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Background: Kawasaki disease (KD) is an acute systemic vasculitis that can lead to acquired heart disease in children mostly from in developed countries. The previous research showed that B cells in KD patients underwent a profound change in both the cell numbers and types after intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) therapy. Methods: We performed the single-cell RNA-sequencing for the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from three febrile patients and three KD patients to investigate the possible mechanism underlying B cell developmental dysfunction in KD. The pseudo-time analysis was employed to study the developmental trajectories of the PBMCs in febrile control and KD patients. Results: Overall single-cell expression profiles show that the biological processes of immunity, B cell activation pathway and their related biological entities are repressed in KD patients before IVIG treatment compared to febrile patient and KD patients after IVIG treatment. The differentially expressed gene analyses further demonstrate that B cell signaling pathway is downregulated in B cells and plasma blast cells of KD patients before treatment while cell cycle genes and MYC gene are upregulated in dendritic cells (DCs) and hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs) of KD patients before treatment. The biological process of immune response is upregulated in the HSPCs of KD patients before treatment in our dataset while the biological process of inflammatory response is upregulated in the HSPCs of KD patients before treatment in GSE168732 dataset. Single-cell trajectory analyses demonstrate that KD patients before treatment have a shortened developmental path in which B cells and T cells are failed to differentiate into separate lineages. HSPD1 and HSPE1 genes show an elevated expression level in the early cell development stage of KD patients before treatment accompanied with the repression of MYC, SPI1, MT2A and UBE2C genes. Our analyses of all B cells from KD patients before treatment show most of B cells are arrested in a transitional state with an ill developmental path compared with febrile patients and KD patients after treatment. Conclusion: Our results indicate that the immune premature HSPCs accompanied with the abnormal expression dynamics of cell cycle and SPI1 genes are the mechanism underlying B cell developmental dysfunction in KD patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reductive amination of 1,6‐hexanediol with ammonia is one of the most promising green routes for synthesis of 1,6‐hexanediamine. Herein, we developed a phosphorous modified Ni catalyst of Ni−P/Al2O3. It presented satisfactory improved selectivity to 1,6‐hexanediamine in the reductive amination of 1,6‐hexanediol compared to the Ni/Al2O3 catalyst. The phosphorous tended to interact with Al2O3 to form AlPOx species, induced Ni nanoparticle to be flatter, and the decrease of strong acid sites, the new‐formed Ni−AlPOx−Al2O3 interface and the flatter Ni nanoparticle were the key to switch the dominating product from hexamethyleneimine to 1,6‐hexanediamine. This work develops an efficient catalyst for production of 1,6‐hexanediamine from the reductive amination of 1,6‐hexanediol, and provides a point of view about designing selective non‐noble metal catalysts for producing primary diamines via reductive amination of diols. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we revisit the popular assumption that politeness in languages such as Japanese and Korean with a complex honorific system is crucially different from politeness in languages with no comparably rich honorific repertoires, such as Chinese. We propose a bottom–up, contrastive and corpus-based model through which we challenge this binary view. This model combines interaction ritual and speech acts. As a case study, we compare a set of expressions representing lexico-grammatical honorifics in Japanese and Chinese, i.e., in a so-called "honorific-rich" and a "non-honorific-rich" language. Our results show that the group of honorifics studied work in an essentially comparable fashion, hence disproving the above-outlined binary view. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much more attention has been paid to the contamination of Alternaria toxins because of food contamination and the threat to human health. In this study, an ultra‐high‐performance liquid chromatography‐tandem mass spectrometry method was developed for the simultaneous detection of the prototypical alternariol, alternariol monomethylether, and the metabolites 4‐oxhydryl alternariol, and alternariol monomethylether 3‐sulfate ammonium salt of Alternaria toxins. The positive samples were used as matrix samples to optimize the different experimental conditions. 0.01% formic acid solution and acetonitrile were used as the mobile phase, and analytes were scanned in negative electron spray ionization under multiple reaction monitoring, and quantitative determination by isotope internal standard method. Application of this method to samples of human plasma and urine showed the detection of the above analytes. The results showed that the recoveries were from 80.40% to 116.4%, intra‐day accuracy was between 0.6% and 8.0%, and inter‐day accuracy was between 1.1% and 12.1%. The limit of detection of the four analytes ranged from 0.02 to 0.6 µg/L in urine, and 0.02 to 0.5 µg/L in plasma, respectively. Thus, the developed method was rapid and accurate for the simultaneous detection of analytes and provided a theoretical basis for the risk assessment of Alternaria toxins for human exposure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The purpose of this study was to explore the association between triglycerides (TGs) and the risk of atrial fibrillation (AF) recurrence. Methods and Results: Included were adult patients with AF who underwent radiofrequency catheter ablation in the Affiliated Changzhou Second People's Hospital of Nanjing Medical University. The enrolled patients were divided into the AF recurrence group and the sinus rhythm (SR) maintenance group. The univariate Cox regression analysis and Kaplan–Meier survival curve were performed estimate the association between TG and the risk of AF recurrence. Of the 402 patients, 79 (19.7%) experienced recurrence of AF after ablation. The TG level was significantly higher in the AF recurrence group than in the SR‐maintaining group. Patients were grouped by quartile of TG levels, with Quartile 1 and Quartile 2 defined as the low concentration group, Quartile 3 as the moderate concentration group, and Quartile 4 as the high concentration group. Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that the moderate concentration group (p =.02, hazard ratio [HR]: 2.331, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.141–4.762) and high concentration group (p =.007, HR: 2.873, 95% CI: 1.332–6.199) were associated with an increased risk of AF recurrence compared with the low concentration group. The median follow‐up was 1.17 years, it is indicated that a higher risk of recurrent AF was observed in the moderate concentration and high concentration group (log‐rank: χ2 = 7.540, p =.023). Conclusion: Our data suggest that an elevated TG level measured before catheter ablation is associated with an increased risk of AF recurrence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global dissemination of carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) has become an urgent public health concern (1,2). In 2016, the World Health Organization included CRE in a list of antimicrobial-resistant priority pathogens [...]