Competition of commensal and probiotic bacteria with pathogens for adhesion and colonization is one of the important protective mechanisms of gastrointestinal tract. In this study, we examined the ability of Lactobacillus paracasei to inhibit the adhesion of pathogenic Salmonella enterica to human colon adenocarcinoma Caco-2 cells. Caco-2 cells were grown for 6 or 21 days to obtain nondifferent...

The 3T3 cell, an established line of mouse fibroblast cell, has been considered to be extremely sensitive to "contact inhibition" of cell division. Under the usual culture conditions, 3T3 cells grow rapidly in sparse culture, but cell division stops after the cells become confluent, at approximately 106 cells per 6-cm dish. The cell monolayer has a typical "cobblestone" appearance. Todaro, Laza...

Most studies of fever have dealt with the pyrogenic activity of the bacterial lipopolysaccharides of gram-negative bacteria (1). The pyrogenic properties of pathogenic gram-positive bacteria, on the other hand, have been the stubject of only a few reports. It is of interest, however, that intravenous injection of living staphylococci and corynebacteria were found to produce higher fever in rabb...

Our purpose was to determine the effects of six cigarette toxicants (pyridine, nicotine, 2-ethylpyridine, 3-ethylpyridine, p-cresol, and pyrazine) on three types of cultured mammalian cells (human umbilical vein endothelial cells [HUVECs], human microvascular endothelial cells [HMVECs], and NIH 3T3 cells) using a cell proliferation/survival assay. Synchronized cells were cultured in proliferati...

The aims of the present study were to determine the number of spermatozoa in the reproductive tract of sows after intra-uterine insemination (IUI) with frozen-thawed (FT) boar semen and to investigate the influence of adding seminal plasma in the thawing medium on the sperm transport in the female reproductive tract. Fourteen multiparous sows were divided into 3 groups: group I (n= 5), insemina...

epididymal tubule (Figure 1c) was harvested simply by touching the base of sterilized disposable plastic dishes (60 mm in diameter), directly to the incised epididymal tubule (Figure 1d). The epididymal fluid collected in the plastic dishes was diluted with washing medium and then examined for the presence of sperm directly under an inverted phase-contrast microscope. If the sperm were not dete...

increase leukocyte capture, various experimental conditions, such as the antibody fixing time, incubation time, and leukocyte concentration, were optimized. The results for the CD45 immobilization experiments showed that various experimental conditions, such as antibody fixing time, incubation time, and leukocyte concentration, affected the leukocyte capture efficiencies. We identified the foll...

Obstetric hemorrhage is the leading cause of maternal mortality and morbidity worldwide. This study was carried out to investigate the effect of obstetric hemorrhage on the prothrombin time (PT), activated partial thromboplastin time (APTT), and platelet count (PLC). Women with obstetric hemorrhage were divided into two categories, women with antepartum hemorrhage (APH) and those with postpartu...

BACKGROUND Sildenafil, a potent phosphodiesterase type 5 (PDE5) inhibitor, has been proposed as a treatment for pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). The mechanism of its anti-proliferative effect on pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells (PASMC) is unclear. Nuclear translocation of nuclear factor of activated T-cells (NFAT) is thought to be involved in PASMC proliferation and PAH. Increase in c...

Itohara, Institute of Physical and Chemical Research, Brain Science Institute, Wako, Japan; 100% C57Bl6) and MMP-12 (gift from S. Shapiro, Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA; 50% C57Bl6 50% Swiss) were used. For all experiments, age-, sexand strainmatched littermate mice were used. Mice were maintained in high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA)–filtered individ...