Methods: A total of 61 male adolescents (10-17 years old; mean: 13.67 +/-

1.08) with gynecomastia were enrolled into the study group. A total of 65 healthy age-matched adolescents were included in the control group. MLN4924 order Body mass index (BMI), Tanner staging, testis volume, stretched penis length (SPL) and bone age were evaluated. Serum follicle-stimulating hormone, luteinizing hormone (LH), estradiol (E-2), testosterone, free testosterone, SHBG, PSA levels were determined and FAI was calculated.

Results: In the study group, free testosterone (p = 0.012) and FAI (p = 0.05) were significantly lower than the control group. In the control group, SHBG levels decreased (p < 0.05) and FAI increased (p < 0.05) significantly with increasing Tanner Nutlin-3 order stages; however, no such difference was observed in the study group (p > 0.05). High FAI was found to decrease the risk of gynecomastia (odds ratio: 0.211, 95% confidence interval: 0.064-0.694, p = 0.01). PSA showed a positive correlation

with FAI, free testosterone, Tanner staging, testosterone, E-2 and LH levels.

Conclusions: PSA is a good indicator of androgen activity during puberty. However, owing to FAI remaining as the single significant variable for pubertal gynecomastia, we suggest that it is still the best parameter to elucidate the etiopathogenesis of gynecomastia as well as other pubertal developmental abnormalities in male adolescents, and further longitudinal studies are needed to investigate the relationships between PSA and

FAI in puberty.”
“Polysaccharide fractions were extracted from partially delignified bamboo (Neosinocalamus affinis) culms pretreated with ultrasonic irradiation for varied times and cold sodium hydroxide/urea solution, and their structure and thermal stability were comparatively characterized. In this case, ball-milled bamboo culms were treated with ultrasonic irradiation for varied times (0, 5, 15, and 25 min), dissolved with 7% GSK1904529A sodium hydroxide/12% urea solution at -12 degrees C, and then extracted with ethanol and dioxane to obtain partially delignified solid fractions. Subsequently, the solid fractions were subjected to be extracted with dimethyl sulfoxide followed by precipitation in ethanol and yielded the polysaccharide fractions. Sugar analysis indicated that the total sugar content increased from 60.63% in the polysaccharide fraction prepared without ultrasonic irradiation to 81.26% in the polysaccharide fraction prepared with an ultrasonic irradiation time of 25 min. Glucose (similar to 50-55%) was the major sugar component, and xylose (similar to 41-44%) was the second major sugar in polysaccharide fractions in all cases.