Search

Solanum lycopersicum phenylalanine ammonia-lyase 5 (SlPAL5) gene regulates the metabolism of phenolic compounds. The study of transcription factors that regulate the expression of SlPAL5 gene is of great significance to elucidate the regulatory mechanism underlying the biosynthesis of phenolic compounds in tomato fruit induced by UV-C irradiation. Here, yeast one-hybrid library of tomato fruit was constructed, and the yeast one-hybrid technology was used to screen the transcription factors that regulate the expression of SlPAL5, the key gene related to the synthesis of phenolic compounds in tomato fruit. As a result, a transcription factor, SlERF7, was obtained and sequenced, followed by the blast homology analysis. Further experiments confirmed that SlERF7 interacted with the promoter of SlPAL5 gene. In addition, UV-C irradiation significantly increased the expression level of SlERF7. These results indicate that SlERF7, which is regulated by UV-C irradiation, might be involved in regulating the transcription of SlPAL5, which provided foundations for further studying the regulation mechanism of the biosynthesis of phenolic compounds in tomato fruit induced by UV-C irradiation.

Tomato fruits contain much organic acids and γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) during ripening which are beneficial to human health. The effects of 4 kJ/m 2 UV-C treatment on the contents of organic acids and GABA, and the expression of related genes in tomato fruits during storage at 13 °C were investigated. The results showed that UV-C treatment significantly increased the organic acids and total soluble protein contents, whereas decreased the free amino acids and glutamate contents. Besides, UV-C treatment enhanced GAD activity while reduced GABA-T activity, which resulted in accumulation of GABA. Moreover, the genes involved in the biosynthesis of organic acids and GABA were up-regulated, including CS, PEPC1, PEPC2, mMDH, cMDH, GAD1, GAD2, and GAD3, while GABA-T1 and GABA-T3 which involved in GABA degradation were obviously decreased by UV-C treatment. These results indicated that UV-C treatment might be an effective approach to accumulate organic acids and GABA during tomato fruits ripening., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: There are no available guidelines regarding preserving or ligating an arteriovenous fistula following successful kidney transplantation. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis to formulate a clear opinion regarding the status of arteriovenous fistula in renal allograft recipients., Methods: We performed an electronic literature search of PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library for eligible studies up to January 2019. We aimed to systematically evaluate cardiac systolic and diastolic function and allograft function after arteriovenous fistula closure. The primary outcome was the differences in left ventricular mass index, left ventricular end-diastolic diameter, ejection fraction, and serum creatinine levels between patients with occluded arteriovenous fistula versus patent arteriovenous fistula., Results: Renal transplant recipients with occluded arteriovenous fistula had lower left ventricular mass index values and left ventricular end-diastolic diameter compared with those with patent arteriovenous fistula. The pooled mean differences were 21.67 (95% confidence interval [CI] 19.94 to 23.39, P < 0.001) and 2.75 (95% CI 1.47 to 4.04, P < 0.001), respectively. Patients with occluded arteriovenous fistula also had lower serum creatinine levels versus those with patent arteriovenous fistula. The pooled mean difference was 0.10 (95% CI 0.04 to 0.17, P = 0.003). We saw no difference regarding ejection fraction between the groups. The pooled mean difference was 0.84 (95% CI -0.85 to 2.53, P = 0.33)., Conclusions: Our meta-analysis demonstrated that arteriovenous fistula closure improves cardiac morphology and has better kidney graft function. Arteriovenous fistula closure may be considered in patients with a well-functioning allograft., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Purpose: To explore the role of whole-volume apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC)-based entropy parameters in the preoperative assessment of gastric cancer's aggressiveness., Materials and Methods: In all, 64 patients with gastric cancers who underwent 3.0T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) were retrospectively included. Regions of interest were drawn manually using in-house software, around gastric cancer lesions on each slice of the diffusion-weighted images and ADC maps. Entropy-related parameters based on ADC maps were calculated automatically: (1) first-order entropy; (2-5) second-order entropies, including entropy(H) 0 , entropy(H) 45 , entropy(H) 90 , and entropy(H) 135 ; (6) entropy(H) mean ; and (7) entropy(H) range . Correlations between entropy-related parameters and pathological characteristics were analyzed with the Spearman correlation test. The parameters were compared among different pathological characteristics with independent-samples Kruskal-Wallis or Mann-Whitney U-test. Additionally, diagnostic performances of parameters in differentiating different pathological characteristics were analyzed by receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis., Results: All the entropy-related parameters significantly correlated with T, N, and overall stages, especially the first-order entropy (r = 0.588, 0.585, and 0.677, respectively, all P < 0.05). All the entropy-related parameters showed significant differences in gastric cancers at different T, N, and overall stages, as well as at different status of vascular invasion (P < 0.001-0.027). And four parameters, including entropy, entropy(H) 0 , entropy(H) 45 , and entropy(H) 90 , showed significant differences between gastric cancers with and without perineural invasion (P 0.006-0.040)., Conclusion: Entropy-related parameters derived from whole-volume ADC texture analysis could help assess the aggressiveness of gastric cancers via analyzing intratumoral heterogeneity quantitatively, especially the first-order entropy., Level of Evidence: 2 Technical Efficacy: Stage 2 J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2018;47:168-175., (© 2017 International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine.)

Objectives: To explore the application of computed tomography (CT) texture analysis in predicting histopathological features of gastric cancers., Methods: Preoperative contrast-enhanced CT images and postoperative histopathological features of 107 patients (82 men, 25 women) with gastric cancers were retrospectively reviewed. CT texture analysis generated: (1) mean attenuation, (2) standard deviation, (3) max frequency, (4) mode, (5) minimum attenuation, (6) maximum attenuation, (7) the fifth, 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th and 90th percentiles, and (8) entropy. Correlations between CT texture parameters and histopathological features were analysed., Results: Mean attenuation, maximum attenuation, all percentiles and mode derived from portal venous CT images correlated significantly with differentiation degree and Lauren classification of gastric cancers (r, -0.231 ~ -0.324, 0.228 ~ 0.321, respectively). Standard deviation and entropy derived from arterial CT images also correlated significantly with Lauren classification of gastric cancers (r = -0.265, -0.222, respectively). In arterial phase analysis, standard deviation and entropy were significantly lower in gastric cancers with than those without vascular invasion; however, minimum attenuation was significantly higher in gastric cancers with than those without vascular invasion., Conclusion: CT texture analysis held great potential in predicting differentiation degree, Lauren classification and vascular invasion status of gastric cancers., Key Points: • CT texture analysis is noninvasive and effective for gastric cancer. • Portal venous CT images correlated significantly with differentiation degree and Lauren classification. • Standard deviation, entropy and minimum attenuation in arterial phase reflect vascular invasion.

Purpose: To investigate the efficacy of histogram analysis of the entire tumor volume in apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) maps for differentiating between histological grades in gastric cancer., Materials and Methods: Seventy-eight patients with gastric cancer were enrolled in a retrospective 3.0T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study. ADC maps were obtained at two different b values (0 and 1000 sec/mm 2 ) for each patient. Tumors were delineated on each slice of the ADC maps, and a histogram for the entire tumor volume was subsequently generated. A series of histogram parameters (eg, skew and kurtosis) were calculated and correlated with the histological grade of the surgical specimen. The diagnostic performance of each parameter for distinguishing poorly from moderately well-differentiated gastric cancers was assessed by using the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC)., Results: There were significant differences in the 5 th , 10 th , 25 th , and 50 th percentiles, skew, and kurtosis between poorly and well-differentiated gastric cancers (P < 0.05). There were correlations between the degrees of differentiation and histogram parameters, including the 10 th percentile, skew, kurtosis, and max frequency; the correlation coefficients were 0.273, -0.361, -0.339, and -0.370, respectively. Among all the histogram parameters, the max frequency had the largest AUC value, which was 0.675., Conclusion: Histogram analysis of the ADC maps on the basis of the entire tumor volume can be useful in differentiating between histological grades for gastric cancer., Level of Evidence: 4 J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2017;45:440-449., (© 2016 International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine.)

Objective: We sought to determine whether free fatty acid receptor 1 (FFAR1), a receptor for free fatty acids on the β-cell membrane, can mediate the pioglitazone (PIO)-attenuating effect on lipoapoptosis in β cells and its relationship to oxidative stress., Methods: The glucose-sensitive mouse beta pancreatic cell line βTC6 was used to investigate the effect of FFAR1 on PIO-attenuating palmitic acid (PA)-induced oxidative stress and apoptosis., Results: (1) PIO reduced PA-induced lipoapoptosis in β cells and upregulated the expression of FFAR1 at the mRNA and protein levels in a dose- and time-dependent manner. Silencing of FFAR1 expression was shown to weaken the protective effect of PIO on PA-induced lipoapoptosis in βTC6 cells; while lentiviral-mediated overexpression of FFAR1 was shown to enhance the protective effect of PIO against lipoapoptosis in β cells. (2) Downregulation of FFAR1 expression reduced the attenuating effect of PIO on the expression of NAPDH oxidase subunit p47(phox), Bax, cleaved caspase 3, and the production of reactive oxygen specific (ROS) induced by lipotoxicity, thereby preventing the upregulation of the expression of bcl-2. Inducing the overexpression of FFAR1 enhanced the anti-oxidative stress effect of PIO. Similarly, these effects of FFAR1 on PIO were reproduced under conditions of oxidative stress and apoptosis in βTC6 cells that were induced by H2O2. (3) PIO was found to increase the expression of PLCγ, ERK1/2, and PPARγ in lipotoxic β cells. Silencing FFAR1 expression reduced the PIO-mediated increases in the expression of above proteins; while inducing FFAR1 overexpression showed the opposite effect. Use of an inhibitor of PLCγ, ERK1/2, PPARγ was shown to restrict the protective effect of PIO on oxidative stress and lipoapoptosis of β cells., Conclusions: FFAR1 can mediate PIO suppression of β-cell lipoapoptosis through anti-oxidative stress, which may be related to the activation of the PLCγ-ERK1/2-PPARγ pathway., (Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)