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Abstract Aims To explore the effect of early initiation of self-management based on multidisciplinary education in heart failure (HF) patients. Methods HF patients in the Cardiology Department of Beijing Hospital were consecutively enrolled from June 2022 to February 2023. In-hospital HF patients from June 2022 to October 2022 were divided into the control group, and HF patients from November 2022 to February 2023 were divided into the cardiac rehabilitation (CR) group. A series of self-management education sessions with cardiologists, pharmacologists, nutritionists, and nurses was initiated early in the CR group. Continuous strengthening education was provided during the 3 months of discharge. Patients in the control group only received education twice during hospitalization. Minnesota Living with Heart Failure Questionnaire (MLHFQ), Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI), anxiety Self-rating anxiety scale (SAS), and Self-rating depression scale (SDS) were compared between the two groups. Major cardiovascular adverse events (MACEs) were recorded during follow-up. Results A total of 91 HF patients were enrolled. There were 44 patients in the CR group and 47 in the control group. Compared with before the program, the MLHFQ and SAS scores significantly decreased at 3 months after discharge in both groups. PSQI also showed mild improvement without significant differences in both groups. Furthermore, SDS showed a significant increase in the CR group but within the normal range. MACE occurrences did not show a significant difference. Conclusion Early initiation of self-management program based on multidisciplinary education may help improve quality of life, sleep quality, and reduce anxiety for hospitalized HF patients.

Abstract Background Paraquat (PQ) -induced pulmonary fibrosis poses a significant medical challenge due to limited treatment options and high mortality rates. Consequently, there is an urgent need for early diagnosis and accurate staging to facilitate appropriate treatment strategies. In this study, we assessed the diagnostic potential of [18F]F-FAPI-42 PET/CT imaging for early detection and disease staging in a rat model of PQ-induced lung fibrosis. Methods After administering 80 mg/kg of PQ orally to Sprague-Dawley rats, we intravenously injected 3-3.5 MBq of [18F]F-FAPI-42 on day 7, 14, and 21 post-dosing. Dynamic PET/CT imaging was carried out for one hour immediately after the administration of [18F]F-FAPI-42. Subsequently, the lung tissues were collected for Hematoxylin and Eosin (HE) staining, Masson’s trichrome staining, and NOTA-FAPI-04-MB fluorescent probe staining. Data analysis was performed using the Imalytics preclinical software, and the mean standardized uptake value (SUVmean) was calculated. Results PET signals revealed that in areas with evident lesions on CT, the SUVmean on day 14 was significantly higher than on day 7 and 21, indicating that changes in fibrosis activity levels contribute to the staging of pulmonary fibrosis. Additionally, the NOTA-FAPI-04-MB fluorescent probe staining also demonstrated the most pronounced probe uptake on day 14. In regions without apparent lesions on CT, the SUVmean gradually increased from day 7 to day 21, reflecting ongoing fibrotic activity. Moreover, HE staining and Masson’s trichrome staining did not reveal pulmonary fibrosis, while PET imaging was able to detect it, serving the purpose of early diagnosis. At 30 min and 60 min, the target-to-background ratio (TBR) of the PQ groups on day 7, 14, and 21 was significantly higher than the control group, suggesting a high specificity of [18F]F-FAPI-42 binding to activated fibroblasts. Conclusion [18F]F-FAPI-42 PET/CT imaging enables early diagnosis and staging of PQ-induced pulmonary fibrosis, demonstrating its feasibility and potential for characterizing early disease stages.

Lactiplantibacillus plantarum is widely distributed in nature and is one of the most widely developed and used lactic acid bacteria species at present. Most developed and used L. plantarum are derived from fermented food or plant-based materials. In this study, L. plantarum was isolated from fecal samples of healthy Uyghur and Kazakh children in Yining, Xinjiang, and 20 representative strains were selected by fingerprinting to remove the identical bands. The clustering results of fingerprinting classified the strains into three major groups, and strains of the same ethnicity and age group were more likely to be clustered in the same small branch. The phylogenetic tree based on groEL gene showed that strains of the same ethnic origin tended to cluster together. At the same time, the acid and bile salt tolerance, self-aggregation, hydrophobicity (xylene), bacteriostatic capacity, antibiotic sensitivity and carbohydrate utilization ability of 20 strains were tested in vitro. The results showed that strains YLW2L-108-29, YLW2L-61-7 and YLW1L-44-7 had better acid (pH2.5) resistance, and YLW1L-44-6 had the best bile salt tolerance (0.3% concentration). Strains YLW2L-61-7, YLW2L-57-4, YLW2L-66-30 had the best self-aggregation and hydrophobics results, and all strains grew well on fructooligosaccharide, galactooligosaccharide, isomaltooligosaccharide, maltodextrin, raffinose, D-(+)-trehalose dihydrate, pectin, stachyose tetrahydrate and soybean oligosaccharide. Most strains had poor growth on inulin and resistant starch, and worst growth on xylo-oligosaccharide. Combined with the results of bacterial inhibition and antibiotic resistance, strain YLW2L-61-7 was screened as a potential probiotic strain for subsequent studies, laying the foundation for the development of excellent probiotic strains and products suitable to regional populations.

Abstract Background and objectives Dietary control and increased physical activity (PA) are recommended for patients with metabolic (dysfunction-) associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD). However, not all patients can sustain both exercise and a healthy diet. This study explored the interaction between dietary quality, PA levels, and mortality in MAFLD patients. Methods The Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and linked mortality data were used in this study. Diet quality was assessed with the Healthy Eating Index (HEI). PA level was calculated by multiply self-reported exercise frequency and its Metabolic Equivalent A high-quality diet was associated. A Cox proportional hazard model was used to explore risk factors for mortality in MAFLD patients. Results In total, 3709 participants with MAFLD were included in the final analysis. The median follow-up time was 26.2 (interquartile range 19.3–28.1) years and 1549 (41.8%) deaths were recorded over follow-up. Cox multivariate regression was used to adjust for potential confounders of mortality. The results showed both HEI score and PA level were inversely correlated with all-cause mortality (P

Abstract The upper lip bite test (ULBT) is considered an effective method for predicting difficult airways, but data on the ULBT for predicting difficult tracheal intubation are lacking. This study aimed to examine the clinical utility of the ULBT in predicting difficult endotracheal intubation. We conducted an observational case-cohort study of adult patients undergoing elective surgery and requiring endotracheal intubation for general anesthesia. Difficult airway assessment was performed on the recruited patients before the operation, including the ULBT, mouth opening, thyromental distance, modified Mallampati test, and body mass index. The primary outcome was the incidence of difficult tracheal intubation. The receiver operating characteristic curve analysis was used to compare the performance of variables in predicting difficult tracheal intubation. We successfully recruited 2522 patients for analysis and observed 64 patients with difficult tracheal intubation. When predicting difficult tracheal intubation, grade 2 ULBT had a sensitivity of 0.75 and a specificity of 0.54, and grade 3 had a sensitivity of 0.28 and a specificity of 0.75. Compared with mouth opening, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of the ULBT was lower in predicting difficult tracheal intubation (0.69 [95% confidence interval: 0.67–0.71] vs. 0.84 [95% confidence interval: 0.82–0.87], P

Abstract Previous studies have demonstrated that bis-(3',5')-cyclic diguanosine monophosphate (bis-3',5'-c-di-GMP) is a ubiquitous second messenger employed by bacteria. Here, we report that 2',3'-cyclic guanosine monophosphate (2',3'-cGMP) controls the important biological functions, quorum sensing (QS) signaling systems and virulence in Ralstonia solanacearum through the transcriptional regulator RSp0980. This signal specifically binds to RSp0980 with high affinity and thus abolishes the interaction between RSp0980 and the promoters of target genes. In-frame deletion of RSp0334, which contains an evolved GGDEF domain with a LLARLGGDQF motif required to catalyze 2',3'-cGMP to (2',5')(3',5')-cyclic diguanosine monophosphate (2',3'-c-di-GMP), altered the abovementioned important phenotypes through increasing the intracellular 2',3'-cGMP levels. Furthermore, we found that 2',3'-cGMP, its receptor and the evolved GGDEF domain with a LLARLGGDEF motif also exist in the human pathogen Salmonella typhimurium. Together, our work provides insights into the unusual function of the GGDEF domain of RSp0334 and the special regulatory mechanism of 2',3'-cGMP signal in bacteria.

Abstract Background The anatomical characteristics of difficult airways can be analysed geometrically. This study aims to develop and validate a geometry-assisted difficult airway screening method (GADAS method) for difficult tracheal intubation. Methods In the GADAS method, a geometric simulated model was established based on computer graphics. According to the law of deformation of the upper airway on laryngoscopy, the expected visibility of the glottis was calculated to simulate the real visibility on laryngoscopy. Validation of the new method: Approved by the Ethics Committee of Yijishan Hospital of Wannan Medical College. Adult patients who needed tracheal intubation under general anaesthesia for elective surgery were enrolled. The data of patients were input into the computer software to calculate the expected visibility of the glottis. The results of tracheal intubation were recorded by anaesthesiologists. The primary observation outcome was the screening performance of the expected visibility of the glottis for difficult tracheal intubation. Results The geometric model and software of the GADAS method were successfully developed and are available for use. We successfully observed 2068 patients, of whom 56 patients had difficult intubation. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of low expected glottis visibility for predicting difficult laryngoscopy was 0.96 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.95–0.96). The sensitivity and specificity were 89.3% (95% CI: 78.1-96.0%) and 94.3% (95% CI: 93.2%-95.3), respectively. Conclusions It is feasible to screen difficult-airway patients by applying computer techniques to simulate geometric changes in the upper airway.

Accurate peach detection is essential for automated agronomic management, such as mechanical peach harvesting. However, ubiquitous occlusion makes identifying peaches from complex backgrounds extremely challenging. In addition, it is difficult to capture fine-grained peach features from a single RGB image, which can suffer from light and noise in scenarios with dense small target clusters and extreme light. To solve these problems, this study proposes a multimodal detector, called CRLNet, based on RGB and depth images. First, YOLOv9 was extended to design a backbone network that can extract RGB and depth features in parallel from an image. Second, to address the problem of information fusion bias, the Rough–Fine Hybrid Attention Fusion Module (RFAM) was designed to combine the advantageous information of different modes while suppressing the hollow noise at the edge of the peach. Finally, a Transformer-based Local–Global Joint Enhancement Module (LGEM) was developed to jointly enhance the local and global features of peaches using information from different modalities in order to enhance the percentage of information about the target peaches and remove the interference of redundant background information. CRLNet was trained on the Peach dataset and evaluated against other state-of-the-art methods; the model achieved an mAP50 of 97.1%. In addition, CRLNet also achieved an mAP50 of 92.4% in generalized experiments, validating its strong generalization capability. These results provide valuable insights for peach and other outdoor fruit multimodal detection.

Maize, as one of the most important crops in the world, faces severe challenges from various diseases and pests. The timely and accurate identification of maize leaf diseases and pests is of great significance for ensuring agricultural production. Currently, the identification of maize leaf diseases and pests faces two key challenges: (1) In the actual process of identifying leaf diseases and pests, complex backgrounds can interfere with the identification effect. (2) The subtle features of diseases and pests are difficult to accurately extract. To address these challenges, this study proposes a maize leaf disease and pest identification model called LFMNet. Firstly, the localized multi-scale inverted residual convolutional block (LMSB) is proposed to perform preliminary down-sampling on the image, preserving important feature information for the subsequent extraction of fine disease and pest features in the model structure. Then, the feature localization bottleneck (FLB) is proposed to improve the model’s ability to focus on and locate disease and pest characteristics and to reduce interference from complex backgrounds. Subsequently, the multi-hop local-feature fusion architecture (MLFFA) is proposed, which effectively addresses the problem of extracting subtle features by enhancing the extraction and fusion of global and local disease and pest features in images. After training and testing on a dataset containing 19,451 images of maize leaf diseases and pests, the LFMNet model demonstrated excellent performance, with an average identification accuracy of 95.68%, a precision of 95.91%, a recall of 95.78%, and an F1 score of 95.83%. Compared to existing models, it exhibits significant advantages, offering robust technical support for the precise identification of maize diseases and pests.

Abstract Syphilis is a global public health concern. This study aimed to assess the global and regional burden of syphilis from 1990 to 2019. Disease burden was evaluated using disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs) and prevalence. Data were extracted from the 2019 global burden of disease Study, an open database available for download. Age-standardized rates (ASR) and estimated annual percentage changes (EAPC) were calculated to evaluate the syphilis burden over time. In 2019, the total number of prevalent cases of syphilis was 49.71 million worldwide. The ASR of prevalence was stable from 1990 to 2019 with an EAPC of 0.00 (95% CI − 0.10–0.11). The number of DALYs caused by syphilis was 7.36 million in 2019, reflecting a reduction of 16.38% compared with that in 1990 (8.80 million). The ASR of DALYs exhibited a decreasing trend from 1990 to 2019 (EAPC = − 1.01; 95% CI − 1.19 to − 0.84), with the highest rates observed in the younger age group (

Abstract High body mass index (BMI) has been associated with better survival in patients with end‐stage kidney disease. Individuals with fatty liver disease (FLD) have a higher risk of chronic kidney disease. It remains unclear whether the survival benefit of high BMI in patients with chronic kidney disease is present when there is concomitant FLD. This study used the data set from the Third American National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and the corresponding survival data. The Cox proportional hazards model was used to evaluate the effect of BMI on mortality. A total of 12,445 participants were included. The prevalence of FLD was 39.8%. The median follow‐up time (with interquartile range) was 22.8 (20.8–24.8) years. During this period, 3749 (30.1%, 14.4 of 1000 person‐year) deaths were observed. Among these, 1169 (31.2%) died within the first 10 years. The Cox regression analysis showed that the BMI level was not associated with 25‐year mortality in patients with decreased glomerular filtration rate (GFR

Abstract Background Based on the upper airway anatomy and joint function parameters examined by ultrasound, a multiparameter ultrasound model for difficult airway assessment (ultrasound model) was established, and we evaluated its ability to predict difficult airways. Methods A prospective case-cohort study of difficult airway prediction in adult patients undergoing elective surgery with endotracheal intubation under general anesthesia, and ultrasound phantom examination for difficult airway assessment before anesthesia, including hyomental distance, tongue thickness, mandibular condylar mobility, mouth opening, thyromental distance, and modified Mallampati tests, was performed. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was used to evaluate the effectiveness of the ultrasound model and conventional airway assessment methods in predicting difficult airways. Results We successfully enrolled 1000 patients, including 51 with difficult laryngoscopy (DL) and 26 with difficult tracheal intubation (DTI). The area under the ROC curve (AUC) for the ultrasound model to predict DL was 0.84 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.82–0.87), and the sensitivity and specificity were 0.75 (95% CI: 0.60–0.86) and 0.82 (95% CI: 0.79–0.84), respectively. The AUC for predicting DTI was 0.89 (95% CI: 0.87–0.91), and the sensitivity and specificity were 0.85 (95% CI: 0.65–0.96) and 0.81 (95% CI: 0.78–0.83), respectively. Compared with mouth opening, thyromental distance, and modified Mallampati tests, the ultrasound model predicted a greater AUC for DL (P

ABSTRACT Many bacteria use small molecules, such as quorum sensing (QS) signals, to perform intraspecies signaling and interspecies or interkingdom communication. Previous studies demonstrated that some bacteria regulate their physiology and pathogenicity by employing 4-hydroxybenzoic acid (4-HBA). Here, we report that 4-HBA controls biological functions, virulence, and anthranilic acid production in Shigella sonnei. The biosynthesis of 4-HBA is performed by UbiC (SSON_4219), which is a chorismate pyruvate-lyase that catalyzes the conversion of chorismate to 4-HBA. Deletion of ubiC caused S. sonnei to exhibit impaired phenotypes, including impaired biofilm formation, extracellular polysaccharide (EPS) production, and virulence. In addition, we found that 4-HBA controls the physiology and virulence of S. sonnei through the response regulator AaeR (SSON_3385), which contains a helix-turn-helix (HTH) domain and a LysR substrate-binding (LysR_substrate) domain. The same biological functions are controlled by AaeR and the 4-HBA signal, and 4-HBA-deficient mutant phenotypes were rescued by in trans expression of AaeR. We found that 4-HBA binds to AaeR and then enhances the binding of AaeR to the promoter DNA regions in target genes. Moreover, we revealed that 4-HBA from S. sonnei reduces the competitive fitness of Candida albicans by interfering with morphological transition. Together, our results suggested that the 4-HBA signaling system plays crucial roles in bacterial physiology and interkingdom communication. IMPORTANCE Shigella sonnei is an important pathogen in human intestines. Following previous findings that some bacteria employ 4-HBA as a QS signal to regulate biological functions, we demonstrate that 4-HBA controls the physiology and virulence of S. sonnei. This study is significant because it identifies both the signal synthase UbiC and receptor AaeR and unveils the signaling pathway of 4-HBA in S. sonnei. In addition, this study also supports the important role of 4-HBA in microbial cross talk, as 4-HBA strongly inhibits hyphal formation by Candida albicans. Together, our findings describe the dual roles of 4-HBA in both intraspecies signaling and interkingdom communication.

Abstract Background Postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV) have always been a concern of clinicians and may increase medical costs for patients. Consensus guidelines recommend using multiple antiemetics with different mechanisms as prophylaxis in patients at high risk of PONV. Individualized risk scores for nausea and vomiting and individualized treatment strategies are feasible. This study evaluated the effect of individualized treatment strategies on postoperative nausea and vomiting after laparoscopic gynaecological operations. Methods This was a double-blind, randomized, controlled trial. A total of 119 adult patients who underwent gynaecological laparoscopic surgery under general anaesthesia were randomly divided into an individualized treatment group or a control group, with the individualized treatment group receiving individualized prevention according to a preoperative risk score of nausea and vomiting and the control group receiving no individualized prevention. Vomiting, retching, nausea, and use of rescue medication were all recorded for 24 h after the operation. The primary outcome variable was complete response, defined as no emesis or the use of rescue medication 24 h postoperatively. Results The complete response rate was higher in the individualized treatment group (56.7%) than in the control group (23.7%) (95% CI, 0.01–0.27; P

The extraction of non-volatile and semi-volatile analytes from solid and semisolid samples has been primarily carried out via heated and/or pressurized liquid extraction mechanisms. Although analyte extraction and concentration processes have significantly evolved and currently several automated solutions are commercially available, these two steps are carried out independently. To the best of our knowledge, human intervention is always required throughout the entire process for sample extract manipulation/transportation among instruments/processes. Expectedly, excessive sample handling throughout the analytical workflow contributes to an increase in the analysis cost, the loss of analyte (s), and numerous potential analytical errors. Herein, we present the first fully automated sample-to-vial solution for analysis of non-volatile and semi-volatile compounds from solid and semisolid samples. This technological development, which is based on gas assisted dynamic accelerated solvent extraction (GA-dASE) and an integrated level-sensing system that controls the endpoint of the evaporation step, allows for fully automated analyte extraction and analyte enrichment. As a proof of concept, we applied this fully automatic extraction and enrichment system towards the quantitative determination of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) in soil samples. Our results showed that GA-dASE not only matched the performance of the legacy accelerated solvent extraction (ASE), in terms of analyte recovery and reproducibility, but also delivered nearly 3-time reduction in labor per sample. Furthermore, our experiments demonstrated the capability of the instrument to perform fully automated extraction and evaporation steps without human intervention and with no impact on data quality (Relative Standard Deviation, RSD, ≤ 20%). In terms of interlaboratory reproducibility (n = 2), our results showed comparable results for the determination of PAHs using either 10- or 100-mL sample cells.

Abstract Background Accurate prediction of the difficult airway (DA) could help to prevent catastrophic consequences in emergency resuscitation, intensive care, and general anesthesia. Until now, there is no nomogram prediction model for DA based on ultrasound assessment. In this study, we aimed to develop a predictive model for difficult tracheal intubation (DTI) and difficult laryngoscopy (DL) using nomogram based on ultrasound measurement. We hypothesized that nomogram could utilize multivariate data to predict DTI and DL. Methods A prospective observational DA study was designed. This study included 2254 patients underwent tracheal intubation. Common and airway ultrasound indicators were used for the prediction, including thyromental distance (TMD), modified Mallampati test (MMT) score, upper lip bite test (ULBT) score temporomandibular joint (TMJ) mobility and tongue thickness (TT). Univariate and the Akaike information criterion (AIC) stepwise logistic regression were used to identify independent predictors of DTI and DL. Nomograms were constructed to predict DL and DTL based on the AIC stepwise analysis results. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to evaluate the accuracy of the nomograms. Results Among the 2254 patients enrolled in this study, 142 (6.30%) patients had DL and 51 (2.26%) patients had DTI. After AIC stepwise analysis, ULBT, MMT, sex, TMJ, age, BMI, TMD, IID, and TT were integrated for DL nomogram; ULBT, TMJ, age, IID, TT were integrated for DTI nomogram. The areas under the ROC curves were 0.933 [95% confidence interval (CI), 0.912–0.954] and 0.974 (95% CI, 0.954–0.995) for DL and DTI, respectively. Conclusion Nomograms based on airway ultrasonography could be a reliable tool in predicting DA. Trial registration Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (No. ChiCTR-RCS-14004539 ), registered on 13th April 2014.

Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is the most common microvascular complication of diabetes and one of the leading causes of global blinding. More attention should be paid to the diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of DR. Swept-source optical coherence tomography angiography (SS-OCTA) is a novel imaging technique presented in recent years. It can accurately present the various levels of the retina, choriocapillaris, macula, and the optic papillary microcirculation, which is new to the diagnosis and prognosis of DR. However, SS-OCTA is limited by poor fixation or severe media clouding and is susceptible to motion artefacts and segmentation errors. Future limitations need to be addressed and large prospective trials conducted to refine the relevance of SS-OCTA to DR. The present study reviews the advances in clinical application of SS-OCTA in diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of DR.

High-sensitive C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) is one of the diagnostic components for metabolic (-dysfunction) associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD). This study aimed to explore the relationship between hs-CRP level and 25-year mortality in patients with MAFLD. The study data were from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1988–1994. All participants were followed up until December 2015 and the outcome of each participant was ascertained from National Death Index records. Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence interval (CI) of all-cause mortality, cardiovascular-related mortality, and malignancy-related mortality. A total of 4,145 participants with MAFLD were included in final analysis. The median follow-up period was 22.3 years (interquartile range 16.9–24.2). There were 1,610 (38.8%) all-cause deaths. The leading cause of death was malignant neoplasms (365/1,610, 22.7%), followed by cardiovascular diseases (342/1,610, 21.2%). Of the 4,145 patients with MAFLD, 1,293 (31.2%) had an hs-CRP level greater than 0.5 mg/dl. Those with hs-CRP > 0.5 mg/dl were older, more likely to be female and had greater derangements of metabolic profiles than those with lower hs-CRP. The results of Cox regression analysis showed that hs-CRP ≥ 0.5 mg/dl was an independent risk factor for all-cause mortality (HR = 1.394, 95% CI 1.253–1.551), cardiovascular mortality (HR = 1.497, 95% CI 1.190–1.885) and malignant neoplasms related mortality (HR = 1.290, 95% CI 1.030–1.615) after adjusting for risk factors. This study confirms that hs-CRP is an independent predictive factor of poor prognosis in patients with MAFLD.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via the original article.

Cu/Zn superoxide dismutase (SOD1) plays a key role in the maintenance of cellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) homeostasis as an antioxidant enzyme. We recently found that SOD1 is involved in the regulation of gene expression in response to changes in cellular ROS levels by binding to DNA-specific sequences. Moreover, the SOD1 binding to DNA was observed to be redox-dependent in solutions. Thus, we examined the redox-dependent DNA binding of SOD1 by multiple measurements, including small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS), indicating the redox-dependent formation of a DNA-SOD1 complex in solutions. The redox-dependent formation of the DNA-SOD1 complex could underlie the SOD1 regulation of gene expression.

Optimal frequency band selection is a critical step of envelope analysis for bearing fault diagnosis. In order to select the most informative band, it is necessary to define a criterion for frequency band evaluation. Kurtosis is one of such criteria, and the frequency band with largest spectral kurtosis is usually regarded as the optimal one. However, it is experimentally and mathematically proved in the past year that spectral kurtosis is sensitive to outliers in a signal. Recently, spectral L2/L1 norm is formally defined for characterizing fault transients in the squared envelope of the signal, and it is also found that spectral L2/L1 norm is actually the square root of spectral kurtosis. Thus, spectral L2/L1 norm still suffers from the drawback of spectral kurtosis. In this paper, however, we utilize this drawback and calculate L2/L1 norms of frequency bands defined by the harmonics of bearing characteristic frequency in the squared envelope spectrum. Since the new calculation is closely related to harmonics of bearing characteristic frequency, it is named as harmonic L2/L1 norm in the paper. Harmonic L2/L1 norm is then employed to evaluate frequency bands obtained from a 1/3-binary tree of filter banks. After the optimal band selection, the filtered signal is used to calculate the squared envelope spectrum. The proposed method is compared with the fast kurtogram method in two case studies, which indicate that the proposed method is more effective, especially in the presence of strong non-Gaussian noise.

Vitamin D deficiency is associated with high susceptibility to infections. The present study aimed at exploring the relationship between vitamin D levels and Toxoplasma gondii ( T. gondii ) infection, on the basis of a nationally representative database. The study data came from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) 2001–2004. Participants underwent both Toxoplasma IgG antibody testing and serum vitamin D testing. Vitamin D deficiency was defined by a serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D level

Abstract Background Previous studies have suggested that Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii) infection might be associated with fatty liver disease. However, the relationship between non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and T. gondii infection has not been investigated in a large population. We aimed to study the relationship between those two diseases using a population-based dataset from the United States. Methods The data were collected from the third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III) between 1988 and 1994. Statistical analysis was applied to compare the prevalence of NAFLD in anti-T. gondii antibody-positive participants with antibody-negative ones. Results A total of 9465 persons with a mean age of 44.33 ± 16.21 years, 46.9% of which were males, were included in the final analysis. Their mean BMI was 27.60 ± 5.96 kg/m2. A total of 2520 participants (26.62%) were positive for the T. gondii antibody. There was an increasing trend of seroprevalence of T. gondii with age (P for trend

Objectives To investigate the relationship between vitamin D-related gene single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and hepatitis B-related liver cirrhosis. Methods This study included patients with chronic hepatitis B who were admitted to the Liver Research Center of the First Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University from July 2012 to August 2016. SNPs rs1544410 and rs2228570 in the vitamin D receptor gene and rs2282679 in the vitamin D-binding protein gene were detected using the imLDR™ multiple SNP typing kit. Genotype and allele frequencies were compared between groups using the chi-square test or Fisher’s exact test. Results A total of 226 patients with hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection were enrolled, including 116 with HBV-related cirrhosis and 110 patients without. The distributions of vitamin D-related gene SNPs in both groups were in accordance with the Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium. There was no significant difference in the frequency or allelic distributions of rs1544410, rs2228570, and rs2282679 between the two groups. Additionally, the SNPs were not associated with the severity of cirrhosis. Conclusion No significant connection was identified between vitamin D-related SNPs and HBV-related liver cirrhosis.

Abstract Background Syphilis is a common disease that has been researched and focused on for many years, however, syphilitic hepatitis has not been well-recognized. We report this case of syphilitic hepatitis with intrahepatic cholestasis and liver granulomas to make a deeper impression. Case presentation A 47-year-old male was admitted with jaundice and rashes. The laboratory examination showed abnormal liver enzymes with significant increases in ALP and GGT but mild increases in ALT and AST. His HBV surface antigen was weakly positive, with negative HIV antibody, HCV antibody, and undetectable HBV DNA. The rapid plasma reagin test and the Treponema pallidum particle assay tests for Syphilis were both positive. Abdominal ultrasonography and magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography revealed the normal biliary tract, liver, and spleen. The liver pathological examination showed cholangiocyte inflammation and micro-granulomas with coagulation necrosis. After 2 months of benzathine penicillin treatment, his liver enzyme decreased rapidly and remained normal after 1-year of follow-up. Conclusions Increased liver enzymes, intrahepatic cholestasis and liver granulomas with well-response to antibiotics may provide clues for the diagnosis of syphilitic hepatitis.

Abstract In the correspondence from Abdurrahman et al., they raised three main concerns and critiques of our recently published article entitled “Syphilitic hepatitis: a case report and review of the literature”. First question pertains to the timing of dermatology opinion, second regarding the history of sexual exposure, and lastly regarding the treatment duration of syphilitic hepatitis. We thank the authors for their constructive comments and would like to answer these questions in detail.

Shigella sonnei is an important human pathogen that provokes severe colitis and diarrhea, causing high mortality and morbidity worldwide. Because of increasing drug resistance, it is particularly important to develop new antibacterial agents against S. sonnei. In this study, we report that Stattic, a potent signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 inhibitor, was found to be effective against S. sonnei. Our results showed that Stattic has dual antibacterial mechanisms. At low concentrations, Stattic binds to GalU of S. sonnei, inhibits its enzyme activity, and then reduces biofilm formation and extracellular polysaccharide production, which ultimately attenuates S. sonnei virulence in human cell lines. At high concentrations, Stattic could kill bacteria by disrupting the integrity of the bacterial cell membrane, causing space collapse and the outflow of contents. Furthermore, Stattic showed excellent synergistic effects with antibiotics against S. sonnei. In addition, Stattic also showed anti-virulence activity against Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae. Together, our findings suggest the promising potential and advantages of Stattic as a new therapeutic agent against bacterial pathogens. IMPORTANCE Shigella sonnei is a major human enteric pathogen that causes bacillary dysentery. The increasing spread of drug-resistant S. sonnei strains has caused an emergent need for the development of new antimicrobial agents against this pathogenic bacterium. In this study, we demonstrate that Stattic employs two antibacterial mechanisms against S. sonnei. It exerted both anti-virulence activity and bactericidal activity against S. sonnei, suggesting that it shows advantages over traditional antibiotics. Moreover, Stattic showed excellent synergistic effects with kanamycin, ampicillin, chloramphenicol, and gentamicin against S. sonnei. Our findings suggest that Stattic has promising potential for development as a new antibiotic or as an adjuvant to antibiotics for infections caused by S. sonnei. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]