Search

EVA1A (also known as transmembrane protein 166) is a transmembrane protein involved in the regulation of autophagy that acts as an adaptor protein to recruit or bind proteins in the lysosome or endoplasmic reticulum. In the present study, we identified EVA1A as a target of microRNA-125b (miR-125b), a member of a highly conserved family of miRNAs that has been proposed as a biomarker for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Analysis of oxaliplatin-sensitive and oxaliplatin-resistant HCC cell lines showed that miR-125b is downregulated in resistant cells and its overexpression in sensitive cells decreased resistance to oxaliplatin by inhibiting cell proliferation, migration and epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT). EVA1A expression was shown to be upregulated in tissue samples from oxaliplatin-resistant HCC patients, and its ectopic expression partially induced autophagy and reversed the effect of miR-125b on inhibiting the growth of oxaliplatin-resistant cell lines and xenograft tumors. Taken together, our results suggest that miR-125b plays a role in the resistance of HCC cells to chemotherapy via a mechanism involving the downregulation of EVA1A-mediated autophagy.

A structure of logical hierarchical cluster for the distributed multimedia on demand server is proposed. The architecture is mainly composed of the network topology and the resource management of all server nodes. Instead of the physical network hierarchy or the independent management hierarchy, the nodes are organized into a logically hierarchical cluster according to the multimedia block they caches in the midderware layer. The process of a member joining/leaving or the structure adjustment cooperatively implemented by all members is concerned with decentralized maintenance of the logical cluster hierarchy. As the root of each logically hierarchical cluster is randomly mapped into the system, the logical structure of a multimedia block is dynamically expanded across some regions by the two replication policies in different load state respectively. The local load diversion is applied to fine-tune the load of nodes within a local region but belongs to different logical hierarchies. Guaranteed by the dynamic expansion of a logical structure and the load diversion of a local region, the users always select a closest idle node from the logical hierarchy under the condition of topology integration with resource management.

In this paper, we propose the structure of the logical hierarchical cluster for the distributed multimedia on demand according to block the nodes cache. The structure of the logical hierarchy is lazily maintained by all members in the decentralized manner. The global load balance is achieved as the root of each LHC is mapped into the system randomly. The LHC is expanded dynamically with the two application policies. The local load balance is applied to fine-tune the load of nodes of different LHCs within a local region. The integration of topology with resource management simplifies the server selection largely.

Under magnetic resonance (MR) guidance, high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) is capable of precise and accurate delivery of thermal dose to tissues. Given the excellent soft tissue imaging capabilities of MRI, but the lack of data on the correlation of MRI findings to histology following HIFU, we sought to examine tumor response to HIFU ablation to determine whether there was a correlation between histological findings and common MR imaging protocols in the assessment of the extent of thermal damage. Female FVB mice (n = 34), bearing bilateral neu deletion tumors, were unilaterally insonated under MR guidance, with the contralateral tumor as a control. Between one and five spots (focal size 0.5 × 0.5 × 2.5 mm3) were insonated per tumor with each spot receiving approximately 74.2 J of acoustic energy over a period of 7 seconds. Animals were then imaged on a 7T MR scanner with several protocols. T1 weighted images (with and without gadolinium contrast) were collected in addition to a series of T2 weighted and diffusion weighted images (for later reconstruction into T2 and apparent diffusion coefficient maps), immediately following ablation and at 6, 24, and 48 hours post treatment. Animals were sacrificed at each time point and both insonated/treated and contralateral tumors removed and stained for NADH-diaphorase, caspase 3, or with hematoxylin and eosin (H&E). We found the area of non-enhancement on contrast enhanced T1 weighted imaging immediately post ablation correlated with the region of tissue receiving a thermal dose CEM43 ≥ 240 min. Moreover, while both tumor T2 and apparent diffusion coefficient values changed from pre-ablation values, contrast enhanced T1 weighted images appeared to be more senstive to changes in tissue viability following HIFU ablation.