that may lead to a diagnosis. MHI is a rapidly progressive, usually fatal condition, which may occur in a setting of adult celiac disease or apparently spontaneously; all patients, however, have villous atrophy and crypt hyperplasia of the jejunum. Characteristic symptoms are malaise, weight loss, abdominal pain, and diarrhea followed, after a period of weeks or months, by acute small intestinal obstruction, perforation, or bleeding. Because of the high mortality associated with MHI, suggestive symptomatology and investigations should, in the absence of a definitive diagnosis, lead to an urgent laparotomy with a view to chemotherapy if the diagnosis is made.
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In earlier evaluations of the agarose LMI assay as an in vitro test for studying the nature and mechanism of action of TF, we reported the existence of a component in human DLEs which caused noncytotoxic inhibition of the random migration of human PMNs. The LMI was not dependent on the stimulation of viable mononuclear leukocytes by antigen or mitogen to effect the release of mediators of cellular immunity such as LIF; rather, the LMI was promoted by the direct action of a preexisting component in DLEs on PMNs. We now present evidence that this "antigen-independent" LMI activity in DLE'S is similar to a NIF shown previously by Goetzl and co-workers to be present in acid extracts of leukocytes and to be released by phagocytosing PMNs. The comparison is drawn from several parameters: (1) cellular origin, (2) molecular weight, (3) target cell, (4) susceptibility to inactivation by heating or by incubation with pronase, trypsin, or chymotrypsin, and (5) ability to cause noncytotoxic inhibition of random migration or chemotaxis of PMNs.
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Plasma and 24-hour urinary cyclic AMP and cyclic GMP levels were determined by saturation analysis in specimens from normal subjects and from 101 patients with tumours of the gastrointestinal tract, breast, lung, bladder or prostate, or with cirrhosis of the liver. Relative to 46 control subjects, plasma cyclic GMP concentrations were significantly elevated in seven patients with gastric tumours, 20 patients with cancer of the breast, six patients with lung cancer, and 12 patients with cirrhosis of the liver. Urinary cyclic GMP/creatinine ratios were significantly increased in cirrhotic patients and in the lung and oesophageal cancer groups. In no cancer group were increases in plasma or urine cyclic GMP levels sufficiently consistent to be of value in the diagnosis of human malignant disease. Changes in extracellular fluid cyclic nucleotide levels in the cirrhotic group were very similar to those that have been reported for primary hepatoma patients.
Endoscopic duodenal biopsies were taken from 27 patients with suspected coeliac disease and compared with intubation capsule jejunal biopsies. The specimens were reported without knowledge of the patients' names or symptoms. In 24 patients (89%), coeliac disease could either be diagnosed or excluded with 100% accuracy, despite the inability to orientate the biopsies correctly. Six biopsies were considered technically unsatisfactory, but only in three (11%) was it impossible to exclude coeliac disease. Duodenal biopsies were also taken from 118 consecutive patients attending for routine upper gastrointestinal endoscopy, and 1 patient with coeliac disease was discovered. We conclude that endoscopic duodenal biopsies are a reliable and worthwhile screening test for coeliac disease in certain patients attending for routine upper gastrointestinal endoscopy.
Nalidixic acid, novobiocin and coumermycin specifically inhibit phage promoter-dependent transcription of the trp operon in phi 80 ptrp but not transcription from the authentic trp promoter. The nalidixic acid inhibition is not observed in an E. coli strain containing a nalAr mutation. These results indicate that DNA gyrase is involved in transcription.
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1. Arrhenius plots of State IV respiratory activity of liver mitochondria from both rainbow trout and rat were linear over the temperature range 5-35 degrees C. 2. Calcium uptake was monitored by stimulation of oxygen consumption and by calcium electrode recording, with quite comparable results. Rainbow trout gave the usual linear Arrhenius plot but this plot for rat mitochondria exhibited two well-defined inflections or discontinuities. 3. The temperature dependence of the activity of the ionophore A23187 was investigated by measuring the increase in oxygen uptake following a sub-maximal dose of this drug. Again a linear relation was found for rainbow trout, but in this case the rat curves showed only a single inflection point. 4. These results are discussed in relation to other work on the effects of lipid phase transitions on mitochondrial membrane-associated systems.
Different inducing agents and treatments produced distinctly different kinetic patterns of inactivation of prophage repressor molecules. The different patterns were related to differences in the initial altered states of DNA that were produced. The timing of appearance of DNA degradation was correlated with the time needed for repressor inactivation. These characteristics suggest that all the inducing treatments lead to the formation of a final predegradative DNA structure(s) (probably involving scissions) that is acted on by specific DNases, including the recBC DNase, to produce the signals for the induction of prophage.
UV light causes inactivation of phage (phi80) repressor molecules in a plasmolyzed, permeable cell preparation of Escherichia coli. Induction without UV irradiation occurs when the permeable cells are incubated in the presence of four deoxyribonucleoside triphosphates and ATP. The induction triggered by dNTP's requires a functional recBC gene product and is associated with degradation of the DNA replication fork. The role of recBC DNase in the induction of prophage and SOS functions in general is discussed.
A 26-year-old woman, who had undergone jejunoileal bypass surgery six years previously for obesity, had symptoms of intermittent fever, myalgia, polyarthralgia, and aseptic joint swelling. These symptoms commenced one year after her surgery and gradually grew in intensity and frequency of occurrence. The patient, observed to have moderately decreased renal function, hyperoxaluria, and circulating cryoglobulins, underwent liver and renal biopsies. Both organ specimens demonstrated granulomatous involvement, but the kidneys exhibited no evidence of oxalate deposition. The findings of circulating cryoglobulins and suppression of symptoms with doxycycline, taken collectively with the circumstances surrounding this case, suggest that the observed granulomatous disease may be due to systematically adsorbed bacterial antigen(s).
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