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Sepsis is a syndrome of organ dysfunction caused by a dysregulated immune response to infection, with high morbidity and mortality. At present, there have been many advances in the study of its pathogenesis, especially the cardiac dysfunction caused by sepsis, namely sepsis-induced myocardial dysfunction, SIMD, which has received widespread attention. The mechanisms of SIMD mainly include excessive release of inflammatory mediators, impaired mitochondrial function, autophagy, apoptosis and myocardial dysfunction. This article reviews the pathogenesis of SIMD and elaborates on the progress in its treatment, aiming to improve the prognosis of patients with SIMD and sepsis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a digital library, book search is one of the most important information services. However, with the rapid development of network technologies such as cloud computing, the server‐side of a digital library is becoming more and more untrusted; thus, how to prevent the disclosure of users' book query privacy is causing people's increasingly extensive concern. In this article, we propose to construct a group of plausible fake queries for each user book query to cover up the sensitive subjects behind users' queries. First, we propose a basic framework for the privacy protection in book search, which requires no change to the book search algorithm running on the server‐side, and no compromise to the accuracy of book search. Second, we present a privacy protection model for book search to formulate the constraints that ideal fake queries should satisfy, that is, (i) the feature similarity, which measures the confusion effect of fake queries on users' queries, and (ii) the privacy exposure, which measures the cover‐up effect of fake queries on users' sensitive subjects. Third, we discuss the algorithm implementation for the privacy model. Finally, the effectiveness of our approach is demonstrated by theoretical analysis and experimental evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Background: Conventional cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT, Bi‐V) is associated with no response in about 40% patients due to an insufficient resynchronization. Some studies showed triple‐site ventricular (Tri‐V) pacing had greater benefits compared with Bi‐V pacing, but the results of these studies were conflicting. We hypothesized that Tri‐V pacing had greater benefits on long‐term outcomes compared with Bi‐V pacing in patients with heart failure. Methods: PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library were searched for clinical studies with related outcomes. Weighted mean differences (WMD) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated to compare the change in left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), left ventricular geometry, functional capacity, and quality of life between Tri‐V pacing group and control group. Results: Five trials with 251 patients were included in the analysis. Patients in the Tri‐V pacing group had a greater improvement in LVEF (WMD 4.04; 95% CI 2.15‐5.92, P < .001) and NYHA classes (WMD −0.27; 95% CI −0.42 to −0.11, P = .001) compared with control group. However, there were no significant differences in left ventricular geometry, six‐min walk distance, or Minnesota Living With Heart Failure Questionnaire score between the two groups. The subgroup analyses showed there might be a greater improvement in LVEF in the Tri‐V pacing group in patients with QRS duration ≥ 155 ms (WMD 5.60; 95% CI 3.09‐8.10, P < .001). Conclusions: The present analysis suggests that Tri‐V pacing has greater benefits in terms of an improvement in LVEF and functional capacity in patients with systolic heart failure, especially in patients with the duration of QRS ≥ 155 ms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies have suggested that galectin-3 is an important mediator of cardiac fibrosis. The aim of this study was to investigate the utility of galectin-3 in identifying early left ventricular remodeling (LVRM) in patients with hypertension. A total of 107 patients with hypertension and 108 controls were enrolled in this study. The levels of galectin-3 were significantly greater in hypertension patients with LVRM compared with those without LVRM. Multivariate regression analysis demonstrated that body mass index and galectin-3 were independent predictors of LVRM in the hypertension group. Only left ventricular mass was independently correlated with serum galectin-3 levels in patients with hypertension. The receiver operating characteristic analysis showed an area under the curve for galectin-3 of 0.698 (P<.001), with an optimal cutoff of 9.43 ng/mL. Therefore, galectin-3 is independently correlated with LVRM and can be regarded as a valuable biomarker of early cardiac remodeling of hypertension. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, silica-based transparent organic–inorganic hybrid materials were prepared via the sol–gel process. Tetraethoxysilane (TEOS) and 3-glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane (GPTMS) were used as the inorganic and organic precursors, respectively. The terbium complex, Tb(Tfacac)3phen (Tfacac=1,1,1-trifluoroacetylacetone, phen=1, 10-phenanthroline) was successfully doped into organically modified silicate (ormosil) matrix derived from TEOS and GPTMS, and the luminescent properties of the resultant ormosil composite phosphors [ormosil/Tb(Tfacac)3phen] were investigated compared with those of the Tb(Tfacac)3phen incorporated into SiO2 derived from TEOS (labeled as silica/Tb(Tfacac)3phen). Both kinds of the materials show the characteristic green emission of Tb3+ ion. The luminescence behavior of the resultant composite products was dependent on the matrix composition. The optimized lanthanide complex concentration in the ormosil/Tb(Tfacac)3phen was increased compared with in silica/Tb(Tfacac)3phen. Furthermore, the lifetime of Tb3+ in Tb(Tfacac)3phen, silica/Tb(Tfacac)3phen and ormosil/Tb(Tfacac)3phen follows the sequence: ormosil/Tb(Tfacac)3phen>silica/Tb(Tfacac)3phen>pure Tb(Tfacac)3phen. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The title complex, [Cu(2)(C(16)H(10)NO(2))(4)(CH(3)OH)(2)], consists of centrosymmetric wheel-shaped dinuclear neutral mol-ecules in which each Cu(II) atom is coordinated in a slightly distorted square-pyramidal geometry by four O atoms of carboxyl-ate groups from different ligands at the basal plane and an O atom of a methanol mol-ecule at the axial position. In the crystal, the dinuclear complex mol-ecules are linked into one-dimensional supra-molecular columns parallel to the b axis by O-H⋯N hydrogen bonds and π-π stacking inter-actions [centroid-centroid distance = 3.7259 (11) Å].