Immunoglobulin secreting cells in lymphocytes of patients with IgA deficiency or hyper-IgA

To assess the ability of immunoglobulin production in vivo, we enumerated the immunoglobulin secreting cells in the peripheral blood of patients with an IgA deficiency and of those with hyper-IgAemia. All seven patients with primary IgA deficiency and two of the three patients with secondary IgA deficiency had low numbers of IgA secreting cells. In all five patients with hyper-IgA the number of IgA secreting cells was increased. Our results suggest that measurement of immunoglobulin secreting cells in PBMCs is useful in the assessment of ability of immunoglobulin production in vivo.Abbreviations PBMCs peripheral blood mononuclear cells - MEM minimum essential medium - PFC plaque forming cells - VH immunoglobulin heavy chain variable region - CH immunoglobulin heavy chain constant region     

Generalizable brain network markers of major depressive disorder across multiple imaging sites

Many studies have highlighted the difficulty inherent to the clinical application of fundamental neuroscience knowledge based on machine learning techniques. It is difficult to generalize machine learning brain markers to the data acquired from independent imaging sites, mainly due to large site differences in functional magnetic resonance imaging. We address the difficulty of finding a generalizable marker of major depressive disorder (MDD) that would distinguish patients from healthy controls based on resting-state functional connectivity patterns. For the discovery dataset with 713 participants from 4 imaging sites, we removed site differences using our recently developed harmonization method and developed a machine learning MDD classifier. The classifier achieved an approximately 70% generalization accuracy for an independent validation dataset with 521 participants from 5 different imaging sites. The successful generalization to a perfectly independent dataset acquired from multiple imaging sites is novel and ensures scientific reproducibility and clinical applicability.

Biomarkers for psychiatric disorders based on neuroimaging data have yet to be put to practical use. This study overcomes the problems of inter-site differences in fMRI data by using a novel harmonization method, thereby successfully constructing a generalizable brain network marker of major depressive disorder across multiple imaging sites.     

Enantioselectivity-promoting factor in enzyme-mediated asymmetric hydrolysis of enol esters

Enantioselectivity-promoting factor enhances enantioselectivity of protonation in lipase AP-catalyzed asymmetric hydrolysis of enol esters. The factor was partially purified by chromatography using Phenyl-TOYOPEARL 650M and Sephacryl S-200HR. The hydrolysis of 2-benzyl-l-cyclohexenyl acetate by PLE in the presence of the purified factor produced (R)-2-benzylcyclo-hexanone in 92% ee, while the reaction without the factor gave the racemate.     

Association of the major ganglioside in sea urchin eggs with yolk lipoproteins

The predominant ganglioside in sea urchin eggs, M5 (NeuGc