Search

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via the original article.

PDF file, 22K, Analysis of miR-146a rs2910164 polymorphism association with non-muscle invasive bladder cancer patients' recurrence, stratified by selected variables.

PDF, 18K, Quantitative real-time PCR was used to measure the levels of mature miR-146a expression in transected T24 and EJ cells.

PDF file, 21K, Key information on the 14 selected miRNA polymorphisms.

PDF file, 21K, Primers and probes for genotype screening by TaqMan allelic discrimination.

PDF file, 22K, Stratified analysis of the association between miR-146a rs2910164 and risk of bladder cancer.

PDF file, 21K, Clinical characteristics of 64 bladder cancer tissue samples.

PDF file, 17K, Association between miR-146a rs2910164 and expression of mature miR-146a.

PDF file, 44K, The position of rs2910164 in the miRNA-146a. Sequences for mature miRNA are shown in red, and the position of the SNP in the miRNA is underlined.

PDF file, 73K, Stratification analyses of associations between miR-146a rs2910164 and bladder cancer risk.

Supplemental Methods and References, Supplemental Tables S1-S10, Supplemental Figures S1-S11

PDF file, 25K, The position of rs2910164 in the miRNA-146a.

PDF file, 355K, Primary information in miRNA SNPs.

PDF file, 27K.

Background In insects, the chemosensory system is crucial in guiding their behaviors for survival. Plagiodera versicolora (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae), is a worldwide leaf-eating forest pest in salicaceous trees. There is little known about the chemosensory genes in P. versicolora. Here, we conducted a transcriptome analysis of larvae heads in P. versicolora. Results In this study, 29 odorant binding proteins (OBPs), 6 chemosensory proteins (CSPs), 14 odorant receptors (ORs), 13 gustatory receptors (GRs), 8 ionotropic receptors (IRs) and 4 sensory neuron membrane proteins (SNMPs) were identified by transcriptome analysis. Compared to the previous antennae and foreleg transcriptome data in adults, 12 OBPs, 2 CSPs, 5 ORs, 4 IRs, and 7 GRs were newly identified in the larvae. Phylogenetic analyses were conducted and found a new candidate CO2 receptor (PverGR18) and a new sugar receptor (PverGR23) in the tree of GRs. Subsequently, the dynamic expression profiles of various genes were analyzed by quantitative real-time PCR. The results showed that PverOBP31, OBP34, OBP35, OBP38, and OBP40 were highly expressed in larvae, PverOBP33 and OBP37 were highly expressed in pupae, and PverCSP13 was highly expressed in eggs, respectively. Conclusions We identified a total of 74 putative chemosensory genes based on a transcriptome analysis of larvae heads in P. versicolora. This work provides new information for functional studies on the chemoreception mechanism in P. versicolora.

Air Potato Yam is widely used in the treatment of many conditions such as cancer, inflammation, and goiter. Diosbulbin B (DIOB) is the primary active component of Air Potato Yam, and it exhibits anti-tumor and anti-inflammatory properties. The main purpose of this study was to determine the mechanism by which DIOB induces lung toxicity, using metabonomics and molecular biology techniques. The results showed that the lung toxicity induced by DIOB may occur because of a DIOB-induced increase in the plasma levels of long-chain free fatty acids and endogenous metabolites related to inflammation. In addition, treatment with DIOB increases the expression of the cyp3a13 enzyme, which leads to enhanced toxicity in a dose-dependent manner. The molecular mechanism underlying toxicity in mouse lung cells is the DIOB-mediated inhibition of fatty acid β-oxidation, partial glycolysis, and the TCA cycle, but DIOB treatment can also compensate for the low Adenosine triphosphate (ATP) supply levels by improving the efficiency of the last step of the glycolysis reaction and by increasing the rate of anaerobic glycolysis. Using metabonomics and other methods, we identified the toxic effects of DIOB on the lung and clarified the underlying molecular mechanism.

Introduction: Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) in patients with congenital heart disease (CHD) is associated with increased morbidity and mortality. While Doppler echocardiography (DE) has been a useful screening test in PAH, the presence of structural cardiac defects may affect the ability to reliably predict systolic pulmonary arterial pressure (sPAP).Therefore, this study was to analyze the reliability of sPAP assessment by DE compared to right heart catheterization (RHC) in a large CHD patient population. Methods: We retrospectively analyzed simple atrial septal defect (ASD) , ventricular septal defect (VSD) and patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) patients older than 14 years with matched examinations (within 1 months) from 2015 to 2020. Relationships between RHC- and DE-derived sPAP were assessed using the Pearson correlation. Bland-Altman analyses were performed to evaluate the agreement between DE and RHC measurements of sPAP. Results: 1937 ASD patients,188 VSD patients, 294 PDA patients were included in this study. In ASD patients, sPAP was 47.06±14.33 mmHg by DE and 39.42±13.18 mmHg by RHC(P Conclusions: DE estimates of sPAP are inaccurate in patients with CHD, a significant overestimation of the sPAP in ASD patients, significant underestimate of the sPAP in VSD and PDA patients.

Objective To assess the ablative margin of microwave ablation (MWA) for stage I non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) using a three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction technique. Materials and methods We retrospectively analyzed 36 patients with stage I NSCLC lesions undergoing MWA and analyzed the relationship between minimal ablative margin and the local tumor progression (LTP) interval, the distant metastasis interval and disease-free survival (DFS). The minimal ablative margin was measured using the fusion of 3D computed tomography reconstruction technique. Results Univariate and multivariate analyses indicated that tumor size (hazard ratio [HR] = 1.91, P P = 0.01) and minimal ablative margin (HR = 0.13, P P P P P P Conclusions The minimal ablative margin is an independent factor of NSCLC relapse after MWA, and the fusion of 3D reconstruction technique can feasibly assess the minimal ablative margin.

Ca0.5Sr0.5Zr4-xSnxP6O24 (0 ≤ x ≤ 0.2) ceramics belonging to a new NZP family were prepared by coprecipitation, to determine the effect of Sn4+-substitution for Zr4+ on the crystal structure, mechanical and thermophysical properties of the ceramics. XRD patterns revealed that a single phase was formed for all compositions. Rietveld refinement was used to analyze the crystal structure and the lattice parameters exhibited a satisfactory structural convergence of R-factors. The substitution of Sn4+ for Zr4+ could effectively improve the sinterability, meanwhile, the flexural strength and Vickers hardness could reach to 60.2 MPa and 3.05 GPa, respectively. The thermal expansion varied from 1.72 to 2.78 × 10−6/oC with Sn4+-substitution increasing. Besides, the thermal conductivity of Ca0.5Sr0.5Zr3.8Sn0.2P6O24 (x = 0.2) reached a minimum value of 0.79 W m−1 oC−1 at 1000 °C. The present investigation let provide that the Ca0.5Sr0.5Zr4-xSnxP6O24 ceramics with high mechanical strength and excellent thermophysical properties are promising candidate materials in high temperature applications.

This study aimed to illustrate p-Chloroaniline (p-CIA) biodegradation efficiencies in bioelectrochemical reactors under stimulation by a low-voltage electric field (0.2 V versus Ag/AgCl) in the presence of easily-degrading cosubstrates including glucose and acetate. The biodegradation efficiencies of closed-circuit bioreactors were compared with those of open-circuit reactors. Experimental results showed that the six different bioreactors provided different p-CIA biodegradation efficiencies. The highest biodegradation efficiency of 38.5 ± 10.3 mg/l was obtained in a closed-circuit bioreactor with acetate and the lowest biodegradation efficiency of 15.7 ± 9.4 mg/l was obtained in an open-circuit bioreactor. This difference may be attributed to the presence of electrical stimulation and acetate. The results for generated current and biodegradation efficiency indicated that acetate is a better cosubstrate than glucose. High-throughput sequencing technologies were used to characterise the bacterial community structure of the six bioreactors and revealed that different bacterial communities resulted in different treatment efficiencies.

The autotrophic removal of sulphate and nitrate in bioelectrochemical reactors was investigated at different external voltages (0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8 and 1.0 V) under anaerobic conditions. Sulphate and nitrate removal, nitrite accumulation, reduction trend of nitrate and sulphate and microbial community structure were explored. Results indicate the highest removal efficiencies of nitrate and sulphate at 43.3 ± 2.8 and 7.1 ± 0.2 mg·l−1·d−1 when the voltage is 0.6 V. Moreover, nitrite accumulation decreases with increased voltage from 0.2 V to 1.0 V. Illumina high-throughput sequencing results show similar richness and diversity of bacterial species with increased voltage from 0.2 V to 0.8 V. However, with further increased voltage to 1.0 V, bacterial diversity and richness decrease significantly. Overall, significant differences in community compositions are observed at different voltages.

Tomato flower abscission is a critical agronomic problem directly affecting yield. It often occurs in greenhouses in winter, with the weak light or hazy weather leading to insufficient photosynthates. The importance of carbohydrate availability in flower retention has been illustrated, while relatively little is understood concerning the mechanism of carbohydrate regulation on flower abscission. In the present study, we analyzed the responding pattern of nonstructural carbohydrates (NSC, including total soluble sugars and starch) and the potential sugar signal pathway involved in abscission regulation in tomato flowers under shading condition, and their correlations with flower abscission rate and abscission-related hormones. The results showed that, when plants suffer from short-term photosynthesis deficiency, starch degradation in flower organs acts as a self-protection mechanism, providing a carbon source for flower growth and temporarily alleviating the impact on flower development. Trehalose 6-phosphate (T6P) and sucrose non-fermenting-like kinase (SnRK1) signaling seems to be involved in adapting the metabolism to sugar starvation stress through regulating starch remobilization and crosstalk with IAA, ABA, and ethylene in flowers. However, a continuous limitation of assimilating supply imposed starch depletion in flowers, which caused flower abscission.

Background: To analyze the online course efficiency of a combined mode of Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) micro-video and E-learning platform in Nanjing Medical University during the COVID-19 epidemic. Methods: We developed a new questionnaire to assess the efficiency of online teaching of medical statistics in Nanjing Medical University. This investigation enrolled students participating in the online course of medical statistics from January 2020 to June 2020. The “Questionnaire Star” electronic questionnaire collection system was used to collect data. Results: In total, 1050 of the 1210 (86.78%) students completed the questionnaire, including 971 (92.48%) juniors. To be specific, 57.33% of the students majored in clinical medicine, 15.14% in pharmacy, 10.38% in pediatrics, 8.00% in medical imageology, and 6.29% in basic medicine. As to the question "Are you satisfied with the current online teaching method?", 354 (32.77%) students responded with "Agree" and "Strongly Agree", and 1012 (96.47%) thought they needed to consolidate what they had learned after returning to school. Most students reported their "Difficulties in the learning process" by "Learning motivation" and "Personal inertia" (59.90% and 58.29%, respectively).Conclusions: The online course of medical statistics was favored by most students, suggesting its efficiency an efficient alternative to classroom study during the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet there were still some problems, such as inconvenient communication between teachers and students, poor mastery of key knowledge, which should be resolved in classroom teaching at school.

Structural reliability analysis without the exclusion of random variables with unknown distributions has attracted increasing attention, and many endeavors have been devoted to this aspect....

This study aimed to investigate the degradation efficiency of 2,4,6-trichlorophenol through a batch of potentiostatic experiments (0.2 V vs. Ag/AgCl). Efficiencies in the presence and absence of acetate and glucose were compared through open-circuit reference experiments. Significant differences in degradation efficiency were observed in six reactors. The highest and lowest degradation efficiencies were observed in the closed-circuit reactor fed with glucose and in the open-circuit reactor, respectively. This finding was due to the enhanced bacterial metabolism caused by the application of micro-electrical field and degradable organics as co-substrates. The different treatment efficiencies were also caused by the distinct bacterial communities. The composition of bacterial community was affected by adding different organics as co-substrates. At the phylum level, the most dominant bacteria in the reactor with the added acetate and glucose were Proteobacteria and Firmicutes, respectively.

Photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting has been demonstrated as a promising way to acquire clean hydrogen energy. However, the efficiency has been limited by the high recombination rate of photogenerated electron-hole pairs. Herein, we provided a simple approach to construct a novel SnO2 quantum dots (QDs) modified TiO2 nanorod arrays (NAs) by the calcination of SnCl2 -adsorbed TiO2 NAs. The photocurrent density of SnO2 QDs/TiO2 NAs exhibits about 5 times higher than that of parent TiO2 NAs at a bias of 0.4 V vs. Ag/AgCl. SnO2 QDs/TiO2 NAs also show a high photoelectrocatalytic activity for overall water splitting with an actual yield of H2 and O2 to be 27.85 and 11.87 μmol cm-2 h-1 , respectively. The excellent performance of photoanode for PEC water splitting could be attributed to its Z-scheme heterostructure for good separation efficiency and transport rate of photogenerated charge carries.

Photocatalytic ammonia synthesis is of great importance but remains very challenging in photocatalysis. Here, we fabricated a photocatalytic reaction system for the efficiently photocatalytic nitrate reduction to ammonia under UV irradiation using PdSn/NiO/NaTaO3:La as a photocatalyst in the presence of formic acid. Several important factors of the photocatalytic performance were investigated, including initial concentration of the nitrate solution, initial pH value and cocatalyst loadings. Nitrate conversion reaches 100% and ammonia selectivity is 72% over the optimum photocatalyst with 5% bimetallic PdSn alloy and 0.2% NiO loadings. The outstanding performance of photocatalyst can be ascribed to both the strong adsorption of nitrite on NiO and the efficient separation of electron-hole pairs by PdSn bimetallic alloy. Besides as the hole scavenger, formic acid also provides not only carboxyl anion radicals for nitrate reduction but also the in-situ buffer effect on ammonia formation. These results give inspiration for designing the reactive system with efficient photocatalytic ammonia synthesis.

Numerous studies have shown that elderly people are susceptible to high-level particles with aerodynamic diameter ≤ 2.5 μm (PM2.5) exposure. However, not all elderly people exposed to PM2.5 suffer from diseases. In this study, we aim to establish a method to predict the vulnerable PM2.5-exposure individuals among elderly population. Fourteen elderly people were recruited from May 8 to July 4, 2016, in Nanjing, China. Ten physiological indicators were repeatedly measured for 15 times. Liner mixed-effects model, principal component analysis (PCA), and PM2.5 lag score were used to estimate the effects of PM2.5 on blood pressure, pulse, and lung function. As a result, each quartile increase of ambient PM2.5 was significantly associated with increased pulse (P

Controlling the creation of oxygen vacancies can effectively regulate the optical and electronic properties of metal oxide nanomaterials. Over the past several decades, numerous metal oxides with oxygen vacancies have been developed. However, an investigation about oxygen vacancies leading to the formation of nanosheets with different thicknesses has not been available up to now. Here, we report the oxygen vacancy modulated formation of γ-Ga2O3 nanosheets and demonstrate that the thickness of the nanosheets is not the decisive factor in the photocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction of ultrathin 2D nanosheets. Detailed structural characterization indicated that γ-Ga2O3 prepared at 160 °C (γ-160) with a morphology of ultrathin nanosheets possesses the highest oxygen vacancy concentration and an optimal thickness of the nanosheets. The enhanced photocatalytic performance could be determined from the synergistic effects between the ultrathin 2D structure and the O-vacancies confined in the ultrathin nanosheets. This work provides an efficient strategy to regulate the formation of nanosheets at the atomic scale and enrich the study on the effect of oxygen vacancies in the photocatalytic water splitting reaction.

Lattice defects of semiconductors have a tremendous influence on the photo-absorption and separation of photogenerated electron–hole pairs; thus the photocatalytic performance of a semiconductor can be modulated by creation of defects on/in it. In this work, WO3−X photocatalysts with oxygen vacancies were prepared from highly crystalline WO3 by vacuum heat treatment. The resulting WO3−X samples with defects were characterized by Raman, XPS, DRS, ESR and photocatalytic water oxidation experiments. The results revealed that the visible light absorption of WO3−X increased with increasing vacuum heat treatment temperature. The surface oxygen vacancies of WO3−X could significantly improve the photoelectric behaviour. WO3−X showed the maximum photocurrent density, which is 3 times higher than that of the pristine WO3, and a much higher photocatalytic activity than the pristine WO3. The surface oxygen vacancies on WO3−X played a more important role in the separation of photogenerated electron–hole pairs and improvement of the photocatalytic activity than the bulk defects. These results indicated that controlling of the number and types of oxygen vacancies on WO3 is important to obtain high-performance WO3−X photocatalysts.

A novel and efficient method is proposed for simulating strongly non-Gaussian and non-stationary processes by combining Karhunen–Loeve expansion with Linear-moments-based (L-moments-based) Hermite polynomial model (HPM). In this method, the complete transformation from non-stationary non-Gaussian auto-correlation function (ACF) to non-stationary Gaussian ACF is realized using L-moments-based HPM. Then, the underlying Gaussian processes is represented by Karhunen–Loeve expansion and further transformed into target non-stationary non-Gaussian processes by L-moments-based HPM. Moreover, a novel approach is proposed to deal with the two kinds of incompatibilities that may occur in strongly non-Gaussian processes, including that non-stationary non-Gaussian ACF falls outside of its applicable range and non-stationary Gaussian ACF is non-positive semi-definite. It can be found from some representative numerical examples that the precision and efficiency of the proposed method are considerable.

Seismic fragility analysis, which quantitatively describes the dynamic relationship between earthquake intensity and structural failure probability, plays an important role in the overall seismic risk assessment. An appropriate structural demand model can significantly improve the efficiency of seismic fragility analysis, and currently the most commonly used model is the lognormal model. However, recent studies have shown that this model's rationality is still in doubt. In this study, a novel structural demand model for generating analytical fragility curves in the form of a three-parameter lognormal distribution is proposed and investigated based on a large amount of nonlinear dynamic analytical data using observed Japanese ground motions with a wide range of magnitudes and epicenter distances. It shows a better fitting effect than the existing lognormal model on structural demand distribution and is expected to be more applicable to seismic fragility analysis. Through numerical fragility analysis examples on two common structural types, i.e., a steel frame structure and a reinforced concrete frame structure, the accuracy and feasibility of the proposed model are proven.

This study aims to explore how microRNA-133a (miR-133a) affects cell apoptosis and radio-sensitivity by targeting EGFR via regulating MEK/ERK pathway in esophageal cancer (EC). A total of 358 EC patients were selected and assigned into the resistant and sensitive groups. Human EC KYSE 150 cell line was assigned into the blank, negative control (NC), miR-133a mimic, miR-133a inhibitors, si-EGFR, miR-133a inhibitors + si-EGFR groups after transfection. MiR-133a and EGFR mRNA expressions were detected by qRT-PCR and EGFR, MEK/ERK pathway-related protein expressions were detected by Western blotting. The radio-sensitivity and cell apoptosis were testified by clone formation and flow cytometry. MiR-133a was up-regulated but EGFR was down-regulated in the sensitive group than in the resistant group. Compared with the blank and NC groups, the miR-133a mimic and si-EGFR groups exhibited increased cell apoptosis rate but decreased EGFR, p-MEK1/2, and p-ERK1/2 protein expressions; while opposite trend was observed in the miR-133a inhibitors group. Compared with the miR-133a inhibitors group, the miR-133a inhibitors + si-EGFR group presented reduced cell survival rate, EGFR, p-MEK1/2, and p-ERK1/2 protein expressions but increased cell apoptosis rate. These results indicated that miR-133a could inhibit the MEK/ERK pathway to promote cell apoptosis and enhance radio-sensitivity by targeting EGFR in EC. J. Cell. Biochem. 118: 2625-2634, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Background and Aim In our previous study, we demonstrated that four microRNAs (miRNAs) (miR-26a, miR-142-3p, miR-148a, and miR-195) that were downregulated in both plasma and tumor tissues were confirmed to be promising non-invasive diagnostic biomarkers for gastric cancer (GC). Methods We used the quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction to assess the expression levels of the four miRNAs from paraffin-embedded surgical specimens of GC patients. Kaplan–Meier curves and log-rank test were applied to predict the correlation between miRNAs and cumulative overall survival (OS) of patients with GC. Besides, we performed in vitro assays including cell proliferation, migration, invasion and colony formation, and apoptosis. Results The median of miRNA expression in paraffin-embedded tissues were used as the cutoff value to classify patients into high or low expression groups. Down-regulation of miR-26a and miR-148a was significantly associated with shorter OS of GC patients either in the test set (miR-26a: P = 0.009; miR-148a: P = 0.005) or the validation set (miR-26a: P = 0.011; miR-148a: P = 0.024). When two sets were combined, Cox regression analysis demonstrated that both of miR-26a and miR-148a were independent prognostic factors for predicting OS of patients with GC (miR-26a: HR = 0.76, 95% CI = 0.61–0.94; miR-148a: HR = 0.73, 95% CI = 0.58–0.91). Furthermore, elevated expression of miR-26 significantly suppressed cell proliferation, migration, invasion and colony formation, and induced apoptosis of MGC-803 cells compared with negative control groups (P

Two novel analogous Dy6 complexes were synthesized in low-temperature reactions and characterized via X-ray crystallographic and magnetic measurements. Structural analysis revealed the resulting complexes form a new topological motif for hexanuclear dysprosium clusters. Magnetic studies indicated the two complexes are both ferromagnetic interactions and exhibit magnetization relaxation behavior.

Simultaneous flue gas desulphurisation and denitrification in biotrickling filter was investigated under different O2 concentrations (0%, 3%, 5%, 8% and 10%) at 45 °C. NO and SO2 removal efficiency, intermediates (NO3−, NO2−, NO2, SO42− and S2−) interaction and accumulation, S0 recovery and microbial community structure were investigated. Results indicated the highest NO removal efficiency was 96.5% at 5% O2. Maximum SO2 removal efficiency was 95.6% at 3% O2. Moreover, N intermediates accumulation increased when O2 concentration increased from 0% to 10%. The lowest S2− concentration of 61 mg/L and the maximum S0 recovery of 76.9% were achieved at 5% O2. The bioreactor at 10% O2 contained less bacterial OTUs richness and evenness compared with other conditions. Illumina analysis indicated Proteobacteria, Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes were the dominant members. Overall, microbial community structure differs significantly under different O2 concentrations.

Controlling the creation of oxygen vacancies can effectively regulate the optical and electronic properties of metal oxide nanomaterials. Over the past several decades, numerous metal oxides with oxygen vacancies have been developed. However, an investigation about oxygen vacancies leading to the formation of nanosheets with different thicknesses has not been available up to now. Here, we report the oxygen vacancy modulated formation of γ-Ga

In this paper, a new method for normal transformation is proposed to transform correlated non-normal random variables into independent standard normal ones based on their first four linear moments (L-moments), standard deviations and correlation matrix. The complete monotonic expressions of the equivalent correlation coefficient are proposed and the applicable range of the original correlation coefficient to ensure the transformation's executability is identified. Numerical studies demonstrate that the admissible range of the normal transformation for correlated random variables based on L -moments is larger in scope than that based on ordinary central moments (C-moments), and the proposed method is effective for normal transformations and sufficiently accurate for reliability engineering practices.

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of bladder cancer have identified a number of susceptibility loci in European populations but have yet to uncover the genetic determinants underlying bladder cancer incidence among other ethnicities. Therefore, we performed the first GWAS in a Chinese cohort comprising 3,406 cases of bladder cancer and 4,645 controls. We identified a new susceptibility locus for bladder cancer at 5q12.3, located in the intron of CWC27 (rs2042329), that was significantly associated with disease risk (OR = 1.40; P = 4.61 × 10−11). However, rs2042329 was not associated with bladder cancer risk in patients of European descent. The rs2042329 risk allele was also related to significantly increased expression levels of CWC27 mRNA and protein in bladder cancer tissues from Chinese patients. Additional functional analyses suggested that CWC27 played an oncogenic role in bladder cancer by inducing cell proliferation and suppressing apoptosis. In conclusion, the identification of a risk-associated locus at 5q12.3 provides new insights into the inherited susceptibility to bladder cancer in Chinese populations and may help to identify high-risk individuals. Cancer Res; 76(11); 3277–84. ©2016 AACR.

The first genome-wide association study (GWAS) for bladder cancer has identified a susceptibility locus at 3q28 in the European ancestry. However, the causal variant at 3q28 remains unknown. We conducted a three-stage fine mapping study to identify potential causal variants in the region. A total of 41 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) across 120 kb at 3q28 were tested for association with bladder cancer risk among 3,094 bladder cancer cases and 3,738 controls. Resequencing and functional assays were further evaluated. The SNP rs35592567 in the 3'-UTR of TP63 was consistently associated with bladder cancer risk in all three stages. In the combined analysis, the T allele of rs35592567 was significantly associated with a decreased risk for bladder cancer (OR = 0.82, 95% CI = 0.75-0.90, P = 9.797 × 10(-6) in the additive model). Biochemical assays revealed that the T allele reduced the post-transcriptional levels of TP63 mediated by interfering binding efficiency of miR-140-5p. In addition, overexpression of miR-140-5p inhibited bladder cancer cell proliferation and attenuated cell migration, invasion and G1 cell-cycle arrest. Together, these results suggest that rs35592567 in TP63 may be a novel causal variant contributing to the susceptibility to bladder cancer, which provides additional insight into the pathogenesis of bladder carcinogenesis.

We report the application of the commercial HZSM-5 zeolite as an efficient and stable photocatalyst for the photoreduction of CO2 with H2O at room temperature. CO and H2 were the main reduction products besides a trace amount of hydrocarbons. The activity of CO evolution was dependent on the source of various zeolites. The highest CO evolution rate over the HZSM-5 samples was 3.32 μmol g−1 h−1 under UV-light irradiation. The control experiments combined with the characterization results of XRD, UV-vis DRS and ESR revealed that the photocatalytic activity was not related to Si/Al ratios or Al–O units but was associated with the content of Fe impurities in the zeolite samples. A reaction mechanism of CO2 photoreduction on Fe species in zeolites was proposed. [Fe3+–O2−] species as a photoactive centre can be excited by UV light to form a charge-transfer excited state, [Fe2+–O−]*, which was responsible for the CO2 reduction reaction. This work demonstrates zeolite molecular sieves as an efficient photocatalyst for CO2 conversion and helps us to understand the photocatalytic nature of zeolites.