Genes and Immunity (2009) 10, 566-578; doi:10.1038/gene.2009.43; published online 4 June 2009″
“We examined the effect of dendritic cells engineered to express an HBV S antigen CD40L fusion gene (HBV S-ecdCD40L). The DNA of HBV S gene and the cDNA of the extracellular domain of human CD40 ligand were linked by cloning. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) from healthy adults were incubated and induced into dendritic cells (DC) in presence of granulocyte/macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) and interleukin-4(IL-4). The DCs were transfected
the novel construct, and the impact of the Small molecule library manufacturer expressed clone assessed. We find that, compared with control groups, modification of DCs with HBV S-ecdCD40L fusion gene resulted in the activation of DCs with upregulated expression of immunologically important cell surface molecules (CD80, CD86 and HLA-DR) and proinflammatory cytokines (IL-12). The DCs modified with HBV S-ecdCD40L are able to stimulate enhanced
allogeneic T-cell proliferation in vitro. Thus, the fusion gene HBV S-ecdCD40L can promote DC’s activation and enhance its function and may prove to be the foundation for a new type of hepatitis B vaccine.”
“Objectives To assess the validity of self-reported Papanicolau (Pap) smear history in Norwegian women and to identify characteristics that influence the validity.\n\nMethods Interview data from a sample of 16,574 Norwegian learn more women, aged 18-45, in 2004-2005, was compared with information from the population-based cytology register. Crude validity in the self-reports with respect to ever/never having taken a Pap smear was summarized. The validity of the reported interval since lost Pop smear was assessed by a smoothed distribution of the reported interval, stratified by the registered
interval. Characteristics of influence on validity were identified this website by logistic regression for true positives (sensitivity and positive predictive value), true negatives (specificity and negative predictive value) and for more than one year discrepancy in time since last Pap smear, between reported and registered interval.\n\nResults Overall validity was summarized by: concordance = 0.9, sensitivity = 0.97, positive predictive value = 0.92, specificity = 0.55, negative predictive value = 0.78 and report-to-records ratio = 1.51. The variance in the reported interval increased proportionally with the registered interval, and women tended to underestimate the interval (telescoping). Age and registered number of years since last Pop smear had the strongest influence on ever/never and time interval validity, respectively.\n\nConclusions Estimated screening rates, based on self-reporting without organized screening, are biased. Telescoping leads to increased risk for developing invasive disease, because women will postpone their next Pap smear.