1 November 1995

Ricardo Rossi – 1 November 1995

Mark G. Swain, Mirjana Maric – 1 November 1995 – Nonspecific systemic complaints are commonly encountered in patients with cholestatic liver diseases. However, the cause of these symptoms is poorly understood. Because corticotropin‐releasing hormone (CRH) has been implicated as a mediator of sickness‐related systemic symptoms, we examined CRH‐mediated neuroendocrine and behavioral responses in rats with cholestasis due to bile duct resection (BDR) or sham resected (sham) controls.

Michael Bauer, Nicole C. Paquette, Jian X. Zhang, Inge Bauer, Benedikt H. J. Pannen, Steven R. Kleeberger, Mark G. Clemens – 1 November 1995 – Recent evidence suggests that hepatic stellate cells function as liver‐specific pericytes that are highly contractile in response to endothelin‐1 (ET‐1). Liver injury has been shown to lead to “activation” of stellate cells producing a phenotypic change to a more myofibroblastic cell type including loss of vitamin A and increased contractility.

Yan Xin, Jerome M. Lasker, Charles S. Lieber – 1 November 1995 – Carbohydrate‐deficient transferrin (CDT) is now considered to be the most sensitive and specific biological marker of alcohol abuse. However, the mechanism by which chronic alcohol consumption causes an elevation of CDT levels in serum is still not understood. Therefore, we fed eight pairs of male rats a nutritionally adequate liquid diet containing either alcohol (36% of energy) or isocaloric dextrose (control) for 4 weeks, after which blood and liver samples were obtained.

Nasim Ara Begum, Masaki Mori, Takashi Matsumata, Kenji Takenaka, Keizo Sugimachi, Graham F. Barnard – 1 November 1995 – Our aim was to isolate potentially important differentially expressed gene products from paired human hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and normal liver samples using the differential messenger RNA (mRNA) display technique. Total RNA samples were reverse transcribed with anchoring oligonucleotide primers and then amplified by the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) with additional upstream random primers.

Olivier le Moine, Arnaud Marchant, Donat de Groote, Camille Azar, Michel Goldman, Jacques Devière – 1 November 1995 – Monocytes of patients with alcoholic cirrhosis produce higher amounts of tumor necrosis factor‐alpha (TNF‐α) after lipopolysaccharide (LPS) stimulation. The mechanisms of this overproduction remain undefined. IL‐10 (IL‐10) is an antiinflammatory cytokine known to downregulate TNF‐α secretion by monocytes. The present study analyzes IL‐10 production by monocytes and its control on TNF‐α secretion in alcoholic cirrhosis.

Luca Todros, Giorgio Saracco, Marilena Durazzo, Maria Lorena Abate, Giovanni Touscoz, Luca Scaglione, Giorgio Verme, Mario Rizzetto – 1 November 1995 – Interferon alfa (IFN) therapy is efficacious in chronic viral hepatitides. It may, however, cause adverse immunologic reactions in patients with concomitant autoimmune phenomena. A minority of patients with chronic type C hepatitis have antibodies against liver and kidney microsomes (anti‐LKM) in serum. We therefore carried out this study to find out whether IFN is safe and efficacious also in this subgroup.

Mary‐Anne Kedda, Michael C. Kew, Richard J. Cohn, Stephen P. Field, Rosemary Schwyzer, Ernest Song, F. Fernandes‐Costa – 1 November 1995 – We report an outbreak of hepatitis A in nine South African hemophiliacs treated exclusively with infusions of factor VIII concentrate. The solvent/detergent (S/D) method (which does not inactivate nonenveloped viruses) was used for virus eradication.

David Mutimer, Anna Matyi‐Toth, Elwyn Elias, Jean Shaw, Katharina O'Donnell, Helena Kilgariff, James Neuberger, Bridget Gunson, Paul McMaster, Per Stalhandske – 1 November 1995 – An assay for quantitation of cytomegalovirus (CMV) has been developed. The assay combines DNA amplification and enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) detection. In this study, the assay has been used to examine sequential buffycoats from 32 consecutive liver transplant recipients.