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Purpose To investigated the changes of gut microbiome and fecal metabolome during anti-tuberculosis chemotherapy with isoniazid (H)-rifampin (R)-pyrazinamide (Z)-ethambutol (E). Patients and methods (1) In this study, we recruited 168 stool specimens from 49 healthy volunteers without M. tuberculosis (Mtb), 30 healthy volunteers with latently infected by Mtb, 41 patients with active tuberculosis (ATB), 28 patients with 2-month HRZE treatment and 20 patients with 2-month HRZE followed by 4-month HR treatment. (2) We used 16S rRNA sequencing and an untargeted Liquid Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer-based metabolomics to investigate the changes of gut microbiome and the alteration of fecal metabolome, respectively, during anti-TB chemotherapy. Results Mtb infection can reduce the diversity of intestinal flora of ATB patients and change their taxonomic composition, while the diversity of intestinal flora of ATB patients were restored during anti-TB chemotherapy. Especially, family Veillonellacea and Bateroidaceae and their genera Veillonella and Bacteroides significantly increased in the gut microbiota during anti-TB chemotherapy. Additionally, Mtb infection dynamically regulates fecal metabolism in ATB patients during anti-TB chemotherapy. Interestingly, the altered abundance of fecal metabolites correlated with the altered gut microbiota, especially the change of gut Clostridium, Bacteroides and Prevotella was closely related to the change of fecal metabolites such as Trans-4-Hydroxy-L-proline and Genistein caused by Mtb infection or anti-TB chemotherapy. Conclusion Anti-TB chemotherapy with HRZE can disrupt both gut microbiotas and metabolome in ATB patients. Some specific genera and metabolites are depleted or enriched during anti-TB chemotherapy. Therefore, revealing potential relevance between gut microbiota and anti-TB chemotherapy will provide potential biomarkers for evaluating the therapeutic efficacy in ATB patients.

Melamine (Mel) is widespread in food and the environment. The effects of Mel on calcium oxalate (CaOx) crystallization and phase transformation were studied in aqueous solution and synthetic urine ...

Step-scheme (S-scheme) photocatalysts have been proposed for highly efficient charge separation and strong redox activity in the photocatalysis field. Here, we reported a facile strategy to obtain the S-scheme heterojunction composite TiO

The outbreak of infant milk powder poisoning in China attracted worldwide attention. The investigations found that the real culprit of this incident was melamine (Mel), which induced the formation of kidney stones. However, little is known about the formation mechanism of infant stones, not to mention the preventive and therapeutic drugs. Here, through thermodynamic and kinetic tests, simulation in vitro and animal experiments, and multidisciplinary analysis and verification, we found that the formation of this kidney stone is a rate-controlled nano-scale supramolecular layered assembly process: Mel, uric acid (UA) and a small amount of H2O combine through hydrogen bonds to form a planar network supramolecular structure; the planar structures self-assemble layer-by-layer to form ellipsoidal nanocrystals through π–π stacking interactions, van der Waals force, hydrophilic/hydrophobic interaction, etc.; the small nanocrystals gradually grow and aggregate concentrically to form ellipsoidal Mel–UA stones under the control of the matrix. Based on the above process, we screen out an effective inhibitor and eliminator for stones, potassium citrate (K3Cit), which works through both hydrogen bonding and alkalinity. This work solves the most challenging conundrum left by the Mel incident and blazes a trail for the prevention and treatment of kidney stone disease.

Ag+, extensively used in our daily life, has caused serious harm to human health and ecological environment, so highly selective detection and accurate quantification of Ag+ are critical. Herein, we report a novel water-soluble dual-element composite doped carbon quantum dots, N,S-CDs, then constructed them into fluorescent probes for Ag+ detection. Carbon source ammonium citrate (AC) could achieve nitrogen doping without additional nitrogen source, inorganic sulfur source sodium thiosulfate was used for rapid sulfur doping, the N,S-CDs emitting dazzling blue fluorescence were obtained through a rapid hydrothermal process. The synthesized N,S-CDs had an average particle size of 3.25 nm, with high quantum yield (QY = 36.8%) and excitation-independent fluorescence properties. Under optimized conditions, the fluorescent probe constructed by N,S-CDs could detect Ag+ with high sensitivity and fast response, showing a good piecewise linear relationship (0.1–700 μM). In addition, the fluorescent probe exhibited remarkable anti-interference ability and reusability, which is practical and feasible, and has broad application prospects in biological and environmental sample detection.

Background Consistent evidence has shown excess mortality associated with cold temperature, but some important details of the cold–mortality association (e.g. slope and threshold) have not been adequately investigated and few studies focused on the cold effect in high-altitude areas of developing countries. We attempted to quantify the cold effect on mortality, identify the details, and evaluate effect modification in the distinct subtropical plateau monsoon climate of Yuxi, a high plateau region in southwest China. Methods From daily mortality and meteorological data during 2009–2014, we used a quasi-Poisson model combined with a “natural cubic spline–natural cubic spline” distributed lag non-linear model to estimate the temperature–mortality relationship and then a simpler “hockey-stick” model to investigate the cold effect and details. Results Cold temperature was associated with increased mortality, and the relative risk of cold effect (1st relative to 10th temperature percentile) on non-accidental, cardiovascular, and respiratory mortality for lag 0–21 days was 1.40 (95% confidence interval: 1.19–1.66), 1.61 (1.28–2.02), and 1.13 (0.78–1.64), respectively. A 1 °C decrease below a cold threshold of 9.1 °C (8th percentile) for lags 0–21 was associated with a 7.35% (3.75–11.09%) increase in non-accidental mortality. The cold–mortality association was not significantly affected by cause-specific mortality, gender, age, marital status, ethnicity, occupation, or previous history of hypertension. Conclusions There is an adverse impact of cold on mortality in Yuxi, China, and a temperature of 9.1 °C is an important cut-off for cold-related mortality for residents.

We herein report the first attempt to engineer an innovative bio-tissue network signal amplifier transduced by a novel natural N-doped carbon material. In order to prevent kidney uric acid (UA) stone disease in advance, based on the excretion of most UA through the kidney, as well as the high nitrogen content in animal tissues, and considering the biocompatibility, a high-N-doped carbon was firstly prepared by in situ carbonization and chemical activation method with the mouse kidney as precursor. The activated mouse kidney transformed carbon (AMKC) had a large specific surface area and network hierarchical pore structure, and played the biological transduction for signal enrichment to vastly increase sensitivity to detect UA, which may be due to the multi-circuitry performance of bio-tissue. Under the optimized conditions, AMKC as a network signal amplifier expressed a linear relationship to UA concentrations from 0.5 to 300 μM, with a high sensitivity of 0.1195 μA μM−1 and a low detection limit of 0.15 μM (3σ). Furthermore, the bio-tissue multi-circuitry signal amplifier exhibited a high selectivity for UA even with interference of other biological inorganic salts and small organic molecules, which has broad application prospects in clinical diagnosis and detection.

OBJECTIVEIntracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) is associated with a poor prognosis and high mortality, but no study has elucidated the association between glycemic variability (GV) and functional outcome in ICH. The authors of this study aimed to determine whether GV is a predictor of 30-day functional outcome in ICH patients.METHODSThe study recruited 366 patients with first-ever acute-onset ICH in the period during 2014 and 2015. Fasting blood glucose was assessed on admission and with 7-day continuous monitoring. Glycemic variability was calculated and expressed by the standard deviation (GluSD) and coefficient of variation (GluCV). Patients were divided into groups of those with diabetes mellitus (DM), stress hyperglycemia (SHG), and normal glucose (NG). Functional outcome was measured using the modified Rankin Scale.RESULTSThe numbers of patients with DM, SHG, and NG were 108 (29.5%), 127 (34.7%), and 131 (35.8%), respectively. As compared with the DM patients, those with SHG had higher mortality (29.9% vs 15.7%, p < 0.05) and a poorer prognosis (64.6% vs 52.8%, p < 0.05). Poor prognosis was associated with both high GluSD (OR 1.54, 95% CI 1.19–1.99) and high GluCV (1.05, 1.02–1.09), especially in the DM group. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was greater for the GluSD (OR 0.929, 95% CI 0.902–0.956) and the GluCV (0.932, 0.906–0.958) model than the original model (0.860, 0.823–0.898) in predicting a poor outcome.CONCLUSIONSStress hyperglycemia may be associated with increased mortality and a poor outcome in ICH, and increased GV may be independently associated with a poor outcome, particularly in ICH patients with DM.

Sleep habits are associated with stroke in western populations, but this relation has been rarely investigated in China. Moreover, the differences among stroke subtypes remain unclear. This study aimed to explore the associations of total stroke, including ischemic and hemorrhagic type, with sleep habits of a population in southern China. We performed a case-control study in patients admitted to the hospital with first stroke and community control subjects. A total of 333 patients (n = 223, 67.0%, with ischemic stroke; n = 110, 23.0%, with hemorrhagic stroke) and 547 controls were enrolled in the study. Participants completed a structured questionnaire to identify sleep habits and other stroke risk factors. Least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (Lasso) and multiple logistic regression were performed to identify risk factors of disease. Incidence of stroke, and its subtypes, was significantly associated with snorting/gasping, snoring, sleep duration, and daytime napping. Snorting/gasping was identified as an important risk factor in the Lasso logistic regression model (Lasso’ β = 0.84), and the result was proven to be robust. This study showed the association between stroke and sleep habits in the southern Chinese population and might help in better detecting important sleep-related factors for stroke risk.

The existing definitions of metabolic syndrome (MetS) may not be fully appropriate for the Shantou population because of ethnic and regional differences. We sought to establish a 95% multivariate medical reference range (MMRR) model for diagnosing MetS in Shantou adults and to evaluate the prevalence of MetS by the MMRR, JCDCG (the Chinese Guidelines) and International Diabetes Federation (IDF) criteria. A total of 4,580 participants were recruited in Shantou, southern China. We developed a MMRR model based on the combinatorial indicatrixes method for three categorized indicatrixes. According to the developed MMRR criteria, men (women) in Shantou have MetS by meeting 3 or more of the following: waist circumference ≥89 (81) cm; triglycerides level ≥1.73 (1.64) mmol/L; high-density lipoprotein cholesterol level ≤1.07 (1.05) mmol/L; blood pressure ≥138/89 (136/85) mmHg; and fasting plasma glucose ≥5.8 (5.7) mmol/L. The agreement of the MMRR with JCDCG and IDF criteria was “substantial” (both κ > 0.68), but the recommended reference values and proportion of individual components of MetS defined by the 3 criteria differed. The population-based MMRR criteria may be appropriate for diagnosing MetS in Shantou population and the model might be useful for generalization to other geographic regions.

Background Consistent evidence has shown that high diurnal temperature range (DTR) is associated with excess mortality, but little is known about the subgroups in the association. We aimed to identify the effect modifiers, including individual characteristics and specific mortality causes, of the association in a high plateau region with large DTR and extensive ethnic minorities in China. Methods We conducted a case-only analysis in 77,319 non-accidental deaths in Yuxi during 2007–2014, and evaluated the effect modifiers of the association of high DTR exposure and mortality. All non-accidental deaths were divided into cardiovascular, respiratory, and “other” causes. High DTR days were defined as ≥ 90th percentile of DTR. Results Risk of mortality on high DTR days was associated with age 75–84 years (odds ratio 1.07; 95% confidence interval 1.01–1.14) and ≥ 85 years (1.16; 1.08–1.24) as compared with age ≤ 64 years. The risk of the association was less for the Dai ethnic minority than Chinese Han (0.85; 0.75–0.96). Farmers (1.08; 1.03–1.14) and people with hypertension (1.09; 1.02–1.16) showed greater risk of dying on high DTR days than non-farmers and people without hypertension, respectively. Compared with “other” mortality causes, the risk was greater with cardiovascular causes (1.09; 1.04–1.15), notably ischemic heart disease (1.16; 1.08–1.25) and myocardial infarction (1.18; 1.08–1.29) in heart disease (1.11; 1.04–1.17), and ischemic stroke (1.17; 1.06–1.28) in stroke deaths (1.09; 1.03–1.15), as well as chronic bronchitis (1.22; 1.11–1.33) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (1.12; 1.05–1.20) in respiratory deaths (1.11; 1.04–1.18). Conclusions Individual characteristics and specific mortality causes can modify the association of high DTR and mortality. This knowledge may help in better targeting the vulnerable populations and developing more effective intervention strategies.