Oral granuloma in a pediatric patient with chronic graft-versus-host disease:A case report

BACKGROUND Oral mucositis is often observed with graft-versus-host disease(GVHD);however,the occurrence of oral granuloma is rare.The rapid increase in granulomatous lesions should be distinguished from malignant tumors in patients with GVHD because malignant diseases can develop in those patients.This case is the youngest pediatric patient with granuloma associated with GVHD.CASE SUMMARY The patient was a 1-year and 5-mo-old girl who presented to our department for the management of oral nodules.At the age of 5 mo,she was diagnosed with primary immunodeficiency disease,cord blood transplant was performed at 11 mo and bone marrow transplant at 1 year of age.After transplantation,GVHD and oral mucositis developed,and tacrolimus was administered.Interestingly,nodules appeared on the lower lip and buccal mucosa,which spontaneously disappeared.Then,a new nodule appeared on the left lateral border of the tongue.Resection was performed and the histopathological diagnosis was granuloma.The origin of these nodules were considered to be the fibroblasts activated under inflammation caused by GVHD because the calcineurin inhibitor tacrolimus acted on their proliferation.CONCLUSION It is very important to distinguish oral granulomatous lesions from malignancies if GVHD is present at the base and if immunosuppressive agents and steroids are being administered.

Long-term culture of primary porcine mature hepatocytes in the medium supplemented with ascorbic acid 2-phosphate

In this study, the effect of ascorbic acid 2-phosphate (Asc2P) was tested on porcine and rat mature hepatocytes in vitro. a). Asc2P increased the porcine, but not rat, albumin secretion and mRNA expression. The enhancing effect of Asc2P on porcine C/EBP alpha mRNA was observed in porcine mature hepatocytes. These data suggested that Asc2P played an important role in the regulation of porcine albumin mRNA level. b). The enhancing effect of Asc2P on ammonium metabolic activity was also observed in porcine, but not rat, mature hepatocytes. The porcine ornithine transcarbamylase (OTC) and arginase mRNAs were augmented by Asc2P, indicating that Asc2P had a direct effect on the urea cycle. c). The porcine collagen type I and type III mRNA, but not type XII mRNA, were detected as well, sugessting that Asc2P did not have the effect on the non-parenchymal hepatocytes to induce collagen type I and III mRNA expression. d). Our RT-PCR analysis demonstrated that the porcine hepatocytes expressed the sodium-ascorbate co-transporters SVCT1 and SVCT2, however, the intensities of porcine sodium-ascorbate co-transporters SVCT1 and SVCT2 bands were not changed markedly. These findings indicated that the Asc2P had no effect on SVCT1 and SVCT2 mRNA expression. e). The enhancing effect of Asc2P on porcine albumin mRNA was inhibited by staurosporine, a portein kinase inhibitor. We conclude that the enhanced albumin mRNA by Asc2P might be due to activation of tyrosine protein kinase and/or PKC and the Asc2P enhanced porcine albumin mRNA mainly at the transcriptional step.

Structure of vitreous body and its relationship with liquefaction

The aim of the study is to clarify the vitreous body structure and liquefaction phenomena. It was found that when melting a frozen rabbit vitreous body, the gel-sol transition phenomenon occurs and the gel structure is broken. This is almost like the liquefaction of the vitreous body in vivo. We try to clarify the liquefaction phenomenon by using this animal model. The native vitreous body has three dimensional meshwork structures. After liquefaction, it is changed into two parts, namely fiber aggregates and soluble amorphous aggregates. The surface of native vitreous body meshwork is mucopolysacharide, but that of fiber aggregates after liquefaction is changed into connective tissue, which means the conformational change of vitreous body in liquefaction. The soluble proteins after liquefaction were analyzed and identified as crystallin family. It is suggested that the liquefaction is induced by detachment of non-collagenous protein beads containing crystallins, resulting in the collapse of the three dimensional structure to release watery liquid trapped within. And the new gel-sol transition model of vitreous bod is proposed.