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Pneumonia is a serious and common infectious disease in children. If not treated in time, it may develop into severe pneumonia. Severe pneumonia in children is mainly characterized by hypoxia and acidosis, often accompanied by various complications such as sepsis and multiple organ dysfunction. Severe pneumonia has a rapid onset and progression, and a high mortality rate. Biomarkers assist clinicians in the early diagnosis and treatment of patients by quickly and accurately identifying their conditions and prognostic risks. In this study, common clinical and novel biomarkers of severe pneumonia in children were reviewed, and the application value of biomarkers related to the severity and prognosis of severe pneumonia in children was evaluated to provide help for early identification and precise intervention by clinicians.

ObjectiveIt is well known that macro-thyroid-stimulating hormone (macro-TSH) could interfere with the detection of TSH. The anti-TSH autoantibody is an essential component of macro-TSH. However, the epidemiological characteristics and the clinical interference of the anti-TSH autoantibody are unclear.MethodsIn this study, the radioimmunoprecipitation technique was used to detect the anti-TSH autoantibody. Platforms with different detection mechanisms were applied to measure the TSH in patients with the anti-TSH autoantibody. Polyethylene glycol (PEG) precipitation was used to determine the immunoassay interference.ResultsThe prevalence of the anti-TSH autoantibody in patients with mild subclinical hypothyroidism (SCH) and autoimmune thyroiditis, but normal thyroid function, was 4.78%. All 10 patients with anti-TSH antibodies had autoimmune diseases, with five of them having significant clinical test interference.ConclusionThe appearance of the anti-TSH antibody is not associated with thyroid autoantibodies. The presence of the anti-TSH autoantibody can interfere with the detection of TSH and can affect clinical diagnosis and treatment.

Zinc is one of the heavy metals present in textile wastewater with high concentrations. However, the chronic toxic effects of zinc on aquatic vertebrates are still ambiguous. Zinc accumulation in zebrafish after chronic zinc exposure and toxic effects on the intestines, muscles, and gills were investigated in this study. The results showed that a significant accumulation of zinc in the intestine, muscle, and gill was observed after 25 d of zinc exposure. The toxic effects of zinc were mainly in the form of zinc-induced oxidative stress in zebrafish, potential neurotoxicity, and changes in intestinal microbes. Significant changes in the levels of superoxide dismutase, catalase, metallothionein, glutathione, and malondialdehyde indicated that zinc damaged the antioxidant system of adult zebrafish. Zinc exposure resulted in a significant decrease in acetylcholinesterase activity and abnormal neural signaling. Furthermore, zinc exposure resulted in increased intestinal microbial richness and decreased the Simpson index in adult zebrafish. At the phylum and genus levels, the predominant microbes in the intestine are altered by zinc. In summary, this study provides an analysis of the toxic effects of chronic zinc exposure on adult zebrafish and the potential mechanisms, which are important for assessing the dual effects of zinc on aquatic organisms. HIGHLIGHTS Zinc accumulation in adult zebrafish organs is significantly associated with oxidative stress.; Differences in oxidative stress of different organs to chronic zinc exposure were found.; Zinc adversely affects the nervous system of adult zebrafish.; The effect of zinc on the intestinal microbiome of adult zebrafish is twofold.;

Abstract Background In children, focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) is the main cause of steroid resistant nephrotic syndrome (SRNS). To identify specific candidates and the mechanism of steroid resistance, we examined the formalin-fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) renal tissue protein profiles via liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). Methods Renal biopsies from seven steroid-sensitive (SS) and eleven steroid-resistant (SR) children FSGS patients were obtained. We examined the formalin-fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) renal tissue protein profiles via liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) enrichment and Gene Ontology (GO) analysis, as well as the construction of protein-protein interaction (PPI) network were performed. Two proteins were further valiadated by immunohistochemistry staining in FSGS patients and mice models. Results In total, we quantified more than 4000 proteins, of which 325 were found to be differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) between the SS and SR group (foldchange ≥2, P

Abstract Proteinuria, an indication of kidney disease, is caused by the malfunction of podocytes, which play a key role in maintaining glomerular filtration. Angiopoietin-like 3 (ANGPTL3) has been documented to have a cell-autonomous involvement in podocytes, and deletion of Angptl3 in podocytes reduced proteinuria in adriamycin-induced nephropathy. Here, we developed a monoclonal antibody (mAb) against ANGPTL3 to investigate its effects on podocyte injury in an ADR nephropathy mouse model and puromycin (PAN) induced podocyte damage in vitro. The mAb against the human ANGPTL3-FLD sequence (5E5F6) inhibited the binding of ANGPTL3-FLD to integrin β3. Treatment with the 5E5F6 mAb in ADR nephropathy mice mitigated proteinuria and led to a significant decline in podocyte apoptosis, reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation and mitochondrial fragmentation. In PAN-induced podocyte damage in vitro, the 5E5F6 mAb blocked the ANPGPLT3-mediated activation of integrin αvβ3 and Rac1, which regulated the mitochondrial homeostasis. Altogether, anti-ANGPLT3-FLD mAb attenuates proteinuria and podocyte lesions in ADR mice models, as well as PAN-induced podocyte damage, in part through regulating mitochondrial functions. Our study provides a therapeutic approach for targeting ANGPTL3 in proteinuric kidney disease.

Abstract Background The non-local module has been primarily used in literature to capturing long-range dependencies. However, it suffers from prohibitive computational complexity and lacks the interactions among positions across the channels. Methods We present a deformed non-local neural network (DNL-Net) for medical image segmentation, which has two prominent components; deformed non-local module (DNL) and multi-scale feature fusion. The former optimizes the structure of the non-local block (NL), hence, reduces the problem of excessive computation and memory usage, significantly. The latter is derived from the attention mechanisms to fuse the features of different levels and improve the ability to exchange information across channels. In addition, we introduce a residual squeeze and excitation pyramid pooling (RSEP) module that is like spatial pyramid pooling to effectively resample the features at different scales and improve the network receptive field. Results The proposed method achieved 96.63% and 92.93% for Dice coefficient and mean intersection over union, respectively, on the intracranial blood vessel dataset. Also, DNL-Net attained 86.64%, 96.10%, and 98.37% for sensitivity, accuracy and area under receiver operation characteristic curve, respectively, on the DRIVE dataset. Conclusions The overall performance of DNL-Net outperforms other current state-of-the-art vessel segmentation methods, which indicates that the proposed network is more suitable for blood vessel segmentation, and is of great clinical significance.

BackgroundDent disease is a group of inherited X-linked recessive renal tubular disorders. This group of disorders is characterized by low molecular weight proteinuria (LMWP), nephrocalcinosis, hypercalciuria and renal failure.Case presentationHere we report one 11-year-old Chinese boy (proband) and one 13-year-old Chinese boy who was proband's cousin, both presented with massive proteinuria. Further laboratory examinations revealed a lack of nephrocalcinosis, nor any other signs of tubular dysfunction, but only LMWP and hypercalciuria. There was no abnormality in growth, renal function or mineral density of the bones. A novel deletion (c.1448delG) in the CLCN5 gene was identified, resulting in a frame shift mutation (p.Gly483fs). The proband's and his cousin's mothers were found to be the carrier of this mutation.ConclusionsIn this study, we have found a novel frameshift mutation (c. 1448delG) at exon 11 of the CLCN5 gene which leads to Dent disease 1, expanding the spectrum of CLCN5 mutations.

PurposeThe aim of this study included determining the prevalence of hypothyroidism in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), clarifying the clinical characteristics of SLE patients with hypothyroidism, and identifying the relationship between hypothyroidism and SLE-related organic damage. Another purpose was to analyze the relationship between SLE and thyroid autoantibody. We also intended to discuss the pathogenesis of hypothyroidism in SLE patients, which would provide clues for further investigation.MethodsThis study recruited 856 SLE patients and 856 age- and sex-matched healthy population and compared the prevalence of hypothyroidism between the cases and controls. Univariate and multivariate logistic analyses were applied to identify risk factors for hypothyroidism in SLE patients.ResultsSLE patients had higher prevalence of clinical hypothyroidism (9.10%) and TgAb+TPOAb- (10.40%) than controls. The prevalence of hypothyroidism was the highest in SLE patients aged 16-26 years (18.9%) and decreased with age. The prevalence of autoimmune hypothyroidism in SLE group was higher than that in the control group (64.4% vs. 51.5%, P=0.042), which was mainly due to TgAb; the prevalence of non-autoimmune hypothyroidism in SLE group was also significantly higher than that in the control group (67.3% vs. 47.8%, P

Berberine hydrochloride (BBR) is a natural product widely used in clinical medicine and animal production. It has a variety of antimicrobial effects, but its complex antimicrobial mechanism has not been clarified. This study aimed to discover the metabolic markers and gain a new perspective on the antibacterial mechanism of BBR. The effects of different inhibitory concentrations of BBR on the survival and growth of standard strain Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 25923 were analyzed by the bacteriostatic activity test. Differences in intracellular metabolites of S. aureus following 19 μg/ml BBR exposure for 1 h were investigated by combining non-targeted metabolomics techniques of gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS). The results showed that the minimum inhibitory concentration of BBR against S. aureus was 51 μg/ml. A total of 368 and 3,454 putative metabolites were identified by GC-MS and LC-MS analyses, respectively. Principal component analysis showed the separation of intracellular metabolite profiles between BBR-exposed samples and non-exposed controls. Pathway activity profiling analysis indicated a global inhibition of metabolisms by BBR exposure, while enhancement was also found in nucleic acid metabolism, amino sugar, and nucleotide sugar metabolism. Several metabolic markers were screened out mainly based on their variable importance of projection values. Two pyridine dicarboxylic acids were significantly downregulated, suggesting the reduction of stress resistance. The oxidized phospholipid (PHOOA-PE) was accumulated, while lipid antioxidant gamma-tocopherol was decreased, and farnesyl PP, the synthetic precursor of another antioxidant (staphyloxanthin), was decreased below the detection threshold. This evidence indicates that BBR reduced the antioxidant capacity of S. aureus. Accumulation of the precursors (UDP-GlcNAc, CDP-ribitol, and CDP-glycerol) and downregulation of the key metabolite D-Ala-D-Ala suggest the inhibition of cell wall synthesis, especially the peptidoglycan synthesis. Metabolites involved in the shikimate pathway (such as 3-dehydroshikimate) and downstream aromatic amino acid synthesis were disturbed. This study provides the first metabolomics information on the antibacterial mechanism of BBR against S. aureus. The key metabolic markers screened in this study suggest that the shikimate pathway, staphyloxanthin synthesis, and peptidoglycan biosynthesis are new directions for further study of BBR antibacterial mechanism in the future.

Whether berberine mediates its anti-inflammatory and blood sugar and lipid-lowering effects solely by adjusting the structure of the gut microbiota or by first directly regulating the expression of host pro-inflammatory proteins and activation of macrophages and subsequently acting on gut microbiota, is currently unclear. To clarify the mechanism of berberine-mediated regulation of metabolism, we constructed an obese mouse model using SPF-grade C57BL/6J male mice and conducted a systematic study of liver tissue pathology, inflammatory factor expression, and gut microbiota structure. We screened the gut microbiota targets of berberine and showed that the molecular mechanism of berberine-mediated treatment of metabolic syndrome involves the regulation of gut microbiota structure and the expression of inflammatory factors. Our results revealed that a high-fat diet (HFD) significantly changed mice gut microbiota, thereby probably increasing the level of toxins in the intestine, and triggered the host inflammatory response. The HFD also reduced the proportion of short-chain fatty acid (SCFA)-producing genes, thereby hindering mucosal immunity and cell nutrition, and increased the host inflammatory response and liver fat metabolism disorders. Further, berberine could improve the chronic HFD-induced inflammatory metabolic syndrome to some extent and effectively improved the metabolism of high-fat foods in mice, which correlated with the gut microbiota composition. Taken together, our study may improve our understanding of host-microbe interactions during the treatment of metabolic diseases and provide useful insights into the action mechanism of berberine.

ABSTRACT: Background: Most patients (≥85%) with minimal-change nephrotic syndrome (MCNS) respond to corticosteroid treatment. However, about 10% to 20% of patients with MCNS have steroid-resistant nephrotic syndrome and 25% to 43% of patients have steroid-dependent nephrotic syndrome or frequent-relapse steroid-sensitive nephrotic syndrome. Patients with refractory MCNS are treated with various second-line therapies. Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate the associations between the use of various second-line therapies and relapse rates in Chinese patients with childhood refractory MCNS. Methods: In this study, patients with childhood nephrotic syndrome renal biopsy proved to be “minimal change” from a single tertiary-care center between January 2002 and July 2018 were identified. A Total of 56 medical charts of patients treated with 1 of these second-line immunosuppressors: cyclophosphamide (CYC), mycophenolate mofetil (MMF), or tacrolimus (TAC) were reviewed. Patients were divided into CYC (n = 24), MMF (n = 20), and TAC (n = 12) groups according to the second-line therapy administered. Baseline characteristics, immune status, immunocomplex deposition in the renal tissue, and treatment outcomes were analyzed. Results: The ratio of patients with steroid-resistant nephrotic syndrome and steroid-dependent nephrotic syndrome in the CYC, MMF, and TAC groups did not differ significantly (P = 0.721). The immunofluorescence assay did not show any significant differences in immunocomplex deposition identified in renal biopsy specimens among the 3 groups. The rate of steroid-free remission in the TAC group (75%) was higher than that in the MMF (55%) and CYC (25%) groups (P = 0.012). At the last follow-up, two-thirds of children in the TAC group had a relapse following discontinuation of therapy. In the TAC group, patients for whom steroids were withdrawn had significantly higher levels of immunoglobulin G at the onset of nephrotic syndrome than those for whom steroids were continued (P = 0.017). In the MMF group, children with relapse had a significantly higher percentage of CD16+CD56+-positive cells than those without relapse (P = 0.042). The relapse rate after treatment discontinuation was significantly different among the 3 groups (P = 0.035). Notably, the relapse rate after treatment discontinuation in the CYC group was lower than those in the other 2 groups (P = 0.035). Conclusions: In this small population of Chinese patients with childhood refractory MCNS, the relapse rate following TAC therapy was higher than that following MMF or CYC therapy. Different proportions of CD16+CD56+-positive cells might be associated with relapse rates in patients with MCNS receiving MMF treatment. (Curr Ther Res Clin Exp. 2022; 83:XXX–XXX)

It is necessary to determine the optimal temperature for Percocypris pingi growth in recirculating aquaculture systems. To describe the effects of temperature, we evaluated the growth, antioxidant enzyme activity, and gut microbiota structure of P. pingi at different temperatures, including 14, 18, 22, and 26 °C. Results showed that increases in body weight of individuals of the groups subjected to 18 and 22 °C temperatures were considerably higher than those in the groups subjected to temperatures of 14 and 26 °C between 20 and 60 d after the experiment started. Acid phosphatase activity in the liver and kidneys of P. pingi did not differ significantly among the various temperature groups (p > 0.05). A gradual restoration of the alkaline phosphatase and superoxide dismutase activities to variations in the surrounding temperature was observed in the liver and kidney of P. pingi. Interestingly, the water temperature did not affect the α-diversity or composition of the gut microbiota of P. pingi. In conclusion, water temperatures between 14 and 26 °C significantly impacted the growth of P. pingi (p < 0.05) but not the liver and kidney antioxidant capacity or the gut microbiota within 60 d.

Objective: To verify the role of miR-425 in colorectal carcinogenesis. Methods: We conducted sphere formation assay, wound-healing assay, transwell assay, MTT cell proliferation assay, flow cytometric analysis, reverse transcription qPCR, and Western blotting to analyse proliferation and invasion of HCT116 cells transfected with miR-425 mimics, miR-425 inhibitor, miR-425 mimic negative control, and miR-425 inhibitor negative control, respectively. The experimental protocol was approved by the Medical Ethics Committee of the First People’s Hospital in Kashi (approval number: 2018 Kuaishen No. (100)). All experiments were conducted during December 2016 to July 2017 at Xinjiang Dingju Medical Laboratory, China. Results: Our results showed that miR-425 expression in HCT116 cells after transfection was up-regulated, which inhibited sphere formation. Overexpression of miR-425 inhibited proliferation of HTC116 cells and induced their apoptosis, and inhibited HCC116 cell migration and invasion. Conclusion: Overexpression of miR-425 could inhibited sphere formation, the migration and invasion of HCT116 cells through inhibiting proliferation and promoting apoptosis. Keywords: apoptosis; colonic carcinoma; microRNA; proliferation Continuous....

Abstract Background The gut microbiota is closely correlated with host health and is strongly influenced by food composition. Chinese herbs are usually used as natural feed additives in livestock production. Therefore, the present study assessed the influence of diet supplementation with green tea and mulberry leaf powders on the chicken gut microbiota. The gut microbiota compositions were determined using 16S rDNA sequencing. Results Enhanced relative abundances of Bacteroides, Prevotella, and Megamonas were found in the chicken gut when mulberry leaf powder was added to diet. Conversely, a higher abundance of potentially pathogenic Gallibacterium was found in the chicken gut when the diet was supplemented with green tea powder. These results indicated that green tea powder and mulberry leaf powder can greatly affect the gut microbiota of chickens by changing their compositions. Conclusions It is imperative to examine and evaluate the effects of Chinese herbs on animal health before they are introduced as feed additives in animal production.

To analyze the structural characteristics of zooplankton functional groups (ZFGs) and their correlation with environmental physicochemical factors in the Chaohu Lake Basin, water samples were collected from October 2019 to July 2020, and the zooplankton species and ZFGs were investigated. A total of 250 species, including 88 protozoa, 115 rotifers, 28 cladocerans, and 19 copepod species, were detected and divided into 16 ZFGs. The ZFGs exhibited obvious spatiotemporal heterogeneity. ZFGs in the Chaohu Lake were notably different from those in rivers and were different between the rivers. In the ecosystem, network analysis showed that protozoan algae/protozoan bacteria (PA/PB), rotifer particle filter (RF), and rotifer small predator (RSG) were important in the spring, summer, and autumn that and small zooplankton filter (SCF) was important in spring, autumn, and winter, while the importance of other ZFGs changed with seasons. Redundancy analysis showed that the environmental factors with a strong correlation between the ZFG compositions differed in each season. Different ZFGs exhibited different correlations with environmental factors. This study showed that ZFGs were closely related to environmental factors and that functional traits can reflect responses to changes in the water environment.

Objectives: Nocturnal enuresis (NE) is a common pediatric condition, and desmopressin (dDAVP) is a first-line therapy for NE. The standard initial dosage of dDAVP is 0. 2 mg/day, and most guidelines recommend that the dose should be increased at 0.2 mg increments until dryness is achieved or to the maximal recommended dose. However, previous evidence has shown that this strategy seems insufficient to further improve efficacy and results in unnecessarily high doses for some patients. Our study aimed to assess the efficacy of our modified dDAVP treatment regimen in children with MNE in China and evaluate predictive factors associated with the dDAVP response.Methods: All MNE patients at the Department of Nephrology at Children's Hospital of Fudan University from January to December 2019 were prospectively and consecutively enrolled. dDAVP treatment comprised a dose titration period and a 3-month maintenance period. The efficacy of dDAVP was assessed according to the latest International Children's Continence Society criteria at the end of the study. Predictive factors were evaluated by logistic regression analysis.Results: Overall, 322 MNE patients were enrolled in our study, and 225 (69.9%) completed the study. The intention to treat analysis showed that the overall dDAVP response rate was 69.9%: among these patients 32.3% were complete responders, and 37.6% were partial responders. At the end of the study, 194/225 (86.2%) patients received a final dose of 0.2 mg, 24/225 (10.7%) patients received a final dose of 0.3 mg, and 7/225 (3.1%) patients received a final dose of 0.4 mg. Multivariate analysis showed that patients requiring lower doses to achieve responses were significantly more likely to experience complete response during the maintenance period [odds ratio (OR)=9.683; 95% confidence interval (CI), 2.770–33.846].Conclusions: Our results indicate that the dDAVP treatment regimen provides a comparable efficacy to the international conventional treatment regimen with a lower overall dose. Low-dose responders were likely to achieve a complete response without increasing the dose; in these cases, the maximum dose might not be necessary.

The gut microbiota (GM) compositions of aquatic animals are influenced by microorganisms in ambient water and sediment. However, the extent to which environmental microorganisms can affect shrimp GM composition is unknown. We analyzed the impact of water and sediment microorganisms on the GM of Macrobrachium rosenbergii at different growth stages. We collected water, sediment, and M. rosenbergii gut samples at the early, middle, and late stages of an M. rosenbergii culture and analyzed the microbiota composition. The shrimps’ body weight differed significantly between sampling stages. The shrimp GM composition differed significantly from that of the ambient water and sediment, and these differences were remarkably stronger than those between the shrimp GM at different sampling times and in different ponds. The proportion of sediment bacteria in the shrimp GM was approximately three times higher than that of water bacteria, which changed among ponds and over sampling time. These results provide important reference information for a deeper understanding of the impact of environmental microorganisms on the composition of shrimp GM. Moreover, the results also provide reference information for increasing the production of shrimp culture as well as ensuring a good health status of the culture.

Background Due to intensive sluice construction and other human disturbances, lakeshore vegetation has been destroyed and ecosystems greatly changed. Rhizospheric microbiota constitute a key part of a functioning rhizosphere ecosystem. Maintaining rhizosphere microbial diversity is a central, critical issue for sustaining these rhizospheric microbiota functions and associated ecosystem services. However, the community composition and abiotic factors influencing rhizospheric microbiota in lakeshore remain largely understudied. Methods The spatiotemporal composition of lakeshore rhizospheric microbiota and the factors shaping them were seasonally investigated in three subtropical floodplain lakes (Lake Chaohu, Lake Wuchang, and Lake Dahuchi) along the Yangtze River in China through 16S rRNA amplicon high-throughput sequencing. Results Our results showed that four archaeal and 21 bacterial phyla (97.04 ± 0.25% of total sequences) dominated the rhizospheric microbiota communities of three lakeshore areas. Moreover, we uncovered significant differences among rhizospheric microbiota among the lakes, seasons, and average submerged depths. The Acidobacteria, Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Bathyarchaeota, Gemmatimonadetes, and Proteobacteria differed significantly among the three lakes, with more than half of these dominant phyla showing significant changes in abundance between seasons, while the DHVEG-6, Ignavibacteriae, Nitrospirae, Spirochaetes, and Zixibacteria varied considerably across the average submerged depths (n = 58 sites in total). Canonical correspondence analyses revealed that the fluctuation range of water level and pH were the most important factors influencing the microbial communities and their dominant microbiota, followed by total nitrogen, moisture, and total phosphorus in soil. These results suggest a suite of hydrological and soil physiochemical variables together governed the differential structuring of rhizospheric microbiota composition among different lakes, seasons, and sampling sites. This work thus provides valuable ecological information to better manage rhizospheric microbiota and protect the vegetation of subtropical lakeshore areas.

Emerging evidence suggests a key role of gut microbiota in maintaining liver functions through modulating the gut–liver axis. In this study, we investigated whether microbiota alteration mediated by probiotic Bacillus was involved in alleviating oxidative stress- induced liver injury. Sprague–Dawley rats were orally administered Bacillus SC06 or SC08 for a 24-day period and thereafter intraperitoneally injected diquat (DQ) to induce oxidative stress. Results showed that Bacillus, particularly SC06 significantly inhibited hepatic injuries, as evidenced by the alleviated damaged liver structure, the decreased levels of ALT, AST, ALP and LDH, and the suppressed mitochondrial dysfunction. SC06 pretreatment markedly enhanced the liver antioxidant capacity by decreasing MDA and p47, and increasing T-AOC, SOD and HO-1.16S rRNA sequencing analysis revealed that DQ significantly changed the diversities and composition of gut microbiota, whereas Bacillus pretreatments could attenuate gut dysbiosis. Pearson’s correlation analysis showed that AST and MDA exerted a positive correlation with the opportunistic pathogenic genera and species (Escherichia and Shigella), and negatively correlated with the potential probiotics (Lactobacillus), while SOD exerted a reverse trend. The microbial metagenomic analysis demonstrated that Bacillus, particularly SC06 markedly suppress the metabolic pathways such as carbohydrate metabolism, lipid metabolism, amino acid metabolism and metabolism of cofactors and vitamins. Furthermore, SC06 decreased the gene abundance of the pathways mediating bacterial replication, secretion and pathogenicity. Taken together, Bacillus SC06 alleviates oxidative stress-induced liver injuries via optimizing the composition, metabolic pathways and pathogenic replication and secretion of gut microbiota. These findings elucidate the mechanisms of probiotics in alleviating oxidative stress and provide a promising strategy for preventing liver diseases by targeting gut microbiota.

Fish gut microbiota were potentially influenced by habitat changes. However, the fish gut has been shown to have a filtering effect on habitat microorganisms. Here, we hypothesized that the filtering of fish gut microbiota could counteract the effect of dam construction on the gut microbiota composition. To test this hypothesis, we collected water and Rhinogobio cylindricus individuals from four sampling sites located upstream of the Three Gorges Dam (TGD) and analyzed the microbiota composition in the water samples (n = 48) and R. cylindricus gut samples (n = 89) by high-throughput sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene. A total of 6,772,720 (49,435.91 ± 3762.80) high-quality sequences were obtained from 137 samples. The microbiota in the water environment was significantly more diverse than that in the gut of R. cylindricus. The β-diversity of microbiota in the water was significantly lower than that in the gut of R. cylindricus. The water microbiota composition varied greatly according to the distribution of the sampling sites upstream of the TGD, but the gut microbiota of R. cylindricus did not show the same pattern. Rather, the gut microbiota of R. cylindricus were not significantly affected by the TGD. This consistency in the internal tract of R. cylindricus is presumedly a result of a filtering effect on the water microorganisms. Our study furthers our understanding of the stabilization mechanism of the gut microbiota composition of fish and the impact of dams on river ecosystems.

Background: Although functional bacteria are widely used in aquaculture water treatment, whether they affect the indigenous microbiota and whether the impact is persistent remain unclear. Therefore, we aimed to explore the denitrification effect of Pseudomonas furukawaii ZS1 isolated from a grass carp culture pond in nitrogen-rich aquaculture water, and determine whether its effect on the microbiota structure of the aquaculture water was persistent. Methods: Three each of treatment and control groups were set up, and P. furukawaii ZS1 was added to the treatment group. The concentrations of ammonia nitrogen, nitrite, and nitrate, and the pH of each sample were measured for eight consecutive days. Changes of microbiota composition in the water were analysed via high-throughput sequencing. Results: Ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate concentrations were substantially lower in the treatment group than in the control group. There were significant differences in the microbiota structure between treatment and control groups, especially on days 2–7 after adding P. furukawaii ZS1. Furthermore, significantly enriched bacterial genera in the treatment group were initially higher in number than inhibited genera, but subsequently reverted to being lower in number. Conclusions: These results provide theoretical guidance for the effective use of P. furukawaii ZS1 to control aquaculture water.

Gut microbiota dysbiosis is closely associated with primary hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Recent studies have evaluated the early diagnosis of primary HCC through analysis of gut microbiota dysbiosis. However, the relationship between the degree of dysbiosis and the prognosis of primary HCC remains unclear. Because primary HCC is accompanied by dysbiosis and dysbiosis usually increases the circulatory concentrations of endotoxin and other harmful bacterial substances, which further increases liver damage, we hypothesized that level of dysbiosis associated with primary HCC increases with the stage of cancer progression. To test this hypothesis, we introduced a more integrated index referred to as the degree of dysbiosis (Ddys); and we investigated Ddys of the gut microbiota with the development of primary HCC through high-throughput sequencing of 16S rRNA gene amplicons. Our results showed that compared with healthy individuals, patients with primary HCC showed increased pro-inflammatory bacteria in their fecal microbiota. The Ddys increased significantly in patients with primary HCC compared with that in healthy controls. Moreover, there was a tendency for the Ddys to increase with the development of primary HCC, although no significant difference was detected between different stages of primary HCC. Our findings provide important insights into the use of gut microbiota analysis during the treatment of primary HCC.

Obesity and the related liver diseases are prevalent around the world. Although probiotics have been shown to prevent obesity through multiple ways, only few researches investigated the lipid-lowering effects of probiotic Bacillus. Moreover, the limited results consistently suggested that Bacillus regulated genes related to lipogenesis and oxidation, but no further exploration was made. Our previous study revealed that Bacillus amyloliquefaciens SC06 has a potent antioxidant capacity in vitro. The aim of this study is to investigate the effects of SC06 on obesity and the associated liver injury of high-fat diet (HFD)-fed-mice and its underlying mechanism. By feeding normal chow (NC), NC+SC06, HFD, and HFD+SC06 to mice, we found that SC06 improved body weight gain, hepatic steatosis, and glucose metabolism of HFD-mice. Furthermore, SC06 also increased the antioxidant capacity of mice through Nrf2/Keap1 signaling pathway. High-throughput sequencing of 16S rRNA gene showed that HFD changed the gut microbiota dramatically, while HFD+SC06 decreased the ratio of Firmicutes/Bacteroidetes and increased TM7 abundance. More differences were also found in lower taxa. Altogether, SC06 is a potential probiotic that decreases HFD-related lipid accumulation and liver injury via regulating the antioxidant capacity and host gut microbiota.

Gut microbial dysbiosis is correlated with the development of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Therefore, analyzing the changing patterns in gut microbiota during HCC development, especially before HCC occurrence, is essential for the diagnosis and prevention of HCC based on gut microbial composition. However, these changing patterns in HCC are poorly understood, especially considering the sex differences in HCC incidence and mortality. Here, with an aim to determine the relationship between gut microbiota and HCC development in both sexes, and to screen potential microbial biomarkers for HCC diagnosis, we studied the changing patterns in the gut microbiota from mice of both sexes with liver-specific knockout of Tsc1 (LTsc1KO) that spontaneously developed HCC by 9–10 months of age and compared them to the patterns observed in their wide-type Tsc1fl/fl cohorts using high-throughput sequencing. Using the LTsc1KO model, we were able to successfully exclude the continuing influence of diet on the gut microbiota. Based on gut microbial composition, the female LTsc1KO mice exhibited gut microbial disorder earlier than male LTsc1KO mice during the development of HCC. Our findings also indicated that the decrease in the relative abundance of anaerobic bacteria and the increase in the relative abundance of facultative anaerobic bacteria can be used as risk indexes of female HCC, but would be invalid for male HCC. Most of the changes in the gut bacteria were different between female and male LTsc1KO mice. In particular, the increased abundances of Allobaculum, Erysipelotrichaceae, Neisseriaceae, Sutterella, Burkholderiales, and Prevotella species have potential for use as risk indicators of female HCC, and the increased abundances of Paraprevotella, Paraprevotellaceae, and Prevotella can probably be applied as risk indicators of male HCC. These relationships between the gut microbiota and HCC discovered in the present study may serve as a platform for the identification of potential targets for the diagnosis and prevention of HCC in the future.

Backgound: Although telemedicine interventional therapy is an innovative method to reduce public medical burden and improve heart failure, its effectiveness is still controversial. This meta-analysis evaluates the role of telemedicine interventional therapy in the treatment of patients with chronic heart failure. Methods: Relevant literature on telemedicine in chronic heart failure treatment was screened and extracted based on predefined criteria. Quality assessment used Cochrane Handbook 5.1.0 tool, and meta-analysis was conducted using R 4.2.2 software. Results: Fifteen English-language articles were ultimately included in this meta-analysis. The risk bias evaluation determined that 4 articles were low-risk bias and 11 articles were unclear risk bias. The meta-analysis revealed that, compared to the routine intervention group, the all-cause hospitalization rate of patients in the telemedicine intervention group decreased [OR = 0.63, 95% CI (0.41; 0.96), P = .03], and the hospitalization rate of heart failure also decreased [OR = 0.70, 95% CI (0.48; 0.85), P < .01]. However, there were no differences in mortality [OR = 0.64, 95% CI (0.41; 1.01), P = .05], length of hospitalization [MD = -0.42, 95% CI (-1.22; 0.38), P = .31], number of emergency hospitalizations [MD = -0.09, 95% CI (-0.33; 0.15), P = .45], medication compliance [OR = 1.67, 95% CI (0.92; 3.02), P = .09], or MLHFQ scores [MD = -2.30, 95% CI (-6.16; 1.56), P = .24] among the patients. Conclusion: This meta-analysis showed that telemedicine reduced overall and heart failure-related hospitalizations in chronic heart failure patients, suggesting its value in clinical management. However, it did not significantly affect mortality, hospital stay length, emergency visits, medication adherence, or quality of life. This suggests the need to optimize specific aspects of telemedicine, identify key components, and develop strategies for better treatment outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Grasping the genetic structure of marine fish populations is vital for comprehending species connectivity patterns and determining the appropriate spatiotemporal scales for conservation management strategies. Here, we analyzed the population genetics of the Orangefin Ponyfish (Photopectoralis bindus Valenciennes, 1835) by examining a portion of the gene coding for the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I. The aim was to evaluate the haplotype pattern, genetic structure, demographic history, as well as the influence of ecological connectivity through the Qiongzhou Strait on the distribution patterns of this species in the northern South China Sea and the Beibu Gulf. In total, 257 specimens yielded only 13 haplotypes, with the predominant haplotype present at all sampling locations. The analysis revealed a “star-like” haplotype pattern, indicating low levels of both haplotype and nucleotide diversity. Additionally, a small but significant genetic structure was observed between the coastal regions flanking the Leizhou Peninsula. These patterns in the haplotype network and genetic structure may be significantly influenced by contemporary currents, particularly through the connectivity of the Qiongzhou Strait. Tajima’s D and Fu’s Fs demonstrated pronouncedly negative values, along with a unimodal mismatch distribution, suggested a recent demographic expansion of Photopectoralis bindus during the late Pleistocene, likely influenced by fluctuations in sea levels.