Aster species (Asteraceae) are widely distributed edible and medicinal plants, known to contain various specialized metabolites including polyphenols and saponins. However, systemic analysis on the chemical profiles of these plants have rarely been made. Here we analyzed the phytochemical constituents in leaves of 6 Aster species occurring in Korea, A. ageratoides, A. altaicus var. uchiyamae, A. glehnii, A. hispidus, A. incisus, and A. yomena, by applying a LC–MS/MS-based untargeted metabolomics approach. The analysis revealed that A. ageratoides, A. hispidus, and A. yomena are relatively rich in saponins most of which are expected to be previously unknown.

Nonconvulsive status epilepticus (NCSE) of frontal origin is rare. The symptoms are unusual and different from that of temporal origin which makes it difficult to be diagnosed. We report two cases with NCSE of frontal origin. The first case was a 17-year-old girl who presented indifference and reduced word fluency, responsiveness, and facial expres-sion daylong with intermittent unresponsiveness and slight rightward eye and head deviations. Confusion was not noted. Electroencephalogram (EEG) showed the recurrent 2 Hz spike-wave ictal discharges on the left frontal area, sometimes spreading to the opposite side. The second case was a 57-year-old woman who had a medically intractable epilepsy. During long-term Video/EEG monitoring, the continuous 2 Hz spike-and-wave complexes were noted on the right hemisphere and the left frontal area. At that time, neurological examination including cognitive functions was normal except for a mild jaw tremor. No confusion was noted. However, she looked depressed, inactive, and affectively indifferent. Intravenous lorazepam injection abolished status EEG activities as well as clinical symptoms. Ictal single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) showed an increased perfusion in the right frontal lobe. Cortical dysplasia was pathologically diagnosed after a right frontal lobectomy.
Adolescent ; Electroencephalography ; Epilepsy ; Female ; Frontal Lobe ; Head ; Humans ; Jaw ; Lorazepam ; Malformations of Cortical Development ; Middle Aged ; Neurologic Examination ; Perfusion ; Status Epilepticus* ; Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon ; Tremor

Psychosis is the most severe psychiatric complication of epilepsy surgery, We report two cases of newly-developed psychosis after temporal lobectomy, First case is a 46-year-old man with mesial temporal lobe epilepsy who presented recurrent postictal psychosis 1 year after right temporal lobectomy. Second case is a 44-years-old woman who presented chronic psychosis 6 month after left temporal lobectomy. Main psychotic symptoms were paranoid persecutory delusion. The common features in both cases were middle age, ling duration of epilepsy, and bilateral independent spike on preoperative EEG. Even if postoperative psychosis is rare, careful observation is needed because temporal lobectomy is an ever-increasing treatment.
Delusions ; Electroencephalography ; Epilepsy ; Epilepsy, Temporal Lobe ; Female ; Humans ; Middle Aged ; Psychotic Disorders*

Betulinic acid, a pentacyclic triterpene isolated from Jujube tree (Zizyphus jujuba Mill), has been known for a wide range of biological and medicinal properties such as antibacterial, antimalarial, anti-inflammatory, antihelmintic, antinociceptive, and anticancer activities. In the study, we investigated the antiviral activity on influenza A/PR/8 virus infected A549 human lung adenocarcinoma epithelial cell line and C57BL/6 mice. Betulinic acid showed the anti-influenza viral activity at a concentration of 50 muM without a significant cytotoxicity in influenza A/PR/8 virus infected A549 cells. Also, betulinic acid significantly attenuated pulmonary pathology including increased necrosis, numbers of inflammatory cells and pulmonary edema induced by influenza A/PR/8 virus infection compared with vehicle- or oseltamivir-treated mice in vivo model. The down-regulation of IFN-gamma level, which is critical for innate and adaptive immunity in viral infection, after treating of betulinic acid in mouse lung. Based on the obtained results, it is suggested that betulinic acid can be the potential therapeutic agent for virus infection via anti-inflammatory activity.
Adaptive Immunity ; Adenocarcinoma ; Animals ; Down-Regulation ; Epithelial Cells ; Humans ; Inflammation ; Influenza, Human* ; Lung ; Mice ; Necrosis ; Pathology ; Pulmonary Edema ; Trees ; Ziziphus*

Rapid geographical classification of Bupleuri Radix is important in quality control. In this study, near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) combined with supervised pattern recognition was attempted to classify Bupleuri Radix according to geographical origins. Three supervised pattern recognitions methods, partial least square discriminant analysis (PLS-DA), quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA) and radial basis function support vector machine (RBF-SVM), were performed to establish the classification models. The QDA and RBF-SVM models were performed based on principal component analysis (PCA). The number of principal components (PCs) was optimized by cross-validation in the model. The results showed that the performance of the QDA model is the optimum among the three models. The optimized QDA model was obtained when 7 PCs were used; the classification rates of the QDA model in the training and test sets are 97.8% and 95.2% respectively. The overall results showed that NIRS combined with supervised pattern recognition could be applied to classify Bupleuri Radix according to geographical origin.
Classification ; Principal Component Analysis ; Quality Control ; Spectrum Analysis ; Support Vector Machine

Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) cytology is an effective tool for evaluating diseases involving the central nervous system, but his technique is usually limited by its low cellularity and poor cellular preservation. Here we compared the manual liquid-base Liqui-PREPTM (LP) to the cytospin (CS) with using a mononuclear cell suspension and we applied both methods to the CSFs of pediatric leukemia patients. The cytopresevability, in terms of cell yield and cell size, and the clinical efficacy were evaluated. When 2000 and 4000 mononuclear cells were applied, LP was superior to CS for the cell yield, 16.8% vs 1.7% (P=0.001) and 26.2% vs 3.5% (P=0.002), respectively. The mean size of the smeared cells was 10.60 micrometer in the CS, 5.01 micrometer in the LP and 6.50 micrometer in the direct smear (DS), and the size ratio was 1.7 (CS to DS), 0.8(LP to DS) and 2.1 (CS to LP), respectively. As compared to the cells in the DS, the cells in the CS were significantly enlarged, but those in the LP were slightly shrunken. Upon application to 109 CSF samples, 4 were diagnosed as positive for leukemia (positive), 4 had atypical cells and 101 were negative by CS; 6 were positive, one had atypical cells and 102 were negative by LP. For six cases, in which 4 were positive for leukemia and 2 of 4 had atypical cells by CS, they were positive by LP and they were also confirmed as positive according to the follow-up study. Three cases diagnosed as atypical cells (two by CS and one by LP), were confirmed as negative. In conclusion, these results suggest that LP is superior to CS for the cytopresevability and for rendering a definite diagnosis of cerebrospinal fluid.
Cell Size ; Central Nervous System ; Cerebrospinal Fluid* ; Diagnosis ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Leukemia

Fetal intussusception is not common and the underlying mechanism triggering the event is not known at present. There are few reports of successful diagnosis in fetus with prenatal ultrasongraphy. It may be detected by meconium peritonitis. Meconium peritonitis is a nonbacterial foreign body reaction or chemical inflammation by intestinal perforation result from intestianl atresia, intussusception and fetal bowel obstruction. Recently we experienced a 33+1 weeks of gestational fetus with fetal intussusception who had prenatal ultrasonographic detection with meconium peritonitis, and the infant was underwent postnatal laparotomy. We present this case with a brief review of literature.
Diagnosis ; Fetus ; Foreign-Body Reaction ; Humans ; Infant ; Inflammation ; Intestinal Perforation ; Intussusception* ; Laparotomy ; Meconium ; Peritonitis ; Prenatal Diagnosis*

BACKGROUND: Endobronchial ultrasound-guided transbronchial needle aspiration (EBUS-TBNA) is a standard procedure to evaluate suspicious lymph node involvement of lung cancer because computed tomography (CT) and 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography-CT (PET-CT) have limitations in their sensitivity and specificity. There are a number of benign causes of false positive lymph node such as anthracosis or anthracofibrosis, pneumoconiosis, old or active tuberculosis, interstitial lung disease, and other infectious conditions including pneumonia. The purpose of this study was to evaluate possible causes of false positive lymph node detected in chest CT or PET-CT. METHODS: Two hundred forty-seven patients who were initially diagnosed with lung cancer between May 2009 and December 2012, and underwent EBUS-TBNA to confirm suspicious lymph node involvement by chest CT or PET-CT were analyzed for the study. RESULTS: Of 247 cases, EBUS-TBNA confirmed malignancy in at least one lymph node in 189. The remaining 58 patients whose EBUS-TBNA results were negative were analyzed. Age ≥65, squamous cell carcinoma as the histologic type, and pneumoconiosis were related with false-positive lymph node involvement on imaging studies such as chest CT and PET-CT. CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that lung cancer staging should be done more carefully when a patient has clinically benign lymph node characteristics including older age, squamous cell carcinoma, and benign lung conditions.
Anthracosis ; Carcinoma, Squamous Cell ; Electrons ; Humans ; Lung Diseases, Interstitial ; Lung Neoplasms* ; Lung* ; Lymph Nodes* ; Needles* ; Pneumoconiosis ; Pneumonia ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Thorax* ; Tomography, X-Ray Computed* ; Tuberculosis