Nidogen 1 regulates proliferation and migration/invasion in murine claudin-low mammary tumor cells

Nidogen 1 (NID1) is a glycoprotein found in basement membranes involved in cross-linking collagen IV and laminin. The role of NID in breast cancer has only been evaluated in a small number of studies and the findings of these studies have been inconsistent. Our previous work revealed that highly tumorigenic murine mammary tumor cells express high levels of Nid1 while weakly tumorigenic mammary tumor cells express low levels of Nid1. To investigate Nid1, two stable knockdown lines were created, and Nid1 knockdown was confirmed at both the mRNA and protein level. Nid1 knockdown significantly reduced cell proliferation and migration/invasion and these reductions in proliferation and migration/invasion could be rescued by conditioned media containing NID1 protein. The reduced migration/invasion observed in the Nid1 knockdown cells was not associated with significant alterations in the epithelial gene Cdh1 or the mesenchymal genes Snai1, Snai2, Twist1, Twist2, Zeb1 and Zeb2. Therefore, suppression of Nid1 expression reduces proliferation and migration/invasion in claudin-low murine mammary tumor cells.     

Alveolar hydatid disease of the liver: Brief review and spectrum of adjacent organ invasion

The purpose of this study is to show the spectrum of adjacent organ invasion and to make a brief review of hepatic alveolar hydatid disease (AHD), using CT and MR imaging. We retrospectively reviewed CT and MR images of three patients with various adjacent organ invasions surgically and histologically proven to be AHD. Local invasion to right kidney and adrenal, right hemidiaphragm and lung were detected in one patient, right adrenal in another patient and gall bladder, duodenum, gastric wall and pancreas invasion in the other. AHD may rarely extend to the gall bladder, stomach, duodenum, pancreas, right adrenal and kidney, diaphragm, pleura and lung. The extension of the disease outside the liver is usually encountered in patients with large, peripherally located masses in the advanced stage of the disease.     

Adjuvant therapy for colorectal cancer--is there a place for a Northern Ireland study?

Survival from colorectal cancer has not improved over the last four decades despite advances in surgery and anaesthesia. The answer to the question whether adjuvant chemotherapy and radiotherapy will improve survival from the disease can only come from randomised, controlled trails. In the future, immunotherapy and gene therapy may be of benefit but these are still many years from the clinical arena. We believe that current evidence suggests that patients with Dukes B and C colorectal cancer should be entered into trials of adjuvant therapy. This evidence is reviewed below among with estimates of the impact that adjuvant therapy would have on the outcome from this disease in Northern Ireland.     

Deprivation of form vision suppresses diurnal cycling of retinal levels of leu-enkephalin

Deprivation of form vision by the fitting of translucent occluders suppressed the diurnal cycling of enkephalinergic amacrine cells (the ENSLI amacrine cells), in the chicken. Daily periods of normal vision or enforcing temporal contrast using strobe lighting appeared to restore normal functioning of the ENSLI cells. These results suggest that the ENSLI cells are involved in retinal circuits that assess the quality of the visual image and control eye growth.     

Colorectal carcinoma: importance of clinical and pathological factors in survival.

A series of clinicopathological variables was assessed on 312 patients undergoing surgical resection for primary colorectal cancer. Although the presence of venous invasion was related to mortality (P = 0.02), classifying invasion into involvement of thick-walled or thin-walled veins did not produce a variable of prognostic value. Intestinal obstruction (P = 0.04) and the macroscopic appearance of the tumour (P = 0.04) were related to mortality from colorectal cancer, but not from all causes of death. Duke''s stage, increasing patient age and poorly differentiated tumours were the variables which were individually most significantly related to poor prognosis (P < 0.001 for each analysis). Cox''s regression analysis identified these three variables as independent predictors of outcome in colorectal cancer. This study confirms that Duke''s stage, patient age and tumour differentiation are still the most important clinicopathological variables in colorectal cancer.