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Large-scale studies of single-cell sequencing and biological experiments have successfully revealed expression patterns that distinguish different cell types in tissues, emphasizing the importance of studying cellular heterogeneity and accurately annotating cell types. Analysis of gene expression profiles in these experiments provides two essential types of data for cell type annotation: annotated references and canonical markers. In this study, the first comprehensive database of single-cell transcriptomic annotation resource (CellSTAR) was thus developed. It is unique in (a) offering the comprehensive expertly annotated reference data for annotating hundreds of cell types for the first time and (b) enabling the collective consideration of reference data and marker genes by incorporating tens of thousands of markers. Given its unique features, CellSTAR is expected to attract broad research interests from the technological innovations in single-cell transcriptomics, the studies of cellular heterogeneity & dynamics, and so on. It is now publicly accessible without any login requirement at: https://idrblab.org/cellstar., (© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.)

Objective: To explore the predictive value of lipoproteins on the progression of critically ill patients to chronic critical illness (CCI)., Methods: A retrospective cohort study was conducted to analyze clinical data of patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) of Nanjing Drum Tower Hospital from January 1, 2020, to December 31, 2022. The levels of high-density lipoprotein (HDL), low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and apolipoproteins (ApoA-I, ApoB) at 1, 3, 7, 14 and 21 days after admission to ICU were collected. The progression to CCI was recorded. CCI was defined as the length of ICU stay ≥14 days with sustained organ dysfunction [sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) score ≥2]. Differences in lipoprotein levels between the patients with and without CCI were compared. Multivariate Logistic regression was used to analyze risk factors for critically ill patients progressing to CCI. Receiver operator characteristic curve (ROC curve) was drawn to evaluate the predictive value of lipoproteins on critically ill patients progressing to CCI., Results: A total of 200 patients were enrolled in the final analysis. 137 patients (68.5%) progressed to CCI, and 63 patients (31.5%) did not. The lipoprotein indicators in the CCI group showed a decrease after the acute phase, while the lipoprotein indicators in the non-CCI group showed an increase. The levels of HDL, LDL, ApoA-I, and ApoB at various time points in the CCI group were significantly lower than those in the non-CCI group. HDL at 7 days in the CCI group was significantly lower than that in the non-CCI group [mmol/L: 0.44 (0.31, 0.61) vs. 0.67 (0.49, 0.75), P < 0.01]. Multivariate Logistic regression analysis showed that 7-day HDL was an independent risk factor for critically ill patients progressing to CCI [odds ratio (OR) = 0.033, 95% confidence interval (95%CI) was 0.004-0.282, P = 0.002]. ROC curve analysis showed that the area under the ROC curve (AUC) of 7-day HDL for predicting critically ill patients progressing to CCI was 0.702, with a 95%CI of 0.625-0.779, P < 0.001. When the optimal cut-off value was 0.59 mmol/L, the sensitivity was 69.8%, and the specificity was 72.4%., Conclusions: The low level of lipoproteins is closely related to the progression of critically ill patients, and 7-day HDL has a certain predictive value for critically ill patients progressing to CCI. Continuously observation of the change trend of lipoprotein level is helpful to judge the progression of CCI in critically ill patients.

Objectives: To analyze the influence of pulmonary infection after radical esophagectomy on serum inflammatory markers, pulmonary function, and prognosis., Methods: We enrolled 278 esophageal cancer patients who underwent radical esophagectomy. Patients were split into the infected (n=51) and uninfected groups (n=227). The inflammatory parameters, complications, and prognosis were compared., Results: In the infected group, interleukin (IL)-6 was 16.19±2.63 ng/L, tumor necrosis factor-α was 19.64±3.07 µg/L, and IL-1β was 22.49±5.13 ng/L at 7 days postoperatively; white blood cell counts was 12.65±2.14 ×10 9 /L, percentage of neutrophils (NEU%) was 67.04±10.48%, and platelet (PLT) counts was 249.82±63.26 ×10 9 /L; the increasing ranges of the above factors after the operation were much raised compared with the uninfected group ( p <0.05). Compared with the uninfected group, forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1), forced vital capacity (FVC), and FEV1/FVC were greater declines in ranges ( p <0.05), and the arrhythmia incidence and the mortality within 60 days postoperatively were greater in the infected group ( p <0.05)., Conclusion: Postoperative pulmonary infection can lead to pulmonary function damage, proinflammatory factor overexpression, and an increased risk of early death., (Copyright: © Saudi Medical Journal.)

Background: Antimicrobial blue light (ABL) therapy is one of the novel non-antibiotic approaches and recent studies showed the potential of pulsed ABL., Purpose: Comparing photoinactivation effect of continuous wave (CW) and pulsed blue light and investigating the impact of varying light parameters., Methods: E. coli cells in planktonic were treated with CW and pulsed light (405 nm and 450 nm) at 60 mW/cm 2 , and the samples were taken to assess survival, reactive oxygen species (ROS) level, damage of cell membrane and metabolic activity. Further, a ROS scavenger was used to find the role of ROS played in ABL therapy., Results: E. coli was more sensitive to 405 nm light and the photoinactivation was dose-dependent. Pulsed 405 nm light showed the better antimicrobial effect on E. coli and caused increasing damage of cell membrane. It might be attributed to the ROS production in bacteria., Conclusion: Pulsed light has a potential of improving the efficacy of ABL therapy and is worth to be explored deeply further., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Neuromorphic vision has been attracting much attention due to its advantages over conventional machine vision (e.g., lower data redundancy and lower power consumption). Here we develop synaptic phototransistors based on the silicon nanomembrane (Si NM), which are coupled with lead sulfide quantum dots (PbS QDs) and poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) to form a heterostructure with distinct photogating. Synaptic phototransistors with optical stimulation have outstanding synaptic functionalities ranging from ultraviolet (UV) to near-infrared (NIR). The broadband synaptic functionalities enable an array of synaptic phototransistors to achieve the perception of brightness and color. In addition, an array of synaptic phototransistors is capable of simultaneous sensing, processing, and memory, which well mimics human vision.

Background: Plant secondary metabolites and their modified derivatives play an important role in the discovery and development of novel insecticides. The natural plant product (3E)-4,8-dimethyl-1,3,7-nontriene (DMNT) has been proven to be able to effectively repel and kill the lepidopteran insect pest Plutella xylostella., Results: In this study, four oxygenated derivatives of DMNT were synthesized by allylic hydroxylation and subsequent etherification or esterification. Bioassays on P. xylostella larvae showed that the compounds DMNT-OCH 3 (2), DMNT-OCy (3) and DMNT-OAc (4) were more toxic to the larvae than DMNT alone. The most pronounced effect was observed for compound 2, which showed a 22.23% increase in lethality at a concentration of 0.25 μm. Moreover, the peritrophic matrix (PM) barrier in the insect midgut was more severely damaged by compounds 2, 3 and 4 than by DMNT. The median lethal concentration (LC 50 , 48 h) of compounds 2, 3 and 4 on P. xylostella was determined to be 0.98, 1.13 and 1.11 mg mL -1 , respectively, which is much lower than the commercial insecticides eucalyptol (2.89 mg mL -1 ) and thymol (2.45 mg mL -1 )., Conclusion: These results suggested that oxygenated DMNT derivatives offer a significantly improved killing effect over DMNT on P. xylostella. This work has provided a basis for further design, structural modification and development of DMNT as botanical insecticides. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry., (© 2023 Society of Chemical Industry.)

Ribonucleic acids (RNAs) involve in various physiological/pathological processes by interacting with proteins, compounds, and other RNAs. A variety of powerful computational methods have been developed to predict such valuable interactions. However, all these methods rely heavily on the 'digitalization' (also known as 'encoding') of RNA-associated interacting pairs into a computer-recognizable descriptor. In other words, it is urgently needed to have a powerful tool that can not only represent each interacting partner but also integrate both partners into a computer-recognizable interaction. Herein, RNAincoder (deep learning-based encoder for RNA-associated interactions) was therefore proposed to (a) provide a comprehensive collection of RNA encoding features, (b) realize the representation of any RNA-associated interaction based on a well-established deep learning-based embedding strategy and (c) enable large-scale scanning of all possible feature combinations to identify the one of optimal performance in RNA-associated interaction prediction. The effectiveness of RNAincoder was extensively validated by case studies on benchmark datasets. All in all, RNAincoder is distinguished for its capability in providing a more accurate representation of RNA-associated interactions, which makes it an indispensable complement to other available tools. RNAincoder can be accessed at https://idrblab.org/rnaincoder/., (© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.)

Exploring cost-efficient/durability bifunctional electrocatalysts are of upmost importance for the practical application of metal-air batteries. However, preparing bifunctional electrocatalysts with the above three advantages remains conceptually challenging. This work reports the preparation of N-doped carbon confined NiCo alloy hollow spheres (NiCo@N-C HS) as bifunctional oxygen electrocatalyst for Zn-air battery with a higher energy density (788.7 mWh g Zn -1 ) and outstanding cycling stability (over 200 h), which are more durable than the commercialized Pt/C+RuO 2 -based device. Electrochemical results and theoretical calculation demonstrate that the synergy in the NiCo@N-C accelerates the electronic transmission for improving activation of O 2 * and OH* intermediates and optimizing reacted free energy pathways, while the hollow structures exposure more active sites for improving the reaction kinetics and enhancing the activity of ORR/OER reaction. This work provides crucial understanding for constructing low-cost transition metal-based catalyst to overcome the efficiency and durability barriers of metal-air batteries for widespread applications., (© 2023 Wiley-VCH GmbH.)

Antimicrobial blue light (aBL) therapy is a novel non-antibiotic antimicrobial approach which works by generating reactive oxygen species. It has shown excellent antimicrobial ability to various microbial pathogens in many studies. However, due to the variability of aBL parameters (e.g., wavelength, dose), there are differences in the antimicrobial effect across different studies, which makes it difficult to form treatment plans for clinical and industrial application. In this review, we summarize research on aBL from the last six years to provide suggestions for clinical and industrial settings. Furthermore, we discuss the damage mechanism and protection mechanism of aBL therapy, and provide a prospect about valuable research fields related to aBL therapy.

The continued scaling-down of nanoscale semiconductor devices has made it very challenging to obtain analytic surface potential solutions from complex equations in physics, which is the fundamental purpose of the MOSFET compact model. In this work, we proposed a general framework to automatically derive analytical solutions for surface potential in MOSFET, by leveraging the universal approximation power of deep neural networks. Our framework incorporated a physical-relation-neural-network (PRNN) to learn side-by-side from a general-purpose numerical simulator in handling complex equations of mathematical physics, and then instilled the "knowledge'' from the simulation data into the neural network, so as to generate an accurate closed-form mapping between device parameters and surface potential. Inherently, the surface potential was able to reflect the numerical solution of a two-dimensional (2D) Poisson equation, surpassing the limits of traditional 1D Poisson equation solutions, thus better illustrating the physical characteristics of scaling devices. We obtained promising results in inferring the analytic surface potential of MOSFET, and in applying the derived potential function to the building of 130 nm MOSFET compact models and circuit simulation. Such an efficient framework with accurate prediction of device performances demonstrates its potential in device optimization and circuit design.

The newly emerging severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Omicron BA.2.75 and BA.2.76 subvariants contained 35 and 29 additional mutations in its spike (S) protein compared with the reference SARS-CoV-2 genome, respectively. Here, we measured the evasion degree of the BA.1, BA.2, BA.4, BA.5, BA.2.75, and BA.2.76 subvariants from neutralizing immunity in people previously infected with the Omicron BA.1 and BA.2, determined the effect of vaccination on immune evasion, and compared the titers of neutralizing antibodies in serums between acute infection and convalescence. Results showed that the neutralization effect of serums from patients with different vaccination statuses and BA.1/BA.2 breakthrough infection decreased with the Omicron evolution from BA.1 to BA.2, BA.4, BA.5, BA.2.75, and BA.2.76. This study also indicated that the existing vaccines could no longer provide effective protection, especially for the emerging BA.2.75 and BA.2.76 subvariants. Therefore, vaccines against emerging epidemic strains should be designed specifically. In the future, we can not only focus on the current strains, but also predict and design new vaccines against potential mutant strains. At the same time, we can combine the virus strains' infection characteristics to develop protective measures for virus colonization areas, such as nasal protection spray. Besides, further studies on the Y248N mutation of BA.2.76 subvariant were also necessary to explore its contribution to the enhanced immune evasion ability., (© 2023 Wiley Periodicals LLC.)

Objective: Although the chemical constituents of the aerial parts of Cannabis have been extensively studied, phytochemicals of Cannabis roots are not well characterized. Herein, we investigated the chemical constituents of industrial hemp (Cannabis sativa L.) roots and evaluated the anti-inflammatory activities of phytochemicals isolated from the hemp roots extract., Methods: An ethyl acetate extract of hemp roots was subjected to a combination of chromatographic columns to isolate phytochemicals. The chemical structures of the isolates were elucidated based on spectroscopic analyses (by nuclear magnetic resonance and mass spectrometry). The anti-inflammatory effects of phytochemicals from hemp roots were evaluated in an anti-inflammasome assay using human monocyte THP-1 cells., Results: Phytochemical investigation of hemp roots extract led to the identification of 32 structurally diverse compounds including six cannabinoids (1-6), three phytosterols (26-28), four triterpenoids (22-25), five lignans (17-21), and 10 hydroxyl contained compounds (7-16), three fatty acids (29-31), and an unsaturated chain hydrocarbon (32). Compounds 14-21, 23, 27, and 32 were identified from the Cannabis species for the first time. Cannabinoids (1-5) reduced the level of cytokine tumor necrosis-alpha (by 38.2, 58.4, 47.7, 52.2, and 56.1%, respectively) and 2 and 5 also decreased the interleukin-1β production (by 42.2 and 92.4%, respectively) in a cell-based inflammasome model. In addition, non-cannabinoids including 11, 13, 20, 25, 29, and 32 also showed selective inhibition of interleukin-1β production (by 23.7, 22.5, 25.6, 78.0, 24.1, 46.6, and 25.4%, respectively) in THP-1 cells., Conclusion: The phytochemical constituent of a hemp roots extract was characterized and compounds from hemp roots exerted promising anti-inflammatory effects., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

Mesocarbon microbead-silicon carbide (MCMB-SiC) composites were prepared by hot-press sintering (2100 °C/40 MPa/1 h) with two different graphitized MCMBs as the second phase, which exhibited good self-lubricating properties. The effects of the graphitization degree of the MCMBs on the microstructure and properties of the composites were investigated contrastively. The results showed that the composites that added raw MCMBs with a low degree of graphitization had excellent self-sintering properties, higher densities, and better mechanical properties; by comparison, the composites that added mature MCMBs with a high degree of graphitization, which has regular and orderly lamellar structures, not only had good mechanical properties but also exhibited a lower and more stable dry friction coefficient (0.35), despite the higher wear rate (2.66 × 10 -6 mm 3 ·N -1 ·m -1 ). Large amounts of mature MCMBs were peeled off during the friction process to form a uniform and flat graphite lubricating film, which was the main reason for reducing the dry friction coefficient of the self-lubricating composites and making the friction coefficient more stable., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.

Background: Herpes zoster is one of the most common diseases in middle and old ages, and the incidence rate is constantly increasing. Long-term, severe neuropathological pain continues to afflict the patients, causing trouble and even the inability to live a normal life. Since the occurrence and development of herpes zoster are related to many mechanisms, there is no uniform conclusion and specific treatment method, and only a limited number of people are currently vaccinated against HZ., Objective: This study aimed at exploring the potential mechanism or biomarkers for Herpes zoster., Methods: In this study, a data set GSE165112 containing 12 samples was downloaded, out of which, 6 samples were treated with interferon, and 6 samples were not treated. Differentially expressed genes (DEG) analysis, KEGG, GO enrichment analysis, and GSEA were carried out., Results: A total of 264 DEGs were identified, including 32 uP-regulated DEGs and 232 downregulated DEGs. DEGs are mainly enriched in immune response, inflammatory response, chemotaxis, etc. Four key pathways were found to be related to HZ, including IL2-STAT5 signaling, inflammatory response, TNF-a signaling via NF-κB, and IFN-α. Moreover, ten hub genes were also identified., Conclusion: This study shows that exploring DEGs and pathways through bioinformatics analysis is of great significance for understanding the molecular mechanism of HZ, especially the defect of the IFN pathway. It may be helpful in improving the treatment for HZ., (Copyright© Bentham Science Publishers; For any queries, please email at epub@benthamscience.net.)

Needle beams have received widespread attention due to their unique characteristics of high intensity, small focal size, and extended depth of focus (DOF). Here, a single-layer all-dielectric metalens based on Pancharatnam-Berry (PB) was used to efficiently generate and focus an azimuthally polarized vortex beam at the same time. Then, additional phase or amplitude modulation was respectively adopted to work with the metalens to produce optical needles. By decorating the PB metalens with the binary optical element (BOE), an optical needle with full-width-at-half-maximum (FWHM) of 0.47 λ and DOF of 3.42 λ could be obtained. By decorating the PB metalens with an annular aperture, an optical needle with long DOF (16.4 λ) and subdiffraction size (0.46 λ) could be obtained. It is expected that our work has potential applications in super-resolution imaging, photolithography, and particle trapping.

Background: The counts of examined lymph nodes (ELNs) in predicting the prognosis of patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is a controversial issue. We conducted a retrospective study to develop an ELNs-based model to individualize ESCC prognosis., Methods: Patients with ESCC from the SEER database and our center were strictly screened. The optimal threshold value was determine by the X-tile software. A prognostic model for ESCC patients was developed and validated with R. The model's efficacy was evaluated by C-index, ROC curve, and decision curve analysis (DCA)., Results: 3,629 cases and 286 cases were screened from the SEER database and our center, respectively. The optimal cut-off value of ELNs was 10. Based on this, we constructed a model with a favorable C-index (training group: 0.708; external group 1: 0.687; external group 2: 0.652). The model performance evaluated with ROC curve is still reliable among the groups. 1-year AUC for nomogram in three groups (i.e., 0.753, 0.761, and 0.686) were superior to that of the TNM stage ( P  < 0.05). Similarly, the 3-year AUC and the 5-year AUC results for the model were also higher than that of the 8th TNM stage. By contrast, DCA showed the benefit of this model was better in the same follow-up period., Conclusion: More than 10 ELNs are helpful to evaluate the survival of ESCC patients. Based on this, an improved model for predicting the prognosis of ESCC patients was proposed., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (© 2022 Yang, Huang, Chen, Chen and Liang.)

Genetic diseases are often caused by nonsense mutations, but only one TRID (translation readthrough inducing drug), ataluren, has been approved for clinical use. Ataluren inhibits release factor complex (RFC) termination activity, while not affecting productive binding of near-cognate ternary complex (TC, aa-tRNA.eEF1A.GTP). Here we use photoaffinity labeling to identify two sites of ataluren binding within rRNA, proximal to the decoding center (DC) and the peptidyl transfer center (PTC) of the ribosome, which are directly responsible for ataluren inhibition of termination activity. A third site, within the RFC, has as yet unclear functional consequences. Using single molecule and ensemble fluorescence assays we also demonstrate that termination proceeds via rapid RFC-dependent hydrolysis of peptidyl-tRNA followed by slow release of peptide and tRNA from the ribosome. Ataluren is an apparent competitive inhibitor of productive RFC binding, acting at or before the hydrolysis step. We propose that designing more potent TRIDs which retain ataluren's low toxicity should target areas of the RFC binding site proximal to the DC and PTC which do not overlap the TC binding site., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

Introduction: Postherpetic neuralgia (PHN) is one of the most common types of chronic neuropathic pain, which seriously affects quality of the life because of pain severity and poor response to the currently available treatments. Ju Re Ba Du therapy as a form of acupuncture therapy which is proved to be effective in RCTs and very suitable for patients, has been used in Postherpetic neuralgia in patients for a long time, therefore a systematic review is necessary to provide available evidence for further study., Methods and Analysis: The following databases will be searched from their inception to October 2020: Electronic database includes PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, Nature, Science online, VIP medicine information, and CNKI (China National Knowledge Infrastructure)., Primary Outcome: pain intensity assessed on a visual analogue scale (VAS); Additional outcomes:Data will be extracted by two researchers independently, risk of bias of the meta-analysis will be evaluated based on the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions. All data analysis will be conducted by data statistics software Review Manager V.5.3. and Stata V.12.0., Results: The results of this study will systematically evaluate the effectiveness and safety of Ju Re Ba Du therapy intervention for people with Postherpetic neuralgia., Conclusion: The systematic review of this study will summarize the current published evidence of Ju Re Ba Du therapy for the treatment of Postherpetic neuralgia, which can further guide the promotion and application of it., Ethics and Dissemination: This study is a systematic review, the outcomes are based on the published evidence, so examination and agreement by the ethics committee are not required in this study. We intend to publish the study results in a journal or conference presentations., Osf Registration Number: September 29, 2020 osf.io/r6y9b. (https://osf.io/r6y9b).

Introduction: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the efficacy and safety of acupuncture for POSEIDON patients undergoing IVF/ICSI., Methods: and analysis We will electronically search Pubmed, Medline, Embase, Web of Science, the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trial, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, China Biomedical Literature Database, China Science Journal Database and Wan-fang Database from their inception. Also, we will manually retrieve other resources, including reference lists of identified publications, conference articles, and grey literature. The clinical randomized controlled trials or quasi randomized controlled trials related to acupuncture treatment for POSEIDON patients in IVF/ICSI will be included in the study. The language is limited to Chinese and English. Research selection, data extraction, and research quality assessment will be independently completed by two researchers. Data were synthesized by using a fixed effect model or random effect model depend on the heterogeneity test. The clinical pregnancy rate (CPR) and live birth rate (LBR) will be the primary outcomes. The ongoing pregnancy, miscarriage rate (MR) and adverse events will also be assessed as secondary outcomes. RevMan V.5.3 statistical software will be used for meta-analysis, and the level of evidence will be assessed by Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE). Continuous data will be expressed in the form of weighted mean difference or standardized mean difference with 95% confidence intervals (CIs), while dichotomous data will be expressed in the form of relative risk with 95% CIs., Ethics and Dissemination: The protocol of this systematic review (SR) does not require ethical approval because it does not involve humans. We will publish this article in peer-reviewed journals and presented at relevant conferences., Systematic Review Registration: OSF Registries, DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/6WP2F (https://osf.io/6wp2f).

5S rRNA is an indispensable component of cytoplasmic ribosomes in all species. The functions of 5S rRNA and the reasons for its evolutionary preservation as an independent molecule remain unclear. Here we used ribosome engineering to investigate whether 5S rRNA autonomy is critical for ribosome function and cell survival. By linking circularly permutated 5S rRNA with 23S rRNA we generated a bacterial strain devoid of free 5S rRNA. Viability of the engineered cells demonstrates that autonomous 5S rRNA is dispensable for cell growth under standard conditions and is unlikely to have essential functions outside the ribosome. The fully assembled ribosomes carrying 23S-5S rRNA are highly active in translation. However, the engineered cells accumulate aberrant 50S subunits unable to form stable 70S ribosomes. Cryo-EM analysis revealed a malformed peptidyl transferase center in the misassembled 50S subunits. Our results argue that the autonomy of 5S rRNA is preserved due to its role in ribosome biogenesis.

This study was conducted to evaluate the safety of laparoscopic radical resection for rectal cancer. A total of 64 cases of rectal cancer patients undergoing radical surgery between January, 1998 and March, 2010 were collected. The patients were divided into the laparoscopic rectal surgery group (LS group, n=31) and the open surgery group (OS group, n=33). Operation time, postoperative recovery, complications and tumor-free survival rate were compared between the two groups. The inclusion criteria were as follows: Standard Karnofsky score >70 prior to surgery, definitive pathological diagnosis and complete clinical data. The exclusion criteria were concomitant tumors affecting survival. With the Dixon operation, the LS group had a longer operation time compared with the OS group (271.2±56.2 vs. 216.0±62.7 min, respectively; P=0.036), and an earlier time of oral intake (3.0±0.9 vs. 4.7±1.0 days, respectively; P=0.000). There were no significant differences between the LS and OS groups in terms of intraoperative blood loss, number of lymph nodes retrieved, duration of postoperative hyperthermia and hospitalization time (P>0.05). With the Miles operation, there were no obvious differences between the LS and OS groups regarding operation time, intraoperative blood loss, number of lymph nodes retrieved, time of oral intake, duration of postoperative hyperthermia and hospitalization time (P>0.05). Furthermore, there were no significant differences between the LS and OS groups with the Dixon or Miles operation in terms of 3-year tumor-free survival rate (P>0.05). Thus, laparoscopic surgery appears to be a safe and feasible option for the treatment of rectal cancer.

Objective: To develop a high-throughput rapid method for Vibrio (V.) cholerae molecular typing based on Melting Curve-based Multilocus Melt Typing (McMLMT)., Methods: Seven housekeeping genes of V.cholerae were screened out, and for each gene, the specific primers were designed for correspondent genes as well as 4 probes covering polymorphism loci of sequences. After optimizing all parameters, a method of melting-curve analysis following asymmetric PCR was established with dual-fluorescent-reporter in two reaction tubes for each gene. A set of 28 Tm-values was obtained for each strain and then translated into a set of code of allelic genes, standing for the strain's McMLMT type (MT). Meanwhile, sequences of the 7-locus polymorphism were typed according to the method of MLST. To evaluate the efficiency and reliability of McMLMT, the data were compared with that of sequence-typing and PFGE using BioNumerics software., Results: McMLMT method was established and refined for rapid typing of V. cholerae that a dozen of strains can be finished testing in a 3-hours PCR running using 96-well plates. 108 strains were analyzed and 28-Tm-values could be grouped and encoded according to 7 housekeeping gene to obtain the code set of allelic genes, and classified into 18 types (D = 0.723 3). Sequences of the 7 genes' polymorphism areas were directly clustered into the same 18 types with reference to MLST method. 46 of the strains, each represented a different PFGE type, could be classified into 13 types (D = 0.614 5) with McMLMT method and A- K groups at 85% similarity (D = 0.858 9) with PFGE method., Conclusion: McMLMT method is a rapid high-throughput molecular typing method for batches of strains with a resolution equal to MLST method and comparable to PFGE group.