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Background: This presentation of two cases and literature review discusses the epidemiology, clinical manifestations, pathogenesis, diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of high-grade glioma with extracranial metastases. Methods: A retrospective analysis of the clinical features of two cases of malignant glioma, including metastatic sites, pathological data and treatment methods, and a literature review was performed. Results: Two patients developed extracranial metastases within 1 year after surgery for primary glioma. One patient developed cervical lymph node and bone metastases while the other developed bone metastases and both patients died within 2 months after the diagnosis of the extracranial metastasis. Conclusion: Extracranial metastases may develop from malignant gliomas. According to the literature, the most common extracranial site is intraspinal (along the neural axis), followed by the vertebrae, lungs, liver and lymph nodes. The complex metastatic mechanism remains unclear and the prognosis is very poor, with a survival duration of less than 6 months. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: This study compared the effects of pre-transplantation minimal residual disease (pre-MRD) on outcomes in AML patients who underwent human leukocyte antigen-matched sibling donor transplantation (MSDT) or who received unmanipulated haploidentical allografts. Methods: A retrospective study (n = 339) and a prospective study (n = 340) were performed. MRD was determined using multiparameter flow cytometry. Results: Either after retrospective or prospective analysis, patients with negative pre-MRD (pre-MRDneg) had a lower incidence of relapse than those with positive pre-MRD (pre-MRDpos) in MSDT settings (P < 0.001 for all), but relapse was comparable in Haplo-SCT settings for patients with pre-MRDneg versus pre-MRDpos (P = 0.866 and 0.161, respectively). In either the retrospective (n = 65) or the prospective study (n = 76), pre-MRDpos subjects receiving Haplo-SCT experienced a lower incidence of relapse than those who underwent MSDT (P <0.001 and p = 0.017, respectively). Of the patients with pre-MRDpos in either the total (n = 141) or the subgroup excluding cases which received donor lymphocyte infusion (DLI; n = 105), those who underwent MSDT had a higher incidence of relapse than those receiving haplo-SCT (P <0.01 for all). Multivariate analysis showed that, for pre-MRDpos cases, haplo-SCT was associated with a low incidence of relapse and with better LFS and OS in either retrospective group, prospective group, combination groups, or subgroup not including cases which received DLI. Conclusions: The results indicated that, for pre-MRD-positive AML patients, haplo-SCT was associated with lower incidence of relapse and better survival, suggesting a stronger anti-leukemia effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Increasing evidence has indicated an important role for estrogen receptor beta 1 (ERβ1) in breast cancer. However, the role of ERβ1 in the metastasis of androgen receptor (AR)-positive triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) and the underlying mechanisms are still unknown. Methods: Stable ERβ1-expressing TNBC cell lines were generated for this study. We detected the abilities of cell migration and invasion by wound-healing and transwell assays and the expression of E-cadherin and N-cadherin by quantitative RT-PCR (qRT-PCR) and western blotting assays in TNBC cell lines. Chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) analysis was performed to assess the effect of AR on ERβ1 promoter. Tumor metastasis was evaluated in vivo using a lung metastasis mouse model. Lastly, immunohistochemical expression of ERβ1 in TNBC tissues was analyzed and correlated with clinicopathological features. Results: ERβ1 suppressed the invasion and migration abilities of AR-positive TNBC cells and induced the downregulation of ZEB1. ZEB1 overexpression abrogated the increase in E-cadherin expression and the decrease in N-cadherin expression modulated by ERβ1. A lung metastasis mouse model showed that the incidence of metastasis was lower in ERβ1-expressing TNBC cells. Further, AR activation increased the anti-metastatic effect of ERβ1 in AR-positive TNBC cells, which accelerated ERβ1 transcription by functioning as a transcription factor that bound to the promoter of ERβ1. No significant change was observed in AR expression induced by ERβ1. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) analysis of TNBC clinical samples showed that ERβ1 and AR were positive in 31. 7% and 23.2% of samples, respectively. ERβ1 expression was negatively correlated with ZEB1 expression and lymph node metastasis, and positively correlated with the expression of AR and E-cadherin. Conclusion: Our findings suggested a potential role of ERβ1 in metastasis of AR-positive TNBC and provided novel insights into the mechanism of action of ERβ1 and the possible relationship between ERβ1 and AR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Poor graft function (PGF) is a life-threatening complication after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT). Nevertheless, whether abnormalities of T cell subsets in the bone marrow (BM) immune microenvironment, including Th17, Tc17, Th1, Tc1, Th2, Tc2 cells and regulatory T cells (Tregs), are involved in the pathogenesis of PGF remains unclear.Methods: This prospective nested case-control study enrolled 20 patients with PGF, 40 matched patients with good graft function (GGF) after allo-HSCT, and 20 healthy donors (HD). Th17, Tc17, Th1, Tc1, Th2, Tc2 cells, Tregs and their subsets were analyzed by flow cytometry.Results: A significantly higher proportion of stimulated CD4+ and CD8+ T cells that produced IL-17 (Th17 and Tc17) was found in the BM of PGF patients than in the BM of GGF patients and HD, whereas the percentages of Tregs in PGF patients were comparable to those in GGF patients and HD, resulting in a dramatically elevated ratio of Th17 cells/Tregs in the BM of PGF patients relative to those in GGF patients. Moreover, both CD4+ and CD8+ T cells were polarized towards a type 1 immune response in the BM of PGF patients.Conclusions: The present study revealed that aberrant T cell responses in the BM immune microenvironment may be involved in the pathogenesis of PGF after allo-HSCT. These findings will facilitate the optimization of immune regulation strategies and improve the outcome of PGF patients post-allotransplant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Standard therapy for Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) involves maximal safe tumor resection followed with radiotherapy and concurrent adjuvant temozolomide. About 20 to 30% patients undergoing their first post-radiation MRI show increased contrast enhancement which eventually recovers without any new treatment. This phenomenon is referred to as pseudoprogression. Differentiating tumor progression from pseudoprogression is critical for determining tumor treatment, yet this capacity remains a challenge for conventional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Thus, a prospective diagnostic trial has been established that utilizes multimodal MRI techniques to detect tumor progression at its early stage. The purpose of this trial is to explore the potential role of intravoxel incoherent motion diffusion-weighted imaging (IVIM-DWI) and three-dimensional arterial spin labeling imaging (3D-ASL) in differentiating true progression from pseudoprogression of GBM. In addition, the diagnostic performance of quantitative parameters obtained from IVIM-DWI and 3D-ASL, including apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC), slow diffusion coefficient (D), fast diffusion coefficient (D*), perfusion fraction (f), and cerebral blood flow (CBF), will be evaluated. Methods: Patients that recently received a histopathological diagnosis of GBM at our hospital are eligible for enrollment. The patients selected will receive standard concurrent chemoradiotherapy and adjuvant temozolomide after surgery, and then will undergo conventional MRI, IVIM-DWI, 3D-ASL, and contrastenhanced MRI. The quantitative parameters, ADC, D, D*, f, and CBF, will be estimated for newly developed enhanced lesions. Further comparisons will be made with unpaired t-tests to evaluate parameter performance in differentiating true progression from pseudoprogression, while receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) analyses will determine the optimal thresholds, as well as sensitivity and specificity. Finally, relationships between these parameters will be assessed with Pearson's correlation and partial correlation analyses. Discussion: The results of this study may demonstrate the potential value of using multimodal MRI techniques to differentiate true progression from pseudoprogression in its early stages to help decision making in early intervention and improve the prognosis of GBM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Polysaccharides often are necessary components of bacterial biofilms and capsules. Production of these biopolymers constitutes a drain on key components in the central carbon metabolism, but so far little is known concerning if and how the cells divide their resources between cell growth and production of exopolysaccharides. Alginate is an industrially important linear polysaccharide synthesized from fructose 6-phosphate by several bacterial species. The aim of this study was to identify genes that are necessary for obtaining a normal level of alginate production in alginate-producing Pseudomonas fluorescens. Results: Polysaccharide biosynthesis is costly, since it utilizes nucleotide sugars and sequesters carbon. Consequently, transcription of the genes necessary for polysaccharide biosynthesis is usually tightly regulated. In this study we used an engineered P. fluorescens SBW25 derivative where all genes encoding the proteins needed for biosynthesis of alginate from fructose 6-phosphate and export of the polymer are expressed from inducible Pm promoters. In this way we would avoid identification of genes merely involved in regulating the expression of the alginate biosynthetic genes. The engineered strain was subjected to random transposon mutagenesis and a library of about 11500 mutants was screened for strains with altered alginate production. Identified inactivated genes were mainly found to encode proteins involved in metabolic pathways related to uptake and utilization of carbon, nitrogen and phosphor sources, biosynthesis of purine and tryptophan and peptidoglycan recycling. Conclusions: The majority of the identified mutants resulted in diminished alginate biosynthesis while cell yield in most cases were less affected. In some cases, however, a higher final cell yield were measured. The data indicate that when the supplies of fructose 6-phosphate or GTP are diminished, less alginate is produced. This should be taken into account when bacterial strains are designed for industrial polysaccharide production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inflammation plays a significant role in protecting hosts against pathogens. Inflammation induced by noninfectious endogenous agents can be detrimental and, if excessive, can result in organ and tissue damage. The inflammasome is a major innate immune pathway that can be activated via both exogenous pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) and endogenous damage-associated molecular patterns (DAMPs). Inflammasome activation involves formation and oligomerization of a protein complex including a nucleotide oligomerization domain (NOD)-like receptor (NLR), an adaptor protein and pro-caspase-1. This then allows cleavage and activation of caspase-1, followed by downstream cleavage and release of proinflammatory cytokines interleukin (IL)-1β and IL-18 from innate immune cells. Hyperinflammation caused by unrestrained inflammasome activation is linked with multiple inflammatory diseases, including inflammatory bowel disease, Alzheimer’s disease and multiple sclerosis. So there is an understandable rush to understand mechanisms that regulate such potent inflammatory pathways. Autophagy has now been identified as a main regulator of inflammasomes. Autophagy is a vital intracellular process involved in cellular homeostasis, recycling and removal of damaged organelles (eg, mitochondria) and intracellular pathogens. Autophagy is regulated by proteins that are important in endosomal/phagosomal pathways, as well as by specific autophagy proteins coded for by autophagy- related genes. Cytosolic components are surrounded and contained by a double-membraned vesicle, which then fuses with lysosomes to enable degradation of the contents. Autophagic removal of intracellular DAMPs, inflammasome components or cytokines can reduce inflammasome activation. Similarly, inflammasomes can regulate the autophagic process, allowing for a two-way mutual regulation of inflammation that may hold the key for treatment of multiple diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Persons with acute leukemia relapsing after allotransplant and who respond to anti-leukemia interventions are at high risk of a second relapse. We studied the impact of minimal residual disease (MRD)- and graft-vs.-host disease (GvHD)-guided multiple consolidation chemotherapy and donor lymphocyte infusions (DLIs) to prevent second relapse in patients with acute leukemia relapsing post-transplant and who achieved complete remission after induction chemotherapy and DLI. Methods: Forty-seven subjects with acute leukemia relapsing after an allotransplant and who achieved complete remission after post-relapse induction chemotherapy and DLI were eligible. The use of consolidation chemotherapy and DLI was guided by the results of MRD testing and whether or not DLI caused acute and/or chronic GvHD. Outcomes were compared with those of 34 similar historical controls who did not receive consolidation chemotherapy and DLIs after induction chemotherapy and DLI. Results: One-year cumulative incidence of relapse (CIR; 22% 95% confidence interval (10, 35%) vs. 56% (39, 73%); P < 0.0001), leukemia-free survival (LFS; 71% (57, 84%) vs. 35% (19, 51%); P < 0.0001), and survival (78% (66, 90%) vs. 44% (27, 61%); P < 0.0001) was significantly better in subjects than controls. In multivariate analyses, no chronic GvHD after therapy (hazard ratio (HR) = 3.56 (1.09, 11.58); P = 0.035) and a positive MRD test after therapy (HR = 21.04 (4.44, 94.87); P < 0.0001) were associated with an increased CIR. Conclusion: These data suggest MRD- and GvHD-guided multiple consolidation chemotherapy and DLIs reduce CIR and increase LFS and survival compared with controls in persons relapsing after allotransplant for acute leukemia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a risk factor for dementia. Mild cognitive impairment (MCI), an intermediary state between normal cognition and dementia, often occurs during the prodromal diabetic stage, making early diagnosis and intervention of MCI very important. Latest neuroimaging techniques revealed some underlying microstructure alterations for diabetic MCI, from certain aspects. But there still lacks an integrated multimodal MRI system to detect early neuroimaging changes in diabetic MCI patients. Thus, we intended to conduct a diagnostic trial using multimodal MRI techniques to detect early diabetic MCI that is determined by the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA). Methods: In this study, healthy controls, prodromal diabetes and diabetes subjects (53 subjects/group) aged 40-60 years will be recruited from the physical examination center of Tangdu Hospital. The neuroimaging and psychometric measurements will be repeated at a 0.5 year-interval for 2.5 years' follow-up. The primary outcome measures are 1) Microstructural and functional alterations revealed with multimodal MRI scans including structure magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI), resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI), diffusion kurtosis imaging (DKI), and three-dimensional pseudo-continuous arterial spin labeling (3D-pCASL); 2) Cognition evaluation with MoCA. The second outcome measures are obesity, metabolic characteristics, lifestyle and quality of life. Discussion: The study will provide evidence for the potential use of multimodal MRI techniques with psychometric evaluation in diagnosing MCI at prodromal diabetic stage so as to help decision making in early intervention and improve the prognosis of T2DM. Trial registration: This study has been registered to ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT02420470) on April 2, 2015 and published on July 29, 2015. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Reciprocal hybrids showing different phenotypes have been well documented in previous studies, and many factors accounting for different phenotypes have been extensively investigated. However, less is known about whether the profiles of small RNAs differ between reciprocal hybrids and how these small RNAs affect gene expression and phenotypes. To better understand this mechanism, the role of small RNAs on phenotypes in reciprocal hybrids was analysed. Results Reciprocal hybrids between Solanum lycopersicum cv. Micro-Tom and S. pimpinellifolium line WVa700 were generated. Significantly different phenotypes between the reciprocal hybrids were observed, including fruit shape index, single fruit weight and plant height. Then, through the high-throughput sequencing of small RNAs, we found that the expression levels of 76 known miRNAs were highly variable between the reciprocal hybrids. Subsequently, a total of 410 target genes were predicted to correspond with these differentially expressed miRNAs. Furthermore, gene ontology (GO) annotation indicated that those target genes are primarily involved in metabolic processes. Finally, differentially expressed miRNAs, such as miR156f and 171a, and their target genes were analysed by qRTPCR, and their expression levels were well correlated with the different phenotypes. Conclusions This study showed that the profiles of small RNAs differed between the reciprocal hybrids, and differentially expressed genes were also observed based on the different phenotypes. The qRT-PCR results of target genes showed that differentially expressed miRNAs negatively regulated their target genes. Moreover, the expression of target genes was well correlated with the observations of different phenotypes. These findings may aid in elucidating small RNAs contribute significantly to different phenotypes through epigenetic modification during reciprocal crossing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Metaplastic breast carcinoma is a rare aggressive malignant neoplasm. The purposes of this study are to review the pathologic features and clinical outcomes of metaplastic breast carcinoma compared to invasive ductal carcinoma and to evaluate the prognosis of metaplastic breast carcinoma. Methods: The cases of 55 patients with metaplastic breast carcinomapresenting between 1991 and 2006 were analyzed and compared to the cases of 767 age-matched patients with invasive ductal carcinoma from the same time period. Results: The group of patients with metaplastic breast carcinoma presented with a larger tumor size, lower lymph node involvement, higher percentage of triple-negative (estrogen receptor-, progesterone receptor- and human epidermal growth factor receptor-2-negative) cases, and Ki-67 over-expression compared with the group of patients with invasive ductal carcinoma and triple-negative invasive ductal carcinomas. Patients in the metaplastic breast carcinoma group tended to have more local (often chest wall) recurrences (P = 0.038) and distant (often lung) metastases (P = 0.001) than those in the invasive ductal carcinomas group. The prognosis of metaplastic breast carcinoma was poorer than that of invasive ductal carcinoma and triple-negative invasive ductal carcinomas; the 5-year overall survival rate was 54.5% in metaplastic breast carcinoma versus 85.1% in invasive ductal carcinoma, and 73.3% in triple-negative invasive ductal carcinomas (P <0.001). The 5-year disease-free survival rate was 45.5% in metaplastic breast carcinoma versus 71.2% in invasive ductal carcinoma, and 60.3% in triple-negative invasive ductal carcinomas (P <0.001). Multivariate analysis revealed tumor size larger than 5.0 cm, lymph node involvement and Ki-67≥14% were significantly related to 5-yearoverall survival (P = 0.010; P = 0.010; P = 0.035) and 5-year disease-free survival (P = 0.020; P = 0.018; P = 0.049). Conclusions: Metaplastic breast carcinoma shows a poorer prognosis than both invasive ductal carcinoma and triplenegative invasive ductal carcinomas. Tumor size larger than 5.0 cm, lymph node involvement and Ki-67 ≥14% indicate a poor prognosis in patients with metaplastic breast carcinoma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Drosophila melanogaster has been established as a model organism for investigating the developmental gene interactions. The spatio-temporal gene expression patterns of Drosophila melanogaster can be visualized by in situ hybridization and documented as digital images. Automated and efficient tools for analyzing these expression images will provide biological insights into the gene functions, interactions, and networks. To facilitate pattern recognition and comparison, many webbased resources have been created to conduct comparative analysis based on the body part keywords and the associated images. With the fast accumulation of images from high-throughput techniques, manual inspection of images will impose a serious impediment on the pace of biological discovery. It is thus imperative to design an automated system for efficient image annotation and comparison. Results We present a computational framework to perform anatomical keywords annotation for Drosophila gene expression images. The spatial sparse coding approach is used to represent local patches of images in comparison with the well-known bag-of-words (BoW) method. Three pooling functions including max pooling, average pooling and Sqrt (square root of mean squared statistics) pooling are employed to transform the sparse codes to image features. Based on the constructed features, we develop both an image-level scheme and a group-level scheme to tackle the key challenges in annotating Drosophila gene expression pattern images automatically. To deal with the imbalanced data distribution inherent in image annotation tasks, the undersampling method is applied together with majority vote. Results on Drosophila embryonic expression pattern images verify the efficacy of our approach. Conclusion In our experiment, the three pooling functions perform comparably well in feature dimension reduction. The undersampling with majority vote is shown to be effective in tackling the problem of imbalanced data. Moreover, combining sparse coding and image-level scheme leads to consistent performance improvement in keywords annotation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adaptive immune responses are induced in liver after major stresses such as hemorrhagic shock (HS) and trauma. There is emerging evidence that the inflammasome, the multiprotein platform that induces caspase-1 activation and promotes interleukin (IL)-1β and IL-18 processing, is activated in response to cellular oxidative stress, such as after hypoxia, ischemia and HS. Additionally, damage-associated molecular patterns, such as those released after injury, have been shown to activate the inflammasome and caspase-1 through the NOD-like receptor (NLR) NLRP3. However, the role of the inflammasome in organ injury after HS and trauma is unknown. We therefore investigated inflammatory responses and end-organ injury in wild-type (WT) and caspase-1-/- mice in our model of HS with bilateral femur fracture (HS/BFF). We found that caspase-1-/- mice had higher levels of systemic inflammatory cytokines than WT mice. This result corresponded to higher levels of liver damage, cell death and neutrophil influx in caspase-1-/- liver compared with WT, although there was no difference in lung damage between experimental groups. To determine if hepatoprotection also depended on NLRP3, we subjected NLRP3-/- mice to HS/BFF, but found inflammatory responses and liver damage in these mice was similar to WT. Hepatoprotection was also not due to caspase-/-dependent cytokines, IL-1β and IL-18. Altogether, these data suggest that caspase-1 is hepatoprotective, in part through regulation of cell death pathways in the liver after major trauma, and that caspase-1 activation after HS/BFF does not depend on NLRP3. These findings may have implications for the treatment of trauma patients and may lead to progress in prevention or treatment of multiple organ failure (MOF). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: During gut colonization, the enteric pathogen Campylobacter jejuni must surmount the toxic effects of reactive oxygen species produced by its own metabolism, the host immune system, and intestinal microflora. Elucidation of C. jejuni oxidative stress defense mechanisms is critical for understanding Campylobacter pathophysiology. Results: The mechanisms of oxidative stress defense in C. jejuni were characterized by transcriptional profiling and phenotypic analysis of wild-type and mutant strains. To define the regulon of the peroxide-sensing regulator, PerR, we constructed an isogenic ΔperR mutant and compared its transcriptome profile with that of the wild-type strain. Transcriptome profiling identified 104 genes that belonged to the PerR regulon. PerR appears to regulate gene expression in a manner that both depends on and is independent of the presence of iron and/or H2O2. Mutation of perR significantly reduced motility. A phenotypic analysis using the chick colonization model showed that the ΔperR mutant exhibited attenuated colonization behavior. An analysis of changes in the transcriptome induced by exposure to H2O2, cumene hydroperoxide, or menadione revealed differential expression of genes belonging to a variety of biological pathways, including classical oxidative stress defense systems, heat shock response, DNA repair and metabolism, fatty acid biosynthesis, and multidrug efflux pumps. Mutagenic and phenotypic studies of the superoxide dismutase SodB, the alkyl-hydroxyperoxidase AhpC, and the catalase KatA, revealed a role for these proteins in oxidative stress defense and chick gut colonization. Conclusion: This study reveals an interplay between PerR, Fur, iron metabolism and oxidative stress defense, and highlights the role of these elements in C. jejuni colonization of the chick cecum and/or subsequent survival. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs) are intra neuronal aggregates associated with several neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's disease. These abnormal accumulations are primarily comprised of fibrils of the micro tubule-associated protein tau. During the progression of NT formation, disperse and non-interacting tau fibrils become stable aggregates of tightly packed and intertwined filaments. Although the molecular mechanisms responsible for the conversion of disperse tau filaments into tangles of filaments are not known, it is believed that some of the associated changes in tau observed in Alzheimer's disease, such as phosphorylation, truncation, ubiquitination, glycosylation or nitration, may play a role. Results: We have investigated the effects of tau phosphorylation by glycogen synthase kinase-3β (GSK-3β) on tau filaments in an in vitro model system. We have found that phosphorylation by GSK-3β is sufficient to cause tau filaments to coalesce into tangle-like aggregates similar to those isolated from Alzheimer's disease brain. Conclusion: These results suggest that phosphorylation of tau by GSK-3β promotes formation of tangle-like filament morphology. The in vitro cell-free experiments described here provide a new model system to study mechanisms of NFT development. Although the severity of dementia has been found to correlate with the presence of NFTs, there is some question as to the identity of the neurotoxic agents involved. This model system will be beneficial in identifying intermediates or side reaction products that might be neurotoxic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An abstract of the article "Does soluble guanylyl cyclase need a chaperone," by Qian Sun, Julio Ortega, Nazish Sayed, Fu-Jung Chang, and Annie Beuve is presented.