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Montelukast, cysteinyl leukotriene receptor 1 (CysLT1R) antagonist, is used clinically for patients with asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases (COPD), and allergic rhinitis. It has been reported that CysLT1R antagonists could reduce the risks of cardiovascular diseases in animal studies. Cardiac fibrosis is one of the major causes of heart failure. But little is known about the role of Montelukast in cardiac fibrosis and its underlying mechanism. In transverse aortic constriction (TAC) mice, Montelukast improved cardiac pumping function and inhibited cardiac fibrosis by down-regulation of the proteins related to the fibrosis, such as connective tissue growth factor (CTGF), Transforming Growth Factor β (TGF-β), and Alpha-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA). Montelukast reduced cell proliferation and collagen production in neonatal cardiac fibroblasts (CFs) with the pretreatment of 20% serum, while down-regulating the expression of TGF-β, CTGF and α-SMA. Molecules docking methods estimated a high affinity of Montelukast to Apelin receptor (APJ) and an effective chemical structure for Montelukast binding APJ. In Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells with stable overexpressing APJ, Montelukast inhibited forskolin (1 μM)-mediated cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP) production and extracellular signal-regulated kinase1/2 (ERK1/2) phosphorylation, while these effects were reversed by pertussis toxin (PTX) pretreatment. APJ silence disrupted the effects of Montelukast in CFs pretreatment by serum 20%. So we concluded that Montelukast inhibited cardiac fibrosis due presumably to the coupling to the APJ-mediated Gi signaling pathway, which may be a promising therapeutic target for cardiac fibrosis.

Chinese national opera has a history of more than 100 years. From "Sparrow and Children" created by Li Jinhui in the 1920s, it is known as the embryonic form of Chinese national opera. Then Chinese opera has experienced five periods of development. This paper will sort out the development of Chinese national opera, focus on the female characters described in opera according to the historical period of combing, division, and select the most representative of the four opera heroine Xi er, celery, Jiang Jie, Aiguri, to analyze its musical image. The conclusion of this research is of practical significance to promote the und

In this paper, a new transformation function was proposed for finding global minimizer of discrete optimization problems. We proved that under some general assumptions the new transformation function possesses the properties of both the tunneling functions and the filled functions. Only one parameter was included in the proposed function, and it can be adjusted easily in the realization. Numerical results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Background: The brain is a metastatic organ that is most prone to lung adenocarcinoma (LAC). However, the prognosis of patients with brain metastasis remains very poor. In this study, we evaluated the efficacy of icotinib plus whole brain radiation therapy (WBRT) for treating patients with brain metastasis from epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-mutated LAC. Methods: All patients received standard WBRT administered to the whole brain in 30 Gy in 10 daily fractions. Each patient was also instructed to take 125 mg icotinib thrice per day beginning from the first day of the WBRT. After completing the WBRT, maintenance icotinib was administered until the disease progressed or intolerable adverse effects were observed. Cranial progression-free survival (CPFS) and overall survival (OS) times were the primary endpoints. Results: A total of 43 patients were enrolled in this study. Two patients (4.7%) presented a complete response (CR), whereas 20 patients (46.5%) presented a partial response (PR). The median CPFS and OS times were 11.0 and 15.0 months, respectively. The one-year CPFS rate was 40.0% for the patients harboring EGFR exon 19 deletion and 16.7% for the patients with EGFR exon 21 L858R (P=0.027). Conclusions: The concurrent administration of icotinib and WBRT exhibited favorable effects on the patients with brain metastasis. EGFR exon 19 deletion was predictive of a long CPFS following icotinib plus WBRT.

This paper considers discrete global optimization problems. A new transformation function for finding global minimizer on discrete global optimization problems is given in this paper. We prove that under some general assumptions the new transformation function possesses the properties of both the tunnelling functions and the filled functions. New transformation function contains only one parameter and can be easily adjusted in the realization of the proposed algorithm. Moreover, the paper intends to obtain promising computational results comparing with filled function method, and shows the efficiency of the transformation function method.

SCY1-like 1-binding protein 1 (SCYL1BP1) is a newly identified transcriptional activator domain containing protein with many unknown biological functions. Recently emerging evidence has revealed that it is a novel regulator of the p53 pathway, which is very important for the development of human cancer. However, the effects of SCYL1BP1 on human lung squamous carcinoma cell biological behavior remain poorly understood. In this study, we present evidence that SCYL1BP1 can promote the degradation of MDM2 protein and further inhibit the G1/S transition of lung squamous carcinoma cell lines. Functional assays found that reintroduction of SCYL1BP1 into lung squamous carcinoma cell lines significantly inhibited cell proliferation, migration, invasion and tumor formation in nude mice, suggesting strong tumor suppressive function of SCYL1BP1 in lung squamous carcinoma. Taken together, our data suggest that the interaction of SCYL1BP1/MDM2 could accelerate MDM2 degradation, and may function as an important tumor suppressor in lung squamous carcinomas.

The image binarization of laser direct marking Data Matrix symbols on metal surface is a key procedure during recognition. Contrast and light uniformity of the symbols is greatly affected by the uneven illumination and reflection of the parts. To avoid the limitation of present binarized methods, an adaptive binarization method composed of Otsu method and Nearest neighbor pixels contributing threshold method is proposed. It takes global and local gray information into consideration, as well as the distribution of gray gradient. Experimental results show that the proposed method has a higher recognition rate and reliability.

The cholesterol has been reported to be associated with cancer development. The aim of our study was to investigate the serum cholesterol level (TC) in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients and their association with clinicopathologic parameters and the prognosis. The serum cholesterol levels were evaluated in 259 resected NSCLC patients and were correlated with clinicopathologic variables including age, gender, tumor size, regional lymph node metastasis, disease-free survival time and overall survival time. Preoperative serum TC level was significantly associated with gender (P=0.001), smoking history (P=0.016), tumor differentiation (P=0.027), pT stage (P

Breast cancer is one of the most common malignant diseases in women. The main cause of death from breast cancer is its metastases at distant sites in the body. Interleukin-33 (IL-33) is a cytokine of the IL-1 family and found overexpressed in various cancers. The aim of the present study was to explore the association of serum IL-33 and sST2 with breast cancer. Here, the serum levels of Interleukin-33 (IL-33) and sST2 were found significantly higher in breast cancer patients than in healthy volunteers. Serum levels of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), metalloproteinase-11 (MMP-11), and platelet-derived growth factor-C (PDGF-C) were also greater in breast cancer patients compared to healthy volunteers. We found that serum levels of IL-33 or sST2 were positively correlated with the serum levels of VEGF, MMP-11, and PDGF-C. Moreover, breast cancer dataset downloaded from The Cancer Genome Atlas showed that patients with higher level of MMP-11 or PDGF-C expression had shorter survival time than those with lower level of these proteins. In conclusion, IL-33 and sST2 may serve as noninvasive diagnosis markers for breast cancer. IL-33 and sST2 were significantly associated with MMP-11 or PDGF-C which indicated poor prognosis of breast cancer patients.

A method of CO laser frequency stability measurement is proposed, based on the molecular laser magnetic resonance (LMR) spectrum, which can be used to measure the linewidths of molecular LMR spectra and their changes. The data were treated by the Allan variance method. A series of CO laser frequency stability measurements were obtained from 0.1 s to 1000 s in the time domain. The frequency stability was fitted to a power law function. The expressions of frequency stability were found for a stabilized and a free-running CO laser in the frequency domain.

A very sensitive method for the determination of pressure broadening coefficients of molecular spectral lines has been developed using the technique of intracavity laser magnetic resonance (LMR). For 15 N 16 O, the pressure broadening coefficients of the fundamental band line P 2 ( 5 2 ) were measured at room temperature. The results are: γ 0 15N16O−14N16O =0.085 cm −1 /atm, γ 0 15N16O−N2 =0.037 cm −1 /atm, γ 0 15N16O−He -0.024 cm −1 /atm.

To evaluate the long-term effects of video-assisted thoracoscopic thymectomy for myasthenia gravis (MG).Eighteen MG patients, 7 males and 11 females, aged 33.4 +/- 9.4 (19 - 48), underwent video-assisted thoracoscopic thymectomy by the same surgical group from November 2001 to May 2005. Right side access was used in 14 of them, left side approach was used in 2, and bilateral approach in 1 of them. The thymus and fatty tissue in the front mediastinum were resected. The medical records were reviewed and telephone survey was conducted to understand the effects. The mean follow-up time was 26.4 +/- 10.9 months.VATS was successfully conducted except in 1 case. The bleeding volume was less than 50 ml. The average chest tube drainage time was 2.1 +/- 1.2 days, and the mean hospitalization day was 6.3 +/- 3.1 days. Three of the 18 patients needed temporary mechanical ventilation less than 72 hours, and 2 needed reintubation due to either myasthenic or cholinergic crises. Nine of the 18 patients achieved complete relief (50%) and 6 of them (33.3%) had their symptoms greatly improved, and the symptoms of one case remained stable (5.6%), and the overall effective rate was 83.3%.Video-assisted thoracoscopic thymectomy is a safe and effective method for treatment of myasthenia gravis with satisfactory long-term outcomes.

The technique of laser magnetic resonance was used to investigate the 3(rho) 1- 3(rho) 0 transition within the 6s6p 3(Rho) excited states of atomic mercury. The isotope shifts of Hg in the 3(rho) 1-3(rho) 0 transition were directly determined. The results are: (Delta) (nu) IS198,200 equals -26.2 +/- 3.0 MHz, (Delta) (nu) IS198,202 equals -55.8 +/- 3.0 MHz, (Delta) (nu) IS198,204 equals -82.6 +/- 3.0 MHz. Their results are more accurate than those of previous studies.© (1992) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.