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Abstract Cancer and cardiovascular diseases are leading causes of death worldwide. Among them, breast cancer is one of the most common malignancies in women, while atrial fibrillation is one of the most extensively studied arrhythmias, with significant public health implications. As the global population ages and advancements in cancer treatments continue, the survival rates of breast cancer patients have significantly improved, leading to an increasing coexistence of breast cancer and atrial fibrillation. However, the mechanisms underlying this coexistence remain insufficiently studied, and there is no consensus on the optimal treatment strategies for these patients. This review consolidates existing research to systematically explore the epidemiological characteristics, risk factors, and pathophysiological mechanisms of both breast cancer and atrial fibrillation. It focuses on the unique signaling pathways associated with different molecular subtypes of breast cancer and their potential impact on the mechanisms of atrial fibrillation. Additionally, the relationship between atrial fibrillation treatment medications and breast cancer is discussed. These insights not only provide essential evidence for the precise prevention and management of atrial fibrillation in breast cancer patients but also lay a solid theoretical foundation for interdisciplinary clinical management practices.

Abstract Background Sex is a determinant of the incidence and etiology of arrhythmia. Observational and basic studies suggest that sex hormones are essential in this process; however, the relationship between sex hormones and arrhythmia remains unclear. Mendelian randomization (MR) was used to investigate the causal relationships between sex hormone levels, arrhythmia, and electrocardiographic (ECG) indices. Methods Large genome-wide association studies (GWAS) data on sex hormones, stratified by sex, from the UK biobank consortium, were used as exposure data, and data on atrial fibrillation (AF), atrioventricular block, sick sinus syndrome, paroxysmal tachycardia, and ECG indices were obtained from the FinnGen consortium and summarized large GWAS data. Inverse variance weighting or wald odds was used as the primary analytical method, and weighted medians and MR-Egger regression were used for complementary analyses. The results of the MR of sex hormones and AF from different sources were analyzed using a meta-analysis. Summary-data-based MR analysis was utilized to explore the relationship between sex-hormone related drugs and arrhythmia. Results In men, genetically predicted higher estradiol concentrations were associated with a lower risk of AF (odds ratio: 0.908 [0.852–0.967]; p = 0.0029], whereas genetically predicted higher concentrations of total testosterone were associated with lower heart rate variability. Sex hormones showed no association with atrioventricular block, sick sinus syndrome, paroxysmal tachycardia, resting heart rate, P wave duration, P wave terminal force in lead V1 [PTFV1], PR interval, QRS duration, QTc [QT interval corrected by heart rate], ST duration, spatial [spQRSTa] and frontal [fQRSTa] QRS-T angles in males. In females, there was no significant evidence that sex hormones are associated with arrhythmias or ECG indices. Conclusion In this study, we identified a potential causal relationship between estradiol and the risk of AF in males. However, there was no significant association between sex hormones and either arrhythmias or ECG indices in females. These results suggested that sex hormones may play a limited role in cardiac arrhythmias, which requires further verification.

Patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) have increased hip fracture risk. And the association between urine albumin to creatinine ratio (ACR) and an increased risk of hip fracture in patients with T2DM remains controversial. This study aimed to investigate the association between urinary ACR and hip fracture risk in postmenopausal women and aged men with T2DM. The study included 219 postmenopausal women and 216 older men (mean age >60 years) with T2DM. Women and men were divided into control group (ACR

Abstract Background Due to its unique anatomical characteristics, supracondylar fractures of the humerus are often difficult to achieve firm fixation with internal fixation equipment, resulting in delayed functional exercise, often leaving cubitus varus deformity, elbow stiffness, contractures, and other complications. Here, we report an adult patient with a supracondylar fracture of the humerus who underwent internal fixation through an anterior median incision in the humerus with our self-developed anterior anatomical locking plate of the distal humerus. Case presentation A 29-year-old male patient of Chinese ethnicity with trauma-induced right supracondylar fracture of the humerus and multiple soft tissue contusions, without nerve damage, blood vessel damage, or other injuries, underwent an internal incision in our hospital using a new anatomical locking plate for the anterior distal humerus fixed treatment. During the 16-month follow-up period, the patient’s elbow range of motion was almost completely restored, functional scores were excellent, and there were no minor or major postoperative complications. Conclusion In this study, we propose a surgical reconstruction strategy for adult patients with supracondylar humeral fractures. Through the anterior median incision of the humerus, open reduction and internal fixation were performed with an anatomic locking plate on the anterior side of the distal humerus to restore and fix the structure of the distal humerus, and satisfactory clinical results were achieved in our case.

MnO2@PCs (porous carbons) exhibiting high energy and power density are utilized as supercapacitor electrodes and prepared by impregnating porous carbons (PCs) derived from coal tar pitch (CTP) with KMnO4 as the manganese source. This study systematically investigates the impact of MnO2 loading on the microstructure and electrochemical performance in sample. It is found that the specific surface areas (SSA) of all MnO2@PCs significantly reduced compared to that of the PCs 2789 m2 g−1. The suggested mechanism might be a combination of the energy storage mechanism of dual layer capacitors with pseudo‐capacitance due to redox reactions of MnO2. Notably, MnO2@PCs‐0.0075 exhibits a maximum SSA of 1454.62 m2 g−1. Its specific capacitance reached 561 F g−1 at 0.5 A g−1, while the capacitance of the PCs increased by 81.5% to 309 F g−1. Remarkably, the Coulombic efficiency remained at 100%. The power density and energy density are determined in a two‐electrode test system to be 0.5 kW kg−1 and 58.01 Wh kg−1, respectively, at 0.5 A g−1. Concluding from these results and related literature, the MnO2 content significantly influences the electrochemical performance, suggesting that MnO2@PCs‐0.0075 could be a promising supercapacitor (SC) electrode material, provided its capacitance retention is enhanced.

Nanofibers serve as widely employed tissue engineering scaffolds in diverse biomedical applications. When implanted in vivo, it is crucial for tissue engineering scaffolds to be visualizable, enabling the monitoring of their shape, position, and performance. This capability facilitates the effective assessment of implant deformations, displacements, degradations, and functionalities. However, in many biomedical imaging techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), the contrast of tissue engineering scaffolds is often inadequate. MRI is particularly notable for its effectiveness in imaging soft tissues. Previous endeavors to enhance the contrast of tissue engineering scaffolds in MRI have involved the use of negative contrast agents (CAs). Nonetheless, negative CAs can result in artifacts, thus favoring the preference for positive CAs due to their ability to generate clearer boundaries. In this study, we successfully prepared composite polyamide 6 nanofibrous scaffolds with ultrafine dispersion Fe(OH)3 nanoparticles using electrospinning and in-situ growth techniques. The relaxation properties of the magnetic nanofibrous scaffolds confirmed the successful production of scaffolds suitable for positive imaging. In vitro cell seeding experiments demonstrated the efficient proliferation and adhesion of endothelial cells and fibroblasts. In vivo studies further revealed the biocompatibility and functionality of the scaffolds. These findings indicate that the prepared PA6/Fe(OH)3 composite nanofibrous scaffolds can enable straightforward, safe, and efficient in vivo positive contrast MRI monitoring, thereby playing a pivotal role in the integration of diagnosis and treatment within tissue engineering scaffolds.

Summary: The cornea and sclera are distinct adjacent tissues, yet their stromal cells originate from common neural crest cells (NCCs). Sclerocornea is a disease characterized by an indistinguishable boundary between the cornea and sclera. Previously, we identified a RAD21 mutation in a sclerocornea pedigree. Here, we investigated the impacts of RAD21 on NCC activities during eye development. RAD21 deficiency caused upregulation of PCDHGC3. Both RAD21 knockdown and PCDHGC3 upregulation disrupted the migration of NCCs. Transcriptome analysis indicated that WNT9B had 190.9-fold higher expression in scleral stroma than in corneal stroma. WNT9B was also significantly upregulated by both RAD21 knockdown and PCDHGC3 overexpression, and knock down of WNT9B rescued the differentiation and migration of NCCs with RAD21 deficiency. Consistently, overexpressing wnt9b in Xenopus tropicalis led to ocular developmental abnormalities. In summary, WNT9B is a determinant factor during NCC differentiation into corneal keratocytes or scleral stromal cells and is affected by RAD21 expression.

ABSTRACT: Cow milk is an important source of food protein for children; however, it could lead to allergy, especially for infants. α-Lactalbumin (α-LA) and β-lactoglobulin (β-LG) from whey protein make up a relatively high proportion of milk proteins and have received widespread attention as major allergens in milk. However, few studies have identified the epitopes of both proteins simultaneously. In this study, ImmunoCAP and indirect ELISA were first used for detection of sIgE to screen sera from allergic patients with high binding capacity for α-LA and β-LG. Subsequently, the mimotopes was biopanned by phage display technology and bioinformatics and 17 mimic peptide sequences were obtained. Aligned with the sequences of α-LA or β-LG, we identified one linear epitope on α-LA at AA 11–26 and 5 linear epitopes on β-LG at AA 9–29, AA 45–57, AA 77–80, AA 98–101, and AA 121–135, respectively. Meanwhile, the 8 conformational epitopes and their distributions of α-LA and β-LG were located using the Pepitope Server. Finally, glutamine and lysine were determined as common AA residues for the conformational epitopes both on α-LA and β-LG. Moreover, we found the addition of mouse anti-human IgE during the biopanning process did not significantly affect the identification of the epitopes.

Abstract Background Plasmodium berghei has been used as a preferred model for studying human malaria, but only a limited number of disease-associated genes of P. berghei have been reported to date. Identification of new disease-related genes as many as possible will provide a landscape for better understanding the pathogenesis of P. berghei. Methods Network module analysis method was developed and applied to identify disease-related genes in P. berghei genome. Sequence feature identification, gene ontology annotation, and T-cell epitope analysis were performed on these genes to illustrate their functions in the pathogenesis of P. berghei. Results 33,314 genes were classified into 4,693 clusters. 4,127 genes shared by six malaria parasites were identified and are involved in many aspects of biological processes. Most of the known essential genes belong to shared genes. A total of 63 clusters consisting of 405 P. berghei genes were enriched in rodent malaria parasites. These genes participate in various stages of parasites such as liver stage development and immune evasion. Combination of these genes might be responsible for P. berghei infecting mice. Comparing with P. chabaudi, none of the clusters were specific to P. berghei. P. berghei lacks some proteins belonging to P. chabaudi and possesses some specific T-cell epitopes binding by class-I MHC, which might together contribute to the occurrence of experimental cerebral malaria (ECM). Conclusions We successfully identified disease-associated P. berghei genes by network module analysis. These results will deepen understanding of the pathogenesis of P. berghei and provide candidate parasite genes for further ECM investigation.

Automatic road extraction from satellite images is a popular research hotspot topic in the field of remote sensing. However, the complexity of road features and structures hinders their precise extraction. Road features have different saliency due to the occlusion of other objects and diverse road types. Road structures are scattered across various locations and affected by geographical conditions, population distribution, and transportation demands. These issues render current methods based on convolutional neural networks prone to fragmented and incomplete road extraction results. To address these issues, a Road Extraction Network with Dual-View Information Perception Based on GCN (RDPGNet) is proposed, where the GCN-based dual-view perceptron (GDVP) uses the superior information interaction capability of the GCN to explore road information under a dual view. In the GDVP, we first design the road feature saliency graph reasoning module (RFSG) and road structure homogeneous space graph reasoning module (RSHS) based on the features and structures. The RFSG obtains the similarity of road feature information in different regions as a similarity matrix to participate in the graph reasoning process, ensuring that equal treatment is given to regions with varying saliency levels. The RSHS projects the road structure onto a corresponding homogeneous space while aggregating and interacting with information through graph convolution, thereby enhancing the network’s perception of roads in diverse locations. Second, because multi-view information usually shares a potential common representation, a multi-view information fusion and alignment strategy (MVFA) is designed to comprehensively model road information. Experimental results obtained from two public datasets indicate that RDPGNet outperforms other state-of-the-art networks.

There is a mismatch between crop water demand, the spatial and temporal distribution of natural rainfall, surface water sources, and arable land resources in the North China Plain. This has been compensated for by massive groundwater exploitation, and as a result, ground water levels have continuously declined and groundwater landing funnels have formed in some areas. Consequently, there is an urgent need for the rational allocation of soil and water resources. In this study, regional soil types and the corresponding crops in Guangping County, Hebei Province, China, alongside the regional annual average total water consumption were used to determine reasonable allocations for crop planting structures, with an aim of maximizing the water utilization efficiency and economic benefits while also achieving a regional groundwater dynamic equilibrium. Daily meteorological data from 1973 to 2021, including precipitation, temperature, sunshine hours, wind speed, and humidity, as well as crop data, including irrigation systems and crop growth status, were collected. Water consumption models for eight soil types and seven typical crops forming 56 calculation partitions were established to obtain annual average water consumption values for the different crops. The maximum economic benefit and water-use efficiency were then used as the objective functions and total water consumption as the control condition for the non-dominated sorted genetic algorithm-Ⅱ (NSGA-II), to optimize the allocation of soil and water resources in the region; the adjusted quantities for the different crops cultivated under different soil types in the study area were obtained. The areas growing sweet potato and vegetable-fruits were found to increase by 0.5255 km2 and 4.4452 km2, respectively, when compared to the pre-optimization period, whereas the areas with winter wheat-summer maize, millet, peanut, cotton, and summer maize decreased by 1.3481 km2, 0.1812 km2, 0.7316 km2, 2.0896 km2, and 0.62 km2, respectively. The economic benefit increased from 810.37 to 853.64 million yuan, while the water-use efficiency increased from 1.5426 kg/m3 to 1.5859 kg/m3. The results provide a basis for soil and water resource management in the region and a technical reference for similar areas to improve agricultural water-use efficiency and economic benefits.

Water inflow poses a critical safety concern in coal mining. The pressing challenge in current mine water inflow research is the need to enhance the prediction of dynamic changes in mine water inflow across different mining stages. In this study, the hydrogeological conditions and aquifer structural characteristics of the Wutongzhuang Coal Mine in Hebei Province, China were analyzed, and the results were combined with pumping test and drilling data. A numerical model of groundwater flow in the study area was established using Visual MODFLOW and the model was calibrated and verified by comparing its results with the measured values to ensure that it realistically reflected the state of groundwater movement in the study area. The results of numerical simulation indicated that: (1) The water level of the Ordovician aquifer varies significantly by season. A large exposed area of Ordovician limestone in the western mountainous region receives a large amount of rainfall infiltration recharge in the summer rainy period that raises the water level of the Ordovician aquifer in the study area. (2) The groundwater system in the study area is in an equilibrium state, with the water inflow approximately equal to the outflow. (3) The recharge of mine drainage water has a slight positive effect on the Ordovician water level and the floor water inflow, with the impact on the water level of the aquifer decreasing as the distance from the recharge well and the import of Ordovician limestone water increase. In cases in which there is mine water recharge, the water level of the Ordovician aquifer is approximately 0.33 to 1.37 m higher than in cases without recharge, resulting in an increase in water inflow of approximately 10.6 m3/d. (4) In cases in which there is recharge of all drainage water, the maximum water inflow into the fifth mining area is 3,491.3 m3/d, which is 12.5 m3/d higher than in the case without recharge. These results provide important technical references for the formulation of mining schemes and water prevention measures in mining areas.

It is widely accepted that the weight distribution of plant fruits conforms to a standard normal distribution. However, some overlooked evidence suggests that some fruits, including strawberries, exhibit positive skewness in fruit weight distribution. This intriguing observation has received limited attention thus far. To shed light on this phenomenon, we conducted a comprehensive simulation study utilizing greenhouse-grown strawberries as our research subject. We modeled the entire process from bee pollination to pollen fertilization on the stigma and fruit growth. The experimental results demonstrated the reliability of the proposed simulation model and revealed that the positive skewness of the fruit weight distribution was the result of the multiplication of several complex intermediate variable distributions, which led to an approximately lognormal distribution. The simulation model and the derived conclusions presented in this paper offer a plausible explanation for the weight distribution patterns observed in strawberry production systems. Furthermore, research results have the potential to be applied to other berry plants that undergo similar bee pollination processes, thereby expanding our understanding of fruit weight distributions across different species.

Summary: The conventional confirmation tests of tuberculous meningitis (TBM) are usually low in sensitivity, leading to high TBM mortality. Hence, sensitive methods for indicating the presence of bacilli are required. Tuberculostearic acid (TBSA), a constituent from Mycobacterium tuberculosis had been evaluated as a promising marker, but fails to demonstrate consistent results for definite TBM. This study retrospectively reviewed medical records of 113 TBM suspects, constructing a TBSA-combined scoring system based on multiple factors, which show sensitivity and specificity of 0.8148 and 0.8814, respectively, and the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.9010. Multivariate analyses revealed four co-predictive factors strongly associated with TBSA: extra-neural tuberculosis, basal meningeal enhancement, CSF glucose/Serum glucose

The lotus seed and lily bulb beverage (LLB) has a problem with solid particle sedimentation. To address this issue, LLB was homogenised twice at different pressures (0~100 MPa) using a homogeniser. This study aims to investigate the changes in the particle size distribution (PSD), microstructure, rheological behaviour, sedimentation index (IS), turbidity, physicochemical properties, and sensory quality of LLBs after homogenisation treatments. The results regarding PSD and microstructure showed that the suspended particles were decomposed at high pressure with increasing homogenisation pressure, forming small particles of cellular material, cell wall fragments, fibre fractions, and polymers. The LLB showed shear-thinning behaviour and weak gelation characteristics (G′ > G″) and rheological properties. Among all homogenisation pressures, the 60 MPa sample showed the lowest sedimentation rate and the highest turbidity. When the pressure was increased from 0 to 100 MPa, the total soluble solid (TSS) content showed an upward trend, while the ascorbic acid content (AAC) gradually decreased. The highest sensory evaluation was observed in the 60 MPa sample in terms of overall acceptability.

In humans, germline TP53 mutations predispose carriers to a wide spectrum of cancers, which is known as Li–Fraumeni syndrome (LFS). To date, the association of melanomas with LFS remains unestablished. No melanomas have been reported in any P53‐modified mouse models either. In this study, we show that targeted disruption of P53 at the DNA‐binding domain in Xenopus tropicalis recapitulates LFS, with the formation of soft‐tissue sarcomas and pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. Interestingly, 19% of the 14‐month‐old tp53Δ7/Δ7 homozygotes and 18% of tp53+/Δ7 heterozygotes spontaneously developed small nevi and non‐invasive melanomas. Large invasive melanomas were also observed in other older homozygous mutants, with about 7.9% penetrance. Our data suggest that more dermatologic investigation of LFS patients should be able to settle the association of melanoma with LFS in epidemiology. Our model is also valuable for further investigation of the molecular mechanism underlying melanoma progression upon germline alteration of the tp53 locus.

Background and purposeSeveral reported cases of autoimmune conditions such as anti-NMDAR encephalitis and neuromyelitis optica (AQP4) have been considered to be potentially secondary to Treponema pallidum infection. Since the role of immune impairment in neurosyphilis is unclear, in this retrospective study, we examined the correlation of the immune impairment in patients with neurosyphilis with their clinical characteristics and outcomes.MethodsClinical information was collected from patients with neurosyphilis in our center from January 2019 to December 2021. Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) samples were subjected to indirect immunofluorescence tissue-based assay (IIF-TBA) on mouse brain sections and cell-based assay (CBA). The clinical characteristics and treatment outcomes of TBA-positive and-negative patients were compared.ResultsA total number of 81 patients diagnosed with neurosyphilis were included. The results of the CBA tests showed that three cases had anti-NMDAR, AQP4, or GAD65 antibodies, respectively. By TBA test, 38 patients (38/81, 46.9%) had positive immunostains, including staining of neuronal cells in 21 cases (21/38, 55.3%), glial cells in 11 cases (11/38, 28.9%), and neuronal and glial cells in six cases (6/38, 15.8%). We then compared the clinical characteristics and treatment outcomes between the TBA-positive and-negative patients and found that TBA-positive staining was significantly correlated with syphilis antibody titers (p = 0.027 for serum and p = 0.006 for CSF) and head MRI abnormalities (p

In the face of global warming, reducing carbon dioxide emissions has become a common concern. Integrated energy system (IES) is considered to be a supporting technology to increase the proportion of clean energy use and achieve goals of carbon emission reduction and carbon neutrality. By introducing carbon neutral costs and demand response into scheduling strategy, the carbon emission and the economy of IES system operation is optimized in the proposed optimal scheduling. First, modeling of the demand response considering the transferable load and replaceable load, as well as reducible load, is established for guiding users to change their energy consumption ways. Then Structure and components of IES are discussed. Later, the article presents the IES carbon emissions calculation method and model of carbon neutrality cost. Finally, the day ahead optimal scheduling of the IES considering the demand response (DR) and carbon neutrality cost is proposed. The results show that the proposed model is effective in balancing low carbon and economy. Comparative results of different carbon neutralization adjustment coefficients shows that total operating cost as well as carbon emissions is reduced with increasing clean energy penetration and setting moderate carbon neutralization cost coefficients. By adjusting the participation of clean energy, the system cost can be effectively reduced by 48.6%. By adjusting the carbon neutralization cost coefficients, the overall carbon emission can be reduced by 282 kg.

Abstract Background The true diploid frog, Xenopus tropicalis (X. tropicalis) is an excellent genetic model organism. To date, the CRISPR/Cas-mediated genome editing methods established in this species are mostly based on SpCas9 that requires the stringent NGG protospacer-adjacent motif (PAM) for target recognition, which limits its genome editing scope. Thus, it is highly desirable to circumvent this limitation. Results Through one-cell stage injection of Cas/gRNAs into X. tropicalis embryos, we evaluated the mutagenic efficiency of 8 different Cas variants using T7EI assay, Sanger DNA sequencing, or deep sequencing. Our data indicate that SaCas9 and KKH SaCas9 are highly effective in frogs, which could be used for direct phenotyping in G0 embryos. In contrast, VQR Cas9, xCas9 3.7, SpG Cas9, and SpRY Cas9 were ineffective in X. tropicalis embryos and no activity was detected for iSpyMac Cas9. We also found that LbCas12a/crRNA RNP complexes with paired crRNAs efficiently induced small fragment deletions in X. tropicalis embryos. Conclusion SaCas9 and KKH SaCas9 are robust genome editing tools in X. tropicalis embryos. LbCas12a/crRNA RNP complexes are useful for inducing DNA fragment deletions in frog embryos. These tools expand the CRISPR/Cas genome editing scope in X. tropicalis and increase the flexibility for various genome editing applications in frogs.