The special issue "Symbiotic Nitrogen Fixation in Legume Nodules: Metabolism and Regulatory Mechanisms" aims to investigate the physiological and biochemical advances in the symbiotic process with an emphasis on nodule establishment, development and functioning. The original research articles included in this issue provide important information regarding novel aspects of nodule metabolism and v...

Recent pathological studies suggest that rheumatoid arthritis may be a disease with widespread involvement of tissues other than the joints. Curtis and Pollard (1940) were the first to describe a nonarticular histological lesion which was common to all cases of rheumatoid arthritis-their cases including four with Felty's syndrome. In every one of 11 cases these authors found small perivascular ...

A 71-year-old woman with active rheumatoid arthritis (RA) was referred to our department because of multiple intracranial nodules. On admission, the RA disease activity was very high even after the treatment of methotrexate in other hospital. She underwent open biopsy to confirm a histopathological diagnosis of the intracranial lesions. Surgical specimen mainly consisted of necrosis surrounded ...

Holthouse (1893) presented an unusual case of ulceration of the conjunctiva and sclera in a patient who also suffered from rheumatoid arthritis and described the typical histology of the condition. Nevertheless, van der Hoeve (1934), in the first description of scleromalacia perforans, which occurred in three cases in association with a polyarthritis, regarded the condition as a primary degener...

Specific lung changes occur in association with rheumatoid arthritis but rheumatoid lung nodules unassociated with pneumoconiosis are rare and there are very few reports of cavitation occurring in such nodules (Sieniewicz, Martin, Moore, and Miller, 1962; Noonan, Taylor, and Engleman, 1963; Dumas, Gregory, and Ozer, 1963; Locke, 1963; Yates, 1963). This paper describes another patient in whom r...

BACKGROUND Phanerochaete sordida is a species of wood rotting fungus, which can degrade lignin, cellulose and hemicellulose contained in wood and other hard-to-biodegrade organic substances. However, to date, there have been no other reports demonstrating that P. sordida can infect humans. CASE PRESENTATION A 66-year-old Japanese man presented for a mass increasing in size on his left thigh. ...

Since the original observations of Meynet (1) and Barlow and Warner (2) on the occurrence of subcutaneous nodules in rheumatic fever, numerous studies on these lesions have appeared. I t is now well recognized that subcutaneous nodules are a frequent manifestation of the disease rheumatic fever and that these lesions present a highly characteristic histological structure. Occasional reference (...

The foregoing comparative study on the subcutaneous nodules in rheumatic fever and rheumatoid arthritis is presented as part of an investigation which has been conducted in this clinic on the relationship of the two clinical entities, rheumatic fever and rheumatoid arthritis. It is believed that the present study has shown that these lesions are highly characteristic of the two diseases and tha...

In the course of 6 years a group of patients was isolated who were characterized by a curious discrepancy. On the one hand they showed a robust personality and a practically infinite capacity for work, but on the other hand they presented two unfavourable features, viz. substantial subcutaneous nodules (often the reason for referral) and a high titre in the Rose test. This type of reaction to r...