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A coating of pure titanium without defects was successfully prepared on the surface of Ti-6Al-4V substrate by pulsed laser cladding. The characteristics and performance of the coating and the substrate including microstructure, phase constitution and hardness were probed by combined use of multiple characterization methods. Results show that fine lamellar grains are formed in the coating during the ultrafast non-equilibrium solidification process induced by pulsed laser cladding. The average size of these grains is about 0.79 μm. The hardness test shows that the hardness of the coating is 433.82 HV, 30.4% higher than that of the Ti-6Al-4V substrate. Besides, a lower wear volume compared to the substrate is found for the coating which indicates greatly improved wear resistance. In-depth analyses suggest that the improved surface performance can be mainly attributed to grain refinement strengthening in the cladding zone.

Constipation is a functional gastrointestinal disorder and one of the most prevalent conditions encountered in primary care settings. Rhubarb navel dressings have been used for more than 2,000 years in Chinese medicine to treat constipation. However, the effect of topical rhubarb administration has still not been well recognized and this strategy is not yet established as an evidence-based approach.In this study, we performed a prospective multicentric randomized controlled trial to evaluate the efficacy and safety of rhubarb navel plasters for patients with chronic constipation.A total of 374 patients from six teaching hospitals were prospectively included between 09/2016 and 10/2017 in the study based on Rome III criteria. All participants were randomly assigned (1:1) into verum/placebo group and given either Rheum officinale rhubarb powder or a placebo flour stick on the navel for 6 h/day/8 days. Primary outcome measures were the Cleveland Constipation Score (CCS) for the feces condition and Bristol Stool Scale (BSS) for stool consistency and 24 h defecation frequency.The groups demonstrated no statistical differences in demographic data, clinical diagnoses and concomitant medication at baseline. In patients treated with the verum CCS was 5.61 (day 8, 95% CI 5.15-6.07) compared to 8.62 (95% CI 8.07-9.18) in placebo-treated controls (P 0.001). The mean change of CCS at the end of treatment (day 8 versus [vs] day 0) was 6.04 in verum-treated vs 2.73 in placebo-treated controls (P 0.001). Also 24 h defecation frequency (BSS) showed superior results (day 5: 0.84 vs 0.62, 95% CI 0.67-0.80, P 0.001; day 6: 0.82 vs 0.60, 95% CI 0.64-0.78, P 0.01 and day 8: 0.82 vs 0.60, 95% CI 0.64-0.78, P 0.01) and better BSS type classification during treatment than controls (P 0.05). No significant differences in adverse events between both groups became obvious.Rhubarb navel plaster administration over an 8-day-treatment period resulted in significantly improved bowel function as demonstrated by the CCS, 24 h defecating frequency and BSS. Our results suggest that rhubarb navel plasters represent a feasible, safe and efficient application route for the treatment of patients suffering from chronic constipation.

Crystallized debranched waxy rice starch had higher resistant starch (RS) content and crystallinity than crystallized debranched normal rice starch. Thus, debranched waxy rice starch (Unf) with molecular-weight dispersity (DM) at 2.161 was fractionated into F1, F2 and F3 with the DM at 1.604, 1.466 and 1.658, respectively. Moreover, the peak molecular weight of Unf, F1, F2 and F3 was 3.146e + 03, 2.906e + 03, 3.585e + 03, and 4.178e + 03 Da, respectively. Obviously, Unf had higher molecular weight but wider distribution than F1. After crystallization, Unf and F1 had similar RS content and crystallinity. Similar phenomenon occurred to F2 and F3. These results suggested that narrowing molecular weight distribution promoted crystallization of starch and improved its resistance. To further improve efficiency of preparing RS by crystallization, crystallization of F3 was optimized. Under the optimal conditions, the yield and RS content of crystallized F3 reached 81.2% and 80.6%, respectively.

Xindi soft capsule is a traditional Chinese medicine preparation which consists of sea buckthorn flavonoids and sea buckthorn berry oil. In this study, a urinary metabonomics method based on the ultra-performance liquid chromatography combined with quadrupole time-of-flight tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC Q-TOF MS) was used to evaluate the efficacy and study the mechanism of traditional Chinese medicine preparation to blood stasis. With pattern recognition analysis (principal component analysis and partial least squares-discriminate analysis) of urinary metabolites, a clear separation of acute blood stasis model group and healthy control group was achieved, the dose groups were located between acute blood stasis model group and healthy control group showing a tendency of recovering to healthy control group, high dose and middle dose were more effective than low dose. Some significantly changed metabolites like cholic acid, phenylalanine and kynurenic acid have been found and identified and used to explain the mechanism. The work shows that the metabonomics method is a valuable tool in the research mechanism of traditional Chinese medicine.

The truncated NcSRS2 gene (tNcSRS2) by removal of the N-terminal hydrophobic sequence was cloned into the pGEX-6p-1 plasmid and subsequently expressed as a glutathione-S-transferase (GST) fusion protein. The purified recombinant tNcSRS2 protein was specific to Neospora caninum and was used in an ELISA for the diagnosis of neosporosis. There was a good agreement between tNctSRS2-based ELISA and three commercially available diagnostic kits (IDEXX ELISA, HIPRA ELISA and VMRD IFAT). Three hundred dairy cattle serum samples from 9 regions were tested by our ELISA. The herd prevalence was 100% and the overall prevalence was 20.3%. There was a statistically significant difference in seroprevalence between regions (P < 0.01) and an association between abortion history and N. caninum seropositivity. Our study showed that neosporosis in dairy cattle is widespread in China.

Hypoxia-inducible factor-1alpha (HIF-1alpha), a subunit of hypoxia-inducible factor-1 (HIF-1), furnishes tumor cells with the means of adapting to stress parameters, such as tumor hypoxia, and promotes critical steps in tumor progression and aggressiveness by inducing angiogenesis and regulating energy metabolism. In this study, we investigated the relationship between HIF-1alpha and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and clinicopathologic characteristics, and evaluated the role of HIF-1alpha expression in patients with rectal adenocarcinoma.The immunohistochemical expression of HIF-1alpha and VEGF was evaluated in 30 formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded postoperative rectal adenocarcinoma tissue samples. Correlations with clinicopathologic characteristics were determined by cross-tabulations. The impact of the immunoreactivity of HIF-1alpha with regard to the overall survival and local control endpoints was determined by univariate analyses.Increased HIF-1alpha expression was strongly associated with VEGF positivity (P = 0.002), Dukes stage (P = 0.017), and lymph node metastasis (P = 0.001). No correlation was found between the level of HIF-1alpha expression and histologic grade (P = 0.63). The Kaplan-Meier curves showed a significantly shorter overall survival (P = 0.0087) and local control (P = 0.0438) for patients with high HIF-1alpha expression.These results show that HIF-1alpha might represent an important biologic marker evaluating the prognosis of patients with rectal adenocarcinoma.