The hypothesis driving this study was that photodynamic therapy (PDT) may limit abdominal aortic aneurysm growth due to matrix changes. The aortas of 12 rats were incubated with elastase using a newly modified experimental aneurysm model (3.5 mg/ml). Rats were allocated to an elastase-only group (n = 6) to study the elastase-induced aneurysm growth and an elastase ± PDT group to evaluate if PDT...

OBJECTIVE Neutrophil elastase is secreted by neutrophils during activation and circulates in the plasma where it can play a role in inflammation and fibrosis. This study examines the role of neutrophil elastase in SSc, a systemic CTD that is typified by vascular dysfunction, tissue fibrosis and inflammation. METHODS Serum neutrophil elastase and α₁-anti-trypsin concentrations were assessed in...

Excessive neutrophil elastase activity within airways of cystic fibrosis (CF) patients results in progressive lung damage. Disruption of disulfide bonds on elastase by reducing agents may modify its enzymatic activity. Three naturally occurring dithiol reducing systems were examined for their effects on elastase activity: 1) Escherichia coli thioredoxin (Trx) system, 2) recombinant human thiore...

background sivelestat is a neutrophil elastase inhibitor (nei) with positive impact on the respiratory complications in thoracic surgery. based on the findings of a recent study, nei may have a good response for avoiding ischemia reperfusion injury in liver resection. conclusions intravenous nei administration had positive impact on the postoperative inflammatory response and oxygenation while ...

We compared the clinical values for diagnosis of acute pancreatitis of two commercial assays for pancreatic elastase: an ELISA procedure with monoclonal antibodies and a RIA technique with polyclonal antibodies. In 14 patients with acute pancreatitis, serum concentrations of elastase determined by ELISA (ELISA-elastase) decreased much faster (half-life 0.4 days) than those of elastase determine...

INTRODUCTION Elastase is a proteolytic pancreatic enzyme that passes through the gastrointestinal tract undergoing only limited degradation. ELISA tests to determine stool elastase concentrations have therefore been developed for the diagnosis of exocrine pancreatic insufficiency. Five different isoforms of pancreatic elastase (CELA1, CELA2A, CELA2B, CELA3A, CELA3B) are encoded in the human gen...

OBJECTIVE To quantitatively compare aortic curvature and motion with resulting aneurysm location, direction of expansion, and pathophysiological features in experimental abdominal aortic aneurysms (AAAs). METHODS AND RESULTS MRI was performed at 4.7 T with the following parameters: (1) 3D acquisition for vessel geometry and (2) 2D cardiac-gated acquisition to quantify luminal motion. Male 24-...

This study examined age-related biochemical changes of the lung in an animal model of senile lung, senescence-accelerated mouse (SAM). Bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) was performed on two strains of SAM, the senescence-prone strain (SAM P2) and the senescence-resistant strain (SAM R1), as well as on normal ageing C57 black mice (C57BL), aged 1-24 months. Elastase-like and elastase inhibitory activ...

The present study had as objective to evaluate the genotypic diversity and biological characteristics, such as hemolysin, protease, elastase of 56 clinical strains of Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolated from 13 cystic fibrosis (CF) patients attending at the School Hospital of Campinas State University (UNICAMP), Brazil. Genotypic diversity has been determined by Ribotyping (RT) and the pattern of t...