We studied whether familial case histories of a liver cancers might be associated with the high mortality rate from liver cancers in Saga prefecture. Examined were 285 familial case histories of a hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) incurred by parents, siblings, and children during the past 10 years. Familial case histories of patients with a gastric cancer and/or apoplexy also were studied as controls. The incidence of various types of cancers, including liver cancers and gastric cancers, in the family members of the HCC group was found to be the same as seen in family members of the gastric cancer group, but higher than in the families of the apoplexy group. Further, the HCC incidence rate in family members in the HCC group was not high as compared to the average for the whole of Japan. The HBsAg was not found to be associated with the rate of liver cancer in family members in the HCC group. Also, there was no high incidence of liver cancer was observed in children of parents with a liver cancer. From these results, we have concluded that high incidence of liver cancer seen in Saga prefecture was not associated with any familial clustering of HCC cases.

The nuclear DNA contents of paraffin-embedded specimens of 41 cases of a hepatocellular carcinoma have been measured by means of flow cytometry. Results have indicated that 25 cases (61%) were diploid and 16 cases (39%) were aneuploid. In the aneuploid cases, the serum AFP level was found to be higher and stage more advanced. We also found that patients with aneuploid tumors had a poorer prognosis than those with diploid tumors, this fact uncovered by means of a Cox's proportional hazard model. In conclusion, the ploidy pattern of the nuclear DNA may serve as a useful prognostic marker for a hepatocellular carcinoma.

We examined the cell biological characteristics of a human embryonal carcinoma cell line. NEC 14, derived from a male germ cell tumor of testis origin. The following results were obtained. 1) The morphological characteristics of NEC 14 cells were small size, an increase in the N/C ratio and poor development of organelle and desmosome-like cell-cell junctions. The NEC 14 cells proliferated rapidly and the population doubling time in vitro was 17 hours. 2) The functional characteristics of NEC 14 cells were the localization of intermediate filaments such as keratin and vimentin, hCG secretion and tissue plasminogen activator and laminin synthesis and expression of cell surface antigens such as stage-specific embryonic antigen-3, trophoblast antigen and neuron cell surface antigen. 3) The mode of chromosome number was 58 and many abnormal and undetermined chromosomes were found in the NEC 14 cells. 4) Differentiation was observed in vitro and in the tumor tissues xenotransplanted into nude mice.

We report a case of infantile acute leukemia with t(16; 21) (p11; q22). The patient was a phenotypically normal one-year-old girl without lymphadenopathy or hepatosplenomegaly. Her peripheral blood at diagnosis showed anemia, thrombocytopenia, and many circulating blasts. Bone marrow blasts were monocytoid with fine reticular nuclear chromatin, abundant grayish-blue cytoplasm with occasional pseudopods or cytoplasmic projections and active hemophagocytosis. Serum levels of lysozyme and ferritin were normal. These blasts were not stained with butyrate esterase and immunologic study showed KOR-P77+ (anti-megakaryocyte monoclonal antibody), MY9+, Ia-. Electron microscopic examination failed to show platelet peroxidase activity. Remission was not induced by mini-COAP or VP-16 and the patient died of measles pneumonitis. The patient's blasts took typical appearance of megakaryoblasts later in the course, although some of them retained the ability of hemophagocytosis observed in the original blasts. This case is considered to be quite atypical since leukemic cells with active hemophagocytosis, megakaryoblastic appearance and t(16; 21) (p11; q22) have not been reported in the literature.

One hundred and thirty-seven female breast cancer patients have been HLA-typed by a cytotoxicity test. Over all, no specific HLA antigen was found, though when the patients were divided into two groups, i.e., into those with bilateral or unilateral cancers, A24 and Cw7 was found to be significantly increased in the bilateral group. Further, a haplotype of A24-Cw7 was frequently seen in the bilateral group. No specific HLA antigen, however, was found in patients stratified by a familial history of cancer. It thus was concluded that bilateral breast cancer patients that have developed from patients with a unilateral cancer are detectable by HLA typing.

The cytogenetical etiology of partial mole (PM) was studied by means of the Q-banding technique in 49 cases during the period between Sep. 1976 and Nov. 1986. Moreover, histological examinations were performed in 39 cases concentrating on the existence of fetal components and trophoblastic hyperplasia, etc. The results were as follows. 1. Karyotype analysis showed triploidy (24 cases), normal diploidy (10 cases), trisomy (9 cases) and other anomalies (mosaic, translocation etc.) (6 cases). These results are quite different from those of many western authors, who reported that most cases of PM are triploidy. 2. The criteria of PM in Japan differ from those of WHO Scientific Group in regard to trophoblastic hyperplasia. 3. Our cases were reclassified on the basis of the definition drawn up by the WHO Scientific Group. Nevertheless, the rate of triploidy was only 54.5%, which is lower than that reported by many western authors. These results show that the development of PM cannot be explained cytogenetically at present, in contrast with complete mole.

We report here a rare transformation from refractory anemia with ring sideroblasts (RARS) to chronic myelomonocytic leukemia (CMML). A rare karyotype, inv (12), was also seen at the phase of CMML. A 76-year-old female consulted a physician because of hoarseness in June, 1983. An anemia was found and blood transfusions were made. In August, 1983, she was referred and admitted to Tsukuba University Hospital for a further examination of anemia. A diagnosis of MDS (RARS) was made by hematological examinations, and pyridoxamine was administered from September, 1983. The monocyte counts in the peripheral blood increased above 1,000/microliters continuously from June, 1985, and an exacerbation of anemia was also seen. At the second admission to our hospital in August, 1988, the diagnostic criteria for CMML by the FAB co-operative group was fulfilled. At that time, chromosomal analysis revealed an abnormal karyotype; 46XY, inv (12) (p13.3 q15). Even at the phase of CMML, ringed sideroblasts were also seen in 2.2% of nucleated cell count in the bone marrow. To our knowledge, only 12 cases have been reported as transformation from another type of MDS to CMML. The present case is thought to be a rare case of transformation of MDS. On the other hand, 8 cases with inv (12) associated with malignant hematological disorders have been reported previously. Four of the above 8 cases were MDS. A relationship between development of MDS and inv (12) was suggested.

The nuclear DNA contents in fresh surgical specimens in cases of 34 hepatocellular carcinoma were measured by flow cytometry. The frequency of aneuploid and relation of ploidy with degree of malignancy (stage and portal vein thrombosis, etc.) were examined. The incidence of aneuploidy of human hepatocellular carcinoma was 53%, these cases were at a significantly higher stage than the diploid cases (P less than 0.05). Among aneuploid cases, 61% (11 out of 18 cases) were associated portal vein thrombosis, this incidence was also significantly higher than the 6% (one of 16 cases) for the diploid cases (P less than 0.01). These findings demonstrated flow cytometric analysis are not only useful to diagnose to hepatocellular carcinoma, but useful to evaluate the prognosis.

We report two cases of Philadelphia (Ph1) chromosome positive acute mixed lineage leukemia (AMLL) with breakpoint cluster region (bcr) (M-BCR-1) rearrangement. A 31 year-old-man (case 1) and a 42 year-old-woman (case 2) were admitted to our hospital for further evaluation of leucocytosis with atypical blasts. Each case was diagnosed as having bilineal type of AMLL because: (1) blasts in each case consisted of larger myeloid cells positive for myeloperoxidase and small lymphoid cells positive for PAS, and blasts in case 2 were positive for TdT; (2) blasts in case 1 expressed B lymphoid associated antigen; (3) Southern analysis in each case showed clonal rearrangements of both the immunoglobulin heavy chain and the T cell receptor beta gene. These two cases demonstrated the Ph1 chromosome and rearrangement of the bcr (M-BCR-1) gene, but none of splenomegaly, basophilia, and additional chromosome abnormalities were observed. In addition, after achieving remissions, they didn't revert to chronic phase of chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) and showed normal neutrophil alkaline phosphatase scores, and the Ph1 chromosome disappeared completely in case 1 and coexisted with the normal chromosome in case 2. These findings suggest that diagnosis of both cases should not be CML blast crisis (BC) but Ph1 positive acute leukemia, and Ph1 positive AMLL may be a distinct clinical entity to be distinguished from CML-BC.

A 56-year-old man was admitted to Sapporo Kitano Hospital on May 30, 1987 because of fever, retention of ascites and pleural effusion, generalized lymphnode swelling and hepatosplenomegaly. Laboratory findings showed Coombs' positive hemolytic anemia, leukocytosis and polyclonal hypergammaglobulinemia. Serological test included positive RA factor, anti-DNA 16 U/ml, thyroglobulin Ab 1600 x and microsome Ab 3200 x. A cervical lymphnode specimen exhibited typical histologic picture of IBL like T cell lymphoma. The surface markers of lymphoma cells were CD2(+), CD8(+) and CD4(-). Chromosomal analysis of these cells revealed polyploidy abnormality for all chromosomes except for No. 14's which are disomy. All lymphoma cells have XXY sex chromosome and mar1, mar2, mar3. Gene rearrangement for beta-chain of T cell receptor was proved in these lymphoma cells. He was treated with prednisolone, vincristine, cyclophosphamide, adriamycin etc, but died of respiratory failure 171 days after admission. We reported a rare case of IBL like T cell lymphoma with polyploidy chromosomal abnormality accompanied with hemolytic anemia.

Surgical treatment of the pancreatic cancer is currently unsatisfactory. By using anti-K,H,N-ras monoclonal and anti-myc polyclonal antibodies, paraffin-embedded tissue specimens of the carcinoma in digestive organs were immunohistologically studied. Then, the incidence of expression of these oncogenes and correlative studies of survival rate and disease stage of pancreatic cancer were analyzed. High incidence of expression of ras oncogene in the carcinoma of the pancreas and biliary tract was obtained. Frequency of expression of ras oncogene was correlated to disease stage and T factor for staging the carcinoma of the pancreas. Prognoses of 6 cases of pancreatic cancer without expression of ras oncogene were better than that of pancreatic cancer expressed ras oncogene.

Two patients with acute lymphocytic leukemia of B-cell phenotype (B-ALL) are described. They were 77-year-old female and 34-year-old male. One patient presented with marked splenomegaly, and the other with rupture of spleen on admission. Leukemic morphology revealed a typical L3 profile by FAB classification system in both cases. Immunologic analysis showed the presence of surface immunoglobulins in both cases, and one phenotype was IgM kappa, whereas the other was IgG kappa. Cytogenetic study revealed the typical translocations (8; 14) in both cases. Following chemotherapy, complete remission was achieved in one case, but the other died 36 days after admission. Including our two cases, we studied 12 cases of B-ALL and 77 cases of Burkitt's lymphoma reported in Japan, investigating the clinical prognosis as well as the biological features. We concluded that there are no significant difference of survival between B-ALL and Burkitt's lymphoma. We estimated it is due to oncogenesis from the same original cell in despite of the difference in main tumor site between two diseases.

A Moloney virus-induced T cell lymphoma, YAC-1, derived from A/Sn (H-2a) inbred mouse origin, was tested for hybrid resistance (HyR) after subcutaneous (s.c.) or intracerebral (i.c.) tumor cell inoculation into syngeneic and semi-syngeneic mice. The F1 hybrids (H-2a/b) between A/Sn and C57BL/6 mice more strongly resisted the s.c. inoculation of 10(6) and 5 x 10(5) cells than did syngeneic recipients. In contrast, no HyR to the i.c. inoculation of 10(4) and 10(3) cells was seen in the F1 hybrid mice. Natural killer (NK) cell activity was much higher in F1 hybrids than in syngeneic mice. 125I-iododeoxyuridine-labeled YAC-1 cells were more efficiently eliminated from the highly resistant F1 hybrids than from the parental strain in both 4 and 18 hour in vivo rejection assays via intravenous (i.v.) and s.c. injection, respectively. The remaining radioactivity of the brain, however, did not differ between these mice. Thus, there was a correlation between the in vivo resistance of F1 hybrid mice to challenge s.c. inoculation of parental tumors and their expression of lymphocyte-mediated natural cytotoxicity in vitro against those tumors. T cell depletion by thymectomy followed by irradiation and fetal liver reconstitution did not abrogate the s.c. HyR against YAC-1, whereas NK cell depletion by i.v. administration of anti-asialo-GM1 antibodies resulted in the disappearance of the resistance. Furthermore, genotypic study segregating (A/Sn x C57BL/6) F1 x A/Sn backcross mice indicated that the s.c. HyR might be attributable primarily to heterozygosity within the H-2 complex.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

The authors have investigated the relationship between oncogene (N-myc and c-src) expression and major histocompatibility complex (H-2 in the mouse) antigen gene expression at the molecular levels, by using mouse neuroblastoma sublines (NB-1 and NB-V). Fluorescence-activated cell sorter analysis showed that NB-1 cells exhibited positive expression to H-2 Kk, H-2 Dd, and beta-2-microglobulin, while NB-V cells were negative to all three antigens. It was found that dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) had a capacity to increase an H-2 class I antigen expression on NB-1 cells, whereas no change was observed on NB-V cells after DMSO treatment. Molecular analysis with deoxyribonucleic and ribonucleic acid (RNA) blot hybridization and immunoprecipitation revealed that the enhancement of H-2 antigen expression on NB-1 cells was modulated at the transcriptional control of the H-2 gene. In contrast, negative H-2 antigen expression on NB-V cells was caused by block at the level of glycosylation of the H-2 heavy chain, although an increase in messenger RNA of the H-2 gene was induced after DMSO treatment. There was neither amplification nor rearrangement of N-myc and c-src oncogenes in either neuroblastoma subline. Nuclear run-on transcription assay revealed that the N-myc gene was post-transcriptionally down-modulated by DMSO, whereas the c-src gene was transcriptionally up-regulated. It was thus suspected that N-myc and c-src might be directly associated with cellular proliferation and differentiation in neuronal tumors and that in vivo tumorigenicity could be regulated by the control mechanism of oncogene expression in relation to H-2 gene expression on tumor cells.

A case of acute myelocytic leukemia (AML-M2) with a late appearance of Philadelphia chromosome (Ph1) is presented. Chromosome analysis revealed a normal karyotype at the time of diagnosis and for 23 months, when hematological relapse occurred, accompanied by abnormal clones, 46, XX, t(9;22) (q34;q11) (78%) and 45,XX, -16, t(9;22) (q34;q11), del (5) (q13q31) (22%). The patient died of GVHD after bone marrow transplantation. Molecular analysis confirmed bcr gene rearrangement in the cells with Ph1 chromosome. Acquisition of Ph1 chromosome during the course of hematological malignancies other than CML is extremely rare. This case is undoubtedly important for the understanding of leukemogenesis and the evolution of leukemia clones. The authors discussed possible mechanisms of Ph1 acquisition in the late stages of AML.

One of the major problems with cancer chemotherapy is the development of drug resistance during treatment. Two mechanisms are considered as the cause of drug resistance, natural and acquired. It is now considered that cancers can be composed of multiple clonal subpopulations of cancer cells. In this study, we separated three clones (C1, C3 and C8) from NBT-2 (human bladder cancer cell line) by limiting dilution. We examined the growth rate and the transplantability to nude mice and performed chromosomal analysis of three clones. The doubling time of C1 is 22 hours, and those of C3 and C8 were 25 and 36 hours, respectively. Each clone was transplantable to nude mice, but we could not find out any histological difference among them. The chromosome numbers of C1 was 66, and those of C3 and C8 were 68 and 63, respectively. We could also find out karyotypic difference among them. We could therefore consider that these three clones had different biological features and studied the difference in drug sensitivity among these three clones and the parent cell line. Cells (1 x 10(4)/well) were incubated in microplates with ten different chemotherapeutic agents for 72 hours. Then 3H-thymidine (1 microCi/ml) was added to each. After 24 hours, cells were harvested and the uptake of 3H thymidine was counted with a liquid scintillation counter. According to the reaction pattern, these chemotherapeutic agents were divided into three groups. 1. The radio isotope uptake of three clones and parent cell line was proportionally inhibited by increasing the drug concentration (carboplatin, (glycolato-o, o-) diammine platinum (II), ifosfamide).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

A 16 year-old boy of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) was reported. Although Hodgkin's disease was suspected by the presence of Reed-Sternberg-like cells and lacunar cells histologically, a diagnosis of NHL was made because of atypism and monoclonality of the background's cells as well as the morphology of invasive cells in the bone marrow. The tumor cells expressed, CD2, CD3, CD4, CD5 and CD7 antigens, which corresponded to the phenotype of helper-inducer T-lymphocytes. In the analysis of their karyotypes, 16 out of 24 cells revealed normal karyotype, while all the rest showed near-triploidy. Common abnormality was identified as trisomies of No. 1, 3, 5, 16, 21 chromosomes, tetrasomies of No. 10, 19, 20 chromosomes, and 4q+, 7q+, 14p+. Multimodal chemotherapy was successful to induce the patient promptly into complete remission. He has been free from the disease for approximately 12 months. Thus far, triploid clones in hematopoietic malignancies have rarely been described. More importantly, the appearance of them in pediatric lymphoid neoplasms has not yet been reported.

A 21-year-old man was admitted to our hospital because of anorexia and general malaise in July, 1988. On admission, the white blood cell count of 18,600/microliters with 72% leukemic cells. The bone marrow aspirate showed 76.8% immature monocytes, 10% mature and immature eosinophils. Leukemic cells were 66.6% myeloperoxidase positive cells, and 20.6% naphthylbutyrate esterase positive cells. The lysozyme activity in urine was high. Cytogenetic analysis revealed the presence of 46 XY inv (16) (p13 q22). Under the diagnosis of acute myelomonocytic leukemia with eosinophilia (M4Eo) associated with inv (16) (p13 q22), one course of DCMP induction therapy was performed. After complete remission, the bone marrow aspirate showed disappearance of inv (16) (p13 q22), and associated with decreased residual leukemic cells.