"Low level light therapy (LLLT) is known to accelerate the process of wound healing, bone and cartilage formation, and to decrease tissue necrosis and inflammation. It also can be applicable to acute and chronic injury or degenerative disease. Despite forty-plus years of accumulating exprerience of the clinical efficacy of LLLT, their molecular biologic evidence is not fully elucidated. The aim of this review is to explore the role of the ROS system and its molecular biologic mechanism in related with inflammatory response, anti-apoptosis and angiogenesis during LLLT. We suggest that activation of ROS system explains many (if not most) of the observed response of cells to LLLT in vitro, and is likely to play a pivotal role in the response of animals and patients to LLLT for both experimental and clinical indications and diseases."

"In recent days, there is much interest in the biocidal activity of silver since silver is known to be safe and effective as disinfectant and biocidal material against bacteria and viruses. There is also increased interest in the nano-sized silver particles which can be used as effective bactericidal material. The purposes of this study were to investigate the effect of silverized elastomers on growth of oral pathogenic microorganisms, including Streptococcus mutans, Fusobacterium nucleatum, Porphyromonas gingivalis by comparing with conventional non-silverized elastomers. The antibacterial efficacy of silverized elastomer against oral pathogenic microbes was investigated by modified disk diffusion test and growth inhibition test. In modified disk diffusion test, silverized elastomer showed no antibacterial activity against S. mutans, F. nucleatum and P. gingivalis, In culture medium, the growth of S. mutans, F. nucleatum, P. gingivalis was not inhibited by silverized elastomer. Silverized elastomer exhibited no bacteriostatic and/or bacteriocidal effects against some experimental strain."

"Metastasis consists of complex cascades and a lot of factors are involved in each step of metastasis. In recent studies, the role of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in metastasis is suggested. EMT has a feature of epithelial cells conversing into mesenchymal cells morphologically and phenotypically, is a characteristic of malignant and metastatic cells in most cancer. The mesenchymal cells usually show more malignant phenotype, including invasion and metastasis. EMT can play an important role in metastasis of oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). Although the role of Snail, slug, other transcriptional factors and E-cadherin are well known in human cancers, there are a few studies on N-cadherin and Twist expression in OSCC. The present study was aimed to analyze the expression of N-cadherin and Twist protein in OSCC from Korean patients. The immunohistochemical stain was performed using 58 primary OSCCs and 6 metastatic OSCCs, and the correlation between the expression of these proteins and clinicopathological parameters of OSCC patients was analyzed.The expression rate of high expression of N-cadherin was observed in 70.4% and Twist in 87.3% of OSCC. The expression of N-cadherin in metastatic OSCC increased than in corresponding primary OSCC (p<0.05). The spearman correlation coefficiency between N-cadherin and Twist was calculated as 0.228. The clinical factors such as lymph node metastasis and survival showed statistically significant correlation between N-cadherin expression. The expression of Twist was correlated with recurrence. In conclusion, the authors suggest that N-cadherin may play an important role in malignant behaviour of OSCC and can be considered as prognostic indicator of OSCC."

"Oral lichen planus (OLP) is an atypically keratinized and ulcerative lesion, producing severe pain and discomforts in the involved patients. Nevertheless, the etiological factor or the pathogenetic mechanism has not been clearly elucidated. In the present study, the different gene expressions were screened in 21 cases of OLP by immunohistochemical (IHC) array method using 80 antibodies, and found that the pathway of E-cadherin/β-catenin was abnormally expressed compared to the other essential genetic pathways. Particularly, the expressions of eIF5A, DHS, and DOHH, which are the biomarkers of protein translation, were remarkably reduced, nevertheless the expression of β-catenin was strongly positive in the 7 cases among 21 cases of OLP. The other expressions of p53, BCL-2, MDM-2, PAKT, BAX, BAK, BAD, NFkB, HO-1, etc, were usually weak or sparse, while the expressions of PCNA, CDK4, and HSP-70 were markedly increased. Taken together, it is presumed that the overexpression of β-catenin indicates the derangement of E-cad/β-catenin/NFkB pathway, causing the transcription of cellular proliferating genes in downstream events, i.e., PCNA and CDK4, and that it may be eventually relevant to the malignant potential of OLP epithelial cells. It is also suggested that the activation of β-catenin/TCF/LEF1 pathway be closely relevant to the immunological reaction of OLP with the accumulation of T-cells underneath the mucosal epithelium. "

"Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) develops through multistep process, that is, from normal mucosa to hyperplastic area and progressed to dysplasia, carcinoma in situ, and finally to invasive carcinoma. The purpose of this study is to investigate the histological types of the transitional area from normal oral mucosa to invasive carcinoma for the baseline data to search intermediate end point markers for early detection of OSCC. For this purpose, we reviewed the 85 patients who were diagnosed as OSCC in the Department of Oral Pathology, Yonsei University College of Dentistry, from 2002 to 2008. We classified these histopathologic findings by light-microscopy, according to the histologic pattern of transitional areas. As results, stepwise transformation from normal oral mucosa, to dysplasia and to OSCC was shown in 47 patients. Intermittent lesions were seen in 16 patients, in which normal oral mucosa, dysplasia, and OSCC were alternately arranged. Twenty two patients showed abruptly transformed to OSCC from normal oral mucosa. These preliminary data will be used for searching biomarkers for early detection of OSCC."

"A 41-year-old male patient complained of a whitish growing mass on the central area of palate. The exophytic keratinizing mass was recently grown and showed rough surface localized at palatal mucosa. He has heavily smoked for more than 25 years. The lesion was clearly demarcated as an out-growing verrucous whitish epithelial lesion with erosive mucosa in the periphery and also continuous with the extensive hyperkeratosis in whole hard palatal mucosa. In the histological examination there appeared a plaque type verrucous hyperplasia in the absence of papillomatous growth. In the series of immunostains including PCNA, p53, β-catenin, APC, E-cadherin, BCL-2, MMP-1 and MMP-3 showed no features of infiltrative growth and malignant transformation. Therefore, the present case was diagnosed oral verrucous hyperplasia(OVH) different from squamous cell papilloma, verrucous leukoplakia, verrucous carcinoma, and oral squamous cell carcinoma."

"Both synovial cysts and synovial chondromatoses originate from synovial tissue, and only one case has been reported to occur simultaneously in a patient. Our patient presented with a swelling of the right preauricular area and pain on opening the mouth. Magnetic resonance images demonstrated two cystic structures in the superficial lobe of right parotid gland. Under the clinical impression of a cyst in the salivary gland, an enucleation was performed. However, the final diagnosis based on microscopic examination was a synovial cyst associated with the right temporomandibular joint and a synovial chondromatosis arising within the cystic wall. Awareness of this combined lesion will help make a diagnosis and establish a proper treatment plan."

"Myositis ossificans traumatica(MOT) in head and neck area is a rare non-neoplastic, heterotopic bone formation within a muscle, arising after trauma or surgery. Although the several case reports have described the occurrence of MOT in other muscles of oro-facial musculature, MOT has never been reported in mentalis muscle. We demonstrate a case of MOT occurred in mentalis muscle of a 64 years old male. He recently complained of a movable mass with no pain. He had experienced a hitting trauma on his right anterior mandible about 25 years ago. Since then, the trauma area has been asymptomatic. The lesion showed severe muscular degeneration, resulted in a pseudocystic change without epithelial lining. The ectopic ossification was closely associated with the fibrous fascia of adjacent muscles. The lesion contained a lot of basophilic materials admixed with atrophying cells, which were supposed to be derived from muscle parenchyma injured previously. It was presumed that the basophilic materials induced callus-like ossification in the fibro-muscular lesion, also recruited macrophages and fibroblasts. However, the ossification processes in MOT were predominantly characterized by dystrophic calcification without osteoblastic differentiation of mesenchymal cells. Even more, there appeared some skeletal muscle bundles which were calcified dystrophically. Therefore, we suggest the present case of MOT might be initiated by dystrophic calcification in the degenerating muscle tissue. "

"Nodular fasciitis is defined by the World Health Organization as a benign proliferative fibroblastic lesion. It was first described in 1955 by Konwaler et al. and also known as “nodular pseudosarcomatous fasciitis” and “infiltrative fasciitis”, which reflect the lesion’s rapid growth, dense cellularity, alarming mitotoic activity and lack of circumscription. Here, we report a case of nodular fasciitis, which appeared as subcutaneous mass of right perizygoma area in 40-year-old Korean female. She had no history of trauma or cosmetic surgery related with the lesion. She disclosed that the mass grew rapidly for last 2 months. Computed tomography showed relatively well-defined spherical mass with 1.2 cm in diameter. Under local anesthesia the mass was resected by intraoral approach. The histological examination revealed a relatively poor-dermacated mass with high cellularity, which was composed with infiltrative spindle-shaped cells without accompanying inflammatory reactions. The tumor cells were partially positive for α-smooth muscle actin and β-catenin, but negative for cytokeratin AE1/3, S-100, desmin, and CD34. Therefore, the lesion was pathologically diagnosed as nodular fasciitis. Although nodular fasciitis is known to pseudosarcomatous benign reactive lesion, the clinician need to follow up the patient periodically. The reasons are as follows; Nodular fasciitis may accompany nuclear accumulation of β-catenin, which imply neoplastic process rather than reactive process of the lesion. Moreover, it has many histological similarities with inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor which have malignant transformation tendency. Further research for mesenchymal tumor could help our understanding for the disease entity of nodular fasciitis."

"Recurrence-metastasis status of squamous cell carcinoma of tongue is a challenging oncologic problem. This study examined the expression of E-cadherin/β-catenin cell adhesion complex in squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue through an immunohistochemical study. Twenty samples from 15 patients with squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue, who were treated at the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, consisted of primary or recurrent tumors along with matched metastatic lymph nodes were retrieved for immunohistochemical staining and grouped based on recurrence-metastasis status.Differences in stain localization were noted in E-cadherin, β–catenin and phospho β–catenin staining between different tumor groups based on the recurrence-metastasis status. The number of phospho β-catenin stain positive cells was found to have a significant role in survival. E-cadherin confirms its role as a powerful individual differentiation indicator and the role of β-catenin specially the phospho type elicts interest."

"Urokinase-type plasminogen activator(uPA) bound to urokinase plasminogen activator receptor(uPAR) expression is strongly correlated with the metastatic potential of various tumors by enhancing ECM degradation through plasminogen and matrix metallopreotease activation. But expression of uPA/uPAR in human malignant salivary gland tumors has been rarely reported. The purpose of this study were to investigate mRNA expression and cytologic concentration of uPAR in SGT cell line compared to various cancer cell lines by RT-PCR and ELISA method, and to study migration and adhesion assay. These results would be to apply the pathogenesis and prognosis of malignant salivary gland tumors. All the cell lines(SGT, HN 4, SCC 25, and HeLA) were cultured under DMEM with 10% FBS at 37℃ in a 5% CO2 incubator. We studied a possible association between mRNA expression and cytosolic concentrations of uPAR in SGT cell line compared to various cancer cell lines using RT-PCR and an enzyme-linked immunoassay(ELISA) method. And also cell adhesion and migration assay were done in all the cell lines. In migration assay SGT cell line was about 2.5-4 folds higher than another cell lines. In adhesion assay SGT cell line was about 1.1-2 folds higher than another cell lines. uPAR cytosolic concentrations of SGT cell line was about 3.4-10 folds by ELISA, while mRNA expression was about 2.5-5 folds by RT-PCR. Oral Scc cell lines showed the lowest value. uPAR protein and mRNA expression were correlated with migration and adhesion assay. From the aboving results, high cytosolic concentrations and mRNA expression of uPAR were correlated with migration and adhesion assay. It suggested that this might be a specific marker for malignant potential of SGT cell line and would be contributed to pathogenesis and prognosis of human salivary gland adenocarcinoma."

"A rare case of primary intraosseous squamous cell carcinoma(PISCC) arising from lining epithelium of a dentigerous cyst is described. The case occurred at the left mandibular 3rd molar region in a 56-year-old Japanese woman. Clinical observation revealed cyst formation with an impacted 3rd molar, a common finding in dentigerous cyst, in the left mandible. Histopathologically, the lining epithelium of the cyst demonstrated transition from epithelial dysplasia to invasive squamous cell carcinoma(SCC). This case was diagnosed as PISCC arising from lining epithelium of a dentigerous cyst."