To localize the differentiation-relevant cDNA RA538 (3.8kb) onto the human chromosome 8q2.

The differentiation effect of HMBA was examined in mucoepidermoid carcinoma transplanted to athymic mice. The animals were divided into HMBA and control groups. The effects were evaluated by inhibitory rate of tumor growth, the survival period and the morphological changes of cells. The results showed that the inhibitory rate of tumor growth was 71.7%, the survival period of HMBA group was 49.6 days while control group was 38.3 days, the cells of HMBA group tended to become more mature, and the mean number of AgNORs was also significantly reduced. These results indicate that HMBA can induce the MEC-1 cells to differentiate toward nomal or benign cells in vivo.

Thirty patients receiving cisplation or non-cisplatin (containing cyclophosphamide and adriamycin) chemotherapy were enrolled in a randomized, crossover study comparing the efficacy of single dose of Navoban (tropisetron, 5 mg) and Kytril (granisetron, 3 mg). The effective control of acute vomiting induced by cisplatin was achieved in 95.2% (20/21) of patients receiving Navoban and 90.5% (19/21) in those receiving Kytril. Complele control rate was 71.4% (15/21) in Navoban arm, and 81.0% (17/21) in Kytril arm. Total control of delayed vomiting (day 2-5) was 71.4%-90.4% in Navoban arm, while it was 66.7%-4% in Kytril arm. The effective control of vomiting induced by non-cisplatin drugs was achieved in 9/9 in both arms. It is concluded that both agents are effective in the control of vomiting induced by chemotherapy. They have identical adverse effects and are well tolerated by the patients.

Four hundred and four patients underwent surgical treatment for adenocarcinoma of the gastric cardia in our hospital between January 1980 to June 1990. Of 342 resected cases, 231 cases were treated with surgery alone, their 1-, 3-, and 5-year survival rates were 83.8%, 38.5% and 20.8%, respectively. Since January 1987, postoperative chemotherapy was given in 47 patients, their 1-, 3-, and 5-year survival rates were 89.4%, 46.8%, 29.8%, respectively, while intraoperative chemotherapy in 54 cases, had 1-, 3-, and 5-year survival rates of 87.1%, 63.0% and 38.9%, respectively. The result showed that the 3- and 5-year survival rates were higher in postoperative chemotherapy cases than in cases with operation alone, but there was no statistical significance between the two groups. However, intraoperative chemotherapy group had much higher 3- and 5-year survival rates than operation alone (P < 0.01). Intra-operative chemotherapy is recommended especially in patients beyond stage I with lymph node metastasis.

To explore the effects of antisense erbB2 on the biological behaviours and on chemotherapeutic drug sensitivity in human ovarian cancer cells.

To determine the characteristics of pharmacokinetics with high-dose cisplatin (DDP) instilled intraperitoneally and its toxicity as compared with that by intravenous (i.v.) route of administration (i.p.).

To study the effects of anti-hepatitis drug, DDB, on leukemia cell line HL-60.

To determine the possibility and magnitude of cardiotoxicity following high dose intravenous infusion of fluorouracil (5-FU).

To assess the efficacy of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) assay for chemosensitity testing of ovarian cancer cell line and to compare its predicting value with that of diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) test.

To explore the mechanism of cisplatin resistance and its reversion in human ovarian cancer.

Experiments have proved that the Chinese compound prescription for reinforcing vital energy and invigorating blood circulation markedly helps to improve the morphology of cancer cell nucleolus and membrane surface microvillus, amend the composition of microtubulin and facilitate intercellular gap junctional communication. Cell cycle kinetics shows that the multiplication of cancer cells in human stomach is checked mainly at G2M stage.

To investigate modulation of decrease of intrinsic bcl-2 protein levels on programmed cell death of leukemia cells.

The effect of ginsenoside Rh2, a constituent isolated from Panax ginseng C. A. Meyer, on the growth of tumor cells in vitro was investigated. The results showed that Rh2 inhibited the growth of B16 cells at the concentration of 10 micrograms.ml-1 (IC50: 4.1 micrograms.ml-1). Rh2 was found to significantly induce the activity of differentiation of B16 cells at the concentration of 10 micrograms.ml-1 in vitro. The melanin synthesis of Rh2 in treated B16 cells was increased. Morphologically, the Rh2 induced B16 cells turned to be epithelioid cells. B16 cells became dendrite shaped morphologically at higher concentration of Rh2. Flow cytometry demonstrated that the B16 cells treated with Rh2 were blocked at G1 phase.

To further study the relationship between resistance to apoptosis and drug resistance in harringtonine-resistant HL-60 cells (HR20), cyclosporine A (CsA) 20, 10 micrograms.ml-1 was shown to induce the sensitive HL-60 cells to apoptosis, showing a typical DNA "ladder" band. But the same concentrations of CsA retarded the HR20 cells in G1 phase and could not induce the cells to apoptosis. The cellular daunorubicin accumulation increased when HR20 cells were treated with low concentration of CsA and the reversal of drug resistance by CsA was unrelated to the retardation of cell cycle progression. High phosphorylation of about 50 kDa protein occured when HR20 cells were treated with CsA 10 micrograms.ml-1. The results domonstrate that cyclosporine A retarded the harringtonine-resistant HL-60 cells in G1 phase but induced HL-60 cells to apoptosis, and the retardation was unrelated to drug resistance.

(Sp)-octyl 8-chloroadenosine 3',5'-cyclophosphate(OCC), a newly synthesized cAMP analog, strongly induced growth inhibition and differentiation in human leukemia HL-60 cells. The effects were dose- and time-dependent and irreversible. In flow cytometry, OCC brought about a block at the G1 phase of HL-60 cell cycle. Determined by incorporation assay, OCC was shown to strongly inhibit DNA synthesis without affecting the synthesis of RNA and protein in HL-60 cells. OCC activated the protein kinase A(PKA) in the cytosol of HL-60 cells and inhibited its binding to cAMP. The activities of PKA in the cytosol of HL-60 cells treated with OCC were more significantly increased than those in control cells. It can be concluded that OCC binds itself to PKA in competition with cAMP and, as a result, activates PKA.

In this paper, orthogonal test was used to optimize the preparation conditions and technique of mitoxantrone ethylcellulose microspheres (DHAQ-EC-MS) for liver embolization. The dynamic osmosis method was used to study the drug release characteristics of DHAQ-EC-MS. DHAQ-EC-MS suspension for clinical liver artery embolization was prepared. The result showed that the DHAQ-EC-MS is regular in its morphology with a mean diameter of 110.24 +/- 38.19 microns. The drug loading was 12.5% and embedding ratio was 55.6%. The release characteristics was in accord with single exponential model. The drug release equation is lg(Yinfinity - Y) = -0.116t - 1.198 x 10(-3) (gamma = 0.9992, t50 = 2.6 h). The DHAQ-EC-MS was shown to be physically and chemically stable and its suspension is suitable for clinical use. Experiments in dogs indicate that drug concentration of DHAQ-EC-MS in hepatic vein blood was higher than DHAQ solution, and the MRT0-72 was 2.45 times higher than DHAQ solution.

The chemosensitivities of 27 fresh specimens of head and neck cancers were tested with MTT assay to study the practicability and accuracy of the assay for the examination of chemosensitivity in head and neck cancer patients. The chemosensitivities among cancers of different primary sites, pathologic types, histological differentiations, DNA ploidies and estrogen receptors were compared in an attempt to evaluate the choice of anticancer drugs for individual chemotherapy. Eight anticancer drugs: Methotroxate (MTX), Mitomycin C (MMC), fluorouracil (5-Fu), Carboplatin (CBDCA), Pingyangmycin (PYM), Homoharringtonine (HHA), Etoposid (VP16) and Vincristine (VCR) were included. The success rate of MTT assay in the present study was 92.6% and the accuracy was relatively high. The sensitivity sequence was PYM > HHA > MTX > CBDCA > MMC > 5-Fu > VCR > VP16, which suggested HHA should be recommended first to the chemotherapy of head and neck cancer. No chemosensitivity differences were found among different primary sites histological differentiations and estrogen receptors. The chemosensitivity of squamous cell carcinoma was significantly higher than that of adenoid cystic carcinoma. The chemosensitivity of aneuploid tumor was significantly higher than that of diploid.

Treated with low dosage (5 ng.ml-1) of staurosporine for 18 h, human embryo lung 2BS cells were blocked at the G1/S boundary, but human gastric carcinoma BGC-823 cells still kept their cell cycle. In comparison with IC50 of 2BS and BGC-823 cells treated with cell cycle phase specific antitumor drugs adriamycin, Ara-C and BLM A5 alone or combined with staurosporine 5 ng.ml-1, the IC50 values increased from 0.325 microgram.ml-1, 5 micrograms.ml-1 and 6.5 micrograms.ml-1 to 0.45 microgram.ml-1, 10 micrograms.ml-1 and 6.5 micrograms.ml-1, respectively in 2BS cells; but decreased from 0.325 microgram.ml-1, 25 micrograms.ml-1 and 1.1 micrograms.ml-1 to 0.07 microgram.ml-1, 6.25 micrograms.ml-1 and 0.4 microgram.ml-1, respectively in BGC-823 cells. These results suggest that combination of staurosporine 5 ng.ml-1 with antitumor drugs showed different effects on tumor cells and normal cells. With the GSH fluorescent probe mBCL, we found that GSH contents increased in 2BS cells treated with staurosporine 5 ng.ml-1.

Colony forming unit of granulocytes and macrophages from peripheral blood (PB CFU-GM) represents stem and/or progenitor cells from human blood. In this paper, the effects of histamine H2 receptor agonist 4-methylhistamine (4-MH) and its antagonist ranitidine (Ranit) on the growth of PB CFU-GM cultured in methylcellulose system were studied and their differential effects on normal PB CFU-GM and leukemic HL-60 cells were compared with the effect of the antineoplastic agent cytosine arabinoside (Ara-C). It was found that the histamine H2 receptor agonist 4-MH stimulated the growth of PB CFU-GM when 4-MH was added at the concentrations from 10(-9) mol.L-1 to 10(-6) mol.L-1 among which the dose 10(-8) mol.L-1 exerted most potent stimulating effect (the PB CFU-GM colony numbers was 137.68% +/- 8.20% vs the control, P < 0.01). In contrast, the antagonist Ranit showed inhibitory effect on the growth of PB CFU-GM when at the concentrations 10(-9)-10(-5) mol.L-1 cultured for 14 d in the same methylcellulose system. The inhibition rate was 23.73% +/- 1.16% (10(-9) mol.L-1) and 41.42% +/- 6.75% (10(-6) mol.L-1), respectively. Although both Ranit and Ara-C could inhibit the growth of PB CFU-GM in vitro, Ranit exerted much greater inhibition on HL-60 leukemic cells than on normal PB CFU-GM at the dose of 10(-6) mol.L-1 (100% inhibition for HL-60 and < 50% inhibition for PB CFU-GM). However, the inhibition rate of Ara-C for both HL-60 and PB CFU-GM was 100% at the intensive chemotherapeutic dose of 10(-5) mol.L-1. It would appear that the histamine H2 receptor agonist 4-MH possesses stimulating effect on the growth of PB CFU-GM similar to its effect on CFU-GM from bone marrow as documented before. It is suggested that the histamine H2 receptor antagonist Ranit has, to some extent, potential in the treatment of myeloid leukemia, especially when combined with antineoplastic agent Ara-C at suboptimal doses.