Search

Chlamydia trachomatis (CT) infection is the most prevalent sexually transmitted bacterial disease worldwide. However, unlike that in female infertility, the role of CT infection in male infertility remains controversial. The objective of this retrospective study was to explore the impacts of CT infection in the genital tract on sperm quality, sperm acrosin activity, antisperm antibody levels, and inflammation in a large cohort of infertile males in China. A total of 7154 semen samples were collected from infertile male subjects, 416 of whom were CT positive (CT+ group) and 6738 of whom were CT negative (CT- group), in our hospital between January 2016 and December 2018. Routine semen parameters (semen volume, pH, sperm concentration, viability, motility, morphology, etc.), granulocyte elastase levels, antisperm antibody levels, and sperm acrosin activity were compared between the CT+ and CT- groups. Our results showed that CT infection was significantly correlated with an abnormally low semen volume, as well as an increased white blood cell count and granulocyte elastase level (all P < 0.05) in the semen of infertile males; other routine semen parameters were not negatively impacted. The antisperm antibody level and sperm acrosin activity were not affected by CT infection. These findings suggested that CT infection might contribute to inflammation and hypospermia but does not impair sperm viability, motility morphology, and acrosin activity or generate antisperm antibodies in the infertile males of China.

The objective of this study was to investigate the diagnosis of colonic polyps (CP) through the computed tomography (CT) images combined with colonoscopy based on Fourier central slice theorem algorithm. In this study, 86 patients with CP admitted to hospital were selected as research objects. CT imaging and colonoscopy were applied to diagnose the patients based on the algorithm of Fourier central slice theorem. The results showed that the diagnostic detection rates of CP and colon cancer (CC) were 88.2% and 94.2%, respectively. The occurrence site of CP was the sigmoid and ascending colon. 38 patients were positive for serosal invasion of CP while 42 patients were negative for serosal invasion of CP, and there were no statistical differences ( P > 0.05 ). The lesion positions of remaining 6 cases were hard to find and could not be detected accurately. Besides, the diagnostic accuracy of preoperative and postoperative stages III and IV was all 100.00%. The combination of CT imaging and colonoscopy was employed to diagnose CP, which was found to be able to accurately locate the lesions, to effectively evaluate the tumor stage before and after surgery, and to have a good diagnostic efficacy in detecting tumor serosal layer.

Traditional fire smoke detection methods mostly rely on manual algorithm extraction and sensor detection; however, these methods are slow and expensive to achieve discrimination. We proposed an improved convolutional neural network (CNN) to achieve fast analysis. The improved CNN can be used to liberate manpower. The network does not require complicated manual feature extraction to identify forest fire smoke. First, to alleviate the computational pressure and speed up the discrimination efficiency, kernel principal component analysis was performed on the experimental data set. To improve the robustness of the CNN and to avoid overfitting, optimization strategies were applied in multi-convolution kernels and batch normalization to improve loss functions. The experimental analysis shows that the CNN proposed in this study can learn the feature information automatically for smoke images in the early stages of fire automatically with a high recognition rate. As a result, the improved CNN enriches the theory of smoke discrimination in the early stages of a forest fire.

To determine the relationship between gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) and coagulation/fibrinolysis abnormality in antenatal Chinese women.Case control study: 50 women had GDM and 132 did not (the NGDM group) grouping by the International Association of Diabetes and Pregnancy Study Groups (IADPSG) criteria. Maternal plasma biochemistry and previous medical history were collected from perinatal health records. Antenatal coagulation/fibrinolysis activity (CFA) parameters were assessed using thromboelastography and routine CFA parameters, respectively. Univariate and multiple regression analyses were used to evaluate the associations between GDM and CFA parameters. Maternal age, platelet, ALT, ALP, urea nitrogen, and previous history of abortion were taken as the covariables.The women with GDM were significantly older than those without GDM (30.3 vs. 28.6 years,GDM is significantly associated with hypercoagulability and hyperfibrinolysis in these antenatal Chinese women.

The establishment of well‐facilitated farmland in recent years has played a key role in addressing the issues of land fragmentation and food security in China. However, few researches focused on the spatially explicit simulation of comprehensive benefit levels (CBL) of well‐facilitated farmland projects in each 1 km × 1 km grid. Here, we analyzed the CBL of well‐facilitated farmland projects in the Huang‐Huai‐Hai Region (HHHR) of China during the 12ᵗʰ Five‐Year Plan period (2011–2015) using 568 questionnaires. Furthermore, we proposed a method based on a logistic regression model to analyze the CBL‐affecting factors and predicted the probability of high, middle, and low CBL in each 1 km × 1 km grid. The results showed that there were significant regional and interprovincial differences in the comprehensive benefits evaluation results. The projects with medium and high comprehensive benefits values were mainly located in southern Hebei Province, western Shandong Province, and southeastern Henan Province. The economic and social benefits of the projects in the plain areas contributed greatly to the increase in the comprehensive benefits of farmland. In contrast, the ecological benefits were greater for the projects in mountainous and hilly areas. The spatial prediction results indicated that 42.5% (22.5 million ha) of the HHHR, mainly distributed in plain areas, was predicted to have a high CBL with a probability of more than 0.5. Our findings are essential for governments to examine the construction benefit in this period, and the spatially predicted CBL probabilities can be used as a reference for well‐facilitated farmland layouts and future planning.

WHAT IS KNOWN AND OBJECTIVE Myelosuppression, an adverse drug reaction (ADR), often causes medical treatment termination in cancer patients. It has been known that genetic components, such as single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), influence the risk of myelosuppression at the individual-patient level. However, due to ethnic variation in frequency of genetic polymorphisms, results reported in Caucasian patients may not be generalizable to the Chinese Han population. Until now, few researches on myelosuppression included Chinese Han patients. In this study, we conducted a systematic study of potential biomarkers for docetaxel-induced myelosuppression in Han Chinese patients. METHODS We examined 61 SNPs in 36 genes that code for drug transporters, metabolism enzymes, nuclear receptors and DNA repair pathway in 110 Chinese Han patients receiving docetaxel-based chemotherapy. Genotyping was conducted using the Sequenom MassARRAY system. Significant SNPs were identified by logistic regression, and gene-gene interactions were investigated by generalized multifactor dimensionality reduction (GMDR) analysis. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Our results revealed that 11 SNPs in nine genes (SLC15A1, SLCO1A2, CYP2D6, FMO3, UGT1A1, NAT2, SULT2A1, PXR and HNF4α) were associated with docetaxel-induced myelosuppression. GMDR analyses suggested that a 3-locus model: SLC15A1 rs2297322-PXR rs3732359-FMO3 rs2266782 was an appropriate predictive model of docetaxel-induced myelosuppression (P = .017, Testing Bal.Acc = 0.653, CV Consistency = 10/10). WHAT IS NEW AND CONCLUSION Our findings suggest multiple novel predictive biomarkers of docetaxel-induced myelosuppression: SLC15A1 rs2297322, PXR rs3732359 and FMO3 rs2266782. These discoveries should help in advancing future personalized therapy of docetaxel-based chemotherapy specific to Chinese Han patients.

Background. Endocrinopathies are common in patients withβ-thalassemia major despite parenteral iron chelation therapy with deferoxamine. Prevalence of abnormal glucose metabolism in previous studies was controversial. The aim of this study was to discuss the prevalence of abnormal glucose metabolism inβ-thalassemia major based on a meta-analysis.Methods. PubMed, ScienceDirect, Springerlink, Ovid, Web of Science, MEDLINE, Wanfang database, and Chinese National Knowledge Internet were searched for relevant articles. Two authors selected the articles according to the inclusion criteria and then extracted the data. The prevalence of diabetes mellitus (DM) inβ-thalassemia major was defined as the primary outcome. The prevalence with the 95% confidence interval (95%CI) was used to evaluate the proportion of abnormal glucose metabolism and other endocrine disorders in patients withβ-thalassemia major. Subgroup analyses were applied to explore the prevalence in different regions. Sensitivity analysis and publication bias assessment were also conducted.Results. A total of 44 studies with 16605 cases were included in this analysis. Diabetes mellitus was present in 6.54% (95% CI: 5.30%-7.78%). The fixed subgroup study revealed that the region with the highest prevalence was the Middle East (prevalence= 7.90%, 95% CI: 5.75%-10.05%). The accumulated meta-analysis revealed that the prevalence of DM inβ-thalassemia major was relatively steady in each year. The prevalence of impaired fasting glucose (IFG), impaired glucose tolerance (IGT), and other endocrine disorders inβ-thalassemia major was 17.21% (95% CI: 8.43%-26.00%), 12.46% (95% CI: 5.98%-18.94%), and 43.92% (95% CI: 37.94%-49.89%), respectively. Sensitivity analysis showed that the pooled results were robust; publication bias assessment revealed that there was no significant evidence that the pooled results were influenced by publication bias.Conclusion. High prevalence of endocrine disorders involving abnormal glucose metabolism was detected inβ-thalassemia major. Treatment and prevention measurements may be necessary to prevent growth and endocrine problems.

Wireless Internet-of-Things (IoT) networks empowered by blockchain have became a promising architecture to establish trust and consensus mechanisms in a distributed manner. However, the computational complexity and limited on-board energy of wireless devices impose great challenges on applying blockchain into IoT networks. To address this issue, this work introduces multiple mobile edge computing (MEC) to provide sufficient computational power for miners (i.e., IoT devices). As such, the computation-intensive tasks of the miners can be either computed locally or offloaded to some certain MEC servers to fully exploit the computation resources. Moreover, to decrease the energy consumption of the IoT networks, an optimization problem is formulated to maximize the energy efficiency of IoT devices by jointly optimizing the computation mode selection and power allocation. Since the formulated problem is generally intractable with mixed-integer variables, an Fmincon-based algorithm is proposed, which guarantees a globally optimal solution. To further reduce the computational complexity of the proposed optimal method, a Deep Neural Network (DNN)-based deep learning method is applied to facilitate the computation of the proposed algorithm. Finally, numerical results demonstrate the advantages of the proposed network architecture and the algorithm in terms of both the energy and computational efficiency.

Background: To determine the independent prognostic factors and develop a multivariate logistic regression model for predicting successful pregnancy following artificial insemination by husband (AIH) in infertile Chinese couples.Methods: A total of 3,015 AIH cycles with superovulation from 1,853 infertile Chinese couples were retrospectively analyzed. The clinical characteristics and sperm parameters were compared between the pregnant and non-pregnant groups. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was performed to remove the confounding factors and create an equation to predict the successful pregnancy. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were constructed for evaluating the abilities for prognostic classification of the independent predictors and the equation.Results: The overall pregnancy rate was 13.0%. The pregnancy rate of double intrauterine insemination (IUI) (18.9%) was significantly higher than that of single IUI (11.4%). The pregnancy rate of the stimulated cycle (14.4%) was significantly higher than that of the natural cycle (9.0%). The pregnancy rates of the age groups P < 0.05). A multivariate logistic regression equation was created based on the above influencing factors. ROC analysis showed that the prognostic power of the equation is better than those of individual predictors.Conclusion: Cycle treatment options, single/double IUI, female age, sperm VSL, SDI, and normal form rate could predict successful pregnancy following AIH in China. The multivariate logistic regression equation exhibited a greater value for prognostic classification than single predictors.

Anemia is common in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). The association between thalassemia and SLE is rare. In this study, we report the first patient who was found to have a severe hemolytic anemia caused by combination of SLE and Hb H disease. The patient had a more severe presentation in the hematological system. Our case indicates that for a patient who was diagnosed with SLE and developed deterioration in her hematological cell lines, investigation of other possible coexisting causes would be warranted.

BackgroundX-linked adrenoleukodysrophy (ALD) is an inherited peroxisomal metabolism disorder, results from the loss-of-function mutation of ATP-binding cassette protein subfamily D1 ( ABCD1 ) gene. The dysfunction of ALD protein, a peroxisomal ATP-binding cassette transporter, results in the excessive saturated very long chain fatty acids (VLCFAs) accumulation in organs including brain, spine and adrenal cortex. X-ALD is characterized as the childhood, adolescent, adult cerebral ALD, adrenomyeloneuropathy (AMN), adrenal insufficiency, and asymptomatic phenotypes, exhibiting a high variety of clinical neurological manifestations with or without adrenocortical insufficiency. ResultsIn this study, we reported two cases of X-ALD, which were firstly diagnosed as adrenal insufficiency (Addison’s disease) and treated with adrenocortical supplement. However, both of the cases progressed as neurological symptoms and signs after decades. Elevated VLCFAs level, brain MRI scan and genetic analysis confirmed final diagnosis. In addition, we identified two novel mutations of ABCD1 gene, c.874_876delGAG (p.Glu292del) and c.96_97delCT (p.Tyr33Profs*161) in exon 1 of ABCD1 gene. Sanger sequencing confirmed that the proband’s mother of the first case was hemizygous carrying the same variant. Adrenal insufficiency-only type is very rare, however, it may be the starting performance of X-ALD. In addition, we summarized reported mutation sites and clinical manifestations to investigate the correlationship of phenotype-genotype of X-ALD. ConclusionsThe early warning manifestations should be noticed, and the probability of X-ALD should be considered. This report could be beneficial for the early diagnosis and genetic counseling for patients with X-ALD.

Background. At present, there is a lack of drug treatment for obese patients, so it is needed to find a drug that is effective and has few side effects to treat obesity. PEX-168 is a novel long-acting glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist for T2DM. It improves blood glucose with fewer side effects. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of PEX-168 on blood glucose and body weight of mice with simple obesity. Methods. Thirty healthy and 6-week-old C57BL/6 male mice were randomly divided into a normal control group (NC, n = 6) and obesity model group (n = 24). The obesity model mice were randomly divided into a high-fat diet group (HF) and intervention groups with different doses of PEX-168 (0.03 mg/kg, 0.1 mg/kg, and 0.3 mg/kg). Each group includes 6 mice. Body weight, food intake, and fasting blood glucose (FBG) were evaluated after intraperitoneal injection, and the intervention was performed weekly for 12 weeks. Fasting insulin (FINS) levels were measured at the 12th week. Results. Compared with HF, the food intake of mice in the intervention groups decreased transiently, but there was no difference between different doses ( P > 0.05 ). The body weight of mice in the middle and high dose of PEX-168 intervention groups decreased significantly, and the differences were statistically significant ( P < 0.05 ). The administration of PEX-168 can effectively improve the blood glucose of obese mice, the difference was statistically significant ( P < 0.05 ), but there was no difference between different doses ( P > 0.05 ). At the 10th week, the incidence of transient hypoglycemia was 67% and 50% in the middle- and high-dose groups, respectively. The levels of serum FINS in the intervention groups were significantly lower than those in the HF group, and the differences were statistically significant ( P < 0.05 ), but there was no difference between different doses ( P > 0.05 ). Conclusions. PEX-168 showed significant improvement in the FBG and FINS levels of simple obese mice. Middle and high doses of PEX-168 could reduce the weight of simple obese mice, but there was a certain risk of hypoglycemia.

Although more and more researchers pay attention to the emotion classification, traditional emotion classification methods can not embrace changes in the global and local areas of the human brain after being stimulated. We propose an emotion classification method based on SVM combining brain functional connectivity. Firstly, the nonlinear phase-locked value (PLV) is used to calculate the multiband brain functional connectivity network, which is then converted into a binary brain network, and seven features of binary brain network are calculated. Secondly, support vector machines (SVM) are used to classify positive and negative emotions at the valence dimension and arousal dimension in the multiband. Experimental results on DEAP show that the best emotion classification accuracy of the proposed method is 86.67% in the arousal dimension, and 84.44% in the valence dimension. The results demonstrate that the classification accuracy of the arousal dimension is better than the valence dimension and the Beta2 frequency band is more suitable for emotion classification. Finally, several findings on brain functional connectivity network is discussed. The left and right areas of brain functional connectivity network are unbalanced in the low frequency band, and the feature values of clustering coefficient, average shortest path length, global efficiency, local efficiency, node degree are positively correlated with the arousal degree in the arousal dimension. Humans emotions are suppressed in the low frequency band, and the brain functional connectivity network after emotional stimulation is strengthened in the high frequency band. Our findings on emotion classification are valuable and consistent with the study of neural mechanisms.

Background Gitelman syndrome is a rare salt-losing renal tubular disorder associated with mutation of SLC12A3 gene, which encodes the Na-Cl co-transporter (NCCT). Gitelman syndrome is characterized by hypokalemia, metabolic alkalosis, hypomagnesemia, hypocalciuria, and renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system (RAAS) activation. Different SLC12A3 variants may lead to phenotypic variability and severity. Methods In this study, we reported the clinical features and genetic analysis of a Chinese pedigree diagnosed with Gitelman syndrome. Results The proband exhibited hypokalaemia, hypomagnesemia, metabolic alkalosis, but hypercalciuria and kidney stone formation. The increased urinary calcium excretion made it confused to Bartter syndrome. The persistent renal potassium wasting resulted in renal tubular lesions, and might affect urinary calcium reabsorption and excretion. Genetic analysis revealed mutations of SLC12A3 gene with c.433C > T (p.Arg145Cys), c.1077C > G (p.Asn359Lys), and c.1666C > T (p.Pro556Ser). Potential alterations of structure and function of NCCT protein due to those genetic variations of SLC12A3 are predicted. Interestingly, one sibling of the proband carried the same mutant sites and exhibited similar clinical features with milder phenotypes of hypokalemia and hypomagnesemia, but hypocalciuria rather than hypercalciuria. Family members with at least one wild type copy of SLC12A3 had normal biochemistry. With administration of spironolactone, potassium chloride and magnesium supplement, the serum potassium and magnesium were maintained within normal ranges. Conclusions In this study, we identified compound mutations of SLC12A3 associated with varieties of clinical features. Further efforts are needed to investigate the diversity in clinical manifestations of Gitelman syndrome and its correlation with specific SLC12A3 mutations.

Hypothalamic and extra-hypothalamic neuronal populations play important roles in the regulation of energy balance and glucose homeostasis. However, the underlying mechanisms of this control remain unclear. We have recently reported that inhibition of hypothalamic pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) neuronal activity leads to a reduction in blood glucose levels of normoglycemic POMC-cre mice. This effect is independent of energy intake. Since hypothalamic POMC neurons project to the paraventricular nucleus of the hypothalamus (PVH) and regulate energy metabolism via melanocortin-4 receptor (MC4R), we hypothesized that changes in the activity of MC4R-expressing neurons in the PVH could alter glycemic levels. To address this, we stereotaxically injected designer receptors exclusively activated by designer drug (DREADD) viruses into the PVH of MC4R-cre mice to chemogenetically and selectively activate or inhibit these neurons. We continuously activated or inhibited these neurons by injecting clozapine-N-oxide (CNO) every 8 hours for 5 days and monitored daily blood glucose levels and energy intake. Interestingly, inhibition of MC4R-expressing neurons in the PVH leads to a significant reduction (∼ 30%) in blood glucose levels despite of increased food intake. On the other hand, blood glucose levels are significantly increased, but food intake is greatly decreased when MC4R-expressing neurons are activated. We further determined the peripheral insulin response via MC4R-expressing neurons in the PVH. We found that CNO-induced inhibition or activation of MC4R-expressing neurons did not affect serum insulin levels. These data suggest that MC4R-expressing neurons in the PVH can regulate blood glucose levels and food intake via divergent cellular mechanisms, which is independent of circulating insulin. Thus, the inhibition of MC4R-expressing neurons may be a promising target for novel antidiabetic medicines. Disclosure A.G. Uner: None. H. Lee: None. J. Han: None. R.M. Pereira: None. X. Sun: None. H. Kim: None. Y. Kim: None.

Background Obesity is a globally increasing health epidemic requiring early lifestyle intervention. Our main objective was to examine the effectiveness of companion-intensive multi-aspect weight management (CIMWM) in Chinese adults with obesity. Methods In this 6-month, prospective, open-label, multicenter, randomized controlled clinical trial, we recruited 272 obese adults aged 18–50 years with a body mass index (BMI) ≥ 28.0 kg/m2 and capable of using smartphones. CIMWM (n = 136) offered both daily online instructions and monthly face-to-face guidance by physicians, dietitians, and health managers along with the provision of meal replacements in the first 3 months. Traditional multi-aspect weight management (TMWM, n = 136) provided monthly face-to-face guidance by the same panel of professionals and the same meal replacements as CIMWM group, but required subjects to complete daily self-monitoring instead of offering daily online instructions. Body composition and metabolic parameters were assessed at baseline, 1, 2, 3, and 6 months by physicians. The primary outcomes were clinically-significant weight loss and changes in BMI and body composition. Results Participants in both groups showed significantly reduced BMI, body fat mass (BFM), visceral fat area (VFA), and HOMA-IR (p p p Conclusions The CIMWM strategy in obese Chinese adults is proved to be more effective than TMWM in weight loss, and motivates greater adherence to intervention and lifestyle reprogramming. Trial registration Chinese Clinical Trial Registry, ChiCTR1800017463, Registered July 31, 2018. http://www.chictr.org.cn/showproj.aspx?proj=29649.

Animal models used to evaluate efficacies of immune checkpoint inhibitors are insufficient or inaccurate. We thus examined two xenograft models used for this purpose, with the aim of optimizing them. One method involves the use of peripheral blood mononuclear cells and cell line-derived xenografts (PBMCs-CDX model). For this model, we implanted human lung cancer cells into NOD-scid-IL2Rg−/− (NSI) mice, followed by injection of human PBMCs. The second method involves the use of hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells and CDX (HSPCs-CDX model). For this model, we first reconstituted the human immune system by transferring human CD34+ hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs-derived humanized model) and then transplanted human lung cancer cells. We found that the PBMCs-CDX model was more accurate in evaluating PD-L1/PD-1 targeted immunotherapies. In addition, it took only four weeks with the PBMCs-CDX model for efficacy evaluation, compared to 10–14 weeks with the HSPCs-CDX model. We then further established PBMCs-derived patient-derived xenografts (PDX) models, including an auto-PBMCs-PDX model using cancer and T cells from the same tumor, and applied them to assess the antitumor efficacies of anti-PD-L1 antibodies. We demonstrated that this PBMCs-derived PDX model was an invaluable tool to study the efficacies of PD-L1/PD-1 targeted cancer immunotherapies. Overall, we found our PBMCs-derived models to be excellent preclinical models for studying immune checkpoint inhibitors.

Patient: Male, 82 Final Diagnosis: Hirschsprung’s disease-related sigmoid volvulus complicated with refractory hypertension Symptoms: Constipation • moderate abdominal pain and progressive abdominal distension • hypertension Medication: Antihypertension medication Clinical Procedure: CT scan • Hartmann’s procedure Specialty: General Surgery Objective: Rare disease Background: Sigmoid volvulus (SV) is a life-threatening condition occasionally seen in adults. Adult Hirschsprung’s disease (HD)-related SV is rarely complicated by difficult-to-control hypertension. In this report we present the case of an elderly man with a rare constellation of HD, SV, and refractory hypertension. Case Report: An 82-year-old man had long-term constipation, moderate abdominal pain, and progressive abdominal distension. A CT scan revealed the typical “coffee bean sign”. Blood pressure was abnormal high. Subsequently, the patient’s condition deteriorated. Therefore, he underwent a Hartmann’s procedure. A giant and redundant sigmoid colon (length more than 60 cm, maximal diameter about 15 cm) was demonstrated to be the cause of SV during the process of surgery. Moreover, abdominal compartment syndrome caused by SV resulted in his high and refractory blood pressure (BP). Postoperative pathological results revealed HD in his sigmoid colon. Conclusions: SV is rarely combined with conditions like refractory hypertension or HD among the elderly. Clinical features of SV typically present with long-term constipation, severe abdominal pain, and progressive abdominal distension. The “coffee bean sign” could be observed in imaging examinations. It is important to note that the management of SV is to relieve the obstruction and prevent recurrence, no matter which therapy is used in elderly patients with Hirschsprung’s disease.

Diabetes leads to amputation in approximately 15% to 20% of patients and is associated with high morbidity and mortality. Thus, improving the quality of wound healing in this condition is essential. Diabetes is associated with acute/chronic inflammation affecting all organs especially the foot, while, inhibition of microRNA-155 (miR-155) has been reported to improve or reduce inflammatory situation. However, the role of miR-155 inhibition in promoting diabetic wound healing is not clear. To further study the potential benefit of miR-155 inhibition, a study of male Sprague-Dawley rats was conducted and diabetes was induced by injection of streptozotocin. Real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR), hematoxylin and eosin staining and immunohistochemistry were then performed. The PCR results confirmed that miR-155 expression was lower after miR-155 inhibition on days 3, 7, and 13 (all Ps

Cadmium (Cd) is an environmental and industrial pollutant that induces a broad spectrum of toxicological effects, influences a variety of human organs, and is associated with poor semen quality and male infertility. Increasing evidence demonstrates that Cd induces testicular germ cell apoptosis in rodent animals. However, the specific effect of Cd exposure on autophagy in germ cells is poorly understood. We investigate the role of high-mobility group box 1 protein (HMGB1), a ubiquitous nuclear protein, on Cd-evoked autophagy in a mouse spermatocyte cell line (GC-2spd). Our data have shown that autophagy was significantly elevated in GC-2spd cells exposed to Cd. Furthermore, there was a reduction in rapamycin (RAP)-mediated apoptosis. In addition, Cd exposure reduced cell viability, which is an effect that could be significantly inhibited by RAP treatment. These results indicate that autophagy appears to serve a positive function in reducing Cd-induced cytotoxicity. In addition, HMGB1 increased coincident with the processing of LC3-I to LC3-II. Thus, the upregulation of HMGB1 increases LC3-II levels. Our data suggest that HMGB1-induced autophagy appears to act as a defense/survival mechanism against Cd cytotoxicity in GC-2spd cells.

Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) wireless communications have experienced an upsurge of interest in both military and civilian applications, due to its high mobility, low cost, on-demand deployment, and inherent line-of-sight (LoS) air-to-ground channels. However, these benefits also make UAV wireless communication systems vulnerable to malicious eavesdropping attacks. In this article, we aim to examine the physical layer security issues in UAV systems. In particular, passive and active eavesdroppings are two primary attacks in UAV systems. We provide an overview on emerging techniques, such as trajectory design, resource allocation, and cooperative UAVs, to fight against both types of eavesdroppings in UAV wireless communication systems. Moreover, the applications of non-orthogonal multiple access, multiple-input and multiple-output, and millimeter wave in UAV systems are also proposed to improve the system spectral efficiency and to guarantee security simultaneously. Finally, we discuss some potential research directions and challenges in terms of physical layer security in UAV systems., 18 pages, 5 figures. This paper has been accepted by IEEE Wireless Communications. X. Sun, D.W.K. Ng, Z. Ding, Y. Xu, and Z. Zhong, "Physical Layer Security in UAV Systems: Challenges and Opportunities," IEEE Wireless Commun., accepted to appear

This retrospective study evaluated the correlation between the sperm DNA integrity results and infertile male age or sperm motility in 654 infertile men undergoing infertility evaluations from 2013 to 2016. The correlation between the results of sperm DNA integrity and male age was positive, while a negative correlation was detected between sperm DNA integrity and sperm motility in all subjects. According to age (≤30, 30-35 and ≥35), men with normozoospermia or abnormal semen parameters were, respectively, divided into groups 1, 2 and 3, or groups A, B and C. The sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) and DFI abnormality rates in groups 3 and C were highest among their respective cohorts. But they were not significantly different between groups within the same age range. Statistically significant differences were found in male age, progressive motility, as well as total motility between patients with normal DFIs and those with abnormal DFIs in group C, but not in group 3. Older (≥35 years) infertile men have increased sperm DNA fragmentation, independent of conventional semen parameters. Male age is more critical to sperm DNA integrity than routine semen parameters.

Grain self-sufficiency is a national food security target of China. The way that built-up land expansion impacts upon cropland loss and food provision needs to be explored in the major grain producing areas. Shandong Province is an important agricultural food production region, which is also experiencing rapidly urbanizing. Here we assessed the spatiotemporal distribution of cropland loss due to built-up land expansion and landscape dynamics of cropland during 2000–2020, by using 30 m resolution land cover data. We also analyzed the potential yield change influenced by cropland loss. The results showed that the area of built-up land expanded by 5199 km2 from 2000–2010, and 11,949 km2 from 2010–2020. Approximately 95% of the new built-up land was from cropland during the two stages, and the primary mode of built-up land expansion was the edge expansion. The patch density and the patch size of cropland kept increasing and decreasing, respectively, and the aggregation index kept decreasing from 2000 to 2020, indicating increased cropland fragmentation. The proportion of occupied cropland with potential yield greater than 7500 kg/ha was 25% and 37% during the former and the latter period. Thus, higher quality cropland was encroached in the recent period. The findings could provide meaningful implications for making sustainable land use development strategies in the study area and other similar regions.

Objective This study aims to investigate the possible cause of a prenatal case of hemivertebrae with a 7q terminal deletion. Case Report This case describes a fetus with hemivertebrae in thoracic vertebrae as the sole antenatal sonographic finding. Genetic testing was performed in order to find more information after the abnormal ultrasound finding. The array-based comparative genomic hybridization results showed that the fetus had approximately 6.4 Mb deletion of 7q36. We discussed the two genes (SHH and HLXB9) that may be associated with hemivertebrae in the deletion region and reviewed several literatures about 7q36 deletion. Conclusion Our results suggest that the phenotype of hemivertebra in our case may be related to the deletion of 7q36.

This paper considers the use of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) as a mobile relay to enhance the physical layer security in wireless wiretap channels. Specifically, we consider a scenario where a source (Alice) transmits signals to a destination (Bob) with the aid of the UAV in the presence of an eavesdropper (Eve). It is assumed that the UAV is able to cache the data received from Alice and then send to Bob in a secret fashion. Joint optimization of the communication resources and the UAV trajectory for maximizing the accumulated secrecy rate is investigated. While the joint design problem is non-convex, we propose an iterative algorithm based on successive convex approximation. Simulation results are presented to provide the insights into the proposed resource allocation strategy and trajectory for secure rate maximization and demonstrate how the UAV-aided rely can significantly enhance secrete rate transmissions.

The 7q36 microdeletion has been identified in patients with variant phenotypes including sacral agenesis, holoprosencephaly and intellectual disability ...

Introduction: Phosphaturic mesenchymal tumor mixed connective tissue type (PMT/MCT) is the most common type (up to 90%) of phosphaturic mesenchymal tumor (PMT), a rare clinicopathologic entity. Besides overproduction of fibroblast growth factor 23 (FGF23), there is a big variation of immunohistochemical characteristic across types of PMT, which makes it difficult to obtain an early diagnosis of PMT/MCT. As a benign tumor, PMT/MCT usually happens in subcutaneous tissues and leads to nonhealing of wound. A complete excision of PMT/MCT facilitates wound healing. Conclusions: Review of the existing evidence indicates that early diagnosis of PMT/MCT is critically important when treating PMT/MCT wound. Hence standardization of early diagnosis for PMT/MCT is mandated.

Repeated exposure to stress during early life has a lifetime impact on physical and psychological functions. Our study investigated the long-term effects of early life stress (ELS; measured retrospectively) on the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis and sympathetic nervous system functions under psychosocial stress among healthy adults. Fifty healthy volunteers (33 male, 17 female, mean age 22.6 ± 1.8 years) underwent a standardized psychosocial stress protocol (the Trier Social Stress Test), with the collection of salivary cortisol, heart rates, and positive and negative affect. The results showed increases in cortisol, heart rate, and negative affect after the stress inducement. More importantly, a significant negative correlation was found between the severity of ELS and the increase of cortisol to the stress. The severity of stress in one's early life predicted his/her cortisol reactivity to the stress in adulthood. Neither the heart rate reactivity nor the affective reactivity shows significant association with ELS. The blunted cortisol reactivity reflects the alteration of the HPA axis, which may confer the risk for certain stress-related disorders.

Genome copy number variation (CNV) is an important cause of genetic and developmental disorders. In recent years, chromosomal microarray analysis (CMA) technology to test for genomic copy number variation has been developed and gradually applied in prenatal diagnostics, offering high diagnostic ability. Here, the authors summarise the CMA established in clinical settings, as well as the significance and clinical application of the standard analyses. They also emphatically discuss the key problems in the establishment process of the platform in prenatal diagnostics in the clinic.

This work introduces non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) into short-packet communications to reduce latency over the air interface in wireless networks. Specifically, we address the optimization of transmission rates and power allocation to maximize the effective throughput of the user with a higher channel gain while guaranteeing the other user achieving a certain level of effective throughput. To demonstrate the benefits of NOMA, we analyze the optimal performance of orthogonal multiple access (OMA) as a benchmark. Our examination shows that NOMA can significantly outperform OMA by achieving a higher effective throughput with the same latency or incurring a lower latency to achieve the same effective throughput targets. Surprisingly, we find that the performance gap between NOMA and OMA becomes more prominent when the effective throughput targets at the two users become comparable. This demonstrates that NOMA can significantly reduce the transmission latency and achieve fairness between users for short-packet communications.

The efficacy of erlotinib treatment for advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is due to its action as an epidermal growth factor receptor tyrosine kinase inhibitor (EGFR-TKI). Patients treated with erlotinib experience different drug responses. The effect of germline mutations on therapeutic responses and adverse drug responses (ADRs) to erlotinib in Chinese patients requires elucidation. Sixty Han Chinese advanced non-small cell lung cancer patients received erlotinib monotherapy and, for each participant, 76 candidate genes (related to EGFR signaling, drug metabolism and drug transport pathways) were sequenced and analyzed. The single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) rs1042640 in UGT1A10, rs1060463, and rs1064796 in CYP4F11, and rs2074900 in CYP4F2 were significantly associated with therapeutic responses to erlotinib. Rs1064796 in CYP4F11 and rs10045685 in UGT3A1 were significantly associated with adverse drug reaction. Moreover, analysis of a validation cohort confirmed the significant association between rs10045685 in UGT3A1 and erlotinib adverse drug response(unadjusted p = 0.015). This study provides comprehensive, systematic analyses of genetic variants associated with responses to erlotinib in Chinese advanced non-small cell lung cancer patients. Newly-identified SNPs may serve as promising markers to predict responses and safety in erlotinib-treated advanced non-small cell lung cancer patients after chemotherapy doublet.

Rationale: An open abdomen complicated with small-bowel fistulae becomes a complex wound for local infection, systemic sepsis and persistent soiling irritation by intestinal content. While controlling the fistulae drainage, protecting surrounding skin, healing the wound maybe a challenge. Patient concerns: In this paper we described a 68-year-old female was admitted to emergency surgery in general surgery department with severe abdomen pain. Resection part of the injured small bowel, drainage of the intra-abdominal abscess, and fashioning of a colostomy were performed. Diagnoses: She failed to improve and ultimately there was tenderness and lot of pus under the skin around the fistulae. The wound started as a 3-cm2 lesion and progressed to a 6 ×13 (78 cm2) around the stoma. Interventions: In our case we present a novel device for managing colostomy wound combination with negative pressure wound therapy. Outcomes: This tube allows for an effective drainage of small-bowel secretion and a safe build-up of granulation tissue. Also it could be a barrier between the bowel suction point and foam. Lessons: Management of open abdomen wound involves initial dressing changes, antibiotic use and cutaneous closure. When compared with traditional dressing changes, the NPWT offers several advantages including increased granulation tissue formation, reduction in bacterial colonization, decreased of bowel edema and wound size, and enhanced neovascularization.

Necrotizing fasciitis (NF) is a severe and rapidly progressive infectious disease that attacks superficial an as well as deep fascia, subcutaneous fat tissue, and muscle. Although the incidence is of relatively low frequency, the median mortality is high. NF is a great burden to patients and hospitals. The most common cause of NF is trauma injuries, followed by other conditions with comorbidity. A classification for NF was presented concerning microbial cause, depth of infection, and anatomy. But the value of classification is not convincing. Early diagnosis of NF is essential and still to be realized by far. Information from clinic or laboratory might contribute to the purpose. Surgery is used in exploration debridement and tissue reconstruction as the main method with NF. Negative pressure wound therapy has proved to be useful in improving wound bed preparation and healing.

Background: Fetal insulin hypothesis was proposed that the association between low birth weight and type 2 diabetes is principally genetically mediated. The aim of this study was to investigate whether common variants in genes CDKAL1 , HHEX , ADCY5 , SRR , PTPRD that predisposed to type 2 diabetes were also associated with reduced birthweight in Chinese Han population. Methods: Twelve single nucleotide polymorphisms (rs7756992/rs10946398 in CDKAL1 , rs1111875 in HHEX , rs391300 in SRR , rs17584499 in PTPRD , rs1170806/rs9883204/rs4678017/rs9881942/rs7641344/rs6777397/rs6226243 in ADCY5 ) were genotyped in 1174 unrelated individuals born in Peking Union Medical College Hospital from 1921 to 1954 by TaqMan allelic discrimination assays, of which 645 had normal glucose tolerance, 181 had developed type 2 diabetes and 348 impaired glucose regulation. Associations of these 12 genetic variants with birthweight and glucose metabolism in later life were analyzed. Results: Birthweight was inversely associated with CDKAL1 -rs10946398 (β = −41 g [95% confidence interval [ CI ]: −80, −3], P = 0.034), common variants both associated with increased risk of impaired glucose metabolism and decreased insulin secretion index later in life. After adjusting for sex, gestational weeks, parity and maternal age, the risk allele of CDKAL1 -rs7756992 was associated with reduced birthweight (β = −36 g [95% CI : −72, −0.2], P = 0.048). The risk allele in SRR showed a trend toward a reduction of birthweight ( P = 0.085). Conclusions: This study identified the association between type 2 diabetes risk variants in CDKAL1 and birthweight in Chinese Han individuals, and the carrier of risk allele within SRR had the trend of reduced birthweight. This demonstrates that there is a clear overlap between the genetics of type 2 diabetes and fetal growth, which proposes that lower birth weight and type 2 diabetes may be two phenotypes of one genotype.

The aim of the study was to update the clinical database of chronic wounds in order to derive an evidence based understanding of the condition and hence to guide future clinical management in China. A total of 241 patients from January 1, 2011 to April 30, 2016 with chronic wounds of more than 2 weeks’ duration were studied in wound healing department in Shanghai. Results revealed that among all the patients the mean age was 52.5 ± 20.2 years (range 2-92 years). The mean initial area of wounds was 30.3 ± 63.0 cm2 (range 0.25-468 cm2). The mean duration of wounds was 68.5 ± 175.2 months (range 0.5-840 months). The previously reported causes of chronic wounds were traumatic or surgical wounds (n = 82, 34.0%), followed by pressure ulcers (n = 59, 24.5%). To study the effects of age, patients were divided into 2 groups: less than 60 years (

This paper investigates the application of simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) to cooperative non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA). A new cooperative multiple-input single-output (MISO) SWIPT NOMA protocol is proposed, where a user with a strong channel condition acts as an energy-harvesting (EH) relay to help a user with a poor channel condition. The power splitting (PS) scheme is adopted at the EH relay. By jointly optimizing the PS ratio and the beamforming vectors, the design objective is to maximize the data rate of the "strong user" while satisfying the QoS requirement of the "weak user". It boils down to a challenging nonconvex problem. To resolve this issue, the semidefinite relaxation (SDR) technique is applied to relax the quadratic terms related with the beamformers, and then it is solved to its global optimality by two-dimensional exhaustive search. We prove the rank-one optimality, which establishes the equivalence between the relaxed problem and the original one. To further reduce the high complexity due to the exhaustive search, an iterative algorithm based on successive convex approximation (SCA) is proposed, which can at least attain its stationary point efficiently. In view of the potential application scenarios, e.g., IoT, the single-input single-output (SISO) case of the cooperative SWIPT NOMA system is also studied. The formulated problem is proved to be strictly unimodal with respect to the PS ratio. Hence, a golden section search (GSS) based algorithm with closed-form solution at each step is proposed to find the unique global optimal solution. It is worth pointing out that the SCA method can also converge to the optimal solution in SISO cases. In the numerical simulation, the proposed algorithm is numerically shown to converge within a few iterations, and the SWIPT-aided NOMA protocol outperforms the existing transmission protocols., 13 pages, 10 figures, to appear in IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing (TSP), 2017

This paper investigates the application of simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) to nonorthogonal multiple access (NOMA). A new cooperative multiple-input-single-output (MISO) SWIPT NOMA protocol is proposed, where user 2 who has a strong channel condition acts as an energy-harvesting relay to help user 1 who has a poor channel condition. Our objective is to maximize the data rate of user 2 while satisfying the QoS requirement of user 1. The formulated problem boils down to a complicated nonconvex problem. We first use the semidefinite relaxation (SDR) technique to relax the nonconvex problem. Then, an iterative algorithm with the successive convex approximation (SCA) method is proposed to solve the relaxed problem. As a result, a local optimal solution is obtained. Motivated by the practical applications, the cooperative SWIPT NOMA protocol design in SISO case is investigated and a semiclosed-form solution is derived, which can strictly guarantee the global optimality. It is worth pointing out that the SCA method also admits a global optimal solution in SISO case. Simulation results show that the SWIPT-aided NOMA protocol outperforms the existing transmission protocols.

This work introduces downlink non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) into short-packet communications. NOMA has great potential to improve fairness and spectral efficiency with respect to orthogonal multiple access (OMA) for low-latency downlink transmission, thus making it attractive for the emerging Internet of Things. We consider a two-user downlink NOMA system with finite blocklength constraints, in which the transmission rates and power allocation are optimized. To this end, we investigate the trade-off among the transmission rate, decoding error probability, and the transmission latency measured in blocklength. Then, a one-dimensional search algorithm is proposed to resolve the challenges mainly due to the achievable rate affected by the finite blocklength and the unguaranteed successive interference cancellation. We also analyze the performance of OMA as a benchmark to fully demonstrate the benefit of NOMA. Our simulation results show that NOMA significantly outperforms OMA in terms of achieving a higher effective throughput subject to the same finite blocklength constraint, or incurring a lower latency to achieve the same effective throughput target. Interestingly, we further find that with the finite blocklength, the advantage of NOMA relative to OMA is more prominent when the effective throughput targets at the two users become more comparable., Comment: 15 pages, 9 figures. This is a longer version of a paper to appear in IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications. Citation Information: X. Sun, S. Yan, N. Yang, Z. Ding, C. Shen, and Z. Zhong, "Short-Packet Downlink Transmission with Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access," IEEE Trans. Wireless Commun., accepted to appear [Online] https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8345745/

Background The Chuanhu anti-gout mixture has been used for many years in the treatment of gout in Chinese Traditional Medicine, and current methods for treatments for acute gouty arthritis have been either less effective or have had serious side effects. Methods In this 12-week, double-blind, double-dummy, non-inferiority study, outpatient individuals with newly diagnosed acute gouty arthritis were randomly assigned to receive Chuanhu anti-gout mixture or colchicine. Both the study investigators and the participants were masked to the treatment assignments. The primary outcome was the recurrence rate of acute gouty arthritis, and the secondary outcomes were changes in white blood cells (WHC) and C-reactive protein (CRP). This trial is registered at ISRCTN.org as trial ISRCTN65219941. Results A total of 176 patients were randomly assigned to receive either the Chuanhu anti-gout mixture or Colchicine. The overall recurrence rates in the Chuanhu anti-gout mixture group (CH group) and the Colchicine group (Col group) were 12.50% vs 14.77% (difference -2.22%, 95% confidence interval (95% CI): -10.78%~6.23%), meeting the predefined non-inferiority criterion of 15%, as did the data for WHC and CRP. The incidence of adverse events (mainly diarrhea) was less in the Col group than in the CH group (2.27% vs 28.41%, 95% CI 0.01~0.26). In addition, changes in blood uric acid, alanine aminotransferase, aspartate aminotransferase and creatinine in the CH group were significantly larger compared to those in the Col group (P

It is postulated that high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) and tumor necrosis factor α (TNF-α) are diagnostic utilities for pleural effusion. This study was designed to explore the detection and significance of TNF-α and hs-CRP in the pleural effusion of patients with diabetes and pulmonary tuberculosis. A total of 60 patients with diabetes and pulmonary tuberculosis pleural effusion were selected as the study group, while 60 patients with pulmonary tuberculosis pleural effusion were considered as the control group. The expression of TNF-α and hs-CRP in the two groups was determined from pleural effusion by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). The expression levels of TNF-α and hs-CRP in pleural effusion of the study group were significantly ( P

Sepsis, severe sepsis and septic shock are the main cause of mortality in non-cardiac intensive care units. Immunometabolism has been linked to sepsis; however, the precise mechanism by which metabolic reprogramming regulates the inflammatory response is unclear. Here we show that aerobic glycolysis contributes to sepsis by modulating inflammasome activation in macrophages. PKM2-mediated glycolysis promotes inflammasome activation by modulating EIF2AK2 phosphorylation in macrophages. Pharmacological and genetic inhibition of PKM2 or EIF2AK2 attenuates NLRP3 and AIM2 inflammasomes activation, and consequently suppresses the release of IL-1β, IL-18 and HMGB1 by macrophages. Pharmacological inhibition of the PKM2–EIF2AK2 pathway protects mice from lethal endotoxemia and polymicrobial sepsis. Moreover, conditional knockout of PKM2 in myeloid cells protects mice from septic death induced by NLRP3 and AIM2 inflammasome activation. These findings define an important role of PKM2 in immunometabolism and guide future development of therapeutic strategies to treat sepsis., Inflammation involves a Warburg effect that switches cellular metabolism to glycolysis. Here the authors show this switch drives IL-1β, IL-18 and HMGB1 release from macrophages by activating the NLRP3 and AIM2 inflammasomes via protein kinase R phosphorylation, a pathway that can be inhibited to prevent sepsis in mice.

In the paper, it is proposed that multi-spectral image pure pixel is utilized for completing SAM classification. The classified samples are utilized for electively constructing sparse dictionary, thereby improving the representativeness of the dictionary. Eight surface feature types are set in Landsat8 image. PPI index is used for calculating pure pixel index of each pixel. Pure pixel of each surface feature is further extracted through N-D visualizer, which is used for SAM calculation. Eight kinds of surface feature samples are selected from SAM image for online dictionary learning. Multi-spectral image sparse dictionary is generated. Multi-spectral image sparse coefficient is calculated through dictionary and OMP. Meanwhile, online dictionary and OMP are utilized for obtaining panchromatic image sparse coefficient. Fusion sparse coefficient is generated by maximum values both sparse coefficients. Multi-spectral image sparse dictionary is combined for reconstructing and generating fusion image. Eight quantitative fusion evaluation indicators are adopted for comparing algorithm fusion and weighted fusion in the paper. Fusion method proposed in the paper contains more information, fusion image texture detail information is improved, and better image multi-spectral information is kept.

Land use change can greatly alter spatial pattern and overall ecosystem service values (ESV). The goal of this study was to explore the likely effects of land use change on ESV in China. In this paper, the spatially explicit land use changes across China from 2010 to 2020 under the 2000s trend scenario and the planning scenario were projected using the Dyna-CLUE model. The ESV evaluation method was improved by adjusting the ESV coefficients using biomass data to reduce the generalization error of proxy-based method. The results revealed that between 2010 and 2020, total ESV increased by 1798 and 2215 billion RMB a(-1) under the 2000s trend scenario and the planning scenario, respectively. The spatial pattern of ESV in 2010 and 2020 presented a logical geographic distribution. The areas with ESV of 50,000 RMB ha(-1) a(-1) and higher occurred primarily in northeastern and southern China, while the areas with ESV of 5000 RMB ha(-1) a(-1) and lower were mainly located in northwestern China. The spatial differences between the two scenarios were insignificant except that the increase of ESV in southwestern China was more prominent in the planning scenario than that in the 2000s trend scenario, while the total ESV in 2020 under the planning scenario was larger than that in the 2000s trend scenario. The increase of ESV occurred mainly in northeastern, southern, and southeastern China due to forest growth and woodland expansion in 2020 compared with 2010. The results of this study can provide useful information for the public and land managers to consider.