Search

Pancreatic cancer (PC) is a devastating and lethal malignant disease and it is well known that there is a complex bidirectional relationship between PC and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). In order to more deeply summarize the relationship between them, this article summarizes the epidemiological data on the relationship between PC and T2DM in the past 5 years, and further explains the mechanism of interaction between them. Meanwhile, it also summed up the effects of drug therapy for T2DM on PC and the impact of T2DM on surgical resection of PC. Epidemiological studies clearly indicate that the risk of PC is increased in patients with T2DM. But increasing epidemiological data points out that PC also acts as a cause of T2DM and new-onset T2DM is sign and consequence of PC. Insulin resistance, hyperinsulinemia, hyperglycemia, and chronic inflammation are the mechanisms of T2DM-Associated PC. Metformin decreases the risk of PC, while insulin therapy increases the risk of PC. Besides, studies have shown that T2DM decreases the survival in patients with PC resection.

The study illustrates a crucial role of tissue microenvironment in mediating endothelial dropout and vascular rarefaction., Endothelial cell injury leading to microvascular rarefaction is a characteristic feature of chronic kidney disease (CKD). However, the mechanism underlying endothelial cell dropout is poorly defined. Here, we show a central role of the extracellular microenvironment in controlling endothelial cell survival and proliferation in CKD. When cultured on a decellularized kidney tissue scaffold (KTS) from fibrotic kidney, endothelial cells increased the expression of proapoptotic proteins. Proteomics profiling identified fibrillin-1 (FBN1) as a key component of the fibrotic KTS, which was up-regulated in animal models and patients with CKD. FBN1 induced apoptosis of endothelial cells and inhibited their proliferation in vitro. RNA sequencing uncovered activated integrin αvβ6/transforming growth factor–β signaling, and blocking this pathway abolished FBN1-triggered endothelial injury. In a mouse model of CKD, depletion of FBN1 ameliorated renal fibrotic lesions and mitigated vascular rarefaction. These studies illustrate that FBN1 plays a role in mediating vascular rarefaction by orchestrating a hostile microenvironment for endothelial cells.

Pancreatic cancer (PC) is a devastating and lethal malignant disease and it is well known that there is a complex bidirectional relationship between PC and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). In order to more deeply summarize the relationship between them, this article summarizes the epidemiological data on the relationship between PC and T2DM in the past 5 years, and further explains the mechanism of interaction between them. Meanwhile, it also summed up the effects of drug therapy for T2DM on PC and the impact of T2DM on surgical resection of PC. Epidemiological studies clearly indicate that the risk of PC is increased in patients with T2DM. But increasing epidemiological data points out that PC also acts as a cause of T2DM and new-onset T2DM is sign and consequence of PC. Insulin resistance, hyperinsulinemia, hyperglycemia, and chronic inflammation are the mechanisms of T2DM-Associated PC. Metformin decreases the risk of PC, while insulin therapy increases the risk of PC. Besides, studies have shown that T2DM decreases the survival in patients with PC resection.

Background Researches on artificial livers greatly contribute to the clinical treatments for liver failure. This study aimed to evaluate the research output of artificial livers and citations from 2004 to 2017 through a bibliometric analysis. Methods A list of included articles on artificial livers were generated after a comprehensive search of the Web of Science Core Collection (from 2004 to 2017) with the following basic information: number of publications, citations, publication year, country of origin, authors and authorship, funding source, journals, institutions, keywords, and research area. Results A total of 968 included articles ranged from 47 citations to 394 citations with a fluctuation. The publications were distributed in 12 countries, led by China (n = 212) and the US (n = 207). There were strong correlations of the number of citations with authors (r2 = 0.133, p < 0.001), and countries (r2 = 0.275, p < 0.001), while no correlations of the number of citations with the years since publication (r2 = 0.016, p = 0.216), and funding (r2 < 0.001, p = 0.770) were identified. Keyword analysis demonstrated that with the specific change of “acute liver failure,” decrease in “bioartificial livers” and “hepatocyte,” and increase in “tissue engineering” were identified. The top 53 cited keyword and keyword plus (including some duplicates counts) were identified, led by bioartificial liver (405 citations) and hepatocyte (248 citations). The top 50 cited keywords bursts were mainly “Blood” (2004–2008), “hepatocyte like cell” (2008–2015), and “tissue engineering” (2014–2017). All keywords could be classified into four categories: bioartificial livers (57.40%), blood purification (25.00%), clinical (14.81%), and other artificial organs (2.78%). Discussion This study shows the process and tendency of artificial liver research with a comprehensive analysis on artificial livers. However, although it seems that the future of artificial livers seems brighter for hepatocyte transplantation, the systems of artificial livers now are inclined on focusing on blood purification, plasma exchange, etc.

Yan Li,1 Xiaohui Bian,2 Junyu Ouyang,2 Shuyi Wei,2 Meizhi He,2 Zelong Luo1 1Department of Oncology, Zhujiang Hospital of Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China; 2The Second School of Clinical Medicine, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China Purpose: To develop nomogram models to predict individualized estimates of overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) in patients with adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC).Patients and methods: A total of 751 patients with ACC were identified within the Surveillance Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database between 1973 and 2015. The predictors comprised marital status, sex, age at diagnosis, year of diagnosis, laterality, histologic grade, ethnicity, historic stage, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, and surgery of primary site. Based on the results of the multivariate logistic regression analyses, the nomogram models were used for predicting OS and CSS in patients with ACC. The nomograms were tested using concordance index (C-index) and calibration curves.Results: In univariate and multivariate analyses of OS, OS was significantly associated with age at diagnosis, year of diagnosis, histologic grade, historic stage, and chemotherapy. In univariate and multivariate analyses of CSS, age at diagnosis, year of diagnosis, historic stage, and chemotherapy were the independent risk factors with CSS. These characteristics were included in the nomograms predicting OS and CSS. The nomograms demonstrated good accuracy in predicting OS and CSS, with the C-index of 0.677 and 0.672.Conclusion: These clinically useful tools predicted OS and CSS in patients with ACC using readily available clinicopathologic factors and could aid individualized clinical decision making. Keywords: adrenocortical carcinoma, nomogram, overall survival, cancer-specific survival

The protein imprinted technique combining surface imprinting and nano-sized supports materials is an attractive strategy for protein recognition and rapid separation. In this work, we imprinted bovine hemoglobin (BHb) on magnetic nanoparticles. With itaconic acid (IA) and acrylamide (AAm) as the monomers, the experiment was carried out in aqueous media via surface-imprinting technique. The effects of initial concentration and adsorption time over the adsorption capacity of both imprinted and non-imprinted nanoparticles were analyzed. The maximum adsorption capability of imprinted nanoparticles was found to be 77.6 mg g(-1), which was 3.1-4.3 times higher than that of the non-imprinted nanoparticles prepared at the same conditions. This resulted in the successful formation of imprinting cavities. Moreover, in selective adsorption experiment and competitive batch rebinding test, imprinted nanoparticles exhibited a high specific recognition of the template protein over the non-imprinted protein.

This paper presents the preparation and thermal characterization of phase change materials (PCMs) enhanced by carbon-based nanoparticles, including graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs), multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and nano-graphite (NG). A systematic experimental framework, consisting of material selection and preparation, material property characterization and thermal performance examination, was proposed and used in this study to facilitate the development of nano-enhanced PCMs (NePCMs) for solar thermal energy storage applications. By applying this framework, the characteristics and potential performance of PCM composites can be comprehensively understood, and better assessed before practical applications. It was found that the thermal conductivity of the myristic acid (MA) can be significantly enhanced by adding the nanoparticles in particular GNPs as additives into the PCM. The thermal conductivity of the PCM composites can be improved by 176.26%, 47.30% and 44.01% respectively under the solid phase, by adding GNPs, MWCNTs and NG with a concentration of 3 wt%. However, the concentration of the nanoparticles needs to be carefully determined to maximise the benefit in thermal conductivity enhancement. Different from that under the solid phase, the thermal conductivity enhancement of the NePCMs developed under the liquid phase followed linear increasing trends with relatively low increasing rates, when increasing the concentration of the nanoparticles. Besides the thermal conductivity enhancement, the adding of nanoparticles also modified the phase change process with a smaller phase change temperature range and eliminated supercooling while maintaining the high latent heat capacity. A further thermal performance examination demonstrated that the prepared NePCMs showed high thermal and chemical stability, which can be used to substantially reduce the phase transition time, and therefore are good potential candidates for solar thermal energy storage applications.

A simple molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) was prepared to recognize the template lysozyme (Lys). Chitosan (CS) was selected as the functional biopolymer to enhance the adsorption capacity. The aldehyde group was introduced to CS, so that the template protein could be immobilized onto the modified CS beads. After the template protein was successfully immobilized, two kinds of organic siloxane, tetraethoxysiloxane (TEOS) and 3-aminopropyl triethoxysilane (APTES), were added and polymerized via a sol–gel process in aqueous solution at 25 °C. After template removal, adsorption experiments were performed to study the properties of the synthesized MIP. The results showed that the MIP exhibited much higher adsorption capacity for Lys than the non-imprinted polymer (NIP). The theoretical maximum adsorption capacity (Qmax) and equilibrium constant (KL) were determined by the Langmuir model, which turned out to be 15.89 mg g−1 and 6.78. The selectivity of the MIP was verified by direct adsorption of a single reference protein and mixed protein. The UV measurement and sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) analysis results showed the MIP had a relatively high adsorption capacity and excellent selectivity, which made it possible to remove the template protein from different sample solutions.