Clinical Response with Sunitinib Therapy in the Treatment of Anaplastic Thyroid Cancer

Background: Anaplastic thyroid cancer (ATC), while rare, carries a uniformly poor prognosis. Current treatment includes surgery when possible, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy. Multiple chemotherapeutic agents are in the process of clinical testing, and promising agents include those in the tyrosine kinase inhibitor family. Our patient represents a novel case of ATC treated with sunitinib, one such tyrosine kinase inhibitor. Methods/Results: We utilized the experimental sunitinib in conjunction with radiation therapy to treat a patient with aggressive ATC in whom curative resection was unable to be achieved due to carotid sheath and tracheal involvement. The patient had marked clinical response and sustained stable disease for 8 months, which coincides with reported data regarding sunitinib to treat other thyroid malignancies. Conclusion: Our case illustrates the efficacy of sunitinib therapy as a possible adjunct in the treatment of ATC.

Solidification of Immiscible Alloys： A Review

Immiscible alloys gained a considerable interest in last decades due to their valuable properties and potential applications. Many experimental and theoretical researches were carded out worldwide to investigate the solidification of immiscible alloys under the normal gravity and microgravity condition. The objective of this article is to review the research work in this field during the last few decades.

Solidification of Pb–Al Alloys Under the Influence of Electric Current Pulses

Continuous solidification experiments are carried out with Pb–Al alloys under the influence of the electric current pulses（ECPs）. The results demonstrate that the ECPs mainly affect the microstructure formation through changing the energy barrier for the nucleation of the minority phase droplets（MPDs） and minority phase particles（MPPs） during cooling Pb–Al alloys in the liquid–liquid and liquid–solid phase transformation temperature ranges in advance of the solidification of the matrix liquid. For Pb–Al alloys with Al-rich droplets/particles as the minority phase, the ECPs lower the energy barriers for the nucleation of the MPDs/MPPs and cause a significant increase in the nucleation rate of the MPDs/MPPs and, thus,promote the formation of Pb–Al alloys with a well-dispersed or even nanoparticles dispersed microstructure. The ECPs parameters show an important influence on the microstructure formation of Pb–Al alloys. The refinement extent of the MPDs/MPPs increases with the increase in the peak current density. For a given peak current density, the refinement extent of the MPDs/MPPs increases with the increases in the pulse frequency and pulse width first, and then level off and become asymptotic.