Case report of a child who may have developed anaphylaxis after ingesting raw horse meat by cross-reactivity of horse and cat pelt.

Pork-cat syndrome can occur in children younger than 10 years. A history of contact with animals since infancy and history of severe atopic dermatitis, which can promote epicutaneous sensitization to animal serum albumin, may be helpful in diagnosis.

Vaccine-induced anaphylaxis in a child with cow's milk allergy: Lactose hydrate was the culprit.

Lactose hydrate was the cause of vaccine-induced anaphylaxis in a child with severe milk allergy. Although the amount of milk protein in lactose-containing vaccines is extremely small, physicians administering such a vaccine must be prepared for the potential risk of severe milk allergy.

[Influence of Bases for External Medicines with Different Coatability and Water Retentivity on Wound Healing].

When selecting external medicines for the treatment of skin diseases, it is thought to be very important to consider differences in characteristics of their bases, because the bases may influence the clinical efficacy of the medicines. In this study, we investigated whether the differences in characteristics of three kinds of bases, white petrolatum, macrogol ointment, and aqueous gel affect wound healing. In vitro moisture permeability tests demonstrated that these bases have different characteristics in coatability and water retentivity, with the rank order of the intensity of coatability as white petrolatum>macrogol ointment>aqueous gel, and that of water retentivity as macrogol ointment>white petrolatum>aqueous gel. Similar rank order of these bases was observed for transepidermal water loss and stratum corneum water content in the dry skin on the abdomen of guinea pigs induced by topical application of acetone/ether mixture, followed by water. In addition, we found that treatment with macrogol ointment, but not white petrolatum or aqueous gel, significantly accelerated wound healing in rat skin, and that the contents of basic fibroblast growth factor and epidermal growth factor in the skin treated with macrogol ointment were significantly higher compared with non-treated skin. In conclusion, these results imply an important role of the bases of external medicines in the treatment of skin diseases.

Dynamic clustering of dynamin-amphiphysin helices regulates membrane constriction and fission coupled with GTP hydrolysis.

Dynamin is a mechanochemical GTPase essential for membrane fission during clathrin-mediated endocytosis. Dynamin forms helical complexes at the neck of clathrin-coated pits and their structural changes coupled with GTP hydrolysis drive membrane fission. Dynamin and its binding protein amphiphysin cooperatively regulate membrane remodeling during the fission, but its precise mechanism remains elusive. In this study, we analyzed structural changes of dynamin-amphiphysin complexes during the membrane fission using electron microscopy (EM) and high-speed atomic force microscopy (HS-AFM). Interestingly, HS-AFM analyses show that the dynamin-amphiphysin helices are rearranged to form clusters upon GTP hydrolysis and membrane constriction occurs at protein-uncoated regions flanking the clusters. We also show a novel function of amphiphysin in size control of the clusters to enhance biogenesis of endocytic vesicles. Our approaches using combination of EM and HS-AFM clearly demonstrate new mechanistic insights into the dynamics of dynamin-amphiphysin complexes during membrane fission.

[A CASE OF HYPERSENSITIVITY REACTION TO ENOKITAKE (FLAMMULINA VELUTIPES) INGESTION].

We experienced a case of 10-year-old girl who developed hypersensitivity reactions after eating enokitake. The patient had food allergy to egg until 5 years old. When she was 4 years old, she ate enokitake with a hot-pot dish. Later, she felt itching in her mouth. Therefore, she never ate enokitake since that time. At the age of 10, she drank only the soup of enokitake with school lunch. After that she felt discomfort and itching in her oral cavity. The result of enokitake and other mushrooms (siitake, simeji, and eringi) skin prick to prick test were all positive. We performed Western blotting with enokitake extracts and the patient's serum. Enokitake protein's band (75kDa) reacted specifically with the patient's IgE. At the same time Western blotting was performed with the patient's serum of previously reported enokitake anaphylaxis, but a 75kDa band showing specific reaction in this case was not observed. This band we identified was a novel enokitake allergen.

A zebrafish chemical suppressor screening identifies small molecule inhibitors of the Wnt/ß-catenin pathway.

Genetic screening for suppressor mutants has been successfully used to identify important signaling regulators. Using an analogy to genetic suppressor screening, we developed a chemical suppressor screening method to identify inhibitors of the Wnt/ß-catenin signaling pathway. We used zebrafish embryos in which chemically induced ß-catenin accumulation led to an "eyeless" phenotype and conducted a pilot screening for compounds that restored eye development. This approach allowed us to identify geranylgeranyltransferase inhibitor 286 (GGTI-286), a geranylgeranyltransferase (GGTase) inhibitor. Our follow-up studies showed that GGTI-286 reduces nuclear localization of ß-catenin and transcription dependent on ß-catenin/T cell factor in mammalian cells. In addition to pharmacological inhibition, GGTase gene knockdown also attenuates the nuclear function of ß-catenin. Overall, we validate our chemical suppressor screening as a method for identifying Wnt/ß-catenin pathway inhibitors and implicate GGTase as a potential therapeutic target for Wnt-activated cancers.