In parentage testing DNA profiles are used to link the alleged father with paternity by matching their patterns. The probative value of a match is often calculated by multiplying together the estimated frequencies with which each particular VNTR or STR pattern occurs in a reference population. When this calculating method applies to the motherless case of paternity disputes, a calculation must usually be based on types determined for the child and the alleged father. In such case, the first consideration is to exclude a man from paternity of a child when the man did not have the child's paternal allele at some loci, or if the paternal allele cannot be determined, when the man had neither of the child s alleles. The second is to evaluate the DNA evidence when a man is not excluded by the paternal allele. This work is to provide theories of paternity analysis with three approach methods for the motherless case, and to evaluate their efficiency compared to the trio case when the man tested is not excluded. Consequently, the motherless case offers lower probability exclusion and questionable cumulative paternity index than those of the trio case as being typed with 14 STR loci(CSF1PO, TH01, TPDX, vWA, D5S818, D13S317, D7S820, D16S539, FGA, D21S11, FES/FPS, F13A1, D18S80, D17S5). Since the motherless case in paternity disputes is less efficient for paternity exclusion of the child, the use of genetic maker systems with the higher value of mean exclusion chance(MEC) and exact levels of the relative probability of paternity must be of importance considered in the analysis of such deficiency cases.
Alleles ; Child ; Dissent and Disputes ; DNA ; Fathers ; Humans ; Paternity*

When we intend to do the personal identification using DNA profiles, it will obviously be better to use as much information as possible. The power of identification is increased by using the genetic marker system such as VNTRs or STRs. Although STRs do not have many alleles per locus as VNTRs, these can be compensated by a large number of loci that are potentially usable. However, it will be more efficient to use a morphic loci. Therefore, prior to choose the genetic marker system of STRs for identification, it is essential to consider the statistical parameters of each STR locus, such as obs-H(observed heterozygosity), exp-H(expected heterozygosity), pM(probability of match), DI(discrimination index), PD(power of discrimination), MEC(mean exclusion chance), MEP(mean exclusion paternity), PIC(polymorphic information content) et al. In this article, we described the exact meaning of statistical parameters for the purpose of identification.
Alleles ; DNA ; Genetic Markers ; Humans

DNA analysis has become one of the most powerful tools in forensic inference for human identification and is now used worldwide. It is used to be statistical technique for the individual identification of a civil and criminal action. The purpose of this article is computerization of the statistical technique for the population study and DNA evidence analysis. The system using SAS/AF and SAS/SCL is the graphic user interface and the correspondence of the changed experimental circumstances.
Criminals ; DNA* ; Forensic Anthropology ; Humans

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Arterial stiffness and wave reflections increase with advancing age, and the systolic and pulse pressures are elevated. These changes in aortic stiffness and pulse wave velocity with aging may change the cardiac function. The diastolic function of the left ventricle declines with aging even in normal healthy subjects too. This investigation was designed to assess the correlations between the left ventricular diastolic function and arterial stiffness with using echocardiography including doppler tissue imaging (DTI) and an applanation tonometer. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: The subjects were 100 healthy volunteers who had normal left ventricular systolic function and no major cardiovascular risk factors such as hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, diabetes, obesity and smoking. The left ventricular diastolic function was assessed with the mitral inflow indexes and DTI, and the pulmonary venous return was measured by echocardiography. The central aorta blood pressure, the augmentation index (AIx) and the pulse wave velocity (PWV) were evaluated by using an applanation tonometer (SphygmoCoR system). RESULTS: With advancing age, the left mitral E/A ratio decreased (r=-.738, p<0.05) and the DTI early/late diastolic velocity (E'/A') ratio decreased (r=-.759, p<0.05), which showed a significant change of the left ventricular diastolic function. The Aix (r=.406, p<0.05) and PWV (r=.614, p<0.05) increased with aging. The PWV correlated significantly with the E/A ratio (r=-.593, p<0.05) and the E'/A' ratio (r=-.559, p<0.05). CONCLUSION: This study showed that increases of the large conduit vessel stiffness with aging are associated with a decline of the left ventricular diastolic function in healthy subjects.
Aging ; Aorta ; Atherosclerosis ; Blood Flow Velocity ; Blood Pressure ; Diastole ; Echocardiography ; Healthy Volunteers ; Heart Ventricles ; Humans ; Hypercholesterolemia ; Hypertension ; Obesity ; Pulse Wave Analysis ; Risk Factors ; Smoke ; Smoking ; Vascular Stiffness*

PURPOSE: Estrogen receptor (ER) is the key therapeutic target in breast cancer. ERbeta has recently been identified to be distinct from ERalpha. In contrast to ERalpha, the functions of ERbeta in breast cancer are still unclear. We sought to determine whether the expression of ERbeta can be used as a predictive marker for endocrine therapy for patients with ERalpha-negative breast cancer. METHODS: Formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tumor specimens from 52 patients with ER-/PR+ invasive breast cancer were immunostained for their ERbeta expression. These patients were treated with adjuvant tamoxifen. The results were correlated with various clinicopathological variables and the follow-up data. The expressions of p53 and HER-2/neu were also analyzed and correlated with the ERbeta status. RESULTS: An ERbeta expression was observed in 53.8% (28/52) of the breast cancer samples. There was no correlation between the ERbeta expression and the other clinicopathologic factors (age, tumor size, histologic type, nodal status, histological grade, stage, therapeutic modality, progesterone receptor (PR) expression, p53 expression and HER-2/neu expression). Recurrence was present in 7.7% (2/26) of the patients whose tumors had an ERbeta expression, as compared to the presence of recurrence in 36.4% (8/22) of the patients whose tumors had no ERbeta expression (p<0.05). The patients with ERbeta negative-tumors revealed lower disease free survival rate than those with ERbeta positive-tumors (p<0.05). Of the 52 patients, 10 (19.2%) were p53 positive, and 11 (21.2%) were HER-2/neu positive. No significant correlations were observed between ERbeta and p53 or HER-2/neu. CONCLUSION: These results suggest that ERbeta might be a predictive marker of a response to endocrine therapy in patients with ER-/PR+ invasive breast cancer, although this needs to be confirmed by additional studies.
Breast ; Breast Neoplasms ; Disease-Free Survival ; Estrogen Receptor alpha ; Estrogen Receptor beta ; Estrogens ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Progesterone ; Receptors, Progesterone ; Recurrence ; Tamoxifen

PURPOSE: This study was performed to evaluate the feasibility of the Gamma Knife Surgery on the symptomatic control of brain metastasis from breast carcinoma. METHODS: We retrospectively reviewed patients with brain metastases from breast cancer who underwent Gamma Knife Surgery at our hospital, between May 2004 and November 2007. Total 82 metastases were treated with 26 cycles of Leksell gamma knife. Freedom from local recurrence and survival time were analyzed by the Kaplan-Meier method. RESULTS: 17 patients with 82 metastases were treated over 26 Gamma Knife Surgery sessions. The mean time to brain metastases was 41.7 months (8~84), median number was 2.0 (1~10), and median volume was 7.4 cm3 (0.6~25.4). Radiologic response occurred in 84.6%, and the rate of symptom relief was 73.1%. Local brain tumor recurrences were observed in 15.3% and intracranial distant recurrence occurred in 57.7% that occurred within 3.2 months. The median length of survival for all patients was 9.3 months (95% confidence interval, 4.23~9.37 months). CONCLUSION: Gamma Knife Surgery is an effective and feasible treatment for symptomatic control of brain metastases from breast cancer patients who have severe extracranial metastases and short life expectancy.
Brain ; Brain Neoplasms ; Breast ; Breast Neoplasms ; Freedom ; Humans ; Life Expectancy ; Neoplasm Metastasis ; Recurrence ; Retrospective Studies

Epidural anesthesia is a technique of regional anesthesia in which the spinal nerves are blocked as they pass through the epidural space. The current study was conducted to determine the extent of contamination of epidural catheters and to attempt to idntify the factors contributing to contamination. The catheters removed from fifty patients were studied, two cultures were taken from each catheter and the following results were obtained. 1) Catheter tips(20%) in ten cultures and portions of the catheter located in the subcutaneous tissue in nine cultures(18%) were found to be contaminated. 2) Staphylococcus epidermidis was found in eight patients, and staphylococcus aureus and xanthomonas maltophilia were found in two patients each other. 3) In the contaminated populations, no significant difference between the growth rate of organisms and the factors in relation to the duration of catheter implantation, age of the patients and the site of catheter inserition was found.
Analgesia, Epidural* ; Anesthesia, Conduction ; Anesthesia, Epidural ; Catheters* ; Epidural Space ; Humans ; Spinal Nerves ; Staphylococcus aureus ; Staphylococcus epidermidis ; Stenotrophomonas maltophilia ; Subcutaneous Tissue

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Hypoxia-inducible factor-1alpha (HIF-1alpha) is a central transcriptional factor involved in the cellular responses related to various aspects of cancer biology, including proliferation, survival, and angiogenesis, and the metabolism of the extracellular matrix in hypoxia. This study evaluated whether adenovirus-mediated small hairpin RNA (shRNA) against HIF-1alpha (shHIF-1alpha) inhibits cell proliferation and angiogenesis in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) cell lines. METHODS: Knockdown of HIF-1alpha expression was constructed by adenovirus-mediated RNA interference tools, and HCC cell lines infected with shHIF-1alpha coding virus were cultured under a hypoxia condition (1% O2) for 24 hours. Following infection, the expression levels of HIF-1alpha, angiogenesis factors, and matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) were examined using Western blotting. Cell proliferation and angiogenesis were measured by a cell proliferation assay (MTT assay) and an angiogenesis-related assay (invasion and tube-formation assay), respectively. RESULTS: Adenovirus mediated inhibition of HIF-1alpha induced suppression of tumor growth in HCC cell lines. It also down-regulated the expression of angiogenesis factor and MMP proteins. Angiogenesis as well as mobility of vascular cells to tumor was suppressed by adenovirus-mediated shHIF-1alpha-infected groups in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). CONCLUSIONS: These data suggest that adenovirus-mediated inhibition of HIF-1alpha inhibits the invasion, tube formation, and cell growth in HUVECs and HCC cells.
Adenoviridae/genetics ; Carcinoma, Hepatocellular/*blood supply/metabolism/therapy ; Cell Line, Tumor ; Cell Proliferation ; Endothelial Cells/metabolism ; Gene Knockdown Techniques ; Genetic Vectors ; Humans ; Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1, alpha Subunit/*antagonists & ; Liver Neoplasms/*blood supply/metabolism/therapy ; Matrix Metalloproteinases/metabolism ; Neovascularization, Pathologic/genetics/metabolism/*therapy ; RNA Interference ; RNA, Small Interfering/metabolism

PURPOSE: After the first subcutaneous mastectomy with nipple preservation in 1974 at the Nottingham Breast Clinic in United Kingdom, many studies have shown that skin-sparing mastectomy (SSM) with the preservation of the nipple-areola complex (NAC) is an oncologically safe procedure with good cosmetic outcomes in selected mastectomy patients. However, the clinical indications for NAC preservation have not yet been precisely defined. This study was performed to investigate the predictive factors for NAC-based neoplastic involvement to determine the indications for NAC preservation. METHODS: A retrospective study of 198 patients with invasive breast cancer who underwent modified radical mastectomy (MRM) at the Department of Surgery at Chonnam University Hospital from April of 2004 to April of 2006 was performed. Patients with bilateral breast cancer were excluded from the study. The predictive factors analyzed for NAC involvement were the hormone receptor status, tumor size, tumor localization, multiplicity, axillary lymph node status, nuclear grade, tumor-nipple distance (TND), and lymphovascular invasion (LVI). RESULTS: The overall frequency of malignant NAC involvement was 19 out of the 198 patients (9.5%) as determined by definitive histology. Significant differences were found for tumor size (P=0.015), axillary lymph node status (P=0.008), TND (P=0.044), and LVI (P=0.014). There were no significant differences for the hormone receptor status, multiplicity, nuclear grade, and localization. CONCLUSION: Although the sample size in this study was small, the findings suggest that the clinical contraindications for NAC preservation should include tumors >2.4 cm, a positive axillary lymph node status, TND <4 cm, and positive LVI. NAC preservation can be offered in selected patients after preoperative or intraoperative evaluation of the tumor size, axillary node status, TND, and LVI.
Breast ; Breast Neoplasms ; Cosmetics ; Great Britain ; Humans ; Lymph Nodes ; Mastectomy ; Mastectomy, Modified Radical ; Mastectomy, Subcutaneous ; Nipples ; Retrospective Studies ; Sample Size