Shakuntala Krishnamurthy, Gerbail T. Krishnamurthy – 1 January 1989 – Technetium‐99m‐labeled iminodiacetic acid analogs are a new class of organic anions, taken up and secreted by hepatocyte into hepatic bile by a carrier‐mediated organic anion pathway. They provide a new dimension in the assessment of pathophysiology and morphology of the hepatobiliary system. The amount of uptake and the rapidity of its elimination from the liver is dependent upon the structural configuration of the agent as well as the functional integrity of the hepatocyte and the patency of the biliary system.

M. S. Lennard – 1 January 1989 – Metoprolol is as widely used beta‐adrenoreceptor antagonist. There is no report of hepatitis involving this drug as well as other beta‐adrenoreceptor antagonists. Metoprolol is metabolized by three major oxidation pathways. Two of them, Odealkylation and alpha‐hydroxylation, undergo genetically controlled polymorphisms correlated with that of debrisoquine oxidation.

Cyrus R. Kapadia – 1 January 1989

Charles D. Surh, Dean J. Danner, Aftab Ahmed, Ross L. Coppel, Ian R. Mackay, E. Rolland Dickson, M. Eric Gershwin – 1 January 1989 – Antimitochondrial autoantibodies recognizing 68 to 74 and 50 to 52 kD inner membrane mitochondrial antigens are characteristically present in sera of patients with primary biliary cirrhosis. The biochemical identification of the antigens, however, has remained elusive. We report herein that the 52 kD antigen is the dihydrolipoamide acyltransferase of the branched‐chain α‐keto acid dehydrogenase complex.

Jenny Heathcote, Young‐In Kim, Colina K. Yim, James Lebrocq, Stanley E. Read – 1 January 1989 – Basal levels of the interferon‐associated enzyme 2′,5′‐oligoadenylate synthetase were studied in lymphocytes of 46 patients with acute viral hepatitis and in 46 patients with chronic hepatitis B. Measurement of in vitro production of 2′,5′‐oligoadenylate synthetase following overnight incubation of lymphocytes with exogenous interferon was used to assess functional capacity of the lymphocyte interferon system.

Jorge J. Gumucio – 1 January 1989

Anna S. F. Lok, Ching‐Lung Lai – 1 January 1989 – Two hundred ninety patients (203 men, 87 women), age 7 to 74 years (mean: 39.1 years), with chronic hepatitis B virus infection, were prospectively followed for a period of 1 to 4 years to determine the value of α‐fetoprotein monitoring in the early detection of hepatocellular carcinoma. At presentation, 66% of the patients were asymptomatic, 19% had chronic hepatitis and 15% had established cirrhosis.

1 November 1988

Toru Nakano, Jiro Yanagisawa, Fumio Nakayama – 1 November 1988 – To investigate the importance of bacterial infection in the formation of free fatty acids found in brown pigment gallstones, free fatty acids and phospholipase activity in hepatic bile, with or without the presence of bacterial infection, were compared. The concentration of free fatty acids in bile with bacterial infection [0.467 ± 0.447 mg per ml (mean ± S.D.)] was significantly higher than when bacterial infection was absent (0.073 ± 0.041 mg per ml; p < 0.01).

David H. Adams, David Burnett, Robert A. Stockley, Stefan G. Hubscher, Paul McMaster, Elwyn Elias – 1 November 1988 – β2‐Microglobulin, which is associated with HLA class 1 antigens, was assayed in bile and serum from 19 patients following 22 liver transplants. Serum levels were elevated in all posttransplant patients irrespective of the presence of rejection. In contrast, biliary levels were significantly higher during episodes of acute rejection compared with posttransplant cholangitis (p < 0.01), stable graft function (p < 0.0001) and nontrans‐plant samples (p < 0.0001).