• 作者： 吳明和; 高玲君
• 作者服務機構： 國立成功大學醫學院外科及生化研究所
• 中文摘要： 為了瞭解胸腺腫瘤及重症肌無力患者之胸腺其產生胸腺激素的情況，我們進行研究在這些組織內兩種胸腺激素(prothymosin α及thymosin β4)所含有的濃度。總共有四十四個組織，來自於胸腔手術患者之胸腺或胸腺瘤。這些組織含括一組對照組，有二十五例，另外三個研究組，即胸腺瘤八例，胸腺瘤三例及重症肌無力患者之胸腺八個。對照組之胸腺組織係正常之胸腺，其胸腺激素之含量依照年齡而形成一與年齡相關之曲線。在這曲線中，顯然的，胸腺激素的含量隨著年齡的增加而減少，prothymosin α其含量之範圍自171μg/g至稀少，而thymosin β4自243μg/g至稀少。含量在青春期最高而漸減少到六十歲時兩種激素皆相當稀少。在研究個案中，如偏離這對照曲線就根容易被提報出來。我們的研究結果顯示，胸腺瘤不論是否具有侵犯性，在其胸腺瘤組織中胸腺激素根明顯增加；在胸腺癌卻減少；而重肌無力症患者之胸腺組織中胸腺激素的含量與一般同年齡者相若。這些發現即印證唯有胸腺瘤能產生相當高之胸腺激素。
• 英文摘要： To understand the thymic hormone production in thymic tumors and the myasthenic thymus, wehave studied the concentrations of two thymic hormones (prothmosin a and thymosin 4) in these tissues.A total of forty four thymus or thymic tumor tissues were obtained from patients who underwent thoracicoperation. These tissues consisted of a control group (n = 25) and three study groups including a thymomagroup (N = 8), thymic carcinoma group (n =3 ) and myasthenic thymus group (n = 8). The age-related curveof the control group, which provided histologically normal thymic tissues for the production of prothymosin and thymosin 4, was established. It was found that in the control group the concentrations (g/gtissue) of prothymosin and thymosin 4 decreased with age, and that the ranges were from 171 g/g totrace and from 243 g/g to trace, respectively. T he amounts were highest at puberty and then graduallydecreased, and only trace amounts of both polypeptides were present at age 60. Study cases which deviatedfrom the standard curves were identified. Our results indicated that the contents of thymic hormonessignificantly increased in the tissues of invasive or non-invasive thymoma, decreased in thymic carcinoma,and were not significantly changed in myasthenic thymus as compared with those of the age-related normalthymus tissues. These findings confirm the notion that only thymomas produce significantly higher thymichormones.
• 中文關鍵字： thymic hormones; thymoma prothymosin α; thymosin β4; myasthenic thymus.
• 英文關鍵字： --