Ocular herpes simplex virus (HSV) infection remains a major cause of corneal blindness. Several topical and oral antiviral medications have been used to treat herpetic keratitis. Advances in topical ophthalmic antivirals have been made over the past several decades. The first antivirals that were discovered were cytotoxic, while the antivirals developed more recently, such as acyclovir and ganc...

A major obstacle to the successful application of suicide gene therapy strategies that rely on in situ transduction of tumor cells is the poor distribution of the vector throughout the tumor mass. To address this problem, we evaluated the use of Ad.TK(RC), an E1b Mr 55,000 deleted replicating adenoviral vector engineered to express the herpes simplex virus type 1 thymidine kinase gene (HSV-tk) ...

BACKGROUND Gastric emptying in the first 2 h after 7 ml kg(-1) of sugared clear fluid has recently been investigated in healthy children using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). This study aims to compare gastric volume and emptying half-life during 1 h after 3 or 7 ml kg(-1) sugared clear fluid intake. METHODS Fourteen healthy volunteer children aged 11.1 (8.2-12.5) yr were investigated prosp...

Renal excretion is an important elimination pathway for antiviral agents, such as acyclovir (ACV), ganciclovir (GCV), and zidovudine (AZT). The purpose of this study was to elucidate the molecular mechanisms of renal ACV, GCV, and AZT transport using cells stably expressing human organic anion transporter 1 (hOAT1), hOAT2, hOAT3, and hOAT4, and human organic cation transporter 1 (hOCT1) and hOC...

We previously reported that among a series of artemisinin-derived monomers and dimers, dimer diphenyl phosphate (838) was the most potent inhibitor of human cytomegalovirus (CMV) replication. Our continued investigation of a prototypic artemisinin monomer (artesunate [AS]) and dimer (838) now reveals that both compounds have specific activity against CMV but do not inhibit lytic replication of ...

We evaluated the efficacy, toxicity, and outcome of preemptive ganciclovir (GCV) therapy in 80 cytomegalovirus (CMV)-seropositive patients allografted between 1991 and 1996 and compared their outcome to 35 seronegative patients allografted during the same period. Both cohorts were comparable with respect to diagnosis and distribution of high- versus standard-risk patients. All patients received...

Donor T cells play a pivotal role in facilitating alloengraftment but also cause graft-versus-host disease (GVHD). Ex vivo T-cell depletion (TCD) of donor marrow is the most effective strategy for reducing GVHD but can compromise engraftment. This study examined an approach whereby donor T cells are selectively eliminated in vivo after transplantation using transgenic mice in which a thymidine ...

OBJECTIVES Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infections in liver transplant recipients are common and result in significant morbidity and mortality. Intravenous ganciclovir or oral valganciclovir are the standard treatment for CMV infection. The present study investigates the efficacy of oral valganciclovir in CMV infection as a preemptive treatment after liver transplantation. METHODS Between 2012 and 2...

BACKGROUND Preemptive therapy with ganciclovir (GCV) based on the results of a cytomegalovirus (CMV) antigenemia assay is a standard strategy for preventing CMV disease after allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT). However, the appropriate threshold of antigenemia-positive cells for deciding when to start GCV remains unclear. PATIENTS This retrospective study included 80 recipien...

Previous studies demonstrated that herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase (HSVtk) could phosphorylate non‑toxic gancyclovir (GCV) efficiently to produce phosphorylated products that result in cell apoptosis, to kill tumor cells. The present study aimed to construct a plasmid vector, pcDNA3.1‑pAFP‑TK, carrying the suicide gene driven by the alpha‑fetoprotein (AFP) promoter, to investigate the cyt...