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Although tobacco leaves (TLs) contain abundant bacteria, how the geography and leaf position of TLs affect these bacteria is unclear. Here, TLs at different positions from Henan (HN, strong flavor style) and Yunnan (YN, fresh flavor style) provinces were collected, and the bacteria were characterized by Illumina sequencing at harvest and 1 year of storage. Bacterial communities were very different between TLs originating from different geographical areas and positions, and beta diversity analysis showed that leaf position was the most important factor for phyllospheric bacterial communities, followed by geographical area and storage time. At the genus level, Subdoligranulum, Thermus, and Acinetobacter were obviously more abundant in HN than in YN, while Blautia and Ruminococcus were significantly more abundant in YN. These differences in bacterial communities decreased after 1 year of storage, indicating that the microbiota tends to become similar during tobacco processing. Storage time also affected the phyllospheric bacteria of TLs, as the bacterial communities shifted significantly on both HN and YN TLs after 1 year of storage. Significant differences in the predicted genes were also observed between the different geographic locations and leaf positions. Potential human pathogens, including Acinetobacter, Methylobacterium, and Escherichia-Shigella, were greatly different between TLs originating from different areas and positions. These data suggested that geographic variations and positions were associated with phyllospheric bacterial communities on TLs, which may be related to not only the flavor style and quality of TLs but also the potential health risks to humans. Key points: • Tobacco leaf position and tobacco growth location affected bacterial communities. • Microbial communities of TLs shifted significantly after one year of storage. • Potential human pathogens differed at different leaf positions and growth locations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A steroid-estrogen-degrading strain ye22 with Estone (E1) as substrate was screened out from tobacco industry wastewater treatment plant sludge. It was identified as Acinetobacter junii by 16S rRNA sequencing. The results showed that the growth characteristics and degradation kinetics of the strain were studied. After 9 days fermentation, the degradation rate of E1 could reach 41.88%. The concentration of E1 in tobaccoindustrial wastewater and tobacco concentrate was higher, reaching 1.41 x 10-4 g/L and 9.01 x 10-5 g/L, respectively. The ye22 strain cultured to logarithmic phrase could degrade 32.07% of E1 in tobacco industry wastewater and 27.23% of E1 in tobacco concentrate within 9 days. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the development of the times, people's living standards are constantly improving, but the medical pressure brought by the aging population is also increasing, and pressure ulcers in elderly patients during hospitalization are also constantly occurring. Of course, the relevant medical equipment is also progressing, especially the emergence of medical-assistant foam dressing on the Internet of Things, which makes people cope with pressure ulcers more handily. In order to test the role of IOT medical devices, especially the application of foam dressings in the prevention of pressure ulcers, this article has carried out a survey of patients in a city hospital, investigated relevant literature, interviewed professionals, collected relevant information, designed experiments, and obtained relevant research data. Research shows that IOT medical devices can improve the efficiency of hospital treatment and improve the efficiency by about 12%; pressure ulcer incidence in different age groups of people is different, and the probability of occurrence in the elderly population is far higher than that of young people; foam dressing has obvious effect on the prevention of pressure sore, and the probability of pressure sore after using foam dressing is lower than that of unused 35%. It indicates that foam dressing can play a key role in the prevention of pressure sore. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Gastric cancer is more common in men than in women, but underlying reasons have not been completely understood. This study aimed to assess patterns of the sex difference in the incidence of gastric cancer in the United States.Methods: Using data from 13 cancer registries in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program, we analyzed the age-specific sex difference in the incidence of gastric cancer by ethnicity, anatomic site and histological type in the United States during 1992-2014. We assessed the temporal trends in the sex differences in the incidence of gastric cancer during the study period.Results: The male-to-female incidence ratio of cardia cancer increased with age until peaking at ages 55-69 years and decreased thereafter, while the ratio for non-cardia gastric cancer increased with age before ages < 60 years and remained stable onwards. The age-specific patterns in the sex difference of gastric cancer incidence varied between intestinal and diffuse histological types. The sex difference in the incidence of cardia cancer remained relatively stable except for that the absolute difference between the sexes in whites decreased on average by 0.8% per year from 1992 to 2014. The absolute incidence difference between the sexes in non-cardia gastric cancer decreased over time in whites, blacks, and Asian and Pacific islanders by approximately 4% per year. The male-to-female incidence ratio of non-cardia gastric cancer decreased over time in whites and blacks, but remained relatively stable in Asian and Pacific islanders.Conclusions: Both extrinsic and intrinsic factors may have contributed to the sex difference in gastric cancer. Sex hormones may play a role in the development of cardia cancer and intestinal type of gastric cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: BACKGROUND: In this paper, two kinds of commonly used vegetable carbon black (VCB, 3000 mesh; nano) at 50 g kg−1 concentration (based on dried gelatin) were added to 48 g kg−1 of fish gelatin (GEL) solutions and their effects on mechanical, barrier and anti‐photooxidation properties of GEL films were investigated. RESULTS: From the SEM images, it was shown that compared with 3000 mesh VCB (1–2 μm), nano VCB (100–200 nm) made the microstructure of GEL film more compact and more gelatin chains were cross‐linked by nano VCB. The addition of nano VCB significantly increased gelatin film strength with the greatest tensile strength of 52.589 MPa and stiffness with the highest Young's modulus of 968.874 MPa, but led to the reduction of film elongation. Also, the VCB presence significantly improved water vapour and oxygen barrier properties of GEL film. Importantly, nano VCB increased GEL film with better UV barrier property due to its stronger UV absorption nature when compared with micron VCB. This property could help in the preservation of oil samples in the photooxidation accelerated test. CONCLUSION: With improved properties, the nano VCB‐reinforced GEL film may have great potential for application in the edible packaging field, especially for the anti‐photooxidation property. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The purpose of the study was to build a model to explain the relationships between social support, uncontrollability appraisal, adaptive coping, and posttraumatic growth (PTG) among cancer patients in China.Methods: The participants who were cancer patients in a cancer hospital in China filled out a survey. The final sample size was 201. Structural equation modeling was used to build a model explaining PTG.Results: Structural equation modeling results indicated that higher levels of social support predicted higher levels of adaptive coping, higher levels of uncontrollability appraisal predicted lower levels of adaptive coping, and higher levels of adaptive coping predicted higher levels of PTG. Moreover, adaptive coping was a mediator between social support and growth, as well as a mediator between uncontrollability and growth. The direct effects of social support and uncontrollability on PTG were insignificant.Conclusions: The model demonstrated the relationships between social support, uncontrollability appraisal, adaptive coping, and PTG. It could be concluded that uncontrollability appraisal was a required but not sufficient condition for PTG. Neither social support nor uncontrollability appraisal had direct influence on PTG. However, social support and uncontrollability might indirectly influence PTG, through adaptive coping. It implies that both internal factors (eg, cognitive appraisal and coping) and external factors (eg, social support) are required in order for growth to happen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The study is to examine the relationships between perceived initial cancer disclosure communication with doctors, levels of hope, and levels of trust in doctors among cancer patients in China.Methods: A total number of 192 cancer inpatients in a cancer hospital in China were surveyed. Perceived disclosure strategies, levels of hope, levels of trust in their doctors, as well as the demographic information were obtained from the participants.Results: In addition to age, patients who had higher levels of perceived emotional support from doctors, or higher levels of perceived personalized disclosure from doctors, or higher levels of perceived discussion of multiple treatment plans with doctors were more likely to have higher levels of trust in doctors. In addition to perceived health status, perceived emotional support from doctors significantly predicted participants' levels of hope. That is, patients who had higher higher levels of perceived doctors' emotional support were more likely to have higher levels of hope. Key disclosure person was a marginally significant variable, that is, patients who were mainly disclosed by family members might have higher levels of hope compared with patients who were mainly disclosed by doctors.Conclusions: When communicating with a cancer patient, doctors might not ignore the importance of emotional support during cancer diagnosis communication. Doctors might want to involve family and collaborate with family to find out ways of personalized disclosure. During the communication process, doctors could provide their patients with multiple treatment options and discuss the benefits and side effects of each treatment. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]