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Electromagnetic wave absorber is critical for reducing increasingly serious electromagnetic wave pollution, however, the development of lightweight and broadband microwave absorbers remains a pressing challenge. We report here the rational design and synthesis of N-doped Ni@SiO2/graphene composite constructed from 3D interconnected porous graphene network and Ni@SiO2 core-shell architecture, which fulfills lightweight and broadband requirements while exhibiting highly efficient electromagnetic wave absorption. The porous graphene network, functioning both as lightweight support and dielectric mediator, was synthesized via NaCl template-assisted high-temperature calcination method. Upon uniformly attached with core-shell Ni@SiO2 on the surface, the resulting abundant heterogeneous interfaces constructed by graphene-Ni and Ni-SiO2 strongly reinforce polarization loss. The presence of low dielectric SiO2 allows facile tuning of the complex permittivity of ternary composite by adjusting coating thickness to balance the attenuation ability and impedance matching. Moreover, further N-doping of graphene assists in the optimization of dielectric loss ability. Taking account of the advantages arising from the porous hierarchical architecture, multiple absorption centers and diverse interfaces, the lightweight composite exhibits an ultra-strong reflection loss (RL) value of - 71.13 dB at 13.76 GHz with a thickness of 2.46 mm and broad effective absorption bandwidth of 7.04 GHz at a low filler content of 15 wt.%. More importantly, the effective absorption range covers 13.28 GHz (4.72–18 GHz) with the optimized thickness of 1.6–5 mm, representing 83% of the whole range of frequencies. Our results demonstrate that the novel 3D porous N-doped Ni@SiO2/graphene network with hierarchical architecture is a promising candidate for high-performance electromagnetic wave absorption.

Graphical abstract, Highlights • The development of scientific research in CIBP was elaborated in a complete and clear perspective. • The possible mechanisms, including the new achievements in central sensitization, glial cell activation, acid environment, of CIBP were reviewed. • Several key molecules and treatments as well as the potential targets and promising therapies were also briefly reviewed. • The challenges we faced and the future directions are also summarized and elaborated., Background Cancer-induced Bone Pain (CIBP) is an important factor affecting their quality of life of cancer survivors. In addition, current clinical practice and scientific research suggest that neuropathic pain is a representative component of CIBP. However, given the variability of cancer conditions and the complexity of neuropathic pain, related mechanisms have been continuously supplemented but have not been perfected. Aim of Review Therefore, the current review highlights the latest progress in basic research on the field and proposes potential therapeutic targets, representative drugs and upcoming therapies. Key Scientific Concepts of Review Notably, factors such as central sensitization, neuroinflammation, glial cell activation and an acidic environment are considered to be related to neuropathic pain in CIBP. Nonetheless, further research is needed to ascertain the mechanism of CIBP in order to develop highly effective drugs. Moreover, more attention needs to be paid to the care of patients with advanced cancer.

To avoid the shear failure of the frame columns in staircase and improve the seismic performance, we propose a reinforced concrete frame staircase with separated slab stairs. In this study, we conduct reversed cyclic loading test of this staircase to investigate the failure mode, hysteretic behavior, ductility, stiffness degradation, and energy dissipation. Our test results show that the failure modes are the crushing damage of the stair beam-stair column joint and the cracking failure of the frame column, resulting in the reduction of energy dissipation capacity of the staircase. The ductility factor is approximately 2.9 and the maximum energy dissipation coefficient is 0.714, showing good seismic performance. Stairs as a diagonal strut can resist most horizontal load exerted on the staircase, but they also can cause uneven distribution of stiffness and torsional deformation in the staircase. In addition, we develop two finite element models to investigate the effect of stairs on the seismic performance of staircase. The lateral stiffness of the staircase with separated slab stairs is 53.46% higher than that of the frame model, and the separated slab stairs show a significant effect on the frame columns that are connected to them.

Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has become one of the most prominent causes of chronic liver diseases and malignancies. However, few therapy has been approved. Radix Bupleuri (RB) is the most frequently used herbal medicine for the treatment of liver diseases. In the current study, we aim to systemically evaluate the therapeutic effects of saikosaponin A (SSa) and saikosaponin D (SSd), the major bioactive monomers in RB, against NAFLD and to investigate the underlying mechanisms. Our results demonstrated that both SSa and SSd improved diet-induced NAFLD. Integrative lipidomic and transcriptomic analysis revealed that SSa and SSd modulated glycerolipid metabolism by regulating related genes, like Lipe and Lipg. SSd profoundly suppressed the fatty acid biosynthesis by downregulating Fasn and Acaca expression and promoted fatty acid degradation by inducing Acox1 and Cpt1a expression. Bioinformatic analysis further predicted the implication of master transcription factors, including peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor alpha (PPARα), in the protective effects of SSa and SSd. These results were further confirmed in vitro in mouse primary hepatocytes. In summary, our study uncoded the complicated mechanisms underlying the promising anti-steatosis activities of saikosaponins (SSs), and provided critical evidence inspiring the discovery of innovative therapies based on SSa and SSd for the treatment of NAFLD and related complications., Graphical abstract Saikosaponins A and D (SSa and SSd) significantly alleviated diet-induced nonalcoholic fatty liver diseases by promoting promoted glycerolipid and fatty acid metabolism, as unraveled by integrative transcriptomic and lipidomic analysis.Image 1

Since some platforms such as Amazon, and JD.com are expanding their business into the fresh produce market, traditional fresh produce suppliers are seeking to cooperate with them. However, markdown...

OBJECTIVE. Vocal turn taking is an important predictor of language development in children with and without hearing loss. Most studies have examined vocal turn taking in mother-child dyads without considering the multitalker context in a child’s life. The present study investigates the quantity of vocal turns between deaf and hard-of-hearing children and multiple members of their social environment. DESIGN. Participants were 52 families with children who used hearing aids (HA, mean age 26.3 months) or cochlear implants (CI, mean age 63.2 months) and 27 families with normal-hearing (NH, mean age 26.6 months) children. The Language ENvironment Analysis system estimated the number of conversational turns per hour (CTC/hr) between all family members (i.e., adult female, adult male, target child and other child) during full-day recordings over a period of about one year. RESULTS. The CTC/hr was lower between the target child and the adult female or adult male in the CI compared to the HA and NH groups. Initially, CTC/hr was higher between the target child and the adult female than between the adult male or the other child. As the child’s age increased, turn taking between the target child and the adult female increased in comparison to that between the target child and the adult male. Over time, turn taking between the target child and the other child increased and exceeded turn taking between the target child and the adult caregivers. The increase was observed earlier in families with siblings compared to those without. CONCLUSIONS. The quantity of vocal turn taking depends on the degree of child hearing loss and the relationship between the children and the members of their social environment. Longitudinally, the positive effect of an assistive device on the quantity of turns between the children and their family members was found. The effect was stronger in families with siblings.

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are cystic vesicles naturally released by most mammalian cells and bacteria. EV contents include proteins, lipids, and nucleic acids. EVs can act as messengers to transmit a variety of molecules to recipient cells and thus play important regulatory roles in intercellular signal transduction. EVs, released by either a host cell or a pathogen, can carry pathogen-associated antigens and thus act as modulators of immune responses. EVs derived from Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb)-infected cells can regulate the innate immune response through various pathways, such as regulating the release of inflammatory cytokines. In addition, EVs can mediate antigen presentation and regulate the adaptive immune response by transmitting immunoregulatory molecules to T helper cells. In this review, we summarize the regulatory roles of EVs in the immune response against Mtb.

Interferon-induced with helicase C domain 1 (IFIH1) is a cytosolic sensor of dsRNA that induces an anti-viral Type I interferon (IFN) state. A gain-of-function mutation in IFIH1 can cause increased Type I IFN activity and is clinically associated with Aicardi-Goutieres syndrome (AGS). AGS is a multisystem disease, characterized as an early-onset progressive encephalopathy with basal ganglia calcification and systemic lupus erythematosus-like features. Gastrointestinal manifestation is rare in AGS patients. We described a 10-year-old female patient with a heterozygous IFIH1 gene mutation who presented with gastrointestinal colitis, cystitis and very severe diarrhea as initial major manifestations of AGS. Proteinuria with high titer of antinuclear antibody and anti-double-stranded DNA was found in this patient. She also had growth retardation and a history of seizures (about two episodes each year) but without attacks until 7 years old. Serum cytokines detected by flow cytometry indicated extremely high level of interleukin 6 (1970.1 pg/ml) and IFN-α (204.1 pg/ml). A contrast-enhanced CT scan of the whole abdomen and an intestinal hydro-MRI indicated that the walls of her stomach, small bowel, colon, and bladder were in various degrees of edema and thickened states. Whole exome sequencing analysis indicated that she harbors an IFIH1 heterozygous mutation (c.2336G > A (p.R779H)) in both blood and intestinal samples. Abundant inflammatory cells infiltration into the intestinal epithelium was observed by immunohistochemical staining. Positive staining of caspase 4 and caspase 5 suggested that the signaling pathway of pyroptosis was involved in the mechanism of intestinal inflammation in AGS. Diarrhea was significantly improved after steroids and intravenous immunoglobulin treatments. Gastrointestinal colitis and cystitis can be rare manifestations of AGS with IFIH1 mutation. Caspase and its related inflammasome pathway may involve in the pathogenesis of AGS.

BACKGROUND Acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) patients have a high short-term mortality rate, and the severity evaluation of ACLF is necessary for prognostication. Therefore, it was meaningful to evaluate the association between type 2 diabetic mellitus (DM) and ACLF and further explore the feasibility of using DM as a prognostic indicator in ACLF patients. The association between type 2 DM and the prognosis of patients with severe liver disease remains unclear. AIM To examine the effect of type 2 DM on the prognosis of patients with ACLF. METHODS Clinical data from 222 ACLF patients were collected and analyzed. The patients were categorized into two groups depending on whether they had DM or not, and the clinical data of ACLF patients were measured within 48 h after admission. Complications of ACLF were documented during treatment, such as hepatic encephalopathy, hepatorenal syndrome, acute upper gastrointestinal hemorrhage, and spontaneous peritonitis (SBP). Values of laboratory parameters, complication rates, and hospital mortality rates were compared between two groups. RESULTS Among 222 ACLF patients, 38 cases were categorized into DM groups, the mean age was 56.32 years and 73.68% were male. The prognosis of ACLF patients was significantly correlated with DM in univariate [hazard ratio (HR) = 2.4, 95% confidence interval (CI) =1.5-3.7, P < 0.001] and multivariable analysis (HR = 3.17, 95%CI =1.82-5.523, P < 0.001). The incident of SBP (34.21% vs 13.59%, P = 0.038) and other infections like lung, urinary, blood, and cholecyst (44.74% vs 28.26%, P = 0.046) were higher in DM patients than non-DM counterparts. In addition, the ACLF patients with DM tended to have a high mortality rate (P < 0.001). Cumulative survival time was also significantly shorter in the ACLF patients with DM than non-DM. CONCLUSION A significant association between DM and the prognosis of ACLF patients was found in China. The ACLF patients with DM had higher incidence of hospital mortality and infection than those without DM.

A novel metasurface (MS)-based method for broadband radar cross section (RCS) reduction of circularly polarized (CP) patch antennas is proposed. The RCS reduction is achieved in a much broader band than the operational band of the antenna. The simple technique is based on MS units on a grounded substrate in a checkerboard-like configuration. The broadband RCS reduction is achieved by combining two different destructive interference principles. In the high-frequency region, for a normal incident wave, the RCS is reduced by the phase cancellation generated by the MSs and the grounded substrate. In the low-frequency region, the RCS is reduced by the polarization conversion property of the MS. In this case, the fields reflected by two MS sections are in counter phase for a normal incident wave. The MS is combined with a CP patch antenna. It concerns a traditional corner-truncated square patch and four sequentially rotated surrounding MS cells. This dedicated MS allows two things: an additional resonant mode is excited resulting in a 3 dB AR bandwidth extension from 4.2% to 15.9% and a broadband RCS reduction of over 6 dB from 4.95 to 15.73 GHz (104.25% bandwidth) for both $x$ - and $y$ -polarized incident waves.

DNA methylation is an important epigenetic change in carcinogenesis. However, the function and mechanism of DNA methylation dysregulation in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is still largely unclear. Our previous genome-wide microarray data showed that NFAT1 is one of the most hypermethylated transcription factor genes in NPC tissues. Here, we found that NFAT1 hypermethylation contributes to its down-regulation in NPC. NFAT1 overexpression inhibited cell migration, invasion, and epithelial-mesenchymal transition in vitro and tumor metastasis in vivo. We further established that the tumor suppressor effect of NFAT1 is mediated by its inactivation of ITGA6 transcription. Our findings suggest the significance of activating NFAT1/ITGA6 signaling in aggressive NPC, defining a novel critical signaling mechanism that drives NPC invasion and metastasis and providing a novel target for future personalized therapy.

Background and aims Endoscopic diagnosis of early esophageal squamous cell cancer (ESCC) is complicated and dependent on operators' experience. This study aimed to develop an artificial intelligence (AI) model for automatic diagnosis of early ESCC. Methods Non-magnifying and magnifying endoscopic images of normal/noncancerous lesions, early ESCC, and advanced esophageal cancer (AEC) were retrospectively obtained from Qilu Hospital of Shandong University. A total of 10,988 images from 5075 cases were chosen for training and validation. Another 2309 images from 1055 cases were collected for testing. One hundred and four real-time videos were also collected to evaluate the diagnostic performance of the AI model. The diagnostic performance of the AI model was compared with endoscopists by magnifying images and the assistant efficiency of the AI model for novices was evaluated. Results The AI diagnosis for non-magnifying images showed a per-patient accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of 99.5%, 100%, 99.5% for white light imaging, and 97.0%, 97.2%, 96.4% for optical enhancement/iodine straining images. Regarding diagnosis for magnifying images, the per-patient accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity were 88.1%, 90.9%, and 85.0%. The diagnostic accuracy of the AI model was similar to experts (84.5%, P = 0.205) and superior to novices (68.5%, P = 0.005). The diagnostic performance of novices was significantly improved by AI assistance. When it comes to the diagnosis for real-time videos, the AI model showed acceptable performance as well. Conclusions The AI model could accurately recognize early ESCC among noncancerous mucosa and AEC. It could be a potential assistant for endoscopists, especially for novices.

Maternal vitamin supplementation has been demonstrated to reduce the risks of a number of neurodevelopmental diseases in children. Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a group of neurodevelopment defects with high prevalence but without satisfactory therapy. The present work detected the effects of pregnancy supplementation with folic acid (FA) at different doses on rat models of ASD induced by prenatal exposure to valproic acid (VPA), an anti-epileptic increasing the risk of ASD when administered during pregnancy. The results show that maternal FA supplementation at a high dose (4 mg kg-1) prevented the delay in growth and development, and the deficits in social communicative behaviors and repetitive behaviors, possibly by restoring the increased dendritic spine density and rectifying the over-expression of synaptic proteins associated with excitatory neurons and the lower expression with inhibitory ones. The results provided experimental evidence suggesting a possible role of maternal FA supplementation in preventing ASD.

Objective: Circulating cell-free Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) DNA has been shown to be a valuable biomarker for population screening and prognostic surveillance for nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC). Despite important insights into the biology of persistence, few studies have addressed the clinical significance of cell-based EBV-DNA loads in peripheral blood cells (PBCs). Methods: A prospective observational cohort study was conducted involving 1,063 newly diagnosed, locoregionally-advanced NPC patients at Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center from 2005 to 2007. Cox regression analysis was conducted to identify the association of PBC EBV DNA loads to overall survival (OS) and other prognostic outcomes. Prognostic nomograms were developed based on PBC EBV DNA loads to predict survival outcomes for NPC patients. Results: After a median follow-up of 108 months, patients with higher PBC EBV-DNA loads had significantly worse OS [hazard ratio (HR) of medium, medium-high, and high vs. low were 1.50, 1.52, and 1.85 respectively; Ptrend < 0.001]. Similar results were found for progression-free survival and distant metastasis-free survival. The concordance index of the prognostic nomogram for predicting OS in the training set and validation set were 0.70 and 0.66, respectively. Our data showed that the PBC EBV DNA load was an independent and robust survival biomarker, which remained significant even after adjusting for plasma EBV DNA loads in a subset of 205 patients of the cohort (HR: 1.88; P = 0.025). Importantly, a combination of PBC EBV DNA load and plasma EBV DNA load improved the predicted OS. Conclusions: The EBV-DNA load in PBCs may be an independent prognosis marker for NPC patients.

Background Conditional survival (CS) provides dynamic prognostic estimates by considering the patients existing survival time. Since CS for endemic nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is lacking, we aimed to assess the CS of endemic NPC and establish a web‐based calculator to predict individualized, conditional site‐specific recurrence risk. Methods Using an NPC‐specific database with a big‐data intelligence platform, 10,058 endemic patients with non‐metastatic stage I–IVA NPC receiving intensity‐modulated radiotherapy with or without chemotherapy between April 2009 and December 2015 were investigated. Crude CS estimates of conditional overall survival (COS), conditional disease‐free survival (CDFS), conditional locoregional relapse‐free survival (CLRRFS), conditional distant metastasis‐free survival (CDMFS), and conditional NPC‐specific survival (CNPC‐SS) were calculated. Covariate‐adjusted CS estimates were generated using inverse probability weighting. A prediction model was established using competing risk models and was externally validated with an independent, non‐metastatic stage I–IVA NPC cohort undergoing intensity‐modulated radiotherapy with or without chemotherapy (n = 601) at another institution. Results The median follow‐up of the primary cohort was 67.2 months. The 5‐year COS, CDFS, CLRRFS, CDMFS, and CNPC‐SS increased from 86.2%, 78.1%, 89.8%, 87.3%, and 87.6% at diagnosis to 87.3%, 87.7%, 94.4%, 96.0%, and 90.1%, respectively, for an existing survival time of 3 years since diagnosis. Differences in CS estimates between prognostic factor subgroups of each endpoint were noticeable at diagnosis but diminished with time, whereas an ever‐increasing disparity in CS between different age subgroups was observed over time. Notably, the prognoses of patients that were poor at diagnosis improved greatly as patients survived longer. For individualized CS predictions, we developed a web‐based model to estimate the conditional risk of local (C‐index, 0.656), regional (0.667), bone (0.742), lung (0.681), and liver (0.711) recurrence, which significantly outperformed the current staging system (P < 0.001). The performance of this web‐based model was further validated using an external validation cohort (median follow‐up, 61.3 months), with C‐indices of 0.672, 0.736, 0.754, 0.663, and 0.721, respectively. Conclusions We characterized the CS of endemic NPC in the largest cohort to date. Moreover, we established a web‐based calculator to predict the CS of site‐specific recurrence, which may help to tailor individualized, risk‐based, time‐adapted follow‐up strategies.

The evaluation performance of PDP (policy decision point), especially in large-scale policy sets, is one of the most significant challenges in XACML (eXtensible Access Control Markup Language). With high time-consuming and extensive storage policies, large-scale policy sets are becoming more complicated when their evaluation performance need to be improved. Based on numericalization and batch processing, a new locomotive algorithm is proposed to design and implement a novel policy evaluation engine called XDPNBE that can efficiently deal with large-scale policy sets and make authorization decisions in multiple circumstances. XDPNBE enables efficient decisions within an attributed-based access control framework that has a strong promotion of evaluation performance. By simulating requests, XDPNBE is compared with the Sun PDP, XEngine, HPEngine and SBA-XACML. Experimental results show that if the number of requests reaches 10,000, the evaluation time of XDPNBE on the large-scale policy set with 120,000 rules is approximately 0.21%, 4.69%, 5.67% and 9.66% of that of the Sun PDP, XEngine, HPEngine and SBA-XACML, respectively.

In this paper, we address the problem of automatic clothing parsing in surveillance images using the information from user-generated tags, such as “jeans” and “T-shirt.” Although clothing parsing has achieved great success in the fashion domain, it is quite challenging to parse target under practical surveillance conditions due to the presence of complex environmental interference, such as that from low resolution, viewpoint variations and lighting changes. Our method is developed to capture target information from the fashion domain and apply this information to a surveillance domain by weakly supervised transfer learning. Most target tags convey strong location information (e.g., “T-shirt” is always shown in the upper region), which can be used as weak labels for our transfer method. Both quantitative and qualitative experiments conducted on practical surveillance datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed surveillance data enhancing method.

Objective. We sought to evaluate the association between femoral neck (FN) and lumbar spine (LS) bone mineral densities (BMDs) with severity of chronic kidney disease (CKD) and prevalence of osteopenia or osteoporosis (OP) among the CKD group. Methods. Cross-sectional data from 11050 participants aged ≥20 years from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) were analyzed. Specifically, Pearson correlation was applied to analyze the relationship between BMD and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR). General linear models (GLMs) were adjusted for potential confounders and used to analyze mean BMD, based on CKD and CKD stages. Results. FN BMD was positively correlated with the eGFR in the total and male CKD, but not in the female CKD population. LS BMD was not significantly associated with eGFR. After controlling for partial correlations, FN T-score was positively correlated with the eGFR in the total at-risk population. According to FN BMD, OP prevalence was positively associated with CKD stage. However, according to LS BMD, there was no significant association between OP and CKD stage. Conclusion. Our results may explain the higher prevalence of hip fracture, relative to that of the spine, among CKD patients and generate meaningful insights to guide care, prevention, and treatment regimens for CKD patients. However, the fact that this was a cross-sectional study may limit the possibility of drawing concrete conclusions. Nevertheless, these findings open up a new frontier for further studies to uncover the higher decrease of FN BMD compared to LS BMD among CKD cases.

Study design A longitudinal cohort study. Objective The objective of this study was to evaluate the prognostic factors and determine the difference between different surgery scopes. Nomograms were constructed and validated to predict overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) of sacrum/pelvic chondrosarcoma (SC) patients. Summary of background data Chondrosarcoma is a bone malignancy which is reported to be resistant to both chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Therefore, surgery is the most preferred treatment method. However, this remains a great challenge due to the complex anatomy of the area. Materials and methods Data from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database of patients with conventional SC between 1998 and 2016 was retrieved for analysis. Cox analysis was used to estimate the mortality hazards ratios among patients. Propensity score matching was used to compare different surgery scope. Nomograms were constructed to predict the OS and CSS of patients with SC. Results A total of 377 patients were included in this study. The cutoff value for tumor size was considered to be 118 mm. The concordance indices (C-index) value for nomogram predictions of CSS were 0.871. Following propensity score matching, 158 patients were selected for the second time and its result showed no significant difference between the scope of surgery. Conclusions Tumor size was considered to be closely related to the outcome of SC. There is no significant difference in the scope of surgery and limb salvage can be considered. The nomograms can precisely predict OS and CSS in patients with SC. These could help clinicians to perform survival assessments and identify patients at high risk. Level of evidence Level IV.

The effect of using a non-uniform reactive impedance surface (RIS) on the circular polarisation performance of a planar antenna is investigated. It is shown that a very wide axial ratio (AR) bandwidth can be obtained, especially when the RIS is combined with parasitic strips. This result is only possible, thanks to the fact that the RIS is non-uniform. The technique is demonstrated by designing, building, and measuring a prototype. The simulated impedance bandwidth S 11 ≤ − 10 dB is 43.6% (4.3–6.7 GHz), and the simulated 3 dB AR bandwidth is 37.2% (4.6–6.7 GHz). The gain variation over the 3 dB AR bandwidth is 3–5.9 dBi. The experimental results are in good agreement with the simulations, validating the new concept.

Introduction Neck pain is a common condition that leads to serious pain, disability, and increased healthcare costs worldwide. Pharmacotherapy is one of the most common strategies to reduce neck pain in patients. The aim of this study was to analyze the real-world pattern of drugs prescribed for patients with neck pain in the USA. Methods Data on individuals who reported current neck pain in the 2009−2010 US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) and with a history of persistent pain for at least 6 weeks or 3 months were extracted from the NHANES database. Those included in the study were divided into three groups based on the duration of pain: the without neck pain group (Group A); subacute group (Group B) with a history of 6 weeks of neck pain; and the chronic neck pain group (Group C) with a history of 3 months of neck pain. The use and duration of medication prescribed for Group A, B, and C patients were compared. Results The analysis revealed that opioid use was significantly more prevalent in the subacute and chronic neck pain group than in the without neck pain group (Group A) (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] 4.20, 95% confidence interval [CI] 2.07–8.52 and aOR 7.00, 95% CI 4.32–11.33, respectively). The factors strongly associated with higher opioid use included older age, low education level, and low family income. In the chronic neck group, opioids, followed in decreasing order of frequency by acetaminophen and nonsteroidal anti-infammatory drugs, were the most common analgesics used in combination with other analgesics. Conclusion Our analysis of the data shows that the long-term excessive use of opioids and the underutilization of other analgesics are two major issues in the treatment of neck pain in the USA. Possible improvements include improved education of patients by healthcare professionals on the use of opioids and more consideration given to non-pharmacotherapy options. Our results reveal the potential problem in pharmacotherapy choices for neck pain treatment and may help improve the current clinical practice in the USA and other countries.

Four-dimensional track prediction is the precise control of the time dimension of three-dimensional space at each stage of the flight. Accurate prediction of the aircraft trajectory is a prerequisite for the automation of air traffic control. This article reviews 4D track prediction technology, that is, particle motion-based prediction method, hybrid estimation-based prediction method and machine learning-based prediction method. At the end, combined with aircraft track data, the method of data mining is used to extract the flight profile and describe the applicable scope of each method. The contents of this paper can be used for reference in the research direction of 4D track prediction technology.

The neuronavigation system is a combination of navigation technology and neurosurgery. It can be used to assist in neurosurgery through three-dimensional reconstruction of medical image data, extraction of lesions, optimal surgical path planning, tracking and positioning of surgical instruments, and real-time intraoperative display. Accurate and maximal treatment of lesions, while effectively avoiding secondary injuries to patients during surgery. Therefore, the development and application of neuronavigation systems are reviewed.

In this study, a dual-broadband reflective polarisation converter with high efficiency for both linear-to-linear and linear-to-circular polarisations based on a metasurface is proposed. Owing to the characteristics of strong anisotropy and multi-order plasmon resonances, the proposed polarisation converter can rotate an y / x polarised electromagnetic wave to its cross-polarised ( x / y ) direction in the lower frequency band of 7.74–14.44 GHz (a fractional bandwidth of 60.4%) with over 0.9 polarisation conversion ratio. Besides, the proposed structure can also convert a linearly polarised incident wave to a circularly polarised one after reflection in the higher frequency band of 14.95–17.35 GHz (a fractional bandwidth of 14.9%). The performance in the two bands can be controlled separately by altering the proper parameters of the structure. Numerical analysis is used to predict the polarisation states of the proposed polarisation converter. Moreover, the physical mechanism of multiple resonances is discussed based on surface current distributions. A prototype of the polarisation converter is fabricated and measured. A reasonable agreement between the experiments and simulations is obtained. The design has a simple and scalable geometry, and is a good candidate for polarisation control devices in microwave, terahertz and optical frequency regions.

Background. The relationship of uric acid (UA) with the thyroid function among healthy individuals remains unclear. We aimed to examine the relationship between UA contents and thyroid hormone levels in healthy Chinese individuals. Methods. This was a cross-sectional study of 1186 Chinese adults (736 men and 450 women) who underwent a health check-up at the Huadong Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University (Shanghai, China) between January 1, 2010 and July 31, 2018. Clinical and thyroid hormone levels were compared in different UA groups (in male and menopause women groups, MG1: UA < 5 mg/dL; MG2: 5 mg/dL ≤ UA< 7 mg/dL; and MG3: UA ≥ 7 mg/dL; in female groups, FG1 to FG3 represent the UA levels of

Outdoor recreation is at the heart of several policies and measures with their goal being to reinforce the level of individuals’ physical activity as well as the development of communities. This is even truer in Quebec where the provincial government recently published (2017) an important note regarding the importance of outdoor recreation in the development of Quebec society. In this perspective, this study, using a quantitative approach through a survey, aims to analyze how outdoor recreation is managed and supported by the Regional County Municipalities (RCM), key actors in the territorial and social development in Quebec, and, to identify the terms and conditions for the practice of these outdoor activities in the RCMs. This study shows that there is no gap between supply and demand. However, the results reveal the importance of supporting and subsidizing promoters and outdoor organizations in Quebec while breaking into segments the pool of practitioners in order to put in place targeted communication and promotion strategies while also promoting the use of new technological information.

Low-rank matrix recovery (LRMR) has recently been applied to saliency detection by decomposing image features into a low-rank component associated with background and a sparse component associated with visual salient regions. Despite its great potential, existing LRMR-based saliency detection methods seldom consider the inter-relationship among elements within these two components, thus are prone to generating scattered or incomplete saliency maps. In this paper, we introduce a novel and efficient LRMR-based saliency detection model under a coarse-to-fine framework to circumvent this limitation. First, we roughly measure the saliency of image regions with a baseline LRMR model that integrates a l1-norm sparsity constraint and a Laplacian regularization smooth term. Given samples from the coarse saliency map, we then learn a projection that maps image features to refined saliency values, to significantly sharpen the object boundaries and to preserve the object entirety. We evaluate our framework against existing LRMR-based methods on three benchmark datasets. Experimental results validate the superiority of our method as well as the effectiveness of our suggested coarse-to-fine framework, especially for images containing multiple objects. MATLAB code for implementing our method is available at https://github.com/qizhust/HLRSaliency .

Context Fish oil and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (ω-3 PUFAs) have anti-inflammatory properties, but their effect on psoriasis and its comorbidities remains inconclusive. Objective The aim of this quantitative systematic review was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of fish oil and its components in the treatment of psoriasis and its comorbidities. Data Sources PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, China Network Knowledge Infrastructure, China Science and Technology Journal Database, and Wanfang databases were searched from inception to March 30, 2019. Study Selection Randomized controlled trials were eligible for inclusion if they measured the effect of fish oil and its components in the treatment of patients with psoriasis. Data Extraction Eighteen randomized controlled trials involving 927 study participants were included. Results Monotherapy with fish oil or ω-3 PUFAs had no effect on the Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) score (P = 0.47), lesion area (P = 0.34), or pruritus (P = 0.62). Fish oil or ω-3 PUFAs combined with conventional treatments, however, resulted in a decreased PASI score (mean difference [MD], −3.92; 95%CI, −6.15 to −1.69; P = 0.0006) and lesion area (MD, −30.00; 95%CI, −33.82 to −26.18; P Conclusions Overall, when combined with conventional treatments, fish oil and its components may have beneficial effects on psoriasis and its comorbidities, including obesity, cardiovascular disease, and metabolic disease. Systematic Review Registration PROSPERO registration number CRD42019128631.

Objective To compare the performances, tolerability and acceptability of mannitol and polyethylene glycol (PEG) as oral contrast agents in patients undergoing computed tomography enterography (CTE). Methods Patients aged 18‐75 years indicated for CTE were randomized to receive either mannitol or PEG as contrast agents. The coronal reconstructed images of each abdominal quadrant were assessed for maximum distention, proportion of distended bowel loops, presence of inhomogeneous contents and visibility of the small bowel wall. Overall subjective imaging quality assessment and patients’ tolerability and acceptability were recorded. Results Seventy patients were enrolled and randomized into two groups. In the per‐protocol analysis, no significant differences in imaging quality was found in bowel distention maximum diameter, wall visibility and intestinal homogeneity (all P > 0.05). The mean nausea score was lower in the mannitol group (0 [0‐0] vs 1.0 [0‐3.0], P

Assembling thermoelectric modules into fabric to harvest energy from body heat could one day power multitudinous wearable electronics. However, the invalid 2D architecture of fabric limits the application in thermoelectrics. Here, we make the valid thermoelectric fabric woven out of thermoelectric fibers producing an unobtrusive working thermoelectric module. Alternately doped carbon nanotube fibers wrapped with acrylic fibers are woven into π-type thermoelectric modules. Utilizing elasticity originating from interlocked thermoelectric modules, stretchable 3D thermoelectric generators without substrate can be made to enable sufficient alignment with the heat flow direction. The textile generator shows a peak power density of 70 mWm−2 for a temperature difference of 44 K and excellent stretchability (~80% strain) with no output degradation. The compatibility between body movement and sustained power supply is further displayed. The generators described here are true textiles, proving active thermoelectrics can be woven into various fabric architectures for sensing, energy harvesting, or thermal management., Despite recent advances in flexible thermoelectric generators for wearable devices, current designs are unable to efficiently harvest heat flowing from human body. Here, the authors report high thermoelectric performance and stretchability in interlocked fiber-based modules for wearable devices.

Microstructures are fabricated with a fast fabrication speed, submicron-scale precision and a minimum feature size of 1.5 μm. The proposed rapid prototyping fabrication method takes advantage of the maskless lithography technique based on a digital mirror device (DMD) and photocurable resin, which has a broad range of uses in three-dimensional (3D) printing. To illustrate the feasibility of this method, a Dammann grating is fabricated. Using a series of experiments and optimized designs, we analyze the characteristics of the photocurable resin, quantify the dose modulation for lithography and redesign the mask pattern. Consequently, a Dammann grating with a 50% diffraction efficiency is successfully fabricated, which can not only guarantee the precision but also maintain the fabrication speed. This work demonstrates the potential of this method to rapidly and directly manufacture binary optical elements or structures at the nanoscale based on photocurable resin and DMD-based maskless lithography.

Background Osteoarthritis (OA) is a degenerative joint disease characterized by articular cartilage degradation and joint inflammation, in which growth factors are significantly involved. The extracellular signal-regulated p38 MAPK pathways play important roles in the regulation of osteogenic and chondrogenic differentiation in bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs). However, the exact mechanism remains unclear. Methods In this study, the chondrogenic differentiation of human BMSCs was initiated in micromass culture in the presence of TGF-β1 for 14 days. Quantitative RT-PCR and Western blot were performed to detect the transfection effect of shRNA-p38 interfering plasmid in BMSCs. The protein expressions of p/t-p38, SOX9, collagen II, Aggrecan, p/t-Smad1, and p/t-Smad4, as well as the kinase activities of p38/ERK/JNK pathway, were investigated using Western blot analysis. Additionally, the level of chondroitin sulfate and glycosaminoglycans (GAG) expression were measured by Alcian blue staining and GAG assay kit via qualitative and quantitative methods, respectively. Results The results demonstrated that p38 pathway was activated in the chondrogenic differentiation of BMSCs induced by TGF-β1. Cartilage-specific genes and chondrogenic regulators, such as SOX9, collagen II, Aggrecan, and GAG, were upregulated by TGF-β1, which could be reversed by predisposed with shRNA-p38 interfering plasmid and p38-MAPK inhibitors (SB203580). Moreover, the activation of p38/ERK/JNK pathways in the presence of TGF-β1 was suppressed by shRNA-p38 and SB203580 treatment. Conclusion Collectively, the activation of p38/ERK/JNK/Smad pathways plays a facilitated role in the chondrogenic differentiation induced by TGF-β1. After suppressing the p38 pathway, the chondrogenesis can be inhibited, which can be used to guide the treatment of osteoarthritis.

Objective:Inhibitory control is a key deficit in patients with schizophrenia. This study aims to test whether emotions can facilitate inhibition in patients with schizophrenia when they increase attention to inhibitory process.Method:A total of 36 patients with schizophrenia and 36 healthy controls completed an emotional stop-signal task. The task involved selective responses to “Go” stimuli and stopped response when emotional or neutral stop cues occurred.Results:In all conditions, patients with schizophrenia took longer time to inhibit response compared with healthy controls, indicating an overall impairment in response inhibition. Importantly, patients with schizophrenia and controls acquired similar size of benefit from the negative stop cues, showing as reduced reaction time to negative than neutral stop cues. However, the negative stop cues impaired subsequent Go performance only in patients with schizophrenia, indicating additional cost of the negative stop cues for patients with schizophrenia. In both groups, the positive stop cues did not have any significant influence on response inhibition.Conclusions:These findings provide novel evidence for the benefit of emotional stop cues on inhibitory control in patients with schizophrenia and reveal different after-effects of emotional enhancement effect in patients and healthy populations. The findings may help develop effective interventions for improving inhibitory control in patients with schizophrenia and other clinical populations.

Semantic segmentation of urban scenes is an enabling factor for a wide range of applications. With the development of deep learning in recent years, semantic segmentation tasks using high-capacity models have achieved considerable successes on large datasets. However, the pixel-level annotation process, especially for urban scene images with various objects, is tedious and labor intensive. Meanwhile, the scale of the unlabeled data, which is currently easy to collect, is often much larger than labeled data. Thus, using the abundant unlabeled data to make up the loss of the segmentation model from insufficient labeled data is of great interest. In this paper, we propose a semi-supervised method based on reinforcement learning to capture the contextual information from the unlabeled data to improve the model trained on the small scale labeled data. Both quantitative and qualitative experiments have shown the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Inflammation and neuronal apoptosis contribute to the progression of secondary injury after spinal cord injury (SCI) and are targets for SCI therapy; autophagy is reported to suppress apoptosis in neuronal cells and M2 polarization may attenuate inflammatory response in microglia, while both are negatively regulated by mTORC1 signalling. We hypothesize that mTORC1 suppression may have dual effects on inflammation and neuronal apoptosis and may be a feasible approach for SCI therapy. In this study, we evaluate a novel inhibitor of mTORC1 signalling, Astragaloside IV (AS‐IV), in vitro and in vivo. Our results showed that AS‐IV may suppress mTORC1 signalling both in neuronal cells and microglial cells in vitro and in vivo. AS‐IV treatment may stimulate autophagy in neuronal cells and protect them against apoptosis through autophagy regulation; it may also promote M2 polarization in microglial cells and attenuate neuroinflammation. In vivo, rats were intraperitoneally injected with AS‐IV (10 mg/kg/d) after SCI, behavioural and histological evaluations showed that AS‐IV may promote functional recovery in rats after SCI. We propose that mTORC1 suppression may attenuate both microglial inflammatory response and neuronal apoptosis and promote functional recovery after SCI, while AS‐IV may become a novel therapeutic medicine for SCI.

Whether primary tumor resection is beneficial in patients with metastatic nonfunctioning pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (NF-pNETs) remains unclear. This study aimed to investigate whether palliative resection of primary tumor affected the survival of patients with stage IV NF-pNETs.We collected data from patients with stage IV NF-pNET registered in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results database from 2004 to 2015. Risk-adjusted Cox proportional hazard regression analysis and propensity score-matched analysis were used to analyze overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) of patients.In total, 1974 stage IV NF-pNETs patients were identified, of whom 392 (19.9%) received palliative primary tumor resection. The latter exhibited significantly prolonged OS (hazard ratio = 2.514, 95% confidence interval: 2.081-3.037, P 0.001) and CSS (hazard ratio = 2.634, 95% confidence interval: 2.159-3.213, P 0.001) in multivariate Cox regression analysis. According to propensity score-matched results, patients without primary tumor resection had worse OS and CSS.This study demonstrates that there is a significant correlation between palliative resection of primary tumor and survival benefit. Therefore, resection could be considered as an additional treatment option in this specific patient population.

Background: Eczema is the most common allergic skin disorder in the world. The treatment of eczema with western medicine generally involves antihistamines, antibiotics, glucocorticoids, and immunomodulatory preparations, which are limited by common relapse events following drug withdrawal. Many traditional Chinese medicines have demonstrated significant effects on eczema; however, high-quality clinical studies are lacking.Objectives: We performed a multi-center, randomized, double-blind, clinical trial to evaluate the efficacy and safety of a Chinese herbal medicine, Qinzhuliangxue (QZLX) granules, and its effect on recurrence of eczema.Methods: A total of 342 patients with eczema who met the inclusion criteria were recruited and randomly divided into a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) treatment group, a Western medicine (WM) treatment group, and a TCM plus WM treatment group, according to random numbers generated using the central stratified zone group random method. The Eczema Area and Severity Index (EASI) score and the level of pruritus were set as the primary outcome measures, and the Dermatology Quality of Life Index (DLQI) score served as the secondary outcome measure. In this study, a two-sided p-value less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: The median EASI score and the pruritus level at baseline were not statistically significant. However, as the treatment period progressed, the EASI score (including the total score and scores for the head, upper limb, trunk, and lower limb) and pruritus level decreased significantly in all three treatment groups. Repeated measures Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) demonstrated that the DLQI scores in the TCM, WM, and TCM+WM groups decreased significantly over time. Limitations: Basic experiments need to be increased.Conclusions: The Chinese herbal medicine QZLX granules significantly improved the EASI score and decreased the pruritus level in eczema patients, with good safety and no obvious adverse reactions.Trial RegistrationThe protocol for this study was registered with the Clinical Trials database (NCT02517957). Registered 1 May 2015, Xia Shi Surgical Treatment for Eczema Multi-center Clinical Research - Full Text View - ClinicalTrials.gov

Rhei Radix et Rhizoma, also known as rhubarb or Da Huang, has been widely used as a spice and as traditional herbal medicine for centuries, and is currently marketed in China as the principal herbs in various prescriptions, such as Da-Huang-Zhe-Chong pills and Da-Huang-Qing-Wei pills. Emodin, a major bioactive anthraquinone derivative extracted from rhubarb, represents multiple health benefits in the treatment of a host of diseases, such as immune-inflammatory abnormality, tumor progression, bacterial or viral infections, and metabolic syndrome. Emerging evidence has made great strides in clarifying the multi-targeting therapeutic mechanisms underlying the efficacious therapeutic potential of emodin, including anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory, anti-fibrosis, anti-tumor, anti-viral, anti-bacterial, and anti-diabetic properties. This comprehensive review aims to provide an updated summary of recent developments on these pharmacological efficacies and molecular mechanisms of emodin, with a focus on the underlying molecular targets and signaling networks. We also reviewed recent attempts to improve the pharmacokinetic properties and biological activities of emodin by structural modification and novel material-based targeted delivery. In conclusion, emodin still has great potential to become promising therapeutic options to immune and inflammation abnormality, organ fibrosis, common malignancy, pathogenic bacteria or virus infections, and endocrine disease or disorder. Scientifically addressing concerns regarding the poor bioavailability and vague molecular targets would significantly contribute to the widespread acceptance of rhubarb not only as a dietary supplement in food flavorings and colorings but also as a health-promoting TCM in the coming years.

Light field microscopy (LFM) can capture the 4D light field for high-speed volumetric imaging with single-shot image by introducing a microlens array in traditional microscopy and combing with Richardson-Lucy deconvolution algorithm, which leads to wide usage in neuroimaging and dynamics observing, etc. However, the spatial resolution of the reconstructed results shows non-uniformity along the axial optical axis due to its varying spatial-angular sampling ratio along axial axis, which limits its application in observing thick samples. In this paper, we propose a new method including light field microscope scanning strategy and a multi-image deconvolution algorithm to address this problem. First, by designing several groups of different distances between the native object plane and microlens array, we can ensure appropriate spatial-angular sampling ratio among a wide range of depth. Secondly, according to the characteristics of camera noise in the process of fluorescence microscopy imaging, we get the loss function by calculating the K-L divergence of the Poisson noise likelihood, then provide an iterative reconstruction deconvolution algorithm. Applying the multi-image deconvolution algorithm to the captured light field images, we can finally get an extended 3D volume with uniform spatial resolution. We validate our approach by using both simulation and real experiments, which contain resolution measurements of a USAF 1951 resolution target and fluorescent beads. Under the same configuration, the proposed method can reduce the variance of the resolution across 200 μm by 20%, compared with existing method, which demonstrates a more uniform resolution distribution.

Objective To evaluate the efficacy and safety of low dose baricitinib in children with refractory or severe juvenile dermatomyositis(JDM) in a real-world setting. Methods A monocentric retrospective real-world study was conducted, in which fourteen refractory and one severe newly diagnosed JDM patients were included. These patients were all treated by low dose baricitinib (below the recommended dose) combined with corticosteroids and or immunosuppressive agents. Clinical data were collected at the baseline and 4, 12, 24 weeks after baricitinib implication. Treatment response (complete response, CR, Partial response, PR and non-response,NR) was evaluated using both the Paediatric Rheumatology International Trials Organization (PRINTO) remission criteria and skin Disease Activity Score (DAS). All the adverse events (AEs) were recorded. Results After baricitinib treatment, all 15 patients showed improvement of skin involvement, including 14 patients with recurrent skin rashes and one newly diagnosed JDM. Calcinosis stabilized in two patients (2/3) and partially regressed in one. Four patients (4/15) had interstitial lung disease (ILD), which normalized in one, improved in two and stabilized in one. One patient complicated with macrophage activation syndrome (MAS) achieved clinical remission. CR was achieved in 3/15 patients, ranging from 4 to 12 weeks after baricitinib initiation. Five patients (5/15) got PR 4 to 24 weeks after baricitinib use. Daily steroid dosage was decreased from 0.632 mg/kg to 0.357 mg/kg (P = 0.043) at 24 weeks in all responders. However, there was no statistically difference in muscle improvement. One patient was stopped using baricitinib because of varicella zoster virus infection, while no other serious side effect was observed in this study. Conclusion Low dose baricitinib had efficacy and was safe to applied in refractory or severe JDM patients, especially for recurrent skin rashes. Baricitinib may also be helpful for JDM complicated with ILD and MAS.

Background Almost 50% of the adults in the United States have hypertension. Although clinical trials indicate that home blood pressure monitoring can be effective in managing hypertension, the reported results might not materialize in practice because of patient adherence problems. Objective The aims of this study are to characterize the adherence of Medicaid patients with hypertension to daily telemonitoring, identify the impacts of adherence reminder calls, and investigate associations with blood pressure control. Methods This study targeted Medicaid patients with hypertension from the state of Texas. A total of 180 days of blood pressure and pulse data in 2016-2018 from a telemonitoring company were analyzed for mean transmission rate and mean blood pressure change. The first 30 days of data were excluded because of startup effects. The protocols required the patients to transmit readings by a specified time daily. Patients not transmitting their readings received an adherence reminder call to troubleshoot problems and encourage transmission. The patients were classified into adherent and nonadherent cohorts; adherent patients were those who transmitted data on at least 80% of the days. Results The mean patient age was 73.2 (SD 11.7) years. Of the 823 patients, 536 (65.1%) were women, and 660 (80.2%) were urban residents. The adherent cohort (475/823, 57.7%) had mean transmission rates of 74.9% before the adherence reminder call and 91.3% after the call, whereas the nonadherent cohort (348/823, 42.3%) had mean transmission rates of 39% and 58% before and after the call, respectively. From month 1 to month 5, the transmission rates dropped by 1.9% and 10.2% for the adherent and nonadherent cohorts, respectively. The systolic and diastolic blood pressure values improved by an average of 2.2 and 0.7 mm Hg (P Conclusions Although we found that patients can achieve high levels of adherence, many experience adherence problems. Although adherence reminder calls help, they may not be sufficient. Telemonitoring lowered blood pressure, as has been observed in clinical trials. Furthermore, blood pressure control was positively associated with adherence.

This paper focuses on the impact of radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology adoption on supply chain coordination. We consider a three-tier supply chain consisting of one supplier, one transporter and one retailer with centralized and decentralized decision-making. Considering the factors of RFID tag cost and product freshness, two scenarios — with RFID and without RFID — are analyzed. In the decentralized supply chain, a revenue-sharing contract is established to explore each partner’s decisions on ordering quantity, wholesale price and profits. The results show that (1) the tag cost of RFID has different effects on the pricing decisions, ordering quantity and profit of an FPSC, and if the amount of transportation time compression increases, the range of the tag cost’s boundary value will be wider when adopting RFID technology; (2) when the members of an FPSC choose the optimal wholesale price, optimal initial fare and appropriate revenue-sharing coefficient, the FPSC can achieve a win–win result; and (3) the amount of transportation time compression has a positive correlation with the expected profit of the supplier, transporter and retailer but has a negative correlation with loss of the product.

To determine the cutaneous effects of in utero and lactational exposure to the AHR ligand 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD), pregnant C57BL/6J mice were exposed by gavage to a vehicle or 5 μg TCDD/kg body weight at embryonic day 12 and epidermal barrier formation and function were studied in their offspring from postnatal day 1 (P1) through adulthood. TCDD-exposed pups were born with acanthosis. This effect was AHR-dependent and subsided by P6 with no evidence of subsequent inflammatory dermatitis. The challenge of adult mice with MC903 showed similar inflammatory responses in control and treated animals, indicating no long-term immunosuppression to this chemical. Chloracne-like sebaceous gland hypoplasia and cyst formation were observed in TCDD-exposed P21 mice, with concomitant microbiome dysbiosis. These effects were reversed by P35. CYP1A1 and CYP1B1 expression in the skin was increased in the exposed mice until P21, then declined. Both CYP proteins co-localized with LRIG1-expressing progenitor cells at the infundibulum. CYP1B1 protein also co-localized with a second stem cell niche in the isthmus. These results indicate that this exposure to TCDD causes a chloracne-like effect without inflammation. Transient activation of the AhR, due to the shorter half-life of TCDD in mice, likely contributes to the reversibility of these effects.

Trait anxiety is a vulnerable personality factor for anxiety and depression. High levels of trait anxiety confer an elevated risk for the development of anxiety and other psychiatric disorders. There is evidence that 5-hydroxytryptamine receptor 1B (5-HT1B) gene polymorphisms play an important role in emotional disorders. Genotyping for four single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) (rs11568817, rs130058, rs6297, and rs13212041) was conducted for 388 high trait anxious (HTA) individuals and 463 low traitanxious (LTA) individuals in Chinese Han college subjects. The results showed that the frequencies of the C-allele and TC + CC genotype of rs13212041 in the LTA individuals were higher than that in the HTA individuals (p = 0.025 and p = 0.014, respectively). Both the C-allele and TC + CC genotype were associated with trait anxiety decreasing (OR = 0.771 and OR = 0.71, respectively). Furthermore, different gene model analysis also showed that the C allele was a protective factor for trait anxiety in Chinese Han college subjects. These findings suggest that 5-HT1B rs13212014 may play a role in trait anxiety among China Han college subjects. The rs13212014 polymorphism may be involved in decreasing the risk of trait anxiety. These results also provide a novel insight into the molecular mechanism underlying trait anxiety.

Postpartum depression (PPD) is a mental disorder that affects pregnant women around the world, with serious consequences for mothers, families, and children. Its pathogenesis remains unclear, and medications for treating PPD that can be used during lactation remain to be identified. 919 syrup (919 TJ) is a Chinese herbal medicine that has been shown to be beneficial in the treatment of postpartum depression in both clinical and experimental studies. The mechanism of action of 919 TJ is unclear. 919 syrup is ingested orally, making the potential interaction between the drug and the gut microbiome impossible to ignore. We therefore hypothesized that 919 syrup could improve the symptoms of postpartum depression by affecting the structure and function of the intestinal flora, thereby altering hippocampal metabolism. We compared changes in hippocampal metabolism, fecal metabolism, and intestinal microflora of control BALB/c mice, mice with induced untreated PPD, and mice with induced PPD treated with 919 TJ, and found that 4-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in the hippocampus corresponded with PPD behaviors. Based on changes in GABA levels, multiple key gut bacterial species (Mucispirillum schaedleri, Bifidobacterium pseudolongum, Desulfovibrio piger, Alloprevotella tannerae, Bacteroides sp.2.1.33B and Prevotella sp. CAG:755) were associated with PPD. Metabolic markers that may represent the function of the intestinal microbiota in mice with PPD were identified (Met-Arg, urocanic acid, thioetheramide-PC, L-pipecolic acid, and linoleoyl ethanolamide). The relationship between these factors is not a simple one-to-one correspondence, but more likely a network of staggered functions. We therefore believe that the composition and function of the entire intestinal flora should be emphasized in research studying the gut and PPD, rather than changes in the abundance of individual bacterial species. The introduction of this concept of “GutBalance” may help clarify the relationship between gut bacteria and systemic disease.