Vascularized composite allotransplantation (VCA) is a novel therapeutic option for treatment of patients suffering from limb loss or severe facial disfigurement. To date, 72 hand and 19 facial transplantations have been performed worldwide. VCA in hand and facial transplantation is a complex procedure requiring a multidisciplinary team approach and extensive surgical planning. Despite good func...

Vascularized composite allotransplantation is a continuously evolving area of modern transplant medicine. Recently, vascularized composite allografts (VCAs) have been formally classified as 'organs'. In this review, key aspects of VCA procurement are discussed, with a special focus on interaction with the procurement of classical solid organs. In addition, options for a matching and allocation ...

Anti-Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) antibodies were tested in 11 children with chronic active EBV infection. Anti-virus capsid antigen (VCA)-IgG antibody titers ranged from 1:640 to 1:10,240. Anti-VCA-IgM antibody was consistently positive in 5 of the 11 patients; anti-VCA-IgA antibody was consistently positive in 6 of the 10 patients; anti-early antigen (EA)-IgG antibody was consistently positive in...

Actin related protein 2/actin related protein 3 (Arp2/3) complex nucleates new actin filaments in eukaryotic cells in response to signals from proteins in the Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome protein (WASP) family. The conserved VCA domain of WASP proteins activates Arp2/3 complex by inducing conformational changes and delivering the first actin monomer of the daughter filament. Previous models of acti...

Skin is the most immunogenic component of a vascularized composite allograft (VCA) and is the primary trigger and target of rejection. The skin is directly accessible for visual monitoring of acute rejection (AR) and for directed biopsy, timely therapeutic intervention, and management of AR. Logically, antirejection drugs, biologics, or other agents delivered locally to the VCA may reduce the n...

BACKGROUND With faster image acquisition times and thinner slice widths, multislice detector computed tomography (MSCT) allows visualisation of human coronary arteries with diagnostic image quality. In addition to conventional axial slices, virtual coronary angioscopies (VCA) can be reconstructed using MSCT datasets. OBJECTIVE To evaluate the feasibility of reconstructing VCA and to determine...

We present an approach to the implementation of the virtual crystal approximation ~VCA! for the study of properties of solid solutions in the context of density-functional methods. Our approach can easily be applied to any type of pseudopotential, and also has the advantage that it can be used to obtain estimates of the atomic forces that would arise if the real atoms were present, thus giving ...

We present a method for modeling disordered solid solutions, based on the virtual crystal approximation ~VCA!. The VCA is a tractable way of studying configurationally disordered systems; traditionally, the potentials which represent atoms of two or more elements are averaged into a composite atomic potential. We have overcome significant shortcomings of the standard VCA by developing a potenti...

Graft copolymerization of binary mixtures of vinylene carbonate (VCA) and N-vinyl-Nmethylacetamide (VIMA) onto low density polyethylene (LDPE) films was studied by the mutual y-irradiation technique. Sufficient amounts of functionally active VCA groups could be grafted onto the surface and the hydrophilicity of the surface was also improved. The grafting of VCA onto polyethylene films in the bi...

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is strongly associated with Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection. To assess whether EBV DNA detection by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) or presence of specific serum antibody to viral capsid antigen (VCA) was a better marker for screening NPC, nasopharyngeal tissues and blood samples from 58 NPC patients and 24 non-NPC patients (23 with laryngotracheal stenosis and...