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In this systematic review and meta-analysis, our aim was to explore the optimal timing of ureteric stent removal after kidney transplant.For our analyses, we searched the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, PubMed, and Embase databases for all randomized clinical trials that evaluated the timing of stent removal after kidney transplant. Patients with early versus late stent removal were compared.Seven eligible studies published from 2012 to 2018, which included 1277 patients, were found to be within the scope of our study. Significant differences were shown between early versus late stent removal groups with regard to development of urinary tract infections (relative risk of 0.42; 95% CI, 0.26-0.685; P.001). In a further subgroup analysis of incidence of urinary tract infection with consideration of heterogeneity, early stent removal was also favored (relative risk at 2 and 3 weeks of 0.36 and 0.35, respectively; P.001 for both). However, with regard to incidence of major urologic complications, there were no significant differences between early and late stent removal (odds ratio at 2 and 3 weeks of 2.79 and 1.97, respectively; P = .18 and P = .26, respectively). There were also no significant differences between groups in risk of development of urinary leakage (odds ratio at 2 weeks of 3.02, P = .18; and relative risk at 3 weeks of 2.00, P = .27). With regard to ureteral stenosis, only 3 cases were reported in the late stent removal group.Our study demonstrated that early ureteral stent removal (that is, not later than 3 weeks) could significantly decrease the incidence of urinary tract infections without affecting incidence of major urological complications. We suggest that the appropriate timing of stent removal should be within 14 to 21 days.

Purpose The study aimed to predict acute radiation esophagitis (ARE) with grade ≥ 2 for patients with locally advanced lung cancer (LALC) treated with intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) using multi-omics features, including radiomics and dosiomics. Methods 161 patients with stage IIIA−IIIB LALC who received chemoradiotherapy (CRT) or radiotherapy by IMRT with a prescribed dose from 45 to 70 Gy from 2015 to 2019 were enrolled retrospectively. All the toxicity gradings were given following the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events V4.0. Multi-omics features, including radiomics, dosiomics (including dose−volume histogram dosimetric parameters), were extracted based on the planning CT image and three-dimensional dose distribution. All data were randomly divided into training cohorts (N = 107) and testing cohorts (N = 54). In the training cohorts, features with reliably high outcome relevance and low redundancy were selected under random patient subsampling. Four classification models (using clinical factors (CF) only, using radiomics features (RFs) only, dosiomics features (DFs) only, and the hybrid features (HFs) containing clinical factors, radiomics and dosiomics) were constructed employing the Ridge classifier using two-thirds of randomly selected patients as the training cohort. The remaining patient was treated as the testing cohort. A series of models were built with 30 times training–testing splits. Their performances were assessed using the area under the ROC curve (AUC) and accuracy. Results Among all patients, 51 developed ARE grade ≥ 2, with an incidence of 31.7%. Next, 8990 radiomics and 213 dosiomics features were extracted, and 3, 6, 12, and 13 features remained after feature selection in the CF, DF, RF and DF models, respectively. The RF and HF models achieved similar classification performance, with the training and testing AUCs of 0.796 ± 0.023 (95% confidence interval (CI [0.79, 0.80])/0.744 ± 0.044 (95% CI [0.73, 0.76]) and 0.801 ± 0.022 (95% CI [0.79, 0.81]) (p = 0.74), respectively. The model performances using CF and DF features were poorer, with training and testing AUCs of 0.573 ± 0.026 (95% CI [0.56, 0.58])/ 0.509 ± 0.072 (95% CI [0.48, 0.53]) and 0.679 ± 0.027 (95% CI [0.67, 0.69])/0.604 ± 0.041 (95% CI [0.53, 0.63]) compared with the above two models (p Conclusions In LALC patients treated with CRT IMRT, the ARE grade ≥ 2 can be predicted using the pretreatment radiotherapy image features. To predict ARE, the multi-omics features had similar predictability with radiomics features; however, the dosiomics features and clinical factors had a limited classification performance.

Hepatocellular carcinoma has become one of the most shared cancers in the whole world because of its high morbidity, poor survival rate and low recovery rate. Especially in China, hepatocellular carcinoma has been regarded as one of the most malignant cancers. With the exploration of tumor diseases and the development of bioinformatics over the years, lncRNAs have been found to play a direct or indirect regulatory role in tumorigenesis and tumor development, which brings a new direction for the treatment of tumors. Previous studies had investigated that DIO3 opposite strand upstream RNA(DIO3OS) played a promoting role in the occurrence and development of thyroid carcinoma and uterine corpus endometrial carcinoma. However, research focusing on the role of DIO3OS in hepatocellular carcinoma is still uncleared. We found that low DIO3OS level often predicts poor prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma. In addition, there was significant correlation between different immune cells and their immune markers and DIO3OS. Our results suggest that DIO3OS can be used as an effective biomarker in the diagnosis and prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma, affecting the development of hepatocellular carcinoma by influencing tumor immune cell infiltration.

Overcoming resistance to radiation is a major challenge in cancer treatment. Stearoyl-coa desaturase (SCD1) is the enzyme responsible for oleic acid (OA) and palmitoleic acid (POA) formation. Here, we provided evidence that targeting SCD1 was capable of inducing ferroptosis and immunogenic cell death (ICD), thereby improving the radiation sensitivity of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). ESCC cell lines with high SCD1 expression were treated with MF-438 (SCD1 inhibitor) to determine cell viability. Colony formation assay was performed to evaluate the radiation sensitization of SCD1 inhibitor. Tumor cell ferroptosis and ICD was analyzed in MF-438, radiation therapy (RT) and the combination treatment group. The potential molecular mechanisms underlying MF-438 as a novel radiation sensitizer in ESCC were explored. We concluded by assessing SCD1 as a prognostic factor in ESCC. MF-438 exhibited antitumor activity in ESCC cells. Our outcomes revealed significant improvement of radiation sensitivity by MF-438. Moreover, the combination treatment enhanced tumor cell ferroptosis and ICD. Further analyses revealed SCD1 conferred radiation resistance via alleviating ferroptosis in tumor cells; targeting SCD1 inhibited the biosynthesis of OA and POA, and improved radiation induced ferroptosis in ESCC cells. Clinical analysis indicated high expression of SCD1 was associated with unfavorable survival in patients of ESCC. In summary, our results demonstrated that MF-438 acted as a ferroptosis inducer. Targeting SCD1 conferred the immunogenicity of ferroptotic cancer cells and increased the effectiveness of RT in ESCC. SCD1 could be considered as a useful prognostic indicator of survival in ESCC.

Purpose: To evaluate the effectiveness of features obtained from our proposed incremental-dose-interval-based lung subregion segmentation (IDLSS) for predicting grade ≥ 2 acute radiation pneumonitis (ARP) in lung cancer patients upon intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT). (1) Materials and Methods: A total of 126 non-small-cell lung cancer patients treated with IMRT were retrospectively analyzed. Five lung subregions (SRs) were generated by the intersection of the whole lung (WL) and five sub-regions receiving incremental dose intervals. A total of 4610 radiomics features (RF) from pre-treatment planning computed tomographic (CT) and 213 dosiomics features (DF) were extracted. Six feature groups, including WL-RF, WL-DF, SR-RF, SR-DF, and the combined feature sets of WL-RDF and SR-RDF, were generated. Features were selected by using a variance threshold, followed by a Student t-test. Pearson’s correlation test was applied to remove redundant features. Subsequently, Ridge regression was adopted to develop six models for ARP using the six feature groups. Thirty iterations of resampling were implemented to assess overall model performance by using the area under the Receiver-Operating-Characteristic curve (AUC), accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score. (2) Results: The SR-RDF model achieved the best classification performance and provided significantly better predictability than the WL-RDF model in training cohort (Average AUC: 0.98 ± 0.01 vs. 0.90 ± 0.02, p < 0.001) and testing cohort (Average AUC: 0.88 ± 0.05 vs. 0.80 ± 0.04, p < 0.001). Similarly, predictability of the SR-DF model was significantly stronger than that of the WL-DF model in training cohort (Average AUC: 0.88 ± 0.03 vs. 0.70 ± 0.030, p < 0.001) and in testing cohort (Average AUC: 0.74 ± 0.08 vs. 0.65 ± 0.06, p < 0.001). By contrast, the SR-RF model significantly outperformed the WL-RF model only in the training set (Average AUC: 0.93 ± 0.02 vs. 0.85 ± 0.03, p < 0.001), but not in the testing set (Average AUC: 0.79 ± 0.05 vs. 0.77 ± 0.07, p = 0.13). (3) Conclusions: Our results demonstrated that the IDLSS method improved model performance for classifying ARP with grade ≥ 2 when using dosiomics or combined radiomics-dosiomics features.

Chronic inflammatory disease (CID) is a category of medical conditions that causes recurrent inflammatory attacks in multiple tissues. The occurrence of CID is related to inappropriate immune responses to normal tissue substances and invading microbes due to many factors, such as defects in the immune system and imbalanced regulation of commensal microbes. Thus, effectively keeping the immune-associated cells and their products in check and inhibiting aberrant activation of the immune system is a key strategy for the management of CID. Canthin-6-ones are a subclass of β-carboline alkaloids isolated from a wide range of species. Several emerging studies based on in vitro and in vivo experiments reveal that canthin-6-ones may have potential therapeutic effects on many inflammatory diseases. However, no study has yet summarized the anti-inflammatory functions and the underlying mechanisms of this class of compounds. This review provides an overview of these studies, focusing on the disease entities and the inflammatory mediators that have been shown to be affected by canthin-6-ones. In particular, the major signaling pathways affected by canthin-6-ones, such as the NLR family pyrin domain containing 3 (NLRP3) inflammasome and the NF-κB signaling pathway, and their roles in several CIDs are discussed. Moreover, we discuss the limitations in studies of canthin-6-ones and provide possible solutions. In addition, a perspective that may suggest possible future research directions is provided. This work may be helpful for further mechanistic studies and possible therapeutic applications of canthin-6-ones in the treatment of CID.

Hepatocellular carcinoma(HCC) has become one of the most shared cancers in the whole world because of its high morbidity, poor survival rate and low recovery rate. Especially in China, HCC has been regarded as one of the most malignant cancers. With the development of tumor exploration and treatment over the years, it has been found that lncRNA plays a direct or indirect regulatory role in the process of tumorigenesis and cancer development, which brought a new direction for early diagnosis and therapy. Previous studies had investigated that DIO3OS played a promoting role in the occurrence and development of thyroid carcinoma and uterine corpus endometrial carcinoma. However, research focusing on the role of DIO3OS in HCC is still uncleared. Our work found that there was a significant negative correlation between low DIO3OS levels and HCC. In addition, there was also a correlation between immune cells and their surface markers and DIO3OS expression in HCC. Our findings demonstrated that DIO3OS may be a potential prognostic biomarker involved in the process of HCC by regulating immune cell infiltration.

As a metabolic mediator of antitumor immunity, indoleamine‑2,3‑dioxygenase 1 (IDO1) is upregulated in various types of cancer; however, the regulatory mechanism and clinical significance of IDO1 in non‑small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) radiotherapy (RT) remain unclear. The present study investigated the role of IDO1 in the NSCLC microenvironment. MTT assay, immunofluorescence, apoptosis analysis, cell cycle analysis, and C57BL/6 and BALB/c nude mouse tumor models were utilized to evaluate the roles of the STAT5A/IDO1/kynurenine axis in radioresistance and in the immune microenvironment of NSCLC. Protein expression levels were evaluated by western blotting, immunofluorescence and immunohistochemistry. Flow cytometry was performed to assess the status of CD8

In this study, we isolated and identified the pathogens by fulfilling Koch's postulates. Disease samples with typical spot blight symptoms were collected and pathogens were isolated from the diseased tissues. The pathogen was identified based on its biological characteristics and molecular analysis of internal transcribed (rDNA-ITS) and large subunit (LSU) sequences. Phylogenetic tree were constructed using MEGA7 software and pathogenicity tests were performed usingBased on Koch's postulates, we identified the pathogen causing spot blight on

It has been reported that oxidative stress plays a prominent role in diabetic macrovascular diseases. 3,4‑Dihydroxyacetophenone (3,4‑DHAP) has been found to have a variety of biological activities. However, few studies have assessed the antioxidant capacity of 3,4‑DHAP and the underlying mechanisms. Thus, the aim of the present study was to explore the effects of 3,4‑DHAP on oxidative stress in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). HUVECs were pre‑treated with 3,4‑DHAP and then exposed to high glucose conditions. Cell viability and cytotoxicity were measured using an MTT assay. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) levels were measured using an inverted fluorescence microscope and a fluorescent enzyme labeling instrument. Protein expression levels of nuclear factor E2‑related factor 2 (Nrf2), heme oxygenase‑1 (HO‑1), microtubule‑associated protein 1A/1B‑light chain 3 (LC3) and poly ADP‑ribose polymerase‑1 (PARP‑1) were measured using western blotting, and mRNA expression of Nrf2 and HO‑1 were measured through reverse transcription‑quantitative PCR (RT‑qPCR). Nrf2 nuclear translocation was evaluated using immunofluorescence analysis and autophagosomes were observed using transmission electron microscope (TEM). The results of the present study demonstrated that compared with the control group, cell viability of the high glucose group was reduced and cell cytotoxicity of the high glucose group was increased. ROS production in the high glucose group was clearly enhanced. In addition, high glucose upregulated Nrf2 and HO‑1 protein and mRNA expression levels. Nuclear translocation of Nrf2 in the high glucose group was also increased. The formation of autophagosomes in the high glucose group was also higher than that in the control group. Furthermore, LC3‑II/LC3‑I and PARP‑1 protein expression levels were increased after treatment with high glucose. However, compared to the high glucose group, 3,4‑DHAP (10 µmol/l) significantly enhanced cell viability. 3,4‑DHAP markedly decreased the production of ROS, increased Nrf2 and HO‑1 protein and mRNA expression levels, and promoted nuclear translocation of Nrf2 in HUVECs. In addition, 3,4‑DHAP promoted the formation of autophagosomes, and notably increased the protein expression levels of LC3‑II/LC3‑I and PARP‑1. Moreover, it was determined that compared to the 3,4‑DHAP group, treatment with 3,4‑DHAP and ML385 enhanced cell viability, and decreased ROS production, Nrf2 and HO‑1 protein and mRNA expression levels, nuclear translocation of Nrf2, and LC3‑II/LC3‑I and PARP‑1 protein expression levels. Collectively, the results of the present study showed that 3,4‑DHAP protected HUVECs against oxidative stress via regulation of the Nrf2/HO‑1 pathway, by increasing autophagy and promoting DNA damage repair.

The geological storage of CO2 is a critical technique for reducing emissions, which significantly contributes to the mitigation of the greenhouse effect. Currently, CO2 is often geologically stored in coal seams, hydrocarbon reservoirs, and saline aquifers in order to store CO2 and improve the oil and gas recovery simultaneously. Shale formations, as candidates for CO2 storage, are drawing more attention because of their rich volumes. CO2 storage through shale formations in the Sichuan Basin, China, has tremendous potential because of the readily available CO2 injection equipment, such as abandoned shale gas wells. Therefore, we review the potential of using these wells to store CO2 in this paper. Firstly, we review the status of the geological storage of CO2 and discuss the features and filed applications for the most studied storage techniques. Secondly, we investigate the formation properties, shale gas field development process, and characteristics of the abandoned wells in the Sichuan Basin. Additionally, after carefully studying the mechanism and theoretical storage capacity, we evaluate the potential of using these abandoned wells to store CO2. Lastly, recommendations are proposed based on the current technologies and government policies. We hope this paper may provide some insights into the development of geological CO2 storage using unconventional reservoirs.

Novel boron 2-(2′-pyridyl)imidazole (BOPIM) complexes T1, T2 and T3 with different substituents (including bromo, tert-butyl and methoxyl) on the benzene ring of BOPIM dyes have been designed and synthesized, and their optical properties in both solution and the solid state were investigated and compared. The three compounds exhibited typical intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) characteristics. Solvent-dependent UV-vis absorption, fluorescence emission spectra and quantum chemical calculation indicated a molecular push-pull electronic structure. Their ICT degrees increased with the sequence of T1

In this study, we successfully synthesized polyethylene glycol (PEG) and folic acid (FA) co-functionalized graphene quantum dots (GQDs) to improve the biocompatibility and tumor-targeting ability of GQDs simultaneously, and labeled GQDs–PEG–FA with 131I for biological behavior evaluation. The in vitro properties, biodistribution and SPECT imaging of 131I-GQDs–PEG–FA were investigated. The uptake of 131I-GQDs–PEG–FA at tumor sites can be clearly examined via SPECT imaging, which can ascribe to enhanced permeability and retention effect and active targeting effect of FA to folate receptors. The results indicate that 131I-GQDs–PEG–FA can be used as a radioactive probe for detection of tumor cells overexpressing folate receptor.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a common malignant tumor characterized by unchecked division and survival of abnormal cells in the colon or rectum with high morbidity and mortality. Despite the rapid development of early screening methods and improved therapies, the prognosis of CRC is not satisfactory. Identification of new biomarkers for early detection and development of more effective therapies are still urgent tasks in current studies to achieve ideal treatment of CRC. Ferroptosis is a recently emerged novel regulated form of cell death characterized by a massive accumulation of iron-dependent lipid peroxidates, making it morphologically and molecularly distinct from apoptosis, cell death, and autophagy. Accumulating studies have shown that induction of ferroptosis in CRC successfully eliminates cancer cells resistant to other modes of cell death. Thus, ferroptosis may become a new direction for the design of CRC therapy. Although many research articles have investigated the possible roles of ferroptosis in CRC, a study that summarizes the main findings, including the regulators and mechanisms of action, of ferroptosis in CRC is not available. Herein, the studies in recent literature regarding the roles of ferroptosis on the progression and treatment of CRC were summarized, mainly focusing on molecular and biological mechanisms in vitro and in vivo. In particular, the roles of numerous ferroptosis regulators, such as SLC7A11, reactive oxygen species (ROS), glutathione (GSH), and iron, in CRC, were discussed and the application of ferroptosis-associated genes for the early diagnosis and prognosis of CRC was explored. In addition, an outlook for future studies of ferroptosis in CRC treatment and the possible barriers and the corresponding solutions were discussed.

Real-world, long-running Internet of Things (IoT) requires intense user-node interaction in the deployment, network operation, and maintenance stages. The rapidly increasing number of IoT nodes urges a new user-friendly interface to reduce the interaction complexity. This paper presents INSIGHT, an AR-enabled user interface for IoT nodes allowing the users to directly grasp perceptual node information from the surrounding videos shot by mobile AR devices such as smart glasses and phones. INSIGHT incorporates camera, magnetic, and IMU sensor data from an AR device to detect, locate, and recognize IoT nodes markerlessly. An intuitive user interface will then be overlaid on each recognized node for fetching/feeding information from/to the node. We have validated the performance of INSIGHT in terms of localization accuracy and the capability to distinguish nearby nodes. The results show that INSIGHT works well even in densely deployed networks.

IntroductionIn clinical practice, the ideal time at which to perform a Frozen–thawed Embryo Transfer (FET) after a failed In-vitro Fertilization-embryo Transfer (IVF-ET) is still unclear to most practicing physicians. In addition, physicians often delay the introduction of FET due to concerns on the possible residual effects of ovarian hyperstimulation, which may interfere with the regular menstrual cycle. Moreover, given that most of the published studies on the topic are retrospective with contradictory findings, it is crucial to provide evidence-based randomized control guides for clinical practice.Methods/analysisThe study is a randomized, non-inferiority, parallel-group, controlled trial that will enroll a total of 732 women undergoing their first FET after a failed fresh embryo transfer (ET) cycle. The participants will then be randomized into two groups based on a computer-generated randomized list. The two groups include: (i) an immediate group were FET will be carried out during the first menstrual cycle after a failed fresh ET cycle and (ii) a delayed group where FET will be carried out during the second menstrual cycle after a failed fresh ET cycle. Primary outcomes will be defined as viable pregnancies with fetal heartbeats, diagnosed through pelvic ultrasonography after twelve weeks of gestation.Ethics and disseminationThe study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Assisted Reproductive Medicine at the Affiliated Hospital of Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine (SDTCM/E-2020.2.01). In addition, written informed consent will be obtained from all the participants before the study. The results of this trial will be disseminated in a peer-reviewed journal.DiscussionCurrently, there is no consensus with regard to the duration after which the effects of ovarian stimulation are observed after a failed fresh ET and the optimal time required to begin FET. Moreover, no randomized controlled trial exists that compares the ongoing pregnancy rates after immediate versus delayed FET following a failed fresh ET cycle. Therefore, it is important to conduct a well-designed randomized trial to determine whether it is necessary to delay FET for at least one menstrual cycle after the failure of fresh ET.Clinical Trial RegistrationChiCTR2000033313 (http://www.chictr.org.cn/enIndex.aspx).

Coleus forskohlii (Wild) Briq. is an aromatic plant in the Lamiaceae family cultivated primarily in India, Sri Lanka, Nepal and China (Yunnan Province). This herb is considered to have medicinal properties and the whole plant can be used to treat asthma, cancer and other diseases with remarkable efficacy. Due to the high medicinal and economic value of C. forskohlii, it has been introduced to Tongcheng (N29°18'12.24″, E113°53'59.36″), Hubei Province for cultivation. However, severe Fusarium wilt disease of C. forskohlii has been epidemic in Tongcheng since 2018 with a disease incidence of 5 to 30% in surveyed fields. This disease is characterized typically by root rot, vascular discoloration and leaf wilting of C. forskohlii (Fig 1), resulting in progressive plant death. Ten diseased plants were collected from the fields and the roots and stems were rinsed in 70% ethanol for 5 min and samples at the junction of disease and healthy tissues (0.5 × 0.5 cm2) were cutted and placed on potato dextrose agar (PDA) for fungal isolation in a dark chamber at 28°C. Eventually, ten pure isolates were obtained from hyphal-tip followed by single-spore purification on PDA. Seven of the purified isolates showed white aerial mycelium initially and secreted orange-brown pigment 8 days after incubation. Macroconidia were falciform, hyaline, three to five septate, ranging from 2.02 to 4.17 (mean 2.98 µm) × 10.05 to 21.90 µm (mean 12.04 µm) in size (n = 30) (Fig 2). These morphological characteristics resembled Fusarium oxysporum. (Leslie and Summerell 2006) and we selected one of them for molecular identification. Genome DNA was extracted from isolate (RS-4) using the CTAB method (Mahadevakumar et al. 2018). The translation elongation factor 1 alpha (EF-1α) DNA sequence was amplified using primers EF1/EF2 (Geiser et al. 2004), and the second largest subunit of RNA polymerase II (RPB2) DNA sequence was amplified using primers fRPB2-5F/fRPB2-7cR (Liu et al. 1999). The obtained EF-1α sequence of RS-4 (MW219142) showed 100% identity with that of F. oxysporum (FD_01376) (FUSARIUM-ID database). RPB2 sequences of RS-4 (MW219143) showed 100% identity with F. oxysporum (FD_01679) (FUSARIUM-ID database). Moreover, a phylogenetic tree of the EF-1α gene sequence of RS-4 was constructed based on the Neighbor-Joining method in MEGA7 software (Tamura et al. 2013) and revealed that strain RS-4 was closest to F. oxysporum (Fig 2). To test the pathogenicity of RS-4, six healthy leaves of C. forskohlii were collected and inoculated either with the colonized PDA discs (diameter, 5 mm) of RS-4 or control PDA discs, in a moist chamber at 25 ± 2°C. Five days later, brown-black lesions were observed on all inoculated leaves. However, the non-inoculated leaves were maintained asymptomatic. For in vivo pathogenicity test, twenty-day-old C. forskohlii plants (n=3) were inoculated with 106 spores/ml of the RS-4 at a position approximately 1 cm above the soil. Three seedlings treated with sterile water were used as controls. These inoculated and control seedlings were incubated in a moist chamber (25 ± 2 °C, RH 85%). Three days later, typical Fusarium rot symptoms were observed on all inoculated seedlings with rotten stems and withering leaves (Fig 2). Fungal pathogens were re-isolated from the inoculated sites of in vitro and in vivo inoculations by repeating the above isolating operation, and were reconfirmed through morphological features. This is the first report of F. oxysporum causing root rot on C. forskohlii in China. F. oxysporum is one of the most economically important fungal pathogens causing vascular wilt on a wide range of plants worldwide (Dean et al. 2012). The identification of F. oxysporum as the causal agent of the observed Fusarium wilt on C. forskohlii, is critical to the prevention and control of this disease in the future. Acknowledgement This research was supported by funding from the Key project at the central government level titled, "The ability to establish sustainable uses for valuable Chinese medicinale resources" (2060302) Reference Dean, R., et al. 2012. Mol. Plant. Pathol. 13: 414. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1364-3703.2011.00783.x. Geiser, D. M., et al. 2004. Eur. J. Plant Pathol. 110: 473. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:EJPP.0000032386.75915.a0. Leslie, J. F. and Summerell, B. A. 2006. The Fusarium Laboratory Manual. Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, U.K. Liu, Y. J., et al. 1999. Mol. Biol. Evol. 16: 1799. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.molbev.a026092 Mahadevakumar, S. et al. 2018. Eur. J. Plant Pathol. 151:1081. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10658-017-1415-2. Tamura, K., et al. 2013. Mol. Biol. Evol. 30: 2725. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msw054.

Oxidative stress is the main factor responsible for the induction of diabetic renal fibrosis. Thus, improving the state of oxidative stress can effectively prevent the further deterioration of diabetic nephropathy (DN). Previous research has shown that formononetin (FMN), a flavonoid with significant antioxidant activity and Sirt1 activation effect, can improve diabetic renal fibrosis. However, the exact mechanisms underlying the effect of FMN on diabetic renal fibrosis have yet to be elucidated. In this study, we carried out in vivo experiments in a db/db (diabetic) mouse model and demonstrated that FMN activated the nuclear factor E2-related factor 2 (Nrf2)/antioxidant response element (ARE) signaling pathway and improved oxidative stress by increasing levels of sirtuin-1 (Sirt1) protein level in renal tissue. We also found that this process reversed the up-regulation of fibronectin (FN) and intercellular adhesion molecule 1 (ICAM-1) and led to an improvement in renal insufficiency. In vitro results further showed that FMN significantly reversed the upregulation of FN and ICAM-1 in glomerular mesangial cells (GMCs) exposed to high glucose. FMN also promoted the expression of Nrf2 and widened its nuclear distribution. Thus, our data indicated that FMN inhibited hyperglycemia-induced superoxide overproduction by activating the Nrf2/ARE signaling pathway. We also found that FMN up-regulated the expression of Sirt1 and that Sirt1 deficiency could block the activation of the Nrf2/ARE signaling pathway in GMCs induced by high glucose. Finally, we found that Sirt1 deficiency could reverse the down-regulation of FN and ICAM-1 induced by FMN. Collectively, our data demonstrated that FMN up-regulated the expression of Sirt1 to activate the Nrf2/ARE signaling pathway, improved oxidative stress in DN to prevent the progression of renal fibrosis. Therefore, FMN probably represents an efficient therapeutic option of patients with DN.

Background Pinellia ternata (Thunb.), a perennial herbal plant in the Araceae family, has great medicinal value and market demand. In August 2020, an outbreak of severe leaf spot blight disease resulted in a huge yield loss of P. ternata. It is necessary to isolate and identify the pathogens that cause spot blight on P. ternata. Methods In this study, we isolated and identified the pathogens by fulfilling Koch’s postulates. Disease samples with typical spot blight symptoms were collected and pathogens were isolated from the diseased tissues. The pathogen was identified based on its biological characteristics and molecular analysis of internal transcribed (rDNA-ITS) and large subunit (LSU) sequences. Phylogenetic tree were constructed using MEGA7 software and pathogenicity tests were performed using in vivo inoculation. Finally, the pathogen was recovered and identified from the inoculated plants. Results Based on Koch’s postulates, we identified the pathogen causing spot blight on P. ternata as Stagonosporopsis cucurbitacearum. To our knowledge, this is the first study to explore spot blight on P. ternata caused by S. cucurbitacearum in China.

High-frequency trading (HFT) has been challenging fintech and data science. HFT trading marker prediction is a rarely investigated but important problem in finance and data science. In this study, we first propose locally linear embedding based HFT marker prediction algorithm to tackle this problem and HFT trading marker evaluation algorithms for validation. Our results demonstrate locally linear embedding (LLE) outperform its peers in capturing trading markers in terms of accuracy and complexity for its local data structure keeping mechanism in embedding.

Background Osteoporosis affects more than half the patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Up to data, there is no effective clinical practice in managing type 2 diabetes osteoporosis (T2DOP) because of its complex pathogenesis. Gegen Qinlian Decoction (GQD) has been used for the long-term management of T2DM. However, the underlying mechanism of GOD in the treatment of T2DOP remains unknown. Purpose To reveal the role of GQD in T2DOP and its potential therapeutic targets in the management of T2DOP. Study Design The effect of GQD on T2DOP was observed in db/db mice in four groups: model group, GQD low-dose group (GQD-L), GQD high-dose group (GQD-H), and metformin (positive control) group. C57BL/6J mice were used as the negative control group. Methods Quantitative phytochemical analysis of GQD was performed using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). Micro-CT and hematoxylin-eosin (H&E) staining were used to evaluate bone histomorphometry. To screen for candidate targets of GQD, a cytokine antibody array was used, followed by bioinformatics analysis. Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) and western blotting (WB) were used to determine expression levels. Results The major active components of GQD were confirmed by HPLC. Micro-CT and H&E staining showed that bone mass was significantly increased in the GQD-H group compared with the model group. Antibody arrays revealed that the expression of insulin-like growth factor binding protein 3 (IGFBP3) was elevated in the GQD-H group. The MAPK pathway was identified using bioinformatics analysis. Additionally, the levels of osteoclastogenesis-related genes, including cathepsin K (Ctsk), acid phosphatase 5 (Acp5), matrix metallopeptidase 9 (Mmp9), and ATPase H+ transporting V0 subunit D2 (Atp6v0d2) were significantly decreased in the GQD-H group. Compared with the model group, high-dosage GQD inhibited phosphorylation of extracellular signal-regulated kinases (ERKs) and P38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) and the expression of c-Fos and nuclear factor of activated T cells 1 (NFATc1). Conclusion GQD plays a protective role in T2DOP by upregulating IGFBP3 expression and downregulating the IGFBP3/MAPK/NFATC1 signaling pathway. IGFBP3 in serum may also be a novel biomarker in the treatment of T2DOP. Our current findings not only expand the application of GQD, but also provide a theoretical basis and guidance for T2DOP.

New triphenylacrylonitrile derivative (DPPA) with triphenylamine moiety as electron donor group has been synthesized. Its emission wavelengths were strongly affected by solvent polarity, indicating intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) transitions. It was found that DPPA was almost non-emissive in tetrahydrofuran (THF), and the emission could be intensified obviously when a great amount of H2O was added, illustrating aggregation induced emission property. It is interesting that the pristine crystal of DPPA emitted green light, and the ground made its emitting color to change into orange, which could be recovered under fumed with dichloromethane (DCM) vapor. The piezofluorochromic behavior might be switched reversibly under the stimulus of external force because of crystalline-amorphous phase transformation, which could be confirmed from the results of PXRD patterns and DSC curves in different solid states. This work might open a new strategy to provide a broad perspective for the development of AIE PFC materials.

For the superiority of graphene quantum dots (GQDs) in bioimaging and drug delivery carrier, GQDs bring new opportunities for theranostics of diseases. In this study, GQDs were successfully prepared and labeled with 131I. The in vitro properties, biodistribution and SPECT imaging of 131I-GQDs were investigated. The uptake of 131I-GQDs at tumor sites can be clearly observed via SPECT imaging and T/B and T/M ratios increase with increasing time, which can contribute to enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect.

Porphyrin derivatives are usually used for photodynamic therapy (PDT) and labeled with raidonuclide for radiopharmaceuticals. In this work, 5,10,15,20-tetrakis (4-hydroxyphenyl) porphyrin (TPPOH) and 5,10,15,20-tetrakis (4-aminophenyl) porphyrin (TPPNH2) were labeled by 131I. 131I-TPPOH and 131I-TPPNH2 were cultured with SMMC-7721 and HL-7702 cells for affinity test. The results show high uptake ratios of SMMC-7721 than HL-7702. 131I-TPPOH and 131I-TPPNH2 were performed radionuclide therapy (RNT) and PDT via tumor in situ injection. At 14 days post injection, the volumes of tumors injected 131I-TPPOH and 131I-TPPNH2 diminished 64 ± 11 and 54 ± 10%, respectively. The therapeutic effect is better than either single PDT or single RNT. The combination therapy of PDT and RNT could be a more effectual method for cancer therapy.

The temperature effect on rock physical properties, including permeability, is still topical, since the available findings are quite contradictory. In the current study of temperature effect on rock permeability, the experiments have been conducted on eight rock samples of different permeability (4) and lithology (4). The results obtained strongly indicate that the temperature effect depends on the initial permeability of core samples: for low-permeability (LP) or higher-permeability (HP) rocks, the temperature-permeability dependence exhibits a negative nonlinear correlation. When the temperature increases from 20 °C to 100 °C, the permeability of LP rocks decreases by 24–70%. However, in ultra-LP rocks, a positive nonlinear correlation has been revealed between temperature and permeability: when the temperature was increased from 100 to 800 °C, the permeability of ultra-LP rocks exhibited a gradual increase within the initial range from 200 °C to 400 °C, and a sharp rise, while in the medium range from 400 to 600 °C the lithology threshold value was reached, the thermal-induced tensile stress in the rock exceeded its yield stress, which resulted in a sharp increase of permeability in the final temperature range from 600 to 800 °C. Based on the experimental data obtained in this study, a theoretical model is proposed, which implies a positive correlation between rock permeability, pressure, and temperature.

The authors report on a chromogenic system based MnO2 nanosheet and the chomgenic substrate 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB). The MnO2 nanosheet can oxidize TMB in acidic environment to form a yellow solution with an absorption peak at 450 nm. The process does not require the presence of an enzyme or H2O2. However, on addition of ferrous ion to the chromogenic system, the MnO2 nanosheet is decomposed via the redox reaction that occurs between Fe(II) and MnO2. As a result, the intensity of the absorption at 450 nm is reduced. This finding is exploited in a photometric method for determination of Fe(II) that shows high selectivity and a 0.3 μM detection limit (based on the 3σ/slope criterion). Fe(II) can also be detected visually in concentrations down to 100 μM. The method was applied to the determination of Fe(II) in spiked water samples and gave satisfactory recoveries.

High-frequency trading (HFT) has continuously evolved and dominated trading in the past decades. However, HFT trading marker prediction is a rarely investigated problem in Fintech literature. In this study, we first propose a novel manifold learning based HFT trading marker prediction model: M-SCAN to handle this challenge. Our study takes advantage of manifold embeddings of HFT data and seeks potential markers among the outliers in density-based clustering. We further propose HFT trading marker evaluation algorithms to validate the prediction effectiveness besides unveiling trading marker discovery via visualization. Our results demonstrate locally linear embedding (LLE) outperforms its peers in capturing trading markers in terms of accuracy and complexity for its local data structure keeping mechanism in embedding though different stocks may demonstrate their model preference under M-SCAN. Our studies also propose novel entropy and variance concentration ratios (VCR) to quantify HFT data and show that a high-entropy dataset is more likely to have better trading marker prediction than a low-entropy one. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first study in HFT trading marker prediction and will inspire coming studies in this area.

Background: Moyamoya disease (MMD) is a type of chronic cerebrovascular disease. Currently, revascularization surgery including direct/indirect procedure is recommended for symptomatic patients. However, some patients still respond poorly to the treatment or develop secondary symptoms. Case report: We report the first case of an MMD patient treated with deep brain stimulation (DBS) and thalamotomy. Symptoms of dystonia due to hemorrhage in the thalamus responded poorly to revascularization surgery, but were considerably alleviated by stereotactic neurosurgery. Discussion: Our case report provides a potential strategy for management of refractory symptomatic MMD patients with dystonia and also supports the combined efficacy of DBS with thalamotomies. Highlights: Approximately 30% of patients with Moyamoya disease (MMD) presenting movement symptoms do not respond well to revascularization surgery. We reported an MMD patient treated with deep brain stimulation (DBS) and thalamotomy with significant dystonia and dystonic tremor symptom amelioration. It indicates that DBS or stereotactic lesioning might be a potential treatment for the refractory movement symptoms of MMD.

Two phenothiazine-based quinoxaline derivatives QPT1 and QPT2 have been rationally designed and synthesized. Optical analysis and theoretical chemical calculations illustrated that they showed typical intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) process from electron-rich phenothiazine unit to electron-withdrawing quinoxaline moiety. Interestingly, QPT1 exhibited the polymorphism feature and high-contrast mechanochromic luminescence. Two types of crystals were prepared by solvent evaporation method. A green needle-like crystal (G-form) and a yellow ribbon-like crystal (Y-form) were yielded from dichloromethane/petroleum ether and THF solution, respectively. The emission peaks of G-form and Y-form in pristine powders appeared at 501 nm and 549 nm, and red-shifted to 570 nm and 594 nm in ground powders, respectively, giving the emission spectral shifts of 69 nm for G-form and 45 nm for Y-form. Besides, QPT2 exhibited moreover autonomously self-recovering mechanochromic luminescence. X-ray diffraction measurements confirmed that the reversible phase transition between the crystalline and amorphous states has been proposed as the MFC mechanism. Moreover, QPT1 and QPT2 also showed stable acidofluorochromic characteristics. The solution and film of QPT1 and QPT2 achieved a fast response to TFA with high sensitivity and low detection limit. The multiple stimuli responsive performances of QPT1 and QPT2 make them potential candidates for smart materials.

The CuCl/BFMO catalyzed coupling reaction of substituted 2-iodobenzoic acids and substituted hydrazines took place in the presence of K2CO3 in DMSO at 80 °C to afford N-protected N-alkenyl-N′-arylhydrazines, which were treated with 4 M HCl (or Yb(OTf)3 and ZnCl2) to afford 7-carboxylate indoles through a [3,3]-sigmatropic rearrangement pathway that is similar to the Fischer indole synthesis. © 2019 Elsevier Science. All rights reserved.

This paper studies optimal market making for large-tick assets in the presence of latency. We consider a random walk model for the asset price, and formulate the market maker's optimization problem using Markov Decision Processes (MDP). We characterize the value of an order and show that it plays the role of one-period reward in the MDP model. Based on this characterization, we provide explicit criteria for assessing the profitability of market making when there is latency. Under our model, we show that a market maker can earn a positive expected profit if there are sufficient uninformed market orders hitting the market maker's limit orders compared with the rate of price jumps, and the trading horizon is sufficiently long. In addition, our theoretical and numerical results suggest that latency can be an additional source of risk and latency impacts negatively the performance of market makers.

Background Acute intermittent porphyria is an inherited disease that is rarely diagnosed in prepubertal children. It can affect the autonomic, peripheral, and central nervous system. Posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome is a clinicoradiological entity characterized by headache, seizures, altered consciousness, and visual disorder associated with potentially reversible neuroradiological abnormalities predominantly in the parieto-occipital lobes. We report a child with acute intermittent porphyria who presented with radiological manifestations suggestive of posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome. Patient A 9-year-old girl underwent an appendectomy after developing abdominal pain. She subsequently developed bilateral visual disturbance, confusion, seizures, hypertension, tachycardia, nausea, vomiting, constipation, dark tea-colored urine, and recurrent abdominal pain. Results Initial brain magnetic resonance imaging revealed hyperintense gyriform lesions on T 2 -weighted images and hypointense to isointense lesions on T 1 -weighted images in both parieto-occipital lobes with mild enhancement. The diagnosis of acute intermittent porphyria was confirmed by increased urinary excretion of porphyrin precursors. Her clinical signs gradually improved after intravenous high-dose glucose treatment and symptomatic therapies. A repeat magnetic resonance imaging confirmed complete resolution of the parieto-occipital lesions, suggesting with posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome. Conclusions The association of abdominal pain, mental status changes, and autonomic dysfunction should arouse the suspicion of acute intermittent porphyria. Acute intermittent porphyria can be associated with posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome.

Multi-user MIMO (MU-MIMO) employing Tomlinson Harashima Precoding (THP) is a powerful technique to enhance the system capacity in multi-user mobile communications systems. However, MU-MIMO has an inherent drawback in the degradation of the transmission performance due to the time variant fading channels which are caused by the mobility of the mobile station (MS). Considering that MU-MIMO is mainly applied to mobile communications systems, the performance degradation due to this terminal mobility has to be solved. This paper proposes a novel MU-MIMO THP transmission scheme for the sake of alleviating the performance degradation due to the terminal mobility. The feature of the proposed approach is to incorporate the concept of time division multiplexing (TDM) into MU-MIMO THP system, which enables the transmission of high mobility user to take precedence over that of the lower mobility user. Thanks to the use of TDM, the proposed scheme exploits the space diversity benefit because TDM decreases the number of MSs within a time slot. The effectiveness of the proposed scheme is demonstrated in comparison with the traditional MU-MIMO THP scheme by means of computer simulations.

This paper proposes a deterministic nonlinear distortion suppression scheme employing transmit power control for MIMO-OFDM systems. The feature of the proposed scheme is to suppress the nonlinear distortion by adjusting the transmit power level of each transmit antenna to be the maximum signal-to-noise-plus-distortion ratio (SNDR) and to perform MIMO signal detection using the appropriate transmit power levels notified to the receiver. In the proposed scheme, since the transmit power tends to be lowered to satisfy the maximum theoretical SNDR, the transmit power as well as the bit error rate (BER) can be fortunately reduced in comparison with the traditional constant power transmission scheme, which consequently leads to alleviating the out-of-band radiation. The effectiveness of the proposed scheme is demonstrated compared with the traditional scheme with constant transmit power by means of computer simulations.

This paper proposes an adaptive single-carrier modulation with frequency domain equalization (SC-FDE) scheme further enhancing frequency diversity benefit. We have so far proposed the periodic spectrum transmission realized by the even-numbered time domain samples, which further improves the bit error rate (BER) of SC-FDE in severe frequency selective fading channels. However, in frequency non-selective fading channels, the periodic spectrum transmission provides worse BER than the traditional non-periodic transmission. Therefore, the proposed adaptive transmission chooses the appropriate transmission mode by comparing the error vector magnitudes (EVM) of the periodic and non-periodic transmissions. Moreover, since the EVM is measured by the CAZAC-based pilot signals used for channel estimation, additional redundancy is not needed any more. Numerical results show that the proposed adaptive scheme always provides the best performance irrespective of the frequency selectivity in channels while its frequency selectivity gives some BER degradation in the periodic and non-periodic transmissions.