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Aims Acupuncture is frequently recommended as a complementary therapy for infertility. However, whether acupuncture can prevent early ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome has not been examined and its potential mechanisms are not well understood. Main methods Forty rats were randomized into four groups: Control, Ovarian Stimulation Model, Acupuncture, and Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG). Serum estradiol, progesterone, testosterone, luteinizing hormone (LH), and follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) levels were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Pituitary ER mRNA and ERβ expression were detected by real-time PCR and western blotting respectively. The pathology of rat ovaries were observed by light microscopy. Key findings We observed significantly lower estradiol levels in the Acupuncture group than in the Model group and increased LH levels in the HCG group than in Model and Acupuncture groups. Testosterone and FSH levels were significantly lower in the Acupuncture group than in the HCG group. Western blotting showed significantly lower pituitary ERβ expression in the Model group than in the Control group and higher expression in the Acupuncture group than in the Model group. Real-time PCR showed lower pituitary ER mRNA expression in the Acupuncture group than in the Model group. Hematoxylin and eosin staining showed a lower proportion of atretic follicles in Acupuncture and HCG groups than in Model and Control groups. Instead, Acupuncture and HCG groups showed growing and mature follicles. Significance Our results demonstrate a relationship between acupuncture and the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis, and the potential mechanism underlying the preventative effects of acupuncture on the incidence of early ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Let be a -covering with excess and a blocking set . Let , , , be all connected components of with at least two vertices (note that if ). The blocking set is called tight if further and for . In this paper, we give a complete solution for the existence of a minimum -covering admitting a blocking set (BS), or a tight blocking set (TBS) for any and when and . [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: An idempotent quasigroup of order is called resolvable (denoted by RIQ) if the set of non-idempotent 3-vectors can be partitioned into disjoint transversals. An overlarge set of idempotent quasigroups of order , briefly by OLIQ, is a collection of IQs, with all the non-idempotent 3-vectors partitioning all those on a -set. An OLRIQ is an OLIQ with each member IQ being resolvable. In this paper, it is established that there exists an OLRIQ for any positive integer , except for , and except possibly for . An OLIQ is another type of restricted OLIQ in which each member IQ has an idempotent orthogonal mate. It is shown that an OLIQ exists for any positive integer , except for , and except possibly for . [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

An (n , k) - Sperner partition system is a collection of partitions of some n -set, each into k nonempty classes, such that no class of any partition is a subset of a class of any other. The maximum number of partitions in an (n , k) -Sperner partition system is denoted SP (n , k). In this paper we introduce a new construction for Sperner partition systems and use it to asymptotically determine SP (n , k) in many cases as n k becomes large. We also give a slightly improved upper bound for SP (n , k) and exhibit an infinite family of parameter sets (n , k) for which this bound is tight. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]