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Biomedical subjects

J L Harris

Publications and source records attributed to J L Harris.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1997

P-4 and RNKP-7, new granzyme-like serine proteases expressed in activated rat lymphocytes.

Serine proteases (granzymes) in killer lymphocytes are required for lymphocyte cytotoxic granules to lyse target cells. Herein we report the development of a 3-step PCR cloning technique to amplify novel granzyme genes and two new rat granzymes are described. Degenerate oligonucleotide primers were designed based on sequence motifs selectively expressed in granzymes. These motifs flank "delta" regions that are unique for each granzyme. Total RNA of RNK-16 cells or activated splenocytes was amplified by reverse transcriptase-PCR to obtain cDNA fragments of several new granzymes. Gene-specific primers based on these delta regions were then used for 3'-RACE to obtain clones with the 3' gene ends. Reverse (antisense) delta-based or active site serine primers were used with a granzyme 5'-UTR primer to obtain clones extending to the 5' ends. Using this technique, two new cDNAs, RNKP-4 and RNKP-7, which encode granzymes of 248 and 241 amino acids, respectively, were cloned from activated lymphocytes. RNKP-4 is likely the rat equivalent of mouse granzyme C. RNKP-7 is most closely related to granzymes F and G. Modeling of the predicted proteins suggests large/polar P1 (Gln/Asn) specificity for RNKP-4 and large/hydrophobic P1 (e.g., Phe) specificity for RNKP-7. These specific protease activities were found in cytotoxic RNK-16 lymphocyte granules indicating that the two new genes may be translated and stored as active granzymes.

Amino Acid Sequence↗
PubMed1997

Dental erosion in a wine merchant: an occupational hazard?

This paper reports a case of dental erosion apparently caused by wine tasting. Dental erosion can cause extensive damage to the dentition, thereby creating a variety of complex restorative problems. Within the literature dental erosion has been attributed to many factors, but to date there are no documented cases specifically linking it with wine tasting. The dental professional is ideally placed to implement early preventive regimes which would make the occupation less damaging to the dentition.

Food Handling↗
PubMed1997

Treatment of postprostatectomy urinary incontinence with behavioral methods.

Prostate cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in men. The radical prostatectomy is the treatment of choice for localized cancer; however, this surgery carries with it the potential complication of urinary incontinence postoperatively. The increasing number of radical prostatectomies each year will thus lead to a growing number of patients suffering from postprostatectomy urinary incontinence. According to the medical literature, the treatment of postprostatectomy incontinence is almost always limited to pharmacological or surgical therapy. Because of the failure of the standard treatment options, many men are left to live with their incontinence. The guidelines for the treatment of urinary incontinence recommend the use of behavioral methods as first-line treatment for stress and urge incontinence. The potential treatment of postprostatectomy incontinence with the use of behavioral methods has a promising future for the advanced practice nurse and for the men who are affected.

Aged↗
PubMed1996

Distinguishing detection from identification in subliminal auditory perception: a review and critique of Merikle's study.

Assertions made by Merikle (1988) regarding audio subliminal messages were tested. Seventeen participants were presented subliminal messages embedded in a white-noise cover, and three signal-to-noise (S/N) detection ratios were examined. Participants were asked to guess message presence and message content, to determine subjective/objective thresholds. Results showed that participants were unable to identify target words presented in this audio subliminal stimulus format beyond chance levels.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1992

Upward mobility for LPNs: a vision made reality.

A recurrent theme in the nursing literature is the shortage of realistic, long-term solutions directed toward registered nurse (RN) recruitment and retention. If fragmentation of RN recruitment and retention is to be eliminated, innovative programs involving collaboration and use of existing resources will be required. This article provides an overview of how collaboration among nurses, administrators, educators, and a personnel specialist resulted in an upward mobility program for licensed practical nurses (LPNs) to become RNs. While the program is specific to one setting, there are numerous implications for other hospitals confronted with persistent recruitment and retention problems.

Career Mobility↗
PubMed1992

Sociologic aspects of pregnancy.

Increasingly, social factors are recognized as having a major impact on pregnancy, childbearing, and prenatal care. This review examines some of the more recent societal developments that have influenced health care for pregnant women. Although human gestation is a biologic phenomena, it exists with the social context of personal needs, family, and community of the pregnant women. This social fabric determines the perception, management, and outcome of that gestation. Significant influences to examine include pregnant women in the work force; malpractice concerns of health care providers; issues related to the cost of health care in pregnancy; the legal rights of the pregnant woman versus the legal rights of the fetus; pregnancy and occupational health; and the role of stress in pregnancy outcome.

Career Choice↗
PubMed1992

Haptic asymmetries in persons with and without mental retardation.

Adults with mild mental retardation and equal-MA children and adults without mental retardation were required to (a) tactually examine single letters, two-letter words, bigrams, and Chinese characters with their right or left index finger and (b) indicate whether a visually presented stimulus was the tactually examined stimulus by saying "same" or "different." The left hand was significantly better for "same" responses and the right hand, for "different" responses, suggesting that hemispheric processing is dependent on information-processing requirements rather than type of stimulus. A left hand advantage for "same" Chinese characters by the children and adults without mental retardation was due to an increase in right hand latencies rather than a decrease in left hand latencies, again suggesting that different types of analyses are employed by the two cerebral hemispheres. Adults with mental retardation had the poorest accuracy and slowest latencies for correct "different" responses and significantly less differentiation of "same" and "different" responses (A') for all stimulus types. They identified "same" letters, words, and bigrams significantly faster than Chinese characters with their left hand and showed a trend toward the differential processing of bigrams ("same" latencies) as a function of hand.

Adult↗
PubMed1992

Diabetes mellitus in pregnancy.

The Council on Scientific Affairs of the California Medical Association presents the following inventory of items of progress in obstetrics and gynecology. Each item, in the judgment of a panel of knowledgeable physicians, has recently become reasonably firmly established, both as to scientific fact and important clinical significance. The items are presented in simple epitome, and an authoritative reference, both to the item itself and to the subject as a whole, is generally given for those who may be unfamiliar with a particular item. The purpose is to assist busy practitioners, students, researchers, or scholars to stay abreast of these items of progress in obstetrics and gynecology that have recently achieved a substantial degree of authoritative acceptance, whether in their own field of special interest or another. The items of progress listed below were selected by the Advisory Panel to the Section on Obstetrics and Gynecology of the California Medical Association, and the summaries were prepared under its direction.

Diabetes, Gestational↗
PubMed1991

Universal self-care requisites as identified by homeless elderly men.

1. Given the current economic climate, the number of homeless persons, and the nature of their needs, nurses must be prepared to facilitate movement of all homeless persons toward self-care. 2. Nurses can contribute to the self-care of homeless elderly men by recognizing and eliciting requisites, associated actions, and nursing interventions that reinforce meeting of needs. 3. Study results support Orem's proposition that universal self-care requisites are common to all individuals regardless of age, sex, developmental level, health state, or internal or external conditions. 4. A number of participant's statements used to formulate themes suggested a relationship to more than one category of universal self-care requisites, which suggests that the categories are not mutually exclusive.

Aged↗
PubMed1990

Monoterpene biosynthesis: specificity of the hydroxylations of (-)-limonene by enzyme preparations from peppermint (Mentha piperita), spearmint (Mentha spicata), and perilla (Perilla frutescens) leaves.

Microsomal preparations from the epidermal oil glands of Mentha piperita, Mentha spicata, and Perilla frutescens leaves catalyze the NADPH- and O2-dependent allylic hydroxylation of the monoterpene olefin (-)-limonene at C-3, C-6, and C-7, respectively, to produce the corresponding alcohols, (-)-trans-isopiperitenol, (-)-trans-carveol, and (-)-perillyl alcohol. These transformations are the key steps in the biosynthesis of oxygenated monoterpenes in the respective species, and the responsible enzyme systems meet most of the established criteria for cytochrome P450-dependent mixed function oxygenases. The reactions catalyzed are completely regiospecific and, while exhibiting only a modest degree of enantioselectivity, are highly specific for limonene as substrate. Of numerous monoterpene olefins tested, including several positional isomers of limonene, only the 8,9-dihydro analog served as an alternate substrate for ring (C-3 and C-6) hydroxylation, but not side chain (C-7) hydroxylation. In addition to the regiospecificity of the allylic hydroxylation, these enzymes are also readily distinguishable based on differential inhibition by substituted imidazoles.

Cyclohexenes↗
PubMed1990

Self-care actions of chronic schizophrenics associated with meeting solitude and social interaction requisites.

Solitude becomes a way of life and social interaction a scarce commodity for many chronic schizophrenics who are in institutional settings. This article describes the self-care actions associated with meeting solitude and social interaction requisites as reported by 10 institutionalized chronic schizophrenics. Eighteen solitude self-care actions and 10 social interaction self-care actions emerged from the interview data. The solitude self-care actions clustered around two distinct categories: distancing and organizing. The social interaction self-care actions clustered around one category, managing situations. The implications of this study extend to anyone who is in the position of providing care and support to an individual diagnosed as a chronic schizophrenic. Additional research is suggested to increase the generalizability of the findings of this study and to isolate conditions related to Orem's (1985) sets of actions for maintenance of a balance between solitude and social interaction.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1990

Microbiology and potential virulence of Sporothrix cyanescens, a fungus rarely isolated from blood and skin.

Sporothrix cyanescens has been recovered from blood and a finger lesion at several medical centers in the United States. The morphology and physiology of these and three additional isolates were studied. S. cyanescens was distinguished from S. schenckii and S. fungorum by white to lavender colonial pigmentation and from S. schenckii also by the formation of secondary conidia. All isolates of S. cyanescens grew well at 37 degrees C, were cycloheximide susceptible, strongly urease positive, and benomyl resistant, failed to hydrolyze starch, and were inhibited by sodium chloride in vitro at a concentration of greater than or equal to 12%. Study of S. cyanescens in a murine model by using intravenous inoculation failed to demonstrate an invasive pathogenic potential. The validity of the transfer of S. cyanescens to the new genus Cerinosterus Moore is discussed.

Cell Division↗
PubMed1987

Metabolism of monoterpenes: demonstration of the hydroxylation of (+)-sabinene to (+)-cis-sabinol by an enzyme preparation from sage (Salvia officinalis) leaves.

A microsomal preparation from the epidermis of Salvia officinalis leaves catalyzed the NADPH- and O2-dependent hydroxylation of the monoterpene olefin (+)-sabinene to (+)-cis-sabinol. The reaction catalyzed is a key step in the biosynthesis of C3-oxygenated thujane monoterpenes, and the hydroxylase is highly specific for (+)-sabinene as substrate. The hydroxylase from leaf homogenates was solubilized and characterized with regard to reaction conditions, inhibitors, and activators. Activity was partially inhibited by rabbit anti-rat cytochrome P-450 and by CO, and the latter inhibition was reversed by 450 nm light. A CO-difference spectrum and type I substrate binding spectrum were obtained. The hydroxylase meets most of the established criteria for a cytochrome P-450-dependent mixed function oxygenase and represents one of very few enzyme systems of this type to be isolated from leaves of a higher plant.

Bicyclic Monoterpenes↗
PubMed1987

Sensitization and hippocampal type 2 theta in the rat.

Previous research has consistently demonstrated that there are two types of theta which can be recorded from the hippocampus of a variety of species. Type 1 theta occurs during voluntary movements such as walking, running and rearing while type 2 theta occurs during alert immobility. Large amplitude irregular activity (LIA) occurs during more automatic behaviors such as grooming and chewing as well as during non-alert immobility. Type 2 theta can be readily elicited in the unrestrained guinea pig and rabbit. While spontaneous type 2 theta rarely occurs in the rat, short trains of type 2 theta have been observed during conditioning. The purpose of the present study was to examine the relationship between type 2 theta and inescapable shock when the temporal characteristics of the conditioning stimulus (CS) were varied. Three conditioning paradigms (delay, trace, random) were utilized. Type 2 theta production increased over time as a function of the number of shocks and was not due to conditioning. There were no differences in the three groups in the occurrence of type 2 theta during CS presentations or during the inter-stimulus intervals. Previously neutral sensory stimulation also produced type 2 theta after conditioning in all groups. The inescapable shocks placed the rat in a high state of arousal which subsequently sensitized the animal to produce type 2 theta. The data was used to support the hypothesis that a state of arousal is a necessary precursor for the production of type 2 theta.

Acoustic Stimulation↗
PubMed1986

Modified method for fungal slide culture.

A modified slide culture method which combines advantages found in several slide culture methods is described. A block of inoculated nutrient agar sandwiched between two sterile cover glasses is placed in a plastic petri dish containing water agar. After adequate growth has occurred, the slide culture is disassembled and mounted in a conventional manner.

Culture Media↗