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Objective To investigate whether combined chemoradiotherapy (CTRT) confers a benefit for survival outcome over radiotherapy (RT) alone after primary surgery in patients with FIGO stage IIIC endometrial adenocarcinoma. Methods We conducted a multicenter retrospective study of patients with surgical stage IIIC endometrial cancer from 1990 to 2011. Adjuvant RT alone was performed in 85 patients (40.3%) and adjuvant CTRT in 126 patients (59.7%). Disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were analyzed using Kaplan–Meier method and Cox proportional hazards model. Results Stage IIIC1 and stage IIIC2 accounted for 63% and 37%, respectively. FIGO IIIC2 had a higher recurrence rate than FIGO IIIC1 (38.5% vs. 29.3%, p = 0.172). Five-year OS and DFS were lower in FIGO IIIC2 than FIGO IIIC1 (85.1% vs. 76.9%, p = 0.417; 71.0% vs. 59.2%, p = 0.108, respectively). Eighteen patients (13.5%) in stage IIIC1 developed PALN recurrence, whereas only one (3.3%) in stage IIIC2 had PALN recurrence (p = 0.001). In multivariate analysis, predictors of DFS were parametrial invasion (HR, 3.49; 95% CI, 1.83–6.64; p < 0.001), higher grade (HR, 2.78; 95% CI, 1.31–5.89; p = 0.008), and > 3 positive pelvic nodes (HR, 1.84; 95% CI, 1.11–3.05; p = 0.019). Combined CTRT did not affect DFS or OS in IIIC1 and IIIC2 compared with RT alone. Conclusion CTRT showed comparable survival outcome to RT alone. Half of relapses (46%) in stage IIIC1 occurred in PALN region, whereas relapse in stage IIIC2 primarily occurred in distant metastasis (90%). Future randomized studies are needed to determine which subgroup may be most likely to benefit from CCRT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The reliable estimation of the coefficient of variation (COV) and probability density function (PDF) is required to characterize the uncertainty and variability of soil properties. An outlier test, a randomness test (runs test), and a Goodness-of-Fit test are performed in sequence to determine the reliable COVs and PDFs of soil properties for Songdo silty clay. Soil properties such as Cc, e0, Cc/(1+e0), Cα/Cc, γt, and γb are found to fit to both normal and lognormal distributions, whereas cv, kv, and su/po′ appear to fit to a lognormal distribution at the 5% significant level. It is observed that the COVs of Cc, Cc/(1+e0), cv, kv, Cα/Cc, and su/po′ are larger than those of e0, γt, and γb. The COVs of cv and kv, which are associated with the time rate of consolidation, are found to be the largest among those of soil properties considered. It is also found that the Nσ rule provides similar COVs to those of a statistical method when using Nσ =6 for soil properties with small COVs and Nσ =4.2–5.3 for soil properties with large COVs. The empirical method appears to provide conservative characteristic values for soil properties that have relatively large COVs. Finally, this study presented the lower and upper bound characteristic values for properties of Songdo silty clay. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This study is to elucidate the involvement of anti-inflammatory heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) in the inhibitory activity of a Chrysanthemum boreale Makino (CB) extract on nitric oxide (NO) production and inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) expression in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated RAW264.7 macrophages. Materials and methods: Cell viability and NO assay were performed. In addition, iNOS expression was detected by Western blotting and real-time PCR. HO-1 expression was also evaluated by Western blotting, and blocking HO-1 activity on NO production was performed. Results: The CB extract at the highest concentration (100μg/ml) significantly inhibited NO production by approximately 90% and suppressed iNOS protein expression by approximately 84.8% compared to LPS-stimulated cells. Furthermore, the CB extract (100μg/ml) inhibited iNOS mRNA expression in a concentration-dependant manner and suppressed iNOS mRNA expression by 94.8%. The CB extract induced the expression of HO-1 in a dose-dependent manner, and blocking HO-1 activity abolished the inhibitory effects of the CB extract. Moreover, the addition of carbon monoxide such as tricarbonyl dichlororuthenium (II) dimmer (RuCO), a byproduct derived from heme degradation, mimicked the inhibitory action of low concentrations of CB extract. Conclusion: These results suggest that a CB extract has potent anti-inflammatory activity in RAW264.7 macrophages involving the induction of HO-1. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]