Refracture-related bone transport of tibia: technical notes and preliminary clinical results in nineteen cases

PURPOSE

Refracture is one of the main complications of bone transport, which brings additional physical and mental burden to surgeries and patients. We aimed to raise a new classification system of refracture-related bone transport based on the Simpson classification and to present our experience on treatment.

METHODS

This retrospective analysis included 19 patients with refracture-related bone transport (average age of 37.7 years; 18 men). We developed a modified Simpson classification system to assist decision-making (conservative versus surgical). The ASAMI criteria were used to assess the outcomes at last follow-up.

RESULTS

The mean follow-up was 12.3 ± 3.2 months. Complete union was achieved in all patients, with no reinfection. Based on the modified Simpson classification, refracture was Ia type (within regeneration area) in three cases, Ib (collapsed fracture at the regeneration area) in one case, Ic (stress fracture) in three cases, II (at the junction between the regenerate and original bone) in one case, III (at the docking site) in nine cases, and V (at distant site) in two cases. Refracture was managed conservatively in six cases and surgically in 13 cases. Average time to bone union was 2.8 ± 1.2 months in the conservative group versus 4.4 ± 1.4 months in the surgery group. Assessment at the final follow-up using the ASAMI criteria revealed excellent bone result in all patients, excellent functional results in six patients (31.6%), and good functional results in 13 patients.

CONCLUSIONS

The modified Simpson classification could include refracture at the docking site and stress fracture in the regeneration zone and provide some guidance in determining the appropriate treatment strategy.

Covalently Bonded Ni Sites in Black Phosphorene with Electron Redistribution for Efficient Metal-Lightweighted Water Electrolysis

The metal-lightweighted electrocatalysts for water splitting are highly desired for sustainable and economic hydrogen energy deployments, but challengeable. In this work, a low-content Ni-functionalized approach triggers the high capability of black phosphorene (BP) with hydrogen and oxygen evolution reaction (HER/OER) bifunctionality. Through a facile in situ electro-exfoliation route, the ionized Ni sites are covalently functionalized in BP nanosheets with electron redistribution and controllable metal contents. It is found that the as-fabricated Ni-BP electrocatalysts can drive the water splitting with much enhanced HER and OER activities. In 1.0 M KOH electrolyte, the optimized 1.5 wt% Ni-functionalized BP nanosheets have readily achieved low overpotentials of 136 mV for HER and 230 mV for OER at 10 mA cm-2. Moreover, the covalently bonding between Ni and P has also strengthened the catalytic stability of the Ni-functionalized BP electrocatalyst, stably delivering the overall water splitting for 50 h at 20 mA cm-2. Theoretical calculations have revealed that Ni-P covalent binding can regulate the electronic structure and optimize the reaction energy barrier to improve the catalytic activity effectively. This work confirms that Ni-functionalized BP is a suitable candidate for electrocatalytic overall water splitting, and provides effective strategies for constructing metal-lightweighted economic electrocatalysts.

Toripalimab plus axitinib versus sunitinib as first-line treatment for advanced renal cell carcinoma: RENOTORCH, a randomized, open-label, phase III study

BACKGROUND

Immune checkpoint inhibitors in combination with tyrosine kinase inhibitors are standard treatments for advanced clear cell renal cell carcinoma (RCC). This phase III RENOTORCH study compared the efficacy and safety of toripalimab plus axitinib versus sunitinib for the first-line treatment of patients with intermediate-/poor-risk advanced RCC.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

Patients with intermediate-/poor-risk unresectable or metastatic RCC were randomized in a ratio of 1 : 1 to receive toripalimab (240 mg intravenously once every 3 weeks) plus axitinib (5 mg orally twice daily) or sunitinib [50 mg orally once daily for 4 weeks (6-week cycle) or 2 weeks (3-week cycle)]. The primary endpoint was progression-free survival (PFS) assessed by an independent review committee (IRC). The secondary endpoints were investigator-assessed PFS, overall response rate (ORR), overall survival (OS), and safety.

RESULTS

A total of 421 patients were randomized to receive toripalimab plus axitinib (n = 210) or sunitinib (n = 211). With a median follow-up of 14.6 months, toripalimab plus axitinib significantly reduced the risk of disease progression or death by 35% compared with sunitinib as assessed by an IRC [hazard ratio (HR) 0.65, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.49-0.86; P = 0.0028]. The median PFS was 18.0 months in the toripalimab-axitinib group, whereas it was 9.8 months in the sunitinib group. The IRC-assessed ORR was significantly higher in the toripalimab-axitinib group compared with the sunitinib group (56.7% versus 30.8%; P < 0.0001). An OS trend favoring toripalimab plus axitinib was also observed (HR 0.61, 95% CI 0.40-0.92). Treatment-related grade ≥3 adverse events occurred in 61.5% of patients in the toripalimab-axitinib group and 58.6% of patients in the sunitinib group.

CONCLUSION

In patients with previously untreated intermediate-/poor-risk advanced RCC, toripalimab plus axitinib provided significantly longer PFS and higher ORR than sunitinib and had a manageable safety profile TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04394975.

Enlarging the Ni-O Bond Polarizability in a Phosphorene-Hosted Metal-Organic Framework for Boosted Water Oxidation Electrocatalysis

The emerging lattice-oxygen oxidation mechanism (LOM) presents attractive opportunities for breaking the scaling relationship to boost oxygen evolution reaction (OER) with the direct OLattice-*O interaction. However, currently the LOM-triggering rationales are still debated, and a streamlined physicochemical paradigm is extremely desirable for the design of LOM-defined OER catalysts. Herein, a Ni metal-organic framework/black phosphorene (NiMOF/BP) heterostructure is theoretically profiled and constructed as a catalytic platform for the LOM-derived OER studies. It is found that the p-type BP host can enlarge the Ni-O bond polarizability of NiMOF through the Ni-O bond stretching and Ni valence declining synergically. Such an enlarged bond polarizability will in principle alleviate the lattice oxygen confinement to benefit the LOM pathway and OER performance. As a result, the optimized NiMOF/BP catalyst exhibits promising OER performance with a low overpotential of 260 mV at 10 mA cm-2 and long-term stability in 1 M KOH electrolyte. Both experiment and calculation results suggest the activated LOM pathway with a more balanced step barrier in the NiMOF/BP OER catalyst. This research puts forward Ni-O bond polarizability as the criterion to design LOM-scaled electrocatalysts for water oxidation.

Comparison of antibiotic-impregnated bone cement coverage versus vacuum sealing drainage in semi-open bone grafting using for tibial fracture with infected bone and soft tissue defect: a retrospective analysis

OBJECTIVE

To compare antibiotic-impregnated bone cement coverage (bone cement surface technique; BCS-T) versus vacuum sealing drainage (VSD) for tibial fracture with infected bone and soft tissue defect.

METHOD

This retrospective analysis compared the clinical outcomes in patients undergoing BCS-T (n = 16) versus VSD (n = 15) for tibial fracture with infected bone and soft tissue defect at the Third Hospital of Hebei Medical University from March 2014 to August 2019. For BCS-T group, osseous cavity was filled with autograft bone graft after debridement, and then the wound was covered with a 3-mm layer of bone cement impregnated with vancomycin and gentamycin. The dressing was changed every day in the first week, and every 2 ~ 3 days in the second week. For VSD group, a negative pressure of -150 ~ -350 mmHg was maintained, and the dressing was changed every 5-7 days. All patients received antibiotics treatment based on bacterial culture results for 2 weeks.

RESULTS

The 2 groups did not differ in age, sex and key baseline characteristics, including type of Gustilo-Anderson classification, size of the bone and soft tissue defect, the percentage of primary debridement, bone transport, and the time from injury to bone grafting. The median follow-up was 18.9 months (range:12-40). The time to complete coverage of bone graft by granulation tissue was 21.2 (15.0-44.0) and 20.3 (15.0-24.0) days in the BCS-T and VSD groups, respectively (p = 0.412). The 2 groups also did not differ in wound healing time (3.3 (1.5-5.5) versus 3.2(1.5-6.5) months; p = 0.229) and bone defect healing time (5.4(3.0-9.6) versus 5.9(3.2-11.5) months; p = 0.402). However, the cost of covering material was significantly reduced in the BCS-T group (2071 ± 134 versus 5542 ± 905 yuan; p = 0.026). Paley functional classification at 12 months did not differ between the 2 groups (excellent in 87.5% versus 93.3% in the 2 groups; p = 0.306).

CONCLUSION

BCS-T could achieve clinical outcomes similar to VSD in patients receiving bone graft for tibial fracture with infected bone and soft tissue defect, but material cost was significantly reduced. Randomized controlled trials are needed to verify our finding.

Insights on catalytic mechanism of CeO2 as multiple nanozymes

CeO₂ with the reversible Ce³⁺/Ce⁴⁺ redox pair exhibits multiple enzyme-like catalytic performance, which has been recognized as a promising nanozyme with potentials for disease diagnosis and treatments. Tailorable surface physicochemical properties of various CeO₂ catalysts with controllable sizes, morphologies, and surface states enable a rich surface chemistry for their interactions with various molecules and species, thus delivering a wide variety of catalytic behaviors under different conditions. Despite the significant progress made in developing CeO₂-based nanozymes and their explorations for practical applications, their catalytic activity and specificity are still uncompetitive to their counterparts of natural enzymes under physiological environments. With the attempt to provide the insights on the rational design of highly performed CeO₂ nanozymes, this review focuses on the recent explorations on the catalytic mechanisms of CeO₂ with multiple enzyme-like performance. Given the detailed discussion and proposed perspectives, we hope this review can raise more interest and stimulate more efforts on this multi-disciplinary field.

Amorphous materials for elementary-gas-involved electrocatalysis: an overview

Given the critical demands on energy conversion, storage, and transportation, tremendous interest has been devoted to the field of material development related to energy harvesting, recently. As the only route towards energy utilization, the carriers with the characteristics of low carbon are regarded as the future choice, e.g., hydrogen and ammonia. To this end, electrocatalysis provides a green way to access these substances. However, the unfulfilled conversion efficiency is the bottleneck for practical application. In this review, the promising characteristics of amorphous materials and the amorphous-induced electrocatalytic enhancement (AIEE) were emphasized. In the beginning, the characteristics of amorphous materials are briefly summarized. The basic mechanism of heterogeneous electrocatalytic reactions is illustrated, including the hydrogen/oxygen evolution and oxygen/nitrogen reduction. In the third part, the electrocatalytic performance of amorphous materials is discussed in detail, and the mechanism of AIEE is highlighted. In the last section of this review, the challenges and outlook for the development of amorphous enhanced electrocatalysis are presented.

New insights into the mechanisms of ultrasonic emulsification in the oil-water system and the role of gas bubbles

Ultrasonic emulsification (USE) assisted by cavitation is an effective method to produce emulsion droplets. However, the role of gas bubbles in the USE process still remains unclear. Hence, in the present paper, high-speed camera observations of bubble evolution and emulsion droplets formation in oil and water were used to capture in real-time the emulsification process, while experiments with different gas concentrations were carried out to investigate the effect of gas bubbles on droplet size. The results show that at the interface of oil and water, gas bubbles with a radius larger than the resonance radius collapse and sink into the water phase, inducing (oil-water) blended liquid jets across bubbles to generate oil-in-water-in-oil (O/W/O) and water-in-oil (W/O) droplets in the oil phase and oil-in-water (O/W) droplets in the water phase, respectively. Gas bubbles with a radius smaller than the resonance radius at the interface always move towards the oil phase, accompanied with the generation of water droplets in the oil phase. In the oil phase, gas bubbles, which can attract bubbles nearby the interface, migrate to the interface of oil and water due to acoustic streaming, and generate numerous droplets. As for the gas bubbles in the water phase, those can break neighboring droplets into numerous finer ones during bubble oscillation. With the increase in gas content, more bubbles undergo chaotic oscillation, leading to smaller and more stable emulsion droplets, which explains the beneficial role of gas bubbles in USE. Violently oscillating microbubbles are, therefore, found to be the governing cavitation regime for emulsification process. These results provide new insights to the mechanisms of gas bubbles in oil-water emulsions, which may be useful towards the optimization of USE process in industry.

Medical Care Disruptions During the First Six-Months of the COVID19 Pandemic: The Experience of Older Breast Cancer Survivors

Purpose.

Older cancer survivors required medical care during the COVID-19 pandemic despite infection risks, but there are limited data on medical care in this age group.

Methods.

We evaluated care disruptions in a longitudinal cohort of non-metastatic breast cancer survivors ages 60–98 from five US regions (n=321). Survivors completed a web-based or telephone survey from May 27, 2020 to September 11, 2020. Care disruptions included self-reported interruptions in ability to see doctors, receive treatment or supportive therapies, or fill prescriptions. Logistic regression models evaluated bivariate and multivariate associations between care disruptions and education, medical, psychosocial and COVID-19-related factors. Multivariate models included age, county COVID-19 rates, comorbidity and post-diagnosis time.

Results.

There was a high response rate (n=262, 81.6%). Survivors were 32.2 months post-diagnosis (SD 17.5, range 4–73). Nearly half (48%) reported a medical disruption. The unadjusted odds of care disruptions were significantly higher with more education (OR 1.23 per one-year increase, 95% CI 1.09–1.39, p =0.001) and greater depression (OR 1.04 per one-point increase in CES-D score, CI 1.003–1.08, p=0.033); tangible support decreased the odds of disruptions (OR 0.99, 95% CI 0.97–0.99 per one-point increase, p=0.012). There was a trend for associations between disruptions and comorbidity (unadjusted OR 1.13 per 1 added comorbidity, 95% CI 0.99–1.29, p=0.07). Adjusting for covariates, only higher education (p=0.001) and tangible social support (p=0.006) remained significantly associated with having care disruptions.

Conclusions.

Older breast cancer survivors reported high rates of medical care disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic and psychosocial factors were associated with care disruptions.

[Safety of biological valves for aortic valve replacement: A systematic review and meta-analysis]

OBJECTIVE

To provide a comprehensive and contemporary overview of the long-term safety outcomes after aortic valve replacements (AVR) with conventional biological heart valve (stented or stentless).

METHODS

English databases (Medline, Embase, Web of Science, CENTRAL, and ClinicalTrial.gov) and Chinese databases (CNKI, VIP, WanFang, and SinoMed) were searched systemically from January 1, 2000 to January 26, 2019. Eligible randomized controlled trials, non-randomized clinical trials, cohort studies (retrospective or prospective), and unselected case series were included. Strict screening of the obtained literature was conducted to extract relevant data by two reviewers. Other inclusion criteria were studied reporting on outcomes of AVR with biological valves (stented or stentless), with or without coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) or valve repair procedure, with mean follow-up length equal to or longer than 5 years. We excluded studies that reported only a specific patient group (e.g., patients with renal failure, or pregnancy), without the report of biological valve type, or with study population size less than 100. The meta-analysis was performed using Stata 14.0 software.

RESULTS

In this study, 53 papers (in total 57 study groups) involving 47 803 patients were included. (1) The all-cause mortality was 6.33/100 patient-years (95%CI: 5.85-6.84). Subgroup analysis showed that the mortality rates of porcine and bovine valve prostheses were 5.69/100 patient-years (95%CI: 5.05-6.41) and 7.29/100 patient-years (95%CI: 6.53-8.13), respectively. The all-cause mortality rates for stented and stentless valve were 6.69/100 patient-years (95%CI: 6.12-7.30) and 5.21/100 patient-years (95%CI: 4.43-6.14), respectively. (2) The incidence rate of thromboembolism was 1.16/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.96-1.40), the incidence rate of permanent pacemaker (PPM) implantation was 1.08/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.75-1.54), the incidence rate of stroke was 0.74/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.51-1.06), the incidence rate of structural valve dysfunction (SVD) was 0.73/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.59-0.91), the incidence rate of major bleeding was 0.52/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.41-0.65), the incidence rate of endocarditis was 0.38/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.33-0.44), and the incidence rate of non-structural valve dysfunction (NSVD) was 0.20/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.13-0.31). The total reoperation rate for biological aortic valve was 0.77/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.65-0.91), and the SVD related reoperation rate was 0.46/100 patient-years (95%CI: 0.36-0.58).

CONCLUSION

The all-cause mortality for conventional biological AVR was 6.33/100 patient-years. Thromboembolism, PPM implantation, reoperation, stroke, and SVD were major long term complications.

Impact of Refrigerated Storage Time on the Instrumental Quality Traits and Dissipation of Woody Broiler Breast Meat

ObjectivesSince 2013, woody breast (WB) has been a prevalent meat quality defect in the broiler industry, affecting 30–40% of chicken breast meat from broilers with live weights greater than 4.2 kg. Woody breast results in a loss over $200 million annually due to decreased yields and product value. WB samples are lighter, more yellow in appearance, and are characterized by a greater pH and cooking loss than normal breast meat. The objective of this research was to evaluate and compare the instrumental quality traits of normal and WB fillets over storage time to determine if the WB condition dissipates over storage time. Dissipation was defined by the change of severely woody to moderately woody breasts or the change of moderately woody to slightly woody or normal breasts.Materials and MethodsNinety chicken breast samples, 30 from each of the following breast meat categories (normal, moderately woody, and severely woody) were collected from a commercial processing plant on 5 separate occasions for evaluation of dissipation, purge loss and shear force from Day 1 (d1) through Day 5 (d5). A 3 × 6 factorial structure (WB severity × storage time) with 5 replications within a randomized complete block design (sampling occasions as blocks) with subsamples was utilized to evaluate the effects of WB severity (normal, moderate, severe) and storage time (d 0, d 1 to d 5) on dissipation, purge loss and shear force (d 0 and d 5) (SAS version 9.4, Cary, NC).ResultsResults indicated that dissipation was observed on moderate and severe woody breast over storage time. After 5 d of storage at 2–4°C, 84% of SEV WB fillets dissipated to MOD WB, which was greater (P < 0.05) than all other storage times. In comparison, only 40–52% of the MOD WB fillets dissipated to slight WB or NOR breasts after 3–5 d of storage. Purge loss increased throughout storage time for NOR, MOD, and SEV chicken breast meat. In addition, purge loss was less (P < 0.05) for NOR than SEV WB after 1, 2, and 4 d of storage. However, after 5 d of storage, no difference (P > 0.05) existed in purge loss among NOR, MOD, and SEV WB meat. Shear force was greater (P < 0.05) for NOR than MOD and SEV WB meat on Day 0in the upper, middle, and lower portions of the breast. By Day 1, there were no differences (P > 0.05) in shear force among the 3 breast meat severities. After 2, 3, 4, and 5 d of storage, the upper position (cranial part) of SEV WB fillets had greater (P < 0.05) shear force than NOR fillets.ConclusionIn conclusion, the dissipation that occurred in WB meat over refrigerated storage was mainly visual and did not improve overall meat quality.

Characterization of Caecal Microbiota in Broilers that Differ in Genetic Strain, Nutrition, and Development of Woody Breast

ObjectivesWoody breast (WB) meat from broilers has undesirable textural characteristics, including, crunchiness and stickiness. Genetic, nutritional, and environmental factors are associated with the mechanism of WB development. A diverse microbiota plays an important role on the growth performance and health of the host, and greater than 900 species of bacteria have been isolated in the gastrointestinal tract of chicken. However, minimal information is known about the microbiota in the guts of broilers that yield WB meat. Therefore, the objective of this research was to characterize and compare the bacterial diversity of caecal microbiota in broilers with normal and woody breast fillets.Materials and MethodsThe Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of Mississippi State University (IACUC-16–542) reviewed and approved all protocols. One-day-old mixed sex broilers from two strains (A2 and B2) were raised in 32 pens in a chicken house. Birds of each strain were randomly assigned to 16 pens (15 birds per pen) and 8 pens were fed a control diet and 8 pens were fed an amino acid reduced diet (digestible lysine, total sulfur amino acids, and threonine reduced by 20% as compared to the control diet). After 8 wk of growth, 4 male broilers with normal breast (1 chick per pen) and 4 male broilers with WB (1 chick per pen) determined by palpation were selected for each treatment (breed × diet). The cecum samples were collected after birds were euthanized and bled. DNA was extracted and amplified using universal primers that target the V3∼4 regions of bacterial 16S rRNA for sequencing in Illumina MiSeq. Raw sequences were processed, and the quality was filtered using the default parameters of Quantitative Insights into Microbial Ecology (QIIME 2). Differences between species were assessed using the unpaired two-tailed Student t test assuming unequal variance at α = 0.05.ResultsData suggested that the most abundant phyla in all samples were Firmicutes, followed by Bacteroidetes and Proteobacteria. Accounting for both abundance and evenness of the species present in each sample (α diversity), results indicated that there was no difference (P > 0.05, pairwise Kruskal–Wallis test) in the diversity of gut microbiota between two phenotypes (normal vs. woody), two strains (A2 vs. B2) or two diets (control vs. reduced). However, principal coordinate analysis plots (β diversity) revealed that the samples were clustered based on the phenotype rather than by the strain or diet. These results revealed that the microbiota of each bird with normal breast was more similar to each other than the microbiota of birds with WB. Among all species (300–400) identified, no difference (P < 0.05) existed in bacterial abundance between the two genetic strains. However, 16 and 13 species were differentially abundant (P < 0.05) between normal and woody breast and between control and reduced diet treatments, respectively. In the ceca of WB birds Selenomonas bovis (12.6%) and Bacteroides plebeius (12.3%) were the top two predominant bacteria; however, the relative abundances of these two bacteria were only 5.1% and 1.2% in normal birds, respectively.ConclusionDifferences in the microbiome may be associated with the development of WB. Further studies are needed to investigate the potential mechanism and how to reduce broiler WB incidence by regulating their gut microbiota.

Quantitative Proteomic Characterization Associated with Woody Breast Meat from Broilers Fed a Standard or an Amino Acid-Reduced Diet

ObjectivesWoody or wooden breast (WB) is an emergent myopathy of broilers and is macroscopically characterized by hardened areas of the Pectoralis major muscle. Woody broiler breast fillets can result in harder texture, higher pH, lower amounts of proteins, lower water-holding capacity, and increased cook loss when compared to normal breasts. The impaired meat quality of WB has been reported to be closely associated with improved nutrition and fast-growth rates. The present research compared the proteome of normal and woody breast muscle from broilers that were fed with either a control diet or an amino acid (AA)-reduced diet.Materials and MethodsMixed-sex broilers were assigned to 16 pens (15 chicks per pen) and fed with control or reduced AA diets (20% reduction of digestible lysine, total sulfur amino acids, and threonine). At 8 wk of age, live broilers were evaluated manually for WB myopathy. Within each diet group, 4 male broilers with normal breast and 4 male broilers with WB were selected (one bird in each pen) and euthanized using CO2 gas. The breast muscle from the cranial portion was immediately sampled after bleeding and snap-frozen in liquid nitrogen. All experimental procedures were approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of Mississippi State University (IACUC-16-542). Whole muscle proteins of normal and woody breast were extracted from frozen samples of three birds within each treatment. Two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2-DE; 6 gels per treatment) coupled with image analysis and mass spectrometry were used to investigate differences in the expression levels of proteins (more than 2.0-fold intensity differences) from chicken breast muscle. Differences were evaluated using Student’s t test at a confidence interval of 95%.ResultsWhen the broilers were fed with the control diet, 10 proteins were expressed differentially between normal and woody breasts. Apolipoprotein A-I, desmin, annexin A2, annexin A5, and ubiquitin carboxyl-terminal hydrolase were overexpressed (P < 0.05) in WB. Peptidyl-prolyl cis-trans isomerase, four and a half LIM domains protein 1 isoform X3, and an uncharacterized protein were only present in WB muscle, but not in normal chicken breast. Two proteins, keratin, type II cytoskeletal 8 and α-1,4 glucan phosphorylase, were overexpressed (P < 0.05) in normal chicken breast. These differentially expressed proteins were involved in glycolytic metabolism, cell structure, and cellular defense.Interestingly, only one protein (heat shock protein β-1) was expressed differentially between normal and woody breasts when broilers were fed with the AA-reduced diet. This protein was overexpressed (P < 0.05) in WB samples and found to play a role in stress resistance and actin organization.ConclusionThe protein profiles of normal and woody chicken breast samples were different, which might help explain the changes in meat quality. Essential amino acid intake resulted in minimizing difference in protein profiles between normal and woody chicken breasts.

MiR-17-5p promotes cervical cancer cell proliferation and metastasis by targeting transforming growth factor-β receptor 2

OBJECTIVE

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) play critical roles in post-translational gene expression. The aim of the current study was to investigate the effects of miR-17-5p in cervical cancer.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

Fifteen clinical cervical cancer tissue samples, as well as their paired adjacent noncancerous tissues, were collected. The microarray was performed to identify differential miRNAs in cervical cancer. Luciferase reporter assay was conducted to identify the target gene of selected miRNA. SiHa was transfected with mimics, inhibitors as well as negative controls of miR-17-5p and Targeting Transforming Growth Factor-β Receptor 2 (TGFBR2) open reading frame or siRNA. Cell counting kit-8 (CCK-8) assay and transwell experiment were performed to detect the proliferation rate and metastasis, respectively. Western blotting and quantitative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) analysis were used to analyze TGFBR2 expression. Balb/c nude mice were utilized to verify the effect of miR-17-5p in vivo.

RESULTS

Microarray analysis identified miR-17-5p as our interesting miRNA, and luciferase reporter assay identified TGFBR2 as its target gene. MiR-17-5p overexpression significantly enhanced cervical cancer cell proliferation and metastasis. In-vivo study also verified that miR-17-5p overexpression stimulated cervical cancer growth.

CONCLUSIONS

MiR-17-5p enhances cervical cancer proliferation and metastasis via targeting TGFBR2. It is proposed that targeting miR-17-5p may be a promising therapeutic approach for cervical cancer.

Nitrogen-aeration tuned ultrasonic synthesis of SiO2@PNIPAm nanoparticles and preparation of temperature responsive Pickering emulsion

Ultrasonic synthesis has shown great potential applications in preparing varieties of nanostructured materials. However, fabrication of nanomaterials with tunable structures and desirable properties is still challenging because of the instability and nonuniform distribution of cavitation effect in liquid phase. In this study, a novel aeration tuned ultrasonic synthesis approach is proposed for optimizing the cavitation effect in both time and space scales and fabricating SiO₂@PNIPAm NPs. By alternation of ultrasonication and N₂ aeration, more and more gas bubbles are formed in the reaction liquid, and the collapse of those bubbles is further enhanced by the reactants of solid SiO₂ and intermediate functionalized SiO₂ NPs. As a result, SiO₂@PNIPAm NPs with various grafting ratios are successfully synthesized simply by changing the number of ultrasonic synthesis cycle. The SiO₂@PNIPAm NPs are subsequently used as stabilizer to form Pickering emulsions with different temperature response. This work provides a potential facile sonochemical synthesis method with high efficiency in obtaining inorganic/organic NPs of well determined structures.

Ultrasonic modulation of phase separation and corrosion resistance for ternary Cu-Sn-Bi immiscible alloy

The effect of power ultrasound on the liquid phase separation of ternary Cu-32%Sn-20%Bi immiscible alloy is experimentally investigated, which shows that as compared with the layered structure formed under static condition, the macrosegregation resulted from liquid phase separation is remarkably reduced with the increase of ultrasonic amplitude. A homogenous microstructure characterized by refined (Bi) particles dispersing uniformly on the (Cu₃Sn) matrix is obtained when the ultrasonic amplitude reaches the highest value of 24 μm. This is mainly ascribed to the ultrasonically induced cavitation and acoustic streaming, which promotes the nucleation, the fragmentation, and the dispersion of (Bi) droplets. The finally solidified immiscible alloy exhibits obvious improvements in electrochemical corrosion resistance, microhardness and wear-resisting if compared with those in static solidification. These results prove that applying power ultrasound is an effective way to modulate the liquid phase separation and enhance the applied performance for immiscible alloys.

Fundamental supply of skin blood flow in the Chinese Han population: Measurements by a full-field laser perfusion imager

BACKGROUND

Skin blood flow is believed to link with many diseases, and shows a significant heterogeneity. There are several papers on basal cutaneous microcirculation perfusion in different races, while the data in Chinese is vacant.

OBJECTIVE

The aim was to establish the database of absolute fundamental supply of skin blood flow in the Chinese Han population.

METHODS

With a full-field laser perfusion imager (FLPI), the skin blood flow can be quantified. Cutaneous perfusion values were determined in 17 selected skin areas in 406 healthy participants aged between 20 and 80 years (mean 35.05 ± 11.33). Essential parameters such as weight, height were also measured and values of BMI were calculated. The perfusion values were reported in Arbitrary Perfusion Units (APU).

RESULTS

The highest cutaneous perfusion value fell on eyelid (931.20 ± 242.59 in male and 967.83 ± 225.49 in female), and pretibial had the lowest value (89.09 ± 30.28 in male and 85.08 ± 33.59 in female). The values were higher in men than women on the bank of fingertips, nose, forehead, cheek, neck and earlobe (P < .05). Perfusion values on stretch and flexion side of forearm had negative correlation with age (P = .01 and P = 4.88 × 10^-3 , respectively) in male. Abdomen was negatively correlated with BMI in both gender (P = .02, respectively).

CONCLUSIONS

Skin blood flow values vary with skin regions. There is a tendency to measure higher perfusion values in men than in women. And the values are irrelevant with age or BMI.

Dynamics of levitated objects in acoustic vortex fields

Acoustic levitation in gaseous media provides a tool to process solid and liquid materials without the presence of surfaces such as container walls and hence has been used widely in chemical analysis, high-temperature processing, drop dynamics and bioreactors. To date high-density objects can only be acoustically levitated in simple standing-wave fields. Here we demonstrate the ability of a small number of peripherally placed sources to generate acoustic vortex fields and stably levitate a wide range of liquid and solid objects. The forces exerted by these acoustic vortex fields on a levitated water droplet are observed to cause a controllable deformation of the droplet and/or oscillation along the vortex axis. Orbital angular momentum transfer is also shown to rotate a levitated object rapidly and the rate of rotation can be controlled by the source amplitude. We expect this research can increase the diversity of acoustic levitation and expand the application of acoustic vortices.

Differential regulation of LncRNA-SARCC suppresses VHL-mutant RCC cell proliferation yet promotes VHL-normal RCC cell proliferation via modulating androgen receptor/HIF-2α/C-MYC axis under hypoxia

This corrects the article DOI: 10.1038/sj.gt.3302808.

A numerical simulation of acoustic field within liquids subject to three orthogonal ultrasounds

When one beam of ultrasound propagates along a single direction in liquids, the cavitation effect is always confined to a limited volume close to the ultrasonic source. This greatly limits the application of power ultrasound in liquid processing and materials fabrication. In this study, a methodology for applying three orthogonal ultrasounds within liquids has been proposed. By solving the Helmholtz equation, the sound field distribution characteristics are investigated in 1D (one dimensional), 2D (two dimensional) and 3D (three dimensional) ultrasounds at their resonant frequencies, which show that the coherent interaction of three beams of ultrasounds is able to strikingly promote the sound pressure level and reinforce the mean acoustic energy density as compared with that in 1D case. Hence, the potential cavitation volume is enlarged remarkably. This opens new possibilities for the design and optimization of ultrasonic technology in fabricating materials.

Three orthogonal ultrasounds fabricate uniform ternary Al-Sn-Cu immiscible alloy

The production of Al based monotectic alloys with uniform microstructure is usually difficult due to the large density difference between the two immiscible liquid phases, which limits the application of such alloys. Here, we apply three orthogonal ultrasounds during the liquid phase separation process of ternary Al_71.9Sn_20.4Cu_7.7 immiscible alloy. A uniform microstructure consisting of fine secondary (Sn) phase dispersed on Al-rich matrix is fabricated in the whole alloy sample with a large size of 30 × 30 × 100 mm. The numerical calculation results indicate that the coupled effect of three ultrasounds promotes the sound pressure level and consequently enlarges the cavitation zone within the alloy melt. The strong shockwaves produced by cavitation prevent the (Sn) droplets from coalescence, and keep them suspended in the parent Al-rich liquid phase. This accounts for the formation of homogeneous composite structures. Thus the introduction of three orthogonal ultrasounds is an effective way to suppress the macrosegregation caused by liquid phase separation and produce bulk immiscible alloys with uniform structures.

Note: Attenuation motion of acoustically levitated spherical rotor

Here we observe the attenuation motion of spherical rotors levitated by near-field acoustic radiation force and analyze the factors that affect the duration time of free rotation. It is found that the rotating speed of freely rotating rotor decreases exponentially with respect to time. The time constant of exponential attenuation motion depends mainly on the levitation height, the mass of rotor, and the depth of concave ultrasound emitter. Large levitation height, large mass of rotor, and small depth of concave emitter are beneficial to increase the time constant and hence extend the duration time of free rotation.

Differential regulation of LncRNA-SARCC suppresses VHL-mutant RCC cell proliferation yet promotes VHL-normal RCC cell proliferation via modulating androgen receptor/HIF-2α/C-MYC axis under hypoxia

It is well established that hypoxia contributes to tumor progression in a hypoxia inducible factor-2α (HIF-2α)-dependent manner in renal cell carcinoma (RCC), yet the role of long noncoding RNAs (LncRNAs) involved in hypoxia-mediated RCC progression remains unclear. Here we demonstrate that LncRNA-SARCC (Suppressing Androgen Receptor in Renal Cell Carcinoma) is differentially regulated by hypoxia in a von Hippel-Lindau (VHL)-dependent manner both in RCC cell culture and clinical specimens. LncRNA-SARCC can suppress hypoxic cell cycle progression in the VHL-mutant RCC cells while derepress it in the VHL-restored RCC cells. Mechanism dissection reveals that LncRNA-SARCC can post-transcriptionally regulate androgen receptor (AR) by physically binding and destablizing AR protein to suppress AR/HIF-2α/C-MYC signals. In return, HIF-2α can transcriptionally regulate the LncRNA-SARCC expression via binding to hypoxia-responsive elements on the promoter of LncRNA-SARCC. The negative feedback modulation between LncRNA-SARCC/AR complex and HIF-2α signaling may then lead to differentially modulated RCC progression in a VHL-dependent manner. Together, these results may provide us a new therapeutic approach via targeting this newly identified signal from LncRNA-SARCC to AR-mediated HIF-2α/C-MYC signals against RCC progression.