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Tuvans are mainly distributed in Siberia (the Republic of Tuva), Mongolia, and China. The genetic origin of Chinese Tuvans remains controversial. The Tuvans in China were classified as Mongolians in the early 1950s by the National Ethnic Affairs Commission of China, but they defined themselves as a separate group. To resolve this dispute and determine their genetic relationships with the peoples in Central Asia, we randomly selected 150 male subjects from the Tuvans in the Altai region of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in China. Fourteen Y chromosomal markers were genotyped using the RFLP method or direct sequencing. These haplogroup data were combined with public data for 15 populations in South Siberia and Central Asia. Tuvans in both China and the Republic of Tuva had the highest frequencies of haplogroups K-M9 and Q-M242. Principal component analysis demonstrated that the Tuvans in China were of a distinct cluster, separated from their neighbors, the Mongolians and Kazakhs, which finding was consistent with the Analysis of Molecular Variances. Further population tree analysis revealed that Tuvans were on a far-separated cluster from their neighbors. Based on these results, we propose that the Tuvans (in both China and the Republic of Tuva) constitute a group distinct from Mongolians and from other Central Asia populations. However, the genetic results might be the consequence of some evolutionary forces like genetic drift and founder effect, and do not necessarily reflect their ultimate origin. Am J Phys Anthropol, 2011. © 2011 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reports the systematic identification of protein complexes in Saccharomyces cerevisiae by mass spectrometry. Identification of protein complexes; Detection of associated proteins covering the yeast proteome; Success rate in detecting known complexes.

Choriocarcinoma is a rare, highly malignant neoplasm, which may occur during or following any type of pregnancy. This tumor often demonstrates rapid hematogenous spread to multiple organs, and is associated with high human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG) levels and a good response to chemotherapy. In the present study, the case of a 29-year-old female with distant metastatic choriocarcinoma [International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO) stage IV; World Health Organization score, 15], who was misdiagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis at a local hospital is presented. The major failure in the diagnosis of this case was that the patient's serum β-HCG levels were ignored initially. However, the patient received combined treatment with systematic multi-agent chemotherapy, whole-brain radiation therapy and gross total resection of the brain lesion at West China Second Hospital, and achieved complete remission. In conclusion, the accurate and prompt diagnosis of choriocarcinoma is crucial for a good outcome. Furthermore, in young female patients exhibiting symptoms such as pulmonary bleeding or neurological disturbances following a hydatidiform mole or a normal pregnancy, even in the absence of abnormal uterine bleeding, serum β-HCG levels must be analyzed and a diagnosis of choriocarcinoma must be considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a video multi-target tracking algorithm combining a detector with a tracker, the quality of detector affects the performance of the whole tracking algorithm. The missing and false detection will lead to the missing and false tracking of target, increase the fragmentation trajectory and increase the number of identity tag transformation. In order to solve these problems, this paper further optimizes the tracking algorithm in the framework of labeled multi-Bernoulli filter, designs a new measurement driven newborn target recognition method to capture newborn targets more quickly and accurately, designs a new target recognition method which can maintain the label invariance in a short time and reduce the fragmentation trajectory and label jumping, and introduces a new template selection strategy to avoid polluting the template by adding the occluded target to the template. Considering the labeled multi-Bernoulli filter is an online reasoning algorithm, parallelization is adopted to speed up the operation efficiency of the algorithm. The result shows that the proposed algorithm can effectively solve the problems of label jumping and inaccurate tracking by target occlusion. It is tested on the challenging MOT17 dataset and has good tracking effect compared with other relevant filtering methods.

The article provides information on a study which examined the conformations of mussel adhesive protein Pvfp-5ß and its salt-tolerant underwater adhesion on superhydrophilic mica, using molecular dynamics simulations. Topics discussed include structure of Pvfp-5ß in solution, adsorption of Pvfp-5ß to mica, and structure and adsorption of the unmodified protein Pvfp-5ß-Tyr.

Myocarditis is an inflammatory heart disease that leads to dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) and heart failure. Sex hormones play an important role in the development of myocarditis with testosterone driving disease in males and estrogen being cardioprotective in females. The human population is widely exposed to the endocrine disruptor bisphenol A (BPA) from plastics such as water bottles, plastic food containers, copy paper, and receipts. Several clinical and numerous animal studies have found an association between elevated BPA levels and cardiovascular disease. A recent report found elevated levels of BPA in the serum of patients with DCM compared to healthy controls. In this study we examined whether exposure to BPA for 2 weeks prior to viral infection and leading up to myocarditis at day 10 altered inflammation in female BALB/c mice housed in standard plastic cages/water bottles with soy-free food and bedding. We found that a human relevant dose of BPA (25 μg/L) in drinking water, with an estimated exposure of 5 μg BPA/kg BW, significantly increased myocarditis and pericarditis compared to control water without altering viral genome levels in the heart. BPA exposure activated ERα and ERβ in the spleen 24 h after infection and phosphorylated ERα and ERβ during myocarditis, but decreased ERα and increased ERβ mRNA in the heart as measured by qRT-PCR. Exposure to BPA significantly increased CD4+ T cells, IFNγ, IL-17A, TLR4, caspase-1, and IL-1β in the heart. BPA exposure also increased cardiac fibrosis compared to controls. Mast cells, which are associated with cardiac remodeling, were found to increase in number and degranulation, particularly along the pericardium. Interestingly, plastic caging/water bottle exposure alone led to increased mast cell numbers, pericardial degranulation and fibrosis in female BALB/c mice compared to animals housed in glass cages/water bottles with soy-free food and bedding. These data suggest that BPA exposure may increase the risk of developing myocarditis after a viral infection in women.

Proteinuria serves as a direct causative factor of renal tubular cell injury and is highly associated with the progression of chronic kidney disease via uncertain mechanisms. Recently, evidence demonstrated that both NLRP3 inflammasome and mitochondria are involved in the chronic kidney disease progression. The present study was undertaken to examine the role of NLRP3 inflammasome/mitochondria axis in albumin-induced renal tubular injury. In patients with proteinuria, NLRP3 was significantly up-regulated in tubular epithelial cells and was positively correlated with the severity of proteinuria. In agreement with these results, albumin remarkably activated NLRP3 inflammasome in both in vitro renal tubular cells and in vivo kidneys in parallel with significant epithelial cell phenotypic alteration and cell apoptosis. Genetic disruption of NLRP3 inflammasome remarkably attenuated albumin-induced cell apoptosis and phenotypic changes under both in vitro and in vivo conditions. In addition, albumin treatment resulted in a significant mitochondrial abnormality as evidenced by the impaired function and morphology, which was markedly reversed by invalidation of NLRP3/caspase-1 signaling pathway. Interestingly, protection of mitochondria function by Mn(III)tetrakis (4-benzoic acid) porphyrin (MnTBAP) or cyclosporin A (CsA) robustly attenuated albumin-induced injury in mouse proximal tubular cells. Collectively, these findings demonstrated a pathogenic role of NLRP3 inflammasome/caspase-1/mitochondria axis in mediating albumin-induced renal tubular injury. The discovery of this novel axis provides some potential targets for the treatment of proteinuria-associated renal injury. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]