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Pollen, as an important component of Eucommia ulmoides (EUP), is rich in nutrients and is receiving increasing attention. At present, there are no reports on research related to the chemical composition and quality standards of EUP, and there are significant quality differences and counterfeit phenomena in the market. This study used a UPLC-QTOF-MS system to identify 49 chemical components in EUP for the first time. In the second step, 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH)-HPLC antioxidant activity screening technology was used to identify the main active components of EUP, quercetin-3-O-sophoroside (QSH), quercetin-3-O-sambubioside (QSB), and quercetin 3-O-neohesperidoside (QNH), and their purification, preparation, and structure identification were carried out. Third, molecular docking was used to predict the activity of these components. Fourth, the intracellular ROS generation model of RAW264.7 induced by H2O2 was used to verify and evaluate the activity of candidate active ingredients to determine their feasibility as Q-markers. Finally, a quality control method for EUP was constructed using the three selected components as Q-markers. The identification of chemical components and the discovery, prediction, and confirmation of characteristic Q-markers in EUP provide important references for better research on EUP and the effective evaluation and control of its quality. This approach provides a new model for the quality control of novel foods or dietary supplements.

Early metastasis of pancreatic cancer (PC) leads to high mortality, and the underlying mechanism of metastasis remains unclear. Tumor necrosis factor superfamily member 9 (TNFSF9) is associated with poor prognosis in PC. Here, we investigated the effect of TNFSF9 on PC proliferation and apoptosis, and focused on the effect of TNFSF9 on PC metastasis and its potential mechanism. We found that TNFSF9 promotes PC metastasis in vivo and in vitro, and may be partially dependent on the Wnt/Snail signaling pathway. In addition, TNFSF9 also regulates the release of cytokines IL-10 and transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) in pancreatic cancer cells through Wnt signaling to induce the M2 polarization of macrophages and promote the migration of PC cells. Overall, our study found that TNFSF9 may directly promote PC metastasis or indirectly promote PC metastasis through macrophage M2 polarization. Our study provides a new costimulatory target for the treatment of PC.

Perfluorobutane ultrasound contrast agent as a new type of contrast agent has a good performance in the diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). This study aim to evaluate the accuracy and reliability of Perfluorobutane contrast-enhanced ultrasonography (P-CEUS) in the diagnosis of HCC with a systematic review and meta-analysis. Web of Science, EMBASE, Cochrane, Clinical Key, Wan Fang, CBM and CNKI databases were systematically searched and checked for studies using P-CEUS in HCC, from 2007 to 2020. Data necessary to construct 2 × 2 contingency tables were extracted from included studies. The QUADAS tool was utilized to assess the methodologic quality of the studies. Meta-analysis included data pooling, subgroup analyses, meta-regression and investigation of publication bias was comprehensively performed. Nine studies were included in this meta-analysis and the overall diagnostic accuracy in characterization of HCC was as follows: pooled sensitivity, 0.90 (95% confidence interval: 0.82–0.95); pooled specificity, 0.97 (0.93–0.98); pooled positive likelihood ratio, 27.2 (14.1 to − 52.3); and pooled negative likelihood ratio, 0.10 (0.06–0.18). The area under the comprehensive receiving operation characteristic curve was 0.98 (0.97–0.99). The sensitivity and specificity of P-CEUS are more valuable than other imaging techniques (such as computer tomography or magnetic resonance imaging). However, due to the large differences in the data samples collected in this study, statistical heterogeneity results. P-CEUS can significantly improve the diagnostic efficiency of previous contrast-enhanced ultrasound for HCC. PROSPERO registration number: PROSPERO (CRD42020200040).

Obesity is a growing epidemic worldwide, and it is also considered a major environmental factor contributing to the pathogenesis of inflammatory skin diseases, including psoriasis (PSO) and atopic dermatitis (AD). Moreover, obesity worsens the course and impairs the treatment response of these inflammatory skin diseases. Emerging evidence highlights that hypertrophied adipocytes and infiltrated immune cells secrete a variety of molecules, including fatty acids and adipokines, such as leptin, adiponectin, and a panel of cytokines/chemokines that modulate our immune system. In this review, we describe how adipose hypertrophy leads to a chronic low-grade inflammatory state in obesity and how obesity-related inflammatory factors are involved in the pathogenesis of PSO and/or AD. Finally, we discuss the potential role of antimicrobial peptides, mechanical stress and impairment of epidermal barrier function mediated by fast expansion, and dermal fat in modulating skin inflammation. Together, this review summarizes the current literature on how obesity is associated with the pathogenesis of PSO and AD, highlighting the potentially important but overlooked immunomodulatory role of adipose tissue in the skin.

(1) Objectives: To investigate the difference in prevalence of depression between patients with CL/P (cleft lip and/or palate) and analyze the possible demographic factors that affect the prevalence of depression in Chinese patients with CL/P. (2) Methods: Patients with CL (cleft lip only), CP (cleft palate), and CLP (cleft lip and palate) were included in the study group. Non-CL/P individuals were included in the control group. The Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) was used to screen the depression of Chinese patients with CL/P. The different proportions of different depression groups between the CL/P group and the control groups were tested by the Fisher–Freeman–Halton test and Bonferroni correction. The scores between the study groups and the control group were analyzed by one-way ANOVA. In the study groups, demographic and clinical data of the patients, including diagnosis (CL, CP, CLP), gender, age, the only child or not, and region were collected to analyze whether they were the possible factors affecting depression through one-way independent-samples t-test. Pearson correlation analysis was used to analyze the correlation between monthly family income and depression. (3) Results: 111 and 80 valid questionnaires were collected from the study and control groups, respectively. The mean PHQ-9 score of the study group (5.459 ± 6.082) was relatively higher than the control group (4.362 ± 3.384), and the difference in proportions of depression groups was statistically significant between the CL/P group and the control group (p = 0.01), especially in the mild depression (p < 0.05) and moderately severe depression groups (p < 0.05). Statistically significant differences in PHQ-9 scores were observed between the individuals of different genders (p = 0.036) and ages (p = 0.007) in patients with CL/P, the individuals who were the only child or not in patients with CL (p = 0.007), and the individuals of different ages in patients with CP (p = 0.016). (4) Conclusions: The prevalence of depression in Chinese patients with CL/P was different compared with those without CL/P, while gender, age, the only child or not, and region played significant roles in affecting depression psychology.

The aim of this study was to elucidate the mechanism of action of the insulin-like growth factor 2 mRNA-binding protein 1 (IGF2BP1) on the phenotype of the liver cancer stem cells (LCSCs). To gain ...

To explore the role of metastasis-related long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) signature for predicting the prognosis of clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) patients. Firstly, metastasis-associated genes were identified to establish a metastasis-related lncRNA signature by statistical analysis. Secondly, the ccRCC patients were grouped into high-risk or low-risk group according to the established signature, and the different pathways between the 2 groups were identified by gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA). Finally, investigations involving PCR, transwell migration and invasion assay were carried out to further confirm our findings. The metastasis-related lncRNA signature was successfully constructed according to 7-metastasis-related genes (ADAM12, CD44, IL6, TFPI2, TGF-β1, THBS2, TIMP3). The diagnostic efficacy and the clinically predictive capacity of the signature were evaluated. Most of the values of the area under the time‐dependent receiver‐operating characteristic (ROC) were greater than 0.70. The nomogram constructed by integrating clinical data and risk scores confirmed that the risk score calculated from our signature was a good prognosis predictor. GSEA analysis showed that some tumor-related pathways were enriched in the high-risk group, while metabolism-related pathways were enriched in the low-risk group. In carcinoma tissues, the SSR3-6, WISP1-2 were highly expressed, but the expression of UBAC2-6 was low there. Knocking down SSR3-6 decreased the ability of migration and invasion in ccRCC cells. In conclusion, we successfully constructed a metastasis-related lncRNA signature, which could accurately predict the survival and prognosis of ccRCC patients.

We performed in vitro and in vivo experiments to explore the role of protein kinase C-binding protein 1 (PICK1), an intracellular transporter involved in oxidative stress-related neuronal diseases, in sepsis-related acute kidney injury (AKI). Firstly, PCR, western blotting, and immunohistochemistry were used to observe the expression of PICK1 after lipopolysaccharide- (LPS-) induced AKI. Secondly, by inhibiting PICK1 in vivo and silencing PICK1 in vitro, we further explored the effect of PICK1 on AKI. Finally, the relationship between PICK1 and oxidative stress and the related mechanisms were explored. We found that the expression of PICK1 was increased in LPS-induced AKI models both in vitro and in vivo. PICK1 silencing significantly aggravated LPS-induced apoptosis, accompanied by ROS production in renal tubular epithelial cells. FSC231, a PICK1-specific inhibitor, aggravated LPS-induced kidney injury. Besides, NAC (N-acetylcysteine), a potent ROS scavenger, significantly inhibited the PICK1-silencing-induced apoptosis. In conclusion, PICK1 might protect renal tubular epithelial cells from LPS-induced apoptosis by reducing excessive ROS, making PICK1 a promising preventive target in LPS-induced AKI.

Downregulation of Carnitine palmitoyltransferase-2 (CPT2) has been shown to be highly associated with the progression of several cancers, but little known about its expression, biological functions and mechanisms in colorectal cancer (CRC).Bioinformatics analysis of The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) data sets was used to explore the expression of CPT2, the relationship between CPT2 expression and clinicopathologic features, as well as the overall survival of CRC. Cox's proportional hazards regression model was used to analyze independent prognostic factors of CRC. In vitro, CRC tissues were analyzed by RT-qPCR, IHC, IF and western blotting to verify CPT2 expression. Colony formation, CCK-8, cell cycle, apoptosis, transwell and wound healing assays were performed to examine the functions of CPT2 in CRC. In vivo, nude mouse xenograft experiment was used to further examine the effect of CPT2 on tumorigenesis. Furthermore, gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) was conducted to explore the downstream pathway of CPT2. The regulation of p53 pathway by CPT2 was verified by RT-qPCR and Western blotting.CPT2 expression was frequently downregulated in CRC and correlated with poor prognosis. Low CPT2 expression was significantly associated with age, lymph node metastasis, distant metastasis and TMN stage. Univariate and multivariate analysis indicated that low CPT2 expression was an independent prognostic factor for poorer overall survival. Functionally, overexpression of CPT2 in CRC cells induced growth suppression, cell cycle arrest at the G1 phase, enhanced apoptosis and reduced cell migration and invasion. Conversely, knockdown of CPT2 contributed to cell proliferation, migration and invasion, increased the proportion of S phase cells, decreased the proportion of G1 phase cells and inhibited apoptosis. Mechanistically, we found that CPT2 overexpression can increase p53 expression by activating p-p53, leading to p21, Bax, cleaved caspase-9, cleaved caspase-3 and cleaved PARP activation and Bcl2, MDM2 deactivation, thereby inhibiting tumor proliferation and promoting apoptosis. CPT2 knockdown yielded opposite results.These findings suggest that CPT2 may be a novel prognostic marker of CRC and downregulation of CPT2 can promote proliferation and inhibit apoptosis through p53 pathway in CRC. Strategies targeting CPT2 may be developed as therapies for CRC.

The effect of tumor necrosis factor superfamily member 9 (TNFSF9) on the metastasis of pancreatic cancer (PC) and the underlying mechanism remain unclear. We studied the expression of TNFSF9 in pancreatic cancer and its relationship with immune cells. We further explored the effect of TNFSF9 on pancreatic cancer metastasis by inducing macrophage polarization, and evaluated the expression of Src/FAK/p-Akt/IL-1β signals in macrophages after knocking down TNFSF9. The data shows that TNFSF9 expression is elevated in pancreatic cancer and is related to the poor prognosis of patients with pancreatic cancer. In addition, TNFSF9 may induce the M2 polarization of macrophages through Src/FAK/p-Akt/IL-1β signals, thereby promoting the migration of pancreatic cancer cells. In conclusion, our data reveals that TNFSF9 may become a predictive biomarker of pancreatic cancer and provides a new intervention target for the immunotherapy of pancreatic cancer.

Osteosarcoma is the most common primary malignant bone tumor; its standard treatment includes neoadjuvant chemotherapy combined with surgery. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy has significantly improved the 5-year survival and limb salvage rates in osteosarcoma since the 1870s. The survival rate of patients with limb salvage was not inferior to that of amputees, and therefore, limb salvage has become the main surgical option for patients with osteosarcoma. The 5-year survival rate for osteosarcoma has plateaued. However, new advances in limb salvage therapy in osteosarcoma, including adjuvant chemotherapy, ablation techniques, bone transport techniques, and computer navigation techniques, are now available. This report summarizes the recent advances in limb salvage therapy for osteosarcoma over the past decade.

Reaction between 4′-phenyl-terpyridine (L) and a Zn (II) salt (zinc sulfate heptahydrate) led to the formation of the complex {[Zn(μ2-O2SO2)L]·3H2O}n (1), which was obtained by hydrothermal synthesis. Its structure was characterized by elemental analysis, and IR and single-crystal X-ray diffraction. In 1, the Zn atom is envisaged as possessing distorted N3O2 irregular trigonal bipyramidal coordination geometries. The compound shows interesting photoluminescent properties in solid state, which are reported along with their TG-DTA thermal decomposition processes.

Microblogging is a popular social networking tool on which people tend to express their views and opinions. As such, the massive data on microblogging platforms mean abundant research value to social science researchers. To help them better analyze these data, a framework for understanding diverse user opinions and identifying complex relationships in the form of knowledge graphs is proposed in this paper. The two main tasks in the framework are sentiment analysis and knowledge graph construction. In the first task, the Skip-gram model is employed to obtain the word embedding matrix and the Bi-LSTM model is adopted to perform stance classification. It is found in this paper that Bi-LSTM showed better performance in classifying different sentiments, compared with Naive Bayes and SnowNLP. In the second task, relations between different users are extracted from their micro-blogs through recognizing specific strings, and on this basis user attitudes are integrated into the knowledge extracted. A knowledge graph of user opinions is constructed with the Neo4J tool. With the knowledge extracted by this framework, social science researchers can more easily observe rules of perspective communication and perform further analysis of the data.

In the era of big data, digital technologies are increasingly used to solve a range of problems, with the support of the Internet, Cloud computing and Internet of things. Human resource management is a traditional discipline that faces the challenge of ever-increasing diversity and complexity of requirements – something that can be solved by applying new technologies. This paper first introduces the development of big data technology and the importance of human resource management in enterprises and governments. Then, it proposes a novel solution for developing a macro human resource management service platform which not only helps collect data about human resources requirements from both enterprises and local governments but also provides support of data classification, analysis and prediction. This paper describes the solutions mentioned above in detail and discusses their evaluation in the development of a prototype system and a case study. The results show that new technologies have great potential in improving effectiveness and efficiency in traditional management disciplines like human resource management.

The noise source identification is an important issue in noise reduction and condition monitoring(CM) for machines in- site using microphone arrays. In this paper, we propose a new approach to optimize array configuration based on particles swarm optimization algorithm in order to improve noise source identification and condition monitoring performance. Two distinct optimized array configurations are designed under the certain conditions. Furthermore, an acoustic imaging equipment is developed to carry out experiments on transformer substation equipment and wind turbine generator, which demonstrate that the acoustic imaging system allows a high resolution in identifying main noise sources for noise reduction and abnormal noise sources for condition monitoring.

Advanced glycation end products (AGEs) are produced by non-enzymatic glycation or glycoxidation of proteins, lipids and nucleic acids. The bond of AGEs and the receptor of AGE (AGER) in a pro-oxidant environment could induce immune and inflammation reaction involved in progress of microvascular disease. Accumulated evidence warrant further study on AGE-AGER pathway and genetic susceptibility to hypertension (HT).We designed a two-stage association study to evaluate the association of AGER polymorphism and HT. In stage 1, seven tagSNPs were tested in 524 cases and 531 controls and the significant SNPs (P0.05) would enter into stage 2 including 807 cases and 869 controls. Furthermore, joint analysis was performed for all 2731 subjects including 1331 cases and 1400 controls, and meta-analysis was applied to evaluate combined estimations from the subgroups of stage 1 and stage 2.In stage 1, rs204994 had significant association with HT (P0.05) and enter stage 2. Neither joint analysis nor meta-analysis found statistical association of rs204994 with HT after adjusted for the covariates in the whole population. However, further stratification analysis found that rs204994 was significantly associated with HT in50years and ≥50years groups, ORs (95%CI) of dominant model were 1.623 (1.054-2.500) and 0.721 (0.546-0.952) respectively. No significant correlation was found between blood pressure and the polymorphisms of rs204994.Our data suggests that age might modulate the genetic effects of variation of rs204994 in AGER on HT and further replications in other populations and functional studies should be warranted.

Serum C-reactive protein (CRP) and genetic variation of CRP gene have been reported as a strong, independent predictor of myocardial infarction and stroke. But there is rare association evidence of CRP genetic variation and hypertension (HT).A community-based case-control study including 1331 cases with HT and 1400 controls was used to evaluate the association of tagSNPs covered CRP gene, CRPP1 gene and 40kb upstream with HT in a Chinese Han population. Haplotypes and stratification analysis were applied to further evaluate relationships between the screened SNPs and HT and general linear model (GLM) was applied to compare blood pressure levels between genotypes.In stage 1, five SNPs had positive association with HT (P0.05) and entered stage 2 and two SNPs rs876537 and rs10737175 polymorphisms showed significant association with HT in joint sample. Haplotype analysis showed that comparing with common haplotype T-C which was constructed by rs6677719 and rs10737175, haplotype T-T significantly associated with HT after adjusted covariates. Stratification analysis found significant associations of HT for rs876537, rs2808630, rs6677719 and rs10737175 in ≥50years group, rs876537, rs10737175 in female, rs876537 and rs10737175 in non-smoking and non-drinking populations as well as rs2808630 in non-drinking population. Furthermore, quantitative trait analysis indicated significant differences of SBP and DBP between the genotypes of rs10737175, rs876537 and rs2808630 in non-treatment hypertensive cases and control population.The findings of this study support that CRP gene polymorphisms have significant association with genetic susceptibility of HT and quantitative traits of blood pressure.

In this paper, a novel optimization method based on the particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm for the array design is proposed. The PSO is introduced to search for the optimal microphone distribution on the Archimedes spiral line with the minimum sidelobe level and the narrow mainlobe width. Numerical simulation show the better performance of the array reconfiguration designed by means of PSO algorithm. Experiments in the semi-anechoic room demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.

The Infrasonic Monitoring Network (IMN) in China is under construction to detect, identify and located the signals generated by natural disasters. Presently, fifteen sensors are operational and transmitting real time data to Central Data Centre (CDC) in Beijing. Each sensor station is composed of one infrasonic sensor, one humidity and temperature sensor, one digital sampling and transmitting device, which collects and delivers real-time continuous infrasonic, temperature, humidity, GPS raw data to CDC. IMN is designed as a robust sensor network optimized for rapid deployment and provides long-term information monitoring; the system supports data acquisition with GMT time and is remotely configurable. Its high performance has been demonstrated in the initial deployment experience and preliminary analysis of sampling data.

Accurate and fast localization of multiple sources is an important issue in many applications such as fault diagnosis. The well-known steered response power (SRP) method is widely used in the source localization but exhibits high computational expense. Therefore, this paper investigates a coarse-to-fine steered response power source localization algorithm to speed up the localization process. The detailed comparisons with previous algorithms are made to demonstrate that the proposed scheme is much faster, robust, and accurate. In addition, the algorithm is implemented in real time based on CUDA frame (Compute Unified Device Architecture) using GPU with high-parallel execution.

A new method has been developed to perform a fantastic diagnosis monitoring for different kinds of machines, including small as computer, shaver, hand phone, or large as 4000hp engine, slow as a walking, or fast as flying in sky, based on acoustic imaging technology with a microphone array measurement system. With it noise field of machine can be analyzed from its sound image coupled in video in door and out door, even in some extent reverberated space. It is particularly useful to analysis large machine with multi noise source and low noise level machine. Comparing to traditional vibration measurement, this method can locate the diagnosis' center and separate every source with 15dB sub-lobe suppression.

In recent years, there happened several large earthquakes which have made very serious destruction to local people and society. Among these terrible events' gestation, occurring, and developing, infrasound waves radiated in these processes were often observed. According to the signals received by monitoring sensors, the infrasound sources should be located accurately by an infrasound microphone array. The array was constructed by several sensors of InSAS2008 developed by IACAS, distributed in the North China area. In near future, the sensors will be constructed in all China. Data of signals received by this network could be processed by some methods such as Progressive Multi Channel Correlation (PMCC), sound imaging, rainbow algorithm, etc., to get useful information of nature events. Depending upon this work, some natural events, such as earthquake, debris flow, tsunami, volcanic eruption, etc., could be forecasted under certain conditions, or get more knowledge of them.