Myasthenia gravis and the thymus gland.

Six skin cancer detection clinics were held at a county fair booth in Turlock, California during August, 1973. Examination of sun-exposed skin areas in 605 people showed potential skin cancer in 28.6 percent of people 25 years of age or older. Of the people examined, 135 were referred to their own physicians for follow-up diagnosis and treatment of skin lesions.     

Somatostatin gene expression in the thymus gland

A complex pattern of interactions appears to exist between the immune and neuroendocrine systems. Recently, vasopressin, oxytocin and vasoactive intestinal peptide have been isolated from the thymus. Using a rat somatostatin antisense RNA probe we have demonstrated expression of the somatostatin gene in the rat thymus. Furthermore, we have shown that the levels of thymic somatostatin mRNA exhibit a bell-shaped response to dexamethasone administration. Lipocortin I and II antisense RNA probes have been used as a positive control for the effects of the dexamethasone. We would suggest that somatostatin acts in the thymus in a paracrine mode to modulate T lymphocyte development.     

Some endocrine aspects of the thymus gland.

In studies of the mouse thymus, lymphocyte mitoses are seen to be most frequent in the thymus cortex. There is evidence from thymic grafts that a hypothetical factor, thymopoietin, may stimulate mitosis of thymic lymphocytes. It is a factor which is postulated to act in conjunction with the PAS-positive mesenchymal reticular cells and epithelial reticular cells of the cortex. The thymus medulla is necessary for the integrity of thymic grafts, and may also elaborate a secretion for maintaining the cellular functions of the gland. Thymectomy has been used as a gauge for judging normal thymic function and results, in the mouse, in lymphopenia, degeneration of spleen and lymph nodes, delayed rejection of skin allografts, reduced ability of spleen cells to mount the graft versus host reaction, and reduced primary immune response to certain antigens. Correction of these deficiencies offers a means of evaluating various thymic extracts and grafts. Lymphocytosis-stimulating hormone (LSH) is known to maintain the peripheral lymphoid organs and cause lymphocytosis in the thymectomized animal. Diffusion chamber studies of thymic grafts also show restored lymphoid tissue by a cell-free factor (CIF). These two factors may be the same and probably represent the basis of the highly purified lymphocyte-stimulating proteins, LSHr and LSHh, which restore the L/P ratio in thymectomized animals and may stimulate lymphopoiesis in spleen and lymph nodes. LSHr, unlike LSHh, increases the total lymphocyte count. LSHr has been found to increase the humoral antibody response in neonatal mice both by the PFC technique and by direct hemolysis of sheep erythrocytes. Homeostatic thymic hormone (HTH) is a thymic extract of small molecular weight and contains nucleic acid. In the thymectomized guinea pig it has been found to maintain normal levels of lymphocytes in the blood, spleen and lymph nodes, to restore antibody titers to typhoid H antigen and to restore the toxic allergic reaction. Thymic humoral factor (THF) is of smaller molecular weight (less than 1,000) and probably is not a protein. It also enhances lymphoid proliferation in neonatally thymectomized mice. There is evidence that THF participates in humoral antibody formation because it stimulates PFC formation from neonatally thymectomized mice after inoculation with sheep erythrocytes. Its effects on cell-mediated immunity are seen from findings that injection of THF restores the ability of thymectomized mice to reject skin allografts. THF enables spleen cells from thymectomized or neonatal animals to mount the graft versus host reaction, and causes maturation of bone marrow cells and spleen or lymph node cells so that they can participate in the graft versus host reaction. It has been reported to stimulate lymphocytes to kill isogeneic tumor cells in vitro. Thymosin is protein extracted from the thymus. It has been found to alleviate leukopenia slightly and provide some improvement in lymphoid histology in thymectomized mice...     

猪胸腺多肽的制备及生物学效应研究

利用健康猪胸腺提取分子量小于10000道尔顿的多肽水溶液,并制成无菌冻干品.将健康猪胸腺去除脂肪及结缔组织,加生理盐水制成匀浆,以低温萃取法提取多肽溶液,再将此液通过滞留分子量10K道尔顿的膜包进行超滤,超滤液加适宜赋形剂除菌、冻干制成冻干粉针剂.本实验制备的猪胸腺多肽,各种生物学效应能够达到国家同类产品的药品标准.以健康猪胸腺为原料可获得具有较高生物活性的胸腺多肽制剂,能为胸腺肽的生产开辟广阔的药用资源.     

Metabolic properties of histones from rat liver and thymus gland

1. The incorporation of ¹⁴C-labelled amino acids into acid-extractable proteins from rat-liver and -thymus nuclei confirmed the existence of a protein component with a higher uptake than that into the major histone components. 2. This rapidly labelled component appeared to contain the thiol groups detectable in the acid extracts. 3. Histone f1 contained 1mol. of serine phosphate/mol. of mol.wt. of 42000–43000. 4. Phosphate was present in other components of the 50mm-hydrochloric acid extract from liver and thymus nuclei, and was probably associated with the thiol-containing component. 5. The difference in amino acid uptake into the histones of diffuse and dense chromatin was confirmed. Dense chromatin was found to have a higher proportion of disulphide than did diffuse chromatin.     

1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D3 receptor in bovine thymus gland

1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D₃ [1,25-(OH)₂D₃] receptor was characterized after partial purification of thymus cytosol by ammonium sulfate fractionation. The 1,25-(OH)₂D₃ receptor sediments at 3.7S in 5–20% sucrose gradients. The binding of 1,25-(OH)₂D₃ in thymic cytosol was a saturable process with high affinity (Kd = 0.12?0.48 nM) at 4°C. Competition for 1,25-(OH)₂[³H]D₃ receptor by nonradioactive analogs demonstrated the affinities of these analogs to be in order; 1,25-(OH)₂D₃ = 1,24R,25-(OH)₃D₃ = 1,25S,26-(OH)₃D₃ = 1,25R,26-(OH)₃D₃ > 1,25-(OH)₂D₃-26,23 lactone > 25-OHD₃ > 23R,25-(OH)₂D₃ > 24R,25-(OH)₂D₃ > 23S,25-(OH)₂D₃ ? 25-OHD₃-26,23 lactone. The receptor bound to DNA cellulose columns in low salt buffer and eluted as a single peak at 0.21 M KCl. These findings provide evidence that the thymus possesses a 1,25-(OH)₂D₃ receptor with properties indistinguishable from 1,25-(OH)₂D₃ receptors in other tissues.