Verhandlungen der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Pathologie
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Verh Dtsch Ges Pathol · Jan 2006
[Urothelial neoplasms in individuals younger than 20 years show very few genetic alterations and have a favourable clinical outcome].
Urothelial neoplasms in patients 19 years or younger are rare, with conflicting data regarding clinical outcome and no molecular data available. ⋯ Urothelial neoplasms in individuals younger than 20 years have predominantly a low grade and favourable clinical outcome. The most frequent genetic alterations found in elderly patients are extremely rare. Urothelial neoplasms in young patients could represent a biologically distinct form of bladder disease with lack of genetic instability in most cases.
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Verh Dtsch Ges Pathol · Jan 1998
[Rudolf-Virchow Prize 1998. Award lecture. Toxoplasmosis: a model infection for studying systemic and intracerebral immune reactions].
Toxoplasmosis has gained particular attention in the AIDS era as the most common opportunistic encephalitis in HIV-infected patients. Since there are important parallels between the human and rodent infection, experimental murine toxoplasmosis is widely used to study the immune reactions to this protozoal parasite. Oral application of low-virulent Toxoplasma (T.) gondii cysts leads to a biphasic disease characterized by an acute, generalized phase followed by a chronic stage confined to the brain, where an encephalitis with persistence of the parasite develops. ⋯ On the other hand, IL-10 may exert a regulatory role and may be necessary to prevent immunopathological effects of an uncontrolled immune response. In conclusion, these studies demonstrate the important role of the cytokines IFN-gamma and TNF-alpha and their receptors, respectively, for an effective control of T. gondii. In the CNS, the target organ of the parasite, a
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Verh Dtsch Ges Pathol · Jan 1997
[Radiation-induced thyroid carcinomas in children: high prevalence of RET rearrangement].
Papillary thyroid carcinomas were observed in children living in the Gomel region of Belarus at the time of the Chernobyl reactor accident in April 1986. Radioactive fallout, iodine-131 in particular, led to thyroid doses of > 10 Gy in some cases. Till now, more than 400 thyroid carcinomas developed. ⋯ Besides ELE/RET transcripts, reciprocal RET/ELE transcripts were expressed indicating a complete inversion of the two genes after double stand break and their functional activity in both rearranged forms. Paracentric inversion on chromosome 10 bringing the functional tyrosine kinase domain of c-RET under the regulatory control of the ubiquitously expressed ELE gene appears to be a typical molecular lesion in thyroid carcinomas of children after radiation. This rearrangement is thought to endow juvenile thyrocytes with a clonal growth advantage and may be a critical initiating event of thyroid carcinogenesis in radiation-exposed children.