Synergistic effect of schizandrin A and DNase I knockdown on high glucose induced beta cell apoptosis by decreasing intracellular calcium concentration.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the synergistic effect of deoxyribonuclease I (DNase I) knockdown combined with Schizandrin A (Sch A) in protecting islet beta-cells (ß-cells) from apoptosis under high-glucose (HG) conditions. METHODS: The concentration of Sch A was detected by Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8). High glucose-cultured rat insulinoma beta cell line (RIN-M5F) cells were treated with Sch A and transfected with DNase I small interfering RNA (siRNA). Cell apoptosis rate and apoptosis-related protein level were examined by flow cytometry and Western blot method respectively. In addition, Na-K-adenosine triphosphatease (Na-K-ATPase) and Ca-Mg-ATPase activity, cell membrane potential, and intracellular Ca concentration was also examined respectively. RESULTS: Our study revealed that HG stimulation can cause a significant increase in DNase I level and cell apoptosis rate. However, Sch A combined with DNase I knockdown can significantly decrease the cell apoptosis rate and apoptosis-related protein levels such as BAX ( 0.05) and Caspase-3 ( 0.01). In addition, we also found that the combination of Sch A and DNase I knockdown can dramatically increase cell membrane potential level, Na-K-ATPase, and Ca-Mg-ATPase activity. Meanwhile, intracellular Ca concentration was also found to be significantly decreased by the synergistic effect of Sch A and DNase I knockdown. CONCLUSION: Overall, our study reveals a synergistic effect of Sch A and DNase I knockdown in protecting ß-cells from HG-induced apoptosis.

Recognition of the atrioventricular node anatomical structure: Connection between the retroaortic node and the compact node.

INTRODUCTION: The complex electrophysiological phenomena related to the atrioventricular node (AVN) are due to its complex anatomical structures. Aside from the inferior nodal extension (INE), other node-like tissues, such as the retroaortic node (RN), have been described less extensively and may also share the mechanism of normal conduction and abnormal conduction in AVN re-entrant tachycardia. METHODS: High-density sections of the entire AVN were obtained from rats and rabbits. Fibrosis was analyzed by Masson's trichrome staining. Connexin (Cx43, Cx40, and Cx45) and ion channel (Nav 1.5, Cav 3.1, and HCN4) proteins were immunohistochemically labeled for the analysis of tissue features. Three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction of the AV junction was performed to clarify the relationships among different structures. RESULTS: The RN expressed the same connexin isoforms as the compact node (CN) and INE. Nav 1.5 labeling was observed at low levels in the CN, RN, and INE, where Cav 3.1 and HCN4 were expressed. The CN connected with the RN in a narrow strip pattern at the start of the CN. The RN presented as a shuttle shape and was the only tissue directly connected with the atrium in the anterior septum. CONCLUSION: The RN connects with the AVN anatomically, suggesting that direct electrical conduction occurs between them. The entrance of the atria into the AVN is distal to the RN, which may form the fast AVN pathway.

Curved skin incision for Ulnar nerve transposition in Cubital Tunnel Syndrome: Cadaveric and clinical study to avoid injury of medial cutaneous nerve.

INTRODUCTION: Medial skin incision is obligatory for ulnar nerve transposition in cubital tunnel syndrome. However, inadvertent surgical damage to the terminal branches of both the medial antebrachial cutaneous nerve (MACN) and the medial brachial cutaneous nerve (MBCN) has been a concern in the current surgical approach. HYPOTHESIS: We hypothesized a modified curved skin incision to avoid the damage to the medial cutaneous nerve. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The numbers and locations of MACN and MBCN terminal branches were investigated; also, the location of the posterior branch of MACN in ten fresh frozen cadaveric upper extremities. Using modified incision which is more anterior than classic approach and includes antegrade dissection of the cutaneous branches, same measurement was performed in clinical cases. We described the techniques. RESULTS: The average number of MACN posterior terminal branches was 2.6±1.6 and 4.4±2.4 branches in the cadaveric specimens and clinical cases, respectively. The average number of MBCN terminal branches was 2.1±0.87 branches. The MACN posterior terminal branches were located at an average of 19mm proximal and 45mm distal from the medial epicondyle. In clinical cases, we could preserve all MBCN terminal branches and posterior terminal branches of MACN using the indexed skin incision. DISCUSSION: Our modified medial skin incision technique with antegrade subcutaneous dissection exposed all the terminal branches of MACN and thus, could reduce the risk of inadvertent injury. The medial epicondyle and the basilic vein are reliable anatomical landmarks to identify the posterior branch of the MACN. LEVEL OF PROOF: IV, Cadaveric and Therapeutic study.

HKUST-1 derived Cu@CuO x /carbon catalyst for base-free aerobic oxidative coupling of benzophenone imine: high catalytic efficiency and excellent regeneration performance.

The oxidative coupling of imines to ketazine with molecular oxygen is a green process towards the synthesis of hydrazine or hydrazine hydrate, which could efficiently address the economic and environmental issues of the traditional Raschig or peroxide-ketazine process. Herein, we developed an efficient heterogeneous base-free benzophenone imine oxidative coupling route with O2 catalyzed by Cu/CuO x /carbon materials derived from MOFs under mild conditions. Under optimized conditions, the conversion of BI is up to 98.2% and the selectivity of ketamine is 94.9%. This catalyst has excellent structure stability, recycling, and regeneration performance, owing to the carbonization of organic ligands of MOF at high temperature. More importantly, it is confirmed that the metallic Cu core is essential to improve the catalytic performance of the CuO shell in the BI oxidative coupling reaction, due to the promotion of electron transfer in the CuO surface, making dissolved O2 molecules more easily insert oxygen vacancies. This strategy might open an avenue to the sustainable catalytic synthesis of hydrazine or hydrazine hydrate.

Meta-analysis on the use of hyaluronic acid gel to prevent recurrence of intrauterine adhesion after hysteroscopic adhesiolysis.

Intrauterine adhesion is a severe complication after intrauterine operation, Various adjuvant therapies failed to improve clinical symptoms and pregnancy rates among patients with moderate-to-severe intrauterine adhesion. At present, hyaluronic acid gel is widely used in the primary prevention of adhesion after hysteroscopic adhesiolysis. However, its efficacy is still under debate. Therefore, the aim of this study was to systematically evaluate the efficacy of hyaluronic acid gel in preventing the recurrence of intrauterine adhesion after hysteroscopic adhesiolysis. The Cochrane Library, Embase, and PubMed databases were used to search for articles published before July 31, 2018, using the following terms: hyaluronic acid, intrauterine adhesions, Asherman's syndrome, IUA, hysteroscopy, and hysteroscopic adhesiolysis. Studies on therapies after hysteroscopic adhesiolysis were collected. The recurrence rate of and pregnancy rate in the presence of intrauterine adhesion after hysteroscopic adhesiolysis were analyzed by RevMan 5.3 software. A total of 6 articles were selected, which included 394 patients who were subjected to hysteroscopic adhesiolysis. The meta-analysis results showed that (1) no statistically significant difference was found between hyaluronic acid gel use and without its use on the score of intrauterine adhesion after hysteroscopic adhesiolysis [the mean difference (MD) = -0.89, 95% confidence interval (CI) (-2.53-0.76), P = 0.29], neither a statistically significant difference was observed between the same groups on the recurrence rate of intrauterine adhesion [odds ratio (OR) = 0.75, 95% CI (0.31-1.81), P = 0.53]; (2) subgroup analysis showed that hyaluronic acid gel could reduce the rate of intrauterine adhesion recurrence in randomized controlled trials [OR = -0.28, 95% CI (0.14-0.56), P = 0.0006]. However, the recurrence rate of intrauterine adhesion after the use of hyaluronic acid gel was not statistically significant in non-randomized controlled experiments [OR = 1.53, 95% CI (0.79-2.95), P = 0.21]; (3) hyaluronic acid gel did not result in a significant effect on pregnancy rate after intrauterine adhesion separation [OR = 2.02, 95% CI (0.53-7.66), P = 0.3]. In conclusion, hyaluronic acid gel could reduce the recurrence rate of intrauterine adhesion, but had no significant effect on the postoperative pregnancy rate.

Transcriptional Aneuploidy Responses of Brassica rapa-oleracea Monosomic Alien Addition Lines (MAALs) Derived From Natural Allopolyploid B. napus.

Establishing the whole set of aneuploids, for one naturally evolved allopolyploid species, provides a unique opportunity to elucidate the transcriptomic response of the constituent subgenomes to serial aneuploidy. Previously, the whole set of monosomic alien addition lines (MAALs, C1-C9) with each of the nine C subgenome chromosomes, added to the extracted A subgenome, was developed in the context of the allotetraploid Brassica napus donor "Oro," after the restitution of the ancestral B. rapa (RBR Oro) was realized. Herein, transcriptomic analysis using high-throughput technology was conducted to detect gene expression alterations in these MAALs and RBR. Compared to diploid RBR, the genes of all of the MAALs showed various degrees of dysregulated expressions that resulted from cis effects and more prevailing trans effects. In addition, the trans-effect on gene expression in MAALs increased with higher levels of homology between the recipient A subgenome and additional C subgenome chromosomes, instead of gene numbers of extra chromosomes. A total of 10 trans-effect dysregulated genes, among all pairwise comparisons, were mainly involved in the function of transporter activity. Furthermore, highly expressed genes were more prone to downregulation and vice-versa, suggesting a common trend for transcriptional pattern responses to aneuploidy. These results provided a comprehensive insight of the impact of gene expression of individual chromosomes, in one subgenome, on another intact subgenome for one allopolyploid with a long evolutionary history.

Highly efficient inhibition of spring viraemia of carp virus replication in vitro mediated by bavachin, a major constituent of psoralea corlifonia Lynn.

As one of nine piscine viruses recognized by the International Office of Epizootics, spring viraemia of carp virus (SVCV) is an important pathogen bringing high mortality to cyprinids. Up to now, there is no approved therapy on SVCV, making them strong public health threat in aquaculture. In this study, the anti-SVCV activities of 12 plant crude extracts were investigated by using epithelioma papulosum cyprini (EPC) cells. Among these plants, Psoralea corylifolia Linn. showed the highest inhibition on SVCV replication, with an inhibitory percentage of 67.98%. Further studies demonstrated that bavachin (BVN), one of the major constituents of Psoralea corylifolia Linn., was also highly effective to SVCV infection. The half maximal inhibitory concentrations (IC50) of BVN on SVCV glycoprotein and nucleoprotein expression were 0.46 (0.29-0.73) and 0.31 (0.13-0.55) mg/L, respectively. In addition, SVCV-induced apoptosis which may be negative to SVCV replication was inhibited by BVN. The apoptotic cells were decreased 21.42% for BVN compared with SVCV group. These results indicated that the inhibition of BVN on SVCV replication was, in some extent, via blocking SVCV induced apoptosis. Furthermore, cellular morphological damage induced by SVCV was also blocked by BVN treatment. Mechanistically, BVN did not affect SVCV infectivity and cannot be used for prevention of SVCV infection. Time-of-addition and viral binding assays revealed that BVN mainly inhibited the early events of SVCV replication but did not interfere with SVCV adsorption. In conclusion, BVN was considered to develop as a promising agent to treat SVCV infection.

Analytical expressions of the imaging and aberration coefficients of a general form surface.

A theoretical development is presented in this paper for describing and understanding the imaging and aberrations of a general form surface. The development is based on the Taylor expansion of an arbitrary ray trace from the object reference plane to the image reference plane, which is called the base mapping of the general form surface in this paper. The base mapping is expressed as two Taylor series of the object and pupil coordinates and the imaging and aberration coefficients in the third-order scope are derived and presented as analytical expressions relevant to the optic parameters, invoking no approximations. The situation with tilted object and observing plane is also considered, and the mapping from a tilted object to a tilted observing plane is derived via simple mathematical manipulations based on the base mapping.

Molecular identification of a pancreatic lipase-like gene involved in sex pheromone biosynthesis of Bombyx mori.

Cytoplasmic lipid droplet (LD) lipolysis is regulated by pheromone biosynthesis activating neuropeptide (PBAN) in Bombyx mori. To elucidate the molecular mechanism of cytoplasm LD lipolysis, the pancreatic lipase-like gene in B. mori pheromone glands (PGs), designated as B. mori pancreatic lipase-like gene (BmPLLG), was identified in this study. Spatial expression analysis revealed that BmPLLG is a ubiquitous gene present in all studied tissues, such as PGs, brain, epidermis, egg, midgut, flight muscle and fat body. Temporal expression analysis showed that the BmPLLG transcript begins to express 96 h before eclosion (-96 h), continues to increase, peaks in newly emerged females and steadily decreases after eclosion. Translational expression analysis of BmPLLG using a prepared antiserum demonstrated that BmPLLG was expressed in an age-dependent pattern at different development stages in B. mori. This finding was similar to the transcript expression pattern. Further RNA interference-mediated knockdown of BmPLLG significantly inhibited bombykol production. Overall, these results demonstrated that BmPLLG is involved in PBAN-induced sex pheromone biosynthesis and release.

[Different dosages Ganciclovir treatment of symptomatic congenital cytomegalovirus infection in neonatal].

OBJECTIVE: Ganciclovir is a first line drug for treatment of cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection. This study aimed to compare the efficacy and side effects of relatively low and high doses of Ganciclovir in the treatment of neonatal congenital CMV infection. METHODS: 37 neonates with congenital CMV infection were randomly assigned to high-dose (n = 19) and low-dose Ganciclovir groups (n = 18). The high-dose Ganciclovir group was injected with Ganciclovir of 7.5 mg/kg in the inducement phase and of 10 mg/kg in the maintaining phase. The low-dose Ganciclovir group was injected with Ganciclovir of 5 mg/kg in the inducement and the maintaining phases. The efficacy and side effects were observed in the two groups. RESULTS: The results of different doses of GCV treatment of congenital CMV infection in symptomatic by the clinical symptoms were improved, high-dose treatment group CMV-IgM negative rate of 89.5%, CMV-DNA negative rate of 73.7%; low-dose treatment group CMV-IgM switch negative rate of 83.3%, CMV-DNA negative rate was 77.8%, no significant difference between the two groups. Low-dose GCV treatment of congenital CMV infection in newborns with symptomatic side effects than high dose GCV, the low dose group neutropenia, anemia, thrombocytopenia was lower than the high dose group, the difference was significant (P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: Low- dose GCV treatment of symptomatic congenital CMV infection with high-doses of the same clinical efficacy, and less side effects than high-doses of GCV.

Determination of betamethasone and betamethasone 17-monopropionate in human plasma by liquid chromatography-positive/negative electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry.

This study presents a high-performance liquid chromatography-positive/negative electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometric (LC-ESI(+/-)-MS-MS) method for the determination of betamethasone (BOH) and betamethasone 17-monopropionate (B17P) in human plasma using beclomethasone dipropionate as the internal standard (I.S.). Both compounds were extracted from human plasma with ether-cyclohexane (4:1, v/v) and were separated by HPLC on a Hanbon Lichrospher C(18) column with a mobile phase of methanol-water (85:15, v/v) at a flow rate of 0.7ml/min. Calibration curves were linear over the range of 0.10-50ng/ml for BOH and 0.050-50ng/ml for B17P. The inter-run relative standard deviations were less than 14.4% for BOH and 12.3% for B17P. The intra-run relative standard deviations were less than 9.3% for BOH and 7.9% for B17P. The mean plasma extraction recovery for BOH and B17P were in the ranges of 82.7-85.9% and 83.6-85.3%, respectively. The method was successfully applied to study the pharmacokinetics of a new formulation of betamethasone phosphate/betamethasone dipropionate injection in healthy Chinese volunteers.

Absence of apparent cardioprotection following ischemic preconditioning in immature rabbit hearts.

BACKGROUND: The cardioprotective effects of ischemic preconditioning (IPC) have been demonstrated in adult hearts of all species so far studied. AIMS: To investigate whether IPC could protect immature rabbit hearts against ischemia-reperfusion injury in an isolated Langendorff-mode perfusion model. METHODS: Hearts from 18 rabbits aged 14-21 days were randomly divided into two groups (an IPC group and a control group). After isolated Langendorff-mode perfused hearts were equilibrated the IPC stimulus in the IPC group was 5 min global ischemia followed by 10 min reperfusion. Hearts in both groups were then made globally ischemic for 30 min (no perfusion), followed by 40 min reperfusion. Coronary flow (CF), heart rate (HR), left ventricular developed pressure (LVDP), and +/-dp/dt(max) were monitored at equilibration (baseline value) and then 5, 10, 20, 30 and 40 min after reperfusion. The values obtained after reperfusion were expressed as a percentage of their baseline value. Arrhythmia severity, myocardial enzymes in the coronary effluent, and myocardial energy metabolism were also determined. RESULTS: There were no statistical differences in postreperfusion CF, HR, LVDP and +/-dp/dt(max) between the two groups. Arrhythmia scores were also comparable between the two groups. The myocardial-specific isoenzyme of creatine kinase (CK-MB) leakage in the IPC group was increased, but not significantly different from that in the control group. At the end of reperfusion, the adenosine triphosphate (ATP) level in the myocardium in the IPC group was significantly lower than the level in the control group. CONCLUSIONS: This model of IPC was not able to protect juvenile rabbit hearts from ischemia-reperfusion injury. This study suggests that signal transduction pathways involved in triggering cardioprotective mechanisms may not be fully developed, or are not able to be invoked by the present model in juvenile rabbit.