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A flame retardant unsaturated polyester resin (UPR) was prepared by methods of glycolysis of recycled polyethylene terephthalate (r-PET) via propylene glycol (PG) and diphenylsilanediol (DDS) as mixed glycolysis agent and esterification of the glycolyzed products with maleic anhydride (MA). The chemical structures of glycolyzed products and the resulted UPRs were characterized by fourier transform infrared (FTIR) and 1H nuclear magnetic resonance (1H-NMR). The peaks at the range of 540–465 cm−1 and 1643 cm−1 on the FTIR spectrum indicated the introduction of Si–O into the main chain of UPR/Si and the reaction between glycolyzed product and MA, respectively). The different amounts of aluminum hydroxide (ATH) was added in the resulted UPRs to obtain UPR composites. The effects of DDS ratio on the flame retardancy, thermal stability, mechanical properties of the resulted UPRs and their composites were investigated. The result showed that the flame retardancy of UPR composites was further improved by addition of ATH to the UPR composites. Finally, the synergistic flame retardant mechanism between DDS and ATH was discussed based on scanning electronic microscopy (SEM) morphologies and FTIR spectra of the residual char after horizontal burning tests (UL-94). It suggested that r-PET can be glycolyzed successfully with PG and DDS as mixed glycolysis agent and the flame retardancy of the resulted UPR based on the glycolyzed products and their composites were improved due to incorporation of DDS in the main chain of UPR and the addition of ATH.

Traumatic bone defect is one of the major orthopedic diseases in clinics, and its incidence is increasing year by year. And repairing traumatic bone defects is a very difficult problem in clinics at present. The surface of medical titanium-based alloy has good biological properties, and its implant has a certain role in promoting bone in bone tissue. However, titanium-based materials are biologically inert and have no biological activity. As a traditional Chinese medicine, Salvia miltiorrhiza has the efficacy of treating bone diseases and promoting bone healing. The curative effect can be better exerted by loading the traditional Chinese medicine active compound Salvia miltiorrhiza on the surface of the titanium implant in a certain way. At present, due to the complex chemical composition of Salvia miltiorrhiza, the mechanism of its use for the treatment of traumatic bone defects is still unclear. Therefore, in this study, we mainly discussed the potential target and mechanism of Salvia miltiorrhiza in the treatment of traumatic bone defects through network pharmacology, which may provide a scientific basis for the treatment of traumatic bone defects with Salvia miltiorrhiza loaded on the surface of medical titanium-based alloy. We screened out effective compounds and targets of Salvia miltiorrhiza and targets related to traumatic bone defects with the help of relevant databases. The targets of Salvia miltiorrhiza for traumatic bone defects were analyzed by STRING and GeneCards databases, and the results were visualized by constructing a compound-target network, protein-protein interaction network, and compound-target-disease network with Cytoscape 3.7.1 analysis software. Finally, the selected core targets carried out GO and KEGG enrichment. The results showed that 60 main active components were screened from Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge, which could act on 149 targets. There were 33 active components and 70 targets related to traumatic bone defects, respectively. The core targets of Salvia miltiorrhiza in the treatment of traumatic bone defects were MAPK1, MAPK10, MAPK14, TGFB1, and TNF. The results of enrichment analysis showed that Salvia miltiorrhiza might treat traumatic bone defects through an osteogenic differentiation pathway.

This study aimed to evaluate the diagnostic value of gastric filling ultrasonography in the preoperative invasion depth (T staging) of gastric cancer.We systematically searched several online electronic databases including CNKI, Wanfang Medical Database, VIP, CBM, Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science from January 2010 to December 2021, identifying the study about gastric filling ultrasonography for diagnostic of invasion depth of gastric cancer. Using bivariate mixed effect model to calculate the sensitivity (Sen), specificity (spe), positive likelihood ratio (PLR), negative likelihood ratio (NLR), and diagnostic odds ratio (DOR) with 95% confidence interval (CI). Draw the summary receiver operating characteristic (sROC) curve, likelihood ratio matrix and fagan diagram to evaluate the diagnostic value of gastric filling ultrasonography in the preoperative invasion depth of gastric cancer. Sen analysis and Publication bias tests were performed.This study obtained 21 literatures and the quality were good. The pooled Sen and spe of gastric filling ultrasonography was: T1: 0.63 (95% CI:0.51-0.73), 0.96 (95% CI:0.94-0.98); T2: 0.67 (95% CI:0.62-0.71), 0.90 (95% CI:0.88-0.93); T3: 0.79 (95% CI:0.75-0.82), 0.83 (95% CI:0.80-0.86); T4: 0.80 (95% CI:0.73-0.86), 0.96 (95% CI:0.94-0.97), respectively. In addition, the PLR and NLR of gastric filling ultrasonography was: T1: 16.74 (95% CI:9.98-28.09), 0.39 (95% CI:0.29-0.52); T2: 6.98 (95% CI:5.20-9.38), 0.36 (95% CI:0.31-0.42); T3: 4.65 (95% CI:3.78-5.73), 0.26 (95% CI:0.21-0.31); T4: 18.51 (95% CI:12.77-26.83), 0.20 (95% CI: 0.15-0.29), respectively. The DOR of gastric filling ultrasonography in T1-T4 was: 43.17 (95% CI:20.62-90.41),19.13 (95% CI:12.61-29.03), 18.15 (95% CI:12.86-25.62), 90.63 (95% CI:47.36-173.41), respectively. The sROC curve revealed that the area under the curve (AUC) of T1-T4 was: 0.93, 0.82, 0.87, 0.97, respectively. Sen analysis indicated that the study was steadily. And there is no publication bias in this study. But the study has some heterogeneity.Gastric filling ultrasonography is useful for clinical preoperative T staging of gastric cancer, and the result indicate that the accuracy of gastric filling ultrasonography in discriminating T1-T4 is higher than that in discriminating T2 - T3. It can be used as an imaging diagnostic method for preoperative T staging of gastric cancer.

Background Congenital left ventricular diverticulum (LVD) is a rare cardiac malformation. Its prevalence rate is less than 0.1% of the congenital heart diseases requiring surgery. Some scholars suggest that all LVD should be actively removed to prevent possible risks, including diverticulum rupture, arterial embolism, and malignant arrhythmia. However, others believe that asymptomatic LVD can be followed up without immediate surgery. We reviewed and reported the diagnosis, clinical features, and surgical treatment of four cases of congenital LVD to provide clinical experience and a reference for the treatment of such patients. Methods Four patients (aged 3-32 years old) were diagnosed with congenital LVD and received surgical treatment at the Department of Cardiovascular Surgery of PLA General Hospital, Beijing, China from September 2009 to July 2019. All four patients had complete long-term postoperative follow-up data, including echocardiogram, enhanced cardiac computed tomography (CT), and electrocardiogram to monitor changes in left ventricular structure, heart function, and heart rhythm. Results In the first case, the fibrodiverticulum under the aortic valve squeezed the right ventricular outflow tract and the right main coronary artery; the morphology of the right ventricle and coronary artery returned to normal after surgery. The second patient was complicated with a huge lipoma in the apex of the left ventricle and underwent lipoma resection during LVD resection surgery. The third and fourth cases had muscular diverticula in the left ventricular apexes and received LVD removal surgery. All four patients recovered well after surgery and their left ventricular morphology and cardiac function were normal without adverse complications, such as atrial fibrillation, ventricular arrhythmia, and cerebrovascular accident. Conclusions Although the morphology and character of congenital LVD were different in each case, the use of effective diagnostic and follow-up tools, including echocardiogram, enhanced CT, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), allowed for successful surgical treatment of the left ventricular diverticula and symptoms or other malformations. We propose that congenital LVD should be actively treated with surgery, especially considering effectiveness and low risk associated with this therapeutic option.

Treatment of congenital pseudarthrosis of the tibia (CPT) still is full of challenges in pediatric orthopedist. Serum-derived exosomes (SDEs) have been proven to be participated in bone remodeling. However, the molecular changes in SDEs of CPT children and their pathologies have not been elucidated. In this study, SDEs were isolated and purified from CPT patients (CPT-SDEs) associated with neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) and normal children (Norm-SDEs). Then we obtained the proteomics profile of SDEs by combining liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) and tandem mass tag label-based quantitation. In vitro, the efficacy of SDEs on osteoblastic differentiation of MC3T3-E1 cells and osteoclastogenesis ability of RAW264.7 cells were evaluated by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) and cytochemical staining. In vivo, we used micro-CT to assess cortical bone mass and trabecular microstructures to reflect the influence of SDEs on bone remodeling after injection into the tail vein of rats. Based on proteomics analysis, 410 differentially expressed proteins, including 289 downregulated proteins and 121 upregulated proteins, were identified in the CPT-SDEs. These proteins have multiple biological functions associated with cellular metabolic processes, catalytic activity, and protein binding, which are important for cell differentiation and proliferation. In vitro, CPT-SDEs decreased the osteogenic differentiation of MC3T3-E1 cells and promoted the osteoclastogenesis of RAW264.7 cells. Injection of CPT-SDEs into the tail vein for two months resulted in bone loss in rats, as indicated by the decrease in trabecular and cortical bone mass. Our findings demonstrated the differences in proteins in SDEs between normal and CPT children with NF1. These differentially expressed proteins in CPT-SDEs contributed to deteriorating trabecular bone microstructures by inhibiting bone formation and stimulating bone resorption.

Bone fracture is one of the most common injuries. Despite the high regenerative capacity of bones, failure of healing still occurs to near 10% of the patients. Herein, we aim to investigate the modulatory role of neurofibromatosis type I gene (NF1) to osteogenic differentiation of bone marrow–derived mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) and new bone formation after fracture in a rat model. We studied the NF1 gene expression in normal and non‐union bone fracture models. Then, we evaluated how NF1 overexpression modulated osteogenic differentiation of BMSCs, autophagy activity, mTORC1 signalling and osteoclastic bone resorption by qRT‐PCR, Western blot and immunostaining assays. Finally, we injected lentivirus‐NF1 (Lv‐NF1) to rat non‐union bone fracture model and analysed the bone formation process. The NF1 gene expression was significantly down‐regulated in non‐union bone fracture group, indicating NF1 is critical in bone healing process. In the NF1 overexpressing BMSCs, autophagy activity and osteogenic differentiation were significantly enhanced. Meanwhile, the NF1 overexpression inhibited mTORC1 signalling and osteoclastic bone resorption. In rat non‐union bone fracture model, the NF1 overexpression significantly promoted bone formation during fracture healing. In summary, we proved the NF1 gene is critical in non‐union bone healing, and NF1 overexpression promoted new bone formation after fracture by enhancing autophagy and inhibiting mTORC1 signalling. Our results may provide a novel therapeutic clue of promoting bone fracture healing.

The α-calcitonin gene-related peptide (α-CGRP) regulates bone metabolism and has potential applications in enhancing bone remodeling in vivo. However, α-CGRP's role in bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) osteogenic differentiation remain unclear. Rat BMSCs were separated into control group, α-CGRP group and α-CGRP siRNA group, in which BMSCs were transfected with α-CGRP plasmid and α-CGRP siRNA respectively followed by analysis of α-CGRP level by real time PCR and ELISA, cell proliferation by MTT assay, Caspase 3 activity, ALP activity, formation of calcified nodules by alizarin red staining, Smad1 and Smad7 level by Western blot and Runx2 by real time PCR. αCGRP transfection into BMSCs significantly up-regulated CGRP, which could promote cell proliferation, inhibit Caspase 3 activity, promote ALP activity, increase calcified nodules formation and upregulate Smad1, Smad7 and Runx2 compared to control (P < 0.05); transfection of αCGRP siRNA significantly down-regulated CGRP in BMSCs, inhibited cell proliferation, promoted Caspase 3 activity, inhibited ALP activity, inhibited calcified nodules formation and downregulate Smad1, Smad7 and Runx2 (P < 0.05). αCGRP overexpression promotes the Smad/Runx2 signaling, which in turn promotes BMSCs proliferation and osteogenesis. Decreased αCGRP level inhibits Smad/Runx2 signaling, promotes BMSCs apoptosis, inhibits proliferation and osteogenic differentiation.

Background Use of minimally invasive approaches for isolated aortic valve or ascending aorta surgery is increasing. However, total arch replacement or aortic root repair through a minimally invasive incision is rare. This study was performed to report our initial experience with surgery of the ascending aorta with complex procedures through an upper mini-sternotomy approach. Methods We retrospectively analyzed 80 patients who underwent ascending aorta replacement combined with complex procedures including hemi-arch, total arch, and aortic root surgeries from September 2010 to May 2018. Using standard propensity score-matching analysis, 36 patients were matched and divided into 2 groups: the upper mini-sternotomy group (n = 18) and the median sternotomy group (n = 18). The preoperative assessment revealed no statistically significant differences between the two groups. Results Hospital mortality occurred in one patient (2.8%). The mini-sternotomy group showed a longer cross-clamping time (160 ± 38 vs. 135 ± 36 min, p = 0.048) due to higher rate of valve-sparing aortic root replacement and total arch repair. The cardiopulmonary bypass time in mini-sternotomy group was shorter than that of full sternotomy group (209 ± 47 min vs 218 ± 62 min, p = 0.595) but fell short of significance. There was no significant difference in lower body hypothermia circulatory arrest time between the two groups (40 ± 10 min vs 48 ± 20 min, p = 0.139). The upper mini-sternotomy group displayed a shorter ventilation time (22 vs. 45 h, p = 0.014), intensive care unit stay (4.6 ± 2.7 vs. 7.9 ± 3.7 days, p = 0.005), and hospital stay (8.2 ± 3.8 vs. 21.4 ± 11.9 days, p = 0.001). The upper mini-sternotomy group showed a lower postoperative red blood cell transfusion volume (4.6 ± 3.3 vs. 6.7 ± 5.7 units, p = 0.042) and postoperative drainage volume (764 ± 549 vs. 1255 ± 745 ml, p = 0.034). The rates of dialysis for newly occurring renal failure, neurological complications, and re-exploration were similar between the two groups (p = 1.000). Conclusion The upper mini-sternotomy approach is safe and beneficial in ascending aorta surgery with complex procedures for aortic dissection, including total arch replacement and aortic root repair.

360 $^{\circ }$ omnidirectional images are very helpful in creating immersive multimedia contents, which enables a huge demand in their efficient generation and effective assessment. In this paper, we leverage an attentive idea to meet this demand by addressing two concerns: how to generate a good omnidirectional image in a fast and robust way and what is a good omnidirectional image for human. To this end, we propose an attentive deep stitching approach to facilitate the efficient generation of omnidirectional images, which is composed of two modules. The low-resolution deformation module aims to learn the deformation rules from dual-fisheye to omnidirectional images with joint implicit and explicit attention mechanisms, while the high-resolution recurrence module enhances the resolution of stitching results with the high-resolution guidance in a recurrent manner. In this way, the stitching approach can efficiently generate high-resolution omnidirectional images that are highly consistent with human immersive experiences. Beyond the efficient generation, we further present an attention-driven omnidirectional image quality assessment (IQA) method which uses joint evaluation with both global and local metrics. Especially, the local metric mainly focuses on the stitching region and attention region that mostly affect the Mean Opinion Score (MOS), leading to a consistent evaluation of human perception. To verify the effectiveness of our proposed assessment and stitching approaches, we construct a hybrid benchmark evaluation with 7 stitching models and 8 IQA metrics. Qualitative and quantitative experiments show our stitching approach generate preferable results with the state-of-the-art models at a 6× faster speed and the proposed quality assessment approach surpasses other methods by a large margin and is highly consistent with human subjective evaluations.

A retrospective study of 104 patients (81 male and 23 females, the age range from 2 to 288days) with talipes equinus was conducted to explore the case factors associated with it. We analyzed and discussed the correlation of plaster correction times, age of first visit, gender, and birthplace of patients in the department and understood their correlation and causality. The data were analyzed using frequency analysis, normality test, chi-square goodness-of-fit test, chi-square test, and PLS regression. The findings are set out below. All the distributions of the number of plaster casts in the samples did not have normality. Therefore, we used the nonparametric test and partial least squares regression (PLS regression) and found that the number of plaster casts was more closely related to the age at first visit, gender, and birthplace and had a strong positive correlation. There was a negative correlation between the times of plaster correction and the compliance of braces. The lower the compliance of patients with braces, the more times the plaster correction will be conducted.

Intrinsically disordered protein domains often have multiple binding partners. It is plausible that the strength of pairing with specific partners evolves from an initial low affinity to a higher affinity. However, little is known about the molecular changes in the binding mechanism that would facilitate such a transition. We previously showed that the interaction between two intrinsically disordered domains, NCBD and CID, likely emerged in an ancestral deuterostome organism as a low-affinity interaction that subsequently evolved into a higher-affinity interaction before the radiation of modern vertebrate groups. Here we map native contacts in the transition states of the low-affinity ancestral and high-affinity human NCBD/CID interactions. We show that the coupled binding and folding mechanism is overall similar but with a higher degree of native hydrophobic contact formation in the transition state of the ancestral complex and more heterogeneous transient interactions, including electrostatic pairings, and an increased disorder for the human complex. Adaptation to new binding partners may be facilitated by this ability to exploit multiple alternative transient interactions while retaining the overall binding and folding pathway.

Objective We aimed to evaluate oblique-axis in-plane (OA-IP) techniques for real-time ultrasound-guided internal jugular vein (IJV) cannulation. Methods We retrospectively analysed 1065 patients who underwent ultrasound (US)-guided IJV cannulation. We recorded demographic characteristics of patients, success rate, access time, cannulation time, number of attempts and the incidence of acute complications. Results The overall success rate of the procedure was 100% (n = 1605). In total, 1594 cases (99.3%) were successful at the first attempt, and 11 (0.7%) were successful at the second attempt; no patient required three or more attempts. The mean access time was 18.7 ± 19.3 seconds. The mean cannulation time was 349.0 ± 103.8 seconds. There were 54 (3.4%) acute complications out of the total 1605 cannulations: 23 cases of puncture site bleeding (1.4%), 20 cases allergic to dressing (1.3%), 10 cases of local cervical hematomas (0.6%), and one catheter misplacement (0.1%). There were no major complications 12 hours following the procedure. Conclusions The results of our study suggest that OA-IP techniques can improve ultrasound-guided IJV cannulation with a high success rate and safety in clinical practice. Clinicians should consider adopting these methods.

Intrinsically disordered protein (IDP) domains often have multiple binding partners. Little is known regarding molecular changes in the binding mechanism when a new interaction evolves from low to high affinity. Here we compared the degree of native contacts in the transition state of the interaction of two IDP domains, low-affinity ancestral and high-affinity human NCBD and CID. We found that the coupled binding and folding mechanism of the domains is overall similar, but with a higher degree of native hydrophobic contact formation in the transition state of the ancestral complex while more heterogenous transient interactions, including electrostatic, and an increased disorder characterize the human complex. From an evolutionary perspective, adaptation to new binding partners for IDPs may benefit from this ability to exploit multiple alternative transient interactions while retaining the overall pathway.

We report a case of a 7-month-old girl who presented with 2 months history of redness and swelling syndromes around the left ankle. The local hospital diagnosis of left ankle soft tissue infection and gave antibiotic treatment. However, her symptoms were failed respond to the antibiotic treatment and suggested to transfer to our hospital. We gave this girl a detailed physical examination, when opening the ankle crease a hidden rubber band was found and the surrounding soft tissues were lacerated. As a result, the child was taken to surgery to remove the band and repair the lacerated structures and her postoperative recovery was well. A rubber band worn for decorative purpose or accidently by the child is sometimes missed by the parents and remains long unnoticed. For the clinical features of a linear constricting scar around the wrist or ankle in the presence of a swollen syndrome, it should always alert the clinician to the possibility of a forgotten band around the joints. This appears to be the first case of acquired rubber band syndrome reported occurred on children's ankle.

The twin-arginine translocase (Tat) transports folded proteins across the cytoplasmic membrane of prokaryotes and the thylakoid membrane of plant chloroplasts. In Gram-negative bacteria and chloroplasts, the translocon consists of three subunits, TatA, TatB, and TatC, of which TatA is responsible for the actual membrane translocation of the substrate. Herein we report on the structure, dynamics, and lipid interactions of a fully functional C-terminally truncated 'core TatA' from Arabidopsis thaliana using solution-state NMR. Our results show that TatA consists of a short N-terminal transmembrane helix (TMH), a short connecting linker (hinge) and a long region with propensity to form an amphiphilic helix (APH). The dynamics of TatA were characterized using 15 N relaxation NMR in combination with model-free analysis. The TMH has order parameters characteristic of a well-structured helix, the hinge is somewhat less rigid, while the APH has lower order parameters indicating structural flexibility. The TMH is short with a surprisingly low protection from solvent, and only the first part of the APH is protected to some extent. In order to uncover possible differences in TatA's structure and dynamics in detergent compared to in a lipid bilayer, fast-tumbling bicelles and large unilamellar vesicles were used. Results indicate that the helicity of TatA increases in both the TMH and APH in the presence of lipids, and that the N-terminal part of the TMH is significantly more rigid. The results indicate that plant TatA has a significant structural plasticity and a capability to adapt to local environments.

Understanding the molecular mechanism of gastric cancer cell apoptosis is pivotal for the development of precise therapies targeting this disease. In the present study, we examined the effects of annexin A7 inhibition on the apoptosis of gastric cancer cells and the growth of tumour xenografts in vivo. Expression of annexin A7 in BGC823 cells was suppressed by small interference RNA, and cells apoptosis was assessed by flow cytometry. The mechanism by which annexin A7 mediates apoptosis in BGC823 cells was explored by determining the expression of key apoptosis regulators. In addition, by suppressing annexin A7 in BGC823 cells with small hairpin RNA, we studied the effects of annexin A7 inhibition on in vivo tumour growth. Our results showed that inhibiting annexin A7 expression induced more than fivefold increase in BGC823 cell apoptosis in vitro. This was in concord with a significant decrease of Bcl-2 expression and increases of Bax, Caspase-3, and Caspase-9. The activities of caspase-3 and caspase-9 were increased by 2.95 ± 0.18 and 3.70 ± 0.33 times, respectively, upon the annexin A7 downregulation in BGC823 cells. Importantly, suppressing annexin A7 showed the same apoptotic mechanism in vivo and significantly inhibited the growth of BGC823 xenografts in mice. These data suggest that annexin A7 likely protects gastric cells from apoptosis and targeting it may represent a valuable strategy in future therapeutic development.

The development and maintenance of neuropathic pain is now given far more attention in the clinic work. Increasing evidence has shown that colony-stimulating factor 1 (CSF1) is involved in microglial activation and may further induce pain. Here, we observed the signaling events that link the CSF1-induced microglial activated and consequences for pain processing. For the in vitro study, flow cytometry showed the microglial activity was markedly increased after CSF1 stimulation. Western blot showed the increased expression of p-PRKAA1/PRKAA1, p-AMPK/AMPK, p-ULK1/ULK1, p-S6k/S6k and LC3-II/LC3-I. QRT-PCR showed the IL-1, TNF-α and BDNF were simultaneously upregulated in the activated microglia cells, whereas the specific AMPK inhibitor compound C exhibited reverse effects in microglia. Using immunofluorescence staining and electron microscopy, we found CSF1 decreased microglial p62 expression and induced the number of autophagosomes, whereas compound C significantly exhibited the reverse effects. For the in vivo study, compared with the control and AMPK-siRNA transfection, the mice under CSF1 intrathecal injection increased CSF1 receptor and LC3 expressed in the activated spinal microglia. More importantly, qRT-PCR showed CSF1 intrathecal injection substantially upregulated BDNF and c-Fos mRNA expression as well as the ensuing neuropathic pain. Our findings demonstrated that CSF1 induced a significant upregulation of microglial activation via the AMPK signaling pathway and resulted in an increasing microglial autophagic level. An increasing CSF1 level in the central nervous system can mimic and cause pain syndromes by up-regulation of AMPK-depended autophagy, thus offering a new target for the therapy of neuropathic pain.

In this paper, we present a novel method to stitch two fisheye images into a panoramic image by using a color calibration box. The color calibration box is a new calibration tool with five planes for double fisheyes camera to calibrate. With the color calibration box, we obtain parameters used in our method to map the fisheye images back to the same logical sphere and stitch them according to the imaging model of the two fisheye cameras aligned back-to-back. Experimental results show that our method can not only produce 360-degree panoramic scenes but also eliminate the brightness difference from the two fisheye cameras. Moreover, our approach achieves comparable stitching performance with Gear360 camera in stitching details, and outperforms it in handling stitching colors.