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Treating type 2 diabetes (T2D) patients with sodium–glucose cotransporter 2 (SGLT2) inhibitors may be associated with an increased risk of urinary tract infections (UTIs), such as diabetes-induced asymptomatic bacteriuria. Pyuria—a condition wherein leukocytes are detected in the urine—is a predictor of UTIs. The aim of this study was to examine the urinary microbiome of Taiwanese T2D patients, with or without pyuria, undergoing SGLT2 treatment. We recruited seven T2D patients, recorded their clinical and biochemical characteristics, and collected their urine samples for 16S metagenomic sequencing. The primary outcomes were the diversity of urinary microbiota and the relative abundance of different species. We found that the microbiome of the pyuria group was significantly less diverse than the non-pyuria group (0.24 ± 0.04 vs. 2.21 ± 0.28, p = 0.002), while the number of operational taxonomic units did not differ significantly (763.5 ± 78.67 and 747 ± 141.3, p = 0.92). Escherichia-Shigella spp. dominated the microbiome of the pyuria group (97.4%–99.4%), and these patients tended to have more comorbidities. In conclusion, pyuria is associated with urinary microbiota dysbiosis in T2D patients being treated with SGLT2 inhibitors.

The spatial instability of double-layer viscoelastic liquid sheets in a viscous gas medium is investigated. A linear stability analysis is used to simplify the governing equations and boundary conditions combined with the Oldroyd-B model for describing the viscoelastic liquid. The growth rate and the cut-off wavenumber have been studied by analyzing the dispersion curve which is based on the spectral collocation method. Moreover, we use the decomposition of growth rate to interpret some special cases. We conclude that the thickness ratio, the liquid density ratio, the liquid viscosity ratio, and the gas-to-liquid viscosity ratio stabilize the liquid sheets, while the gas-to-liquid density ratio, the Reynolds number, and the Weber number destabilize the liquid sheets. The dispersion curves are nearly-identical when the surface tension ratio is smaller than one, while the surface tension ratio is a stabilizing factor when the ratio is larger than one, but the second maximum and the counterintuitive destabilization exist in the large wavenumber region. As specific parameters concerning the viscoelasticity, the elasticity number transforms from the destabilizing factor into the stabilizing factor with the increased Reynolds number in the region nearby the cut-off wavenumber, because the relationship between the change rates of viscous dissipation terms and elasticity terms in the decomposition of the growth rate is varying. Besides, it is discovered that the trend of the change of the growth rate under the varying stress relaxation time ratio is non-monotonic and double-layer liquid sheets are most stable when the stress relaxation time ratio is near 3 (not 1), because the difference between the change rate of the viscous dissipation and the deformation retardation dissipation determines the most stable region (not the elasticity difference), which can also be interpreted with the variation of the energy terms.

Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) has a higher potential for invasion and metastasis than other types of breast cancer. Enhancer of zeste homolog 2 (EZH2) is the catalytic core protein in the polycomb repressive complex 2 (PRC2), which catalyzes the trimethylation of histone H3 at lysine 27 (H3K27me3) and mediates gene silencing of the target genes that are involved in fundamental cellular processes, such as the cell fate decision, cell cycle regulation, senescence, cell differentiation, and cancer formation. A consistent association between TNBC metastasis and EZH2 has not been confirmed. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of EZH2 in the regulation of tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinase (TIMPs) and matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) to promote metastasis of TNBC cells and to characterize the metastasis-associated genes regulated by EZH2 in TNBC cells. We found that high levels of EZH2 expression induce repression of TIMP2 transcription, leading to increased activity of MMP-2 and MMP-9 and thus to increased invasive activity of TNBC cells.

Linear instability of compound liquid threads in the presence of surfactant is investigated. The limitation of one-dimensional approximation in previous work is removed so both unstable modes can be captured. The squeezing mode is much more sensitive to surfactant effects than the stretching mode.

This paper investigates the temporal instability of an eccentric compound liquid thread. Results of linear stability are obtained for a typical case in the context of compound threads in microencapsulation. It is found that the disturbance growth rate of an eccentric compound liquid thread is close to that of the corresponding concentric one, in terms of both the maximum growth rate and the dominant wavenumber. Furthermore, linear stability results over a wide parameter range are obtained and the conclusion is basically unchanged. Energy balance of the destabilization process is analyzed to explain the mechanism of instability, and it is found that although the disturbance growth rate of an eccentric compound thread is close to that of the corresponding concentric thread, their energy balances are distinctively different. The disturbance interface shape and disturbance velocity distributions are plotted. It is found that the behavior of the disturbance velocity in the cross section plane is different from...

The instability of gas-surrounded Rayleigh viscous jets is investigated analytically and numerically in this paper. Theoretical analysis is based on a second-order perturbation expansion for capillary jets with surface disturbances, while the axisymmetric two-dimensional, two-phase simulation is conducted by applying the Gerris code for jets subjected to velocity disturbances. The relation between the initial surface and velocity disturbance amplitude was obtained according to the derivation of Moallemi et al. [“Breakup of capillary jets with different disturbances,” Phys. Fluids 28, 012101 (2016)], and the breakup lengths resulting from these two disturbances agree well. Analytical and numerical breakup profiles also coincide satisfactorily, except in the vicinity of the breakup point, which shrinks forcefully. The effects of various parameters (i.e., oscillation frequency, Reynolds number, Weber number, and gas-to-liquid density ratio) have also been examined by comparing spatial growth rate, second-ord...

This paper investigates the spatial instability of a double-layer viscous liquid sheet moving in a stationary gas medium. A linear stability analysis is conducted and two situations are considered, an inviscid-gas situation and a viscous-gas situation. In the inviscid-gas situation, the basic state of the entire gas phase is stationary and the analytical dispersion relation is derived. Similar to single-layer sheets, the instability of double-layer sheets presents two unstable modes, the sinuous and the varicose modes. However, the result of the base-case double-layer sheet indicates that the cutoff wavenumber of the dispersion curve is larger than that of a single-layer sheet. A decomposition of the growth rate is performed and the result shows that for small wavenumbers, the surface tension of all three interfaces and the aerodynamic forces of both the lower and upper gases contribute significantly to the unstable growth rate. In contrast, for large wavenumbers the major contribution to the unstable growth rate is only the surface tension of the upper interface and the aerodynamic force of the upper gas. In the viscous-gas situation, although the majority of the gas phase is stationary, gas boundary layers exist at the vicinity of the moving liquid sheet, and the stability problem is solved by a spectral collocation method. Compared with the inviscid-gas solution, the growth rate at large wavenumber is significantly suppressed. The decomposition of growth rate indicates that all the aerodynamic and surface tension terms behave consistently throughout the entire unstable wavenumber range. The effects of various parameters are discussed. In addition, the effect of gas viscosity and the gas velocity profile is investigated separately, and the results indicate that both factors affect the maximum growth rate and the dominant wavenumber, although the effect of the gas velocity profile is stronger than that of the gas viscosity.

A weakly nonlinear stability analysis has been conducted for viscous planar liquid sheets moving in a resting inviscid gas medium by a perturbation expansion technique. In the first-order linear area, the disturbances are considered purely varicose. The solutions to the second-order interface displacement have been derived for both temporal instability and spatial instability analyses. It is found that the first harmonic of the fundamental varicose mode is also varicose, and the first-order and second-order varicose waves interact with each other, forming satellite ligaments and causing the eventual breakup of the liquid sheet at full-wavelength intervals of the fundamental wave. The interface deformation has been presented and the breakup time (or length) has been calculated in temporal (or spatial) instability analysis. The results indicate that liquid viscosity always weakens instability for all conditions in the varicose mode, which is different from viscosity that plays a dual role in instability for the sinuous mode concluded by previous researchers. In addition, an energy method is adopted both in the linear segment and nonlinear segment of the temporal instability analysis to further explain the mechanism of instability onset.