Porcine periweaning failure to thrive syndrome (PFTS) is a clinical condition characterized by anorexia, lethargy, and progressive debilitation of pigs occurring within 2 to 3 weeks after weaning. In affected populations, there is a striking contrast between the clinically affected pigs, which progress from being normally active to lethargic within days of weaning, and the unaffected members of...

Y. Tanaka and M. Yao (Hokkaido Univ.) Pathogenic bacteria express pore-forming toxins (PFTs) to attack host cells. PFTs are expressed as soluble monomeric proteins, which assemble to prepore oligomer on the target cells. After forming prepore, conformational change occurs, and then the pore is formed. Although the crystal structures of monomer and pore have been determined, the detailed mechani...

Trends in Pulmonary Function Testing Before Noncardiothoracic Surgery Preoperative pulmonary function tests (PFTs) assess the severity of known pulmonary disease, diagnose causes of respiratory symptoms, and may help identify patients who are at risk for postoperative pulmonary complications. While useful in selected patients, unnecessary testing is costly.1 Few guidelines for the appropriate u...

Pore-forming toxins (PFTs) secreted by pathogenic bacteria are the most common bacterial protein toxins and are important virulence factors for infection. PFTs punch holes in host cell plasma membranes, and although cells can counteract the resulting membrane damage, the underlying mechanisms at play remain unclear. Using Caenorhabditis elegans as a model, we demonstrate in vivo and in an intac...

BACKGROUND Pulmonary function tests (PFTs) are used in assessing physiological to clinical status of the respiratory system, which is expressed as a percentage of predicted values. Predicted PFTs values are varies in different ethnics. Predicted PFTs values were studied in a sample of Iranian children. MATERIALS AND METHODS Prediction equations for PFTs were derived from urban children in the...

High-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) may be useful to monitor lung disease in children with common variable immunodeficiency disorder (CVID). We evaluated interobserver agreement and correlation with pulmonary function tests (PFTs) for automated quantification and visual scoring of air trapping and airway wall thickening on HRCT in paediatric CVID patients. In a cohort of 51 children with...