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Biomedical subjects

M C Wu

Publications and source records attributed to M C Wu.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources
PubMed1994

CATCH: family process evaluation in a multicenter trial.

The Child and Adolescent Trial for Cardiovascular Health (CATCH) is an elementary school cardiovascular health education field trial in progress in San Diego, California, New Orleans, Louisiana, Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Austin, Texas. Because a significant part of a child's health behaviors are shaped within the home, CATCH is evaluating whether the effects of the school-based program are enhanced by the inclusion of a home-based program. A 7 x 7 x 10 randomized design with 7 school-only and 7 school-plus-family intervention schools, along with 10 control schools is implemented at each site. The CATCH family intervention is implemented during Grades 3 through 5 and consists of home-based curricula and Family Fun Nights focusing on healthier eating and increased physical activity during Grades 3 and 4, along with a smoking prevention curriculum in Grade 5. CATCH is examining the effectiveness of family (household) involvement through changes in students' dietary intake of fat and sodium. This paper describes the process evaluation methods used to document the extent of participation in the family program. Data reported for the third-grade Family Fun Nights held in the 28 family schools across all sites reflected an average student participation rate of 67%. The average family member to student ratio was approximately 2:1. Participation by all third-grade teachers and the majority of physical education specialists was observed.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1994

[The experimental study of anti-human AFP variant McAb in radioimmuno-detection and radioimmuno-therapy of human hepatocellular carcinoma model in nude mice].

Anti-human AFP variant monoclonal antibody (AFP-R-LCA McAb) was labeled by 131I and injected intraperiton ealy. The 131I-AFP-R-LCA McAb was gathered in tumor of nude mice bearing human hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The tumor/liver radioactivity redio was 5.2, but normal mice IgG labeled by 131I-(131-mIgG) or free 131I was not gathered in tumor and distributed everywhere in average. The group of 131I-AFP-R-LCA McAb was positively visualized by gamma camea. The test showed that 131I-AFP-R-LCA McAb cured the nude mice bearing HCC. The tumor inhibition rate in 131I-AFP-R-LCA McAb group at the 4th week after treatment was significantly higher than those of the other groups (85%, 45%, 20%, 7% respectively, P < 0.05). The result showed that the AFP-R-LCA McAb have strong affinity and special combination to HCC cells and it can be recognized as a carrier for radioimmunodetection and radioimmunotherapy.

Animals↗
PubMed1994

[The prognostic value of focusylated alpha-fetoprotein measurement in liver cancer patients after surgery].

Postoperative change of focusylation index (FI) of serum alpha-fetoprotein (F-AFP) and the result of surgery were studied in 34 patients of hepatocellular carcinoma. In 23 patients, serum F-AFP was disappeared with serum AFP turning negative and no tumor recurrence heppaned within the first 6 months postoperatively. In 4 patients, owing to hepatitis or active cirrohosis in the remained liver, serum AFP didn't turn negative, but FI of AFP was obviously decreased, follow-up found no signs of tumor recurrence within the first 6 months. In 5 of 7 patients, with decreased postoperative serum AFP levels and unchanged FI, tumor recurred. These results showed that postoperative F-AFP monitoring is helpful in evaluating surgical efficacy in liver tumor producing AFP.

Adult↗
PubMed1993

Primary hepatocellular carcinoma in women of mainland China. A clinicopathologic analysis of 104 patients.

The clinicopathologic characteristics of 104 hepatectomy samples from female patients with primary hepatocellular carcinoma (PHC) were compared with similar samples from 900 male patients with primary hepatocellular carcinoma; results of this comparison were studied. The male-to-female ratio was 8.7:1. The mean age of female patients with PHC was 46.2 years, which was approximately 3 years younger (49.1 years) than that of male patients with PHC. The frequency of associated liver cirrhosis (LC) was 49% in women with PHC and 68.2% in men with PHC (P < 0.01). The mean age of the female patients without LC was 43.2 years, more than 4 years younger (47.9 years) than that of the male patients. The mean ages of female and male patients with LC were 49.1 years and 49.8 years, 6 and 2 years older than that of their corresponding groups without LC, respectively. The positive rates of serum hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) were 70.8% in the men and 59.7% in the women. The 5-year postoperative survival rates were 50% in the women and 25.7% in the men (P < 0.01). It is suggested that the development of PHC in women appears at a younger age than that of PHC in men in China and usually is associated with a lower frequency of LC and a more satisfactory postoperative prognosis.

Adult↗
PubMed1993

Evidence for unusual stability of ADP-ribosyl linkage to membrane proteins of a murine leukemic cell line.

A set of membrane proteins from murine myelomonocytic leukemia cell line WEHI-3BD+ was found to be ADP-ribosylated. Both this ADP-ribosylation reaction and granulocytic differentiation in response to recombinant G-CSF were inhibited approximately 50% by 2 mM benzamide, suggesting a correlation between these two processes. The stability of the ADP-ribosyl linkage was examined under a series of chemical release conditions and was found to resemble none of the known ADP-ribosyl-amino acid linkages. This chemical modification may represent a new class of mono(ADP-ribosyl) modifications of proteins.

Adenosine Diphosphate Ribose↗
PubMed1993

Pharmacokinetics of recombinant secretory leukoprotease inhibitor aerosolized to normals and individuals with cystic fibrosis.

Recombinant secretory leukoprotease inhibitor (rSLPI), a recombinant form of a natural airway inhibitor of neutrophil elastase (NE), is a potential therapeutic agent for cystic fibrosis (CF), a condition characterized by airway derangement mediated in part by the large burden of NE on the CF respiratory epithelial surface. After in vitro studies that demonstrated that aerosolized rSLPI retains its form and function, rSLPI was administered via aerosol to normal individuals and individuals with CF to determine the pharmacokinetics of in vivo rSLPI augmentation of the anti-NE defenses of the respiratory epithelial surface. After rSLPI aerosolization to normal individuals (100 mg single dose or 100 mg twice daily for 1 wk) there was a marked increase in SLPI levels and anti-NE capacity in airway epithelial lining fluid (ELF) at 1 h, diminishing gradually over 4 to 12 h. Interestingly, the ELF SLPI levels and anti-NE capacity achieved 12 h after 1 wk of rSLPI aerosols were no different than those 12 h after a single dose of rSLPI, suggesting that rSLPI does not accumulate on the respiratory epithelial surface after aerosolization. The ability of rSLPI to suppress NE in vivo was evaluated by aerosolization of rSLPI to individuals with CF, first as an escalating dose to assess safety, and then at doses of 100 mg twice daily for 1 wk or 50 mg twice daily for 2 wk.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Aerosols↗
PubMed1993

Alpha-fetoprotein reaction to Pisum sativum agglutinin in differentiation of benign liver diseases from hepatocellular carcinoma.

Alpha-fetoprotein reactive to Pisum sativum agglutinin levels (AFP-R-PSA) was measured in sera from 124 patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and 54 patients with benign liver diseases (BLD). The level of AFP-R-PSA in the HCC group (42% +/- 22%) was significantly higher than that in the BLD group (10% +/- 8%). When an AFP-R-PSA level above 25% was used as a value highly suggestive of HCC, the sensitivity of the test was 82%, the specificity was 96%, the accuracy was 86%, and the positive prediction value was 98%. The positive rates of AFP-R-PSA in HCC patients with a serum AFP level below 100 micrograms/L and with a serum AFP level below 400 micrograms/L were 78% and 84%, respectively. Corresponding value was 74% for 31 patients with a tumor size less than 5cm. If AFP was combined with AFP-R-PSA, the detection rate of small HCC in this study would be increased from 32% to 87%. These data indicate that measurement of AFP-R-PSA is useful for the differentiation of BLD and for the early diagnosis of HCC.

Adult↗
PubMed1992

Stimulation of macrophage colony-stimulating factor synthesis by interleukin-1.

Interleukin-1 (IL-1), which plays an important role in the inflammatory response, was found to induce colony-stimulating factor-1 (CSF-1) expression in the MIA PaCa-2 cells. IL-1-induced CSF-1 production was markedly suppressed (70%) by pertussis toxin. This inhibition by pertussis toxin was reversed by benzamide, an inhibitor of ADP-ribosylation reactions. Similarly, IL-1-induced CSF-1 production was inhibited by cholera toxin and this inhibition was reversed by an arginine analog, p-methoxy-benzylaminodecamethylene guanidine sulfate. Dibutyryl-cAMP as well as other cAMP elevating agents such as theophylline and forskolin also suppressed IL-1-induced CSF-1 production, suggesting that cAMP concentrations inversely regulate the biosynthesis of CSF-1. Measurement of cAMP concentration indicated that IL-1 treatment of MIA PaCa-2 cells did not change the cAMP level. IL-1-induced CSF-1 production was not suppressed by the protein kinase C (PKC) inhibitor, H7, under conditions in which 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate-induced CSF-1 production was completely abolished. These data suggest that IL-1-induced CSF-1 production is not mediated via the activation of PKC. Analysis of oncogene c-fos and c-jun expression has shown the enhancement of expression of both protooncogenes prior to CSF-1, suggesting that the expression of these two oncogenes may be the mechanism which triggers CSF-1 gene expression.

Bucladesine↗
PubMed1992

A phorbol diester resistant monocytic leukemia cell line is PKC deficient.

MIA C51 is a rat monocytic leukemia cell line which exhibits undifferentiated monocytic phenotype in culture. The proliferation of MIA C51 cells was not inhibited by the addition of 12-O-tetradecanoyl-phorbol-13-acetate (TPA, 1 microgram/ml) or phorbol 12, 13 dibutyrate (PDBu, 10 micrograms/ml). Comparison of MIA C51 cells to a phorbol diester-sensitive human monoblastoid U-937 cell line demonstrated that MIA C51 cells contained significantly lower number of PDBu receptors, protein kinase C (PKC) activity, and PKC protein level. Further experiments demonstrated that addition of TPA to MIA C51 cells did not induce the expression of c-fos proto-oncogene; whereas incubation of MIA C51 cells with N6, O2-dibutyryl cyclic adenosine 3',5' monophosphate (Bt2cAMP) resulted in a rapid increase of c-fos mRNA level. Thus, this cell line provides a new system for studying the signal transduction mechanisms in induced monocytic differentiation.

Animals↗
PubMed1992

Sequential monitoring for comparison of changes in a response variable in clinical studies.

The spending function approach proposed by Lan and DeMets (1983, Biometrika 70, 659-663) for sequential monitoring of clinical trials is applied to situations where comparison of changes in a continuous response variable between two groups is the primary concern. Death, loss to follow-up, and missed visits could cause follow-up measurements to be right-censored or missing for some participants. Furthermore, the probability of being censored may be dependent on the parameter value of the response variable (informative censoring). We propose to compare treatment effects by comparing areas under the expected response change curves between the two groups. When the response curves are linear as a function of time in both groups, this comparison is equivalent to comparing the rates of change in the response variable. Covariances of the sequential test statistics are derived. Conditions for having independent increments are presented. For studies designed to evaluate long-term treatment effects, spending functions obtained by shifting the usual spending functions (Kim and DeMets, 1987, Biometrika 74, 149-154) to the right and then rescaling to the remaining interval are also proposed. Such a shifted spending function is applied to the monitoring plan for the Lung Health Study (Anthonisen, 1989, American Review of Respiratory Diseases 140, 871-872).

Adult↗
PubMed1992

Characteristic changes of DNA stemlines during hepatocarcinogenesis in rats.

DNA stemlines of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) model of adult Wistar rats established by diethylnitrosamine were quantitatively measured by flow cytometry. The cancer-inducing course was divided into four stages, eg, precirrhosis stage, cirrhosis stage, early cancer stage and cancer progression stage. The advantageous DNA stemline of hepatocytes of normal adult Wistar rats was tetraploid (4C). It was from the cirrhosis stage that atavistic proliferation of hepatocytes with diploid (2C) DNA stemline started and replaced 4C hepatocytes, resulting in a new advantageous population. The features of early cancer stage were formation of HCC with 2C DNA stemline, whereas during the cancer progression stage, HCC cells with aneuploid (AN) DNA stemline presented the advantageous growth. The study clearly shows the change pattern of DNA stemline during the course of hepatocarcinogenesis from 4C-2C-AN, which is believed to be the biokinetic mechanism of the development and progression of HCC.

Aneuploidy↗
PubMed1992

Induction of human monocyte cell line U937 differentiation and CSF-1 production by phorbol ester.

The monoblast-like human histiocytic lymphoma cell line U937 can be induced by phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA) at concentrations of 8-16 ng/ml to undergo differentiation. The induced cells show growth inhibition, morphological changes to monocyte-macrophage-like cells, and increases in nitroblue tetrazolium (NBT) and nonspecific esterase activities. The expression of surface markers MO1 and MO2 for macrophages is also elevated. The induced differentiation of U937 cells is accompanied by the appearance of colony-stimulating activity in the culture medium as assayed on mouse bone marrow cells. Gel filtration chromatography of the conditioned media shows a peak of colony-stimulating factor (CSF) activity with an apparent molecular weight of approximately 100 kd. Morphological analysis of the colonies reveals a predominant monocyte-macrophage population. This CSF activity can be neutralized by anti-human colony-stimulating factor 1 (CSF-1) antibody, and Western blot analysis shows a CSF-1 band. All these results strongly indicate that CSF produced by induced U937 cells is CSF-1. Northern blot analysis of RNA isolated from U937 cells demonstrated that CSF-1 gene expression started after PMA induction for 3 h and declined after 18 h. Protooncogenes c-fos and c-jun were expressed after half an hour of incubation with PMA.

Blotting, Northern↗
PubMed1992

[Risk factors related to the use of amphetamines in adolescent students].

The prevalence of amphetamine abuse among school children was studied by asking 3548 adolescent students (aged 12-15, response rate 98.6%) to complete a questionnaire anonymously, which was developed and evaluated by the authors. A complete set of data was collected for 3200 (90.2%) students. Eighty-five (2.7%) of them who admitted that they had used amphetamines constituted the case group. Non-users with negative urine tests formed the control group. Six independent factors were found to be related to amphetamine use when the answers were analyzed by stepwise logistic regression. The prevalence odds ratio estimation was elevated in: males compared females, students who did not live with both parents compared to those who lived with both parents, students with amphetamine-user friends compared to those with no-user friends, smokers compared to non-smoker, betel nut chewers compared non-chewers, and in students with positive attitudes compared to those with negative attitudes. The average starting age for smoking was 12.5 +/- 0.1 years; later this was followed by alcohol abuse, chewing of betel-nuts, and use of amphetamines. The average age of starting to use amphetamines was 13.5 +/- 0.2 years; a common reason given for using amphetamines was curiosity (65.4%). Many students (54.2%) obtained the amphetamine from their friends and most of them (85.2%) used it six months before responding to the questionnaire.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1992

Hepatic arterial chemoembolization with CDDP microcapsules. Experimental studies.

After cis-diamminedichloroplatinum ethylcellulose microcapsules (CDDPmc) and unencapsulated CDDP were infused into the hepatic arteries of New Zealand rabbits, both CDDP concentrations in the circulating blood and in hepatic tissue were measured at different time intervals. In the rabbits infused with CDDPmc, the CDDP concentration was maintained at a high level for a significantly longer time in the hepatic tissue and the maximum CDDP level in the circulating blood was greatly reduced, as compared with those in the rabbits infused with unencapsulated CDDP. The tumoricidal effects of arterial infusion of CDDPmc were also evaluated in a model of liver tumor in rats. The therapeutic effects on rat liver tumor of CDDPmc were superior to those of unencapsulated CDDP and blank ethylcellulose microcapsules. The rats treated with CDDPmc showed a significantly lower tumor growth ratio, more extensive tumor necrosis and longer survival time. The results of this study indicate that CDDPmc is a more potential dosage from than conventional CDDP for hepatic arterial infusion in the treatment of liver cancer.

Animals↗
PubMed1991

[Study on targeting drug delivery system--the characteristics of methotrexate microsphere and experimental treatment of hepatic tumor in rats by arterial embolization].

Preparation of methotrexate microsphere (MTX-ms) by emulsion-freezing technique was introduced and the experimental results proved that MTX entrapped in the microspheres exhibited good stabilities towards temperature, cobalt-60 radiation and light. The dissolution and inflation rate of the microspheres in pH 7.4 buffer solution at different times measured by Coulter counter was presented. Antitumor activity of MTX-ms after hepatic arterial embolization was examined in a model of liver tumor in Wistar rats. The group of rats treated with MTX-ms showed a rather significant reduction in tumor growth and more extended tumor necrosis as compared with the other groups, e.g. normal saline solution, MTX solution, placebo gelatin-ms and the results demonstrate that the effect of arterial chemoembolization used by MTX-ms is superior to that of the groups either using arterial chemotherapy or arterial embolization alone in treating rat liver cancer.

Animals↗