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A 60-year-old man was admitted to our hospital experiencing difficulty in opening his mouth, and diplopia. Chest computed tomography showed a mass on the right lung. Transbronchial biopsy and scrutiny of the whole body resulted in the diagnosis of small cell lung cancer, cT2N2M1a stage IV. With chemotherapy including carboplatin and etoposide, the primary mass of the right lung shrank, and the patient no longer had diplopia or trouble opening his mouth. After the first-line chemotherapy, itching, ptosis, and dysphagia appeared, accompanied by tumor relapse. These symptoms improved with chemotherapy for lung cancer. After four lines of chemotherapy, the lung cancer was not controlled. The patient died 19 months after the first chemotherapy had started. Difficulty in opening the mouth is a rare symptom for lung cancer patients, but chemotherapy for lung cancer clearly improved this symptom. Therefore, we diagnosed this rare symptom as paraneoplastic neurological syndrome.

Cucumber mosaic virus (CMV) is divided into subgroups I (sub-I) and II (sub-II). Isolate CMV-PF, which had been isolated from tomato by single lesion isolation (SLI), was classified in sub-II by serology, but it had the pathogenicity of sub-I CMVs. Sequence comparisons and phylogenetic analyses showed that CMV-PF was actually a reassortant CMV isolate containing RNAs 1 and 2 from sub-I and RNA 3 from sub-II (I, I, and II). A subgroup-specific reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (SS-RT-PCR) was devised to detect reassortants between sub-I and sub-II. Six primer sets specific to genomic RNAs were designed for each subgroup, and those primer sets successfully amplified their target RT-PCR products. Of 38 natural CMV isolates, two isolates (nos. 9-7 and 27-3) contained mixed RNAs of both subgroups. SLI-progenies of 9-7 were subsequently isolated by SLI using Vigna unguiculata and analyzed by SS-RT-PCR; they were found to be a reassortant containing RNAs 1 and 2 from sub-I and RNA 3 from sub-II (I, I, and II). Although natural reassortants between CMV subgroups were thought to be infrequent based on previous observations, we readily found two isolates of a reassortant (I, I, and II) in different tomato fields, implying that tomato may act as a reservoir of mixed infection in the generation of a CMV reassortant perhaps by aphids.

Selective gas permeation of porous organic/inorganic hybrid membranes via sol-gel route and its thermal stability are described. Separation performance of the hybrid membrane was improved compared with porous membranes governed by the Knudsen flow, and gas permeability was still much higher than that through nonporous membranes. Additionally, it was shown that these membranes were applicable at higher temperatures than organic membranes. SEM observation demonstrated that the thin membrane was crack-free. Nitrogen physisorption isotherms showed the pore size was in the range of nanometers. Gas permeability through this membrane including phenyl group was in the range of 10−8 [cc(STP) cm/(cm2 s cmHg)] at 25°C. The ratios of O2/N2 and CO2/N2 were 1.5 and 6.0, respectively, showing the permeation was not governed by the Knudsen flow. The permeability decreased as the temperature increased. Furthermore, the specific affinity between gas molecules and surface was observed not only in the permeation data of the hybrid membranes but in the physisorption data. These results suggested that the gas permeation through the hybrid membrane was governed by the surface flow mechanism. Thermal analysis indicated that these functional groups were still stable at higher temperatures. The phenyl group especially remained undamaged even at 400°C.