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Vitiligo is a cutaneous depigmentation disorder caused by melanocyte injury or aberrant functioning. Oxidative stress (OS) is considered to be a major cause of the onset and progression of vitiligo. Ginsenoside Rk1 (RK1), a major compound isolated from ginseng, has antioxidant activity. However, whether RK1 can protect melanocytes against oxidative injury remains unknown. The aim of the present study was to investigate the potential protective effect of RK1 against OS in the human PIG1 melanocyte cell line induced with hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), and to explore its underlying mechanism. PIG1 cells were pretreated with RK1 (0, 0.1, 0.2 and 0.4 mM) for 2 h followed by exposure to 1.0 mM H2O2 for 24 h. Cell viability and apoptosis were determined with Cell Counting Kit-8 and flow cytometry assays, respectively. The activity levels of superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) and glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) were analyzed using ELISA kits. Protein expression levels, including Bax, caspase-3, Bcl-2, phosphorylated-AKT, AKT, nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (Nrf2), heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1), cytosolic Nrf2 and nuclear Nrf2, were analyzed using western blot analysis. In addition, the expression and localization of Nrf2 were detected by immunofluorescence. RK1 treatment significantly improved cell viability, reduced the apoptotic rate and increased the activity levels of SOD, CAT and GSH-Px in the PIG1 cell line exposed to H2O2. In addition, RK1 treatment notably induced Nrf2 nuclear translocation, increased the protein expression levels of Nrf2 and HO-1, and the ratio of phosphorylated-AKT to AKT in the PIG1 cells exposed to H2O2. Furthermore, LY294002 could reverse the protective effect of RK1 in melanocytes against oxidative injury. These data demonstrated that RK1 protected melanocytes from H2O2-induced OS by regulating Nrf2/HO-1 protein expression, which may provide evidence for the application of RK1 for the treatment of vitiligo.

Genomic epidemiology is important to study the COVID-19 pandemic, and more than two million severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) genomic sequences were deposited into public databases. However, the exponential increase of sequences invokes unprecedented bioinformatic challenges. Here, we present the Coronavirus GenBrowser (CGB) based on a highly efficient analysis framework and a node-picking rendering strategy. In total, 1,002,739 high-quality genomic sequences with the transmission-related metadata were analyzed and visualized. The size of the core data file is only 12.20 MB, highly efficient for clean data sharing. Quick visualization modules and rich interactive operations are provided to explore the annotated SARS-CoV-2 evolutionary tree. CGB binary nomenclature is proposed to name each internal lineage. The pre-analyzed data can be filtered out according to the user-defined criteria to explore the transmission of SARS-CoV-2. Different evolutionary analyses can also be easily performed, such as the detection of accelerated evolution and ongoing positive selection. Moreover, the 75 genomic spots conserved in SARS-CoV-2 but non-conserved in other coronaviruses were identified, which may indicate the functional elements specifically important for SARS-CoV-2. The CGB was written in Java and JavaScript. It not only enables users who have no programming skills to analyze millions of genomic sequences, but also offers a panoramic vision of the transmission and evolution of SARS-CoV-2.

In this paper, leveraging the resonant phase and the geometry phase simultaneously, we demonstrated a low scattering lens antenna, which can work at both transmission and reflection mode. Different from the traditional microwave lens which only realizes wavefront shaping in half-space, the proposed metasurface lens not only squeezes the transmitted divergent beam to improve the gain of the conventional circular-polarized antenna, but also scatters the electromagnetic wave to maintain a low reflection property in broadband. The proposed lens antenna working in full space may provide a new approach for an integrated communication system.

Purpose It is recommended for colorectal cancer to harvest at least 12 lymph nodes (LNs) during surgery to avoid understaging of the disease. However, it is still controversial whether it is necessary to harvest from locally advanced rectal cancer (LARC) patients who underwent neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (neo‐CRT). The impact of lymph node yield (LNY) on prognosis in LARC patients was analyzed. Materials/Methods In total, 495 LARC patients who underwent neo‐CRT in 2006‐2015 were analyzed. After examining clinicopathological distribution differences between the LNY subgroups (with the threshold of 12), univariate and multivariate Cox survival analyses were performed. Survival plots were obtained from Kaplan‐Meier analyses. Similar subgroup analyses were performed according to the tumor regression grade (TRG) and metastatic status of post‐operational LNs. Results Of the 495 patients, 287 (57.98%) had an LNY of less than 12. Nearly no significant clinicopathological difference was found between the LNY subgroups, including the TRG scores. Multivariate survival analysis demonstrated that at least 12 LNs examined was an independent prognostic feature of good overall survival (OS), disease‐free survival (DFS), and distant metastasis free survival (DMFS), but not local recurrence free survival (LRFS). However, in the subgroup analyses, no association was found between LNY and prognosis in patients with good TRG scores (0‐1) or negative LNs. Conclusions For LARC patients treated with neo‐CRT, an LNY of at least 12 indicated an improved survival. Decreased LNY was not related to better tumor regression. It suggests that a sufficiently high LNY is still required, especially in those with a potentially poor tumor response.

The homogeneous heteropolysaccharide CMSPW90-1 was first purified from bergamot by DEAE Sepharose Fast Flow and Sephadex G-75 column with a molecular weight of 18.8 kDa. The structure of CMSPW90-1 was elucidated with high-performance gel permeation chromatography, gas chromatography–mass spectrometry, infrared spectrum, methylation, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), Congo red test, and circular dichroism. In comparison with CMSPW90-1, the sulfated derivative CMSPW90-M1 showed significant ultra-structural differences with a molecular weight of 75.4 kDa. The antioxidant and immunomodulatory activities of CMSPW90-M1 were examined to determine the relationships of structure-bioactivity. CMSPW90-M1 exhibited stronger scavenging activities for DPPH and ABTS+ than those of CMSPW90-1. CMSPW90-M1 exhibited more immunomodulatory activity in vitro by promoting the proliferation of mouse splenocytes and the neutral red phagocytosis of RAW264.7 cells. The results demonstrated that CMSPW90-M1 could be developed as one of the potential free radical inhibitors and immunomodulators.

A new homogeneous heteropolysaccharide (CMSPA90-1) was purified from bergamot by DEAE sepharose fast flow and Sephadex G-75 columns, and was shown to have a molecular weight of 17.6 kDa. Its chemical structure was elucidated by acid hydrolysis and methylation analysis, along with high-performance anion-exchange chromatography, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy coupled with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, NMR spectroscopies, the Congo red test, and circular dichroism. CMSPA90-1 consisted of a pyranoside and funanside with branches containing α- and β-configurations simultaneously. Arabinose and glucose might form an arabinoglucan backbone. The ultrastructure of CMSPA90-1 was further characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). The results of thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) revealed that CMSPA90-1 had good thermal stability. The results of DPPH˙ and ABTS+˙ radical scavenging assays indicated that CMSPA90-1 exhibited free-radical-scavenging properties. Otherwise, CMSPA90-1 could promote the proliferation of mouse splenocytes and the neutral red phagocytosis of RAW264.7 cells, which indicated that CMSPA90-1 could be researched and developed as one of the potential functional foods or natural medicines.

Object Epilepsy is one of the most common clinical manifestations of primary brain tumors. Intraoperative electrocorticography (ECoG) has been widely used in tumor resection. We aim to describe the indication and utility of ECoG during brain tumor surgery. Methods We performed a systematic review of the literature on the prognosis of tumor-related epilepsy surgery guided by intraoperative ECoG. The published studies were searched in PubMed, Embase, and Web of Science using the keyword ‘seizure’ or ‘epilepsy’ and ‘electrocorticography’ or ‘ECoG’. Two reviewer authors screened studies and extracted data independently. Results Thirteen studies included 569 patients were finally selected, of which eight investigated medically intractable epilepsy. Three publications described temporal tumor-related epilepsy. All included studies were retrospective, and the age of all patients ranged from 1-71 years. The duration of epilepsy ranged from 1 month to 30 years. Patients with tumor-related epilepsy underwent surgical treatment with Engel I outcomes ranging from 56.5%-100%. Conclusion Intraoperative ECoG is generally considered a useful technique in delineating epileptogenic areas and improving the prognosis of surgical treatment of tumor-related epilepsy. However, large-scale randomized control trials are still needed to verify these findings and formulate appropriate surgical strategies.

This study investigated the purification and characterization of a new immunomodulatory GlcNAc-containing polysaccharide (MIPB70-1) from Morchella importuna with molecular weights of 20.6 kDa. Structural analysis indicated that MIPB70-1 was composed of GlcNAc:Gal:Glc:Man with molar ratios of 1.00:7.16:5.54:5.61, and its primary structure was characterized as a repeating unit consisting of →6)-α-D-Glcp-(1→, α-D-GlcpNAc-(1→, α-D-Galp-(1→, β-D-Glcp-(1→, →6)-α-D-Manp-(1→, →4)-α-D-GlcpNAc-(1→, →4)-β-D-Glcp-(1→, →3,6)-α-D-Manp-(1→, →2)-α-D-Galp-(1→, →2,3,6)-α-D-Manp-(1→. Immunological assays indicated that MIPB70-1 enhanced the phagocytic function and promoted the secretion of nitric oxide (NO) as well as cytokines through targeting Toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4) on macrophage membrane and activating the downstream signaling pathways in RAW 264.7 cells. MIPB70-1 regulated mouse immunity to counteract the immune damage caused by the chemotherapy drug cyclophosphamide (CTX) in vivo. Furthermore, MIPB70-1 enhanced the anti-tumor activity of doxorubicin (DOX) and inhibited the growth of tumors, by immunomodulation in the orthotopic murine model of 4T1 breast cancer. These results demonstrate the potential of this GlcNAc-containing polysaccharide as an immune enhancer.

Three prevalent SARS-CoV-2 Variants of Concern (VOCs) were emerged and caused epidemic waves. It is essential to uncover the key genetic changes that cause the high transmissibility of VOCs. However, different viral mutations are generally tightly linked so traditional population genetic methods may not reliably detect beneficial mutation. In this study, we proposed a new pandemic-scale phylogenomic approach to detect mutations crucial to transmissibility. We analyzed 3,646,973 high-quality SARS-CoV-2 genomic sequences and the epidemiology metadata. Based on the sequential occurrence order of mutations and the instantaneously accelerated furcation rate, the analysis revealed that two non-coding mutations at the position of 28271 (g.a28271-/t) might be crucial for the high transmissibility of Alpha, Delta and Omicron VOCs. Both two mutations cause an A-to-T change at the core Kozak site of the N gene. The analysis also revealed that the non-coding mutations (g.a28271-/t) alone are unlikely to cause high viral transmissibility, indicating epistasis or multilocus interaction in viral transmissibility. A convergent evolutionary analysis revealed that g.a28271-/t, S:P681H/R and N:R203K/M occur independently in the three-VOC lineages, suggesting a potential interaction among these mutations. Therefore, this study unveils that non-synonymous and non-coding mutations could affect the transmissibility synergistically.

BACKGROUND: Hypertrophic-scar (HS) is the most common pathological healing phenomenon after trauma, especially after deep burns. We aimed to investigate the expression and role of microRNA-211-5p (miR-211-5p) in HS and explore its underlying mechanism. METHODS: Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) was used to detect the expression of miR-211-5p in 15 cases of HS tissues and normal skin tissues, as well as its expression in human hypertrophic scar fibroblasts (hHSFs) and normal fibroblasts. At the same time, the cell counting kit-8 (CCK-8), scratch test, cell invasion test, and flow cytometry were used to determine cell proliferation, migration, invasion, and apoptosis, respectively. Western blot assay was used to determine the expression of proteins. TargetScan was performed to predict the potential binding sites between miR-211-5p and TGFβR2, which was then verified by western blotting and luciferase reporter gene experiments. Also, co-transfection of plasmids that overexpress miR-211-5p and TGFβR2 were used to observe the reversal effect of miR-211-5p. RESULTS: The level of miR-211-5p in HS tissues and hHSFs cells was significantly down-regulated (both P

BACKGROUND: LipoxinA4 (LXA4) is an anti-inflammatory lipid mediator which was recently proposed to have antitumor potential. However, the therapeutic effect of LXA4 in melanoma is still unclear. This work aimed to investigate the function of LXA4 and its analog in melanoma invasion through in vivo and in vitro experiments. METHODS: The expression of the LXA4 receptor (ALXR) was detected in melanoma tissues and A375 human melanoma cells, using benign melanocytic nevi tissues and human melanocytes as negative controls, respectively. The invasive and apoptotic abilities of A375 cells in the presence or absence of LXA4 were examined by cell invasion assay and flow cytometric analysis. Finally, mice melanoma models were established, and the antitumor effects of BML-111 [5(S), 6(R)-7-trihydroxymethyl heptanoate], an agonist of ALXR, were examined in vivo. RESULTS: ALXR was abundantly expressed in human melanoma tissues. The ALXR messenger RNA (mRNA) and protein expression levels were higher in A375 melanoma cells than in the controls (P

The application of total quality control in the prevention and nursing of vascular crisis in patients after replantation...

Two novel glucans named MIPB50-W and MIPB50-S-1 were obtained from edible Morchella importuna with molecular weights (Mw) of 939.2 kDa and 444.5 kDa, respectively. MIPB50-W has a backbone of α-(1 → 4)-d-glucan, which was substituted at O-6 position by α-d-Glcp-(1→. Moreover, MIPB50-S-1 has a backbone of α-(1 → 4)-d-glucan, which was substituted at O-6 position by α-d-Glcp-(1 → 6)-α-d-Glcp-(1→. This is the first report about glucan found in Morchella mushrooms. Furthermore, MIPB50-W and MIPB50-S-1 strengthened the phagocytosis function and the promoted secretion of interleukins (IL)-6/tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) and nitric oxide (NO), which induced the activation of Toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2), TLR4 as well as mitogen activated protein kinase (MAPK) and nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) pathways. Interestingly, MIPB50-S-1 performed the better immunomodulatory activity than that of MIPB50-W in almost all tests. Therefore, MIPB50-W and MIPB50-S-1 are potential immune-enhancing components of functional foods.

The COVID-19 pandemic poses a great threat to human society. SARS-CoV-2 is mainly transmitted through social contact; however, it is highly debated whether cold-chain related transmission has occurred and can be identified in the epidemic areas of COVID-19. Here, we provide a new method and distinguish two transmission routes by detecting a lineage-specific reduction of SARS-CoV-2 mutation rate. After analyzing 1,610,125 SARS-CoV-2 genomic sequences, we find that two outbreaks in Xinfadi-Beijing and Auckland are cold-chain related and respectively caused by two mutation-dormant variants. A Dalian outbreak in July 2020 and a Yingkou outbreak ten months later are epidemiologically connected and derived from a cold-chain related variant. Mutation-dormant variants are detected during the spread of spike D614G variant and the Delta Variant of Concern. Cold-chain contaminations repeatedly caused by epidemiologically connected patients are also found and have resulted in infections. Moreover, the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan is likely to be cold-chain related. A systematic identification reveals that the frequency of cold-chain related transmission is in the order of magnitude of 0.1-10%. Our results indicate that that cold-chain related transmission is rare but happens globally.

To investigate the application and evaluation of effective quality management by objectives in patient care for persistent vacuum sealing drainage (VSD), a total of 164 patients with fractures of the hands and feet combined with soft tissue damage admitted to the department of hand and foot surgery in a provincial tertiary hospital from January 2018 to January 2020 were selected as study subjects. The patients were randomly divided into observation and control groups based on the types of fractures, with 82 patients in each group, and both groups underwent VSD surgery for treatment. Both of the groups were cared for VSD using the original nursing model and were compared in terms of treatment compliance, wound recovery, the occurrence of complications, and patient satisfaction with nursing work. The treatment compliance of patients in the observation group was higher than that of the control group ( P P

Human communication is multimodal in nature; it is through multiple modalities such as language, voice, and facial expressions, that opinions and emotions are expressed. Data in this domain exhibits complex multi-relational and temporal interactions. Learning from this data is a fundamentally challenging research problem. In this paper, we propose Modal-Temporal Attention Graph (MTAG). MTAG is an interpretable graph-based neural model that provides a suitable framework for analyzing multimodal sequential data. We first introduce a procedure to convert unaligned multimodal sequence data into a graph with heterogeneous nodes and edges that captures the rich interactions across modalities and through time. Then, a novel graph fusion operation, called MTAG fusion, along with a dynamic pruning and read-out technique, is designed to efficiently process this modal-temporal graph and capture various interactions. By learning to focus only on the important interactions within the graph, MTAG achieves state-of-the-art performance on multimodal sentiment analysis and emotion recognition benchmarks, while utilizing significantly fewer model parameters., Comment: NAACL 2021

OBJECTIVE Diffuse gliomas are the most common primary gliomas with a poor prognosis. This study aimed to develop and validate prognostic models for predicting the survival probability in newly diagnosed lower-grade glioma (LGG) patients. METHODS Detailed data were obtained for newly diagnosed LGG from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and the Chinese Glioma Genome Atlas (CGGA) cohorts. Survival was assessed using Cox proportional hazards regression with adjustment for known prognostic factors. The model was established using the TCGA cohort, and independently validated using the CGGA cohort, to predict the 3-, 5-, and 10-year survival probabilities of patients. RESULTS Data from 293 patients with newly diagnosed LGG from the TCGA cohort were used to establish a prognostic model, and from 232 patients with primary LGG in the CGGA cohort to validate the model. Age, tumor grade, molecular subtype, tumor resection, and preoperative neurological deficits were included in the prediction model. The Cox regression model had a satisfactory corrected concordance index of 0.8508, 0.8510, and 0.8516 in the internal bootstrap validation at 3, 5, and 10 years, respectively. The calibration plots demonstrated high consistency of the predicted and observed outcomes. The CGGA cohort was used for external validation and showed satisfactory discrimination of 0.7776, 0.7682, and 0.7051 at 3, 5, and 10 years, respectively. The calibration plots demonstrated an acceptable calibration capability in the external validation. CONCLUSIONS This study established and validated a prognostic model to predict the survival probability of patients with newly diagnosed LGG. The model performed well in discrimination and calibration with ease of use, speed, accessibility, interpretability, and generalizability. An easily used nomogram based on the Cox model was established for clinical application. Moreover, a free, easy-to-use software interface based on the nomogram is provided online.

COVID-19 has widely spread across the world, and much research is being conducted on the causative virus SARS-CoV-2. To help control the infection, we developed the Coronavirus GenBrowser (CGB) to monitor the pandemic. With CGB, 178,765 high quality SARS-CoV-2 genomic sequences were analyzed, and 121,522 mutations were identified. In total, 1,041 mutation cold spots were found, suggesting that these spots are key functional elements of SARS-CoV-2 and can be used for detection and vaccine development. CGB revealed 203 accelerated evolutions of SARS-CoV-2, but variants with accelerated evolution were not found to be highly contagious, suggesting that most of these evolutions are neutral. The B.1.1.7 (CGB75056.84017) lineage previously identified in the UK was not found to be significantly accelerated although its adaptive evolution was detected. Moreover, 2,297 strains with a significantly reduced evolutionary rate were identified, including three closely related variants widely spreading in Europe with no mutations in three months. By lineage tracing, a strain dated early March 2020 was determined to be the most recent common ancestor of nine strains collected from six different regions in three continents. This strain was also found to cause the outbreak in Xinfadi, Beijing, China in June 2020. CGB allows visualization and analysis of hundreds of thousands of SARS-CoV-2 genomic sequences. Distributed genome alignments and its effective analysis pipeline ensure timely update of the latest genomic data of SARS-CoV-2. CGB is an efficient platform for the general public to monitor the transmission and evolution of SARS-CoV-2.

Background: Ca2+ was supposed to play an important role in the cataract formation. Exosomal miR-29b from aqueous humour may play an important role in the mechanism of diabetes and cataracts. The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of exosomal miR-29b and Ca2+ in regulating the function of human lens epithelial cells. Methods: Exosomes were isolated from human aqueous humour by ultracentrifugation, and visualized by nanoparticle tracking and transmission electron microscopy. Exosomal miRNA sequencing was performed to identify differentially expressed miRNAs between diabetes and cataracts group (DMC) and age-related cataracts group (ARC). TargetScan was used to predict potential target of certain miRNA. The expression of CACNA1C mRNA was determined by quantitative real-time PCR and CACNA1C protein was determined by Western blotting. Concentration of Ca2+ in human aqueous humour and the culture supernatant of cells was detected by the Calcium Assay Kit. Cell Counting Kit-8 was used to determine cell viability. Results: Exosomes were isolated from human aqueous humour, which had a typical cup-shaped phenotype and a particle size distribution in accordance with micro extracellular vesicles. Exosomal miRNA sequencing revealed that miR-29b was significantly downregulated in diabetes and cataracts group (DMC) compared with age-related cataracts group (ARC). Ca2+ concentration of human aqueous humour in DMC was higher than that in ARC. The culture supernatant of cells transfected with miR-29b inhibitors had a higher concentration of Ca2+ than that transfected with miR-29b mimics. miR-29b reduced the viability of human lens epithelium cells (HLECs) by upregulating CACNA1C expression.Conclusions: Exosomes isolated from human aqueous humour contained abundant miRNAs. A significantly expressed miRNA, miR-29b, could affect the concentration of Ca2+ and regulate HLEC processes by upregulating CACNA1C.

The innovation of the biomedical engineering (BME) industry is inseparable from its cooperation with medical institutions. China has considerable medical institutions. Although private hospitals account for more than half of Chinese medical institutions, they rarely participate in biomedical engineering industry innovation. This paper analyzed the collaborative relationship among biomedical engineering enterprises, universities, research institutes, public hospitals and private hospitals through evolutionary game theory and discussed the influence of different factors on the collaborative innovation among them. A tripartite evolutionary game model is established which regards private hospitals as a stakeholder. The results show that (1) the good credit of private hospitals has a positive effect on their participation in collaborative innovation, (2) it is helpful for BME collaborative innovation to enhance the collaborative innovation ability of partners, (3) the novelty of innovation projects has an impact on BME collaborative innovation. The specific impacts depend on the revenue, cost and risk allocation ratio of innovation partners, (4) the higher the practicability of innovation projects, the more conducive to collaborative innovation.

The general method to achieve electromagnetic (EM) invisibility is to use absorbing materials that can reduce the backscattering microwave signals. However, they will influence the transmission of useful signals, and their passive operation mode also blocks the realization of active camouflage systems. Here, the authors propose an electrically tunable metadevice which can dynamically manipulate the reflection magnitude and realize high-efficiency transmission at two distinctive frequency bands. Such a metadevice is driven by graphene sandwich structure integrated with multi-layer metasurface. By electrically controlling the sheet resistance of graphene, the authors have experimentally verified that the metadevice can tune the reflection magnitude from -5 to -20 dB over a wide frequency band of 5-15 GHz, and meanwhile realize a high transparent EM window with 3-dB transmission band covering from 23 to 25 GHz. The operation mechanism is discussed by examining the electric field distribution and also employing an equivalent circuit model to analyze the input impedance. Furthermore, using the developed metadevice, the authors still demonstrate its dynamical camouflaging performance and application potential as an antenna radome by experiment. The finding in this study is expected to trigger great interest in adaptive camouflage, stealth radome, and multifunctional EM manipulation fields.

Background The involvement of the nerve in psoriasis development was suggested by sporadic case reports. Objectives To provide multiple evidence for the nerve in psoriasis development with a retrospective case review, a literature review and a mouse-based experimental experiment. Methods Psoriatic patients who had concomitant nerve injuries and such cases from literatures were reviewed. And, on wild-type mouse level, unilateral denervation surgery was performed on the dorsal skin before and after the induction of psoriasiform dermatitis, respectively. Lesion visual scores were calculated, and biopsies were taken for hematoxylin-eosin (HE) staining, immunofluorescence analysis, and RNA sequencing & bioinformatics analysis before denervation surgery and the 2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th day after the surgery. Results All clinical cases (20/20) showed that local lesions under the control of injured nerves relieved spontaneously or even cleared/spared, and only about 1/3 experienced partial recurrence. Next, mouse psoriasiform experiments demonstrated that unilateral denervation prior to imiquimod application attenuated the enhancement of inflammatory reactions (e.g. adaptive immune response and Th17 cell differentiation pathway) and the induction of ipsilateral psoriasiform dermatitis. On the other hand, unilateral denervation after psoriasiform dermatitis induction promoted the regression of inflammatory reactions (e.g. T cell activation, TNF signaling, and Th17 cell differentiation pathway) and ipsilateral dermatitis recovery. Conclusion Our study based on both retrospective clinical case review and wild-type mouse experiments provides multiple evidence for the involvement of the nerve in psoriasis development. Regulation of immune events, including TNF signaling and Th17 cell differentiation, may be the mechanisms of the nerve in psoriasis.

BackgroundThe involvement of the nerve in psoriasis development has been suggested by sporadic case or case serial reports.ObjectivesTo provide multiple evidence for the nerve in psoriasis development with a retrospective case review, a literature review and a mouse-based experimental study.MethodsPsoriatic patients who had concomitant nerve injuries and such cases from the literatures were reviewed. And, on wild-type mouse level, unilateral denervation surgery was performed on the dorsal skin before and after the induction of psoriasiform dermatitis, respectively. Lesion visual scores were calculated, and lesion biopsies were taken for hematoxylin-eosin (HE) staining, immunofluorescence analysis, and RNA sequencing & bioinformatics analysis at the time before denervation surgery and the 2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th day after the surgery. ResultsAll clincal cases (20/20) showed that local lesions under the control of injured nerves relieved spontaneously or even cleared/spared, and only about 1/3 experienced partial recurrence. Next, experimental study based on mouse model demonstrated that the unilateral denervation prior to imiquimod application interfered with the enhancement of inflammatory reactions (e.g. adaptive immune response and Th17 cell differentiation pathway) and the induction of ipsilateral psoriasiform dermatitis. On the other hand, the unilateral denervation after the induction of psoriasiform dermatitis promoted the regression of inflammatory reactions (e.g. T cell activation, TNF signaling, and Th17 cell differentiation pathway) and the recovery of ipsilateral dermatitis. ConclusionOur study based on both retrospective clinical case review and wild-type mouse experiments provides multiple evidence for the involvement of the nerve in psoriasis development. Regulation of immune events, including TNF signaling and Th17 cell differentiation, may be one of the mechanisms of the nerve in psoriasis.

Background: Non-Hispanic Blacks (NHBs) have a higher prevalence of hypertension and incidence of cardiovascular events than NH(W)hites and Hispanics. To improve hypertension control and outcomes in NHBs, the U.S. High Blood Pressure (BP, mmHg) Guidelines recommended calcium channel blockers (CCBs) and diuretics over other drug classes as initial therapy in 2014 and 2017. Among adults with hypertension, percentages of NHBs who reported taking CCBs and diuretic monotherapy before and after 2014 were assessed and compared to NHWs and Hispanics. Methods: National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys data in 2-year cycles from 2007-2012 and 2015-2018 were analyzed and included self-identified NHB, NHW, and Hispanic adults ≥18 years with recorded BP values and hypertension defined as self-reported BP medication use in the previous month, which included medication class, e.g., CCBs and diuretics. Multivariable logistic regression was used to assess the independent contribution of NHB race/ethnicity to prevalence of CCB and diuretic use as monotherapy. Results: Self-reported CCB or diuretic monotherapy did not increase significantly from 2007-2012 to 2015-2018 among NHBs (44% vs. 50%, p=0.12) or Hispanics (22% vs 29%, p=0.12) and a non-significant decline in NHWs (26% vs 22%, p=0.14). NHBs were more likely to report taking CCBs or diuretics as monotherapy than NHWs or Hispanics in both time periods (p Conclusions: NHBs had a non-significant increase in self-reported CCB or diuretic as monotherapy from 2007-2012 to 2015-2018, suggesting limited impact for this prescribing recommendation in the 2014 and 2017 High BP Guidelines. NHBs more often reported CCB or diuretic monotherapy than NHWs and Hispanics in both time periods, suggesting some clinicians were aware of evidence prior to the 2014 Guideline. Yet, half of NHBs did not report taking CCBs or diuretics as monotherapy in 2015-2018, indicating further opportunity to prescribe evidence-based initial therapy in NHBs that could improve BP control, cardiovascular outcomes and health equity.

Environmental sensing is a key technology for the development of unmanned cars, drones and robots. Many vision sensors cannot work normally in an environment with insufficient light, and the cost of using multiline LiDAR is relatively high. In this paper, a novel and inexpensive visual navigation sensor based on structured-light vision is proposed for environment sensing. The main research contents of this project include: First, we propose a laser-stripe-detection neural network (LSDNN) that can eliminate the interference of reflective noise and haze noise and realize the highly robust extraction of laser stripes region. Then we use a gray-gravity approach to extract the center of laser stripe and used structured-light model to reconstruct the point clouds of laser center. Then, we design a single-line structured-light sensor, select the optimal parameters for it and build a car&ndash, platform for experimental evaluation. This approach was shown to be effective in our experiments and the experimental results show that this method is more accurate and robust in complex environment.

Background: Ca2+ was supposed to play an important role in the formation of cataract. Considering our increasing knowledge of exosomes, exosomal miRNAs isolated from aqueous humour may play an important role in the mechanism of diabetes and cataracts. In this study, we aimed to investigate the role of exosomal miR-29b and Ca2+ in regulating the function of human lens epithelial cells. Methods: Exosomes were isolated from human aqueous humour by ultracentrifugation, and visualized by nanoparticle tracking and transmission electron microscopy. Exosomal miRNA sequencing was performed to identify differentially expressed miRNAs between diabetes and cataracts group (DMC) and age-related cataracts group (ARC). TargetScan was used to predict potential target of certain miRNA. The expression of CACNA1C mRNA was determined by quantitative real-time PCR and CACNA1C protein was determined by Western blotting. Concentration of Ca2+ of human aqueous humour and cell culture supernatant was detected by the Calcium Assay Kit. Cell Counting Kit-8 was used to determine cell viability. Results: Exosomes could be isolated from human aqueous humour, which had a typical cup-shaped phenotype and a particle size distribution in accordance with micro extracellular vesicles. Exosomal miRNA sequencing revealed that miR-29b was significantly downregulated in diabetes and cataracts group (DMC) compared with age-related cataracts group (ARC). Ca2+ concentration of human aqueous humour in DMC was higher than that in ARC. Cell culture supernatant transfected with miR-29b inhibitors had a higher concentration of Ca2+ than that transfected with miR-29b mimics. miR-29b reduced the viability of human lens epithelium cells (HLECs) by up-regulating CACNA1C expression.Conclusions: Exosomes isolated from human aqueous humour contained abundant miRNAs. A significantly expressed miRNA, miR-29b, could affect the concentration of Ca2+ and regulate HLEC processes by up-regulating CACNA1C.

A novel homogeneous heteropolysaccharide (GSPB70-S) with a molecular weight of 2.87 kDa was isolated from Ganoderma sinense. Structural analysis showed that GSPB70-S was composed of glucose, glucosamine, mannose, and galactose with a molar ratio of 12.90:3.70:2.26:1.00. The repeating structure units of GSPB70-S were characterized by the combined application of chemical methods and nuclear magnetic resonance. GSPB70-S contains a backbone of →3)-β-D-Glcp-(1 → 4)-α-D-GlcpNAc-(1 → 4)-α-D-Manp-(1 → 3)-β-D-Glcp-(1→, with branches of β-D-Glcp-(1→, α-D-GlcpNAc-(1 → and →4)-α-D-Galp-(1→. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) showed that GSPB70-S presented a long strip shape with different thicknesses, and there were many lamellar substances on the surface. Biological research showed that GSPB70-S inhibited the activity of α-glucosidase in vitro, increased the viability of RAW 264.7 macrophages, and promoted the release of NO. In addition, GSPB70-S showed good abilities to scavenge free radicals.

Tumour-associated macrophages (TAMs) inhibit the killing effect of T lymphocytes on tumour cells through the immunocheckpoint programmed death ligand-1 (PD-L1)/programmed death-1 (PD-1) axis. TAMs-targeted therapy is a promising approach that could be used to reverse the immunosuppressive tumour microenvironment. Here, we further report CMPB90-1, a novel natural polysaccharide from Cordyceps militaris, could function as an anti-tumour modulator that resets TAMs from a tumour-promoting M2 phenotype to a tumour-killing M1 phenotype. This process involves reversing the functional inhibition of T lymphocytes by inhibiting the PD-L1/PD-1 axis between TAMs and T lymphocytes. Mechanistically, the membrane receptor of CMPB90-1 binding to M2 macrophages was identified by tandem mass spectrometry. CMPB90-1 converts immunosuppressive TAMs via binding to toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2), which causes the release of Ca2+ and the activation of p38, Akt and NF-κB, or ERK. This process then leads to the polarization of TAMs from M2 phenotype to the M1 phenotype. In vivo experiment shows that CMPB90-1 is able to polarize TAMs into the M1 phenotype and has anti-tumour effects with improved safety. Additionally, the anti-tumour effects of CMPB90-1 in vivo depend on the phenotypic conversion of TAMs. The results demonstrated that CMPB90-1 could be developed as a potential immune-oncology treatment reagent.

Outlier detection is a key field of machine learning for identifying abnormal data objects. Due to the high expense of acquiring ground truth, unsupervised models are often chosen in practice. To compensate for the unstable nature of unsupervised algorithms, practitioners from high-stakes fields like finance, health, and security, prefer to build a large number of models for further combination and analysis. However, this poses scalability challenges in high-dimensional large datasets. In this study, we propose a three-module acceleration framework called SUOD to expedite the training and prediction with a large number of unsupervised detection models. SUOD's Random Projection module can generate lower subspaces for high-dimensional datasets while reserving their distance relationship. Balanced Parallel Scheduling module can forecast the training and prediction cost of models with high confidence---so the task scheduler could assign nearly equal amount of taskload among workers for efficient parallelization. SUOD also comes with a Pseudo-supervised Approximation module, which can approximate fitted unsupervised models by lower time complexity supervised regressors for fast prediction on unseen data. It may be considered as an unsupervised model knowledge distillation process. Notably, all three modules are independent with great flexibility to "mix and match"; a combination of modules can be chosen based on use cases. Extensive experiments on more than 30 benchmark datasets have shown the efficacy of SUOD, and a comprehensive future development plan is also presented., Comment: In AAAI-20 Workshop on Artificial Intelligence for Cyber Security (AICS)

CaV6O16·3H2O spong-like and tube-like three-dimensional (3D) structures were constructed by a simple hydrothermal method. The 3D structures composed of superlong CaV6O16·3H2O nanobelts have good tailorability. CaV6O16·3H2O papers with different thickness can be obtained by simply pressing (cutting) and drying the 3D structures. The electrochemical performances of the obtained CaV6O16·3H2O paper as the self-standing cathode for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) were investigated for the first time. It delivers an initial discharge capacity of 463.9 mAh g−1 at 50 mA g−1 and maintains at 162.3 mAh g−1 after 50 cycles. This work provide the possibility for designing high-performance cathode for LIBs.

Better blood pressure (BP; mm Hg) control is a pivotal national strategy for preventing cardiovascular events. Measure accurately, Act rapidly, and Partner with patients (MAP) with practice facilitation improved BP control (P P P =0.01), and systolic BP decreased more per therapeutic intensification (−5.4 to −12.7; P

Wang Yang,1,2,* Menglong Zhou,1,2,* Ran Hu,1,2 Guichao Li,1,2 Yan Wang,1,2 Lijun Shen,1,2 Liping Liang,1,2 Jianing Yang,1,2 Zhen Zhang1,2 1Department of Radiation Oncology, Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center, Shanghai, China; 2Department of Oncology, Shanghai Medical College, Fudan University, Shanghai,China *These authors contributed equally tothis work Purpose: This study mapped the localization of regional nodal recurrence to determine whether the clinical target volume (CTV) should be redefined in adjuvant radiotherapy.Patients and methods: Between January 2004 and October 2015, a total of 129 patients with gastric cancer following D2 resection who experienced regional recurrence were retrospectively examined. The lymph nodes (LNs) were hand-drawn proportionally on template computed tomography (CT) images of a standard patient by referencing surrounding anatomic landmarks. The association between clinicopathologic factors and LNs at risk was further investigated.Results: Based on the contour of the recurrent LNs, the authors observed high-risk regions for relapse and drew a density distribution map of 16 LN stations on the CT images. The most commonly involved recurrent LNs were stations 16b (51.2%) and 16a (39.5%). Stations 13, 12, 9, and 14 were involved in 36.4%, 33.3%, 28.7%, and 27.9% of recurrences, respectively. Other regions, including stations 1–6 (perigastric LNs) and station 10 (splenic hilar LN), were of low risk. Notably, 72% (83/116) of recurrent 16b LNs were located in the upper half of 16b1. Analysis within subgroups showed that the pathologic N stage was the only independent risk factor for LN 16 relapse.Conclusion: This mapping suggests a new method for vessel-guided delineation of regional LNs when defining the CTV in patients after standard D2 resection. LNs around the abdominal aorta and its main branches, as well as regions around the hepatic hilar area and pancreatic head, should be the most important radiotherapeutic targets. Keywords: gastric cancer, regional, lymph nodes, recurrence, target volume

Supplemental Digital Content is available in the text., Better blood pressure (BP; mm Hg) control is a pivotal national strategy for preventing cardiovascular events. Measure accurately, Act rapidly, and Partner with patients (MAP) with practice facilitation improved BP control (

Measure Accurately, Act Rapidly, and Partner With Patients (MAP) is an evidence‐based protocol implemented to improve hypertension control in a clinic for underserved patients (49.9% Medicaid and 50.2% black). Patients with hypertension seen during the year before intervention and with at least one visit during the 6‐month intervention (N = 714) were included. If initial attended blood pressure (BP; standard aneroid manometer) was ≥140/≥90 mm Hg, unattended automated office BP was measured in triplicate and averaged (Measure Accurately) using an Omron HEM‐907XL. When automated office BP was ≥140/≥90 mm Hg, Act Rapidly included intensification of antihypertensive medications, assessed by therapeutic inertia. Partner With Patients included BP self‐monitoring, reducing pill burden, and minimizing medication costs, which was assessed by systolic BP change per therapeutic intensification. Between baseline and the last study visit, BP control to

Four newly synthesized pyromellitic diimide-based fluorescent dyes with different aryl groups were first reported. All pyromellitic diimide (PMDI) derivatives were firstly displayed prominent aggregation-induced emission (AIE) properties. Additionally, the tunable fluorescence of PMDI derivatives were achieved by the varied substituent groups linked on the PMDI skeleton. With the enlarged sizes of isolation groups, aggregation-induced emission migration in the direction of red waves, as the result of the efficient inhibition of π-π stacking by the larger substituent groups. Furthermore, the mechanofluorochromic (MFC) performance of these PMDI derivatives could be tuned by different sized of the substituent groups. Interestingly, PMDI-ESCz, PMDI-PSCz and PMDI-DSCz exhibited reversible mechanofluorochromic performances, but no mechanochromism phenomenon was found for PMDI-In. These results exhibited that substituent groups had significant influence on their AIE and MFC properties.

Considerable attentions have been focused on the realization of carpet cloaks in the past decade. Most of the current carpet cloaks can perform only one electromagnetic (EM) shape for concealing inside objects, and dynamical control of arbitrary EM virtual shapes remains a significant challenge. Here, a desirable method is proposed to construct a reconfigurable carpet cloak using tunable metasurface technology. By controlling the active elements loaded on the metasurface, the surface phase distribution can be dynamically changed to make the cloak generate the predesigned scattering field. This reconfigurable metasurface cloak is experimentally realized at the microwave frequency, which demonstrates that it can not only reduce unwanted scattering for imitating the reflection of a flat metallic plane, but also mimic other different EM virtual shapes by reconfiguring the phase distribution. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first carpet cloak that achieves dynamical illusions by switching the EM shap...

Blood pressure (BP) measurement is the most common procedure performed in clinical practice. Accurate BP measurement is critical if patient care is to be delivered with the highest quality, as stressed in published guidelines. Physician training in BP measurement is often limited to a brief demonstration during medical school without retraining in residency, fellowship, or clinical practice to maintain skills. One hundred fifty-nine students from medical schools in 37 states attending the American Medical Association's House of Delegates Meeting in June 2015 were assessed on an 11-element skillset on BP measurement. Only one student demonstrated proficiency on all 11 skills. The mean number of elements performed properly was 4.1. The findings suggest that changes in medical school curriculum emphasizing BP measurement are needed for medical students to become, and remain, proficient in BP measurement. Measuring BP correctly should be taught and reinforced throughout medical school, residency, and the entire career of clinicians.

We report the development of system for packaging critical components of the traditional collection kit to make an integrated fingerstick blood collector for self-collecting blood samples of 100 μl or more for radiation countermeasures. A miniaturized vacuum tube system (VacuStor system) has been developed to facilitate liquid reagent storage, simple operation and reduced sample contamination. Vacuum shelf life of the VacuStor tube has been analyzed by the ideal gas law and gas permeation theory, and multiple ways to extend vacuum shelf life beyond one year have been demonstrated, including low temperature storage, Parylene barrier coating and container vacuum bag sealing. Self-collection was also demonstrated by healthy donors without any previous fingerstick collection experience. The collected blood samples showed similar behavior in terms of gene expression and cytogenetic biodosimetry assays comparing to the traditionally collected samples. The integrated collector may alleviate the sample collection bottleneck for radiation countermeasures following a large-scale nuclear event, and may be useful in other applications with its self-collection and liquid reagent sample preprocessing capabilities.

Objective: Examine the prevalence of black hypertensive patients receiving guideline-recommended medication therapy for treating hypertension, either thiazide diuretics or calcium channel blocking agents (CCBs), alone or a component in single pill combination. Study design: Using 2011 and 2015 National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey data, we identified adult patient visits to non-federally employed office-based physicians, with a diagnosis of hypertension or when hypertension was the reason for the visit. Population Studied: 2,454 adult hypertensive patient visits in 2011 (93.3 million weighted national estimates) and 2,648 in 2015 (141.9 million weighted national estimates). Principal Findings: Between 2011 and 2015, monotherapy prevalence was unchanged for non-Hispanic-blacks at 49%; non-Hispanic white monotherapy prevalence increased from 54% to 60%. However, in nearly 70% of visits, in both 2011 and 2015, blacks were prescribed an antihypertensive medication other than guideline recommended CCB or thiazide. The prevalence of CCB prescribing and thiazide diuretics precribing among blacks were both less than 20%. There is no difference between white patients and black patients in their shares of CCBs, thiazides and other monotherapy prescriptions in either year (Wald Chi-Square test p >.10). Conclusions: The majority of adult hypertensive patients are on monotherapy; black patients on monotherapy are not prescribed guideline recommended medication therapies, either CCB or thiazide diuretics. Hypertensive patients are getting similar pharmacological treatment across racial groups, though the guideline recommends are different for black patients. Implications for Policy or Practice: Black patients who are prescribed monotherapy as initial treatment and are not receiving guideline recommended medications nearly 69% of the time suggests that there are significant opportunities for improvement. Adoption of the 2017 ACC/AHA Guideline for High BP in Adults recommendation to lower the threshold for hypertension control from

In this paper, we propose a novel tunable metesurface design for broadband tunable RCS reduction. This metasurface element is composed of a single-layer metallic pattern involved with a PIN diode and a varactor diode. By tuning the loaded PIN and varactor diodes, the absorbing frequency band of our metasurface can be dynamically controlled. In addition, we can also manipulate its reflected field wavefront to change the low-scattering frequency band. Full-wave simulation results show that the absorbing frequency can be tuned between 3.5 and 9 GHz, and manipulating backward scattering wave can further make the low-scattering frequency reconfigurable between 9 GHz and 12GHz. As a result, broadband tunable RCS reduction property has been realized by our design.

Abnormal uterine bleeding is a common benign gynecologic complaint around the time of menopause, and is also the most common symptom of endometrial cancer. This complaint prompts in-office endometrial biopsy to exclude malignancy. Unfortunately, because only a limited portion of the lining tissue is sampled, the endometrial biopsy is not always accurate which can lead to delays in diagnosis and the potential for worsening of the disease and prognosis. Biomolecules have proven to be useful tools in cancer screening and early diagnosis. Liquid biopsy has been widely accepted as a less- or non-invasive way to obtain samples from patients, including blood, urine, saliva and other types of body fluids. However, no circulating biomarkers have been easily identified in the patient blood of endometrial cancer. MicroRNA are a class of small molecules and has shown promise in cancer detection. MicroRNAs may be detected in the biopsy tissue or by testing the fluid that cells secrete. Endometrial tissue is inherently difficult to sample in the office. Although direct sampling from the endometrium has limitations, but the fluid secreted by the lining endometrial epithelial cells can be easily sampled using a technique adapted from an in-office procedure known as a sonohysterography. This procedure is used in the evaluation of abnormal uterine bleeding by introducing saline solution into the endometrial cavity as a contrast material during transvaginal ultrasound. The infused saline is normally discarded, but can be collected for microRNA analysis. In this study, we report the preliminary results of potential miRNA biomarkers identified in 60 patient endometrial fluid collected using sonohystography technique. Patients were recruited who planned to undergo hysterectomy for either benign indication or for a known endometrial cancer diagnosis. The endometrial fluid was collected prior to surgery using a technique similar to that used in sonohysterography. The miRNA was extracted and quantitated. Following the reverse transcription, each sample was amplified on a customized microarray plate with known specific miRNA target primer printed in each well (miScrpt miRNA PCR Array). Patient demographic and health information was collected to be used in the final analysis along with the final pathology results of their surgery. In total, 60 patient samples have been collected and processed (30 cancer and 30 controls). Significant variations in expression were identified in several miRNA markers. Markers with at least a two-fold increase (e.g. miR-429, miR-146a-5p, miR-34b-3p) or decrease (e.g. miR-296-5p, miR-204-5p) in expression were considered candidates for validation. Twelve miRNA markers with the greatest variation in expression were chosen to be used on an additional set of patients to further validate the results. The results will be presented. The method developed here will provide a non-invasive way in early diagnosis and screening for endometrial cancer and therefore impact on improvement of women’s health. Citation Format: Jianing Yang, Joel Barkley, Kameron Firouzi, Bikash Bhattarai, Dean Coonrod, Frederic Zenhausern. Identification and validation of endometrial cancer specific miRNA biomarkers in endometrial fluid collected using saline infused sonohysterography techniques [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Virtual Special Conference: Endometrial Cancer: New Biology Driving Research and Treatment; 2020 Nov 9-10. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Clin Cancer Res 2021;27(3_Suppl):Abstract nr PO035.

To explore application and effect of nursing quality target management in free flap transplantation for hand injury. 140 patients with free skin flap transplantation for hand injury admitted to the hand and foot surgery ward of the hospital from January 2017 to December 2019 were selected as the research objects. They were randomly divided into observation group and control group. There were 70 patients in each group, and both groups of patients received microscopic free flap transplantation. The observation group adopted traditional nursing mode and nursing quality target management mode to carry out nursing, while the control group adopted traditional nursing mode to carry out nursing. The treatment compliance, skin flap survival, occurrence of vascular crisis, occurrence of complications, VAS and Barthel comparison score of the two groups were compared. The treatment compliance of patients in the observation group was significantly higher than that in the control group (P < 0.05). The survival rate of skin flap in the observation group was higher than that in the control group (P < 0.05). The incidence of vascular crisis in the observation group was lower than that in the control group (P < 0.05). The postoperative pain in the observation group was better than that in the control group (P < 0.05). There was no significant difference in Barthel score between the observation group and the control group at admission (P > 0.05), but the improvement range of Barthel score in the observation group was higher than that in the control group at discharge (P < 0.05), The satisfaction of patients in the observation group to nurses was higher than that in the control group (p < 0.05). The application of nursing quality target management can improve the treatment compliance of patients, improve the survival rate of free skin flap transplantation for hand injury, reduce the incidence of vascular crisis within 48 hours after operation, reduce the occurrence of postoperative complications, relieve the pain of patients, improve self-care ability and ensure the quality of life.

Background Osteosarcoma (OS) is a common bone cancer in children and adolescents which causes a large number of cancer-related deaths. Eukaryotic Translation Elongation Factor 1 Alpha 2 (EEF1A2) has been revealed to have carcinogenic properties and promote tumor progression in many cancers. We want to investigate the biological function and mechanism of EEF1A2 in OS. Methods The expression of EEF1A2 in OS was investigated using the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database and quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR). The biological function of EEF1A2 in OS was studied using cell counting kit-8 (CCK8) assay, 5-ethynyl-2'-deoxyuridine (EdU) assay, Transwell assay, and OS of xenograft nude mice model. Real-time fluorescence quantitative PCR was used to detect the expression level of EEF1A2 mRNA in OS tissues and cell lines. Western blot was used to detect the phosphorylation level of Akt and mTOR. Results There was high expression of EEF1A2 in OS, which was closely related to the Enneking stage and tumor size of OS. In vitro, EEF1A2 promoted the proliferation, migration, and invasion of OS cells; in vivo, EEF1A2 promoted the growth of OS tumors. The mechanism study showed that EEF1A2 can promote protein kinase B (Akt) and mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) phosphorylation, thereby activating the Akt/mTOR signaling pathway in OS. Conclusion There is high expression of EEF1A2 in OS, which can promote the proliferation, migration, and invasion of OS cells in vitro and the growth of OS tumors in vivo via activation of the Akt/mTOR signaling pathway.

In this study, high-amylose starches were hydrothermally-treated and the structural changes were monitored with time (up to 12 h) using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM), small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). When high-amylose starches were treated in boiling water, half-shell-like granules were observed by SEM, which could be due to the first hydrolysis of the granule inner region (CLSM). This initial hydrolysis could also immediately (0.5 h) disrupt the semi-crystalline lamellar regularity (SAXS) and dramatically reduce the crystallinity (XRD); but with prolonged time of hydrothermal treatment (≥2 h), might allow the perfection or formation of amylose single helices, resulting in slightly increased crystallinity (XRD and DSC). These results show that the inner region of granules is composed of mainly loosely-packed amylopectin growth rings with semi-crystalline lamellae, which are vulnerable under gelatinization or hydrolysis. In contrast, the periphery is demonstrated to be more compact, possibly composed of amylose and amylopectin helices intertwined with amylose molecules, which require greater energy input (higher temperature) for disintegration.\ud \ud