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Due to its special flavour and cheapness, starch is a source of nutrition for humans and most animals, some of whom even prefer to consume large amounts of starchy foods. However, the use of starch by carnivorous fish is limited and excessive starch intake can lead to liver damage, but the mechanism of damage is not clear. Therefore, in this study, two isonitrogenous and isolipid semi-pure diets, Z diet (0% starch) and G diet (22% starch), were formulated, respectively. The largemouth bass (M. salmoides) cultured in fiberglass tanks were randomly divided into two groups and fed the two diets for 45 days. Blood and liver were collected on day 30 and 45 for enzymology, histopathology, ultramicropathology, flow cytometry, and transcriptomics to investigate the damage of high starch on the liver of largemouth bass and its damage mechanism. The results showed that the high starch not affect the growth performance of largemouth bass. However, high starch caused a whitening of the liver and an increase in hepatopancreas index (HSI), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), and alanine aminotransferase (ALT) in the serum. Histopathological observations showed that high starch led to severe vacuolisation, congestion, and moderate to severe necrotizing hepatitis in the liver. The high starch intake led to a significant increase in postprandial blood glucose and insulin in serum of largemouth bass, promoting the synthesis and accumulation of large amounts of hepatic glycogen in the liver, leading to the loss of hepatocyte organelles and inducing liver fibrosis. Meanwhile, high starch induced the production of oxidative stress and promoted apoptosis and necrosis of hepatocytes. Transcriptome analysis revealed that there were 10,927 and 2,656 unique genes in the G and Z groups, respectively. KEGG enrichment analysis showed that 19 pathways were significantly enriched, including those related to glucose metabolism and cell survival. Network mapping based on enrichment pathways and differential expressing genes showed the emergence of a regulatory network dominated by PI3K/Akt signaling pathway. This indicated that the PI3K/Akt signalling pathway plays a very important role in this process, regulating the liver injury caused by high starch. Our results provide a reference for the mechanism of liver injury caused by high starch, and the PI3K/Akt signalling pathway could be a potential therapeutic target for liver injury caused by high starch.

The proatlantal intersegmental artery (PIA) is a rare embryonic residual blood vessel of which there are two types: I and II. Type I originates from the internal carotid artery and type II originates from the external carotid artery. It passes into the skull via the occipital bone. We report a rare case of PIA reflux compensation. A 45-year-old-man was admitted with dysphasia and right hemiparesis for one day. We performed cerebral angiography. The right external carotid artery was blocked. There was no stenosis of the right vertebral artery. A right PIA was seen. In the lateral view of the right vertebral artery, contrast can be seen to flow backward into the external carotid artery and branches from the vertebral via the PIA.

Just as SARS-CoV-2 continues to infect a growing number of people around the world, harmful misinformation about the outbreak also continues to spread. We designed and built Jennifer chatbot to provide easily accessible information from reliable resources to answer questions related to the current COVID-19 pandemic. It covers a wide variety of topics, from case statistics to best practices for disease prevention and management. Short conference paper

The modified cyanate ester resin(CE) which can be applied stably in the cryogenic environment was prepared by using phenoxy resin(PKHH) and high purity epoxy resin(EP) through the method of melting prepolymerization. The results show that the curing reaction of CE is accelerated by the addition of PKHH, but the reaction pathways are not changed. It is found that PKHH can improve the ductility by the mechanism of the semi-interpenetrating network (SIPN) in the cured CE networks. Especially, the impact strength value of the CE/EP blends with the content of 10% (mass fraction) PKHH reaches to 18.4 kJ/m2 and the modulus is maintained at about 3.5 GPa at –196 ℃, accordingly the cracks are not observed on the surface of specimens after 20 low-high temperature cycles (–196 to 200 ℃).

We developed a convenient technique to detect Herpesviral haematopoietic necrosis attributed to cyprinid herpes virus 2 (CyHV-2), a serious disease of Crucian carp and goldfish related to high mortality. In the present study, we employed a lateral flow dipstick (LAMP-LFD) to present a loop-mediated isothermal amplification assay. The specificity was ascertained via other six viruses, and the sensitivity was compared using PCR method, which are the reaction conditions changes for the method improved. The results revealed that CyHV-2 performance was observable at 64 °C in a separated tube within 60 min, when the samples hybridized using an FITC-labeled probe. As the LAMP-LFD method's specificity was high, with its sensitivity identical to that of traditional PCR, the overall DNA collected revealed the lowest detection limit of 0.18 pg/μl from goldfish diseased by CyHV-2. In summary, the development of LAMP-LFD's method does not require expensive instruments, and it can be regarded as a fast, simple, and reliable method for CyHV-2 detection.

Qi Zhang,1 Min Zhao,1 Mei Xu,1 Fengjuan Gu,1 Quan Liu,1 Yuan Chen,2 Haiqi Zhang,1 Aize Kijlstra31The First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Department of Ophthalmology, Chongqing Key Laboratory of Ophthalmology and Chongqing Eye Institute, Chongqing, People’s Republic of China; 2Chongqing Vision Institute, Chongqing, People’s Republic of China; 3University Eye Clinic Maastricht, Maastricht, the NetherlandsPurpose: This study aimed to evaluate the outcomes of therapeutic keratoplasty for severe infectious keratitis in Chongqing (Southwest China).Patients and methods: The records of 561 eyes that underwent therapeutic keratoplasty for refractory microbial keratitis from 2001 to 2016 were analyzed in this retrospective study. Data included demographic information, microbiological investigations, associated factors, graft size, preoperative status, postoperative complications, and final anatomical outcomes.Results: Trauma was the most common cause (267, 47.6%) for corneal ulcers leading to therapeutic keratoplasty. The etiological diagnosis included bacterial keratitis (80 eyes, 14.3%), fungal keratitis (317 eyes, 56.5%), acanthamoeba keratitis (3 eyes, 0.5%), and mixed bacteria/fungal infection (15 eyes, 2.7%). Anatomical success was achieved for 492 eyes (87.7%), with bacterial keratitis having a better outcome than fungal and mixed infections. Diabetes and preoperative time ≥30days were significantly associated with anatomical failure in the multivariate logistic regression (P=0.028 and P=0.022, respectively). Patients with hypopyon, corneal perforation, surgical delay, and/or large graft size had a higher incidence of postoperative complications (reinfection, cataract, glaucoma, hyphema, or graft rejection) (P

The effects of social inequality usually include income inequality. Income inequality is augmented or reduced by tax policies. This paper finds empirical evidence that shifting the tax burden from ...

Consumption of shellfish contaminated with algal toxins produced by marine dinoflagellates can lead to diarrhetic shellfish poisoning (DSP). It was therefore essential that there are analytical techniques to identify and quantify DSP toxins in shellfish. This new methodology could facilitate DSP monitoring and create a means of rapidly responding to incidents threatening public health. In the last years there were different analytical methods for DSP, such as mouse bioassay and LC-FLD. With the development of instrument, Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry was substituted for other analytical methods with its good sensitivity and selectivity and without derivatization for the determination of DSP. In this report, a high performance liquid chromatogra-phytandem mass spectrometric（HPLC-MS/MS）method was developed for the simultaneous determination of okadaic acid (OA) and dinophysistoxins(DTX1) in Sinonovacula constricta. Optimization of pretreatment experiment was carried out to maximize recoveries and the effectiveness. The analytes were determined under multi-reactions monitoring (MRM) scan type with tandem mass analyzer using negative ion electrospray ionization (-ESI) mode .Finally, the detection and identification of OA and DTX-1 were based upon their retention times (RT) and the fragmentation patterns of their mass spectra. The method of LOQ for the two poisons was 0.02 mg·kg-1.The real sample test showed that this method could be used for sensitive, fast, and accurate determination of the two diarrheic shellfish poisons in shellfish.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the Japanese journals in bibliometric parameters such as impact factors (IFs), mean IFs from citing and cited journals, and self-citing and sell-cited rates. The data consists of 128 Japanese journals indexed in the 1994 Journal Citation Reports. The results note that only 15 journals, with a wide variation of self-citing and self-cited rates, have obtained a current impact higher than 1.00. The results also note that the Japanese journals have not achieved a high international reputation, although some of the citing journals are the top most-cited journals identified by Garfield as a small core of journals worldwide.

This bibliometric study is to provide a quantitative analysis of the authorship of Nature, Science, and Cell from 1991 to 1993. The source data consist of two sets: The hot papers in biology and the selective sample of articles, research articles, reports, or letters from three respective periodicals. The results show that the hot papers have more authors, more institutions participating in the research than the non-hot papers. The results also show that funding sources are significantly related to the mean number of authors per paper. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

The purpose of this study is to analyze the characteristics of scientific research collaboration in China by bibliometric indicators, collaborative index, degree of collaboration and level of collaboration, based on the articles published in 1218 titles of Chinese scientific and technical periodicals in the year 1993. The results suggest that the current trend of collaboration among multiauthors and multiinstetutions for producing scientific articles may have reflected the multidimensional science of China.

Research performance in China has increased appreciably during the past few years, both in regard to relative output of publications and in their impact on the international research productivity. The purpose of this survey, based on the data recorded in the Science Citation Index (SCI) database between 1987 and 1993, is to study the research performance in the People's Republic of China. The 35,087 papers published in domestic or foreign periodicals were selected for analysis and evaluation of the distribution of publications and citations, for the numerical characterization of research performance in China. The findings indicate that 17,687 papers covered by the Source Indexes of the SCI in the period 1990–1992 had received 7944 citations in the year 1993 and that the mean citation rate is 0.45. The number of cited papers is 4491 and the proportion of cited papers to the total is 0.25.

Research activities in the life sciences during the past few years, have increased appreciably in China, both in regard to relative output of publications and in their impact on the international research community. The purpose of this study is to analyze and evaluate quantitatively the scientific productivity of key medical universities in China by using CBMdisc, MEDLINE and SCI databases. The results showed that Tongji Medical University ranks first in terms of paper output in Chinese and in English languages, while Beijing Medical University is placed second in output but is first in citation impact. Shanghai Medical University had the top annual paper output per scientist, with 2.53 papers in Chinese and 0.13 papers in English. The results also showed that the coverage of Chinese biomedical publications by western indexing services is very poor.

Three medical library periodicals published in China, Japan and U.S.A. were selected for this study. During the years 1990–1992, 36 issues, 410 articles, and 2915 cited references were compared to find each country's trends of research in medical library and information services by way of a bibliometric method. The citation characteristics in the periodicals provided evidence that differences were likely attributable to the fact that the three periodicals were published in different countries.

This bibliometric analysis was examined by the references of the articles on Medicine Chinese Traditional (MCT) searched by the CD-ROM Medline. The 3006 references of the articles on MCT which were published between 1974 and 1992 in 343 periodicals were the samples for present study. The results were illustrated in order to identify reasonably a hierarchical ranking of periodicals and to evaluate objectively a distribution of countries where those articles were published and languages in which those articles were written.

In April-June of 2007, a gas hydrate drilling expedition was carried out by using M/V Bavenit in Shenhu Area, the north slope of South China Sea. High concentrations of hydrate (>40%) were obtained in a disseminated forms in foram-rich clay sediments at 3 selected sites. The hydrate-bearing sediments ranged several ten meters in thickness are located in the lower part of GHSZ, just above the BGHSZ, and are typically characteristic of higher sonic velocity and resistivity, and lower gamma density in wireline logging profiles. Evidences for gas hydrate include the IR cold spots and temperature anomalies, salinity and chlorite geochemical anomaly of pore water for non-pressurized cores, and X-ray imaging, high p-wave velocity and low gamma density, and high concentration of methane from the pressurized cores. Gasses are mainly methane (max. ethane 0.2-0.3%), therefore only hydrate S1 is formed. It is inferred that the foram content and other silt size grains may provide enough free water for the hydrate to happily occupy both the large spaces in the forams and for it to distribute itself evenly (disseminated) throughout the formation. It is possible that all the forams are hydrate filled. As the forams are visible does this not count for visible white gas hydrates.

Gas hydrate is a very complicated reservoir system characterized of temperature, pressure, gas composition, pore-water geochemical features, and gas sources, gas hydrate distribution within the gas hydrate stability zone. Temperature, pressure and the gas composition of the sediments were suitable for gas hydrate formation in the gas hydrate reservoir system of Shenhu Area, north slope of South China Sea. The high-resolution seismic data and the gas hydrate drilling getting high concentrations of hydrate (>40%) in a disseminated form in foram-rich clay sediment showed that gas hydrate is distributed heterogeneously at all spatial scales in all drill holes, and the hydrate-bearing sediments ranged several ten meters in thickness are located in the lower part of gas hydrate stability zone (GHSZ), just above the bottom of gas hydrate stability zone (BGHSZ). It is likely seem that the methane to crystallize gas hydrate is from in-situ microbial methane.

A method of non-target pigment screening in Chinese softshell turtle has been established by using liquid chromatography coupled to time of flight mass spectrometry (LC-Q-TOF MS). After being purified by a simple acetonitrile extraction work, the non-target pigment in 20 Chinese softshell turtle samples was detected by liquid chromatography-photodiode array detection (LC-DAD). The S7 sample, which has a strong spectral response, was chosen to extract the mass spectrometry information of the non-target pigment on different gradient elution conditions. In order to get the characteristic molecular mass ion (564.397 73 Da and 564.395 61 Da) of the non-target pigment, qualitative spectral full scan with negative sample was used. The molecular formula generation data and the literature information prompted speculation that the non-target pigment was canthaxanthin with the formula of C40H52O2. By comparing the canthaxanthin standard material MS/MS information, the result was confirmed accurate. A strategy of LC-Q-TOF MS method for the qualitative analysis of unknown compounds is discussed, and the results indicated that the described method can be effectively applied to qualitative analysis for non-target pigment in Chinese softshell turtle.

The objective of this study was to tell the differences from services of medical school libraries between China and Japan. It was concluded that resource sharing in Japan were generally well - employed as compared to China. The common problem encountered was to strengthen the information and education link between users and the information resources.

This bibliometric study analyzes the references of articles on acupuncture searched by the Medline during the period from 1988 to 1992. The 1457 articles distributed in 382 periodicals were illustrated in order to identify reasonably a hierarchical ranking of periodicals according to the number of articles and to evaluate objectively a distribution of countries where those articles were contributed and languages in which those articles were written. Over this period, the numbers of authors ranged from one to 10+ and the mean number of authors is 2.68.