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PURPOSE To investigate the in vivo neurofunctional changes and therapeutic effects of young blood plasma (YBP) in aged mice, as well as the molecular mechanisms underlying the therapeutic effects of YBP ex vivo and in vitro. METHODS Aged C57/BL6 mice received systemic administrations of phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) or YBP twice a week, for 4 weeks. In vivo 2-[18F]-fluoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose positron emission tomography (18F-FDG PET) under conscious state and cognitive behavioural tests were performed after 4-week treatment. In addition, an in vitro senescent model was established, and the expressions of key cognition-associated proteins and/or the alterations of key neuronal pathways were analysed in both brain tissues and cultured cells. RESULTS Aged mice treated with YBP demonstrated higher glucose metabolism in the right hippocampus and bilateral somatosensory cortices, and lower glucose metabolism in the right bed nucleus of stria terminalis and left cerebellum. YBP treatment exerted beneficial effects on the spatial and long-term social recognition memory, and significantly increased the expressions of several cognition-related proteins and altered the key neuronal signalling pathways in the hippocampus and somatosensory cortex. Further in vitro studies suggested that YBP but not aged blood plasma significantly upregulated the expressions of several cognition-associated proteins. CONCLUSION Our results highlight the role of the hippocampus and somatosensory cortex in YBP-induced beneficial effects on recognition memory in aged mice. 18F-FDG PET imaging under conscious state provides a new avenue for exploring the mechanisms underlying YBP treatment against age-related cognitive decline.

Background PET imaging has been widely used in diagnosis of neurological disorders; however, its application to pediatric population is limited due to lacking pediatric age–specific PET template. This study aims to develop a pediatric age–specific PET template (PAPT) and conduct a pilot study of epileptogenic focus localization in pediatric epilepsy. Methods We recruited 130 pediatric patients with epilepsy and 102 age-matched controls who underwent 18F-FDG PET examination. High-resolution PAPT was developed by an iterative nonlinear registration-averaging optimization approach for two age ranges: 6–10 years (n = 17) and 11–18 years (n = 50), respectively. Spatial normalization to the PAPT was evaluated by registration similarities of 35 validation controls, followed by estimation of potential registration biases. In a pilot study, epileptogenic focus was localized by PAPT-based voxel-wise statistical analysis, compared with multi-disciplinary team (MDT) diagnosis, and validated by follow-up of patients who underwent epilepsy surgery. Furthermore, epileptogenic focus localization results were compared among three templates (PAPT, conventional adult template, and a previously reported pediatric linear template). Results Spatial normalization to the PAPT significantly improved registration similarities (P P n = 40), the PAPT-based localization also achieved a substantial agreement with resection areas (Kappa = 0.743), and the highest detection rate (95%) and accuracy (80.0%). Conclusion The PAPT can significantly improve spatial normalization and epileptogenic focus localization in pediatric epilepsy. Future pediatric neuroimaging studies can also benefit from the unbiased spatial normalization by PAPT. Trial registration. NCT04725162: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04725162

Purpose This study aimed to develop a novel analytic approach based on 2-deoxy-2-[18F]fluoro-D-glucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography ([18F]FDG PET/CT) radiomic signature (RS) and International Prognostic Index (IPI) to predict the progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) of patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL). Methods We retrospectively enrolled 152 DLBCL patients and divided them into a training cohort (n = 100) and a validation cohort (n = 52). A total of 1245 radiomic features were extracted from the total metabolic tumor volume (TMTV) and the metabolic bulk volume (MBV) of pre-treatment PET/CT images. The least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) algorithm was applied to develop the RS. Cox regression analysis was used to construct hybrid nomograms based on different RS and clinical variables. The performances of hybrid nomograms were evaluated using the time-dependent receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curve and the Hosmer–Lemeshow test. The clinical utilities of prediction nomograms were determined via decision curve analysis. The predictive efficiency of different RS, clinical variables, and hybrid nomograms was compared. Results The RS and IPI were identified as independent predictors of PFS and OS, and were selected to construct hybrid nomograms. Both TMTV- and MBV-based hybrid nomograms had significantly higher values of area under the curve (AUC) than IPI in training and validation cohorts (all P P > 0.05). The Hosmer–Lemeshow test showed that both TMTV- and MBV-based hybrid nomograms calibrated well in the training and validation cohorts (all P > 0.05). Decision curve analysis indicated that hybrid nomograms had higher net benefits than IPI. Conclusion The hybrid nomograms combining RS with IPI could significantly improve survival prediction in DLBCL. Radiomic analysis on MBV may serve as a potential approach for prognosis assessment in DLBCL. Trial registration NCT04317313. Registered March 16, 2020. Public site: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04317313

Positron emission tomography (PET) with 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose ([18F]-FDG) has been increasingly applied in precise localization of epileptogenic focus in epilepsy patients, including pediatric patients. The aim of this international consensus is to provide the guideline and specific considerations for [18F]-FDG PET in pediatric patients affected by epilepsy. An international, multidisciplinary task group is formed, and the guideline for brain [18F]-FDG PET/CT in pediatric epilepsy patients has been discussed and approved, which include but not limited to the clinical indications, patient preparation, radiopharmaceuticals and administered activities, image acquisition, image processing, image interpretation, documentation and reporting, etc. This is the first international consensus and practice guideline for brain [18F]-FDG PET/CT in pediatric epilepsy patients. It will be an international standard for this purpose in clinical practice.

The local microenvironment is essential to stem cell-based therapy for ischemic stroke, and spatiotemporal changes of the microenvironment in the pathological process provide vital clues for understanding the therapeutic mechanisms. However, relevant studies on microenvironmental changes were mainly confined in the acute phase of stroke, and long-term changes remain unclear. This study aimed to investigate the microenvironmental changes in the subacute and chronic phases of ischemic stroke after stem cell transplantation. Herein, induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and neural stem cells (NSCs) were transplanted into the ischemic brain established by middle cerebral artery occlusion surgery. Positron emission tomography imaging and neurological tests were applied to evaluate the metabolic and neurofunctional alterations of rats transplanted with stem cells. Quantitative proteomics was employed to investigate the protein expression profiles in iPSCs-transplanted brain in the subacute and chronic phases of stroke. Compared with NSCs-transplanted rats, significantly increased glucose metabolism and neurofunctional scores were observed in iPSCs-transplanted rats. Subsequent proteomic data of iPSCs-transplanted rats identified a total of 39 differentially expressed proteins in the subacute and chronic phases, which are involved in various ischemic stroke-related biological processes, including neuronal survival, axonal remodeling, antioxidative stress, and mitochondrial function restoration. Taken together, our study indicated that iPSCs have a positive therapeutic effect in ischemic stroke and emphasized the wide-ranging microenvironmental changes in the subacute and chronic phases.

Acute stress relates to high prevalence of anxiety, depression or even sudden death. Although dopaminergic system in amygdala-medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) circuit is hyper-responsive to stress-induced anxiety, the mechanisms that control anxiety still remains unanswered. Here, the acute restraint stress model(ARS) was established to develop anxiety-like behavior. The D2-dopamine receptor (D2R) availability in amygdala and mPFC was assessed using [18F]-fallypride positron emission tomography(PET) and immunohistochemical assay. We revealed that ARS paradigm was successfully established, as evidenced by elevated plus-maze test(EPM) and increased corticosterone release. Moreover, PET imaging displayed elevated D2R availability in the amygdala and mPFC in ARS as compared to that in the naives. PET imaging combined with immunohistochemical assay confirmed that amygdaloid D2R was significantly implicated in stress-induced anxiety. Our findings delivered valuable insights into neuromechanism of amygdaloid D2R underlying stress-induced anxiety and might have important implications for developing therapeutics for anxiety by targeting amygdaloid D2R.

Thalassemia is a common monogenic disease in southwestern China, especially in Guizhou province. In this study, 18 309 neonates were examined for thalassemia. The thalassemia carrier rate was 12.90%, which is associated with geographical regions, with carrier frequencies significantly differing between regions (p < 0.0001). The carrier rates for α-thalassemia and β-thalassemia were 8.91% and 3.36%, respectively. There are 22 genotypes identified among 1632 α-thalassemia cases, and 18 genotypes detected among 615 β-thalassemia cases. The birthrates of individuals with intermediate thalassemia and β-thalassemia major were 0.153% and 0.055%, respectively. Methodologically, NGS-Gap-PCR is superior to traditional detection methods, with 65 more cases detected by NGS-Gap-PCR. Since thalassemia-rich genotypes were highly prevalent in this region, early detection of thalassemia carriers would be meaningful for genetic counseling and prevention/treatment of thalassemia. NGS-Gap-PCR provides a powerful tool for neonate genetic testing and clinical diagnosis of thalassemia, especially in high-prevalence regions.

Normal brain aging is commonly associated with neural activity alteration, β-amyloid (Aβ) deposition, and tau aggregation, driving a progressive cognitive decline in normal elderly individuals. Positron emission tomography (PET) with radiotracers targeting these age-related changes has been increasingly employed to clarify the sequence of their occurrence and the evolution of clinically cognitive deficits. Herein, we reviewed recent literature on PET-based imaging of normal human brain aging in terms of neural activity, Aβ, and tau. Neural hypoactivity reflected by decreased glucose utilization with PET imaging has been predominately reported in the frontal, cingulate, and temporal lobes of the normal aging brain. Aβ PET imaging uncovers the pathophysiological association of Aβ deposition with cognitive aging, as well as the potential mechanisms. Tau-associated cognitive changes in normal aging are likely independent of but facilitated by Aβ as indicated by tau and Aβ PET imaging. Future longitudinal studies using multi-radiotracer PET imaging combined with other neuroimaging modalities, such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) morphometry, functional MRI, and magnetoencephalography, are essential to elucidate the neuropathological underpinnings and interactions in normal brain aging.

This study took shear wave elastography (SWE) technology to measure the shear wave velocity (SWV) of peripheral nerve in healthy population, which represents the stiffness of the peripheral nerves, and research whether these parameters (location, age, sex, body mass index (BMI), the thickness and cross-sectional area(CSA) of the nerve) would affect the stiffness of the peripheral nerves. 105 healthy volunteers were enrolled in this study. We recorded the genders and ages of these volunteers, measured height and weight, calculated BMI, measured nerve thickness and CSA using high-frequency ultrasound (HFUS), and then, we measured and compared the SWV of the right median nerve at the middle of the forearm and at the proximal entrance of the carpal tunnel. The SWV of the median nerve of the left side was measured to explore whether there exist differences of SWV in bilateral median nerve. Additionally, we also measured the SWV of the right tibial nerve at the ankle canal to test whether there is any difference in shear wave velocity between different peripheral nerves. This study found that there existed significant differences of SWV between different sites in one nerve and between different peripheral nerves. No significant difference was found in SWV between bilateral median nerves. Additionally, the SWV of peripheral nerves was associated with gender, while not associated with age or BMI. The mean SWV of the studied male volunteers in median nerve were significantly higher than those of female (p

Pathology is the medical specialty concerned with the study of the disease nature and causes, playing a key role in bridging basic researches and clinical medicine. In the course of development, pathology has significantly expanded our understanding of disease, and exerted enormous impact on the management of patients. However, challenges facing pathology, the inherent invasiveness of pathological practice and the persistent concerns on the sample representativeness, constitute its limitations. Molecular imaging is a noninvasive technique to visualize, characterize, and measure biological processes at the molecular level in living subjects. With the continuous development of equipment and probes, molecular imaging has enabled an increasingly precise evaluation of pathophysiological changes. A new pathophysiology visualization system based on molecular imaging is forming and shows the great potential to reform the pathological practice. Several improvements in “trans-,” including trans-scale, transparency, and translation, would be driven by this new kind of pathological practice. Pathological changes could be evaluated in a trans-scale imaging mode; tissues could be transparentized to better present the underlying pathophysiological information; and the translational processes of basic research to the clinical practice would be better facilitated. Thus, transpathology would greatly facilitate in deciphering the pathophysiological events in a multiscale perspective, and supporting the precision medicine in the future.

Radiographically assisted dental identification is an important means for individual identification. Specific identifiers help to quickly filter some of the possible corresponding AM and PM images at the beginning. The study seeks specific oral and maxillofacial identifiers in panoramic radiographs. A total of 920 panoramic radiographs from 460 live patients were used. The most recent radiograph served as the surrogate post-mortem (PM) record of an unidentified person, and the earliest radiograph served as the ante-mortem (AM) record of the same person. We evaluated the following four groups of identifiers of the images: (1) dental morphology, tooth number, and position; (2) dental treatment and pathology; (3) morphological identifiers of the jaw; and (4) pathological identifiers of the jaw. The ratio of each identifier being identified simultaneously in the AM and PM databases was determined. Specific identifiers were defined as those that appeared at low frequency (ratio: 0%-0.250%). A total of 18 specific oral and maxillofacial identifiers were determined. The specific identifiers were a retained deciduous tooth (0.011%), S-shaped deflection of a tooth root (0.012%), distal deflection of tooth root (0.017%), inverted impaction (0.018%), malposition (0.038%), supernumerary teeth (0.061%), mesial deflection of tooth root (0.092%), microdontia (0.136%), buccal/lingual impaction (0.188%), cementoma (0.002%), hypercementosis (0.002%), continuous crown (0.004%), pulp calcification (0.023%), attrition (0.030%), residual root (0.106%), root resorption (0.137%), implant (0.156%), and osteomyelitis (0.002%). Identifiers of the teeth and jaw can be used for human identification, and dental identifiers are more specific than identifiers of jaw.

Purpose Epilepsy is one of the most disabling neurological disorders, which affects all age groups and often results in severe consequences. Since misdiagnoses are common, many pediatric patients fail to receive the correct treatment. Recently, 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography (18F-FDG PET) imaging has been used for the evaluation of pediatric epilepsy. However, the epileptic focus is very difficult to be identified by visual assessment since it may present either hypo- or hyper-metabolic abnormality with unclear boundary. This study aimed to develop a novel symmetricity-driven deep learning framework of PET imaging for the identification of epileptic foci in pediatric patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE). Methods We retrospectively included 201 pediatric patients with TLE and 24 age-matched controls who underwent 18F-FDG PET-CT studies. 18F-FDG PET images were quantitatively investigated using 386 symmetricity features, and a pair-of-cube (PoC)-based Siamese convolutional neural network (CNN) was proposed for precise localization of epileptic focus, and then metabolic abnormality level of the predicted focus was calculated automatically by asymmetric index (AI). Performances of the proposed framework were compared with visual assessment, statistical parametric mapping (SPM) software, and Jensen-Shannon divergence-based logistic regression (JS-LR) analysis. Results The proposed deep learning framework could detect the epileptic foci accurately with the dice coefficient of 0.51, which was significantly higher than that of SPM (0.24, P < 0.01) and significantly (or marginally) higher than that of visual assessment (0.31–0.44, P = 0.005–0.27). The area under the curve (AUC) of the PoC classification was higher than that of the JS-LR (0.93 vs. 0.72). The metabolic level detection accuracy of the proposed method was significantly higher than that of visual assessment blinded or unblinded to clinical information (90% vs. 56% or 68%, P < 0.01). Conclusion The proposed deep learning framework for 18F-FDG PET imaging could identify epileptic foci accurately and efficiently, which might be applied as a computer-assisted approach for the future diagnosis of epilepsy patients. Trial registration NCT04169581. Registered November 13, 2019 Public site: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04169581

Personality assessments are at present nearly entirely dependent on self-reports, and machine learning methods have been rarely applied to this field. This study used machine learning to predict people’s self-reported proactive personalities. Based on a sample of 901 participants that used Weibo text and short answer text, the authors used five machine learning algorithms for classification: Support Vector Machine (SVM), XGboost, k-nearest neighbor (KNN), naïve Bayes, and logistic regression. Seven different indicators – Accuracy (ACC), F1-score(F1), Sensitivity(SEN), Specificity (SPE), Positive Predictive Value (PPV), Negative Predictive Value (NPV) and Area under Curve (AUC) – combined with hierarchical cross-validation were also used to make the comprehensive evaluation of models. Based on this, we proposed a method to classify people’s proactive personalities based on text mining technology. The results showed that the SVM and naïve Bayes outperformed the other methods on short texts (i.e., short answer texts) and mixed long texts (i.e., short answer & Weibo text). In the context of the texts used, mixed long text (i.e., short answer & Weibo text) improved and stabilized the indices, and this combination was the best choice of text for predicting proactive personality. In addition, the SVM was the most stable classifier in most situations, even on Weibo text that was not suitable for analysis as long text, and it also recorded good results in terms of accuracy, the F1-score, and the AUC.

In transportation architecture, wayfinding quality is a crucial factor for determining transfer efficiency and level of service. When developing architectural design concepts, designers often employ their visual attention to imagine where passengers will look. A saliency model is a software program that can predict human visual attention. This research examined whether a saliency model or designer visual attention is a good predictor of passenger visual attention during wayfinding inside transportation architecture. Using a remote eye-tracking system, the eye-movements of 29 participants watching 100 still images depicting different indoor scenes of transportation architecture were recorded and transformed into saliency maps to illustrate participants' visual attention. Participants were categorized as either “designers” or “laypeople” based on their architectural design expertise. Similarities were compared among the “designers'” visual attention, saliency model predictions, and “laypeople's” visual attention. The results showed that while the “designers'” visual attention was the best predictor of that of “laypeople”, followed by saliency models, a single designer's visual attention was not a good predictor. The divergence in visual attention highlights the limitation of designers in predicting passenger wayfinding behavior and implies that integrating a saliency model in practice can be beneficial for wayfinding design.

Hypoxia conditioning could increase the survival of transplanted neuronal progenitor cells (NPCs) in rats with cerebral ischemia but could also hinder neuronal differentiation partly by suppressing mitochondrial metabolism. In this work, the mitochondrial metabolism of hypoxia-conditioned NPCs (hcNPCs) was upregulated via the additional administration of resveratrol, an herbal compound, to resolve the limitation of hypoxia conditioning on neuronal differentiation. Resveratrol was first applied during the in vitro neuronal differentiation of hcNPCs and concurrently promoted the differentiation, synaptogenesis, and functional development of neurons derived from hcNPCs and restored the mitochondrial metabolism. Furthermore, this herbal compound was used as an adjuvant during hcNPC transplantation in a photothrombotic stroke rat model. Resveratrol promoted neuronal differentiation and increased the long-term survival of transplanted hcNPCs. 18-fluorine fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography and rotarod test showed that resveratrol and hcNPC transplantation synergistically improved the neurological and metabolic recovery of stroke rats. In conclusion, resveratrol promoted the neuronal differentiation and therapeutic efficiency of hcNPCs in stroke rats via restoring mitochondrial metabolism. This work suggested a novel approach to promote the clinical translation of NPC transplantation therapy.

Background. Lipid abnormalities are prevalent among people living with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) (PLWH) and contribute to increasing risk of cardiovascular events. This study aims to investigate the incidence of dyslipidemia and its risk factors in PLWH after receiving different first-line free antiretroviral regimens. Methods. PLWH who sought care at the Third People's Hospital of Shenzhen from January 2014 to December 2018 were included, and the baseline characteristics and clinical data during the follow-up were collected, including total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C). The risk factors of dyslipidemia after antiretroviral therapy were analyzed with the generalized estimating equation model. Results. Among the 7623 PLWH included, the mean levels of TC, HDL-C and LDL-C were 4.23 ± 0.85 mmol/L, 1.27 ± 0.29 mmol/L and 2.54 ± 0.65 mmol/L, respectively, and the median TG was 1.17 (IQR: 0.85−1.68) mmol/L. Compared with that in PLWH receiving tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (TDF) + lamivudine (3TC) + ritonavir-boosted lopinavir (LPV/r), zidovudine (AZT) + 3TC + efavirenz (EFV), and AZT + 3TC + LPV/r, the incidence of dyslipidemia was lower in PLWH receiving TDF + 3TC + EFV. In multivariate analysis, we found that the risks of elevations of TG, TC, and LDL-C were higher with TDF + 3TC + LPV/r (TG: odds ratio [OR] = 2.82, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.55−3.11, P

Background Our study aimed to explore the anxiety levels and possible associated factors in the pediatric medical staff in Jiangsu province during an outbreak of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). Methods Pediatric medical staff (n=534) from nine hospitals in Jiangsu province were enrolled. Their anxiety levels and quality of sleep were assessed using the online SAS and PSQI questionnaires. Results The prevalence of anxiety was 14.0% among the medical staff. In children's hospital staff, anxiety levels in outpatient and emergency departments were significantly higher than those in inpatient departments, except for the intensive care unit. The SAS scores were significantly associated with educational background, professional title, lifestyle, and physical condition. Stepwise multiple linear regression showed that physical condition, lifestyle, attention to the epidemic, professional title, and educational background all had a linear relationship with the individual's anxiety levels. Pearson correlation analysis showed that sleep quality was moderately associated with anxiety levels. Conclusions The prevalence of anxiety was 14.0% in pediatric medical staff in Jiangsu province during an outbreak of COVID-19. Department, professional title, and educational background were associated with anxiety levels in these workers. More attention should be paid to staff who are in poor health, and this anxiety can also be accompanied by poor sleep quality. Peer support can assist with anxiety relief.

To study the expression of CD14 + CD16 + monocytes and VEGF and the levels of serum adiponectin and MCP-1 in peripheral blood of patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) and diabetic macroangiopathy to understand the possible mechanism of inflammatory immune response in T2DM and diabetic macroangiopathy. Peripheral blood CD14 + CD16 + monocytes were detected by flow cytometry in 50 T2DM patients, 50 patients with diabetic macroangiopathy, and 20 healthy controls or normal controls who participated in outpatient physical examination, and used the Ficoll-Hypaque density gradient centrifugation isolated PBMC and quantitative PCR technology comparison between groups research object in the peripheral blood PBMC VEGF mRNA expression level. Serum levels of adiponectin and MCP-1 were measured by ELISA. Compared with normal control group (NGT), the fluorescence intensity of proinflammatory CD14 + CD16 + monocytes in simple T2DM group and T2DM combined with macroangiopathy group were significantly increased (p T2DM patients> healthy volunteers, the differences were significant (p

Cannabinoid type 1 receptor (CB1R), as the major member of the endocannabinoid system, is among the most abundant receptors expressed in the central nervous system. CB1R is mainly located on the axon terminals of presynaptic neurons and participate in the modulation of neuronal excitability and synaptic plasticity, playing an important role in the pathogenesis of various neuropsychiatric diseases. In recent years, the consistent development of CB1R radioligands and the maturity of molecular imaging techniques, particularly positron emission tomography (PET) may help to visualize the expression and distribution of CB1R in central nervous system in vivo. At present, CB1R PET imaging can effectively evaluate the changes of CB1R levels in neuropsychiatric diseases such as Huntington’s disease and schizophrenia, and its correlation with the disease severity, therefore providing new insights for the diagnosis and treatment of neuropsychiatric diseases. This article reviews the application of CB1R PET imaging in Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, Huntington’s disease, schizophrenia, post-traumatic stress disorder, cannabis use disorder and depression.

Purpose: Adjuvant therapy for small, node-negative HER2-positive breast cancer (HER2+ BC) is controversial. We aimed to identify the subgroup that would benefit most from adjuvant chemotherapy and trastuzumab. Experimental Design: We reviewed records of patients with pT1N0M0 HER2+ BC treated at our institution from January 1, 1998, through October 31, 2009. We compared three groups: A, no adjuvant chemotherapy; B, adjuvant chemotherapy only; and C, adjuvant chemotherapy with trastuzumab. We evaluated disease-free survival (DFS), overall survival (OS), distant recurrence-free survival (DRFS), and breast cancer-specific survival (BCSS) in each group. Results: We reviewed 587 consecutive patients with a median follow-up of 123.0 months. The 10-year DFS rate was 81.0%, 65.4%, and 97.3% in groups A, B, and C, respectively (P < 0.001). The restricted mean survival time ratio did not differ between groups A and B [ratio = 0.982; 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.930–1.036; P = 0.498). Cox regression showed that adjuvant chemotherapy with trastuzumab was associated with better DFS compared with no adjuvant chemotherapy [hazard ratio (HR), 0.071; 95% CI, 0.025–0.204; P < 0.001). Larger tumor size was associated with short DFS (HR, 2.384; 95% CI, 1.549–3.056; P < 0.001); improvements in DFS, OS, DRFS, and BCSS were observed with adjuvant chemotherapy plus trastuzumab in patients with tumors ≥0.8-cm diameter. Receiving adjuvant chemotherapy with trastuzumab was not associated with improved DFS, OS, or DRFS for tumors Conclusions: Adjuvant chemotherapy plus trastuzumab should be recommended for patients with pT1N0M0 HER2+ BC ≥0.8 cm in diameter; adjuvant therapy may not be necessary for tumors

In vitro fertilization/intracytoplasmic sperm injection (IVF/ICSI).is associated with an increased risk of preterm (33rd - 37th gestational week), and early preterm birth (20th - 32nd gestational week). The underlying general and procedure related risk factors are not well understood so far. 4,328 infertile women undergoing IVF/ICSI were entered into this study. The study population was divided into three groups: a) early preterm birth group (n=66), b) preterm birth group (n=675 ) and c) full-term birth group (n=3653). Odds for preterm birth were calculated by stepwise multivariate logistic regression analysis. We identified seven independent risk factors for preterm birth and four independent risk factors for early preterm birth. Older (>39) or younger (

BackgroundDynamic changes in circulating immune-inflammatory cells have been regarded as simple and convenient prognostic biomarkers in various cancers. However, studies on the prognostic values of their ratios in oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) remain limited.Materials and MethodsA total of 493 OSCC patients were included in the present study. Here, we investigated the prognostic values of the neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), lymphocyte-to-monocyte ratio (LMR), neutrophil-to-white blood cell ratio (NWR), and lymphocyte-to-white blood cell ratio (LWR) in OSCC. The correlations of the NLR, LMR, NWR, and LWR with clinicopathological characteristics were statistically analyzed using the Chi-square test, Kaplan-Meier curves, and univariate and multivariate Cox regression models.ResultKaplan-Meier analyses revealed that OSCC patients with a high LMR and low NWR had prolonged overall survival (OS, PPP=0.003, respectively), but there were no significant differences in metastasis-free survival (MFS, P=0.053 and P=0.052, respectively). In contrary, a high NLR and low LWR were associated with poor OS (PP=0.0016, respectively), DFS (P=0.0014 and 0.0012, respectively) and MFS (P=0.021 and 0.008, respectively). Additionally, Cox multivariate analyses showed that the LMR was an independent prognostic factor for both OS (P=0.007) and DFS (P=0.017), while the LWR was an independent prognostic factor for MFS (P=0.009).ConclusionPreoperative NLR, LMR, NWR, and LWR in the peripheral blood are significant prognostic factors for OSCC and might be helpful in predicting OSCC progression.

Background Both patient-specific dose recalculation and γ passing rate analysis are important for the quality assurance (QA) of intensity modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) plans. The aim of this study was to analyse the correlation between the γ passing rates and the volumes of air cavities (Vair) and bony structures (Vbone) in target volume of head and neck cancer. Methods Twenty nasopharyngeal carcinoma and twenty nasal natural killer T-cell lymphoma patients were enrolled in this study. Nine-field sliding window IMRT plans were produced and the dose distributions were calculated by anisotropic analytical algorithm (AAA), Acuros XB algorithm (AXB) and SciMoCa based on the Monte Carlo (MC) technique. The dose distributions and γ passing rates of the targets, organs at risk, air cavities and bony structures were compared among the different algorithms. Results The γ values obtained with AAA and AXB were 95.6 ± 1.9% and 96.2 ± 1.7%, respectively, with 3%/2 mm criteria (p > 0.05). There were significant differences (p Vair (R2 = 0.674) and inversely proportional to the natural logarithm of Vbone (R2 = 0.816). When the Vair in the targets was smaller than approximately 80 cc or the Vbone in the targets was larger than approximately 6 cc, the γ values of AAA were below 95%. Using AXB, no significant relationship was found between the γ values and Vair or Vbone. Conclusion In clinical head and neck IMRT QA, greater attention should be paid to the effect of Vair and Vbone in the targets on the γ passing rates when using different dose calculation algorithms.

This research adopted a typological approach to explore international students' academic engagement in China. Using data generated by a survey study involving 801 international undergraduate students at 34 full-time Chinese universities, this research developed an international student engagement typology, and examined important individual and learning environment factors associated with the engagement types presented in the typology. The international student engagement typology helps to understand and enhance international undergraduate students' learning experiences in Chinese HEIs. Although located in China, this research holds implications for practitioners in broader contexts striving for the sustainable development of international student education.

In rare cases, clinical inhibitors of the pro-inflammatory cytokine tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) can induce symptoms of lupus erythematosus (drug-induced lupus, DIL), but this adverse response usually resolves rapidly upon drug withdrawal. We report the case of a 25-year-old Asian woman with rheumatoid arthritis exhibiting severe prolonged DIL even after the termination of TNF-α inhibitor treatment. The patient had been treated intermittently using Traditional Chinese Medicine for 11 years, but this therapy failed to effectively control her clinical symptoms. Subsequently, methotrexate and hydroxychloroquine were prescribed, but a reduced white blood cell count was detected. Finally, the TNF-α inhibitor Anbainuo was prescribed. However, after 2 months of treatment, the patient exhibited elevated serum creatinine, anti-double-stranded DNA (+++), anti-nuclear antibody (1:1000), and urine protein (+++) accompanied by buccal erythema, hair loss, and hand shaking, consistent with Anbainuo-induced lupus, lupus nephritis, and lupus encephalopathy. Moreover, her serum creatinine level remained high after Anbainuo withdrawal and prolonged steroid and immunosuppressive therapy. Careful and sustained monitoring for adverse reactions to Anbainuo (and other TNF-α inhibitors) is recommended.

Vision-based automatic railway fastener inspection, instead of manual operation, remains a great challenge. Even though many supervised learning-based methods have been developed, expensive training labels and imbalanced data are the main obstacles to leverage the performance of the fastener inspection task. To tackle the problems, we present a novel vision-based fastener inspection system (VFIS) which is inspired by few-shot learning. VFIS can automatically collect and annotate a large number of fastener samples by using the proposed online template matching-based classification method, and it only requires a very small number of annotated fastener templates. Moreover, we employ a similarity-based deep network to solve the problem of the imbalanced dataset. The comprehensive experiments are conducted on a large scale fastener dataset. VFIS yields competitive performance on both fastener localization and fastener classification. Specifically, an average detection rate of 99.36% is achieved for fastener localization, and an average accuracy of 92.69% is achieved for fastener classification. Moreover, for identifying defective fasteners, our proposed method achieves an average precision of 92.63% and an average recall of 92.88%.

In order to assess the health risk of low-dose radiation to radiation professionals, monitoring is performed through chromosomal aberration analysis and micronuclei (MN) analysis. MN formation has drawbacks for monitoring in the low-dose range. Nucleoplasmic bridge (NPB) analysis, with a lower background level, has good dose-response relationships at both high and relatively low dose ranges. Dicentric and ring chromosomes were analyzed in 199 medical radiation professionals, and NPB/MN yields were analyzed in 205 radiation professionals. The effects of sex, age of donor, types of work, and length of service on these cytogenetic endpoints were also analyzed. The yields of the three cytogenetic endpoints were significantly higher in radiation professionals versus controls. Frequencies of dicentric plus ring chromosomes were affected by length of service. NPB frequencies were influenced by type of work and length of service. MN yields were affected not only by types of work and length of service but also by donor sex and age. In conclusion, dicentric plus ring chromosomes, NPB, and MN can be induced by low-dose radiation in radiation professionals. NPB is a potential biomarker to assess the health risk of occupational low-dose radiation exposure.

Objectives To compare the efficacy and prognosis of one-stop hybrid surgery using the elephant trunk procedure for treatment of complex Stanford type B aortic dissection. Methods We retrospectively analyzed patients who underwent surgical treatment from January 2014 to July 2019. The patients were divided into those who underwent the elephant trunk procedure (n = 10) and those who underwent one-stop hybrid surgery (n = 10). The cardiopulmonary bypass time, mechanical ventilation time, length of hospital stay, and red blood cell usage were compared between the two groups. All patients’ 3-month postoperative aortic computed tomography angiography (CTA) findings were also reviewed. Results The cardiopulmonary bypass time, mechanical ventilation time, and length of hospital stay were significantly shorter and red blood cell usage was significantly lower in the one-stop hybridization group. The aortic cross-clamp time was not significantly different between the two groups. Aortic CTA review after hybrid surgery showed that the true lumen of the descending aorta was almost completely restored at 3 months. Conclusion One-stop hybrid surgery effectively alleviated the occlusion of the aortic dissection, prevented the need for additional surgery, and expanded the indications for covered-stent endovascular repair.

The novel 2019 Coronavirus (COVID-19) infection has spread worldwide and is currently a major healthcare challenge around the world. Chest computed tomography (CT) and X-ray images have been well recognized to be two effective techniques for clinical COVID-19 disease diagnoses. Due to faster imaging time and considerably lower cost than CT, detecting COVID-19 in chest X-ray (CXR) images is preferred for efficient diagnosis, assessment, and treatment. However, considering the similarity between COVID-19 and pneumonia, CXR samples with deep features distributed near category boundaries are easily misclassified by the hyperplanes learned from limited training data. Moreover, most existing approaches for COVID-19 detection focus on the accuracy of prediction and overlook uncertainty estimation, which is particularly important when dealing with noisy datasets. To alleviate these concerns, we propose a novel deep network named RCoNet $^{k}_{s}$ for robust COVID-19 detection which employs Deformable Mutual Information Maximization (DeIM), Mixed High-order Moment Feature (MHMF), and Multiexpert Uncertainty-aware Learning (MUL). With DeIM, the mutual information (MI) between input data and the corresponding latent representations can be well estimated and maximized to capture compact and disentangled representational characteristics. Meanwhile, MHMF can fully explore the benefits of using high-order statistics and extract discriminative features of complex distributions in medical imaging. Finally, MUL creates multiple parallel dropout networks for each CXR image to evaluate uncertainty and thus prevent performance degradation caused by the noise in the data. The experimental results show that RCoNet $^{k}_{s}$ achieves the state-of-the-art performance on an open-source COVIDx dataset of 15 134 original CXR images across several metrics. Crucially, our method is shown to be more effective than existing methods with the presence of noise in the data.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has become a major public health problem worldwide since its outbreak in 2019. Currently, the spread of COVID-19 is far from over, and various complications have roused increasing awareness of the public, calling for novel techniques to aid at diagnosis and treatment. Based on the principle of molecular imaging, positron emission tomography (PET) is expected to offer pathophysiological alternations of COVID-19 in the molecular/cellular perspectives and facilitate the clinical management of patients. A number of PET-related cases and research have been reported on COVID-19 over the past one year. This article reviews the current studies of PET in the diagnosis and treatment of COVID-19, and discusses potential applications of PET in the development of management strategy for COVID-19 patients in the pandemic era.

We report herein an unusual case of systemic lupus erythematosus in a 35-year-old woman who developed acute abdominal pain while hospitalized. Abdominal computed tomography (CT) scan with enhancement indicated long-segment inflammatory lesions in the right ureter. The patient received spasmolytic and analgesic drugs with poor effect and continued to have persistent severe abdominal pain and signs of peritonitis. We suspected that the patient had acute abdominal disease, but no abnormality was detected during laparoscopic surgery. Therefore, we considered the possibility of right upper urinary tract hydronephrosis; the patient’s abdominal pain was relieved after double-J tube implantation. The patient’s clinical symptoms improved after hormone and mycophenolate mofetil therapy for 1 year, and all laboratory indicators returned to normal. Reexamination by abdominal CT showed that the long-segment inflammatory lesions of the right ureter had resolved. Early identification and diagnosis are important for ureteritis associated with systemic lupus erythematosus.

The crosstalk between cancer cells and adipocytes is critical for breast cancer progression. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying these interactions have not been fully characterized. In the present study, plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1) was found to be a critical effector of the metastatic behavior of breast cancer cells upon adipocyte coculture. Loss-of-function studies indicated that silencing PAI-1 suppressed cancer cell migration. Furthermore, we found that PAI-1 was closely related to the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) process in breast cancer patients. A loss-of-function study and a mammary orthotopic implantation metastasis model showed that PAI-1 promoted breast cancer metastasis by affecting the EMT process. In addition, we revealed that leptin/OBR mediated the regulation of PAI-1 through the interactions between adipocytes and breast cancer cells. Mechanistically, we elucidated that leptin/OBR further activated STAT3 to promote PAI-1 expression via miR-34a&ndash, dependent and miR-34a&ndash, independent mechanisms in breast cancer cells. In conclusion, our study suggests that targeting PAI-1 and interfering with its upstream regulators may benefit breast cancer patients.

Rapid early triage and dose estimation is vital for limited medical resource allocation and treatment of a large number of the wounded after radiological accidents. Lipidomics has been utilized to delineate biofluid lipid signatures after irradiation. Here, high-coverage targeted lipidomics was employed to screen radiosensitive lipids after 0, 1, 2, 3, 5, and 8 Gy total body irradiation at 4, 24, and 72 h postirradiation in rat plasma. Ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry with a multiple reaction monitoring method was utilized. In total, 416 individual lipids from 18 major classes were quantified and those biomarkers altered in a dose-dependent manner constituted panel A-panel D. Receiver operator characteristic curve analysis using combined lipids showed good to excellent sensitivity and specificity in triaging different radiation exposure levels (area under curve = 0.814-1.000). The equations for dose estimation were established by stepwise regression analysis for three time points. A novel strategy for radiation early triage and dose estimation was first established and validated using panels of lipids. Our study suggests that it is feasible to acquire quantitative lipid biomarker panels using targeted lipidomics platforms for rapid, high-throughput triage, which can provide further insights in developing lipidomics strategies for radiation biodosimetry in humans.

Atypical benign epilepsy with centro-temporal spikes (BECTS) have less favorable outcomes than typical BECTS, and thus should be accurately identified for adequate treatment. We aimed to investigate the glucose metabolic differences between typical and atypical BECTS using 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography ([18F]FDG PET) imaging, and explore whether these differences can help distinguish. Forty-six patients with typical BECTS, 31 patients with atypical BECTS and 23 controls who underwent [18F]FDG PET examination were retrospectively involved. Absolute asymmetry index (|AI|) was applied to evaluate the severity of metabolic abnormality. Glucose metabolic differences were investigated among typical BECTS, atypical BECTS, and controls by using statistical parametric mapping (SPM). Logistic regression analyses were performed based on clinical, PET, and hybrid features. The |AI| was found significantly higher in atypical BECTS than in typical BECTS (p = 0.040). Atypical BECTS showed more hypo-metabolism regions than typical BECTS, mainly located in the fronto-temporo-parietal cortex. The PET model had significantly higher area under the curve (AUC) than the clinical model (0.91 vs. 0.70, p = 0.006). The hybrid model had the highest sensitivity (0.90), specificity (0.85), and accuracy (0.87) of all three models. Atypical BECTS showed more widespread and severe hypo-metabolism than typical BECTS, depending on which the two groups can be well distinguished. The combination of metabolic characteristics and clinical variables has the potential to be used clinically to distinguish between typical and atypical BECTS. • Distinguishing between typical and atypical BECTS is very important for the formulation of treatment regimens in clinical practice. • Atypical BECTS showed more widespread and severe hypo-metabolism than typical BECTS, mainly located in the fronto-temporo-parietal cortex. • The logistic regression model based on PET outperformed that based on clinical characteristics in classification of typical and atypical BECTS, and the hybrid model achieved the best classification performance.

During the past two decades, aggregation-induced emission luminogens (AIEgens) have been intensively exploited for biological and biomedical applications. Although a series of investigations have been performed in non-primate animal models, there is few pilot studies in non-human primate animal models, strongly hindering the clinical translation of AIE luminogens (AIEgens). Herein, we present a systemic and multifaceted demonstration of an optical imaging-guided surgical operation via AIEgens from small animals (e.g., mice and rabbits) to rhesus macaque, the typical non-human primate animal model. Specifically, the folic conjugated-AIE luminogen (folic-AIEgen) generates strong and stable fluorescence for the detection and surgical excision of sentinel lymph nodes (SLNs). Moreover, with the superior tumor/normal tissue ratio and rapid tumor accumulation, folic-AIEgen successfully images and guides the precise resection of invisible cancerous metastases. Taken together, the presented strategies of folic-AIEgen based fluorescence intraoperative imaging and visualization-guided surgery show potential for clinical applications.

We herein report an unusual case of primary Sjögren’s syndrome in a 38-year-old woman with typical clinical symptoms (joint pain, dry mouth, and positive Schirmer test) and immunoglobulin G positivity but negativity for antinuclear antibody and all antinuclear antibody spectrum antibodies. Emission computed tomography demonstrated normal ingestion but impaired secretion by the submandibular and bilateral parotid glands. Labial gland biopsy revealed chronic tissue inflammatory changes and Chisholm grade 4 lymphocyte infiltration, confirming primary Sjögren’s syndrome. The patient’s condition was successfully controlled by nonsteroidal treatment with tacrolimus. Patients presenting with chronic dry mouth should be examined by a Schirmer test, lip gland biopsy, and salivary gland emission computed tomography for possible Sjögren’s syndrome, even if serological autoantibodies are negative, to facilitate early intervention. Tacrolimus is a potential treatment option in patients intolerant of steroidal drugs.

The blood-brain barrier (BBB) hinders the distribution of therapeutics intended for treatment of neuroinflammation (NI) of the central nervous system. A twelve-amino acid peptide that transcytoses the BBB, termed MTfp, was chemically conjugated to siRNA to create a novel peptide-oligonucleotide conjugate (POC), directed to downregulate NOX4, a gene thought responsible for oxidative stress in ischemic stroke. The MTfp-NOX4 POC has the ability to cross the intact BBB and knockdown NOX4 expression in the brain. Following induction of ischemic stroke, animals pretreated with the POC exhibited significantly smaller infarcts; accompanied by increased protection against neurological deterioration and improved recovery. The data demonstrates that the MTfp can act as a nanomule to facilitate BBB transcytosis of siRNAs; where the NOX-4 specific siRNA moiety can elicit effective therapeutic knockdown of a gene responsible for oxidative stress in the central nervous system. This study is the first to conclusively demonstrate both siRNA-carrier delivery and therapeutic efficacy in any CNS disease model where the BBB remains intact and thus offers new avenues for potential treatments of oxidative stress underlying neuroinflammation in a variety of neuropathologies that are currently refractory to existing therapies.

A new aggregation-induced emission (AIE) luminescence core, 1-hydroquinol-1,2,2-triphenylethene (HQTPE), has been designed and synthesized for the first time. This AIE core is amazingly simple but is fundamentally important to chemistry because of its intrinsic redox and pH activities. The incorporation of hydroquinone (HQ) moiety into a common AIE core tetraphenylethene (TPE) yields HQTPE with unique fluorescent properties over most other AIEgens so far reported. There are tremendous differences of photochemcical properties between HQTPE, 1-benzoquinol-1,2,2-triphenylethene (QTPE, the oxidized counterpart) and its anions. Interestingly, as the solution concentration is increased, AIEgen HQTPE shows stronger fluorescence but QTPE exhibits rapid quenching of fluorescence in a nonlinear fashion, which are in agreement with theoretical studies. The fluorescence of HQTPE is also highly dependent of pH value of media. We have further explored HQTPE as an ultrasensitive redox probe and efficient deoxidizer, which could lead to many potential applications in health care, food security, environmental monitoring, optic and electronic devices.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a heterogeneous neurodevelopmental disorder associated with both genetic and environmental risks. Neuroimaging approaches have been widely employed to parse the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying ASD, and provide critical insights into the anatomical, functional, and neurochemical changes. We reviewed recent advances in neuroimaging studies that focused on ASD by using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), positron emission tomography (PET), or single-positron emission tomography (SPECT). Longitudinal structural MRI has delineated an abnormal developmental trajectory of ASD that is associated with cascading neurobiological processes, and functional MRI has pointed to disrupted functional neural networks. Meanwhile, PET and SPECT imaging have revealed that metabolic and neurotransmitter abnormalities may contribute to shaping the aberrant neural circuits of ASD. Future large-scale, multi-center, multimodal investigations are essential to elucidate the neurophysiological underpinnings of ASD, and facilitate the development of novel diagnostic biomarkers and better-targeted therapy.

Student engagement has been attracting attention in the discussion of higher education (HE) quality. Despite the rapid increase of international students in China, little understanding has been gained for quality management on these students&rsquo, engagement in learning. This paper focuses on international undergraduate students in Chinese higher education institutions, exploring the nature and characteristics of their academic engagement and the environmental factors influencing the engagement. The discussion was based on a synthesis of the findings of two studies, i.e., an exploratory qualitative study following a small group of international students at a research university and a large-scale survey involving 1428 international students at 34 Chinese universities. The analyses revealed less than satisfactory levels of international students&rsquo, engagement, with a high proportion of the participants being passively or ineffectively involved in learning. The qualitative findings highlighted pedagogical and attitudinal factors that affected international students&rsquo, engagement. The survey results indicated six environmental factors, categorized into three groups, having significant effects on the respondents&rsquo, engagement. Although located in China, the analyses bear implications for practitioners striving for the sustainable development of international education in a broader range of contexts.

Upregulation of a disintegrin and metalloprotease 9 (ADAM9) is correlated with progression of cancers, such as prostate, bladder, and pancreatic cancers. However, its role in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is still unclear. Our study aimed to investigate whether ADAM9 is upregulated and promoted the aggressiveness in TNBC. Breast cancer cell lines and patient specimens were used to evaluate the ADAM9 expression by western blotting and immunohistochemistry staining, respectively. Compared with the non-TNBC, ADAM9 expression was significantly increased in TNBC cells and TNBC patient specimens. Based on the data acquired from public databases, the correlation between ADAM9 expression and breast cancer patient survival was analyzed by Kaplan-Meier method. It was shown that ADAM9 overexpression was significantly correlated with poorer survival in patients with TNBC. Furthermore, ADAM9 in TNBC cells was knocked down by small interference RNA and then studied by the MTT/colony formation assay, wound healing assay and transwell invasion assay on the cell proliferation, migration, and invasion, respectively. We found that inhibiting ADAM9 expression suppressed TNBC cell proliferation, migration, and invasion by lowering the activation of AKT/NF-κB pathway. Our results demonstrated that ADAM9 is an important molecule in mediating TNBC aggressiveness and may be a potential useful therapeutic target in TNBC treatment.

Purpose: Simple, rapid and high-throughput dose assessment is critical for clinical diagnosis, treatment and emergency intervention in a large-scale radiological accident. The goal of this study is...

It is known that information collection is the first link in fault diagnosis. Whether the collected signal contains sufficient and effective fault information directly affects the final diagnosis result. The lack, one-sided and incomplete fault information is one of the main causes of uncertainty in fault diagnosis. Therefore, first of all, combined with the structural characteristics of numerical control machine tools equipped with a variety of precision sensors and the uniqueness of the numerical control mode of the machine tools, based on the concept of big data and the characteristics of different types of signals, this paper proposes and constructs a multidimensional sensing numerical control machine tools state monitoring system and discusses the online acquisition mode of a variety of information, so as to ensure comprehensive and effective acquisition of fault information and provide reliable original data for numerical control machine tools state monitoring and fault diagnosis.

Objective: To analyze changes in immune functions by detecting lymphocyte subsets in the peripheral blood of residents in the vicinity of radon from hot springs. Methods: Two groups were randomly selected; 61 residents in the vicinity of the hot springs were assigned to the radon group, and 51 residents with a similar lifestyle and habits but no contact with hot springs were assigned to the control group. The percentages of lymphocyte subsets (CD3+, CD4+CD8−, CD4−CD8+, CD4+/CD8+, and TCR/CD3) in the 2 groups were evaluated on a FACS Aria flow cytometer. The absolute values of lymphocytes (LYMPH#) and percentages of lymphocytes (LYMPH%) were measured by an automatic blood analyzer. Results: In the radon group, the numbers of CD3+ ( Z = −0.140, P > .05) and CD4+CD8− ( Z = −0.964, P > .05) T cells were higher, as compared with the controls, but this difference was not significant. In addition, the number of CD4−CD8+ ( t = −2.141, P < .05) T cells was significantly lower in the radon group. Furthermore, the average ratios of CD4+/CD8+ ( t = −2.201, P < .05) and TCR/CD3 ( t = 2.047, P < .05) cells were significantly higher in the radon group than in the controls. Compared with the control group, the LYMPH# ( t = −0.485, P > .05) and LYMPH% (Z = −0.835, P > .05) showed no significant change. Conclusion: Radon-rich hot springs could alter the proportions of lymphocyte subsets and possibly affect immunologic functions.