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Chromosomal abnormalities in the role of prognostic factor for transplant patients with myelofibrosis (MF) are not fully investigated. Regarding complex karyotype (CK), we retrospectively analyzed 241 patients with primary and secondary MF who received a first allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT). Based on an unfavorable karyotype in the Dynamic International Prognostic Scoring System, we compared the outcomes in 3 groups: favorable karyotype, unfavorable karyotype including CK (unfavorable-CK(+)), and unfavorable karyotype not including CK (unfavorable-CK(-)). Overall survival was significantly shorter in the unfavorable-CK(+) group (hazard ratio (HR) 2.49, 95% CI: 1.46-4.24, P 0.001), whereas there was no difference between the unfavorable-CK(-) group and the favorable group (HR 0.57, 95% CI: 0.20-1.59, P = 0.28). In addition, a significantly higher proportion of patients in the unfavorable-CK(+) group did not achieve complete remission after HCT (P = 0.007). The cumulative incidence of disease progression was significantly higher in the unfavorable-CK(+) group (HR 2.5, 95% CI 1.6-3.92, P 0.001), whereas that in the unfavorable-CK(-) group was comparable to that in the favorable group (HR 0.49, 95% CI 0.12-1.94, P = 0.31). Further investigations will be needed to clarify the impact of CK on transplant outcomes in MF.

Fit patients with peripheral T-cell lymphoma, not otherwise specified (PTCL-NOS) and angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma (AITL) in relapsed or refractory (R/R) disease status often receive salvage chemotherapy followed by autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (autoHCT) or allogeneic HCT (alloHCT). However, there is no consensus on the type of HCT that should be applied for such patients. Herein, we retrospectively evaluated the survival outcome of 760 adult R/R PTCL-NOS or AITL patients who underwent the first HCT. Among them, 318 relapsed after first remission (REL) and 442 were refractory to the primary therapy (PIF). The 4-year overall survival (OS) of autoHCT and alloHCT was 50 and 50% for REL patients, and 52 and 49% for PIF patients, respectively. In the multivariable analysis, alloHCT tended to be associated with better progression-free survival (PFS) in REL (hazard ratio [HR] 0.74; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.53-1.03), and significantly better PFS in PIF (HR 0.64; 95% CI: 0.46-0.88) compared with autoHCT. The subgroup analysis with propensity-score matching showed that alloHCT was associated with better OS for REL-sensitive and PIF-nonremission disease. This study suggested that the advantage of alloHCT for R/R PTCL-NOS or AITL is different, depending on the disease status at HCT.

A technique for excluding the target signal from contaminated training samples is proposed for robust adaptive beamforming (ABF) in radar. We focus on applying the proposed technique to mitigate the effect of ionospheric clutter in high-frequency surface-wave radar systems, but the technique can also be applied to overcome jamming signals without the need to allocate dedicated listening intervals. A computer simulation indicates that the proposed technique for effectively excluding the target signal is successful; the subsequent ABF achieves asymptotically the same signal to interference-plus-noise ratio where target contamination in the training samples is absent.

The international staging system (ISS) is the most commonly used risk-stratification system for patients with multiple myeloma (MM) and is determined by serum albumin and β2-microglobulin levels. In the two determinants, β2-microglobulin levels are frequently observed to be elevated in patients with myeloma, particularly in those with renal impairment. In comparison with patients with intact immunoglobulin myeloma, patients with LC myeloma do not necessarily show decreased levels of serum albumin. The clinical impact of ISS in patients with LCMM, in particular the distinction between ISS I and II, may be complicated due to non-decreased levels of serum albumin in both stages. Accordingly, we have attempted to assess clinical relevance of the ISS in patients with LC myeloma. The clinical data of 1899 patients with MM diagnosed between January 2001 and December 2012 were collected from 38 affiliated hospitals of the Japanese Society of Myeloma. Significant difference was not found between stage I (n = 72) and stage II (n = 92) in LC myeloma patients (n = 307). The mean serum albumin concentration of patients with LC myeloma was within the reference range but higher than that of patients with IgG + IgA myeloma (n = 1501), which complicates the distinction between ISS stage I and II myeloma. Patients with LC myeloma had low frequencies of t(4; 14) and high frequency of elevated lactate dehydrogenase, and despite a relevant amount of missing data in our registry (R-ISS stage I; n = 11, stage II; n = 32, and stage III: n = 18), the information included in the R-ISS scoring system seems to be more accurate than ISS to obtain a reliable risk stratification approach in non-ISS stage III LC myeloma patients.

Polarimetric radar provides useful information on scattering mechanisms, and advances in polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (POLSAR) technology have shown the effect of polarization information on various applications. The disadvantage of POLSAR is low azimuth resolution capability. Since the effective pulse repetition frequency (PRF) in each polarimetric channel of POLSAR is half the total PRF, the resolution is twice as low as the single-polarization SAR. This drawback may be mitigated by employing a superresolution method designed for polarimetric radar such as polarimetric bandwidth extrapolation (PBWE), previously proposed by the authors. Thus far, the authors only empirically showed that polarization information helps in improving resolution via numerical simulations. In this paper, theoretical analysis on the resolution of a polarimetric radar is provided. Along with the resolution, estimation accuracy of the polarization property of the target is studied. In the analysis, we employ the recently proposed metric called the statistical resolution limit (SRL) that provides the highest resolution achievable by any unbiased parametric spectral estimator. The SRL of polarimetric radar is derived and compared with that of single-polarization radar. The Cramer-Rao bound (CRB) of the polarization estimation error of the polarimetric radar is also derived. The complexified full Fisher information matrix and the CRBs of signal parameters are derived first for the general multichannel signal in nonwhite Gaussian noise. Then, the SRL and the polarization estimation error are derived using the CRBs of signal parameters for the cases where two point targets are closely located. It is shown analytically and numerically that the polarization information helps in improving the SRL. It is also shown that the polarimetric processing significantly improves the accuracy of the polarization estimation when two targets are located closer than the Fourier resolution cell. Finally, the performance of the PBWE is evaluated via simulations and is compared to the SRL and the CRB for the polarization estimation.

Inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) is one of the radar techniques used to observe 2-D images of a remotely based target using radio waves. If we keep observing the target and consecutively generate multiple ISAR images, which we call an ISAR movie, the target image varies considerably due to the motion of the target. The authors have proposed an algorithm for reconstructing a 3-D target shape from an ISAR movie; however, the algorithm requires a priori knowledge of the relative motion of the target. In this paper, we propose a novel method that estimates the relative motion and the 3-D shape of the target using a multistatic ISAR movie.

Background: We recently reported that the International Prognostic Scoring System for Waldenström macroglobulinemia (ISSWM), which is widely used to predict the prognosis of WM patients, might not be applicable to Japanese patients, and evidence of pleural effusion might be a novel adverse prognostic factor for symptomatic WM in the rituximab era. Further studies with a large number of patients are deemed to be conducted. Methods: We retrospectively analyzed the clinical data of 498 patients with WM diagnosed between January 2001 and December 2015 from 44 institutes involved with the Japanese Society of Myeloma. The overall survival (OS) was analyzed using Kaplan-Meier methods and compared using log-rank test. Several clinical characteristics at the diagnosis were assessed by Cox regression for univariate and multivariate analyses of the OS. Results: We included 420 cases diagnosed with symptomatic (n=314) and asymptomatic WM (n=106) in accordance with the classification of the Second International Workshop on WM. The median age at the diagnosis was 69 (range, 32-91) years, with 75.5% male, and 16.0% had an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status (ECOG PS) of 2-4. Oral alkylating agents, purine analogs, cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine and prednisolone (CHOP) or CHOP-like regimens ± rituximab, rituximab monotherapy, or dexamethasone, rituximab and cyclophosphamide (DRC) were mainly administered as initial treatment. Rituximab-containing therapy was administered in 76.8% of all patients. The median follow-up was 45 months. The 5-year OS rate for all patients was 77.9%, while the rates for those with symptomatic and asymptomatic WM were 72.9% and 92.2%, respectively. Significant differences in the survival were seen between risk groups of ISSWM in symptomatic WM patients (5-year OS: high, 55.4%; intermediate, 81.2%; low, 90.2%; p65 years, platelet count ≤10×104/µL, serum β2-microglobulin (β2-MG) >3 mg/L, ECOG PS 2-4, abnormal karyotype, pleural involvement, WBC 1.5 mg/dL, CRP >2.0 mg/dL and sIL-2R >4000 U/mL were significant adverse prognostic factors for the OS. A multivariate analysis revealed that a platelet count ≤10×104/µL (hazard ratio [HR] 5.942; 95% confidence interval [CI] 2.265-14.761), serum β2-MG >3 mg/L (HR 2.748; 95% CI 1.091-7.655), ECOG PS 2-4 (HR 2.899; 95% CI 1.219-6.290), and pleural involvement (HR 11.066; 95% CI 3.672-29.829) were adverse independent risk factors for symptomatic WM. We constructed a prognostic model by combining these prognostic variables as follows: patients with good risk (n=219), no adverse factors or only serum β2-MG >3 mg/L or ECOG PS 2-4; patients with poor risk (n=81), ≥1 adverse factors with a platelet count ≤10×104/µL, pleural involvement, or both serum β2-MG >3 mg/L and ECOG PS 2-4. The 5-year OS rates were 82.3% for good risk and 44.4% for poor risk, and this prognostic model significantly stratified symptomatic WM patients separately by the survival (p Conclusion: Although ISSWM may be useful for survival risk stratification in Japanese patients, we found that intermediate- and high-risk patients seemed to have a better prognosis than those in Western studies in the rituximab era (Dimopoulos MA, et al. Haematologica. 2008; 93: 1420-22). Thrombocytopenia and pleural involvement were found to be strong adverse prognostic factors in symptomatic WM, and our new prognostic index including them was easy to use in daily clinical practice and superior to ISSWM for detecting high-risk patients. Further studies are warranted to validate our prognostic index, especially in the era of novel agents. Disclosures Yamamoto: Bristol-Myers Squibb: Honoraria. Hagiwara:Celgene: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees; Bristol Myers Squibb: Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees. Sunami:Celgene: Honoraria, Research Funding; Sanofi: Research Funding; Janssen: Research Funding; Daiichi-Sankyo: Research Funding; Ono: Honoraria, Research Funding; Bristol-Myers Squibb K.K.: Honoraria, Research Funding; AbbVie: Research Funding; Takeda: Research Funding; MSD: Research Funding; GlaxoSmithKline: Research Funding; Novartis: Research Funding. Kurokawa:Teijin Pharma: Research Funding; Eizai: Research Funding; Kyowa Hakko Kirin: Honoraria, Research Funding; Chugai Pharmaceutical: Research Funding; Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma: Research Funding; Pfizer: Research Funding; Takeda Pharmaceutical: Research Funding; MSD: Honoraria, Research Funding; Ono Pharmaceutical: Honoraria, Research Funding; Nippon Sinyaku: Honoraria, Research Funding; Astellas Pharma: Research Funding; Otsuka Pharmaceutical: Research Funding. Takamatsu:Janssen: Honoraria; Celgene: Honoraria, Research Funding; Bristol-Myers Squibb: Research Funding; Ono: Research Funding. Ito:Bristol-Myers Squibb, Celgene: Honoraria. Tamura:Bristol-Myers Squibb: Honoraria; Celgene: Honoraria, Research Funding; Ono Pharmaceutical: Honoraria; Takeda Pharmaceutical: Honoraria.

For urban area monitoring, detection and classification of small targets with synthetic aperture radar imagery are one of the useful solutions. The conventional method has the problem that when a target on both master and slave images at the same position has the same radar cross section, it does not classify the target as either a slightly moved reparked vehicle or as a different vehicle. To overcome this problem, we propose a Fourier-transform-based simple phase compensation method for both accurate coherence estimation and classification of the reparked vehicle's status. The proposed method obtains the maximum value of the frequency basis, and also determines the threshold, which is based on effective sample number, with a constant false alarm rate. This number is determined by the peak signal-to-noise ratio in estimation window, and are used on the preprocessed probability density function for each sample number. Finally, the proposed method classifies a target as either a slightly moved vehicle or as a different vehicle by using both the proposed coherence and threshold detection, which enables it to determine the target status. Experimental results with the COSMO-SkyMed X-band spotlight SAR images demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

To observe fog, a 35-GHz scanning Doppler radar was designed, assembled, and tested. The radar, mounted on a flatbed vehicle for portability, transmits peak powers of 100 kW in a pulse of 0.5-µs width and a beamwidth of 0.3°. Thus, a reflectivity factor Z of −20 dBZ at a range of 10 km generates a signal-to-noise ratio of 0 dB. Doppler velocity measurements are made by sampling the radio frequency phase within each pulse transmitted by a magnetron oscillator and referencing the phases of the received echoes to the transmitted phase. A Nyquist velocity of approximately 9.7 m s–1 is obtained in real time using the spaced pulse-pair method, and aliases of radial velocities are corrected using software. The three-dimensional structure of sea fog and its advection are depicted with the radar.

We investigated the effects of low-dose granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) on the mobilization of stem cells in 6 healthy subjects. When G-CSF was administered by continuous subcutaneous infusion at a rate of 72 microg/day for 5 days, the numbers of white blood cells and granulocytes rapidly increased to maximal levels. CD34+ cells were mobilized to the peripheral blood in 3 days, and the maximal level was reached 4 or 5 days after the start of treatment. We attempted to determine whether the levels of mobilized stem cells that we could obtain using this method would be sufficient for peripheral blood stem cell transplantation. Two of the 6 subjects complained of mild bone pain 4 or 5 days after the start of treatment, but the pain did not affect their daily activities. Only 1 abnormal result (for serum alkaline phosphatase) was found in the laboratory data. The present preliminary results have provided us with a framework for a prospective study comparing low-dose continuous infusion with conventional mobilization procedures.

A fast calculation method of 2-dimensional MUSIC, which can estimate two parameters such as DOA and frequency, is proposed. In the proposed method, 2-dimensional search calculation is substituted with FFT (Fast Fourier Transformation) and convergent calculation. Simulation results showed the proposed method is approximately twenty times faster than the conventional method.

In this paper, Time Difference Of Arrival (TDOA) association problem in 2 dimensional localization is discussed. In 2 dimensional localization, at least three sensors are necessary to locate an emitter. When 2 or more emitters exist, there are multiple number of TDOAs obtained at each cross correlation process. In this case, it is necessary to associate TDOA to the right emitter. The problem here is that the number of TDOAs obtained at each cross correlation process could be different from the other. It happens when some of the emitted signals are received only at some of antennas, not all, due to directional pattern of antenna, blocking, and so forth. This paper proposes a TDOA association method when the number of TDOAs are different from one sensor pair to the other. The simulation result shows that the proposed method can associate TDOAs at the success rate of 97%.

This study concerns a patient with minor (m)-BCR/ABL transcript-positive and Philadelphia (Ph) chromosome-negative myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS). The patient was a 78-year-old man whose condition was diagnosed as refractory anemia with excess of blasts in transformation. Molecular genetic studies, using reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction analysis detected m-BCR/ABL messenger RNA. We used spectral karyotyping to analyze metaphase cells but could not detect a Ph chromosome. Fluorescence in situ hybridization, however, revealed fusion signals of BCR and ABL probes on an apparently normal chromosome 22.

A robust and high-resolution two-dimensional (2D) imaging algorithm is proposed for retrieving the shape of conductive objects embedded in a uniform lossy and dispersive medium. The target is modeled in terms of the location of points that represents the enter contour of the object, together with the parameters of the medium. A nonlinear least-squares fitting is applied to the estimated scattered waveform to adjust the model parameters. The estimated waveform is computed using the extended ray-tracing method, which incorporates the edge-diffraction waves. The performance of the algorithm is examined with numerical simulations and test-site experiments. The simulation with clutters also revealed the robustness of the algorithm even under fairly strong clutter environments.

The remote sensing Synthetic using Aperture Radar can obtain the information of moving targets on the earth surface using MTI (Moving Target Indication) technique, which detects differentiation of the surface image data obtained in successive sessions taken with two antennas mounted on one satellite or two satellites flying in a close formation. In the latter case, the operation of the differentiation is usually performed at the ground station, then each satellite needs to transmit the large amount of data to the ground station separately, which requires broad downlink bandwidths. However, the earth surface image data at the two satellites clearly have a strong correlation since the static background image data other than the moving targets are essentially the same except for some noise factors. Focusing on this fact, we claim that the transmission data can and should be reduced by taking off the redundancy of the two data and sending only the differential parts. In this paper, we discuss the coding theory matter related to this redundancy suppression first, and then discuss source, channel and network coding, and also the Slepian-Wolf theorem for two correlated sources. We next propose a coding and compressing scheme for a certain simplified model. We further generalize it in order to apply this idea to a more realistic model and present a procedure of the proposed scheme.

This paper presents an experimental result to demonstrate azimuth ambiguity suppression with the displaced phase center antenna technique that is promising technique to realize the high resolution wide swath imagery for spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR). The dual receiver antenna data was acquired by airborne Ku-band SAR. In this paper, we propose a signal compensation procedure to cope with beam squint for the following coherent signal processing such as the dual channel reconstruction algorithm. The azimuth ambiguity suppression capability is evaluated by comparing the image reconstructed from dual-receiver channel to the single receiver channel image. The experimental result shows significant azimuth ambiguity suppression.

Serum granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) level were measured for 24 h in 6 patients with hematological disorders and two patients with Graves' disease associated with malignant exophthalmos after iv infusion of high-dose methylprednisolone (HDMP) (20 mg/kg BW) for 2 h starting at 0900 h. Saline solution (500 ml) was infused iv for 2 h as a control on two days before starting the HDMP therapy. Serum G-CSF levels increased with the mean peak values at 4 h after the HDMP therapy (mean +/- SD: 488.1 +/- 125.8 pg/ml vs. saline control 74.4 +/- 21.9 pg/ml, P0.01). Circulating absolute neutrophil counts (ANC) also increased with the mean peak values at 24 h after the HDMP (6,057 +/- 1,460 / microliters vs. saline control 2,007 +/- 390 / microliters, P0.025). These findings indicate that glucocorticoid has a stimulating effect on G-CSF release and that the increased G-CSF release could be involved, at least partly, in neutrophilia induced by glucocorticoid.

A special observation mode for space debris was developed for a vhf phased-array radar to measure the time variation of the radar cross section (RCS). Since a simple low-frequency approximation holds for the analysis of scattering of the radar signal from most of space debris, it is feasible to estimate the effective axial ratio of each target from the magnitude of the observed RCS variations. Preliminary statistical study showed that debris with smaller RCS has larger RCS variations than larger debris, suggesting that they may have elongated shape rather than spherical shape as usually assumed in the impact estimation. A series of numerical simulations has shown that the volume of small observed debris is estimated to be less than half of that of a sphere with the same RCS.

In the two-dimensional radar image reconstruction using diffraction tomography, missing data become a significant problem if the observation direction and the scan range are restricted. A method is proposed in which these missing data are interpolated in the wavenumber domain. As an object image, a collection of the point targets is assumed. By means of a method which minimizes repetitively the square residual of the observed values and the reconstructed image in the wavenumber space, it is shown by simulation that a good image reconstruction is possible even if the missing rate is as high as 50 percent. As a method to provide the initial value for the repetitive method, an interpolation method using the autocorrelation function is proposed. It is shown that this scheme works well in a stable manner even for a high missing rate and a poor SN ratio. Further, an objective discrimination criterion is proposed for estimation of the number of targets. It is shown that the true target can easily be discriminated if the SN is good and that a stable estimation is still possible even if the SN is poor and the extraction of a weak image is difficult.

Statistical resolution limit (SRL) is a simple metric that provides the highest resolution achievable by any unbiased parametric spectral estimator. In this paper, the SRL of polarimetric radar is derived and compared with that of single polarization radar. The SRL is defined using the Cramer-Rao bound (CRB) of signal parameters for the cases where two point targets are closely located. It is shown analytically and numerically that the polarization information helps improving the SRL.

Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) often suffers from interference signal from various radio sources. In general, notch filters or band elimination filters have been utilized to eliminate such interference signal; however, if the bandwidth of the interference signal is relatively wide, the gap in the spectrum caused by the band elimination filter could significantly degrade the original image. We propose an algorithm to suppress relatively wide bandwidth interference while maintaining the image quality. In the algorithm, spatially variant interference suppression filter is generated based on the signal of interference free band, then the filter is applied to the interference contaminated image. Unlike the band elimination filter, the spatially variant interference suppression filter preserves the signal component within the interference contaminated band; therefore, the image distortion caused by the spectrum gap can be largely eliminated. The algorithm has been tested with a simulated interference contaminated image generated from the real 10cm resolution airborne Ku band SAR image and a TerraSAR-X image. It has been shown that while conventional band elimination filter would degrade the image quality, the image quality of the interference suppressed image obtained by the proposed algorithm is satisfactory.

Passive bistatic radars (PBRs) exploit existing transmitters such as TV broadcasts as the source of illumination. PBR is consisted of two receivers, with one antenna pointed at the source and the other at the target, and the target range is determined by correlating the signal scattered by the target with the signal directly arrived at the receiver. Since PBR does not transmit any waveform, it consumes lower power, and no frequency allocation is required. We have conducted a field experiment exploiting terrestrial digital TV broadcast to assess the feasibility of ISAR (Inverse Synthetic Aperture Radar) observation based on PBR. The wide and flat spectrum of the OFDM signal and the small gap between the channels enables us to obtain high range resolution of up to several meters by exploiting multiple physical channels. Therefore, moderate resolution ISAR imaging is expected to be possible. In this paper, PBR based ISAR algorithm is briefly explained, and the first example of observed PBR based ISAR image of an aircraft target is shown.

Background Multiple myeloma (MM) is a clonal disorder of plasma cells, accounting for 10% of hematologic malignancies. Relapsed or refractory MM has a poor prsognosis. Thalidomide has been reported to be effective for these patients; however, high-dose thalidomide has induced many adverse events, including in the nervous, gastrointestinal, and hematopoietic systems in approximately 20%-50% of patients. Recently, low-dose thalidomide therapy has been used in many countries in order to reduce these adverse events. The objective of this study was to determine whether plasma concentration of thalidomide is related to the efficacy and the development of adverse events in patients with refractory MM treated with low-dose thalidomide plus low-dose dexamethasone. Patients and Methods A total of 66 patients (age range, 40-74 years) presenting with progressive disease after previous treatments were treated with low-dose thalidomide and low-dose dexamethasone. Thalidomide was administered orally at 100 mg/day for the first week. When severe adverse events did not develop, the dose was increased to 200 mg/day in the second week and was continued until progression. Dexamethasone was administered at a dose of 4 mg/day for the first 4 weeks, then decreased by 1 mg every week, and finally maintained at 1 mg/day. Plasma trough concentration of thalidomide 3 days after thalidomide treatment was analyzed by high-performance liquid chromatography in 45 patients (age range, 42-74 years) who agreed to participate in this study of thalidomide concentration analysis. Results The mean concentrations at 100 mg/day and 200 mg/day were 0.343 μg/mL (range, 0.05-1.45 μg/mL) and 0.875 μg/mL (range, 0.19-2.09 μg/mL), respectively. The overall response rate (near-complete response + partial response + minimal response) of this treatment was 73%. Five had stable disease, and 3 patients experienced progressive disease. There was no relationship between the concentration of thalidomide in the plasma and the efficacy ( P > .8). Severe adverse events, including grade > 2 nonhematologic and grade > 3 hematologic adverse events, were observed in 21 patients (46.6%). There was no significant difference in the concentration of thalidomide between the patients with and without severe adverse events ( P > .843). Conclusion The thalidomide concentration in the plasma does not predict treatment efficacy and the development of adverse events.

We report the results of a non-randomized phase II study of low-dose thalidomide plus low-dose dexamethasone therapy in 66 patients with refractory multiple myeloma. The overall response rate (near complete, partial and minimal response) was 63.6%, and progression-free and overall survival periods were 6.2 and 25.4 months. In adverse events, the incidence of peripheral neuropathy and deep vein thrombosis was lower than the data reported in USA and Europe. On the other hand, leukopenia was observed in 41% of patients, including 11% of those with Grade 3. Leukopenia was closely related to pretreatment pancytopenia, especially thrombocytopenia. The incidence of adverse events related to dexamethasone was low. In conclusion, low-dose thalidomide plus low-dose dexamethasone therapy was as effective as high-dose thalidomide plus high-dose dexamethasone therapy in patients with refractory multiple myeloma. Leukopenia is one of the most serious adverse events in Japanese patients, especially in patients with pretreatment pancytopenia.

Thalidomide was used in 73 patients with refractory myeloma in 15 of 45 institutes participating in the Japan Myeloma Study Group. The mean age and male/female ratio were 63.8 years and 0.92 (35/38), respectively. Thirty-four patients (47%) were treated with only thalidomide, 27 patients (37%) were treated with thalidomide and steroids, and 12 (16%) were treated with thalidomide and chemotherapy. The mean initial, maximum, and maintenances dose of thalidomide were 111.0, 204.8, and 163.0 mg/day, respectively. Almost all of the patients were maintained on low-dose thalidomide between 100-200 mg/day. Complete, near complete and partial response was obtained in 31 patients (42.5%). The progression-free and overall survivals after thalidomide therapy were 9.8 and 21.3 months, respectively. The most common adverse effects were gastrointestinal disturbance, peripheral neuropathy, psychological signs, and skin eruption. In contrast to reports from Europe and America, no deep vein thrombosis was observed in this study. On the other hand, leukopenia was relatively frequently observed, and might be recognized as a serious adverse effect in myeloma patients. In conclusion, low-dose thalidomide is a useful and safe tool for the treatment of refractory myeloma.

To prevent weather disaster caused by a downpour and a heavy snowfall, there is growing to need for spatial and automatic improving observation systems in weather conditions. The atmospheric boundary layer radar (BLR) [H. Hashiguchi et al, 1995] is one of wind profiling radars that measure wind directions and velocities from the Doppler shifts of weak reflections (clear-air echoes) along a beam direction. They are widely noticed as ones of meteorological observation instruments. For a parabolic antenna applied as a conventional BLR, there are the following difficulties: First, the beam is fixed, therefore the data acquisition is limited. Second, the antenna is not easy to carry and set up within limited space. In order to relax these issues, we have developed 1.3 GHz active phased array antennas (APAAs) which can achieve electronically beam scanning and easily carriage. These antennas are currently set up at 25 spots in Japan and have been in operation for weather forecast by Japan Meteorological Agency since April 2001 (see Fig. 1). This paper mainly presents the phased array antenna, where electromagnetically coupled coaxial dipole (ECCD) array antennas mounted over a ground plane [H. Miyashita et al., 1999 ]-[Q. Rao et al.] are adapted as radiating elements, for ground based wind profiling in the vicinity of boundary layer and an outline of the BLR system.

Objective The aim of this study was to evaluate the safety and efficacy of allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation with a reduced-intensity conditioning regimen (RIST) for interferon-α–refractory metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC). Patients and methods Of 26 patients referred to the National Cancer Center Hospital for possible RIST between June 2000 and April 2002, an HLA-identical relative was identified for 12 patients. Nine patients underwent RIST. The conditioning regimen consisted of fludarabine 180 mg/m 2 or cladribine 0.66 mg/kg, plus busulfan 8 mg/kg and rabbit antithymocyte globulin 5 mg/kg. Graft-vs-host disease (GVHD) prophylaxis was cyclosporine alone. Results All patients achieved engraftment without grade III to IV nonhematologic regimen-related toxicity. All patients achieved complete donor-type chimerism without donor lymphocyte infusion by day 60. Four patients developed acute GVHD, and four developed chronic GVHD. One patient (11%) achieved partial response. As of July 2003, six patients were alive at median follow-up of 681 days. The actuarial overall survival rate was 89% at 1 year and 74% at 2 years. The overall survival rate tended to be higher in the 12 patients with a matched donor than in the other 14 patients without a matched donor ( p =0.088). Conclusion Our RIST procedure is feasible without severe toxicity. The efficacy of RIST for RCC should be confirmed in phase II/III clinical trials.

The authors have previously (Wakayama et al., 1992) developed an algorithm for radar image reconstruction which can be applied to an arbitrarily arranged antenna array. The algorithm is based on a model fitting by nonlinear least-squares. In the present paper, this algorithm is extended to treat a case where the medium has simple inhomogeneity. Reconstruction is executed on the assumption that targets consist of discrete point scatterers embedded in a medium composed of two layers with different permittivity. The algorithm of the model fitting including the initial guess for the fitting is described. Nonlinear least-squares fits the theoretical waveform calculated by the FDTD method to the observed waveform, and determines the parameters of the targets and the medium. The proposed algorithm estimates the position of targets more accurately than the conventional algorithm which assumes homogeneity of the medium. >

In subsurface radar applications, it is often experienced that the requirements for the resolution and the penetration depth contradict each other. For example, pre-excavation survey of archaeological sites may require one to detect buried objects of the order of 10 cm at a depth of 1 m. In such a case, the compromise will be the use of around 500 MHz, for which the target is on the order of a radar wavelength. We refer to the target in such a situation as a 'small object'. It is thus hard to identify the shape of the object with conventional signal processing such as the synthetic aperture method. Our objective is to develop a robust high-resolution imaging algorithm applicable to targets whose dimension is close to the radar wavelength. In order to avoid instabilities in super-resolution techniques, we limit the freedom in the estimation by properly modeling the target as well as the parameters of the medium.

The authors have been studying radar image reconstruction based on the discrete model fitting method to realize high performance subsurface sensing for various applications, such as detection of buried pipes and archeological research. This method assumes that targets consist of point scatterers, and a model fitting with nonlinear least-squares reconstructs the high-resolution image of the targets and layers. Moreover, this algorithm can be applied to an arbitrarily arranged array and reconstructs a much sharper image than the conventional aperture synthesis even if the size of the array aperture is restricted. In the present paper, the authors extend the discrete model fitting method so that it can handle the problem of an image reconstruction of point targets embedded in a layered inhomogeneous medium.

Acute GVHD is one of the most serious complications and the main cause of morbidity and mortality for patients undergoing allogeneic bone marrow transplantation (BMT). So choice of GVHD prophylaxis has great impact on transplant outcome. We performed large-scale retrospective study for acute GVHD by using the data on patients who underwent BMT from unrelated donors (UR-BMT) facilitated by Japan Marrow Donor Program (JMDP). From January 1993 to September 2004, 4,999 patients were registered in the JMDP. The study population consisted of 3,410 out of 4,999 patients who received UR-BMT from HLA A,B,DR genotyping matched or HLA DR DNA allele mismatched donors(2,626 and 784, respectively). We evaluated the effect of age, HLA compatibility, disease status, GVHD prophylaxis (Cyclosporine:CsA+Methotrexate:MTX or Tacrolimus:FK+MTX), severity of acute GVHD and other factors. The Kaplan-Meier estimates of over all survival(OS) were higher for the FK group than for the CsA group in the case of HLA A,B,DR genotyping matched BMT with 5-year survival rates of 54 and 51.4% (P

Background: Thalidomide is effective for treating refractory multiple myeloma; however, it induces many adverse events, including peripheral neuropathy, deep vein thrombosis, constipation, and neuropsychological symptoms. Hematological adverse events have rarely been reported in the United States and Europe. Some Japanese cases have been reported to reveal leucopenia during thalidomide therapy. We report here severe leucopenia, which has been observed in the JMSG phase II study “Low-dose thalidomide plus low-dose dexamethasone therapy for refractory myeloma”, and analyze the factors related to leucopenia. Patients and Methods: Patients with refractory myeloma were eligible. Thalidomide at 100 mg/day was administered on Days 1–7 and increased to 200 mg/day without severe adverse events, and continued until disease progression. Dexamethasone at 4 mg/day was administered on Days 1–28, decreased to 1 mg/day, and maintained at 1 mg/day. The response was assessed by the finding of a decline in paraprotein in serum or urine on two occasions at least 4 weeks apart. Results: Sixty-six patients (male/female ratio: 0.7; median age, 64.5 years; range, 40–74 years) were enrolled in the study. The myeloma subtypes were 48 IgG, 6 IgA, 1 IgD, and 11 light chain only. Forty-nine patients were refractory for conventional chemotherapy and 17 patients had relapsed disease after autologous stem cell transplantation. Responses were observed in 30 patients (4 near complete response, 9 partial response, and 17 minimal response) (45.5%). Median progression-free and overall survivals were 6.2 months and 23.3 months. The incidence rates of grade 2 or higher events were: peripheral neuropathy, 7.5%; hyperglycemia, 1.5%; skin rash, 4.5%; constipation, 4.5%; and deep vein thrombosis, 4.8%. Grade 1–2 incidence of leukopenia was 41% and of thrombocytopenia was 27%; Grade 3 or higher leucopenia was observed in 12%. One patient died from sepsis caused by severe leucopenia. Thalidomide-induced leucopenia was closely related to pre-treatment white blood cell count (p Conclusion: Low-dose thalidomide plus low-dose dexamethasone therapy was as effective as low-dose thalidomide plus high-dose dexamethasone therapy in patients with refractory multiple myeloma. The incidence of adverse events including deep vein thrombosis and hyperglycemia was lower than the data reported in the United States and Europe. However, leukopenia is one of the most serious adverse events in Japanese patients, especially in patients with low pretreatment white blood cell and platelet counts.