Synergistic combined effect between CD40-1C>T and CTLA-4+6230G>A polymorphisms in Graves' disease

The aim of this study was to investigate whether a genetic combined effect exists between CD40-1C>T and CTLA-4+6230G>A (CT60) polymorphisms and whether the combined effect renders susceptibility to Graves' disease (GD). We recruited 260 patients with GD and 248 healthy controls. Single nucleotide polymorphisms were genotyped by polymerase chain reaction-high resolution melting. Genetic polymorphisms related to GD were identified, levels of thyroid stimulating hormone receptor antibodies (TRAb) were measured, and genetic interactions were assessed by logistic regression analysis. Significant difference in allele and genotype frequency of CD40-1C>T polymorphism was observed between the patients and control subjects (P<0.001, 0.002 respectively). As for CTLA-4+6230G>A polymorphism, significant difference was observed only in allele frequencies between the patient and control groups (P=0.014). Moreover, a significant combined effect was presented in CD40-1C>T and CTLA-4+6230G>A polymorphism (P=0.020), and all, but one, combination CC-genotype of CD40-1C>T and GG-genotype of CTLA-4+6230G>A polymorphism has 54% lower risk of GD development than subjects with the CC and GG genotypes (OR=0.46, 95% CI=0.25-0.84). In newly onset GD group, neither single SNP (CD40-1C>T or CTLA-4+6230G>A polymorphism) nor their combined effect was showed a significant association with TRAb concentration (all P>0.05). Our findings suggest a possible additive combined effect between CD40-1C>T and CTLA4+6230G>A polymorphisms in the development of GD.

A multi-center study on the prophylactic application of antibiotics in aseptic operations

To understand the application of antibacterial agents in aseptic operations and to provide evidence for their rational use and management, the antibiotic use statuses of six types of aseptic operations (306 cases from 4 tertiary hospitals) were retrospectively analyzed. Of 312 patients, 306 (65.08%) were treated with antibacterial agents in the perioperative period. Four categories of antibiotics including cephalosporins, penicillins, nitroimidazoles, and fluoroquinolones were administered (descending sequence). Administration time: preoperative >2 h, 15 cases; preoperative 0.5-2 h, 20 cases; postoperative: 265 cases. Drug withdrawal time: postoperative 1-3 days: 33 cases; 3-7 days: 255 cases; 7-15 days: 12 cases. The prophylactic use of antibacterial agents in aseptic operations suffers from non-strict mastered medication indication, improper drug selection, aimless drug combinations, inappropriate administration timing, and over long medication duration.

Severe influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 infection induces thymic atrophy through activating innate CD8(+)CD44(hi) T cells by upregulating IFN-γ

Thymic atrophy has been described as a consequence of infection by several pathogens including highly pathogenic avian influenza virus and is induced through diverse mechanisms. However, whether influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 infection induces thymic atrophy and the mechanisms underlying this process have not been completely elucidated. Our results show that severe infection of influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 led to progressive thymic atrophy and CD4⁺CD8⁺ double-positive (DP) T-cells depletion due to apoptosis. The viruses were present in thymus, where they activated thymic innate CD8⁺CD44^hi single-positive (SP) thymocytes to secrete a large amount of IFN-γ. Milder thymic atrophy was observed in innate CD8⁺ T-cell-deficient mice (C57BL/6J). Neutralization of IFN-γ could significantly rescue the atrophy, but peramivir treatment did not significantly alleviate thymic atrophy. In this study, we demonstrated that thymic innate CD8⁺CD44^hi SP T-cells have critical roles in influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 infection-induced thymic atrophy through secreting IFN-γ. This exceptional mechanism might serve as a target for the prevention and treatment of thymic atrophy induced by influenza A(H1N1)pdm09.

Opioid receptor trafficking and interaction in nociceptors

Opiate analgesics such as morphine are often used for pain therapy. However, antinociceptive tolerance and dependence may develop with long-term use of these drugs. It was found that μ-opioid receptors can interact with δ-opioid receptors, and morphine antinociceptive tolerance can be reduced by blocking δ-opioid receptors. Recent studies have shown that μ- and δ-opioid receptors are co-expressed in a considerable number of small neurons in the dorsal root ganglion. The interaction of μ-opioid receptors with δ-opioid receptors in the nociceptive afferents is facilitated by the stimulus-induced cell-surface expression of δ-opioid receptors, and contributes to morphine tolerance. Further analysis of the molecular, cellular and neural circuit mechanisms that regulate the trafficking and interaction of opioid receptors and related signalling molecules in the pain pathway would help to elucidate the mechanism of opiate analgesia and improve pain therapy.

LINKED ARTICLES

This article is part of a themed section on Opioids: New Pathways to Functional Selectivity. To view the other articles in this section visit http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/bph.2015.172.issue-2.

Meta-analysis of the association of dermatomyositis and polymyositis with cancer

BACKGROUND

Although some features of dermatomyositis (DM) and polymyositis (PM) have been reported as possible prognostic indicators for cancer development, previous studies were small in size and were unable to establish a definitive relationship between neoplasms and DM and PM.

OBJECTIVES

To evaluate risk factors for developing malignancies in patients with DM and PM.

METHODS

Meta-analysis of the studies reported in the literature was performed to unveil risk factors for developing cancer among patients with DM and PM. The included studies were either cohort or retrospective case-control studies with information on cancer status. Risk for malignancy was determined as the odds ratio (OR) or weighted mean difference (WMD) with a 95% confidence interval (CI), determined by fixed and random effects models. Stata 10.0 software was used to identify possible publication bias.

RESULTS

Twenty studies with 380 patients and 1575 controls were included in the analysis. The factors that may increase the risk of cancer in patients with DM and PM were older age (WMD 11·41, 95% CI 9·84-12·98), male sex (OR 1·92, 95% CI 1·49-2·48), cutaneous necrosis (OR 5·52, 95% CI 3·49-8·74) and dysphagia (OR 2·41, 95% CI 1·50-3·86), whereas those that may provide protection against cancer included arthritis (OR 0·38, 95% CI 0·24-0·61) and interstitial lung disease (OR 0·32, 95% CI 0·20-0·51).

CONCLUSIONS

Our data suggest that age, sex, cutaneous necrosis, dysphagia, arthritis and lung complications may influence susceptibility to cancer in patients with DM and PM.

Immunolocalization of NGF and its receptors in ovarian surface epithelium of the wild ground squirrel during the breeding and nonbreeding seasons

The ovarian surface epithelium (OSE) plays an important role in normal ovarian physiology. During each reproductive cycle, the OSE takes part in the cyclical ovulatory ruptures and repair. The aim of this study was to investigate the immunolocalization of nerve growth factor (NGF) and its receptors, tyrosine kinase A (TrkA) and p75, in the OSE cells of the wild ground squirrels during the breeding and nonbreeding seasons. There were marked variations in ovarian weight and size between the breeding and the nonbreeding seasons. Histologically, cuboidal cells and squamous cells were identified in the OSE of both seasons. Yet, stronger immunostaining of NGF, TrkA and p75 were observed in cuboidal cells and squamous cells in the breeding season as compared to the nonbreeding season. In addition, plasma gonadotropin concentrations were higher in the breeding season than in the nonbreeding season, suggesting that the expression patterns of NGF, TrkA and p75 in the OSE were correlated with changes in plasma gonadotropins. These findings suggested that NGF and its receptor TrkA and p75 may be involved in the regulation of seasonal changes in the OSE of wild ground squirrel.

Mycobacterium tuberculosis MPT64 stimulates the activation of murine macrophage modulated by IFN-γ

BACKGROUND AND AIMS

MPT64, a major target of cell-mediated immunity in tuberculosis, is proposed to be a promising candidate for novel vaccines and diagnostic tests; it also involves in virulence mechanism of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In this study, we investigated the effect of MPT64 on activation of RAW264.7 macrophage, and explored the possible mechanism.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

MPT64 protein was prepared by cloning, expression and purification from Escherichia (E.) coli. Cytokines (IL-1β, IL-6, IL-10 and TNF-α) expression in RAW264.7 macrophage induced by MPT64 was evaluated by xMAP technology. Cell counting kit (CCK8) assay was employed to detect the viability of MPT64-treated macrophage; moreover, flow cytometric analysis and Western Blot analysis were used to measure the effect of MPT64 on apoptosis in macrophage and cleaved caspase-3 expression respectively.

RESULTS

MPT64 significantly promoted the levels of IL-1β, IL-6, IL-10 and TNF-α; pretreatment of MPT64 followed by IFN-γ stimulation further up-regulated IL-6 production (p < 0.01, compared with MPT64-treated group). In CCK8 assay, significantly increased absorbance of MPT64-treated macrophage suggested that cell viability might be enhanced. Additionally, MPT64 modulated the apoptosis of RAW264.7 macrophage partly through caspase-3 pathway.

CONCLUSIONS

MPT64 activated RAW264.7 macrophage to secrete IL-1β, IL-6, IL-10 and TNF-α; it might down-regulate apoptosis of macrophage partially via caspase-3 pathway. Furthermore, the effect of MPT64 on RAW264.7 macrophage could be modulated by IFN-γ, and co-stimulation of MPT64 with IFN-γ was conducive to the host immune, which might be applied for vaccine design and provide a reference for the treatment of tuberculosis.

A novel clinical pharmacy management system in improving the rational drug use in department of general surgery

Hospital information system is widely used to improve work efficiency of hospitals in China. However, it is lack of the function providing pharmaceutical information service for clinical pharmacists. A novel clinical pharmacy management system developed by our hospital was introduced to improve the work efficiency of clinical pharmacists in our hospital and to carry out large sample statistical analyzes by providing pharmacy information services and promoting rational drug use. Clinical pharmacy management system was developed according to the actual situation. Taking prescription review in the department of general surgery as the example, work efficiency of clinical pharmacists, quality and qualified rates of prescriptions before and after utilizing clinical pharmacy management system were compared. Statistics of 48,562 outpatient and 5776 inpatient prescriptions of the general surgical department were analyzed. Qualified rates of both the inpatient and outpatient prescriptions of the general surgery department increased, and the use of antibiotics decreased. This system apparently improved work efficiency, standardized the level and accuracy of drug use, which will improve the rational drug use and pharmacy information service in our hospital. Meanwhile, utilization of prophylactic antibiotics for the aseptic operations also reduced.

Multispecies coexistence of trees in tropical forests: spatial signals of topographic niche differentiation increase with environmental heterogeneity

Neutral and niche theories give contrasting explanations for the maintenance of tropical tree species diversity. Both have some empirical support, but methods to disentangle their effects have not yet been developed. We applied a statistical measure of spatial structure to data from 14 large tropical forest plots to test a prediction of niche theory that is incompatible with neutral theory: that species in heterogeneous environments should separate out in space according to their niche preferences. We chose plots across a range of topographic heterogeneity, and tested whether pairwise spatial associations among species were more variable in more heterogeneous sites. We found strong support for this prediction, based on a strong positive relationship between variance in the spatial structure of species pairs and topographic heterogeneity across sites. We interpret this pattern as evidence of pervasive niche differentiation, which increases in importance with increasing environmental heterogeneity.

Development of a high-volume air sampler for nanoparticles

As a tool to evaluate the characteristics of aerosol nano-particles, a high-volume air sampler for the collection of nano-particles was developed based on the inertial filter technology. Instead of the webbed fiber geometry of the existing inertial filter, wire mesh screens alternately layered using spacing sheets with circular holes aligned to provide multi-circular nozzles were newly devised and the separation performance of the filter was investigated experimentally. The separation performance was evaluated for a single-nozzle inertial filter at different filtration velocities. A webbed stainless steel fiber mat attached on the inlet surface of the developed inertial filter was discussed as a pre-separator suppressing the bouncing of particles on meshes. The separation performance of a triple-nozzle inertial filter was also discussed to investigate the influence of scale-up on the separation performance of a multi-nozzle inertial filter. The influence of particle loading on the pressure drop and separation performance was discussed. A supplemental inlet for the nano-particle collection applied to an existing portable high-volume air sampler was devised and the consistency with other types of existing samplers was discussed based on the sampling of ambient particles. The layered-mesh inertial filter with a webbed stainless steel fiber mat as a pre-separator showed good performance in the separation of particles with a d p50 ranging from 150 to 190 nm keeping the influence of loaded particles small. The developed layered-mesh inertial filter was successfully applied to the collection of particles at a d p50∼ 190 nm that was consistent with the results from existing samplers.

Abstract P2-06-01: Breast-to-breast metastasis can cause hormone-receptor positive/triple negative bilateral synchronous tumors

Background: Prior work suggests that synchronous bilateral breast cancers may be clonal, with one tumor a metastasis, although prior techniques lacked resolution to prove this relationship. We used deep whole exome and shallow whole genome sequencing to compare bilateral tumors in two cases. In both cases, tumors were invasive and node negative with one tumor ER+/PR+/HER2− (HR+) lobular and the other triple negative (TN) ductal. Case 1 is a 75-year-old African American woman and Case 2 a 70-year-old white woman. With 44 and 12 months of follow up, respectively, neither patient has recurred.

Methods: Agilent SureSelect All Exon 50Mb Target Enrichment Kits were used for exome capture. Paired-end sequencing was performed with 200 base pair reads on the Illumina HiSeq 2000. Sequencing depth was targeted to cover 80% of the genome at 100x for three tumors with 70% cellularity, 200x for one tumor with 40% cellularity and 30x for germline. Tumor and germline exome results were compared to identify high confidence somatic single nucleotide variants (HC SNV). HC SNV's were called using GATK and stringent custom filtering to avoid false positives resulting from unrecognized germline single nucleotide polymorphisms. For each tumor pair, we define a clonality likelihood score (CLS) as the ratio of the number of HC SNV called at the same site and with the same alternate base in both tumors, to the total number of sites with an HC SNV called in either tumor. For comparison we analyzed the called SNV data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) for exome sequenced HR+ or TN breast cancers.

Results: In Case 1, of 102 HC SNVs called in either tumor, 82 were shared, for a CLS of 80.3%. Additionally, 11 shared SNVs were synonymous, consistent with clonality. Lastly the non-shared HC SNVs were asymmetrically found in the TN tumor, consistent with clonal evolution during metastasis. Copy number analysis (CNA) showed Case 1 to have a deletion in 6q, including the ESR1 gene, unique to the TN tumor.

To assess significance of the CLS, we found three primary/metastatic clonal pairs in the TCGA to serve as positive controls. To serve as negative controls, from 357 ER+ and 46 TN primary TCGA tumors, we formed a total of 16,422 independent ER+/TN pairs. For the 3 clonal TCGA pairs, the CLS values were 39.3%, 58.5% and 60.0%. Most of the independent TCGA pairs had a CLS of zero (98.5%), with a maximum CLS of 2.8%. As the CLS for Case 1 lies above maximum observed CLS among 16,422 independent tumor pairs, we reject the hypothesis that this tumor pair is independent, at p &lt; 0.0001. For Case 2, of 222 HC SNV sites, 5 were shared for a CLS of 2.3%, consistent with independence.

Conclusion: Somatic single nucleotide mutations identified by exome sequencing found that the two tumors in Case 1 share &gt;80% of SNVs, consistent with clonal evolution of metastasis. The two tumors from Case 2 have few shared SNVs, consistent with independent origin. CNA results were consistent. This is the first clonality analysis reported from deep sequencing of phenotypically discordant synchronous bilateral breast cancers, and demonstrates that next-generation sequencing can distinguish clonal from independent tumor pairs with high confidence.

Funding: The Breast Cancer Research Foundation

Citation Information: Cancer Res 2012;72(24 Suppl):Abstract nr P2-06-01.

Hypolipidemic effects of piperlonguminine in HepG2 cells and in Wistar rats

A novel thermostable form of piperlonguminine (GB-N) was extracted from medicinal plant Piper longum in efforts to explore the bioactive components underlying the mechanism of Piper longum in reducing plasma lipids. In vitro, HepG2 cells were employed to investigate the effects of GB-N on regulating cellular total cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) receptor (LDLR) mRNA abundance, while high-fat and high-cholesterol diet-induced hyperlipidemic Wistar rats were used to investigate in vivo effects of GB-N. Cellular total cholesterol assay showed that GB-N dose-dependently reduced cellular total cholesterol in HepG2 cells in the presence and absence of elevated plasma cholesterol levels by 25% and 32%, respectively. Reverse transcription PCR assay showed that LDLR mRNA abundance was up-regulated dose-dependently by 142% via GB-N treatment in HepG2 cells. Animal experiment revealed that GB-N dose-dependently reduced serum total cholesterol by 26%, triglyceride by 47%, LDL cholesterol by 30%, while increased serum high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol by 524% in diet-induced hyperlipidemic Wistar rats. In conclusion, the results suggest the potential therapeutic uses of GB-N in the prevention and treatment of hyperlipidemia and related diseases.

Ventilation and dampness in dorms and their associations with allergy among college students in China: a case-control study

To study the associations between dorm environment and occupants' health, a nested case-control study on 348 college students was carried out in 2006-2007 at Tianjin University, China. Two hundred and twenty-three dorm rooms where the 'cases' and 'controls' resided were inspected. Measured variables were ventilation rate, air temperature, and relative humidity indoors. Allergic symptoms in the last 12 months were self-reported by occupants. Adjusted odds ratios (AORs) of a 'localized moldy smell/moisture indicator' in 'special places' (e.g., in a room corner or close to the radiator under the window) for wheezing was 3.56 [95% Confident Interval (CI): 1.56-8.14] and for rhinitis 2.81 (95% CI: 1.32-5.97). The AOR of a low air change rate (below the median value of 0.7/h) for wheezing was 2.28 (95% CI: 1.38-3.75) and for dry cough 2.26 (95% CI: 1.08-4.75). The prevalence of students with allergic symptoms in dorm rooms decreased with increasing ventilation rate. The combination of a 'localized moldy/moisture indicator' and a low air change rate significantly increased the AOR of case status to 13.35 (95% CI: 3.73-47.83), compared to the reference condition with no-dampness and high ventilation rate (above the median). This supports the hypothesis that ventilation rate is an effect modifier for moisture problems and indoor pollutants.

Improved immunogenicity of recombinant Mycobacterium bovis bacillus Calmette-Guérin strains expressing fusion protein Ag85A-ESAT-6 of Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Early secretory antigen target 6 (ESAT-6) is a dominant target for cell-mediated immunity in the early phase of tuberculosis (TB) in patients with TB, causing T-cell proliferation and gamma interferon (IFN-γ) production, which has been considered to be a protective antigen that can be used for future vaccine development. Ag85A is the most essential component for bacterial survival within macrophages and has been used in numerous vaccine preparations, which can induce strong cellular immune responses. In this study, we constructed a new recombinant bacilli Calmette-Guérin (BCG) strain (rBCG-AE) that could express fusion protein Ag85A-ESAT-6 of Mycobacterium tuberculosis and evaluated its immunogenicity in BALB/c mice. There was no evidence for increased virulence of this rBCG. Our experiments illustrated that the rBCG-AE was able to induce higher titer of antibody and elicit more long-lasting and stronger Th1 type cellular immune responses than the parental BCG strain, or rBCG-A (expressing Ag85A) strain, or rBCG-E (expressing ESAT-6) strain, which are characterized by the strong antibody response, the proliferation rate of splenocytes, the ratio of CD4(+) T and CD8(+) T cells stimulated by tuberculin-purified protein derivative and elevated levels of IFN-γ in antigen-stimulated splenocyte cultures. The results show that rBCG-AE is an improved TB vaccine for further study.