Lectin affinity electrophoresis of alpha-fetoprotein in cancer diagnosis

Lectin affinity electrophoresis of serum alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) was carried out on samples obtained from patients with benign and malignant diseases and on cord blood, and separated AFP bands were detected by antibody-affinity blotting. The following major bands were identified by determination of kinetic constants: AFP-C1 and -C2 with concanavalin A, AFP-L1, -L2 and -L3 with Lens culinaris agglutinin A, AFP-P1, -P2, -P3, -P4 and -P5 with erythroagglutinating phytohemagglutinin, and AFP-A1, -A2 and -A3 with Allomyrina dichotoma lectin. AFP bands with the lowest number had either low or no affinity and those with higher numbers had higher affinities for respective lectins. AFP from cord blood and chronic liver disease was characterized by the predominance of AFP-C2, AFP-L1, AFP-P2 and AFP-A3. Hepatocellular carcinoma was differentiated from the benign liver disease by increased proportions of AFP-L3 and AFP-P4. Extrahepatic tumors had additional increases of AFP-C1, AFP-L2, AFP-P5 and AFP-A1 (or slow-migrating AFP-Als, particularly in yolk sac tumor).     

Preliminary calculations on excited states of the oxygen molecule

It is well known that the energy interval separating ³ _u ^– and ³ _u ⁺ states of O₂, as given by the conventional ASMO method, is too large. In order to resolve this difficulty, removal of the equivalence restrictions usually employed in the orbital theory is proposed. Thus the orbital exponent of one antibonding _g MO is allowed to take a different value from the other _g's. Variational calculations show that the resulting outermost orbital is much more diffuse than the others. This model of a single diffuse orbital brings about a considerable energy lowering for the ³ _u ^– state and thus the agreement of the ³ _u ^– - ³ _u ⁺ interval with experiment is improved.

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Zusammenfassung Die konventionelle ASMO-Theorie liefert bekanntlich eine viel zu große Differenz der Terme ³ _u ^– und ³ _u ⁺ von O₂, weswegen der Vorschlag gemacht wird, die üblicherweise vorgenommene Äquivalenz-Einschränkung fallen zu lassen. Der Orbital-Exponent eines lockernden MO's kann von dem der übrigen _g's abweichen. Rechnungen zeigen, daß das äußerste MO viel diffuser als die anderen ist und daß die Energie des ³ _u ^– -Zustandes beträchtlich erniedrigt wird.

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Résumé La séparation entre les états ³ _u ^{– 3} _u ⁺ de O₂ donnée par la méthode ASMO conventionnelle est connue pour être trop grande. Afin de résoudre cette difficulté la levée des restrictions d'équivalence ordinairement utilisées est proposée. Ainsi l'exposant orbital d'une des orbitales moléculaires antiliantes _g peut prendre une valeur différente de celui de l'autre orbitale antiliante _g. Des calculs variationnels montrent que l'orbitale la plus haute ainsi obtenue est beaucoup plus diffuse que les autres. Ceci a pour effet de diminuer considérablement l'énergie de l'état ³ _u ^– , améliorant la séparation entre les états ³ _u ^– et ³ _u ⁺ .

     

Environment potential in Hartree-Fock-Slater formalism

A new formulation of the environment potential approach (EPA) is developed within the Hartree-Fock-Slater framework. As the results of illustrative applications to C₅ cluster which is the smallest unit of diamond lattice, EPA is shown to annul efficiently the fictitious-surface effects which are inevitably brought into a finite-size-cluster model.     

Environment potential in closing bonds case

A method of an electronic structure calculation of cluster is suggested. It consists of an “effective” potential with an electron to close the torn valence bonds which appear inevitably in a finite-size-cluster model. The method is applied to the C₅ cluster representing the diamond lattice and is shown to be effective to nullify the pseudo-surface effects.     

Role of Alginate Composition on Copper Ion Uptake in the Presence of Histidine or Beta-Amyloid

The anomalous interaction between metal ions and the peptide beta-amyloid is one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease. Metal-binding biopolymers, including polysaccharides, can elucidate the fundamental aspects of metal ions’ interactions with biological tissue and their interplay in Alzheimer’s disease. This work focuses on the role of the alginate composition on Cu(II) adsorption in the presence of histidine or β-amyloid, the peptide associated with the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Alginate samples with different mannuronic/guluronic (M/G) ratios led to similar Cu(II) adsorption capacities, following the Langmuir isotherm and the pseudo-second-order adsorption kinetic models. Although the presence of histidine produced up to a 20% reduction in the copper adsorption capacity in guluronic-rich alginate samples (M/G~0.61), they presented stable bidentate chelation of the metallic ion. Chemical analyses (FTIR and XPS) demonstrated the role of hydroxyl and carboxyl groups in copper ion chelation, whereas both crystallinity and morphology analyses indicated the prevalence of histidine interaction with guluronic-rich alginate. Similar results were observed for Cu(II) adsorption in alginate beads in the presence of beta-amyloid and histidine, suggesting that the alginate/histidine system is a simple yet representative model to probe the application of biopolymers to metal ion uptake in the presence of biological competitors.     

Clinical applications of lectin affinity electrophoresis.

Principles and several modifications of lectin affinity electrophoresis are described. The results obtained using these newly developed techniques are reviewed for individual glycoproteins, the altered lectin reactivities of which have some clinical implications, showing different lectin reactivities, which occur not only on malignant transformation but also in association with inflammatory process and hormonal action.     

Theoretical study of electronic structure for “inclined” CO chemisorbed on Pd (210) surface

Electronic structure for CO chemisorbed on Pd (210) surface has been calculated by the model potential Xα method which involves Bonifacic-Huzinaga's model potential and Slater's Xα potential. The results of the present calculations are consistent with the “inclined” CO model which was proposed by Madey et al. The results also show that the electronic structure of CO chemisorbed on Pd (210) surface resembles surprisingly those of CO on the other low-index planes where the CO molecular axis is supposed to be perpendicular to the surfaces.     

Thermal quenching of defect photoluminescence and recombination rates of electron–hole pairs in a-Si:H

Temperature variation of non-radiative recombination rate, competing with defect photoluminescence (PL), has been obtained from characteristic lifetimes estimated from experiments by means of frequency resolved spectroscopy (FRS) for a-Si:H films after illumination of pulsed light. Conventional interpretation of thermal quenching of the PL in a-Si:H, where the non-radiative recombination rate has an activation-type temperature dependence and the radiative recombination rate is independent of the temperature, is not suitable to explain the experimental results of the defect PL. The temperature variation of the non-radiative recombination rate obtained for the defect PL is well described by a theory of Englman and Jortner for the case of strong electron–phonon coupling.     

On the energy difference between the lP and 3P states of the beryllium isoelectronic sequence

Wave functions of the ¹S (ground state), ³P and ¹P states for the beryllium isoelectronic sequence have been obtained in various approximations. The HF ²p orbitals for the ¹P and ³P states are similar except for Be, where the ²p orbital is quite diffuse for the ¹P state. The difference between the experimental E(¹P) – E(³P) and the HF E(¹P) – E(³P) is 0.62 eV for Be and 1.17 ～ 1.40 eV for B⁺ ～ F⁵⁺. The disagreements are attributed to the correlation effects between the 2s and 2p electrons. This is confirmed by ci calculations. It is shown that a limited basis SCF calculation reproduces the above feature of the HF results if we treat the orbital exponents as the variational parameters. The use of the Slater values for the orbital exponents is shown to be inadequate especially for the Be ¹P state. The conclusions of this paper will be useful for discussing the V–T separations of H₂ and C₂H₄.     

The [2?+?2?+?2] mechanisms of trimerization of three ethynes and monosilaethylenes

The mechanisms of [2?+?2?+?2] reactions of three ethynes and monosilaethylenes to form benzene and 1,3,5-trisilacyclohexane were studied by ab initio MO methods. The reaction mechanisms were analyzed by configuration interaction/localized molecular orbital/CASSCF calculations. Although the [2?+?2?+?2] reaction of ethyne is typically ??homologous?? concerted, that of monosilaethylene is polarized (ionic-cyclic) one-step reaction. In addition, the aromaticity along the intrinsic reaction coordinate pathway was studied using the index of deviation from aromaticity. Although the transition state of trimerization of ethyne does not have an aromatic nature for the ??- and ??-bonds formation system, the crossing point of the ??-bond formation and ??-bond breaking shows an aromatic nature.